Part I.

L END , O you heav'ns, unto my voice an ear,
And thou, O earth, what I shall utter, hear.
My words shall fall like dew, like April showers
On tender herbs and new-disclosed flowers,
While I the goodness of our God proclaim:
O celebrate His great and glorious Name!
Our Rock, Whose works are perfect. Justice leads,
And equal judgment walks the way He treads.
In Him unstain'd sincerity excells;
The God of Truth, in Whom no falsehood dwells:
But you are all corrupt, perverse; nor bear
Those marks about you which His children wear,
O fools! depriv'd of intellectual light!
Do you your Great Preserver thus requite?
Your Father, He who made you, did select
From all the world, and with His beauty deck't?
Remember, — ask the ancient, — they will tell
What in old times and ages past befell,
When the Most High did distribute the earth,
With liberal hand, to all of human birth.
When yet you were not, He, according to
Your num'rous race, design'd a seat for you.

Part II.

His people are His portion: Jacob is
Th' inheritance alone reserv'd for His.
He, when he wander'd through a desert land,
And in a horrid wilderness of sand,
Conducted, taught him His high mysteries,
And kept him as the apples of His Eyes.
As the old eagle on her eyrie spreads
Her fost'ring plumes, renews their downy beds,
Feeds, trains them for the flight, subdues their fears,
And on her soaring wings her eaglets bears;
So He sustain'd, so led him; He alone:
No stranger-gods to Israel then were known.
Whom like a horse the tow'ring mountains bore,
That those rich fields might feast him with their store.
With honey the hard rocks supplied his want,
And pure oil drill'd from cliffs of adamant.
Him with the milk of ewes, with butter fed,
With fat of lambs, and rams in Bashan bred.
With flesh of goats, with wheat's pure kernels fill'd,
And drank the blood which from the grape distill'd.

Part III.

But Jesurun grew fat; kick'd like a horse
Full of high feeding and untamed force;
Forsook his God, Who made, sustain'd, adorn'd,
And That strong Rock of his salvation scorn'd.
With barbarous gods and execrable rites,
His jealousy and wrath at once excites.
To devils they profanely sacrific'd;
Gods made with hands before their Maker priz'd;
Gods brought from foreign nations, strange and new;
Gods which their ancestors nor fear'd nor knew.
Their Father, their firm Rock, remember'd not,
And Him Who had created them forgot.
This having seen with burning eyes, the Lord
His daughters and degen'rate sons abhorr'd:
Said, From these rebels I will hide My Face,
And see the end of this unfaithful race.
Since they with gods, that are but gods in name,
My Soul with so great jealousy inflame,
And through their vanities My wrath incense,
I by the like will punish their offence,
Their glory to an unknown nation grant,
And in their room a foolish people plant.

Part IV.

A fire is kindled in My wrath, which shall
Ev'n in the depth of hell devour them all;
Polluted earth, with her productions, burn,
And airy mountains into ashes turn.
One misery another shall invite,
And all My arrows in their bosoms light.
Famine shall eat them, hot diseases burn,
And all by violent deaths to earth return.
The teeth of savage beasts their blood shall spill,
And serpents with their fatal poison kill.
The sword without, and home-bred terrors, shall
Devour their lives, their youth untimely fall.
Betrothed virgins, such as stoop with age,
And sucking babes, shall sink beneath My rage.
Scatter I would, like chaff by tempests blown,
Nor should their memory to man be known,
If not withheld by their insulting foe,
Lest he should triumph in their overthrow,
And boasting say: This our own hands have done;
Our swords, the gods which have their battle won.

Part V.

A nation which hath no intelligence,
Uncapable of counsel, void of sense,
O! that My words could to their hearts descend,
To make them wise and think of their last end!
How would one man a thousand put to flight,
And two a myriad overthrow in fight!
But that their Strength hath sold them to their foes,
And left them naked to their deadly blows.
For, though our enemies should judge, their pow'rs
Are faint to His; their rock no rock to ours.
Their vine of Sodom, of Gomorrah's fields,
Which grapes of gall and bitter clusters yields.
Poison of dragons is their deadly wine,
To which cold asps their drowsy venom join.
Is not all this unto My sight reveal'd?
Laid up in store, and with My signet seal'd?
To Me belongs revenge and recompense,
Which I will in the time decreed dispense.
The day is near which their destruction brings,
And punishment now flies with speedy wings.

Part VI.

God will His people judge, at length relent,
And of His servants' miseries repent,
Then, when they are of all their pow'r bereft,
No strength, no hope of human succour left,
And say: Where are the gods of your defence,
Those rocks of your presuming confidence,
Whose flaming altars ye so often fed
With fat of beeves, and wine profusely shed?
Now let them from their crowned banquets rise,
And shield you from your furious enemies.
Behold! I am your God: I, only I,
Assisted by no foreign deity.
I kill, revive; I wound and heal; no hand
Or pow'r of mortals can My strength withstand.
I, to the heav'ns I made, My arms extend;
Pronounce, I ever was, and have no end.
Whet I My glitt'ring sword, if I advance
My Hand in judgment, woes past utterance,
And vengeance equal to their merits, shall
Upon My foes, and those who hate Me, fall.
The hungry sword shall eat their flesh like food,
My thirsty arrows shall be drunk with blood.
For captives slain, and for the blood they spilt,
I will with horror recompence their guilt.
You wiser nations with His people joy,
For He will all their enemies destroy,
His servants vindicate from their proud foe,
And to their land and them His mercy show.