Classic Poem

Adjusted, steady to their varying size,
By geometric rule, and calculation nice:
These have their palaces, and coral groves,
Their latent grotts, and pearly bright alcoves;
Wide is the copious hand of Bounty spread,
And myriads at the plenteous feast are fed.
Nor less, the grateful light salutes their eye,
And solar glories gild the nether sky;
Their ocean blushes with the lord of day,
And nightly glitters at the twinkling ray,
The moon, attended by her starry train,
Reflects reflection to the floating plain,
Its murmuring flux with pale dominion guides,
And swells the pride of its returning tides;
The deep those wholsome agitations purge,
And drive stagnation from the rolling surge;
Their rage the S OVEREIGN M ODERATOR cools,
And riding, as a steed the bounding billow rules;
Whence rising floods their stated empire know,
Nor wasteful o'er the neighbouring regions flow.

Low as the sea's capacious basin sinks,
The thirsty soil the incumbent ocean drinks;
Whence, thro' the globe diluting liquors pass,
And circulate, as in our smaller mass;
The salts with curious percolation strain,
And kindly thro' the porous strata drain,
Attracted, in a maze of tubes exhale;
(A stiffening clay cements the spacious vale)
From whence opposed, the mountain's height they claim,
And thence perpetual pour the winding stream;
Or lower, in perennial fountains rise,
Nor dread the star that fires autumnal skies.

While ocean thus the latent store bequeaths,
Above its humid exhalation breaths;
Its bosom pants beneath the vigorous heat,
And eager beams the expanding surface beat;
Insinuating, form the lucid cell;
To bladders the circumfluous moisture swell;
The inflated vapours spurn the nether tide,
And mounted on the weightier aether ride:
As tho' in scorn of gravitating power,
Sublime the cloudy congregations tower;
O'er torrid climes collect their sable train,
And form umbrellas for the panting swain;
Or figured wanton in romantick mould,
Careering knights and airy ramparts hold,
(Imblazoning beams the flitting champions gild,
And various paint the visionary field;)
Sudden the loose inchanted squadrons fly,
And sweep delusion from the wondering eye;
Thence, on the floating atmosphere they sail,
And steer precarious with the varying gale;
Or hovering, with suspended wing delay,
And in disdain the kindred flood survey:
When lo! the afflicting aether checks their pride,
Compressing chills the vain dilated tide;
Their shivering essence to its center shrinks,
And a cold nuptial their coherence links;
With artful touch the curious meteor forms,
Parent prolifick of salubrious storms
When from on high the rapid tempest's hurl'd,
Enlivening as a sneeze to man's inferior world:
The frigid chymist culls the mineral store,
The glossy sphaerules of metallick ore;
Sublimes with nitre the sulphureous foam,
And hoards contagion in heaven's ample dome,
Where nature's magazine fermenting lies,
Till the bright ray athwart the welkin flies;
High rage the small incendiary inspires,
Whose kindling touch the dread artillery fires;
Quick, with effusion wide, the lightnings glare;
Disploding bolts the cloudy entrails tear;
The cleansing flames sweep thro' the etherial room,
And swift the gross infectious steam consume:
Our vital element the blaze refines,
While man, ingrateful, at his health repines.
With various skill the chilling artist works,
And operator chief in every meteor lurks:
Oft, where the zenith's lofty realms extend,
E'er mists, conglobing, by their weight descend,
With sudden nitre captivates the cloud,
And o'er the vapour throws a whitening shrowd;
Soft, from the concave, hovering fleeces fall,
Whose flaky texture cloaths our silver ball.
Or when the shower forsakes the sable skies,
Haply the cold in secret ambush lies,
Couching awaits in some inferior space,
And chills the tempest with a quick embrace;
The chrystal pellets at the touch congeal,
And from the ground rebounds the rattling hail,
Or constant where this artificer dwells,
And algid from his heights the mist repels,
The A LMIGHTY A LCHYMIST his limbeck rears,
His lordly Taurus, or his Alpine peers;
Suspending fogs around the summit spread,
And gloomy columns crown each haughty head,
Obstructed drench the constipating hill,
And soaking thro' the porous grit distil:
Collected from a thousand thousand cells
The subterraneous flood impatient swells;