In science too—how many a system, raised
Like Neva's icy domes, awhile hath blazed
With lights of fancy and with forms of pride,
Then, melting, mingled with the oblivious tide!
Now Earth usurps the centre of the sky,
Now Newton puts the paltry planet by;
Now whims revive beneath Descartes's[8] pen,
Which now, assailed by Locke's, expire again.
And when perhaps in pride of chemic powers,
We think the keys of Nature's kingdom ours,
Some Davy's magic touch the dream unsettles,
And turns at once our alkalis to metals.
Or should we roam in metaphysic maze
Thro' fair-built theories of former days,
Some Drummond from the north, more ably skilled,
Like other Goths, to ruin than to build,
Tramples triumphant thro' our fanes o'erthrown,
Nor leaves one grace, one glory of its own.
Oh! Learning, whatsoe'er thy pomp and boast,
_Un_lettered minds have taught and charmed men most.
The rude, unread Columbus was our guide
To worlds, which learned Lactantius had denied;
And one wild Shakespeare following Nature's lights
Is worth whole planets filled with Stagyrites.
See grave Theology, when once she strays
From Revelation's path, what tricks she plays;
What various heavens,—all fit for bards to sing,—
Have churchmen dreamed, from Papias,[9] down to King![10]
While hell itself, in India naught but smoke[11]
In Spain's a furnace and in France—a joke.
Hail! modest Ignorance, thou goal and prize,
Thou last, best knowledge of the simply wise!
Hail! humble Doubt, when error's waves are past,
How sweet to reach thy sheltered port at last,
And there by changing skies nor lured nor awed.
Smile at the battling winds that roar abroad.
There gentle Charity who knows how frail
The bark of Virtue, even in summer's gale,
Sits by the nightly fire whose beacon glows
For all who wander, whether friends or foes.
There Faith retires and keeps her white sail furled,
Till called to spread it for a better world;
While Patience watching on the weedy shore,
And mutely waiting till the storm be o'er,
Oft turns to Hope who still directs her eye
To some blue spot just breaking in the sky!
Such are the mild, the blest associates given
To him who doubts,—and trusts in naught but Heaven!
[1] "The particular bulk, number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire or snow are really in them, whether any one perceives them or not, and therefore they may be called real qualities because they really exist in those bodies; but light, heat, whiteness or coldness are no more really in them than sickness or pain is in manna. Take away the sensation of them; let not the eye see light or colors, nor the ears hear sounds; let the palate not taste nor the nose smell, and all colors, tastes, odors and sounds, as they are such particular ideas, vanish and cease."—Locke, book ii. chap 8.
[2] This was the creed also of those modern Epicureans, whom Ninon de l'Enclos collected around her in the Rue des Tournelles, and whose object seems to have been to decry the faculty of reason, as tending only to embarrass our wholesome use of pleasures, without enabling us, in any degree, to avoid their abuse. Madame des Houlières, the fair pupil of Des Barreaux in the arts of poetry and gallantry, has devoted most of her verses to this laudable purpose, and is even such a determined foe to reason, that, in one of her pastorals, she congratulates her sheep on the want of it.
[3] Socrates and Plato were the grand sources of ancient scepticism. According to Cicero ("de Orator," lib. iii.), they supplied Arcesilas with the doctrines of the Middle Academy; and how closely these resembled the tenets of the Sceptics, may be seen even in Sextus Empiricus (lib. i. cap. 33), who with all his distinctions can scarcely prove any difference. It appears strange that Epicurus should have been a dogmatist; and his natural temper would most probably have led him to the repose of scepticism had not the Stoics by their violent opposition to his doctrines compelled him to be as obstinate as themselves.
[4] Acts, chap. xix. "For a certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain unto the craftsmen."
[5] "Those two thieves," says Ralph, between whom the nation is crucified."—"Use and Abuse of Parliaments."