Kindle a fiery boil upon the skin,

And putrefy the breath of blooming Health.
He calls for Famine, and the meagre fiend
Blows mildew from between his shrivell'd lips,
And taints the golden ear. He springs his mines,
And desolates a nation at a blast.

Forth steps the spruce Philosopher, and tells
Of homogeneal and discordant springs,
And principles; of causes, how they work
By necessary laws their sure effects

Of action and reaction: he has found

The source of the disease that nature feels,
And bids the world take heart and banish fear.
Thou fool! will thy discovery of the cause
Suspend the effect, or heal it? Has not God

Still wrought by means since first he made the world?
And did he not of old employ his means
To drown it? What is his creation less

Than a capacious reservoir of means,

Form'd for his use, and ready at his will?

Go, dress thine eyes with eye-salve; ask of Him,
Or ask of whomsoever he has taught;

And learn, though late, the genuine cause of all.

THE WOUNDED SPIRIT HEALED.

Task, ii. 161.

I was a stricken deer, that left the herd
Long since. With many an arrow deep infix'd
My panting side was charged, when I withdrew
To seek a tranquil death in distant shades.
There was I found by one who had himself
Been hurt by the archers. In his side he bore,
And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars.
With gentle force soliciting the darts,

He drew them forth, and heal'd, and bade me live.

TRUE PHILOSOPHY.

Philosophy, baptized

In the pure fountain of eternal love,

Has eyes indeed; and viewing all she sees
As meant to indicate a God to man,

Task, iii. 108.

Gives Him his praise, and forfeits not her own.
Learning has borne such fruit in other days
On all her branches: Piety has found

Friends in the friends of science, and true prayei
Has flow'd from lips wet with Castalian dews.
Such was thy wisdom, Newton, child-like sage!
Sagacious reader of the works of God,
And in His word sagacious. Such, too, thine,
Milton, whose genius had angelic wings,
And fed on manna! And such thine, in whom
Our British Themis gloried with just cause,
Immortal Hale! for deep discernment praised,
And sound integrity, not more than famed
For sanctity of manners undefiled.

Task, ill. 143.

THE GEOLOGIST AND COSMOLOGIST.1

Some drill and bore

The solid earth, and from the strata there
Extract a register, by which we learn
That he who made it and reveal'd its date
To Moses, was mistaken in its age.
Some, more acute and more industrious still,
Contrive creation; travel nature up

To the sharp peak of her sublimest height,
And tell us whence the stars; why some are fixt,
And planetary some; what gave them first.
Rotation, from what fountain flow'd their light.
Great contest follows, and much learned dust
Involves the combatants; each claiming truth,
And truth disclaiming both. And thus they spend
The little wick of life's poor shallow lamp
In playing tricks with nature, giving laws
To distant worlds, and trifling in their own.

SLAVERY.2

There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart;
It does not feel for man; the natural bond
Of brotherhood is sever'd, as the flax,
That falls asunder at the touch of fire.

He finds his fellow guilty of a skin

Not color'd like his own; and having power
T'enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Make enemies of nations, who had else
Like kindred drops been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;
And worse than all, and most to be deplored,

Task, iii. 150.

1 In the early history of geology many good and pious people were concerned, lest such discoveries should be made as would invalidate the Mosaic account of the creation. But how groundless have all their fears proved! Truth is one, and God's works can never be in conflict with his Word. Of the whole race of "spruce philosophers,” as Cowper calls them, even the infidel Voltaire could thus write: "Philosophers put themselves, without ceremony, in the place of God, and destroy and renew the world after their own fashion." "From the time of Buffon," says Dr. Wiseman, in his learned Lectures on Science and Revealed Religion, "system rose beside system, like the moving pillars of the desert, advancing in threatening array; but like them they were fabrics of sand; and though in 1806 the French Institute counted more than EIGHTY such theories of geology hostile to Scripture history, not one of them has stood till now, or deserves to be recorded." And Turner, in his learned work on Chemistry, says, "Of all the wonders of geology, none is so wonderful as the confidence of the several theorists."

2 Upon this and other pieces of Cowper, in behalf of the poor slave, the poet Campbell thus truthfully as well as feelingly remarks: "Poetical expositions of the horrors of slavery may, indeed, seem very unlikely agents in contributing to destroy it; and it is possible that the most refined planter in the West Indies, may look with neither shame nor compunction on his own image, ex~ posed in the pages of Cowper, as a being degraded by giving stripes and tasks to his fellow creatures. But such appeals to the heart of the community are not lost. They fix themselves silently in the popular memory, and they become, at last, a part of that public opinion, whien must, sooner o later, wrench the lash from the hand of the oppressor."-Specimens, vii. 364.

As human nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.
Then what is man? And what
And what man, seeing this,
And having human feelings, does not blush,
And hang his head, to think himself a man?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.
No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart's
Just estimation prized above all price,
I had much rather be myself the slave,

And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him.1

Task, li. 8.

KNOWLEDGE AND WISDOM.

Knowledge and Wisdom, far from being one,
Have ofttimes no connection, Knowledge dwells
In heads replete with thoughts of other men;
Wisdom in minds attentive to their own.
Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass,

The mere materials with which Wisdom builds,
Till smoothed, and squared, and fitted to its place,
Does but encumber whom it seems t' enrich.
Knowledge is proud that he has learn'd so much;
Wisdom is humble that he knows no more.

Task. vi. 88.

MERCY TO ANIMALS.

I would not enter on my list of friends,

(Though graced with polish'd manners and fine sense,

1 When Cowper wrote these lines, nearly a million of African slaves toiled in the British colonies. But the English abolitionists, led on by Sharpe, and Clarkson, and Wilberforce, so earnestly portrayed their wrongs and plead their cause, that the great heart of the nation became at length fully aroused to the subject, and they were declared absolutely and unconditionally free on the 1st of Au gust, 1838.

It was predicted that theft, and plunder, and murder, would be the consequence, and the 1st of August was anticipated by all with the most intense interest. It came and passed with all the solemnity of a Sabbath-day. The houses of worship were thronged the preceding evening, to wel· come the advent of Liberty, and as the clock tolled out the hour of midnight, the assembled populace bowed the knee in prayer and praise to the God who had bestowed it. Not a blow was struck in revenge-not an arm upraised in riot.

Ten years have now elapsed, and they have borne witness to the constant and rapid improvement of the freedmen. Their food, clothing, and furniture are much better: nearly every family has a horse or a mule, and very many have several. They are willing to work steadily for moderate wages, and most of them remain on the estates of their former masters. Many have purchased land, and it is estimated that there are now 20,000 freeholders among the emancipated peasantry of Jamaica alone. Marriage is now "honorable" among them; the parental relation is better understood, and its duties better performed; education is appreciated; and churches have multiplied. The freedmen contribute liberally towards sustaining the ministration of the gospel among themselves, and are already beginning to stretch out their hands, and to send forth their missionaries to their benighted fatherland. For these condensed facts I am indebted to Rev. C. S. Renshaw, for many years a de voted missionary among the freedmen in Jamaica.

Yet wanting sensibility,) the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail
That crawls at evening in the public path;
But he that has humanity, forewarn'd,
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight,
And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes,
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes

Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die:

A necessary act incurs no blame.

Not so when, held within their proper bounds,
And guiltless of offence, they range the air,
Or take their pastime in the spacious field.
There they are privileged; and he that hunts
Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong,
Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm,
Who, when she form'd, design'd them an abode.
The sum is this: If man's convenience, health,
Or safety interfere, his rights and claims
Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs.
Else they are all--the meanest things that are-
As free to live, and to enjoy that life,

As God was free to form them at the first,
Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all.
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too.

Task, vi. 560.

WAR.

Some seek diversion in the tented field,
And make the sorrows of mankind their sport.
But war's a game, which, were their subjects wise,
Kings should not play at. Nations would do well
To extort their truncheons from the puny hands
Of heroes, whose infirm and baby minds
Are gratified with mischief; and who spoil,
Because men suffer it, their toy, the world.

Task, v. 185.

LIBERTY.

'Tis liberty alone that gives the flower Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume;

And we are weeds without it. All constraint,
Except what wisdom lays on evil men,

Is evil; hurts the faculties, impedes

Their progress in the road of science; blinds
The eyesight of discovery; and begets,
In those that suffer it, a sordid mind

Bestial, a meagre intellect, unfit

To be the tenant of man's noble form.

Task, v. 448.

THE POST-BOY.

Hark! 'tis the twanging horn! o'er yonder bridge,
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood; in which the moon
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright:-
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,

With spatter'd boots, strapp'd waist, and frozen locks,
News from all nations lumbering at his back.
True to his charge, the close-pack'd load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destined inn;
And having dropp'd the expected bag, pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch,
Cold and yet cheerful: messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indifferent whether grief or joy.
Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks,
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears, that trickled down the writer's cheeks
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,

Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains,
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect

His horse and him, unconscious of them all.

Task, iv. i.

PLEASURES OF A WINTER EVENING.

Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round,
And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups,
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each,
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
Not such his evening, who with shining face
Sweats in the crowded theatre, and, squeezed

And bored with elbow points through both his sides,
Outscolds the ranting actor on the stage:

Nor his, who patient stands till his feet throb,
And his head thumps, to feed upon the breath

Of patriots, bursting with heroic rage,

Or placemen, all tranquillity and smiles.

This folio1 of four pages, happy work!
Which not even critics criticise; that holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read,

Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break
What is it but a map of busy life,

Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
Here runs the mountainous and craggy ridge
That tempts Ambition. On the summit see
The seals of office glitter in his eyes;
He climbs, he pants, he grasps them'
At his heels,
Close at his heels, a demagogue ascends,

1 The Newspaper.