The poetical works of James Montgomery :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Diamond, in its native bed,
Hid like a buried star may lie,
Where foot of man must never tread,
Seen only by its Maker's eye:
And though imbued with beams to grace
His fairest work in woman's face,
Darkling, its fire may fill the void,
Where fix'd at first in solid night,
Nor, till the world shall be destroy'd,
Sparkle one moment into light.

The Plant, upspringing from the seed,
Expands into a perfect flower;
The virgin-daughter of the mead,
Woo'd by the sun, the wind, the shower:
In loveliness beyond compare,
It toils not, spins not, knows no care;
Train'd by the secret hand, that brings
All beauty out of waste and rude,
It blooms its season, dies, and flings
Its germs abroad in solitude.

Almighty skill, in ocean's caves,
Lends the light Nautilus a form
To tilt along the Atlantic waves,
Fearless of rock, or shoal, or storm;
But, should a breath of danger sound,
With sails quick furl'd it dives profound,

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And far beneath the tempest's path,
In coral grots, defies the foe,
That never brake, in heaviest wrath,
The sabbath of the deep below.

Up from his dream, on twinkling wings,
The Sky-lark soars amid the dawn;
Yet, while in Paradise he sings,
Looks down upon the quiet lawn,
Where flutters, in his little nest,
More love than music e'er express'd;
Then, though the Nightingale may thrill
The soul with keener ecstasy,
The merry bird of morn can fill
All Nature's bosom with his glee.

The Elephant, embower'd in woods,
Coeval with their trees might seem,
As though he drank from Indian floods
Life in a renovating stream:
Ages o'er him have come and fled;
Midst generations of the dead,
His bulk survives to feed and range,
Where ranged and fed of old his sires;
Nor knows advancement, lapse, or change,
Beyond their walks, till he expires.

Gem, flower, and fish, the bird, the brute,
Of every kind occult or known
(Each exquisitely form'd to suit
Its humble lot, and that alone),
Through ocean, earth, and air fulfil,
Unconsciously, their Maker's will,
Who gave, without their toil or thought,
Strength, beauty, instinct, courage, speed;
While through the whole his pleasure wrought
Whate'er his wisdom had decreed.

But Man, the master-piece of God,
Man, in his Maker's image framed,—
Though kindred to the valley's clod,
Lord of this low creation named,—
In naked helplessness appears,
Child of a thousand griefs and fears:
To labour, pain, and trouble born,
Weapon, nor wing, nor sleight hath he;
Yet, like the sun, he brings his morn,
And is a king from infancy.

For, him no destiny hath bound
To do what others did before,
Pace the same dull perennial round,
And be a man, and be no more:
A man?—a self-will'd piece of earth,
Just as the lion is, by birth;
To hunt his prey, to wake, to sleep,
His father's joys and sorrows share,
His niche in Nature's temple keep,
And leave his likeness in his heir!—

No: infinite the shades between
The motley millions of our race;
No two, the changing moon hath seen
Alike in purpose, or in face:
Yet all aspire beyond their fate;
The least, the meanest, would be great;
The mighty future fills the mind
That pants for more than earth can give:
Man, to this narrow sphere confined,
Dies when he but begins to live.

Oh! if there be no world on high
To yield his powers unfetter'd scope;
If man be only born to die,
Whence this inheritance of hope?
Wherefore to him alone were lent
Riches that never can be spent?
Enough, not more, to all the rest,
For life and happiness, was given;
To Man, mysteriously unblest,
Too much for any state but heaven.

It is not thus;—it cannot be,
That one so gloriously endow'd
With views that reach eternity,
Should shine and vanish like a cloud:
Is there a God?—all Nature shows
There is,—and yet no mortal knows:
The mind that could this truth conceive,
Which brute sensation never taught,
No longer to the dust would cleave,
But grow immortal with the thought.

1819.