"In ocean's pearly haunts, the waves beneath
Sits the grim monarch of insatiate Death;
[The shark rapacious] with descending blow
Darts on the scaly brood, that swims below;
[The crawling crocodiles], beneath that move,
Arrest with rising jaw the tribes above; 60
With monstrous gape sepulchral whales devour
Shoals at a gulp, a million in an hour.
—Air, earth, and ocean, to astonish'd day
One scene of blood, one mighty tomb display!
From Hunger's arm the shafts of Death are hurl'd,
And [one great Slaughter-house] the warring world!
"The brow of Man erect, with thought elate,
Ducks to the mandate of resistless fate;
Nor Love retains him, nor can Virtue save
Her sages, saints, or heroes from the grave. 70
[While cold and hunger] by defect oppress,
Repletion, heat, and labour by excess,
The whip, the sting, the spur, the fiery brand,
And, cursed Slavery! thy iron hand;
And led by Luxury Disease's trains,
Load human life with unextinguish'd pains.
"[Here laughs Ebriety] more fell than arms,
And thins the nations with her fatal charms,
With Gout, and Hydrops groaning in her train,
And cold Debility, and grinning Pain, 80
With harlot's smiles deluded man salutes,
Revenging all his cruelties to brutes!
There the curst spells of Superstition blind,
And fix her fetters on the tortured mind;
She bids in dreams tormenting shapes appear,
With shrieks that shock Imagination's ear,
[E'en o'er the grave] a deeper shadow flings,
And maddening Conscience darts a thousand stings.
"There writhing Mania sits on Reason's throne,
Or Melancholy marks it for her own, 90
Sheds o'er the scene a voluntary gloom,
Requests oblivion, and demands the tomb.
[And last Association]'s trains suggest
[Ideal ills], that harrow up the breast,
Call for the dead from Time's o'erwhelming main,
And bid departed Sorrow live again.
"Here ragged Avarice guards with bolted door
His useless treasures from the starving poor;
Loads the lorn hours with misery and care,
And lives a beggar to [enrich his heir]. 100
Unthinking crowds thy forms, Imposture, gull,
A Saint in sackcloth, or .
While mad with foolish fame, or drunk with power,
Ambition slays his thousands in an hour;
Demoniac Envy scowls with haggard mien,
And blights the bloom of other's joys, unseen;
Or wrathful Jealousy invades the grove,
And turns to night meridian beams of Love!
"Here wide o'er earth impetuous waters sweep,
And fields and forests rush into the deep; 110
Or dread Volcano with explosion dire
Involves the mountains in a flood of fire;
Or yawning Earth with closing jaws inhumes
Unwarned nations, living in their tombs;
Or Famine seizes with her tiger-paw,
And swallows millions with unsated maw.
"There livid Pestilence in league with Dearth
Walks forth malignant o'er the shuddering earth,
Her rapid shafts [with airs volcanic] wings,
Or steeps in putrid vaults her venom'd stings. 120
Arrests the young in Beauty's vernal bloom,
And bears the innocuous strangers to the tomb!—
"And now, e'en I, whose verse reluctant sings
The changeful state of sublunary things,
Bend o'er Mortality with silent sighs,
And wipe the secret tear-drops from my eyes,
Hear through the night one universal groan,
And mourn unseen for evils not my own,
With restless limbs and throbbing heart complain,
Stretch'd on the rack of [sentimental pain]! 130
—Ah where can Sympathy reflecting find
One bright idea to console the mind?
One ray of light in this terrene abode
To prove to Man the Goodness of his God?"
II. "Hear, O ye Sons of Time!" the Nymph replies,
Quick indignation darting from her eyes;
"When in soft tones the Muse lamenting sings,
And weighs with tremulous hand the sum of things;
She loads the scale in melancholy mood,
Presents the evil, but forgets the good. 140
But if the beam some firmer hand suspends,
And good and evil load the adverse ends;
With strong libration, where the Good abides,
Quick nods the beam, the ponderous gold subsides.
"Hear, O ye Sons of Time! the powers of Life
Arrest the elements, and stay their strife;
[From wandering atoms], ethers, airs, and gas,
By combination form the organic mass;
And,—as they seize, digest, secrete,—dispense
The bliss of Being to the vital Ens. 150
Hence in bright groups from Irritation rise
Young Pleasure's trains, and roll their azure eyes.