For lodging ill; too dearly rents her clay.
Reason, a baffled counsellor! but adds
The blush of weakness to the bane of woe.
The noblest spirit fighting her hard fate,
In this damp, dusky region, charg'd with storms,
But feebly flutters, yet untaught to fly;
Or, flying, short her flight, and sure her fall.
Our utmost strength, when down, to rise again;
And not to yield, though beaten, all our praise.
"Tis vain to seek in men for more than man.
Though proud in promise, big in previous thought,
Experience damps our triumph. I, who late,
Emerging from the shadows of the grave,
Where grief detain'd me prisoner, mounting high,
Threw wide the gates of everlasting day,
And call'd mankind to glory, shook off pain,
Mortality shook off, in ether pure,
And struck the stars; now feel my spirits fail;
They drop me from the zenith; down I rush,
Like him whom fable fledg'd1 with waxen wings,
In sorrow drown'd--but not in sorrow lost.
How wretched is the man who never mourn'd!
I dive for precious pearl in sorrow's stream:
Not so the thoughtless man that only grieves ;
Takes all the torment, and rejects the gain;
(Inestimable gain !) and gives Heav'n leave
To make him but more wretched, not more wise.
If wisdom is our lesson, (and what else
Ennobles man? what else have angels learn'd ?),
Grief! more proficients in thy school are made,
Than genius, or proud learning, e'er could boast.
Voracious learning, often over-fed,
Digests not into sense her motley meal.
1 'Fable fledged:' Icarus.
This book-case, which dark booty almost burst,
This forager on others' wisdom, leaves
Her native farm, her reason, quite untill'd.
With mix'd manure she surfeits the rank soil,
Dung'd, but not dress'd; and rich to beggary.
A pomp untameable of weeds prevails.
Her servant's wealth, encumber'd wisdom mourns.
And what says Genius? "Let the dull be wise."
Genius, too hard for right, can prove it wrong;
And loves to boast, where blush men less inspir'd.
It pleads exemption from the laws of sense;
Considers reason as a leveller;
And scorns to share a blessing with the crowd.
That wise it could be, thinks an ample claim
To glory, and to pleasure gives the rest.
Crassus but sleeps, Ardelio is undone.
Wisdom less shudders at a fool, than wit.
But Wisdom smiles, when humbled mortals weep.
When sorrow wounds the breast, as ploughs the glebe,
And hearts obdurate feel her soft'ning show'r ;
Her seed celestial, then, glad wisdom sows;
Her golden harvest triumphs in the soil.
If so, Narcissa, welcome my Relapse;
I'll raise a tax on my calamity,
And reap rich compensation from my pain.
I'll range the plenteous intellectual field;
And gather every thought of sov'reign pow'r
To chase the moral maladies of man;
Thoughts, which may bear transplanting to the skies,.
Though natives of this coarse penurious soil;
Nor wholly wither there, where seraphs sing,
Refin'd, exalted, not annull'd, in heav'n.
Reason, the sun that gives them birth, the same
In either clime, though more illustrious there.
These choicely cull'd, and elegantly rang'd,
Shall form a garland for Narcissa's tomb ;
And, peradventure, of no fading flow'rs.
Say on what themes shall puzzled choice descend?
"Th' importance of contemplating the tomb;
Why men decline it; suicide's foul birth;
The various kind of grief; the faults of age;
And Death's dread character-invite my song."
And first th' importance of our end survey'd.
Friends counsel quick dismission of our grief:
Mistaken kindness! our hearts heal too soon.
Are they more kind than He, who struck the blow?
Who bid it do his errand in our hearts,
And banish peace, till nobler guests arrive,
And bring it back, a true and endless peace?
Calamities are friends: as glaring day
Of these unnumber'd lustres robs our sight;
Prosperity puts out unnumber'd thoughts
Of import high, and light divine, to man.
The man how blest, who, sick of gaudy scenes,
(Scenes apt to thrust between us and ourselves!)
Is led by choice to take his favourite walk,
Beneath death's gloomy, silent, cypress shades,
Unpierc'd by vanity's fantastic ray ;
To read his monuments, to weigh his dust,
Visit his vaults, and dwell among the tombs!
Lorenzo read with me Narcissa's stone;
(Narcissa was thy favourite) let us read
Her moral stone; few doctors preach so well;
Few orators so tenderly can touch
The feeling heart. What pathos in the date!
Apt words can strike and yet in them we see
Faint images of what we here enjoy.
What cause have we to build on length of life?
Temptations scize, when fear is laid asleep;
And ill foreboded is our strongest guard.
See from her tomb, as from an humble shrine,
Truth, radiant goddess! sallies on my soul,
And puts delusion's dusky train to flight;
Dispels the mists our sultry passions raisc,
From objects low, terrestrial, and obscene;
And shows the real estimate of things;
Which no man, unafflicted, ever saw ;
Pulls off the veil from virtue's rising charms;
Detects temptation in a thousand lies.
Truth bids me look on men, as autumn leaves,
And all they bleed for, as the summer's dust,
Driv'n by the whirlwind lighted by her beams,
I widen my horizon, gain new pow'rs,
See things invisible, feel things remote,
Am present with futurities; think naught
To man so foreign, as the joys possess'd;
Naught so much his, as those beyond the grave.
No folly keeps its colour in her sight;
Pale worldly wisdom loses all her charms;
In pompous promise, from her schemes profound,
If future fate she plans, 'tis all in leaves,
Like Sibyl, unsubstantial, fleeting bliss!
At the first blast it vanishes in air.
Not so, celestial: would'st thou know, Lorenzo !
How differ worldly wisdom, and divine?
Just as the waning and the waxing moon.
More empty worldly wisdom every day ;
And every day more fair her rival shines.
When later, there's less time to play the fool.
Soon our whole term for wisdom is expir'd
(Thou know'st she calls no council in the grave):
And everlasting fool is writ in fire,
Or real wisdom wafts us to the skies.
As worldly schemes resemble Sibyl's leaves,
The good man's days to Sibyl's books compare,
(In ancient story read, thou know'st the tale),
In price still rising, as in number less,
Inestimable quite his final hour.
For that who thrones can offer, offer thrones;
Insolvent worlds the purchase cannot pay.
"O let me die his death!" all nature cries.
"Then live his life."-All nature falters there;
Our great physician daily to consult,
To commune with the grave, our only cure.
What grave prescribes the best?—A friend's; and yet,
From a friend's grave, how soon we disengage!
Ev'n to the dearest, as his marble, cold.
Why are friends ravish'd from us? "Tis to bind,
By soft affection's ties, on human hearts,
The thought of death, which reason, too supine,
Or misemploy'd, so rarely fastens there.
Nor reason, nor affection, no, nor both
C'ombin'd, can break the witchcrafts of the world.
Behold, th' inexorable hour at hand!
Behold, th' inexorable hour forgot!
And to forget it, the chief aim of life,
Though well to ponder it, is life's chief end.
Is Death, that ever threat'ning, ne'er remote,
That all-important, and that only sure
(Come when he will), an unexpected guest?
Nay, though invited by the loudest calls
Of blind imprudence, unexpected still;
Though numerous messengers are sent before,
To warn his great arrival. What the cause,
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