Page:The white doe of Rylstone - or, The fate of the Nortons. A poem (IA whitedoeofrylsto00wordrich).pdf/13

  “Weak is the will of Man, his judgement blind; “Remembrance persecutes, and Hope betrays; “Heavy is woe;—and joy, for human kind, “A mournful thing, so transient is the blaze!”— Thus might he paint our lot of mortal days Who wants the glorious faculty, assigned To elevate the more-than-reasoning Mind, And colour life’s dark cloud with orient rays. Imagination is that sacred power, Imagination lofty and refined: ’Tis her’s to pluck the amaranthine Flower Of Faith, and round the Sufferer’s temples bind Wreaths that endure affliction’s heaviest shower, And do not shrink from sorrow’s keenest wind.

“They that deny a God, destroy Man's nobility: for certainly Man is of kinn to the Beasts by his Body; and if he be not of kinn to God by his Spirit, he is a base ignoble Creature. It destroys likewise Magnanimity, and the raising of humane Nature: for take an example of a Dogg, and mark what a generosity and courage he will put on, when he finds himself maintained by a Man, who to him is instead of a God, or Melior Natura. Which courage is manifestly such, as that Creature without that confidence of a better Nature than his own, could never attain. So Man, when he resteth and assureth himself upon Divine protection and favour, gathereth a force and faith which human Nature in itself could not obtain.”