Samf.

A

Little onward lend thy guiding hand
To thefe dark steps, a little farther on;
For yonder bank hath choice of fun or shade,
There I am wont to fit, when any chance
Relieves me from my task of fervile toil,
Daily in the common prison else enjoin'd me,
Where I a pris'ner chain'd, scarce freely draw
The air imprifon'd alfo, close and damp,
Unwholfom draught; but here I feel amends,
The breath of heav'n fresh blowing, pure and sweet,
With day-fpring born; here leave me to respire.
This day a folemn feast the people hold
To Dagon their sea idol, and forbid
Laborious works, unwillingly this rest
Their fuperftition yields me; hence with leave
Retiring from the pop'lar noise, I feek
This unfrequented place to find some ease,
Eafe to the body fomé, none to the mind
From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm
Of hornets arm'd, no fooner found alone,
But rush upon me thronging, and present
Times paft, what once I was, and what am now.
O wherefore was my birth from heav'n foretold
Twice by an angel; who at last in fight

Of both my parents all in flames afcended
From off the altar, where an off'ring burn'd,
As in a fiery clumn charioting

His God-like prefence, and from fome great act

Or benefit reveal'd to Abraham's race?
Why was my breeding order'd and prescrib❜d
As of a person separate to God,

Defign'd for great exploits; if I must die
Betray'd, captiv'd, and both my eyes put out,
Made of my enemies the fcorn and gaze;
To grind in brazen fetters under task,
With this heav'n-gifted strength? O glorious strength
Put to the labour of a beast, debas'd
Lower than bondslave! promife was that I
Should Ifrael from Philistian yoke deliver;
Ask for this great deliv'rer now, and find him
Eyelefs in Gaza at the mill with flaves,
Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke.
Yet ftay, let me not rafhly call in doubt
Divine prediction: what if all foretold

Had been fulfill'd but through mine own default,
Whom have I to complain of but my felf?
Who this high gift of strength committed to me,
In what part lodg'd, how easily bereft me,
Under the feal of filence could not keep,
But weakly to a woman must reveal it,
O'ercome with importunity and tears.
O impotence of mind, in body strong!
But what is ftrength without a double share
Of wisdom, vaft, unwieldy, burthenfome,
Proudly fecure, yet liable to fall

By weakest fubtleties, not made to rule,

But to fubferve where wisdom bears command.
God, when he gave me ftrength, to fhew withal
How flight the gift was, hung it in

my

hair.

But peace, I must not quarrel with the will
Of highest difpenfation, which herein
Haply had ends above my reach to know:
Suffices that to me strength is my bane,
And proves the fource of all my miferies;
So many, and fo huge, that each apart
Would ask a life to wail, but chief of all,
O lofs of fight, of thee I most complain!
Blind among enemies, O worfe than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, decrepit age!

Light the prime work of God to me is extinct,
And all her various objects of delight

Annull'd, which might in part my grief have eas'd,
Inferior to the vileft now become

Of man or worm; the vileft here excel me,
They creep, yet fee, I dark in light expos'd
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse and wrong,
Within doors, or without, ftill as a fool,
In pow'r of others, never in my own;

Scarce half I feem to live, dead more than half.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrecov'rably dark, total eclipse

Without all hope of day!

O first created beam, and thou great Word,
Let there be light, and light was over all;
Why am I thus bereav'd thy prime decree?
The fun to me is dark

And filent as the moon

When the deferts the night

Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.

Since light fo neceffary is to life,

And almost life itself, if it be true
That light is in the foul,

She all in ev'ry part; why was the fight
To fuch a tender ball as th'

eye confin'd? So obvious and fo eafy to be quench'd,

And not, as feeling, through all parts diffus'd,
That she might look at will through ev'ry pore?
Then had I not been thus exil'd from light,
As in the land of darkness yet in light,
To live a life half dead, a living death,
And bury'd; but O yet more miferable!
My felf, my fepulchre, a moving grave,
Bury'd, yet not exempt

By privilege of death and burial

From wort of other evils, pains and wrongs,
But made hereby obnoxious more

To all the miseries of life,

Life in captivity

Among inhuman foes.

But who are these? for with joint pace I hear
The tread of many feet steering this way;
Perhaps my enemies who come to stare
At my affliction, and perhaps t'infult,
Their daily practice to afflict me more.

Chor. This, this is he; foftly a while,
Let us not break in upon him;

O change beyond report, thought or belief!
See how he lies at random, carelefly diffus'd,
With languilh'd head unpropt,

As one past hope, abandon'd,

And by himself giv'n over?

In flavish habit, ill-fitted weeds

O'erworn and foil'd;

Or do my eyes misreprefent? can this be he

That heroick, that renown'd,

Irresistable Samfon; whom unarm'd

Noftrength of man,or fierceft wild beaft could withstand?

Who tore the lion, as the lion tears the kid,

Ran on embatti'd armies clad in iron,

And weaponlefs himself,

Made arms ridiculous, useless the forgery
Of brazen shield and spear, the hammer'd cuirafe
Chalybean temper'd steel, and frock of mail

Adamantean proof;

But safest he who stood aloof,

When infupportably his foot advanc'd,

In fcorn of their proud arms and warlike tools, Spurn'd them to death by troops. The bold Afcalonité Fled from his lion ramp, old warriors turn'd

Their plated backs under his heel;

Or grov'ling foil'd their crested helmets in the duft.
Then with what trivial weapon came to hand,
The jaw of a dead afs, his sword of bone,
A thousand foreskins fell, the flow'r of Palestin,
In Ramath-lechi famous to this day:

Then by main force pull'd up and on his shoulders bore

The gates of Azza, post, and massly bar

Up to the hill by Hebron, seat of giants old,
No journey of a sabbath-day, and loaded so;
Like whom the Gentiles feign to bear up heav'n.
Which fhall I first bewail,

Thy bondage or lost fight,