TO THE COMET, 1811.

Comet! who from yon’ dusky sky

Dart'st o'er a shrinking world thy fiery eye,

Scattering from thy burning train

Diffusive terror o'er the earth and main;

What high behest dost thou perform

Of Heaven's Almighty Lord? what coming storm

Of war or woe does thy etherial flame

To thoughtless man proclaim?

Dost thou commissioned shine

The silent harbinger of wrath divine?

Or does thy unprophetic fire

Thro’ the wide realms of solar day

Mad Heat or purple Pestilence inspire?

Thro’ all her lands, Earth trembles at thy ray;

And starts, as she beholds thee sweep

With fiery wing Air's far-illumined deep.

The Eternal gave command, and from afar,

From realms unbless'd with heat or light,

The mournful kingdoms of perpetual Night,

Unvisited but by thy glowing car,—

Radiant and clear as when thy course begun,

Swift as the flame that fires th'etherial blue,

Thro’ the wide system, like a sun,

Thy moving glories flew.

Thou shinest terrific to the guilty soul!

But not to him, who calmly brave

Spurns earthly terror's base control,

And dares the yawning grave:

To one superior Will resigned,

He views with an unanxious mind

Earth's passing wonders,— and can gaze

With eye serene on thy innocuous blaze,

As on the meteor-fires, that sweep

O'er the smooth bosom of the deep,

Or gild with lustre pale

The humid surface of some midnight vale.