One scene of arts, of arms, of rising trade:
For what his wisdom plann'd, and power enforced,
More potent still, his great example show'd.
Mattering, the winds at eve, with blunted point, Blow hollow-blustering from the south. Subdued, The frost resolves into a trickling thaw. Spotted the mountains shine; loose sieet descends, And floods the country round. The rivers swell, Of bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills, O'er rocks and woods, in broad brown cataracts, A thousand snow-fed torrents shoot at once; And, where they rush, the wide-resounding plain Is left one slimy waste. Those sullen seas, That wash'd the ungenial pole, will rest no more Beneath the shackles of the mighty north; But, rousing all their waves, resistless heavo. And hark! the lengthening roar continuous runs Athwart the rifted deep at once it bursts, And piles a thousand mountains to the clouds. Il fares the bark, with trembling wretches charged, That, toss'd amid the floating fragments, moors Beneath the shelter of an icy isle,
While night o'erwhelms the sea, and horror looks
More horrible. Can human force endure
The' assembled mischiefs that besiege them round?
Heart-gnawing hunger, fainting weariness,
The roar of winds and waves, the crush of ice,
Now ceasing, now renew'd with louder rage,
And in dire echoes bellowing round the main.
More to embroil the deep, Leviathan,
And his unwieldy train, in dreadful sport,
Tempest the loosen'd brine, while through the gloom, Far from the bleak inhospitable shore
Loading the winds, is heard the hungry how.
Of famish'd monsters, there awaiting wrecks.
Yet Providence, that ever waking eye,
Looks down with pity on the feeble toil
Of mortars ♬ost to hope, and lights them safe,
Through all this dreary labyrinth of face.
"Tis done! dread Winter spreads his latest glooms, And reigns tremendous o'er the conquer'd year. 1025 How dead the vegetable kingdom lies!
How dumb the tuneful! horror wide extends
His desolate domain. Behold, fond man!
See here thy pictured life; pass some few years,
Thy flowering Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, Thy sober Autumn fading into age,
And pale concluding Winter comes at last,
And shuts the scere. Ah! whither now are fled
Those dreams of greatness? those unsolid hcpes
Of happiness? those lengings after fame?
Those restless cares? those busy bustling days?
Those gay-spent, festive nights? those veering thoughts,
Lost between good and ill, that shared thy life?
All now are vanish'd! Virtue sole survives,
Immortal never failing friend of Man,
His guide to happiness on high. And see!
"Tis come, the glorious morn! the second birth
Of heaven and earth! awakening Nature hears
The new-creating word, and starts to life,
In every heighten'd form, from pain and death
For ever free. The great eternal scheme,
Involving all, and in a perfect whole
Uniting, as the prospect wider spreads,
To reason's eve refined clears up apace.
Ye vainly wise! ye blind presumptuous! now, 1050
Confounded in the dust, adore that Power
And Wisdom oft arraign'd: see now the cause,
Why unassuming worth in secret lived,
And died neglected: why the good man's share
In life was gall and bitterness of soul:
Why the lone widow and her orphans pined
Ir starving solitude; while Luxury,
In palaces, lay straining her low thought,
To form unreal wants: why heaven-born truth,
And moderation fair, wore the red marks
Of superstition's scourge: why licensed pain,
That cruel spoiler, that embosom'ù foe,
Embitter'd all our bliss. Ye good distress'd!
Ye noble few! who here unbending stand
Beneath life's preasure, yet bear up awhile,
And what your bounded view, which only saw
A little part, deem'd evil is no more :
The storms of Wintry Time will quickly pass,
And one unbounded Spring encircle all.
THESE, as they change, ALMIGHTY FATHER, these
Are but the varied GoD. The rolling year
Is full of THEE. Forth in the pleasing Spring
THY beauty walks, THY tenderness, and love.
Wide flush the fields; the softening air is balm;
Echo the mountains round: the forest smiles;
And every sense, and every heart is joy.
Then comes THY glory in the Summer months,
With light and heart refulgent. Then THY sun
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year: 10
And oft THY VOICE in dreadful thunder speaks:
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve,
By brooks and groves, in hollow-whispering gales
THY bounty shines in Autumn unconfined,
And spreads a common feast for all that lives.
In Winter awful THOU with clouds and storms
Around THEE thrown, tempest o'er tempest roll'd.
Majestic darkness! on the whirlwind's wing,
Riding sublime, THOU bidst the world adore,
And humblest Nature with THY northern blast.
Mysterious round! what skill, what force divine,
Deep felt, in these appear! a simple train,
Yet so delightful mix'd, with such kind art,
Such beauty and beneficence combined;
Shade, unperceived, so softening into shade;
And all so forming an harmonious whole;
That, as they still succeed, they ravish still.
But wandering oft, with brute unconscious gaze,
Man marks not THEE, marks not the mighty hand,
That, ever busy, wheels the silent sphere;
Works in the secret deep; shoots, steaming, thence
The fair profusion that o'erspreads the Spring:
Flings from the sun direct the flaming day;
Feeds every creature; hurls the tempest forth;
And, as on carth this grateful rhange .evolves,
With transport touches all the springs of life
Nature, attend! join, every living soul
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky,
In adoration join; and, ardent, raise
One general song! To HIM, ye vocal gales,
Breathe soft, whose spirit in our freshness breathes. Oh, talk of HIM in solitary glooms!
Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely waving pine
Fills the brown shade with a religious awe.
And ye, whose bolder note is heard afar,
Who shake the' astonish'd world, lift high to heaven
The' impetuous song, and say from whom you rage.
His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills;
And let me catch it as I muse along.
Ye headlong torrents, rapid and profound;
Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze
Along the vale; and thou, majestic main.
A secret world of wonders in thyself,
Sound His stupendous praise: whose greater voice
Or bids you roar or bids your roarings fall.
Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fruits, and flowers,
In mingled clouds to HIM; whose sun exalts,
Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil paints.
Ye forests, bend; ye harvests, wave to Him;
Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart,
As home he goes beneath the joyous moon.
Ye hat keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep
Unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams,
Ye constellations, while your angels strike,
Amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre.
Great source of day! best image here below
Of thy CREATOR, ever pouring wide,
From world to world, the vital ocean round,
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