The Soul secure in his Resistance smiles
At the drawn Dagger, and defies its Point:
The Stars shall fade away, the Sun himself
Grow dim with Age, and Nature sink in Years?
But thou shalt flourish in immortal Youth,
Unhurt amidst the War of Elements,
The Wrecks of Matter, and the Crush of Worlds.
The two Verses quoted out of Horace:
Si fractus, &c.
are not so well imitated by the Gentleman that turned Cato's Siloloquy into Latin, as to defy a Comparison;
Orbesque fractis ingerentur orbibus
Illæsa tu sedebis extra fragmina
But not to be always running back to the Antients, let us have Recourse to the Moderns, particularly Quillet, and we shall find something in this Kind of Thinking. Tons. Callip. p. 72.
As far as thou may'st Nature's Depths explore
Still inexhaustible, thou find'st the Store;
Thee let the Order she observes suffice,
What Laws controul our Earth, and what the Skies.
Mark how a thousand starry Orbs on high
Around the Void with equal Motion fly;
Mark how the huge Machine one Order keeps,
And how the Sun th' Etherial Champian sweeps.
Both Earth and Air with genial Heat he warms,
Gives ev'ry Grace, and every Beauty forms;
Whether around the lazy Globe he rolls.
Or Earth is whirl'd about him on her Poles;
God is the Mover, God the living Soul,
That made, that acts, that animates the Whole.
Hence with thy Atoms, Epicurus; hence:
Was all this wond'rous Frame the Sport of Chance!
Of Solids, they, 'tis true, the Matter make,
Can Matter from itself its Figure take!
Can the bright Order in the World we see,
The blind Effect of wanton Fortune be!
Did jumbling Atoms form the various Kind
Of Beings, or did one Almighty Mind?
Guess what you will, you must at last resort
To a first Cause, and not to Chance's Sport.
This Cause is God————
I must not omit this Noble Thought of Milton's:
Then crown'd, again their golden Harps, they took
Harps ever tun'd, that glitt'ring by their Side
Like Quivers hung, and with Preamble sweet
Of charming Symphony, they introduce
The sacred Song, and waken Raptures high:
No one exempt, no Voice but well cou'd joyn
Melodious Part, such Concord is in Heav'n.
Having mention'd so many noble Thoughts in Verse, I shall conclude this Article, with a very plain but very noble one in Prose, the Saying of Leonidas to Xerxes: If you had not been too powerful and too happy, you might have been an honest Man.