Young's Night Thoughts Part 24

Patron of pleasure! doater on delight! 570 I am thy rival; pleasure I profess; Pleasure the purpose of my gloomy song.

Pleasure is nought but virtue's gayer name; I wrong her still, I rate her worth too low; Virtue the root, and pleasure is the flower; And honest Epicurus' foes were fools.

But this sounds harsh, and gives the wise offence; If o'erstrain'd wisdom still retains the name.

How knits Austerity her cloudy brow, And blames, as bold, and hazardous, the praise 580 Of Pleasure, to mankind, unpraised, too dear!

Ye modern Stoics! hear my soft reply; Their senses men will trust: we can't impose; Or, if we could, is imposition right?

Own honey sweet; but, owning, add this sting; "When mix'd with poison, it is deadly too."

Truth never was indebted to a lie.

Is nought but virtue to be praised, as good?

Why then is health preferr'd before disease?

What nature loves is good, without our leave. 590 And where no future drawback cries, "Beware!"

Pleasure, though not from virtue, should prevail.

'Tis balm to life, and grat.i.tude to Heaven; How cold our thanks for bounties unenjoy'd! 594 The love of pleasure is man's eldest-born, Born in his cradle, living to his tomb; Wisdom, her younger sister, though more grave, Was meant to minister, and not to mar, Imperial Pleasure, queen of human hearts.

Lorenzo! thou, her majesty's renown'd, Though uncoift, counsel, learned in the world!

Who think'st thyself a Murray,[47] with disdain 602 May'st look on me. Yet, my Demosthenes!

Canst thou plead Pleasure's cause as well as I?

Know'st thou her nature, purpose, parentage?

Attend my song, and thou shalt know them all; And know thyself; and know thyself to be (Strange truth!) the most abstemious man alive.

Tell not Calista; she will laugh thee dead; Or send thee to her hermitage with L----. 610 Absurd presumption! Thou who never knew'st A serious thought! shalt thou dare dream of joy?

No man e'er found a happy life by chance; Or yawn'd it into being with a wish; Or, with the snout of grovelling appet.i.te, E'er smelt it out, and grubb'd it from the dirt.

An art it is, and must be learn'd; and learn'd With unremitting effort, or be lost; And leaves us perfect blockheads, in our bliss.

The clouds may drop down t.i.tles and estates; 620 Wealth may seek us; but Wisdom must be sought; Sought before all; but (how unlike all else We seek on earth!) 'tis never sought in vain.

First, Pleasure's birth, rise, strength, and grandeur, see.

Brought forth by Wisdom, nursed by Discipline, By Patience taught, by Perseverance crown'd, She rears her head majestic; round her throne, 627 Erected in the bosom of the just, Each virtue, listed, forms her manly guard.

For what are virtues? (formidable name!) What, but the fountain, or defence, of joy?

Why, then, commanded? Need mankind commands, At once to merit, and to make, their bliss?-- Great Legislator! scarce so great, as kind! 634 If men are rational, and love delight, Thy gracious law but flatters human choice; In the transgression lies the penalty; And they the most indulge, who most obey.

Of Pleasure, next, the final cause explore; Its mighty purpose, its important end. 640 Not to turn human brutal, but to build Divine on human, Pleasure came from heaven.

In aid to Reason was the G.o.ddess sent; To call up all its strength by such a charm.

Pleasure, first, succours Virtue; in return, Virtue gives Pleasure an eternal reign.

What, but the pleasure of food, friendship, faith, Supports life natural, civil, and divine?

'Tis from the pleasure of repast, we live; 'Tis from the pleasure of applause, we please; 650 'Tis from the pleasure of belief, we pray (All prayer would cease, if unbelieved the prize): It serves ourselves, our species, and our G.o.d; And to serve more, is past the sphere of man.

Glide, then, for ever, pleasure's sacred stream!

Through Eden, as Euphrates ran, it runs, And fosters every growth of happy life; Makes a new Eden where it flows;--but such As must be lost, Lorenzo! by thy fall.

"What mean I by thy fall?"--Thou'lt shortly see, While Pleasure's nature is at large display'd; 661 Already sung her origin, and ends.

Those glorious ends, by kind, or by degree, When Pleasure violates, 'tis then a vice, A vengeance too; it hastens into pain.

From due refreshment, life, health, reason, joy; From wild excess, pain, grief, distraction, death; Heaven's justice this proclaims, and that her love.

What greater evil can I wish my foe, Than his full draught of pleasure, from a cask 670 Unbroach'd by just authority, ungauged By temperance, by reason unrefined?

A thousand demons lurk within the lee.

Heaven, others, and ourselves! uninjured these, Drink deep; the deeper, then, the more divine; Angels are angels, from indulgence there; 'Tis unrepenting pleasure makes a G.o.d.

Dost think thyself a G.o.d from other joys?

A victim rather! shortly sure to bleed.

The wrong must mourn: can Heaven's appointments fail?

Can man outwit Omnipotence? strike out 681 A self-wrought happiness unmeant by Him Who made us, and the world we would enjoy?

Who forms an instrument, ordains from whence Its dissonance, or harmony, shall rise.

Heaven bid the soul this mortal frame inspire!

Bid virtue's ray divine inspire the soul With unprecarious flows of vital joy; And, without breathing, man as well might hope For life, as, without piety, for peace. 690 "Is virtue, then, and piety the same?"-- No; piety is more; 'tis virtue's source; Mother of every worth, as that of joy.

Men of the world this doctrine ill digest; They smile at piety; yet boast aloud 695 Good will to men; nor know they strive to part What Nature joins; and thus confute themselves.

With piety begins all good on earth; 'Tis the first-born of rationality.

Conscience, her first law broken, wounded lies; Enfeebled, lifeless, impotent to good; A feign'd affection bounds her utmost power. 702 Some we can't love, but for th' Almighty's sake; A foe to G.o.d was ne'er true friend to man; Some sinister intent taints all he does; And, in his kindest actions, he's unkind.

On piety, humanity is built; And, on humanity, much happiness; And yet still more on piety itself.

A soul in commerce with her G.o.d, is heaven; 710 Feels not the tumults and the shocks of life; The whirls of pa.s.sions, and the strokes of heart.

A Deity believed, is joy begun; A Deity adored, is joy advanced; A Deity beloved, is joy matured.

Each branch of piety delight inspires; Faith builds a bridge from this world to the next, O'er death's dark gulf, and all its horror hides; Praise, the sweet exhalation of our joy, That joy exalts, and makes it sweeter still; 720 Prayer ardent opens heaven, lets down a stream Of glory on the consecrated hour Of man, in audience with the Deity.

Who worships the great G.o.d, that instant joins The first in heaven, and sets his foot on h.e.l.l.

Lorenzo! when wast thou at church before?

Thou think'st the service long: but is it just?

Though just, unwelcome: thou hadst rather tread Unhallow'd ground; the Muse, to win thine ear, 729 Must take an air less solemn. She complies.

Good conscience! at the sound the world retires; Verse disaffects it, and Lorenzo smiles: Yet has she her seraglio full of charms; And such as age shall heighten, not impair.

Art thou dejected? Is thy mind o'ercast?

Amid her fair ones, thou the fairest choose, To chase thy gloom.--"Go, fix some weighty truth; Chain down some pa.s.sion; do some generous good; Teach ignorance to see, or grief to smile; Correct thy friend; befriend thy greatest foe; 740 Or with warm heart, and confidence divine, Spring up, and lay strong hold on Him who made thee."

Thy gloom is scatter'd, sprightly spirits flow; Though wither'd is thy vine, and harp unstrung.

Dost call the bowl, the viol, and the dance, Loud mirth, mad laughter? Wretched comforters!

Physicians! more than half of thy disease.

Laughter, though never censured yet as sin (Pardon a thought that only seems severe), Is half immoral: Is it much indulged? 750 By venting spleen, or dissipating thought, It shows a scorner, or it makes a fool; And sins, as hurting others, or ourselves.

'Tis pride, or emptiness, applies the straw, That tickles little minds to mirth effuse; Of grief approaching, the portentous sign!

The house of laughter makes a house of woe.

A man triumphant is a monstrous sight; A man dejected is a sight as mean.

What cause for triumph, where such ills abound? 760 What for dejection, where presides a Power, Who call'd us into being to be bless'd?

So grieve, as conscious, grief may rise to joy; 763 So joy, as conscious, joy to grief may fall.

Most true, a wise man never will be sad; But neither will sonorous, bubbling mirth, A shallow stream of happiness betray: Too happy to be sportive, he's serene.

Yet would'st thou laugh (but at thy own expense), This counsel strange should I presume to give-- 770 "Retire, and read thy Bible, to be gay."

There truths abound of sovereign aid to peace; Ah! do not prize them less, because inspired, As thou, and thine, are apt and proud to do.

If not inspired, that pregnant page had stood, Time's treasure, and the wonder of the wise!

Thou think'st, perhaps, thy soul alone at stake; Alas!--should men mistake thee for a fool;-- What man of taste for genius, wisdom, truth, Though tender of thy fame, could interpose? 780 Believe me, sense here acts a double part, And the true critic is a Christian too.

But these, thou think'st, are gloomy paths to joy.-- True joy in sunshine ne'er was found at first; They, first, themselves offend, who greatly please; And travel only gives us sound repose.

Heaven sells all pleasure; effort is the price; The joys of conquest, are the joys of man; And glory the victorious laurel spreads O'er pleasure's pure, perpetual, placid stream. 790 There is a time, when toil must be preferr'd, Or joy, by mistimed fondness, is undone.

A man of pleasure, is a man of pains.

Thou wilt not take the trouble to be blest.

False joys, indeed, are born from want of thought; From thoughts full bent, and energy, the true; And that demands a mind in equal poise, 797 Remote from gloomy grief, and glaring joy.

Much joy not only speaks small happiness, But happiness that shortly must expire.

Can joy, unbottom'd in reflection, stand?

And, in a tempest, can reflection live?

Can joy, like thine, secure itself an hour?

Can joy, like thine, meet accident unshock'd? 804 Or ope the door to honest poverty?

Or talk with threatening death, and not turn pale?

In such a world, and such a nature, these Are needful fundamentals of delight: These fundamentals give delight indeed; Delight, pure, delicate, and durable; 810 Delight, unshaken, masculine, divine; A constant, and a sound, but serious joy.

Is joy the daughter of severity?

It is:--yet far my doctrine from severe.

"Rejoice for ever:" it becomes a man; Exalts, and sets him nearer to the G.o.ds.

"Rejoice for ever!" Nature cries, "Rejoice!"

And drinks to man, in her nectareous cup, Mix'd up of delicates for every sense; To the great Founder of the bounteous feast, 820 Drinks glory, grat.i.tude, eternal praise; And he that will not pledge her, is a churl.

Ill firmly to support, good fully taste, Is the whole science of felicity: Yet sparing pledge: her bowl is not the best Mankind can boast.--"A rational repast; Exertion, vigilance, a mind in arms, A military discipline of thought, To foil temptation in the doubtful field; And ever-waking ardour for the right." 830 'Tis these, first give, then guard, a cheerful heart. 831 Nought that is right, think little; well aware, What reason bids, G.o.d bids; by His command How aggrandized, the smallest thing we do!

Thus, nothing is insipid to the wise; To thee, insipid all, but what is mad; Joys season'd high, and tasting strong of guilt.

"Mad! (thou reply'st, with indignation fired); Of ancient sages proud to tread the steps, I follow Nature."--Follow Nature still, 840 But look it be thine own: is Conscience, then, No part of nature? Is she not supreme?

Thou regicide! Oh, raise her from the dead!

Then, follow Nature; and resemble G.o.d.

When, spite of Conscience, pleasure is pursued, Man's nature is unnaturally pleased: And what's unnatural, is painful too At intervals, and must disgust even thee!

The fact thou know'st; but not, perhaps, the cause.

Virtue's foundations with the world's were laid; 850 Heaven mix'd her with our make, and twisted close Her sacred interests with the strings of life.

Who breaks her awful mandate, shocks himself, His better self: and is it greater pain, Our soul should murmur, or our dust repine?

And one, in their eternal war, must bleed.