THE TRIBUNAL OF CONSCIENCE.
When retrospection casts a guilty eye
On crimes of youth and days of lawless sport,
Blessings abus’d, and time profusely squander’d;
Th’ Almighty’s image in the human breast
Polluted, and false deities ador’d;
What solid satisfaction can the joys,
The glittering trifles of this life afford?
—Not regal splendour, nor enormous heaps
Of shining ore, nor reputation earn’d
By smooth hypocrisy, nor pleasures strain’d
By art’s device, to satiate the sense
Beyond the bounds of reason, can afford
Aught of serenity or peace of mind.
In vain invention furnishes new schemes
To drown reflection: these abortive prove,
And leave unadvocated and abash’d,
At the dread bar of Conscience, him who late
Defy’d her power and spurned her admonitions.
—Now prostrate falls the culprit in the dust,
While thund’ring through his soul the awful voice
Shatters his stubborn will, and breaks the bands
Which tie his darling vices to his heart.
Nor is this call the signal of destruction—
’Tis but the voice of love omnipotent,
Once speaking in a still small voice, but now
Rising with power t’ accuse and to deride;
Which once intreated, now commands attention,
And wretched, doubly wretched is the man
Who still endeavours to evade its influence.
VIATOR.
New-York, Sept. 15, 1796.