Classic Poem

1
Thus Man by his own strength to Heaven would soar:
And would not be obliged to God for more.
Vain, wretched creature, how art thou misled
To think thy Wit these God-like notions bred!
These truths are not the product of thy mind,
But dropped from Heaven, and of a nobler kind.
Revealed religion first informed thy sight,
And Reason saw not till Faith sprung the light.
Hence all thy Natural Worship takes the source:
'Tis Revelation what thou thinkst Discourse.
2

But if there be a Power too just and strong
To wink at crimes and bear unpunished wrong,
Look humbly upward, see his will disclose
The forfeit first, and then the fine impose,
A mulct thy poverty could never pay
Had not eternal wisdom found the way
And with coelestial wealth supplied thy store;
His justice makes the fine, his mercy quits the score.
See God descending in thy human frame;
The offended, suffering in the offender's name.
All thy misdeeds to Him imputed see,
And all His righteousness devolved on thee.