Little onward lend thy guiding hand
To thefe dark steps, a little further 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 servile toil,
Daily in the common prifon elfe enjoin'd me,
Where I a pris'ner chain'd, scarce freely draw
The air imprifon'd alío, close and damp,
Unwholfome draught; but here I feel amends,
The breath of heav'n fresh blowing, pure and sweet,
With day-spring born; here leave me to refpire.
This day a folemn feast the people hold
To Dagon their fea-idol, and forbid
Laborious works, unwillingly this rest
Their superstition yields me; hence with leave
Retiring from the pop'lar noise, I seek
This unfrequented place to find some ease,
Eafe to the body fome, none to the mind
From restless thoughts, that like a deadly fwarm
Of hornets arm'd, no fooner found alone,
But rush upon me thronging, and prefent
Times past, what once I was, and what am now.
O wherefore was my birth from heav'n foretold
Twice by an angel; who at laft in fight
Of both my parents all in flames afcended
From off the altar, where an off'ring burn'd,
As in a fiery column charioting
His God-like presence, 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 beaft, debas'd
Lower than bondflave! Promife was that I
Should Ifrael from Philiftian yoke deliver;
Afk for this great deliv'rer now, and find him
Eyelefs in Gaza at the mill with flaves,
Himself in bonds under Philiftian yoke :
Yet stay, 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 myself?
Who this high gift of ftrength committed to me,
In what part lodg'd, how eafily bereft me,
Under the feal of filence could not keep,
But weakly to a woman must reveal it,
C'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 wifdom 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 ftrength is my bane,
And proves the fource of all my miferies;
So many, and fo huge, that each apart
Would afk 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, or 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 cas'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, abufe, 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,
Irrecoverably 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 itfelf, 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!
Myfelf my fepulchre, a moving grave,
Bury'd, yet not exempt
By privilege of death and burial
From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs,
But made hereby obnoxious more
To all the miferies of life,
Life in captivity
Among inhuman foes.
But who are thefe ? for with joint pace I hear
The tread of many feet fteering this way;
Perhaps my enemies who come to ftare
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 mifreprefent? can this be he,
That heroic, that renown'd,
Irreliftable Samfon; whom unarm'd
No strength of man, or fierceft wild beaft could with
Who tore the lion, as the lion tears the kid,
Ran on embattl'd armies clad in iron,
And weaponlefs himself,
Made arms ridiculous, ufelefs the forgery
Of brazen shield and fpear, the hammer'd cuirafs,
Chalybean temper'd steel, and frock of mail
Adamantean proof;
But fafeft he who stood aloof,
When infupportable his foot advanc'd,
In fcorn of their proud arms and warlike tools,
Spurn'd them to death by troops. The bold Afcalonite
Fled from his lion ramp, old warriors turn'd
Their plated backs under his heel;
Or grov'ling foil'd their crefted helmets in the duft.
Then with what trivial weapon came to hand,
The jaw of a dead afs, his fword of bone,
A thousand forefkins fell, the flow'r of Palestine,
In Ramath-lechi famous to this day.
Then by main force pull'd up, and on his fhoulders
The gates of Azza, post, and maffy bar,
Up to the hill of Hebron, feat of giants old,
No journey of a Sabbath-day, and loaded fo;
Like whom the Gentiles feign to bear up heav'n.
Which fhall I first bewail,
Thy bondage or loft fight,
Prifon within prifon
Infeparably dark?
Thou art become (O worft imprisonment!).
The dungeon of thyfelf; thy foul
|