Prefent (fad profpect!) can he ought defcry, But (what affects his melancholy eye)
The beauties of the ancient fabric loft,
In chains of craggy hill, or lengths of dreary coaft? While to high heav'n 'his pious breathings turn'd, Weeping he hop'd, and facrificing mourn'd; When of God's image only eight he found Snatch'd from the wat'ry grave, and fav'd from na- tions drown'd;
And of three fons, the future hopes of earth, The feed, whence empires muft receive their birth, One he forefees excluded heav'nly grace, And mark'd with curfes, fatal to his race.
Abraham, potent prince, the friend of GOD, Of human ills must bear the deftin'd load; By blood and battles muft his pow'r maintain, And flay the monarchs, ere he rules the plain Muft deal juft portions of a fervile life To a proud handmaid, and a peevish wife; Muft with the mother leave the weeping fon, In want to wander, and in wilds to groan; Muft take his other child, his age's hope, To trembling Moriam's melancholy top, Order'd to drench his knife in filial blood; Deftroy his heir, or difobey his GOD.
Mofes beheld that GOD; but how beheld The Deity in radiant beams conceal'd, And clouded in a deep abyfs of light; While prefent, too fevere for human fight, Nor staying longer than one fwift-wing'd night. The following days, and months, and years decreed To fierce encounter, and to toilfome deed.
His youth with want and hardships muft engage: Plots and rebellions muft difturb his age,
Some Corah ftill arofe, fome rebel flave, Prompter to fink the ftate, than he to fave: And Ifrael did his rage fo far provoke,
That what the Godhead wrote, the prophet broke. His voice scarce heard, his dictates fcarce believ'd, In camps, in arms, in pilgrimage he liv'd; And dy'd obedient to feverest law,
Forbid to tread the promis'd land, he faw. My father's life was one long line of care, A scene of danger, and a state of war, Alarm'd, expos'd, his childhood must engage The bear's rough gripe, and foaming lion's rage. By various turns his threaten'd youth muft fear Goliah's lifted fword, and Saul's emitted fpear." Forlorn he muft, and perfecuted fly;
Climb the steep mountain, in the cavern lie; And often afk, and be refus'd to die.
For ever, from his manly toils, are known The weight of pow'r, and anguifh of a crown. What tongue can speak the restlefs monarch's woes; When GOD, and Nathan were declar'd his foes? When ev'ry object his offence revil'd,
The husband murder'd, and the wife defil'd, The parent's fins imprefs'd upon the dying child? What heart can think the grief which he sustain❜d; When the king's crime brought vengeance on the land; And the inexorable prophet's voice' [choice? Gave famine, plague, or war; and bid him fix his He dy'd; and oh! may no reflexion fhed Its pois'nous venom on the royal dead:
Yet the unwilling truth must be exprefs'd; Which long has labour'd in this penfive breaft: Dying he added to my weight of care: He made me to his crimes undoubted heir: Left his unfinith'd murder to his fon, And Joab's blood intail'd on Judah's crown. Young as I was, I hafted to fulfill
The cruel dictates of my parent's will. Of his fair deeds a distant view I took; But turn'd the tube upon his faults to look; Forgot his youth, spent in his country's cause, His care of right, his rev'rence to the laws: But could with joy his years of folly trace, Broken and old in Baththeba's embrace; Could follow him, where-e'er he stray'd from good, And cite his fad example: whilft I trod
Paths open to deceit, and track'd with blood. Soon docile to the fecret acts of ill,
With fmiles I could betray, with temper kill: Soon in a brother could a rival views Watch all his acts, and all his ways purfue. In vain for life he to the altar fled:
Ambition and revenge have certain speed. Ev'n there, my foul, ev'n there he fhould have fell; But that my intereft did my rage conceal: Doubling my crime, I promise, and deceive; Purpose to flay, whilft fwearing to forgive. Treaties, perfuafions, fighs, and tears are vain With a mean lie curs'd vengeance I sustain Join fraud to force, and policy to pow'r; 'Till of the deftin'd fugitive fecure,
In folemn ftate to parricide I rife;
And, as Gon lives, this day my brother dies. Be witness to my tears, celestial muse! In vain I would forget, in vain excuse Fraternal blood by my direction fpilt; In vain on Joab's head transfer the guilt: The deed was acted by the fubject's hand; The fword was pointed by the king's command. Mine was the murder: it was mine alone; Years of contrition must the crime atone : Nor can my guilty foul expect relief,
But from a long fincerity of grief.
With an imperfect hand, and trembling heart, Her love of truth fuperior to her art.
Already the reflecting mufe has trac'd The mournful figures of my action paft.. The penfive goddess has already taught, How vain is hope, and how vexatious thought; From growing childhood to declining age, How tedious ev'ry step, how gloomy ev'ry ftage. This courfe of vanity almoft compleat,
Tir'd in the field of life, I hope retreat
In the still shades of death: for dread and pain, And grief will find the fhafts elanc'd in vain, And their points broke, retorted from the head, Safe in the grave, and free among the dead.
Yet tell me, frighted Reafon! what is death? Blood only stopp'd, and interrupted breath? The utmost limit of a narrow span,
And end of motion which with life began? As smoke that rifes from the kindling fires Is feen this moment, and the next expires; VOL. II.
As empty clouds by rifing winds are toft, Their fleeting forms fcarce fooner found than loft; So vanishes our state, so pass our days: So life but opens now, and now decays: The cradle and the tomb, alas! fo nigh; To live is fcarce diftinguifh'd from to die.
Cure of the mifer's wifh, and coward's fear, Death only fhews us, what we knew was near. With courage therefore view the pointed hour; Read not death's danger; but expect his pow'r ; Nor nature's law with fruitlefs forrow mourn; But die, O mortal man for thou waft born. Cautious thro' doubt; by want of courage, wife, To fuch advice the reas'ner ftill replies.
Yet measuring all the long continu'd space, Ev'ry fucceffive day's repeated race,
Since time first started from his priftine goal, 'Till he had reach'd that hour, wherein my foul Join'd to my body fwell'd the wonrb; I was, (At least I think fo) nothing: must I pass Again to nothing, when this vital breath Ceafing, configns me o'er to reft, and death? Muft the whole man, amazing thought! return To the cold marble, or contracted urn? And never hall thofe particles agree, That were in life this individual He?
But fever'd, muft they join the general mafs, Thio' other forms, and fhapes ordain'd to pafs; Nor thought nor image kept of what he was? Does the great Word that gave him fenfe, ordain, That life fhall never wake that fense again?
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