ON THE IMMENSITY OF THE SUPREME BEING. BY THE SAME. ONCE more I dare to rouse the sounding string THE POET OF MY GOD — Awake my glory, Awake my lute and harp — myself shall wake, Soon as the stately night-exploding bird In lively lay sings welcome to the dawn. List ye! how nature with ten thousand tongues Begins the grand thanksgiving, Hail, all hail, Ye tenants of the forest and the field! My fellow subjects of th' eternal King, I gladly join your Mattins, and with you Confess his presence, and report his praise. O Thou, who or the Lambkin, or the Dove, When offer'd by the lowly, meek, and poor, Prefer'st to Pride's whole hecatomb, accept This mean Essay, nor from thy treasure-house Of Glory' immense the Orphan's mite exclude. What tho' th' Almighty's regal throne be rais'd High o'er yon azure Heaven's exalted dome By mortal eye unkenn'd — where East nor West Nor South, nor blustering North has breath to blow; Albeit He there with Angels, and with Saints Hold conference, and to his radiant host Ev'n face to face stand visibly confest: Yet know that nor in Presence or in Power Shines He less perfect here; 'tis Man's dim eye That makes th' obscurity. He is the same, Alike in all his Universe the same. Whether the mind along the spangled sky Measures her pathless walk, studious to view Thy works of vaster fabric, where the Planets Weave their harmonious rounds, their march directing Still faithful, still inconstant to the Sun; Or where the Comet thro' space infinite (Tho' whirling worlds oppose, and globes of fire) Darts, like a javelin, to his destin'd goal. Or where in Heaven above the Heaven of Heavens Burn brighter Sans, and goodlier Planets roll With Satellits more glorious — Thou art there. Or whether on the Ocean's boisterous back Thou ride triumphant, and with out-stretch'd arm Curb the wild winds and discipline the billows, The suppliant Sailor finds Thee there, his chief, His only help — When Thou rebuk'st the storm — It ceases — and the vessel gently glides Along the glassy level of the calm. O! could I search the bosom of the sea, Down the great depth descending; there thy works Would also speak thy residence; and there Would I thy servant, like the still profound, Astonish'd into silence muse thy praise! Behold! behold! th' unplanted garden round Of vegetable coral, sea-flowers gay, And shrubs of amber from the pearl-pav'd bottom Rise richly varied, where the finny race In blithe security their gambols play: While high above their heads Leviathan, The terror and the glory of the main, His pastime takes with transport, proud to see The ocean's vast dominion all his own. Hence thro' the genial bowels of the earth Easy may fancy pass; till at thy mines Gani or Raolconda she arrive, And from the adamant's imperial blaze Form weak ideas of her Maker's glory. Next to Pegu or Ceylon let me rove, Where the rich ruby (deem'd by Sages old Of Sovereign virtue) sparkles ev'n like Sirius, And blushes into flames. Thence will I go To undermine the treasure-fertile womb Of the huge Pyrenean, to detect The Agat and the deep-intrenched gem Of kindred Jasper — Nature in them both Delights to play the Mimic on herself; And in their veins she oft pourtrays the forms Of leaning hills, of trees erect, and streams Now stealing softly on, now thundering down In desperate cascade with flowers and beasts And all the living landskip of the vale: In vain thy pencil Claudio, or Poussin, Or thine, immortal Guido, would essay Such skill to imitate — it is the hand Of God himself — for God himself is there. Hence with the ascending springs let me advance Thro' beds of magnets, minerals, and spar, Up to the mountain's summit, there t' indulge Th' ambition of the comprehensive eye, That dares to call th' Horizon all her own. Behold the forest, and the expansive verdure Of yonder level lawn, whose smooth-shorn sod No object interrupts, unless the oak His lordly head uprears, and branching arms Extends — Behold in regal solitude, And pastoral magnificence he stands So simple! and so great! the under-wood Of meaner rank an awful distance keep. Yet Thou art there, yet God himself is there Ev'n on the bush (tho' not as when to Moses He shone in burning majesty reveal'd) Nathless conspicuous in the Linnet's throat Is his unbounded goodness — Thee her Maker, Thee her Preserver chaunts she in her song; While all the emulative vocal tribe The grateful lesson learn — no other voice Is heard, no other sound — for in attention Buried, ev'n babbling Echo bolds her peace. Now from the plains, where th' unbounded prospect Gives liberty her utmost scope to range, Turn we to yon enclosures, where appears Chequer'd variety in all her forms, Which the vague mind attract and still suspend With sweet perplexity. What are yon towers, The work of labouring man and clumsy art, Seen with the ring-dove's nest — on that tall beech Her pensile house the feather'd Artist builds — The rocking winds molest her not; for see, With such due poize the wond'rous fabric's hung, That, like the compass in the bark, it keeps True to itself, and stedfast ev'n in storms. Thou ideot that asserts, there is no God, View and be dumb for ever — Go bid Vitruvius or Palladio build The bee his mansion, or the ant her cave — Go call Correggio, or let Titian come To paint the hawthorn's bloom, or teach the cherry To blush with just vermillion — hence away — Hence ye prophane! for God himself is here. Vain were th' attempt, and impious to trace Thro' all his works th' Artificer Divine — And tho' nor shining sun, nor twinkling star Bedeck'd the crimson curtains of the sky; Tho' neither vegetable, beast, nor bird Were extant on the surface of this ball, Nor lurking gem beneath; tho' the great sea Slept in profound stagnation, and the air Had left no thunder to pronounce its maker; Yet man at home, within himself, might find The Deity immense, and in that frame So fearfully, so wonderfully made, See and adore his providence and power — I see, and I adore — O God most bounteous! O infinite of Goodness and of Glory! The knee, that thou hast shap'd, shall bend to Thee, The tongue, which thou hast tun'd, shall chaunt thy praise, And, thine own image, the immortal foul, Shall consecrate herself to Thee for ever.