Читать книгу Terrible Tractoration, and Other Poems онлайн

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Made dreadful clattering in chaos,

And form’d, with horrid quakes t’ assist him,

His new exploded solar system.[46]

Though Volney, having in his view,

First peer’d our continent through and through,[47]

Left us a specimen of the quality

Of graduated French morality.[48]

Though Priestley manufactured souls,

For which we had him o’er the coals,

A thing we had forgot to mention,

For making use of our invention.

Buffon, with other wonders done,

A comet dash’d athwart the sun,

And, hitting off a flaming slice,

Our earth created in a trice.

These wights, when taken altogether,

Are but the shadow of a feather

Compared with Caustic, even as

A puff of hydrogenous gas.

Should you pronounce my systems lax

For want of some astringent facts,

I’ll knock you down, by my surprising

New method of philosophizing.

I first a fine new system form,

Which none can either sap or storm;

Then, to support my favorite plan,

I muster all the facts I can.

To make my theories defensible,

Whereas some facts are indispensable,