As if an angel spoke,
I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright,
It is the knell of my departed hours.
Where are they? with the years beyond the flood!
It is the signal that demands dispatch:
How much is to be done! My hopes and fears
Start up alarm'd, and o'er life's narrow verge
Look down--on what? A fathomless abyss!
A dread eternity! How surely mine!
And can eternity belong to me,
Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour?
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august,
How complicate, how wonderful is man!
How passing wonder He who made him such!
Who center'd in our make such strange extremes--
From different natures, marvellously mix'd:
Connexion exquisite! of distant worlds
Distinguish'd link in being's endless chain!
Midway from nothing to the Deity;
A beam ethereal--sullied and absorpt!
Though sullied and dishonour'd, still divine!
Dim miniature of greatness absolute!
An heir of glory! a frail child of dust!
Helpless immortal! insect infinite!
A worm! a god! I tremble at myself,
And in myself am lost. At home a stranger.
Thought wanders up and down, surprised, aghast,
And wondering at her own.
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