University of Virginia Library

But whence they came, even more than what they were,
Awaken'd wonder, and defied conjecture:
Blank wonder could not satisfy his soul,
And resolute conjecture would not yield,
Though foil'd a thousand times, in speculation
On themes that open'd immortality.
The gods whom his deluded countrymen
Acknowledged, were no gods to him; he scorn'd
The impotence of skill that carved such figures,
And pitied the fatuity of those
Who saw not in the abortions of their hands
The abortions of their minds.—'Twas the Creator
He sought through every volume open to him,
From the small leaf that holds an insect's web,
From which ere long a colony shall issue
With wings and limbs as perfect as the eagle's,
To the stupendous ocean, that gives birth
And nourishment to everlasting millions
Of creatures, great and small, beyond the power
Of man to comprehend how they exist.
One thought amidst the multitude within him
Press'd with perpetual, with increasing, weight;
And yet the elastic soul beneath its burden
Wax'd strong and stronger, was enlarged, exalted,
With the necessity of bearing up
Against annihilation,—for that seem'd
The only refuge were this hope foregone.
It was as though he wrestled with an angel,
And would not let him go without a blessing,
If not extort the secret of his name.
This was that thought, that hope:—dumb idols,
And the vain homage of their worshippers,
Were proofs to him, not less than sun and stars,
That there were beings mightier far than man,
Or man had never dream'd of aught above him.
'Twas clear to him as was his own existence,
In which he felt the fact personified,
That man himself was for this world too mighty,
Possessing powers which could not ripen here,
But ask'd infinity to bring them forth,
And find employ for their unbounded scope.