560 
INVESTIGATION OF INSECTS, 
Then with a glance of fancy to survey, 
Far as the faculty can stretch away, 
Ten thousand rivers pour’d at his command 
From urns that never fail through every land; 
These like a deluge with impetuous force, 
Those winding modestly a silent course ; 
The cloud-surmounting alps, the fruitful vales ; 
Seas on which every nation spreads her sails ; 
The sun, a world whence other worlds drink light; 
The crescent moon, the diadem of night ; 
Stars countless, each in his appointed place, 
Fast anchor’d in the deep abyss of space :— 
At such a sight to catch the poet’s flame, 
And with a rapture like his own exclaim, 
These are thy glorious works, thou source of good ! 
How dimly seen, how faintly understood ! 
Thine, and upheld by thy paternal care, 
This universal frame, thus wondrous fair ; 
Thy power divine, and bounty beyond thought, 
Adored and praised in all that thou hast wrought. 
Absorb’d in that immensity I see, 
I shrink abas’d, and yet aspire to thee; 
Instruct me, guide me to that heavenly day, 
Thy words, more clearly than thy works, display, 
That, while thy truths my grosser thoughts refine, 
ao 
I may resemble thee, and call thee mine. 
* Cowper’s Retirement. 
