230 PRIDb's PICTCBB8. 



Life's secret known and kept, enough for man, 



In this low vale probationary still : 

 Get wealth — gain honours — wisdom, if you can — 



That mental bulwark 'gainst life's latest ill. 



The road to heaven is not through Church or State : 

 Nor o'er the fabrics of immortal fame : 



Prayer paves the way — yet pray not when too late, 

 Though everlasting mercy be the same. 



The dullest eye, the most capacious mind. 

 See not the radii of our Maker's love : 



Nor pierce that God-lit influence, undefined — 

 Pervading Essence ! Great First Cause ! above. 



The spirit's home is not on earth below : 



Behind yon blazing sphere, beyond the skies : 



Faith's realm of hope, which earth-born cannot know- 

 There, there it blooms, immortal ! — here, it dies. 



Untiring Nature hath not dreamt of rest : 

 Her labours never ending, still begun : 



If man could gaze on regions of the blest. 

 And measure out the glory of the sun : — 



Could he, with listless aim, survey whole worlds, 

 And laugh to scorn the mimic might of man ; 



Could he controul those bolts the Godhead hurls. 

 And bridge the ocean with his puny span : — 



Or ride upon the whirlwind of the storm : 

 And grasp the " Rainbow" of divine import : 



Then see himself, but sin's most abject worm. 



Struggling through evil and through good report ;- 



Still onward flee, where morning's golden gates 

 Obey the mandate of an angel's key 



(While doomed sin its crime still expiates) ] 

 'Neath the vast portals of eternity : — 



Then, with unerr"ng blow, might he propel 

 The sluices wide of ocean's boiling breast : 



Now look, with horror, on the pangs of hell — 

 The vengeance and the doom of Satan's crest: — 



How might he then desire to swell the hymn 

 Creation's spirit never ceased to breathe ! 



Mistake his God for winged cherubim. 



And heaven-lit Majesty for Truth's bright wreath. 



