A Collection of Miscellanies Consisting of Poems, Essays, Discourses & Letters, Occasionally Written. By John Norris ... The Second Edition Corrected |
 |
A divine Hymn on the Creation.
|
 | A Collection of Miscellanies |  |
83
A divine Hymn on the Creation.
I
Awake my Lyre, and thy sweet forces joynWith me to sing an Hymn divine,
Let both our Strains in pleasing numbers flow,
But see, thy strings with tediousness and pain
Arise into a tuneful strain,
How can'st thou silent lye?
The Universe is Harmony,
Awake, and move by sympathy,
My heart's already tuned, O why art thou so slow!
II
Jehovah is our Theme, th' eternal King,Whose Praise admiring Angels sing,
They see with steddy and attentive eyes
His naked Beauties, and from Vision raise
To wondrous heights their Love and Praise.
We Mortals only view
His Back-parts, and that darkly too,
We must fall short, what shall we do,
But neither too can they up to his grandeur rise.
III
No power can justly praise him but must beAs great, as infinite as he,
He comprehends his boundless self alone,
Created minds too shallow are and dim
His works to fathom, much more him.
Our Praise at height will be
Short by a whole Infinity,
Of his all glorious Deity,
He cannot have the full, and stands in need of none.
84
IV
He can't be less, nor can he more receive,But stands on fix'd Superlative.
He's in himself compendiously blest;
We, acted by the Weights of strong desire,
To good without our selves aspire,
We're always moving hence
Like lines from the Circumference
To some more in-lodg'd excellence.
But he is one unmov'd self-center'd Point of Rest.
V
Why then, if full of Bliss that ne're could cloy,Would he do ought but still enjoy?
Why not indulge his self-sufficing state,
Live to himself at large, calm and secure,
A wise eternal Epicure?
Why six days work, to frame
A Monument of Praise and Fame
To him whose Bliss is still the same?
What need the wealthy Coin, or he that's Blest Create?
VI
Almighty Love the fairest Gem that shoneAll-round, and half made up his Throne,
His Favorite and darling excellence,
Whom oft he would his Royal vertue stile,
And view with a peculiar Smile,
Love moved him to create
Beings that might participate
Of their Creator's happy state,
And that good which he could not heighten, to dispence.
85
VII
How large thy Empire, Love, how great thy Sway!Omnipotence does thee obey.
What complicated Wonders in thee shine!
He that t' infinity it self is great
Has one way to be greater yet;
Love will the method shew,
'Tis to impart; what is't that thou
O Soveraign Passion can'st not do?
Thou mak'st Divinity it self much more divine.
VIII
With pregnant love full-fraught, the great Three-one.Would now no longer be alone.
Love, gentle Love unlockt his fruitful Breast
And 'woke th' Ideas which there dormant lay,
Awak'd their Beauties they display,
Th' Almighty smil'd to see
The comely Form and Harmony
Of his eternal Imag'ry;
He saw 'twas good and fair, and th' infant Platform blest.
IX
Ye Seeds of Being, in whose fair Bosoms dwellThe Forms of all things possible;
Arise, and your Prolific force display;
Let a fair Issue in your Moulds be cast
To fill in part this empty waste.
He spake. The empty space
Immediately in Travel was
And soon brought forth a formless mass,
First matter came undress'd, she made such haste t' obey.
86
X
But soon a Plastick Spirit did fermentThe liquid dusky element.
The Mass harmoniously begins to move,
Let there be Light, said God, 'twas said and done,
The Mass dipt through with brightness shone.
Nature was pleas'd to see
This feature of Divinity,
Th' Almighty smil'd as well as she,
He own'd his likeness there, and did his First-born love.
XI
But lo, I see a goodly frame arise,Vast folding Orbs, and azure skies,
With lucid whirle-pools the vast Arch does shine,
The Sun by day shews to each world his light,
The Stars stand sentinel by night.
In midst of all is spread
That ponderous bulk whereon we tread,
But where is its foundation laid?
'Tis pompous all and great, and worthy hands divine.
XII
Thy Temple's built great God, but where is heThat must admire both it and thee?
Ope one Scene more my Muse, bless and adore,
See there in solemn Councel and debate
The great divine Triumvirate.
The rest one Word obey'd,
'Twas done almost before 'twas said;
But Man was not so cheaply made,
To make the world was great, but t' epitomize it more.
87
XIII
Th' accomplish'd work stands his severe reviewWhose Judgment's most exactly true.
In Nature's Book were no Errata's found,
All things are good, said God, they answer well
Th' Ideas which within me dwell;
Th' Angelick voices join
Their Praise to the Applause divine,
The Morning Stars in Hymns combine,
And as they sung and play'd, the jocant Orbs danc't round.
XIV
With this thy Quire divine, great God I bringMy Eucharistick Offering.
I cannot here sing more exalted layes,
But what's defective now I will supply
When I enjoy thy Deity.
Then may'st thou sleep my Lyre,
I shall not then thy help require,
Diviner thoughts will then me fire
Than thou tho play'd on by an Angels hand, canst raise.
| A Collection of Miscellanies | |