Oh, popular applause! what heart of man Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms? The wisest and the best feel urgent need Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales; But swelled into a gust—who then, alas! With all his canvas set, and inexpert, And therefore heedless, can withstand thy power? Praise from the riveled lips of toothless, bald Decrepitude, and in the looks of lean And craving poverty, and in the bow Respectful of the smutched artificer, Is oft too welcome, and may much disturb The bias of the purpose. How much more, Poured forth by beauty splendid and polite, In language soft as adoration breathes? Ah, spare your idol! think him human still; Charms he may have, but he has frailties too; Dote not too much, nor spoil what ye admire. All truth is from the sempiternal source Of light divine. But Egypt, Greece, and Rome Drew from the stream below. More favoured, we Drink, when we choose it, at the fountain head. To them it flowed much mingled and defiled With hurtful error, prejudice, and dreams Illusive of philosophy, so called, But falsely. Sages after sages strove, In vain, to filter off a crystal draught Pure from the lees, which often more enhanced The thirst than slaked it, and not seldom bred Intoxication and delirium wild. In vain they pushed inquiry to the birth And spring-time of the world; asked, Whence is man? Why formed at all? and wherefore as he is? Where must he find his Maker? With what rites Adore Him? Will He hear, accept, and bless? Or does He sit regardless of His works? Has man within him an immortal seed? Or does the tomb take all? If he survive His ashes, where? and in what weal or woe? Knots worthy of solution, which alone A Deity could solve. Their answers vague, And all at random, fabulous and dark, Left them as dark themselves. Their rules of life, Defective and unsanctioned, proved too weak To bind the roving appetite, and lead Blind nature to a God not yet revealed. ’Tis Revelation satisfies all doubts, Explains all mysteries, except her own, And so illuminates the path of life, That fools discover it, and stray no more. Now tell me, dignified and sapient sir, My man of morals, nurtured in the shades Of Academus, is this false or true? Is Christ the abler teacher, or the schools? If Christ, then why resort at every turn To Athens or to Rome for wisdom short Of man’s occasions, when in Him reside Grace, knowledge, comfort, an unfathomed store? How oft when Paul has served us with a text, Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully, preached! Men that, if now alive, would sit content And humble learners of a Saviour’s worth, Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth, Their thirst of knowledge, and their candour too.