Classic Poem

THE AUTHOR'S THIRD SON .

Thou little wond'rous miniature of man,
Form'd by unerring Wisdom's perfect plan;
Thou little stranger, from eternal night
Emerging into life's immortal light;
Thou heir of worlds unknown, thou candidate
For an important everlasting state,
Where this young embryo shall its pow'rs expand,
Enlarging, rip'ning still, and never stand.
This glimm'ring spark of being, just now struck
From nothing by the all-creating Rock,
To immortality shall flame and burn,
When suns and stars to native darkness turn;
Thou shalt the ruins of the worlds survive,
And through the rounds of endless ages live.
Now thou art born into an anxious state
Of dubious trial for thy future fate:
Now thou art lifted in the war of life,
The prize immense, and O! severe the strife.

 Another birth awaits thee, when the hour
Arrives that lands thee on th' eternal shore;
(And O! 'tis near, with winged haste 'twill come,
Thy cradle rocks toward the neighb'ring tomb;)
Then shall immortals say, “A son is born,”
While thee as dead mistaken mortals mourn;
From glory then to glory thou shalt rise,
Or sink from deep to deeper miseries;
Ascend perfection's everlasting scale,
Or still descend from gulph to gulph in hell.

 Thou embryo-angel, or thou infant fiend,
A being now begun, but ne'er to end,
What boding fears a Father's heart torment,
Trembling and anxious for the grand event,
Lest thy young soul so late by Heav'n bestow'd,
Forget her Father, and forget her God!
Lest, while imprison'd in this house of clay,
To tyrant lusts she fall an helpless prey!
And lest, descending still from bad to worse,
Her immortality should prove her curse!

 Maker of souls! avert so dire a doom,
Of snatch her back to native nothing's gloom!