Classic Poem

A much indebted muse, o Yorke! intrudes.
Amid the smiles of fortune, and of youth,
Thine ear is patient of a serious song.
How deep implanted in the breast of man
The dread of death! I sing its sovereign cure.
Why start at death! Where is he? Death arrived,
Is past; not come, or gone, he's never here.
Ere hope, sensation fails; black-boding man
Receives, not suffers, death's tremendous blow.
The knell, the shroud, the mattock, and the grave;
The deep damp vault, the darkness, and the worm;
These are the bugbears of a winter's eve.
The terrors of the living, not the dead.
Imagination's fool, and error's wretch,
Man makes a death, which nature never made:
Then on the point of his own fancy falls;
And feels a thousand deaths, in fearing one.
But were death frightful, what has age to fear?
If prudent, age should meet the friendly foe,
And shelter in his hospitable gloom.
I scarce can meet a monument, but holds
My younger; every date cries—“Come away.”
And what recalls me? Look the world around,
And tell me what: the wisest cannot tell.
Should any born of woman give his thought
Full range, on just dislike's unbounded field;
Of things, the vanity; of men, the flaws;
Flaws in the best; the many, flaw all o'er;
As leopards, spotted, or, as Ethiops, dark;
Vivacious ill; good dying immature;
(How immature, N ARCISSA'S marble tells!
And at his death bequeathing endless pain;
His heart, though bold, would sicken at the sight.
And spend itself in sighs for future scenes.
But grant to life (and just it is to grant
To lucky life) some perquisites of joy;
A time there is, when, like a thrice-told tale,
Long-rifled life of sweet can yield no more,
But, from our comment on the comedy,
Pleasing reflections on parts well sustain'd,
Or purposed emendations where we fail'd;
Or hopes of plaudits from our candid Judge,
When, on their exit, souls are bid unrobe,
Toss fortune back her tinsel, and her plume,
And drop this mask of flesh behind the scene.
With me, that time is come; my world is dead;
A new world rises, and new manners reign;
Foreign comedians, a spruce band! arrive,
To push me from the scene, or hiss me there.
What a pert race starts up! the strangers gaze,
And I at them: my neighbour is unknown:
Nor that the worst: ah me! the dire effect
Of loitering here, of death defrauded long;
Of old so gracious (and let that suffice,)
My very master knows me not.——
Shall I dare say, peculiar is the fate?
I've been so long remember'd, I'm forgot.
An object ever pressing dims the sight,
And hides behind its ardour to be seen.
When in his courtiers' ears I pour my plaint,
They drink it as the nectar of the great;
And squeeze my hand, and beg me come to-morrow.
Refusal! canst thou wear a smoother form?
Indulge me, nor conceive I drop my theme:
Who cheapens life, abates the fear of death.
Twice told the period spent on stubborn Troy,
Court favour, yet untaken, I besiege;
Ambition's ill-judged effort to be rich.
Alas! ambition makes my little, less;
Imbittering the possess'd: why wish for more?
Wishing, of all employments, is the worst;
Philosophy's reverse, and health's decay!
Were I as plump as stall'd theology,
Wishing would waste me to this shade again.
Were I as wealthy as a South-Sea dream
Wishing is an expedient to be poor.
Wishing, that constant hectic of a fool;
Caught at a court; purged off by purer air,
And simpler diet; gifts of rural life!
Bless'd be that hand divine, which gently laid
My heart at rest, beneath this humble shed.
The world's a stately bark, on dangerous seas,
With pleasure seen, but boarded at our peril;
Here, on a single plank, thrown safe ashore,
I hear the tumult of the distant throng,
As that of seas remote, or dying storms!
And meditate on scenes more silent still;
Pursue my theme, and fight the fear of death.
Here, like a shepherd gazing from his hut,
Touching his reed, or leaning on his staff
Eager ambition's fiery chase I see;
I see the circling hunt of noisy men,
Burst law's enclosure, leap the mounds of right,
Pursuing, and pursued, each other's prey;
As wolves, for rapine; as the fox, for wiles;
Till death, that mighty hunter, earths them all.
Why all this toil for triumphs of an hour?
What though we wade in wealth, or soar in fame?
Earth's highest station ends in, “Here he lies:”
And “Dust to dust” concludes her noblest song.
If this song lives, posterity shall know
One, though in Britain born, with courtiers bred,
Who thought even gold might come a day too late,
Nor on his subtle death-bed plann'd his scheme
For future vacancies in church or state;
Some avocation deeming it——to die,
Unbit by rage canine of dying rich;
Guilt's blunder! and the loudest laugh of hell.
O my coevals: remnants of yourselves!
Poor human ruins, tottering o'er the grave!
Shall we, shall aged men, like aged trees,
Strike deeper their vile root, and closer cling,
Still more enamour'd of this wretched soil?
Shall our pale, wither'd hands, be still stretch'd out,
Trembling, at once, with eagerness and age?
With avarice, and convulsions, grasping hard?
Grasping at air! for what has earth beside?
Man wants but little; nor that little, long:
How soon must he resign his very dust,
Which frugal nature lent him for an hour!
Years unexperienced rush on numerous ills;
And soon as man, expert from time, has found
The key of life, it opes the gates of death.
When in this vale of years I backward look,
And miss such numbers, numbers too of such,
Firmer in health, and greener in their age,
And stricter on their guard, and fitter far
To play life's subtle game, I scarce believe
I still survive: and am I fond of life,
Who scarce can think it possible, I live?
Alive by miracle! or, what is next,
Alive by Mead ! if I am still alive,
Who long have buried what gives life to live
Firmness of nerve, and energy of thought.
Life's lee is not more shallow, than impure,
And vapid; sense and reason show the door,
Call for my bier, and point me to the dust.
O thou great Arbiter of life and death!
Nature's immortal, immaterial Sun!
Whose all-prolific beam late call'd me forth
From darkness, teeming darkness, where I lay
The worm's inferior, and, in rank, beneath
The dust I tread on, high to bear my brow,
To drink the spirit of the golden day,
And triumph in existence; and couldst know
No motive, but my bliss; and hast ordain'd
A rise in blessing! with the patriarch's joy,
Thy call I follow to the land unknown:
I trust in Thee, and know in whom I trust;
Or life, or death, is equal; neither weighs:
All weight in this—O let me live to Thee;
Though nature's terrors, thus, may be repress'd;
Still frowns grim death; guilt points the tyrant's spear.
And whence all human guilt? From death forgot.
Ah me! too long I set at nought the swarm
Of friendly warnings, which around me flew;
And smiled, unsmitten: small my cause to smile!
Death's admonitions, like shafts upward shot,
More dreadful by delay, the longer ere
They strike our hearts, the deeper is their wound.
O think how deep, L ORENZO ! here it stings
Who can appease its anguish? How it burns!
What hand the barb'd, envenom'd thought can draw?
What healing hand can pour the balm of peace;
And turn my sight undaunted on the tomb?
With joy,—with grief that healing hand I see;
Ah! too conspicuous! it is fix'd on high.
On high?—What means my frenzy? I blaspheme:
Alas! how low! how far beneath the skies!
The skies it form'd; and now it bleeds for me—
But bleeds the balm I want—yet still it bleeds.
Draw the dire steel—Ah no! the dreadful blessing
What heart or can sustain, or dares forego?
There hangs all human hope; that nail supports
The falling universe: that gone, we drop;
Horror receives us, and the dismal wish
Creation had been smother'd in her birth—
Darkness his curtain, and his bed the dust;
When stars and sun are dust beneath his throne!
In heaven itself can such indulgence dwell?
Oh what a groan was there! a groan not His.
He seized our dreadful right; the load sustain'd,
And heaved the mountain from a guilty world.
A thousand worlds, so bought, were bought too dear:
Sensations new in angels' bosoms rise;
Suspend their song, and make a pause in bliss.
Oh for their song, to reach my lofty theme!
Inspire me, night! with all thy tuneful spheres:
Whilst I with seraphs share seraphic themes,
And show to men the dignity of man;
Lest I blaspheme my subject with my song.
Shall Pagan pages glow celestial flame,
And Christian languish? On our hearts, not heads,
Falls the foul infamy. My heart! awake:
What can awake thee, unawaked by this,
“Expanded Deity on human weal?”
Feel the great truths, which burst the tenfold night
Of Heathen error, with a golden flood
Of endless day: to feel, is to be fired;
And to believe, L ORENZO ! is to feel.
Thou most indulgent, most tremendous Power!
Still more tremendous, for thy wondrous love!
That arms, with awe more awful, thy commands;
And foul transgression dips in sevenfold guilt;
How our hearts tremble at thy love immense!
In love immense, inviolably just!
Thou, rather than thy justice should be stain'd,
Didst stain the cross; and, work of wonders far
The greatest, that thy Dearest far might bleed.
Bold thought! shall I dare speak it, or repress?
Should man more execrate, or boast, the guilt
Which roused such vengeance? which such love inflamed?
O'er guilt (how mountainous!) with out-stretch'd arms,
Stern justice, and soft-smiling love, embrace,
Supporting, in full majesty, thy throne,
When seem'd its majesty to need support,
Or that, or man, inevitably lost:
What, but the fathomless of thought divine,
Could labour such expedient from despair,
And rescue both? Both rescue? both exalt!
Oh how are both exalted by the deed!
The wondrous deed! or shall I call it more?
A wonder in omnipotence itself!
A mystery no less to gods than men!
Not, thus, our infidels th' Eternal draw;
A God all o'er, consummate, absolute,
Full-orb'd, in his whole round of rays complete:
They set at odds Heaven's jarring attributes;
And, with one excellence, another wound;
Maim Heaven's perfection, break its equal beams,
Bid mercy triumph over—God himself,
Undeified by their opprobrious praise:
A God all mercy, is a God unjust.
Ye brainless wits! ye baptized infidels!
Ye worse for mending! wash'd to fouler stains!
The ransom was paid down; the fund of Heaven,
Heaven's inexhaustible, exhausted fund,
Amazing, and amazed, pour'd forth the price,
All price beyond: though curious to compute,
Archangels fail'd to cast the mighty sum:
Its value vast, ungrasp'd by minds create,
For ever hides, and glows, in the Supreme.
And was the ransom paid? It was: and paid
(What can exalt the bounty more?) for you.
The sun beheld it—No, the shocking scene
Drove back his chariot: midnight veil'd his face;
Not such as this; not such as nature makes;
A midnight nature shudder'd to behold;
A midnight new! a dread eclipse (without
Opposing spheres,) from her Creator's frown!
Sun! didst thou fly thy Maker's pain? or start
At that enormous load of human guilt,
Which bow'd his blessed head; o'erwhelm'd his cross;
Made groan the centre; burst earth's marble womb,
With pangs, strange pangs! deliver'd of her dead?
Hell howl'd; and Heaven that hour let fall a tear;
Heaven wept, that men might smile! Heaven bled, that man
Might never die!———
And is devotion virtue? 'Tis compell'd:
What heart of stone, but glows at thoughts like these?
Such contemplations mount us; and should mount
The mind still higher; nor ever glance on man,
Unraptured, uninflamed.—Where roll my thoughts
To rest from wonders? Other wonders rise;
And strike where'er they roll: my soul is caught:
Heaven's sovereign blessings, clustering from the cross,
Rush on her, in a throng, and close her round,
The prisoner of amaze!—In His bless'd life,
I see the path, and, in his death, the price,
And in his great ascent, the proof supreme,
Of immortality.—And did He rise?
Hear, O ye nations! hear it, O ye dead!
He rose! He rose! He burst the bars of death.
Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates!
And give the King of glory to come in.
Who is the King of glory? He who left
His throne of glory for the pang of death.
Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates!
And give the King of glory to come in.
Who is the King of glory? He who slew
The ravenous foe, that gorged all human race!
The King of glory, He, whose glory fill'd
Heaven with amazement at his love to man!
And with divine complacency beheld
Powers most illumined, wilder'd in the theme.
The theme, the joy, how then shall man sustain!
Oh the burst gates! crush'd sting! demolish'd throne!
Last gasp! of vanquish'd death. Shout earth and heaven!
This sum of good to man: whose nature, then,
Took wing, and mounted with him from the tomb!
Then, then, I rose; then first humanity
Triumphant pass'd the crystal ports of light,
(Stupendous guest!) and seiz'd eternal youth,
Seiz'd in our name. E'er since, 'tis blasphemous
To call man mortal. Man's mortality
Was, then, transferr'd to death; and heaven's duration
Unalienably seal'd to this frail frame,
This child of dust—Man, all-immortal! hail;
Hail, Heaven! all-lavish of strange gifts to man!
Thine all the glory; man's the boundless bliss.
Where am I rapt by this triumphant theme?
On Christian joy's exulting wing, above
Th' Aonian mount?—Alas! small cause for joy!
What if to pain immortal? if extent
Of being, to preclude a close of woe?
Where, then, my boast of immortality?
I boast it still, though cover'd o'er with guilt:
For guilt, not innocence, his life he pour'd;
'Tis guilt alone can justify his death;
Nor that, unless his death can justify
Relenting guilt in Heaven's indulgent sight
If, sick of folly, I relent; he writes
My name in heaven, with that invested spear
(A spear deep-dipp'd in blood!) which pierced his side,
And open'd there a font for all mankind,
Who strive, who combat crimes, to drink, and live
This, only this, subdues the fear of death.
And what is this?—Survey the wondrous cure;
And, at each step, let higher wonder rise!
“Pardon for infinite offence! and pardon
Through means that speak its value infinite!
A pardon bought with blood! with blood divine!
With blood divine of Him, I made my foe!
Persisted to provoke! though woo'd and awed,
Bless'd and chastised, a flagrant rebel still!
A rebel, 'midst the thunders of his throne!
Nor I alone! a rebel universe!
My species up in arms! not one exempt!
Yet for the foulest of the foul, he dies;
Most joy'd, for the redeem'd from deepest guilt!
As if our race were held of highest rank;
And Godhead dearer, as more kind to man!”
Bound, every heart! and every bosom, burn!
Oh what a scale of miracles is here!
Its lowest round, high planted on the skies:
Its towering summit, lost beyond the thought
Of man or angel! Oh that I could climb
The wonderful ascent, with equal praise!
Praise! flow for ever (if astonishment
Will give thee leave;) my praise! for ever flow;
Praise ardent, cordial, constant; to high Heaven
More fragrant, than Arabia sacrificed,
And all her spicy mountains in a flame.
So dear, so due to Heaven, shall praise descend,
With her soft plume (from plausive angels' wing
First pluck'd by man) to tickle mortal ears,
Thus diving in the pockets of the great?
Is praise the perquisite of every paw,
Though black as hell, that grapples well for gold?
O love of gold! thou meanest of amours!
Shall praise her odours waste on V IRTUE'S dead,
Embalm the base, perfume the stench of guilt,
Earn dirty bread by washing Æthiops fair,
Removing filth, or sinking it from sight,
A scavenger in scenes, where vacant posts,
Like gibbets yet untenanted, expect
Their future ornaments? From courts and thrones
Return, apostate praise! thou vagabond!
Thou prostitute! to thy first love return,
Thy first, thy greatest, once unrival'd theme.
There flow redundant; like Meander flow,
Back to thy fountain; to that parent Power,
Who gives the tongue to sound, the thought to soar,
The soul to be. Men homage pay to men,
Thoughtless beneath whose dreadful eye they bow,
I