Classic Poem

In man a living spirit dwells,
An understanding mind,
Which far the brutal rank excels,
As does th' angelic kind.

In him there is a nature found,
Above the senses far;
Though some, in sensual pleasures drown'd,
But soul-oppressors are.

Through things both low, and things sublime,
The nimble soul doth slide;
Both far and nigh, in point of time,
Which thought cannot divide.

She sends to China as soon as Spain;
And comes as soon as sent;
And metes with equal time and pain
A span, and heav'n's wide tent.

She hath, ev'n though in flesh confined,
No body of her own;
But is an immaterial mind,
Distinct from flesh and bone.

How souls that live, and flesh that dies,
Their match at first began,
We learn; for he that spread the skies,
First form'd the soul of man:

Who shed in man, first made the earth,
A beam of heav'nly fire;
In all men now, before their birth,
He does their soul inspire.

This spirit cannot mortal be,
Nor subject to the grave;
For thoughts of immortality,
No mortal thing can have.

When she aspires to endless bliss
In God, th' eternal spring,
She proves herself to be no less
Than an eternal thing.

Our bodies food of mortal kind,
Shews their mortality;
But truth eternal feeds the mind,
Which shews she cannot die.