wizard Passions weave an holy spell!
O Chatterton! that thou wert yet alive!
Sure thou would’st spread the canvass to the gale,
And love with us the tinkling team to drive 150
O’er peaceful Freedom’s undivided dale;
And we, at sober eve, would round thee throng,
Would hang, enraptur’d, on thy stately song,
And greet with smiles the young-eyed Poesy
All deftly mask’d as hoar Antiquity. 155
Alas, vain Phantasies! the fleeting brood
Of Woe self-solac’d in her dreamy mood!
Yet will I love to follow the sweet dream,
Where Susquehannah pours his untamed stream;
And on some hill, whose forest-frowning side 160
Waves o’er the murmurs of his calmer tide,
Will raise a solemn Cenotaph to thee,
Sweet Harper of time-shrouded Minstrelsy!
And there, sooth’d sadly by the dirgeful wind,
Muse on the sore ills I had left behind. 165
1796
THE DESTINY OF NATIONS: A VISION
Auspicious Reverence! Hush all meaner song,
Ere we the deep preluding strain have poured
To the Great Father, only Rightful King,
Eternal Father! King Omnipotent!
To the Will Absolute, the One, the Good! 5
The I AM, the Word, the Life, the Living God!
Such symphony requires best instrument.
Seize, then, my soul! from Freedom’s trophied dome
The Harp which hangeth high between the Shields
Of Brutus and Leonidas! With that 10
Strong music, that soliciting spell, force back
Man’s free and stirring spirit that lies entranced.
For what is Freedom, but the unfettered use
Of all the powers which God for use had given?
But chiefly this, him First, him Last to view 15
Through meaner powers and secondary things
Effulgent, as through clouds that veil his blaze.
For all that meets the bodily sense I deem
Symbolical, one mighty alphabet
For infant minds; and we in this low world 20
Placed with our backs to bright Reality,
That we may learn with young unwounded ken
The substance from its shadow. Infinite Love,
Whose latence is the plenitude of All,
Thou with retracted beams, and self-eclipse 25
Veiling, revealest thine eternal Sun.
But some there are who deem themselves most free
When they within this gross and visible sphere
Chain down the wingéd thought, scoffing ascent,
Proud in their meanness: and themselves they cheat 30
With noisy emptiness of learned phrase,
Their subtle fluids, impacts, essences,
Self-working tools, uncaused effects, and all
Those blind Omniscients, those Almighty Slaves,
Untenanting creation of its God. 35
But Properties are God: the naked mass
(If mass there be, fantastic guess or ghost)
Acts only by its inactivity.
Here we pause humbly. Others boldlier think
That as one body seems the aggregate 40
Of atoms numberless, each organized;
So by a strange and dim similitude
Infinite myriads of selfconscious minds
Are one all-conscious Spirit, which informs
With absolute ubiquity of thought 45
(His one eternal self-affirming act!)
All his involvéd Monads, that yet seem
With various province and apt agency
Each to pursue its own self-centering end.
Some nurse the infant diamond in the mine; 50
Some roll the genial juices through the oak;
Some drive the mutinous clouds to clash in air,
And rushing on the storm with whirlwind speed,
Yoke the red lightnings to their volleying car.
Thus these pursue their never-varying course, 55
No eddy in their stream. Others, more wild,
With complex interests weaving human fates,
Duteous or proud, alike obedient all,
Evolve the process of eternal good.
And what if some rebellious, o’er dark realms 60
Arrogate power? yet these train up to God,
And on the rude eye, unconfirmed for day,
Flash meteor-lights better than total gloom.
As ere from Lieule-Oaive’s vapoury head
The Laplander beholds the far-off Sun 65
Dart his slant beam on unobeying snows,
While yet the stern and solitary Night
Brooks no alternate
