Page:The Carcanet.djvu/197



LINES SAID TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY LOUD BYRON IN HIS BIBLE.

Within this awful volume lies The mystery of mysteries. Oh ! happiest they of human race To whom our God has given grace To hear, to read, to fear, to pray, To lift the latch and force the way; But better had they ne'er been born, Who read to doubt, or read to scorn.

Methinks if ye would know

How visitations of calamity

Affect the pious soul, 'tis shown ye here !

Look yonder at that cloud which, thro' the sky

Sailing along, doth cross in her career

The rolling moon ! I watched it as it came,

And deem'd the deep opake would blot her beams;

But, melting like a wreath of snow, it hangs

In folds of wavy silver round, and clothes

The orb with richer beauties than her own;

Then passing, leaves her in her light serene ! Southey.

If misery be the effect of virtue, it ought to be reverenced; if of ill fortune, to be pitied; and if of vice, not to be insulted, because it is perhaps itself a punishment adequate to the crime by which it was produced; and the humanity of that man can deserve no panegyric, who is capable of reproaching a criminal in the hands of the executioner. Johnson.