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 | The complete works, poetry and prose, of the Rev. Edward Young prefixed, a life of the author, by John Doran ... With eight illustrations on steel, and a portrait. In two volumes |  |
Reason progressive, Instinct is complete:
Swift Instinct leaps; slow Reason feebly climbs.
Brutes soon their zenith reach; their little all
Flows in at once; in ages they no more
Could know, or do, or covet, or enjoy.
Were man to live coëval with the sun,
The patriarch pupil would be learning still;
Yet, dying, leave his lesson half unlearnt.
Men perish in advance, as if the sun
Should set ere noon, in eastern oceans drown'd;
If fit, with dim ILLUSTRIOUS to compare,
The sun's meridian with the soul of man.
To man why, step-dame Nature, so severe?
Why thrown aside thy master-piece half-wrought,
While meaner efforts thy last hand enjoy?
Or, if abortively poor man must die,
Nor reach what reach he might, why die in dread?
Why cursed with foresight, wise to misery?
Why of his proud prerogative the prey?
Why less pre-eminent in rank than pain?
His immortality alone can tell;
Full ample fund to balance all amiss,
And turn the scale in favour of the just!
Swift Instinct leaps; slow Reason feebly climbs.
Brutes soon their zenith reach; their little all
Flows in at once; in ages they no more
Could know, or do, or covet, or enjoy.
Were man to live coëval with the sun,
The patriarch pupil would be learning still;
Yet, dying, leave his lesson half unlearnt.
Men perish in advance, as if the sun
Should set ere noon, in eastern oceans drown'd;
If fit, with dim ILLUSTRIOUS to compare,
119
To man why, step-dame Nature, so severe?
Why thrown aside thy master-piece half-wrought,
While meaner efforts thy last hand enjoy?
Or, if abortively poor man must die,
Nor reach what reach he might, why die in dread?
Why cursed with foresight, wise to misery?
Why of his proud prerogative the prey?
Why less pre-eminent in rank than pain?
His immortality alone can tell;
Full ample fund to balance all amiss,
And turn the scale in favour of the just!
| The complete works, poetry and prose, of the Rev. Edward Young prefixed, a life of the author, by John Doran ... With eight illustrations on steel, and a portrait. In two volumes | |