NOAH.

BOOK THE FOURTH.

MONOTONY! the sickness of the soul!
When mellow'd by time's distillations deep,
It fills the eye with dire morbidity!

Torments the thoughts with visions unrepaid!
Distracts the brain with sad disguis'd conceits!
Strips from keen reason half her drapery!
Unlocks the chamber of despair! breaks off
The bolt from sanity's vast massy gate!
Chains discord to the seat of unity!
0. Breaks all the ties of social interchange!
Robs of its lawful prey the heart's desire!
Bullies the inmates of fair peace's shrine!
Turns the head giddy that would study right!
And drives the man, the universal man,

To madness, very madness, pain, and death!

I

O nature, parent of variety!

Sing to the God that form'd thee not all green,

All white, all yellow, but with matchless dyes
Color'd thy surface: and sweet interchange
20. Unyok'd to fluctuation, on thy front
Wrote, as with iron pen!

As in the physical, e'en so it is
Upon the moral pathway of resort,

The eye finds objects many, rare, and choice,
On which t'expatiate! and when o'erpower'd
By the bright sun-beam darting from the sky,
It then can plunge in th'ocean for relief! Į
Air, earth, and water, pregnant are with life!!
They live for man! and even in the fire

30. The red hot burning embers burn for man!

Disease gives novelty; and that's new life!
The vale of death is not without a flow'r!-
A tall, lank, whity flow'r that runs to seed,
But blossoms in the spring-tide of a year
Whose spring is ever,-ever, and to come!
Each clod of clay is pliant, and doth yield

Its docile tendons to the human touch!

So each new object upon which we gaze,

Accommodates to vision its contour,

40. And while it cheers, relieves the eye long strain'd By gazing on the scene it last observ'd!

The vilest rebels that ere trod the soil,

Know the great truth, that sameness is not good, And change they ask for, change, change, only change!

Ah! clumsy text for rebel-minded men!

44. And change, &c.—Truth, in its essentiality, is immutable! Truth, in its distributive praxis, is settled, but not monotonous. To discover the distinction between a fixed principle, and its practical bearings upon external objects, should be the ardent endeavour of those who, grown tired of old associations, old customs, old laws, old governments, and old duties, are wearing out their best energies in hankering after new ones. We are told, with respect to the All-perfect Being, that "with him his no variableness, neither shadow of turning ;" and the wise man exhorts us to "meddle not with them that are given to change." Notwithstanding this admonition, the disorders of our social system sometimes render change both necessary and desirable. Be the rule, then, never to admit it into our commonwealth, except it come riding upon a gaunt and stubborn must-be! States, like men and women, when they sicken or become infirm, are fit patients for the chirurgic blade of medication, but should never be delivered over to the quackeries of unskilful turnabouts.

Ah! cumbrous watch-word for unhallow'd

mouths!

Now through the streets six ragged rogues proceed,

* And cry aloud, "old Noah is gone mad;→→

He's now employ'd in making what he terms 50. An ark! God having bidden him, he says, To do so! and to-morrow noon appoints

To preach to utter to the world aloud/

(E'en to as many as will come to hear,)

Heav'n's wrath against the wicked! Furthermore

He tells us that ere long a dreadful flood

Of water unabateable shall fall

In ceaseless torrents, and drown man and

beast,

Savé but so many as repenting go

Into the ark, the only refuge left!" and 60. And now a thousand trumpets thro' the air

Resound, all blown by Noah's messengers !

The trumpets cease! and straight the blowers raise

f

Their voices high, and shout the self-same tale
As the six ragged rogues just told before!
Men, women, children, rush from out their
homes:

The strange report on ev'ry breath is borne,
That Noah's mad! Not one believes that God
Hath spoken to the Patriarch, or said,

"Build thee an ark, according to my word!" 70. And now with one consent the rebels haste, (Not with the soldiers' upright march of war, But in detachments, here, lo, ten,there five, A little further on a dozen more;) Unan'mously the crowds rush headlong on

H

(Hundreds and thousands) to "dear Odin's!"

house!

Odin receives them with a louder shout

Than e'er before he welcom❜d them. “All hail!— Good morn, brave friends, good morn, I greet ye well!

Noddle and Muddiduck, (mankind's best

friends,)