As men who long in prifon dwell,

With lamps that glimmer round the cell, • When'er their suff'ring years are run,

Spring forth to greet the glitt'ring funş Such joy, tho' far tranfcending fenfe, • Have pious fouls at parting hence. • On earth, and in the body plac'd, A few and evil years they wafte; • But when their chains are cast aside, See the glad fcene unfolding wide, Clap the glad wing, and tow'r away, • And mingle with the blaze of day.'

JOVI ELEUTHERIO,

OR,

AN OFFERING TO LIBERTY.

BY DR. RIDLEY.

Quifnam igitur liber? Sapiens, fibique imperiofus ; 1 Quem neque pauperies, neque mors, neque vincula terrent: Refponfare cupidinibus, contemnere honores

Fortis; et in feipfo totus teres atque rotundus.

HOR. Serm. Lib. II. Sat. 7.

AIL, Liberty! whose presence glads th' abode

HA

Of Heav'n itself, great attribute of God!
By thee fuftain'd, th' unbounded spirit runs,
Moulds orbs on orbs, and lights up funs on funs;
By thee fuftain'd, in love unwearied lives,
And uncontroul'd creates, fupports, forgives:
No pow'r, or time, or space, his will withstood;
Almighty! endlefs! infinite in good!

If fo, why not communicate the blifs,

And let man know what this great bleffing is?'

Say, what proportion, creature, wouldst thou claim? As thy Creator's in extent the fame!

Unless

Unless his other attributes were join'd,
To poise the will, and regulate the mind;
Goodness to aim, and wisdom to direct,
What mighty mischiefs must we thence expect!
The Maker knows his work, nor judg'd it fit
To truft the rafh refolves of human wit;
Which, prone to hurt, too blind to help, is ftill
Alike pernicious, mean it good or ill.

A whim, t' improvement making fond pretence,
Would burft a fyftem in experiments;

Sparrows and cats, indeed, no more should fear,
But Saturn tremble in his distant sphere:
Give thee but footing in another world,
Say, Archimedes, where fhould we be hurl'd?
A fprightly wit, with liquor in his head,
Would burn a globe, to light him drunk to bed:
Th' Ephefian temple had escap'd the flame,

And Heaven's high dome had built the madman's fame,

The fullen might (when malice boil'd within)

Strike out the stars, to intimate his spleen :

Not poppy-heads had spoke a Tarquin crofs'd;

Nature's chief spring had broke, and all been loft.

Nor lefs deftructive would this licence prove,

Tho' thy breaft flam'd with universal love.
In vain were thy benevolence of foul;
Soon would thy folly difconcert the whole.
No rains, or fnows, fhould difcompose the air;
But flow'rs and fun-fhine drain the weary year:
No clouds fhould fully the clear face of day;
No tempefts rife to blow a plague away.
Mercy fhould reign untir'd, unftain'd with blood;
Spare the frail guilty, to eat up the good.
In their defence, rife, facred Juftice, rife!
Awake the thunder fleeping in the skies,
Sink a corrupted city in a minute;

-Woe to the righteous ten who may be in it!

Pick

Pick out the bad, and fweep them all away!
-So leave their babes, to cats and dogs a prey.
Such pow'r without God's wisdom and his will,
Were only an omnipotence of ill.

Suited to man can we fuch pow'r esteem!
Fiends would be harmless, if compar'd with him.
Say, then, fhall all his attributes be given?
His effence follows, and his throne of heav'n;
His very unity. Proud wretch! fhall he
Un-god himself, to make a god of thee?

How wide, fuch luft of liberty confounds!
Would lefs content thee, prudent mark the bounds:
Those which the Almighty Monarch first defign'd,
• When his great image feal'd the human mind;
• When to the beafts the fruitful earth was giv'n,
To fifh the ocean, and to birds their heaven,
And all to man; whom full creation, ftor'd,
Receiv'd as it's proprietor and lord;

• Ere earth, whose spacious tract unmeasur'd spreads,
'Was flic'd by acres and by roods to shreds;

• When trees and streams were made a general good, And not as limits meanly to exclude;

• When all to all belong'd, ere pow'r was told

By number'd troops, or wealth by counted gold;

Ere kings or priests their tyranny began, 'Or man was vaffal'd to his fellow-man.'

O halcyon ftate! when man began to live!
A bleffing worthy of a God to give!
Who, on th' unspotted mind his Maker drew
The heav'nly characters correct and true.
All useful knowledge from that source supply'd,
No blindness fprung from ignorance or pride;
All proper bleffings from that hand bestow'd,
No mischiefs or for want or fulness flow'd:
The quick'ning paffions gave a pleasing zest,
While thankful man fubmitted to be blefs'd..

Simplicity,

Simplicity, was wisdom; temperance, health;
Obedience, pow'r; and full contentment, wealth,
So happy once was man! till the vain elf
Shook off his guide, and fet up for himself,
Smit with the charms of independency,
He foorns protection, raging to be free.
Now, felf-expos'd, he feels his naked state;
Shrinks with the blast, or melts before the heat
And blindly wanders, as his fancy leads,
To starve on waftes, or feast on pois'nous weeds.
Now to the favage beasts an obvious prey ;
Or crafty men, more favage ftill than they :
No less imprudent, to his breaft to take
The friend unfaithful, or th' envenom'd fnake;
Equally fatal, whether on the Nile,
Or in the city, weeps the crocodile.

Nor yet lefs, blindly deviates learned pride;
In Etna burn'd, or drown'd amid the tide :
Boafts of fuperior sense; then raves to see
(When contradicted) fools lefs wife than he,
Mates with his great Creator; vainly bold
To make new systems, or to mend the old.
Shapes out a Deity; doubts, then denies:
And, drunk with fcience, curfes God, and dies.
Not heav'nly wisdom only is witheld,
But the free bounty of the self-fown field.
No more, as erft, from Nature's ready feast,
Rifes the fatisfy'd, but temp'rate gueft;

Caft wild abroad, no happy mean preferves,
By choice he furfeits, by constraint he starves
Toils life away upon the ftubborn plain,
T'extort from thence the flow, reluctant grain;
The flow, reluctant grain, procur'd to-day,
His lefs induftrious neighbour steals away:
Hence fifts and clubs the village-peace confound,
Till fword and cannon spread the ruin round;

For

For time and art but bring from bad to worse.
Unequal lots fucceed unequal force;

Each lot a feveral curfe. Hence rich, and poor:
This pines, and dies, neglected, at the door;
While gouts and fevers wait the loaded mefs,
And take full vengeance for the poor's distress.

1

No more the paffions are the fprings of life;
But feeds of vice, and elements of strife:
Love, focial love, t'extend to all defign'd,
Back to it's fountain flows, to felf confin'd.
Source of misfortunes; the fond husband's wrong;
The maid difhonour'd, and deferted young!

The mischief spreads; when vengeance for the luft
Unpeoples realms, and calls the ruin just.

Hence, Troy, thy fate! the blood of thousands fpilt,
And orphans mourning for unconscious guilt.

Thus love destroys, for kinder purpose giv'n;
And man corrupts the bleffings meant by Heav'n:
Self-injur'd, let us cenfure Him no more;
Ambition makes us flaves, and av'rice poor.

What arts the wild disorder shall controul,
And render peace with virtue to the foul!
Out-reafon intereft, balance prejudice,
Give paffion ears, and blinded error eyes?
Arm the weak hand with conqueft, and protect
From guile, the heart too honeft to fuspect?
For this, mankind, by fad experience taught,
Again their fafety in dependence fought:
Prefs'd to the ftandard, fued before the throne;
And durft rely on wisdom not their own.
Hence Saturn rul'd in peace th' Ausonian plains,
While Salian fongs to virtue won the swains.

But pois'nous ftreams muft flow from poifon'd fprings:
The priests were mortal, and mere men the kings.
What aid from monarchs, mighty to enflave?
What good from teachers, cunning to deceive?

Allegiance