Young's Night Thoughts Part 16

Who, beaten by these sublunary storms, Boundless, interminable joys can weigh, Unraptured, unexalted, uninflamed?

What slave unblest, who from to-morrow's dawn 610 Expects an empire? He forgets his chain, And, throned in thought, his absent sceptre waves.

And what a sceptre waits us! what a throne!

Her own immense appointments to compute, Or comprehend her high prerogatives, In this her dark minority, how toils, How vainly pants, the human soul divine!

Too great the bounty seems for earthly joy; What heart but trembles at so strange a bliss?

In spite of all the truths the Muse has sung, 620 Ne'er to be prized enough! enough revolved!

Are there who wrap the world so close about them, They see no farther than the clouds; and dance On heedless vanity's fantastic toe, Till, stumbling at a straw, in their career, Headlong they plunge, where end both dance and song?

Are there, Lorenzo? is it possible? 627 Are there on earth (let me not call them men) Who lodge a soul immortal in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s; Unconscious as the mountain of its ore; Or rock of its inestimable gem?

When rocks shall melt, and mountains vanish, these Shall know their treasure; treasure, then, no more. 633 Are there (still more amazing!) who resist The rising thought? who smother, in its birth, The glorious truth? who struggle to be brutes?

Who through this bosom-barrier burst their way, And, with reversed ambition, strive to sink?

Who labour downwards through th' opposing powers Of instinct, reason, and the world against them, 640 To dismal hopes, and shelter in the shock Of endless night; night darker than the grave's?

Who fight the proofs of immortality?

With horrid zeal, and execrable arts, Work all their engines, level their black fires, To blot from man this attribute divine (Than vital blood far dearer to the wise), Blasphemers, and rank atheists to themselves?

To contradict them, see all nature rise!

What object, what event, the moon beneath, 650 But argues, or endears, an after-scene?

To reason proves, or weds it to desire?

All things proclaim it needful; some advance One precious step beyond, and prove it sure.

A thousand arguments swarm round my pen, From heaven, and earth, and man. Indulge a few, By Nature, as her common habit, worn; So pressing Providence a truth to teach, Which truth untaught, all other truths were vain.

Thou! whose all-providential eye surveys, 660 Whose hand directs, whose Spirit fills and warms Creation, and holds empire far beyond!

Eternity's inhabitant august!

Of two eternities amazing Lord!

One past, ere man's, or angel's, had begun Aid! while I rescue from the foe's a.s.sault Thy glorious immortality in man: A theme for ever, and for all, of weight, Of moment infinite! but relish'd most By those who love Thee most, who most adore. 670 Nature, thy daughter, ever-changing birth Of Thee the Great Immutable, to man Speaks wisdom, is his oracle supreme; And he who most consults her, is most wise.

Lorenzo, to this heavenly Delphos haste; And come back all-immortal, all-divine: Look nature through, 'tis revolution all; All change; no death. Day follows night; and night The dying day; stars rise, and set, and rise; Earth takes th' example. See, the summer gay, 680 With her green chaplet, and ambrosial flowers, Droops into pallid autumn: winter grey, Horrid with frost, and turbulent with storm, Blows autumn, and his golden fruits, away: Then melts into the spring: soft spring, with breath Favonian, from warm chambers of the south, Recalls the first. All, to re-flourish, fades; As in a wheel, all sinks, to re-ascend.

Emblems of man, who pa.s.ses, not expires.

With this minute distinction, emblems just, 690 Nature revolves, but man advances; both Eternal, that a circle, this a line.

That gravitates, this soars. Th' aspiring soul, Ardent, and tremulous, like flame, ascends, 694 Zeal and humility her wings, to heaven.

The world of matter, with its various forms, All dies into new life. Life born from death Rolls the vast ma.s.s, and shall for ever roll.

No single atom, once in being, lost, With change of counsel charges the Most High.

What hence infers Lorenzo? Can it be?

Matter immortal? And shall Spirit die? 702 Above the n.o.bler, shall less n.o.ble rise?

Shall Man alone, for whom all else revives, No resurrection know? Shall Man alone, Imperial Man! be sown in barren ground, Less privileged than grain, on which he feeds?

Is Man, in whom alone is power to prize The bliss of being, or with previous pain Deplore its period, by the spleen of fate, 710 Severely doom'd Death's single unredeem'd?

If Nature's revolution speaks aloud, In her gradation, hear her louder still.

Look nature through, 'tis neat gradation all.

By what minute degrees her scale ascends!

Each middle nature join'd at each extreme, To that above it join'd, to that beneath.

Parts, into parts reciprocally shot, Abhor divorce: what love of union reigns!

Here, dormant matter waits a call to life; 720 Half life, half death, join there; here, life and sense; There, sense from reason steals a glimmering ray; Reason shines out in man. But how preserved The chain unbroken upward, to the realms Of incorporeal life? those realms of bliss, Where Death hath no dominion? Grant a make Half mortal, half immortal; earthy, part, And part ethereal; grant the soul of man 728 Eternal; or in man the series ends.

Wide yawns the gap; connexion is no more; Check'd Reason halts; her next step wants support; Striving to climb, she tumbles from her scheme; A scheme, a.n.a.logy p.r.o.nounced so true; a.n.a.logy, man's surest guide below. 734 Thus far, all nature calls on thy belief.

And will Lorenzo, careless of the call, False attestation on all nature charge, Rather than violate his league with Death?

Renounce his reason, rather than renounce The dust beloved, and run the risk of heaven? 740 Oh, what indignity to deathless souls!

What treason to the majesty of man!

Of man immortal! Hear the lofty style: "If so decreed, th' Almighty Will be done.

Let earth dissolve, yon ponderous...o...b.. descend, And grind us into dust. The soul is safe; The man emerges; mounts above the wreck, As towering flame[31] from Nature's funeral pyre; O'er devastation, as a gainer, smiles; His charter, his inviolable rights, 750 Well pleased to learn from thunder's impotence, Death's pointless darts, and h.e.l.l's defeated storms."

But these chimeras touch not thee, Lorenzo!

The glories of the world thy sevenfold shield.

Other ambition than of crowns in air, And superlunary felicities, Thy bosom warm. I'll cool it, if I can; And turn those glories that enchant, against thee.

What ties thee to this life, proclaims the next. 759 If wise, the cause that wounds thee is thy cure.

Come, my ambitious! let us mount together (To mount, Lorenzo never can refuse); And from the clouds, where pride delights to dwell, Look down on earth.--What seest thou? Wondrous things!

Terrestrial wonders, that eclipse the skies.

What lengths of labour'd lands! what loaded seas!

Loaded by man, for pleasure, wealth, or war!

Seas, winds, and planets, into service brought, His art acknowledge, and promote his ends.

Nor can th' eternal rocks his will withstand; 770 What levell'd mountains! and what lifted vales!

O'er vales and mountains sumptuous cities swell.

And gild our landscape with their glittering spires.

Some mid the wondering waves majestic rise; And Neptune holds a mirror to their charms.

Far greater still! (what cannot mortal might?) See, wide dominions ravish'd from the deep!

The narrow'd deep with indignation foams.

Or southward turn; to delicate and grand, The finer arts there ripen in the sun. 780 How the tall temples, as to meet their G.o.ds, Ascend the skies! the proud triumphal arch Shows us half heaven beneath its ample bend.

High through mid-air, here, streams are taught to flow; Whole rivers, there, laid by in basins, sleep.

Here, plains turn oceans; there, vast oceans join Through kingdoms channell'd deep from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e; And changed creation takes its face from man.

Beats thy brave breast for formidable scenes, Where fame and empire wait upon the sword? 790 See fields in blood; hear naval thunders rise; Britannia's voice! that awes the world to peace.

How yon enormous mole projecting breaks 793 The mid-sea, furious waves! Their roar amidst, Out-speaks the Deity, and says, "O main!

Thus far, nor farther; new restraints obey."

Earth's disembowell'd! measured are the skies!

Stars are detected in their deep recess!

Creation widens! vanquish'd Nature yields!

Her secrets are extorted! Art prevails! 800 What monument of genius, spirit, power!

And now, Lorenzo! raptured at this scene, Whose glories render heaven superfluous! say, Whose footsteps these?--Immortals have been here.

Could less than souls immortal this have done?

Earth's cover'd o'er with proofs of souls immortal; And proofs of immortality forgot.

To flatter thy grand foible, I confess, These are Ambition's works: and these are great: But this, the least immortal souls can do; 810 Transcend them all--but what can these transcend?

Dost ask me what?--One sigh for the distress'd.

What then for infidels? A deeper sigh.

'Tis moral grandeur makes the mighty man: How little they, who think aught great below!

All our ambitions death defeats, but one; And that it crowns.--Here cease we: but, ere long, More powerful proof shall take the field against thee, Stronger than death, and smiling at the tomb. 819

THE INFIDEL RECLAIMED.

PART II.

CONTAINING THE NATURE, PROOF, AND IMPORTANCE OF IMMORTALITY.

PREFACE.

As we are at war with the power, it were well if we were at war with the manners, of France. A land of levity is a land of guilt. A serious mind is the native soil of every virtue; and the single character that does true honour to mankind. The soul's immortality has been the favourite theme with the serious of all ages. Nor is it strange: it is a subject by far the most interesting and important that can enter the mind of man. Of highest moment this subject always was, and always will be. Yet this its highest moment seems to admit of increase, at this day; a sort of occasional importance is superadded to the natural weight of it; if that opinion which is advanced in the Preface to the preceding Night be just.

It is there supposed, that all our infidels, whatever scheme, for argument's sake, and to keep themselves in countenance, they patronise, are betrayed into their deplorable error, by some doubts of their immortality, at the bottom. And the more I consider this point, the more I am persuaded of the truth of that opinion. Though the distrust of a futurity is a strange error; yet it is an error into which bad men may naturally be distressed. For it is impossible to bid defiance to final ruin, without some refuge in imagination, some presumption of escape. And what presumption is there? There are but two in nature; but two, within the compa.s.s of human thought. And these are,--That either G.o.d will not, or can not, punish. Considering the divine attributes, the first is too gross to be digested by our strongest wishes. And since omnipotence is as much a divine attribute as holiness, that G.o.d cannot punish, is as absurd a supposition as the former. G.o.d certainly can punish as long as wicked men exist. In non-existence, therefore, is their only refuge; and, consequently, non-existence is their strongest wish. And strong wishes have a strange influence on our opinions; they bias the judgment in a manner almost incredible. And since on this member of their alternative, there are some very small appearances in their favour, and none at all on the other, they catch at this reed, they lay hold on this chimera, to save themselves from the shock and horror of an immediate and absolute despair.

On reviewing my subject, by the light which this argument, and others of like tendency, threw upon it, I was more inclined than ever to pursue it, as it appeared to me to strike directly at the main root of all our infidelity. In the following pages it is, accordingly, pursued at large; and some arguments for immortality, new at least to me, are ventured on in them. There also the writer has made an attempt to set the gross absurdities and horrors of annihilation in a fuller and more affecting view than is (I think) to be met with elsewhere.

The gentlemen, for whose sake this attempt was chiefly made, profess great admiration for the wisdom of heathen antiquity: what pity it is they are not sincere! If they were sincere, how would it mortify them to consider, with what contempt and abhorrence their notions would have been received by those whom they so much admire! What degree of contempt and abhorrence would fall to their share, may be conjectured by the following matter of fact (in my opinion) extremely memorable. Of all their heathen worthies, Socrates (it is well known) was the most guarded, dispa.s.sionate, and composed: yet this great master of temper was angry; and angry at his last hour; and angry with his friend; and angry for what deserved acknowledgment; angry for a right and tender instance of true friendship towards him. Is not this surprising? What could be the cause?

The cause was for his honour; it was a truly n.o.ble, though, perhaps, a too punctilious, regard for immortality. For his friend asking him, with such an affectionate concern as became a friend, "where he should deposit his remains," it was resented by Socrates, as implying a dishonourable supposition, that he could be so mean, as to have a regard for anything, even in himself, that was not immortal.

This fact well considered, would make our infidels withdraw their admiration from Socrates; or make them endeavour, by their imitation of this ill.u.s.trious example, to share his glory: and, consequently, it would incline them to peruse the following pages with candour and impartiality; which is all I desire; and that, for their sakes: for I am persuaded, that an unprejudiced infidel must, necessarily, receive some advantageous impressions from them.