Like lightning flies the inspiring guess--
Leaps every heart--"The truth we seize;
Your might is here, EUMENIDES!
The murderer yields himself confest--
Vengeance is near--that voice the token--
Ho!-him who yonder spoke, arrest!
And him to whom the words were spoken!"

Scarce had the wretch the words let fall,
Than fain their sense he would recall
In vain; those whitening lips--behold!
The secret have already told.
Into their Judgment Court sublime
The Scene is changed;--their doom is seal'd!
Behold the dark unwitness'd Crime,
Struck by the lightning that reveal'd!

* * * * *



THE WORDS OF BELIEF (1797)


Three Words will I name thee--around and about,
From the lip to the lip, full of meaning, they flee;
But they had not their birth in the being without,
And the heart, not the lip, must their oracle be!
And all worth in the man shall for ever be o'er
When in those Three Words he believes no more.