O Christian, whose chastened curiosity loveth things mysterious, Accounting them shadows and eclipses of Him the one great light, Look now, satisfied with faith, on minds that judge by sense, And, dull from contemplating matter, take small heed of spirit. Toiling feebly upward, their argument tracketh from below, They catch the latest consequent, and prove the nearest cause: What is this? that a seed produced a seed, and so for a thousand seasons; Ascend a thousand steps, thy ladder leaveth thee in air: Thou canst not climb to God, and short of Him is nothing; There is no cause for aught we see, but in His present will. Begin from the Maker, thou carriest down His attributes to reptiles, The sharded beetle and the lizard live and move in Him: Begin from the creature, corruption and infirmity mar thy foolish toil, Heap Ossa on Olympus, how much art thou nearer to the stars? It is easy running from a mountain's top down to the valleys at its foot, But difficult and steep the laborious ascent, and feebly shalt thou reach it: Yet man, beginning from himself, that first deluding mystery, Hopeth from the pit of lies to struggle up to truth; So, taxing knowledge to its strength, he pusheth one step further, And fancieth complacently that much is done by reaching a remote effect: Then he maketh answer to himself, as a silly nurse to her little one, Evading, in a mist of words, hard things he cannot solve; Till, like an ostrich in the desert, he burieth his head in atoms, Thinking that, if he is blind, no sun can shine in heaven. Therefore cometh it to pass, that an atheist is ever the most credulous, Snatching at any foolish cause, that may dispel his doubts; And, even as it were for ridicule, a spectacle for men and angels, The captious and cautious unbeliever is of all men weakest to believe: Cut from the anchorage of God, his bark is a plaything of the billows; The compass of his principle is broken, the rudder of his faith unshipped: Chance and Fate, in a stultified antagonism, govern all for him; Truth sprang from the conflict of falsities, and the multitude of accidents hath bred design! Where is the imposture so gross, that shall not entrap his curiosity? What superstition is so abject, that it doth not blanch his cheek? Whereof can he be sure, with whom Chaos is substitute for Order? How should his silly structure stand, a pyramid built upon its apex?-- Yea, I have seen grey-headed men, the bastard slips of science, Go for light to glow-worms, while they scorn the sun at noon: Men, who fear no God, trembling at a gipsy's curse, Men, who jest at revelation, clinging to a madman's prophecy!