On the BEING of a GOD

Retire;—The world shut out;—Thy thoughts call home; Imagination's airy wing repress;— Lock up thy senses;—Let no passion stir;— Wake all to Reason—Let her reign alone;— Then, in thy Soul's deep silence, and the depth Of Nature's silence, midnight, thus enquire, As I have done.—

What am I? and from whence?—I nothing know, But that I am; and, since I am, conclude Something eternal; had there e'er been nought, Nought still had been: Eternal there must be.— But what eternal?—Why not human race? And Adam's ancestors without an end?— That's hard to be conceiv'd; since ev'ry link Of that long-chain'd succession is so frail; Can ev'ry part depend, and not the whole? Yet grant it true; new difficulties rise; I'm still quite out at sea; nor see the shore. Whence earth, and these bright orbs?—Eternal too? Grant matter was eternal; still these orbs Would want some other Father:—Much design Is seen in all their motions, all their makes; Design implies intelligence, and art: That can't be from themselves—or man; that art Man scarce can comprehend, could man bestow? And nothing greater, yet allow'd, than man.— Who, motion, foreign to the smallest grain, Shot thro' vast masses of enormous weight! Who bid brute matter's restive lump assume Such various forms, and gave it wings to fly? Has matter innate motion? Then each atom, Asserting its indisputable right To dance, would form an universe of dust: Has matter none? Then whence these glorious forms, And boundless flights, from shapeless, and repos'd? Has matter more than motion? Has it thought, Judgment, and genius? Is it deeply learn'd In mathematics? Has it fram'd such laws, Which, but to guess, a Newton made immortal? If art, to form; and counsel, to conduct; And that with greater far, than human skill, Resides not in each block;—a GODHEAD reigns. And, if a GOD there is, that GOD how great!