Bacchanalia :: :: University of Virginia Library

Now these mad Hurricanes are over-blown,
In cooler thoughts, Consider what y' h' done.
Think, each of you this day has kil'd a Man,
Stabbing, with Murd'rous Hand,
That noble Reason, by which Mortals are
Most like their Maker, and do bear
Their Great Creator's Superscription.

Think of your ruin'd Health. See! your own Blood
Flies in your guilty Face: as if she wou'd
Now tell you, to your Head, 'Tis you alone,
But whom she's scorch't, disordred, and undone.

Think of those Hours consum'd in sordid Vice,
Those Golden Sands, that run in vain,
(Lusts Measure made and Sacrifice)
Those winged Hours, that n'ere return again.

Think of that abused Wealth,
Due to your Families, or the Poor;
Think how you swallow, in each Drunken Health,
The Widows Tears, and starved Orphans Goar,

Think of your Bankrupt Reputation;
Each Ear abhors your more than brutish Name;
More dirty than the dirt you tread upon.
Your very Vomit stinks not, like your Fame.

Think, lastly, on the Worlds great Doom,
When guilty Souls must to an Audit come.
A far more heavy Reckoning, then e're
You met with here.
More true by far, and yet far more severe.

Think on All this: and think on't soberly,
And then, perhaps you'l say, as well as I,
Your Mirth is Madness: Wine is Poison fell:
Your Paradise is Bedlam; if not Hell.