The Improvment

Summary

ʿTis more to recollect than make; the one

Is but an Accident without the other:

We cannot think the World to be the Throne

Of God, unless his Wisdom shine as Brother

Unto his Power, in the Fabrick, so

That we the one may in the other know.

His Goodness also must in both appear,

And All the Children of his Lov be found,

In the Creation of the Starry Sphere,

And in the framing of the fruitful Ground,

Before we can that Happiness descry

Which is the Daughter of the Deity.

His Wisdom's seen in ord'ring this Great House;

His Power shines in governing the Sun;

His Goodness doth exceeding Marvellous

Appear in ev'ry Thing His Hand hath don:

And all his Works, in their Variety,

United or asunder, pleas the Ey.

But neither Goodness, Wisdom, Power, nor Lov,

Nor Happiness its self, in things could be,

Did they not all in one fair Order mov,

And jointly by their Service end in Me.

Had He not made an Ey to be the Sphere

Of all these Things, How could their Use appear?

His Wisdom, Goodness, Power, as they unite

All Things in One, that they may be the Treasures

Of one Enjoyer, reach the utmost Hight

They can attain; and are then Our Pleasures,

When all the Univers combines in One

T' exalt a Creature, as if that alone.

To make the Product of far distant Seas

Meet in a point, be present to mine Ey

In Virtu, not in Bulk; one Man to pleas

With His wise Conduct of the Hevens high;

From East, and West, and North, and South to bring

The useful Influence of ev'ry Thing;

Is far more Great than to create them where

They now do stand; His Wisdom more approv'd,

So do His Might and Goodness more appear,

In recollecting All that should be lov'd,

That All might be a Gift to ev'ry One,

Than in the sev'ral Parts of His wide Throne.