Lefs bafe the fear of death, than fear of life.
O Britain, infamous for fuicide!
An island in thy manners,
far disjoin'd
From the whole world of rationals befide!
In ambient waves plunge thy polluted head,
Wash the dire ftain, nor fhock the continent.
But thou be fhock'd, while I detect the cause
Of felf-affault, expofe the monfter's birth,
And bid abhorrence hifs it round the world.
Blame not thy clime, nor chide the distant fun;
The fun is innocent, thy clime abfolv'd:
Immoral climes kind nature never made.
The cause I fing, in Eden might prevail,
And proves, It is thy folly, not thy fate.
The foul of man (let man in homage bow,
Who names his foul), a native of the skies!
High-born, and free, her freedom should maintain,
Unfold, unmortgag'd for earth's little bribes.
Th' illuftrious ftranger, in this foreign land,
Like ftrangers, jealous of her dignity,
Studious of home, and ardent to return,
Of earth fufpicious, earth's inchanted cup
With cool referve light touching, should indulge,
On immortality, her godlike tafte,
There take large draughts; make her chief banquet.
But fome reject this fuftenance divine;
To beggarly vile appetites defcend;
Afk alms of earth for guests that came from heaven: Sink into flaves; and fell, for present hire,
Their rich reversion, and (what shares its fate)
Their native freedom, to the prince who sways
This nether world. And when his payments fail,
When his foul basket gorges them no more,
Or their pall'd palates loath the basket full;
Are instantly, with wild demoniac rage,
For breaking all the chains of Providence,
And bursting their confinement; though fast barr'd
By laws divine and human; guarded strong
With horrors doubled to defend the pass,
The blackeft, nature, or dire guilt can raise;
And moated round with fathomless destruction,
Sure to receive, and whelm them in their fall.
Such, Britons! is the cause, to you unknown,
Or worse, o'erlook'd; o'erlook'd by magistrates,
Thus criminals themselves. I grant the deed
Is madness; but the madnefs of the heart.
And what is that? Our utmost bound of guilt.
A fenfual, unreflecting life, is big
With monftrous births, and Suicide, to crown
The black infernal brood. The bold to break
Heaven's law fupreme, and defperately rush
Through facred nature's murder, on their own,
Because they never think of death, they die.
'Tis equally man's duty, glory, gain,
At once to fhun, and meditate, his end.
When by the bed of languishment we fit,
(The feat of wisdom! if our choice, not fate)
Or, o'er our dying friends, in anguish hang,
Wipe the cold dew, or fly the finking head,
Number their moments, and, in every clock,
Start at the voice of an Eternity;
See the dim lamp of life juft feebly lift
An agonizing beam, at us to gaze,
Then fink again, and quiver into death,
That most pathetic herald of our own;
How read we fuch fad fcenes? As fent to man
In perfect vengeance? No; in pity fent,
To melt him down, like wax, and then imprefs,
Indelible, death's image on his heart ;
Bleeding for others, trembling for himself.
We bleed, we tremble, we forget, we smile.
The mind turns fool, before the cheek is dry.
Our quick-returning folly cancels all;
As the tide rufhing rafes what is writ
In yielding fands, and fmooths the letter'd fhore.
Lorenzo! haft thou ever weigh'd a figh?
Or ftudy'd the philofophy of tears?
(A science, yet unleður'd in our schools!
Haft thou defcended deep into the breast,
And feen their fource? If not, defcend with me,
And trace thefe briny rivulets to their fprings.
Our funeral tears from different caufes rife,
As if from feparate cifterns in the foul,
Of various kinds, they flow. From tender hearts,
By foft contagion call'd, fome burst at once,
And stream obfequious to the leading eye.
Some ask more time, by curious art distill'd.
Some hearts, in fecret hard, unapt to melt,
Struck by the magic of the public eye,
Like Mofes' fmitten rock, gush out amain.
Some weep to fhare the fate of the deceas'd,
So high in merit, and to them fo dear.
They dwell on praifes, which they think they fhare;
And thus, without a blufh, commend themselves.
Some mourn, in proof, that fomething they could
love :
They weep not to relieve their grief, but shew.
Some weep in perfect juftice to the dead,
As confcious all their love is in arrear.
Some mischievously weep, not unappriz'd,
Tears, fometimes, aid the conquest of an eye.
With what address the soft Ephesians draw
Their fable net-work o'er entangled hearts!
As feen through cryftal, how their rofes glow,
While liquid pearl runs trickling down their cheek?
Of her's not prouder Egypt's wanton queen,
Caroufing gems, herself diffolv'd in love.
Some weep at death, abftracted from the dead,
And celebrate, like Charles, their own decease.
By kind conftruction fome are deem'd to weep,
Because a decent veil conceals their joy.
Some weep in earnest, and yet weep in vain;
As deep in indifcretion, as in woe.
Paffion, blind paffion! impotently pours
Tears, that deferve more tears; while reafon fleeps ; Or gazes like an idiot, unconcern'd;
Nor comprehends the meaning of the storm;
Knows not it fpeaks to her, and her alone.
Irrationals all forrow are beneath,
That noble gift! that privilege of man!
From forrow's pang, the birth of endless joy.
But these are barren of that birth divine:
They weep impetuous, as the fummer ftorm,
And full as fhort! The cruel grief foon tam'd,
They make a paftime of the ftinglefs tale;
Far as the deep refounding knell, they spread
The dreadful news, and hardly feel it more.
No grain of wisdom pays them for their woe.
Half-round the globe, the tears pump'd up by death
Are spent in watering vanities of life;
In making folly flourish ftill more fair.
When the fick soul, her wonted stay withdrawn,
Reclines on earth, and forrows in the duft;
Inftead of learning, there, her true support,
Though there thrown down her true fupport to learn.
Without heaven's aid, impatient to be bleft,
She crawls to the next fhrub, or bramble vile,
Though from the stately cedar's arms the fell;
With ftale, forfworn embraces, clings anew,
The stranger weds, and bloffoms, as before,
In all the fruitless fopperies of life:
Prefents her weed, well fancy'd, at the ball,
And raffles for the death's head on the ring.
So wept Aurelia, till the deftin'd youth
Stept in, with his receipt for making smiles,
And blanching fables into bridal bloom.
So wept Lorenzo fair Clariffa's fate;
Who gave that angel boy, on whom he doats;
And dy'd to give him, orphan'd in his birth!
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