Page:Redemption, a Poem.djvu/285

 KEDEMPTION. 279

Devise and execute, reckless of shame,

Or damning ruin on my head rain'd down.

How shall I hide me from his wrathful face?

Or whither fly t' escape his kindling eye?

Earth hath no glen so wild, no waste so drear,

Nor ocean's depths a deep so dark, that hid

Within it, I his vengeful arm may shun.

Could I this state of being 'scape what then ?

Would that the hell which in me burns forefend ?

Or still the worm which at my vitals knaws ?

Would 't ease my soul, with serrate fangs infix' d

Of dire remorse, fell sequence of the deed ?

Vain, empty hope ! that naught the wretched cheers ;

Unless with death, all being were dissolved.

Happy extreme ! but conscience tells me nay ;

Who not himself hath made, cannot destroy;

And who hath made, doth not this boon confer.

Life, here or elsewhere then, is one to me ;

A life of torturing, unconsuming fire,

Of keen remorse, of woful, wild despair.

Life ? death ! a living death, and I foraye,

Must in my guilty consciousness abide,

Think what I might have been, contrast what am.

Come, friendly tree, thou sole my solace art,

And Aman's fate, as promised, now is mine ;

No room for penance can to me remain,

And worse than in me burns no hell can be."

Whilst thus perdition's son completes his guilt, And thrusts his soul before the Judge unbid, The sacred Victim, dragg'd to Pilate's bar, In silence hears his mad accusers plead, And him consign to malefactor's doom ;

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