NIGHT THE FIRST.

ON

Life, Death, & Immortality.

HUMBLY INSCRIB'D

To the RIGHT HONOURABLE

ARTHUR ONSLOW, Efq;

SPEAKER of the House of COMMONS.

THE

COMPLAINT.

NIGHT the FIRST.

I R'D nature's fweet reftorer, balmy Sleep!
He, like the world, his ready vifit pays

Where Fortune fmiles; the wretched he
forfakes:

Swift on his downy pinion flies from Woe,
And lights on lids unfully'd with a Tear.

From fhort (as ufual) and disturb'd Repose, I wake: How happy they who wake no more! Yet that were vain, if Dreams infest the Grave. I wake, emerging from a fea of Dreams

Tumul

Tumultuous; where my wreck'd,defponding thought From wave to wave of fancy'd Misery,

At random drove, her helm of Reason loft;

Tho' now reftor'd, 'tis only Change of pain,
A bitter change; feverer for severe :

The Day too fhort for my diftrefs! and Night
Even in the Zenith of her dark Domain,
Is Sunshine, to the colour of my Fate.

Night, fable Goddefs! from her Ebon throne, In rayless Majefty, now ftretches forth

Her leaden Scepter o'er a flumbering world:
Silence, how dead? and Darkness how profound ?

Nor Eye, nor lift'ning Ear an Object finds;
Creation fleeps. 'Tis, as the general Pulse

Of Life stood still, and Nature made a Pause;

An aweful paufe! prophetic of her End.
And let her prophecy be foon fulfill'd;

Fate! drop the Curtain; I can lofe no more.

Silence,

Silence, and Darkness! folemn Sifters! Twins From antient Night, who nurse the tender Thought

To Reason, and on Reafon build Refolve, (That column of true Majesty in Man)

Affift me: I will thank you in the Grave;

fall

The grave, your Kingdom: There this frame fhall A victim facred to your dreary shrine.

But what are Ye? Thou, who didft put to flight Primæval Silence, when the Morning-Stars Exulting, fhouted o'er the rifing Ball;

O thou! whofe Word from folid Darkness ftruck That fpark, the Sun; ftrike Wisdom from my foul; My foul which flies to thee, her Truft, her Treasure: As mifers to their Gold, while others reft.

Thro' this Opaque of Nature, and of Soul, This double Night, tranfmit one pitying ray, To lighten, and to chear: O lead my Mind, (A Mind that fain would wander from its Woe,)

Lead