An agency divine, to make him know

His moment when to fink and when to rise,

Age after

age, than to arreft his courfe?

All we behold is miracle; but, seen

So duly, all is miracle in vain.

Where now the vital energy that mov'd,

While fummer was, the pure and fubtile lymph
Through th' imperceptible meand'ring veins.
Of leaf and flow'r? It fleeps; and th' icy touch
Of unprolific winter has imprefs'd

A cold ftagnation on th' inteftine tide.

But let the months go round, a few short months,
And all fhall be reftor'd. Thefe naked fhoots,

Barren as lances, among which the wind

Makes wintry mufic, fighing as it goes,

Shall put their graceful foliage on again,

And, more aspiring, and with ampler spread,

Shall boaft new charms, and more than they have lost.

Then, each in its peculiar honours clad,

Shall publifh, even to the diftant eye,

Its family and tribe. Laburnum, rich
In streaming gold; fyringa, iv'ry pure; :
The fcentlefs and the fcented rofe; this red
And of an humbler growth, the other tall,
And throwing up into the darkest gloom
Of neighb'ring cypress, or more fable yew,
Her filver globes, light as the foamy furf
That the wind fevers from the broken wave;
The lilac, various in array, now white,

Now fanguine, and her beauteous head now fet

With purple spikes pyramidal, as if,

Studious of ornament, yet unrefolv'd

Which hue fhe most approv'd, fhe chose them all;
Copious of flow'rs the woodbine, pale and wan,
But well compenfating her fickly looks

With never-cloying odours, early and late;
Hypericum, all bloom, fo thick a fwarm
Of flow'rs, like flies clothing her flender rods,
That scarce a leaf appears; mezerion, too,
Though leaflefs, well attir'd, and thick befet

The Guelder-rofe.

With blushing wreaths, invefting ev'ry spray;

Althea with the purple eye; the broom,

Yellow and bright, as bullion unalloy'd,

Her bloffoms; and, luxuriant above all,
The jafmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets,
The deep dark green of whose unvarnish'd leaf
Makes more confpicuous, and illumines more
The bright profufion of her scatter'd stars.-
These have been, and these shall be in their day;
And all this uniform, uncolour'd scene,

Shall be difmantled of its fleecy load,

And flush into variety again,

From dearth to plenty, and from death to life,
Is Nature's progress, when she lectures man

In heav'nly truth; evincing, as fhe makes
The grand tranfition, that there lives and works.

A foul in all things, and that foul is God.
The beauties of the wilderness are his,

That make fo gay the folitary place

Where no eye fees them. And the fairer forms

That cultivation glories in, are his..

He fets the bright proceffion on its way,

And marshals all the order of the year;

He marks the bounds which winter may not pass,
And blunts his pointed fury; in its cafe,

Ruffet and rude, folds up the tender germ,
Uninjur'd, with inimitable art;

And, ere one flow'ry season fades and dies,
Designs the blooming wonders of the next.

Some fay that, in the origin of things, When all creation started into birth,

The infant elements receiv'd a law,

From which they fwerve not fince. That under force Of that controuling ordinance they move,

And need not his immediate hand, who first

Prefcrib'd their course, to regulate it now.

Thus dream they, and contrive to fave a God
Th' incumbrance of his own concerns, and fpare

The great Artificer of all that moves

The stress of a continual act, the pain
Of unremitted vigilance and care,

As too laborious and severe a task.

So man, the moth, is not afraid, it seems,
To span omnipotence, and measure might,
That knows no measure, by the scanty rule
And standard of his own, that is to-day,
And is not ere to-morrow's fun go down!
But how should matter occupy a charge
Dull as it is, and fatisfy a law

So vaft in its demands, unless impell'd
To ceafelefs fervice by a ceafelefs force,
And under preffure of fome confcious caufe?
-The Lord of all, himself through all diffus'd,
Suftains, and is the life of all that lives.

Nature is but a name for an effect,

Whofe caufe is God. He feeds the fecret fire

By which the mighty procefs is maintain'd,

Who fleeps not, is not weary; in whofe fight Slow-circling ages are as tranfient days;