The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. Containing, besides his Sermons, and Essays on miscellaneous subjects, several additional pieces, Selected from his Manuscripts by the Rev. Dr. Jennings, and the Rev. Dr. Doddridge, in 1753: to which are prefixed, memoirs of the life of the author, compiled by the Rev. George Burder. In six volumes |
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True Learning.
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 | The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. |  |
True Learning.
Partly imitated from a French Sonnet of Mr. Poiret.
I
Happy the feet that shining truth has ledWith her own hand to tread the path she please,
To see her native lustre round her spread,
Without a veil, without a shade,
All beauty, and all light, as in herself she is.
II
Our senses cheat us with the pressing croudsOf painted shapes they thrust upon the mind:
The truth they show lies wrapp'd in sev'nfold shrouds,
Our senses cast a thousand clouds
On unenlighten'd souls, and leave them doubly blind.
III
I hate the dust that fierce disputers raise,And lose the mind in a wild maze of thought:
What empty triflings, and what subtle ways
To fence and guard by rule and rote!
Our God will never charge us, that we knew them not.
IV
Touch, heav'nly Word, O touch these curious souls;Since I have heard but one soft hint from thee,
From all the vain opinions of the schools
(That pageantry of knowing fools)
I feel my powers releas'd, and stand divinely free.
V
'Twas this Almighty Word that all things made,He grasps whole nature in his single hand;
All the eternal truths in him are laid,
The ground of all things, and their head,
The circle where they move, and centre where they stand.
VI
Without his aid I have no sure defence,From troops of errors that besiege me round;
But he that rests his reason and his sense
Fast here, and never wanders hence,
Unmoveable he dwells upon unshaken ground.
VII
Infinite truth, the life of my desires,Come from the sky, and join thyself to me;
I'm tir'd with hearing, and this reading tires;
But never tir'd of telling thee,
'Tis thy fair face alone my spirit burns to see.
VIII
Speak to my soul, alone, no other handShall mark my path out with delusive art;
All nature silent in his presence stand,
Creatures be dumb at his command,
And leave his single voice to whisper to my heart.
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IX
Retire, my soul, within thyself retire,Away from every sense and every outward show:
Now let my thoughts to loftier themes aspire,
My knowledge now on wheels of fire
May mount and spread above, surveying all below.
X
The Lord grows lavish of his heav'nly light,And pours whole floods on such a mind as this:
Fled from the eyes she gains a piercing sight,
She dives into the infinite,
And sees unutterable things in that unknown abyss.
| The Works of the Reverend and Learned Isaac Watts, D. D. | |