Too often we complain-but flesh is weak; Silence would waste us, and the heart would break.

Behold yon' rose, the poor despondent cries, (Pain on his brow, and anguish in his eyes) What healthy verdure paints its juicy shoots, What equal circulation feeds the roots! At morning dawn it feels the dew-ting'd ray, But opens all its bosom to the day. No art assists it, and no toil it takes13, Slumbers at ev'ning, and with morning wakes14. Why was I born? Or wherefore born a man? Immense my wish; yet tether'd to a span! The slave, that groans beneath the toilsome

oar,

"Obtains the sabbath of a welcome shore:"
His captive stripes are heal'd; his native soil
Sweetens the memory of foreign toil.
"Alas, my sorrows are not half so blest;"
My labours know no end, my pains no rest!
Tell me, vain-glorious Newtons, if you can,
What heterogeneous mixtures form the man?
Pleasure and anguish, ignorance and skill;
Nature and spirit, slav'ry and free will;
Weakness and strength; old age and youthful
Errour and truth; eternity and time!-[prime;

What contradictions have for ever ran
Betwixt the nether brute and upper man15 ?

Ah! what are men, who God's creation scorn?
The worm their brother 16;-brother elder born!
Plants live like them, in fairer robes array'd,
Alike they flourish, and alike they fade.
The lab'ring steer sleeps less disturb'd at night,
And eats and drinks with keener appetite,-
Restrain'd by nature just t' enjoy his fill;
Useful, and yet incapable of ill.

Say, man, what vain pre-eminence is thine ?
Each sense impair'd by gluttony and wine17:
Thou art the beast, except thy soaring mind
Aspires to pleasures of immortal kind :

Else, boasted knowledge, hapless is thy curse,
T'approve the better, and embrace the worse!
So Annas owns the miracle, and then
(Wilfully blinded) persecutes agen18.

To minds afflicted ever has been giv'n
A claim upon the patronage of Heav'n :
(Whilst the world's idiots ev'ry thought employ
With hopes to live and die without annoy.)
In the first agonies of heart-struck grief,
Heav'n to our parents typify'd relief19.

13 Matth. ch. vi, v. 28.

14 Concerning the sleep of plants, see an ingenious Latin treatise lately published in Sweden. 15 Poetical definition of a centaur.

16 Job, ch. xvii, v 14.-There is a remarkable passage in the Psalms upon this occasion, where the worm takes place of the monarch: "O praise the Lord, ye mountains and all hills; fruitful trees and all cedars; beasts and all cattle; worms and feathered fowls; kings of the Earth and all people; princes and judges of the world."

Psalm cxlviii, v. 10, Septuagint Version. 17" If we pamper the flesh too much, we nourish an enemy; if we defraud it of lawful sustenance, we destroy a good citizen." St. Gregor. Homil,

18 Acts, ch. iv, v. 6, 18. 19 Gen. ch. iii, v. 15.

VOL. XVI.

Th' Almighty lent an ear to Hannah's pray 'r20,
And bless'd her with each blessing, in an heir:
Whilst Hezekiah", earnest in his cause,
Gain'd a suspension of great Nature's laws,
And permanence to time;-for lo! the Sun
Retrac'd the journey he had lately run.—

But most th' unhappy wretch, aggriev'd in Rais'd pity in the Saviour of mankind. [mind, He ask'd for peace; Heav'n gave him its own Demons were dumb, and Legion dispossest. [rest, Wither'd with palsy'd blasts, the limbs resume, Thy strength, O manhood; and, O youth, thy Syro-Phenicia's maiden re-enjoy'd [bloom 23! That equal mind, which Satan once destroy'd 24. And, when the heav'nly Ephphatha 25 was spoke, The deaf-born heard, the dumb-born silence broke.

Th' ethereal fluid mov'd, the speech return'd;
No spasms were dreaded, no despondence
mourn'd.

Then rouse, my soul, and bid the world adieu,
Its maxims, wisdom, joys and glory too;
The mighty ETPHKA26 appears in view.

Just so, the gen'rous falcon27, long immur'd'
In doleful cell, by osier-bars secur'd,
Laments her fate; till, flitting swiftly by,
Th' aerial prize attracts her eager eye:
Instant she summons all her strength and fire;
Her aspect kindles fierce with keen desire;
She prunes her tatter'd plumes in conscious
[side:
And bounds from perch to perch, and side to
Impatient of her jail, and long detain'd,
She breaks the bounds her liberty restrain'd:
Then, having gain'd the point by Heav'n de-..
sign'd,

pride,

doom.

The bed of sickness (after cares and strife)
Is weak man's cradle for a second life:
Death's but a moment; and, before we die,
We touch the threshold of eternity!

So, stretch'd beneath the juniper's chill shade,
Th' afflicted prophet 29 in despondence pray'd:
"Oh, take the burthen of my life away,
Dead are my sires; nor better I than they:"
At length a seraph cry'd, "Arise and eat;
Behold thy bev'rage; and behold thy meat:
Heav'n's one repast shall future strength supply
For forty days, till Horeb meets thy eye
The good man neither fears, desponds, nor
faints,

Arm'd with the heav'nly panoply 31 of saints.

AND PASSION.

AN EMBLEM.

He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him.

Isaiah, ch. liii, v. 5. Σός είμι, ΧΡΙΣΤΕ· σῶσον, ὡς Αυτός θέλεις. Greg. Naz. Carm. lamb. Respice dum transis, quia sis mihi causa doloris HASTE not so fast, on worldly cares employ'd, Thy bleeding Saviour 1 asks a short delay: What trifling bliss is still to be enjoy'd, What change of folly wings thee on thy way? Look back a moment, pause a while 2, and stay. For thee thy God assum'd the human frame; For thee the guiltless pains and anguish try'd; Thy passion (sin excepted) his became : Like thee he suffer'd, hunger, wept, and dy'd. Nor wealth nor plenty did he ever taste, The moss his pillow oft, his couch the ground; The poor man's bread completed his repast; Home he had none, and quiet never found, For fell reproach pursu'd, and aim'd the wound : weeping it is a sort of consolation to an afflicted person to be thoroughly sensible of his affliction." St. Ambrose.

29 Elijah.

30 2 Kings, ch. xix., v. 4—8.

Mr.

A self-made pris'ner in a dolesome cell,
Victim for sin, and conqueror of Hell 4!
Lustration for offences not his own!
Th' unspotted for th' impure resign'd his breath;
No other off'ring could thy crimes atone:
Then blame thy Saviour's love, but not his death.

From this one prospect draw thy sole relief,
Here learn submission, passive duties learn;
Here drink the calm oblivion of thy grief:
Eschew each danger, ev'ry good discern,
And the true wages of thy virtue earn.
Reflect, O man, on such stupendous love,
Such sympathy divine, and tender care 5;
Beseech the Paraclete thine heart to move,
And offer up to Heav'n this silent pray'r.

7" Great God, thy judgments are with justice crown'd,

To human crimes and errours gracious still;
Yet, though thy mercies more and more abound,
Right reason spares not fresh-existing ill,

"For he (Pilate) knew that the chief priests had delivered him for envy."

Mark, ch. xv, v. 10.
An antient Heathen also hath personified envy,
and painted her in a mischievous attitude;
Gnara malorum,

Invidia infelix! animi vitalia vidit,
Lædendique vias,

4 Nolo vivere sine vulnere, cum te videam vulneratum. Bouavent. "To know God, without knowing our misery, creates pride: to know misery, without knowing Christ, causes despondence.'

St. Augustin. 5"They make a free-will offering to God, who in the midst of their sufferings preserve their gratitude and acknowledgements."

Cassian.

6" God's Holy Spirit worketh in the following manner in his rational children. It instructs, moves, and admonishes: as for example; it instructs the reason, moves the will, and admonishes the memory." St. Gregor. in Moral.

7 Translated from the famous French Ode of M. de Barreaux.

Grand Dieu! Tes jugements sont remplis équité, &c.

Nor can thy goodness counter-work thy will.
Ah no! The gloom of sin so dreadful shows,
That horrour, guilt,and death the conscience fill:
Eternal laws our happiness oppose;

Thy nature and our lives are everlasting foes!

"Severe thy truth, yet glorious is thy scheme;
Complete the vengeance of thy just desire;
See from our eyes the gushing torrents stream,
Yet strike us, blast us with celestial fire;
Our doom, and thy decrees, alike conspire.
Yet dying we will love thee and adore.
Where shall the flaming flashes of thy ire

Transpierce our bodies? Ev'ry nerve and pore With Christ's immaculate blood is cover'd and o'er."

"When we praise God we may speak much, and yet come short: Wherefore in sum, he is all. When you glorify him, exalt him as much as you can: for even yet he will far exceed. And when you exalt him, put forth all your strength, and be not weary, for you can never go far enough." Ecclus. ch. xliii, v, 27— 30.