Of social peace; and list'ning Treachery lurks, Thee, Lamb of God! Thee, blameless Prince of Peace! Death's prime slave merchants! scorpion whips of fate! Apt for the yoke, the race degenerate, Whom Britain erst had blush'd to call her sons! Thee to defend, the Moloch priest prefers The prayer of hate, and bellows to the herd; That Deity, accomplice Deity, In the fierce jealousy of waken'd wrath Will go forth with our armies and our fleets Lord of unsleeping Love, THE LAST EPIPHANY. [POMFRET.] I. ADIEU, ye toyish reeds, that once could please A brighter power invokes my muse, And loftier thoughts and rapture does infuse. How my breast heaves, and pulses beat! Some nobler bard, O sacred Pow'r, inspire, And each gay following charm, from death to save. I rise, the mountains lessen and retire, And now I mix, unsing'd, with elemental fire; Nor mortal knows as yet, what wonders will ensue II. We pass'd through regions of unsullied light! A shudd'ring paleness seiz'd my look, At last the pest flew off, and thus I spoke : Say, sacred guide, shall this bright clime Or perish, with our mortal globe below, "Tis not for you to ask, nor mine to say, The niceties of that tremendous day. Know, when o'er-jaded Time his round has run, And Heaven's bright Judge appear in opening skies, III. He said; I mus'd, and thus return'd : 'What ensigns, courteous stranger, tell, Shall the brooding day reveal?' He answer'd mild Already, stupid with their crimes, Blind mortals, prostrate to their idols lie! Such were the boding times Ere ruin blasted from the sluicy sky, Dissolv'd they lay, in fulsome ease, And revell'd in luxuriant peace; In bacchanals they did their hours consume, IV. 'Adult'rate Christs already rise, And dare to 'swage the angry skies; Erratic throngs their Saviour's blood deny ; So long the gore through poison'd veins has flow'd, That scarcely ranker is a Fury's blood; Yet specious artifice, and fair disguise, The monster's shape, and curst design belies; A fiend's black venom, in an angel's mien, He quaffs, and scatters the contagious spleen : Straight, when he finishes his lawless reign, Nature shall paint the shining scene, Quick as the lightning which inspires the train. V. Forward Confusion shall provoke the fray, And, as they march, in thickest sables drown'd, The blust'ring armies o'er the skies shall spread, Loud issuing peals, and rising sheets of smoke, VI. 'Reverse all Nature's web shall run, And sportless misrule all around, Whilst backward all the threads shall haste to be unspun, (The wand, with which, ere time begun, His wand'ring slaves he did command, And made 'em scamper right, and in rude ranges run), And panting to the neighb'ring refuge flies, The globe shall faintly tremble round, And backward jolt, distorted with the wound. VII. Swath'd in substantial shrouds of night, The sick'ning sun shall from the world retire, Stripp'd of his dazzling robes of fire, Which dangling once shed round a lavish flood of light; No frail eclipse, but all essential shade, Not yielding to primæval gloom, Whilst day was yet an embryo in the womb, Nor glimm'ring in its source, with silver streamers play'd, A jetty mixture of the darkness spread O'er murmuring Egypt's head; And that which angels drew O'er Nature's face, when Jesus dy'd; Which sleeping ghosts for this mistook, And, rising, off their hanging funerals shook, [view, And fleeting pass'd, expos'd their bloodless breasts to Yet find it not so dark, and to their dormitories glide. Now bolder fires appear, VIII. And o'er the palpable obscurement sport, Glaring and gay as falling Lucifer, Yet mark'd with fate as when he fled th' etherial court And plung'd into the op'ning gulf of night; A sabre of immortal flame I bore, And with this arm his flour'shing plume I tore, And straight the fiend retreated from the fight. |