It would be difficult to determine whether the age is growing better…

Flowers, the sole luxury which nature knew, In Eden's pure and guiltless garden grew.[…] Gay without toil, and lovely without art, They spring to cheer the sense, and glad the heart.

It is to hope, tho' hope were lost.

Man is the nobler growth our realms supply, And souls are ripen'd in our northern sky.

Child of mortality, whence comest thou? Why is thy countenance sad, and why are thine eyes red with weeping?

O gently guide my pilgrim feet To find thy hermit cell; Where in some pure and equal sky Beneath thy soft indulgent eye The modest virtues dwell.

I read his awful name, emblazon'd high With golden letters on th' illumin'd sky.