s: So should'st thou know! The birth with Asuras


s: Brings into bondage. Be thou joyous, Prince!


s: Whose lot is set apart for heavenly Birth.


s: Two stamps there are marked on all living men,


s: By what marks thou shouldst know the Heavenly Man,


s: How Souls go forth from Me; nor how they come


s: Back unto Me: nor is there Truth in these,


s: Nor purity, nor rule of Life. "This world


s: So say they: "nor hath risen up by Cause


s: Following on Cause, in perfect purposing,


s: But is none other than a House of Lust."


s: And, this thing thinking, all those ruined ones--


s: Of little wit, dark-minded--give themselves


s: To evil deeds, the curses of their kind.


s: Full of deceitfulness, folly, and pride,


s: In blindness cleaving to their errors, caught


s: Into the sinful course, they trust this lie


s: As it were true--this lie which leads to death--


s: Finding in Pleasure all the good which is,


s: Slaves to their passion and their wrath, they buy


s: Wealth with base deeds, to glut hot appetites;


s: "Thus much, to-day," they say, "we gained! thereby


s: Such and such wish of heart shall have its fill;


s: And this is ours! and th' other shall be ours!


s: Are we not lords? Make we not goodly cheer?


s: Is not our fortune famous, brave, and great?


s: Rich are we, proudly born! What other men


s: Live like to us? Kill, then, for sacrifice!


s: Cast largesse, and be merry!" So they speak


s: Darkened by ignorance; and so they fall--


s: Tossed to and fro with projects, tricked, and bound


s: In net of black delusion, lost in lusts--


s: Stubborn and proud, dead-drunken with the wine


s: Of wealth, and reckless, all their offerings


s: Have but a show of reverence, being not made


s: To self-hood, force, insolence, feasting, wrath,


s: These My blasphemers, in the forms they wear


s: And in the forms they breed, my foemen are,


s: Lowest and least of men, whom I cast down


s: Into some devilish womb, whence--birth by birth--


s: The devilish wombs re-spawn them, all beguiled;


s: And, till they find and worship Me, sweet Prince!


s: Are threefold, whereby men to ruin pass,--


s: The door of Lust, the door of Wrath, the door


s: All those three gates of Narak, wendeth straight


s: To find his peace, and comes to Swarga's gate.


s: Heedless of Shastras, yet keep faith at heart


s: And worship, what shall be the state of those,


s: Threefold the faith is of mankind and springs


s: From those three qualities,--becoming "true,"


s: Or "passion-stained," or "dark," as thou shalt hear!


s: The faith of each believer, Indian Prince!


s: Where thou shalt see a worshipper, that one


s: The "soothfast" souls adore true gods; the souls


s: Or Yakshas; and the men of Darkness pray


s: To Pretas and to Bhutas.[FN#35] Yea, and those


s: Who  practise bitter penance, not enjoined


s: By rightful rule--penance which hath its root


s: Those men, passion-beset, violent, wild,


s: Torturing--the witless ones--My elements


s: Shut in fair company within their flesh,


s: (Nay, Me myself, present within the flesh!)


s: Know them to devils devoted, not to Heaven!


s: For like as foods are threefold for mankind


s: In nourishing, so is there threefold way


s: Hear this of Me! there is a food which brings


s: Force, substance, strength, and health, and joy to live,


s: Being well-seasoned, cordial, comforting,


s: The "Soothfast" meat. And there be foods which bring


s: Aches and unrests, and burning blood, and grief,


s: Being too biting, heating, salt, and sharp,


s: And therefore craved by too strong appetite.


s: And there is foul food--kept from over-night,[FN#36]


s: Savourless, filthy, which the foul will eat,


s: A feast of rottenness, meet for the lips


s: Offered in rightful wise, when he who vows


s: Sayeth, with heart devout, "This I should do!"


s: Is "Soothfast" rite. But sacrifice for gain,


s: Offered for good repute, be sure that this,


s: With stamp of "passion." And a sacrifice


s: Offered against the laws, with no due dole


s: Of hallowed hymn, nor largesse to the priests,


s: Of Twice-borns, Teachers, Elders; Purity,


s: Words causing no man woe, words ever true,


s: Gentle and pleasing words, and those ye say


s: These make the true religiousness of Speech.


s: Sway of the silent Spirit, constant stress


s: To sanctify the Nature,--these things make


s: Good rite, and true religiousness of Mind.


s: Kept, with no hope of gain, by hearts devote,


s: Is perfect work of Sattwan, true belief.


s: To win good entertainment, worship, fame,


s: Such--say I--is of Rajas, rash and vain.


s: To torture self, or come at power to hurt


s: The gift lovingly given, when one shall say


s: "Now must I gladly give!" when he who takes


s: Can render nothing back; made in due place,


s: Is gift of Sattwan, fair and profitable.


s: The gift selfishly given, where to receive


s: Is hoped again, or when some end is sought,


s: Or where the gift is proffered with a grudge,


s: This is of Rajas, stained with impulse, ill.


s: The gift churlishly flung, at evil time,


s: Is gift of Tamas, dark; it doth not bless![FN#37]


s: Fain would I better know, Thou Glorious One!


s: The very truth--Heart's Lord!--of Sannyas,


s: Is the foregoing of all acts which spring


s: There be among the saints some who have held


s: And some who answer, "Nay! the goodly acts--


s: As worship, penance, alms--must be performed!"


s: 'Tis well set forth, O Chaser of thy Foes!


s: And Worship, Penance, Alms, not to be stayed;


s: Nay, to be gladly done; for all those three


s: Yet must be practised even those high works


s: In yielding up attachment, and all fruit


s: Produced by works. This is My judgment, Prince!


s: Abstaining from a work by right prescribed


s: Never is meet! So to abstain doth spring


s: From "Darkness," and Delusion teacheth it.


s: Abstaining from a work grievous to flesh,


s: When one saith "'Tisunpleasing!" this is null!


s: Such an one acts from "passion;" nought of gain


s: Saying, "Tis right to do!" that is "true " act


s: Unflattered, in his own heart justified,


s: Quit of debates and doubts, his is "true" act:


s: Wholly aloof from act; yet, who abstains


s: The fruit of labours, in the lives to come,


s: But no fruit is at all where no work was.


s: Hear from me, Long-armed Lord! the makings five


s: Which go to every act, in Sankhya taught


s: The agent; next, the various instruments;


s: Fourth, the especial effort; fifth, the God.


s: By these five doth he that. Which being thus,


s: Whoso, for lack of knowledge, seeth himself


s: As the sole actor, knoweth nought at all


s: And seeth nought. Therefore, I say, if one--


s: Holding aloof from self--with unstained mind


s: Should slay all yonder host, being bid to slay,


s: He doth not slay; he is not bound thereby!


s: Knowledge, the thing known, and the mind which knows,


s: These make the threefold starting-ground of act.


s: These make the threefold total of the deed.


s: But knowledge, agent, act, are differenced


s: There is "true" Knowledge. Learn thou it is this:


s: To see one changeless Life in all the Lives,


s: There is imperfect Knowledge: that which sees


s: There is false Knowledge: that which blindly clings


s: To one as if 'twere all, seeking no Cause,


s: Deprived of light, narrow, and dull, and "dark."


s: There is "right" Action: that which being enjoined--


s: Is wrought without attachment, passionlessly,


s: For duty, not for love, nor hate, nor gain.


s: There is "vain" Action: that which men pursue


s: By sense of self, with all-absorbing stress:


s: There is "dark" Action: when one doth a thing


s: Heedless of issues, heedless of the hurt


s: Or wrong for others, heedless if he harm


s: His own soul--'tis of Tamas, black and bad!


s: There is the "rightful"doer. He who acts


s: Free from self-seeking, humble, resolute,


s: Steadfast, in good or evil hap the same,


s: There is th' "impassioned" doer. He that works


s: From impulse, seeking profit, rude and bold


s: To overcome, unchastened; slave by turns


s: And there be evil doers; loose of heart,


s: Low-minded, stubborn, fraudulent, remiss,


s: Dull, slow, despondent--children of the "dark."


s: Hear, too, of Intellect and Steadfastness


s: The threefold separation, Conqueror-Prince!


s: The coming forth and going back of life,


s: What must be done, and what must not be done,


s: What should be feared, and what should not be feared,


s: What binds and what emancipates the soul:


s: That is of Sattwan, Prince! of "soothfastness."


s: Marred is the Intellect which, knowing right


s: And knowing wrong, and what is well to do


s: And what must not be done, yet understands


s: Nought with firm mind, nor as the calm truth is:


s: This is of Rajas, Prince! and "passionate!"


s: Evil is Intellect which, wrapped in gloom,


s: Looks upon wrong as right, and sees all things


s: Masters his beats of heart, his very breath


s: Of life, the action of his senses; fixed


s: That is of Sattwan, Prince! "soothfast" and fair!


s: Stained is the steadfastness whereby a man


s: Holds to his duty, purpose, effort, end,


s: For life's sake, and the love of goods to gain,


s: Sad is the steadfastness wherewith the fool


s: Cleaves to his sloth, his sorrow, and his fears,


s: His folly and despair. This--Pritha's Son!--


s: Hear further, Chief of Bharatas! from Me


s: The threefold kinds of Pleasure which there be.


s: Good Pleasure is the pleasure that endures,


s: Sweet as the taste of Amrit. Drink of that!


s: It springeth in the Spirit's deep content.


s: And painful Pleasure springeth from the bond


s: Between the senses and the sense-world. Sweet


s: As Amrit is its first taste, but its last


s: Bitter as poison. 'Tis of Rajas, Prince!


s: And foul and "dark" the Pleasure is which springs


s: From sloth and sin and foolishness; at first


s: And at the last, and all the way of life


s: The soul bewildering. 'Tis of Tamas, Prince!


s: For nothing lives on earth, nor 'midst the gods


s: In utmost heaven, but hath its being bound


s: With these three Qualities, by Nature framed.


s: The work of Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas,


s: Patience, uprightness, learning, and to know


s: The truth of things which be. A Kshatriya's pride,


s: Born of his nature, lives in valour, fire,


s: Constancy, skilfulness, spirit in fight,


s: Born with his nature, is to till the ground,


s: Tend cattle, venture trade. A Sudra's state,


s: Lays hold of perfectness! Hear how a man


s: He findeth it through worship--wrought by work--


s: Of Him that is the Source of all which lives,


s: Of HIM by Whom the universe was stretched.


s: Better thine own work is, though done with fault,


s: Than doing others' work, ev'n excellently.


s: He shall not fall in sin who fronts the task


s: Set him by Nature's hand! Let no man leave


s: His natural duty, Prince! though it bear blame!


s: For every work hath blame, as every flame


s: Is wrapped in smoke! Only that man attains


s: Perfect surcease of work whose work was wrought


s: With mind unfettered, soul wholly subdued,


s: Desires for ever dead, results renounced.


s: How one, attaining perfect peace, attains


s: BRAHM, the supreme, the highest height of all!


s: Devoted--with a heart grown pure, restrained


s: Of song and senses, freed from love and hate,


s: With body, speech, and will tamed to obey,


s: From passions liberate, quit of the Self,


s: Freed from surroundings, quiet, lacking nought--


s: Such an one grows to oneness with the BRAHM;


s: Such an one, growing one with BRAHM, serene,


s: Sorrows no more, desires no more; his soul,


s: Equally loving all that lives, loves well


s: Me, Who have made them, and attains to Me.


s: By this same love and worship doth he know


s: And knowing, straightway enters into Me.


s: Th' Eternal Rest! So win thou! In thy thoughts


s: Do all thou dost for Me! Renounce for Me!


s: Sacrifice heart and mind and will to Me!


s: All dangers thou shalt vanquish, by My grace;


s: But, trusting to thyself and heeding not,


s: Thou can'st but perish! If this day thou say'st,


s: Vain will the purpose prove! thy qualities


s: Would spur thee to the war. What thou dost shun,


s: Misled by fair illusions, thou wouldst seek


s: Against thy will, when the task comes to thee


s: Waking the promptings in thy nature set.


s: There lives a Master in the hearts of men


s: Maketh their deeds, by subtle  pulling--strings,


s: Dance to what tune HE will. With all thy soul


s: Trust Him, and take Him for thy succour, Prince!


s: This Truth of Truths, the Mystery more hid


s: Take My last word, My utmost meaning have!


s: Precious thou art to Me; right well-beloved!


s: Listen! I tell thee for thy comfort this.


s: Give Me thy heart! adore Me! serve Me! cling


s: So shalt thou come to Me! I promise true,


s: Thy soul from all its  sins! Be of good cheer!


s: Hath this been heard by thee, O Indian Prince!


s: With mind intent? hath all the ignorance--


s: Which bred thy trouble--vanished, My Arjun?


s: Trouble and ignorance are gone! the Light


s: Thus gathered I the gracious speech of Krishna, O my King!


s: The Yoga, being Yoga's Lord. So is the high truth shown!


s: And aye, when I remember, O Lord my King, again


s: Arjuna and the God in talk, and all this holy strain,


s: Great is my gladness: when I muse that splendour, passing speech,


s: My marvel and my love and bliss. O Archer-Prince! all hail!


s: O Krishna, Lord of Yoga! surely there shall not fail


s: Blessing, and victory, and power, for Thy most mighty sake,


s: Where this song comes of Arjun, and how with God he spake.


s: which I have endeavoured to mark by change of metre.


s: but a beautiful lyrical episode, a new "Parable of the fig-tree."


s: great power, gifts, and beauty, same times  also of benignity.


s: In 1697, Pierre Bayle published at Rotterdam, his "Historical and


s: Pope's Satires, which still deal with characters of men, followed


s: Of the Nature and State of Man, with respect to the Universe.


s: Awake, my St. John! leave all meaner things


s: To low ambition, and the pride of kings.


s: Let us (since life can little more supply


s: Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man;


s: A wild, where weeds and flowers promiscuous shoot;


s: Or garden tempting with forbidden fruit.


s: Try what the open, what the covert yield;


s: The latent tracts, the giddy heights, explore


s: Of all who blindly creep, or sightless soar;


s: Eye Nature's walks, shoot Folly as it flies,


s: And catch the manners living as they rise;


s: Laugh where we must, be candid where we can;


s: What can we reason, but from what we know?


s: Of man, what see we but his station here,


s: From which to reason, or to which refer?


s: Through worlds unnumbered though the God be known,


s: He, who through vast immensity can pierce,


s: See worlds on worlds compose one universe,


s: May tell why Heaven has made us as we are.


s: But of this frame, the bearings, and the ties,


s: The strong connections, nice dependencies,


s: Looked through? or can a part contain the whole?


s: Is the great chain, that draws all to agree,


s: And drawn supports, upheld by God, or thee?


s: Why formed so weak, so little, and so blind?


s: First, if thou canst, the harder reason guess,


s: Why formed no weaker, blinder, and no less;


s: Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made


s: Taller or stronger than the weeds they shade?


s: Why Jove's satellites are less than Jove?


s: That wisdom infinite must form the best,


s: Then in the scale of reasoning life, 'tis plain,


s: There must be, somewhere, such a rank as man:


s: And all the question (wrangle e'er so long)


s: Is only this, if God has placed him wrong?


s: In human works, though laboured on with pain,


s: A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain;


s: In God's one single can its end produce;


s: Yet serves to second too some other use.


s: Perhaps acts second to some sphere unknown,


s: Touches some wheel, or verges to some goal;


s: 'Tis but a part we see, and not a whole.


s: When the proud steed shall know why man restrains


s: His fiery course, or drives him o'er the plains:


s: When the dull ox, why now he breaks the clod,


s: Then shall man's pride and dulness comprehend


s: His actions', passions', being's, use and end;


s: Why doing, suffering, checked, impelled; and why


s: Then say not man's imperfect, Heaven in fault;


s: Say rather man's as perfect as he ought:


s: His knowledge measured to his state and place;


s: His time a moment, and a point his space.


s: What matter, soon or late, or here or there?


s: All but the page prescribed, their present state:


s: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know:


s: The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day,


s: Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?


s: Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food,


s: And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood.


s: Oh, blindness to the future! kindly given,


s: That each may fill the circle, marked by Heaven:


s: And now a bubble burst, and now a world.


s: Hope humbly, then; with trembling pinions soar;


s: Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore.


s: What future bliss, He gives not thee to know,


s: But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.


s: Hope springs eternal in the human breast:


s: The soul, uneasy and confined from home,


s: Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutored mind


s: Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind;


s: His soul, proud science never taught to stray


s: Yet simple Nature to his hope has given,


s: Behind the cloud-topped hill, an humbler heaven;


s: Some safer world in depth of woods embraced,


s: Some happier island in the watery waste,


s: Where slaves once more their native land behold,


s: No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold.


s: He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire;


s: His faithful dog shall bear him company.


s: Call imperfection what thou fanciest such,


s: Say, here He gives too little, there too much;


s: Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust,


s: Yet cry, if man's unhappy, God's unjust;


s: If man alone engross not Heaven's high care,


s: Alone made perfect here, immortal there:


s: Snatch from His hand the balance and the rod,


s: Re-judge His justice, be the God of God.


s: In pride, in reasoning pride, our error lies;


s: All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies.


s: Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes,


s: Men would be angels, angels would be gods.


s: Of order, sins against the Eternal Cause.


s: Earth for whose use?  Pride answers, "'Tis for mine:


s: For me kind Nature wakes her genial power,


s: Suckles each herb, and spreads out every flower;


s: Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew


s: The juice nectareous, and the balmy dew;


s: For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings;


s: For me, health gushes from a thousand springs;


s: Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise;


s: My footstool earth, my canopy the skies."


s: But errs not Nature from this gracious end,


s: From burning suns when livid deaths descend,


s: When earthquakes swallow, or when tempests sweep


s: Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep?


s: "No, ('tis replied) the first Almighty Cause


s: Acts not by partial, but by general laws;


s: The exceptions few; some change since all began;


s: And what created perfect?"--Why then man?


s: Then Nature deviates; and can man do less?


s: As much that end a constant course requires


s: Of showers and sunshine, as of man's desires;


s: As much eternal springs and cloudless skies,


s: As men for ever temperate, calm, and wise.


s: If plagues or earthquakes break not Heaven's design,


s: Who knows but He, whose hand the lightning forms,


s: Who heaves old ocean, and who wings the storms;


s: Pours fierce ambition in a Caesar's mind,


s: Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge mankind?


s: From pride, from pride, our very reasoning springs;


s: Account for moral, as for natural things:


s: Why charge we heaven in those, in these acquit?


s: Better for us, perhaps, it might appear,


s: Were there all harmony, all virtue here;


s: That never passion discomposed the mind.


s: The general order, since the whole began,


s: And little less than angel, would be more;


s: Now looking downwards, just as grieved appears


s: To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears


s: Made for his use all creatures if he call,


s: Say what their use, had he the powers of all?


s: Nature to these, without profusion, kind,


s: The proper organs, proper powers assigned;


s: Each seeming want compensated of course,


s: Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force;


s: Each beast, each insect, happy in its own:


s: Be pleased with nothing, if not blessed with all?


s: The bliss of man (could pride that blessing find)


s: But what his nature and his state can bear.


s: For this plain reason, man is not a fly.


s: Say what the use, were finer optics given,


s: To inspect a mite, not comprehend the heaven?


s: Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o'er,


s: Or quick effluvia darting through the brain,


s: If Nature thundered in his opening ears,


s: And stunned him with the music of the spheres,


s: How would he wish that Heaven had left him still


s: The whispering zephyr, and the purling rill?


s: Who finds not Providence all good and wise,


s: Alike in what it gives, and what denies?


s: The scale of sensual, mental powers ascends:


s: Mark how it mounts, to man's imperial race,


s: From the green myriads in the peopled grass:


s: What modes of sight betwixt each wide extreme,


s: The mole's dim curtain, and the lynx's beam:


s: And hound sagacious on the tainted green:


s: Of hearing, from the life that fills the flood,


s: To that which warbles through the vernal wood:


s: The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine!


s: Feels at each thread, and lives along the line:


s: In the nice bee, what sense so subtly true


s: From poisonous herbs extracts the healing dew?


s: How instinct varies in the grovelling swine,


s: Compared, half-reasoning elephant, with thine!


s: 'Twixt that, and reason, what a nice barrier,


s: What thin partitions sense from thought divide:


s: And middle natures, how they long to join,


s: Without this just gradation, could they be


s: Subjected, these to those, or all to thee?


s: The powers of all subdued by thee alone,


s: Is not thy reason all these powers in one?


s: All matter quick, and bursting into birth.


s: Above, how high, progressive life may go!


s: Around, how wide! how deep extend below?


s: Vast chain of being! which from God began,


s: Beast, bird, fish, insect, what no eye can see,


s: No glass can reach; from Infinite to thee,


s: From thee to nothing.  On superior powers


s: Were we to press, inferior might on ours:


s: Where, one step broken, the great scale's destroyed:


s: From Nature's chain whatever link you strike,


s: Tenth or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike.


s: That system only, but the whole must fall.


s: Let earth unbalanced from her orbit fly,


s: Planets and suns run lawless through the sky;


s: Let ruling angels from their spheres be hurled,


s: Being on being wrecked, and world on world;


s: Heaven's whole foundations to their centre nod,


s: And nature tremble to the throne of God.


s: All this dread order break--for whom? for thee?


s: Vile worm!--Oh, madness! pride! impiety!


s: Or hand, to toil, aspired to be the head?


s: What if the head, the eye, or ear repined


s: To serve mere engines to the ruling mind?


s: Just as absurd, to mourn the tasks or pains,


s: The great directing Mind of All ordains.


s: All are but parts of one stupendous whole,


s: That, changed through all, and yet in all the same;


s: Great in the earth, as in the ethereal frame;


s: Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze,


s: Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees,


s: Lives through all life, extends through all extent,


s: Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part,


s: As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart:


s: As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns,


s: As the rapt seraph that adores and burns:


s: To him no high, no low, no great, no small;


s: He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all.


s: Our proper bliss depends on what we blame.


s: Know thy own point: this kind, this due degree


s: Of blindness, weakness, Heaven bestows on thee.


s: Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear:


s: Safe in the hand of one disposing Power,


s: All chance, direction, which thou canst not see;


s: And, spite of pride in erring reason's spite,


s: One truth is clear, whatever is, is right.


s: Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,


s: With too much knowledge for the sceptic side,


s: With too much weakness for the stoic's pride,


s: He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest;


s: In doubt to deem himself a god, or beast;


s: Born but to die, and reasoning but to err;


s: Whether he thinks too little, or too much:


s: Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;


s: Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;


s: Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled:


s: The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!


s: Go, wondrous creature! mount where science guides,


s: Go, measure earth, weigh air, and state the tides;


s: Instruct the planets in what orbs to run,


s: Go, soar with Plato to th' empyreal sphere,


s: To the first good, first perfect, and first fair;


s: Or tread the mazy round his followers trod,


s: As Eastern priests in giddy circles run,


s: And turn their heads to imitate the sun.


s: Could he, whose rules the rapid comet bind,


s: Describe or fix one movement of his mind?


s: Who saw its fires here rise, and there descend,


s: Unchecked may rise, and climb from art to art;


s: But when his own great work is but begun,


s: What reason weaves, by passion is undone.


s: Trace Science, then, with Modesty thy guide;


s: First strip off all her equipage of pride;


s: Or tricks to show the stretch of human brain,


s: Mere curious pleasure, or ingenious pain;


s: Expunge the whole, or lop th' excrescent parts


s: Which served the past, and must the times to come!


s: Self-love to urge, and reason, to restrain;


s: Nor this a good, nor that a bad we call,


s: Each works its end, to move or govern all


s: Ascribe all good; to their improper, ill.


s: Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul;


s: Reason's comparing balance rules the whole.


s: Man, but for that, no action could attend,


s: And but for this, were active to no end:


s: Fixed like a plant on his peculiar spot,


s: Or, meteor-like, flame lawless through the void,


s: Destroying others, by himself destroyed.


s: Most strength the moving principle requires;


s: Active its task, it prompts, impels, inspires.


s: Formed but to check, deliberate, and advise.


s: Self-love still stronger, as its objects nigh;


s: Reason's at distance, and in prospect lie:


s: That sees immediate good by present sense;


s: Thicker than arguments, temptations throng.


s: At best more watchful this, but that more strong.


s: Reason still use, to reason still attend.


s: Each strengthens reason, and self-love restrains.


s: Let subtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight,


s: And grace and virtue, sense and reason split,


s: Wits, just like fools, at war about a name,


s: Have full as oft no meaning, or the same.


s: Pain their aversion, pleasure their desire;


s: But greedy that, its object would devour,


s: This taste the honey, and not wound the flower:


s: Pleasure, or wrong or rightly understood,


s: Our greatest evil, or our greatest good.


s: 'Tis real good, or seeming, moves them all:


s: Passions, though selfish, if their means be fair,


s: List under Reason, and deserve her care;


s: Those, that imparted, court a nobler aim,


s: Exalt their kind, and take some virtue's name.


s: Their virtue fixed; 'tis fixed as in a frost;


s: But strength of mind is exercise, not rest:


s: The rising tempest puts in act the soul,


s: Parts it may ravage, but preserves the whole.


s: Reason the card, but passion is the gale;


s: Nor God alone in the still calm we find,


s: He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind.


s: Passions, like elements, though born to fight,


s: Yet, mixed and softened, in his work unite:


s: These, 'tis enough to temper and employ;


s: Suffice that Reason keep to Nature's road,


s: Subject, compound them, follow her and God.


s: Love, hope, and joy, fair pleasure's smiling train,


s: Hate, fear, and grief, the family of pain,


s: These mixed with art, and to due bounds confined,


s: Make and maintain the balance of the mind;


s: The lights and shades, whose well-accorded strife


s: Gives all the strength and colour of our life.


s: Pleasures are ever in our hands or eyes;


s: And when in act they cease, in prospect rise:


s: Present to grasp, and future still to find,


s: All spread their charms, but charm not all alike;


s: On different senses different objects strike;


s: Hence different passions more or less inflame,


s: As strong or weak, the organs of the frame;


s: And hence once master passion in the breast,


s: Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest.


s: As man, perhaps, the moment of his breath


s: Receives the lurking principle of death;


s: The young disease that must subdue at length,


s: Grows with his growth, and strengthens with his strength:


s: So, cast and mingled with his very frame,


s: The mind's disease, its ruling passion came;


s: Each vital humour which should feed the whole,


s: Soon flows to this, in body and in soul:


s: Whatever warms the heart, or fills the head,


s: As the mind opens, and its functions spread,


s: Wit, spirit, faculties, but make it worse;


s: Reason itself but gives it edge and power;


s: As Heaven's blest beam turns vinegar more sour.


s: We, wretched subjects, though to lawful sway,


s: In this weak queen some favourite still obey:


s: Ah! if she lend not arms, as well as rules,


s: What can she more than tell us we are fools?


s: Teach us to mourn our nature, not to mend,


s: Or from a judge turn pleader, to persuade


s: She but removes weak passions for the strong;


s: So, when small humours gather to a gout,


s: The doctor fancies he has driven them out.


s: Yes, Nature's road must ever be preferred;


s: Reason is here no guide, but still a guard:


s: And treat this passion more as friend than foe:


s: A mightier power the strong direction sends,


s: Like varying winds, by other passions tossed,


s: This drives them constant to a certain coast.


s: Let power or knowledge, gold or glory, please,


s: Or (oft more strong than all) the love of ease;


s: Through life 'tis followed, even at life's expense;


s: The merchant's toil, the sage's indolence,


s: All, all alike, find reason on their side.


s: Grafts on this passion our best principle:


s: Strong grows the virtue with his nature mixed;


s: The dross cements what else were too refined,


s: And in one interest body acts with mind.


s: As fruits, ungrateful to the planter's care,


s: On savage stocks inserted, learn to bear;


s: The surest virtues thus from passions shoot,


s: Wild nature's vigour working at the root.


s: From spleen, from obstinacy, hate, or fear!


s: Even avarice, prudence; sloth, philosophy;


s: Lust, through some certain strainers well refined,


s: Is gentle love, and charms all womankind;


s: Envy, to which th' ignoble mind's a slave,


s: Nor virtue, male or female, can we name,


s: But what will grow on pride, or grow on shame.


s: Thus Nature gives us (let it check our pride)


s: And makes a patriot as it makes a knave.


s: This light and darkness in our chaos joined,


s: What shall divide?  The God within the mind.


s: In man they join to some mysterious use;


s: Though each by turns the other's bound invade,


s: As, in some well-wrought picture, light and shade,


s: And oft so mix, the difference is too nice


s: Where ends the virtue or begins the vice.


s: Fools! who from hence into the notion fall,


s: That vice or virtue there is none at all.


s: If white and black blend, soften, and unite


s: A thousand ways, is there no black or white?


s: Ask your own heart, and nothing is so plain;


s: 'Tis to mistake them, costs the time and pain.


s: Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,


s: We first endure, then pity, then embrace.


s: But where th' extreme of vice, was ne'er agreed:


s: Ask where's the north? at York, 'tis on the Tweed;


s: At Greenland, Zembla, or the Lord knows where.


s: No creature owns it in the first degree,


s: But thinks his neighbour farther gone than he;


s: Even those who dwell beneath its very zone,


s: What happier nations shrink at with affright,


s: Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree,


s: The rogue and fool by fits is fair and wise;


s: And even the best, by fits, what they despise.


s: 'Tis but by parts we follow good or ill;


s: For, vice or virtue, self directs it still;


s: But Heaven's great view is one, and that the whole.


s: That counter-works each folly and caprice;


s: That disappoints th' effect of every vice;


s: That, happy frailties to all ranks applied,


s: Shame to the virgin, to the matron pride,


s: Fear to the statesman, rashness to the chief,


s: To kings presumption, and to crowds belief:


s: That, virtue's ends from vanity can raise,


s: Which seeks no interest, no reward but praise;


s: And build on wants, and on defects of mind,


s: The joy, the peace, the glory of mankind.


s: Till one man's weakness grows the strength of all.


s: Wants, frailties, passions, closer still ally


s: To these we owe true friendship, love sincere,


s: Each home-felt joy that life inherits here;


s: Yet from the same we learn, in its decline,


s: Those joys, those loves, those interests to resign;


s: Taught half by reason, half by mere decay,


s: Whate'er the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf,


s: Not one will change his neighbour with himself.


s: The fool is happy that he knows no more;


s: The poor contents him with the care of Heaven.


s: See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing,


s: The starving chemist in his golden views


s: See some strange comfort every state attend,


s: And pride bestowed on all, a common friend;


s: Hope travels through, nor quits us when we die.


s: Behold the child, by Nature's kindly law,


s: Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw:


s: Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight,


s: Scarves, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage,


s: And beads and prayer-books are the toys of age:


s: Pleased with this bauble still, as that before;


s: Till tired he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er.


s: Meanwhile opinion gilds with varying rays


s: Those painted clouds that beautify our days;


s: Each want of happiness by hope supplied,


s: These build as fast as knowledge can destroy;


s: In folly's cup still laughs the bubble, joy;


s: One prospect lost, another still we gain;


s: Even mean self-love becomes, by force divine,


s: The scale to measure others' wants by thine.


s: See! and confess, one comfort still must rise,


s: 'Tis this, though man's a fool, yet God is wise.


s: Of the Nature and State of Man with respect to Society.


s: Here, then, we rest: "The Universal Cause


s: Acts to one end, but acts by various laws."


s: In all the madness of superfluous health,


s: The trim of pride, the impudence of wealth,


s: Let this great truth be present night and day;


s: But most be present, if we preach or pray.


s: Look round our world; behold the chain of love


s: Attract, attracted to, the next in place


s: Formed and impelled its neighbour to embrace.


s: See matter next, with various life endued,


s: Press to one centre still, the general good.


s: All forms that perish other forms supply


s: (By turns we catch the vital breath, and die),


s: Like bubbles on the sea of matter borne,


s: They rise, they break, and to that sea return.


s: Nothing is foreign: parts relate to whole;


s: Connects each being, greatest with the least;


s: Made beast in aid of man, and man of beast;


s: All served, all serving: nothing stands alone;


s: The chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown.


s: Has God, thou fool! worked solely for thy Thy good,


s: Thy joy, thy pastime, thy attire, thy food?


s: Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn,


s: For him as kindly spread the flowery lawn:


s: Is it for thee the lark ascends and sings?


s: Joy tunes his voice, joy elevates his wings.


s: Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat?


s: Loves of his own and raptures swell the note.


s: The bounding steed you pompously bestride,


s: Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride.


s: Is thine alone the seed that strews the plain?


s: The birds of heaven shall vindicate their grain.


s: Thine the full harvest of the golden year?


s: Part pays, and justly, the deserving steer:


s: The hog, that ploughs not nor obeys thy call,


s: Lives on the labours of this lord of all.


s: Know, Nature's children all divide her care;


s: The fur that warms a monarch, warmed a bear.


s: While man exclaims, "See all things for my use!"


s: "See man for mine!" replies a pampered goose:


s: And just as short of reason he must fall,


s: Who thinks all made for one, not one for all.


s: Grant that the powerful still the weak control;


s: Nature that tyrant checks; he only knows,


s: And helps, another creature's wants and woes.


s: Say, will the falcon, stooping from above,


s: Smit with her varying plumage, spare the dove?


s: Admires the jay the insect's gilded wings?


s: Man cares for all: to birds he gives his woods,


s: To beasts his pastures, and to fish his floods;


s: For some his interest prompts him to provide,


s: For more his pleasure, yet for more his pride:


s: That very life his learned hunger craves,


s: He saves from famine, from the savage saves;


s: Nay, feasts the animal he dooms his feast,


s: And, till he ends the being, makes it blest;


s: Which sees no more the stroke, or feels the pain,


s: Than favoured man by touch ethereal slain.


s: The creature had his feast of life before;


s: Thou too must perish when thy feast is o'er!


s: To each unthinking being, Heaven, a friend,


s: Gives not the useless knowledge of its end:


s: As, while he dreads it, makes him hope it too;


s: The hour concealed, and so remote the fear,


s: Death still draws nearer, never seeming near.


s: Great standing miracle! that Heaven assigned


s: Its only thinking thing this turn of mind.


s: Know, all enjoy that power which suits them best;


s: And find the means proportioned to their end.


s: Say, where full instinct is the unerring guide,


s: What pope or council can they need beside?


s: Cares not for service, or but serves when pressed,


s: Stays till we call, and then not often near;


s: Sure never to o'er-shoot, but just to hit;


s: While still too wide or short is human wit;


s: Which heavier reason labours at in vain,


s: This too serves always, reason never long;


s: One must go right, the other may go wrong.


s: See then the acting and comparing powers


s: One in their nature, which are two in ours;


s: And reason raise o'er instinct as you can,


s: In this 'tis God directs, in that 'tis man.


s: Who taught the nations of the field and wood


s: To shun their poison, and to choose their food?


s: Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand,


s: Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand?


s: Who did the stork, Columbus-like, explore


s: Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before?


s: Who calls the council, states the certain day,


s: Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way?


s: Its proper bliss, and sets its proper bounds:


s: But as He framed a whole, the whole to bless,


s: And creature linked to creature, man to man.


s: Whate'er of life all-quickening ether keeps,


s: Or breathes through air, or shoots beneath the deeps,


s: Or pours profuse on earth, one nature feeds


s: The vital flame, and swells the genial seeds.


s: Not man alone, but all that roam the wood,


s: Or wing the sky, or roll along the flood,


s: Each loves itself, but not itself alone,


s: Each sex desires alike, till two are one.


s: Nor ends the pleasure with the fierce embrace;


s: They love themselves, a third time, in their race.


s: Thus beast and bird their common charge attend,


s: The mothers nurse it, and the sires defend;


s: The young dismissed to wander earth or air,


s: There stops the instinct, and there ends the care;


s: The link dissolves, each seeks a fresh embrace,


s: A longer care man's helpless kind demands;


s: That longer care contracts more lasting bands:


s: Reflection, reason, still the ties improve,


s: At once extend the interest and the love;


s: With choice we fix, with sympathy we burn;


s: Each virtue in each passion takes its turn;


s: And still new needs, new helps, new habits rise.


s: Still as one brood, and as another rose,


s: These natural love maintained, habitual those.


s: The last, scarce ripened into perfect man,


s: Saw helpless him from whom their life began:


s: Memory and forecast just returns engage,


s: That pointed back to youth, this on to age;


s: While pleasure, gratitude, and hope combined,


s: Still spread the interest, and preserved the kind.


s: The state of nature was the reign of God:


s: Self-love and social at her birth began,


s: Union the bond of all things, and of man.


s: Pride then was not; nor arts, that pride to aid;


s: Man walked with beast, joint tenant of the shade;


s: The same his table, and the same his bed;


s: No murder clothed him, and no murder fed.


s: In the same temple, the resounding wood,


s: All vocal beings hymned their equal God:


s: The shrine with gore unstained, with gold undressed,


s: Unbribed, unbloody, stood the blameless priest:


s: And man's prerogative to rule, but spare.


s: Ah! how unlike the man of times to come!


s: Of half that live the butcher and the tomb;


s: Who, foe to nature, hears the general groan,


s: Murders their species, and betrays his own.


s: The fury-passions from that blood began,


s: And turned on man a fiercer savage, man.


s: To copy instinct then was reason's part;


s: Thus then to man the voice of Nature spake--


s: "Go, from the creatures thy instructions take:


s: Learn from the birds what food the thickets yield;


s: Learn from the beasts the physic of the field;


s: Thy arts of building from the bee receive;


s: Learn of the mole to plough, the worm to weave;


s: Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale.


s: Here too all forms of social union find,


s: And hence let reason, late, instruct mankind:


s: Learn each small people's genius, policies,


s: The ant's republic, and the realm of bees;


s: How those in common all their wealth bestow,


s: And these for ever, though a monarch reign,


s: Their separate cells and properties maintain.


s: Mark what unvaried laws preserve each state,


s: Laws wise as nature, and as fixed as fate.


s: In vain thy reason finer webs shall draw,


s: And right, too rigid, harden into wrong;


s: Still for the strong too weak, the weak too strong.


s: Yet go! and thus o'er all the creatures sway,


s: And, for those arts mere instinct could afford,


s: Be crowned as monarchs, or as gods adored."


s: Here rose one little state: another near


s: Grew by like means, and joined, through love or fear.


s: Did here the trees with ruddier burdens bend,


s: And there the streams in purer rills descend?


s: What war could ravish, commerce could bestow,


s: And he returned a friend, who came a foe.


s: Converse and love mankind might strongly draw,


s: Thus States were formed; the name of king unknown,


s: 'Till common interest placed the sway in one.


s: The same which in a sire the sons obeyed,


s: King, priest, and parent of his growing state;


s: On him, their second providence, they hung,


s: Their law his eye, their oracle his tongue.


s: He from the wondering furrow called the food,


s: Taught to command the fire, control the flood,


s: Draw forth the monsters of the abyss profound,


s: Or fetch the aerial eagle to the ground.


s: Till drooping, sickening, dying they began


s: Whom they revered as God to mourn as man:


s: Then, looking up, from sire to sire, explored


s: One great first Father, and that first adored.


s: Conveyed unbroken faith from sire to son;


s: The worker from the work distinct was known,


s: Ere wit oblique had broke that steady light,


s: Man, like his Maker, saw that all was right;


s: To virtue, in the paths of pleasure, trod,


s: Love all the faith, and all the allegiance then;


s: No ill could fear in God; and understood


s: This was but love of God, and this of man.


s: Who first taught souls enslaved, and realms undone,


s: The enormous faith of many made for one;


s: That proud exception to all Nature's laws,


s: To invert the world, and counter-work its cause?


s: Force first made conquest, and that conquest, law;


s: Till superstition taught the tyrant awe,


s: Then shared the tyranny, then lent it aid,


s: And gods of conquerors, slaves of subjects made:


s: She, 'midst the lightning's blaze, and thunder's sound,


s: When rocked the mountains, and when groaned the ground,


s: She taught the weak to bend, the proud to pray,


s: To power unseen, and mightier far than they:


s: She, from the rending earth and bursting skies,


s: Saw gods descend, and fiends infernal rise:


s: Here fixed the dreadful, there the blest abodes;


s: Fear made her devils, and weak hope her gods;


s: Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust,


s: Whose attributes were rage, revenge, or lust;


s: Such as the souls of cowards might conceive,


s: And, formed like tyrants, tyrants would believe.


s: Zeal then, not charity, became the guide;


s: And hell was built on spite, and heaven on pride,


s: Then sacred seemed the ethereal vault no more;


s: Altars grew marble then, and reeked with gore;


s: Then first the flamen tasted living food;


s: Next his grim idol smeared with human blood;


s: With heaven's own thunders shook the world below,


s: And played the god an engine on his foe.


s: So drives self-love, through just and through unjust,


s: To one man's power, ambition, lucre, lust:


s: The same self-love, in all, becomes the cause


s: Of what restrains him, government and laws.


s: For, what one likes if others like as well,


s: What serves one will when many wills rebel?


s: How shall he keep, what, sleeping or awake,


s: All join to guard what each desires to gain.


s: Forced into virtue thus by self-defence,


s: Even kings learned justice and benevolence:


s: Self-love forsook the path it first pursued,


s: And found the private in the public good.


s: 'Twas then, the studious head or generous mind,


s: Follower of God, or friend of human-kind,


s: Re-lumed her ancient light, not kindled new;


s: If not God's image, yet His shadow drew:


s: Taught power's due use to people and to kings,


s: Taught nor to slack, nor strain its tender strings,


s: The less, or greater, set so justly true,


s: That touching one must strike the other too;


s: Till jarring interests, of themselves create


s: The according music of a well-mixed state.


s: Such is the world's great harmony, that springs


s: From order, union, full consent of things:


s: Where small and great, where weak and mighty, made


s: To serve, not suffer, strengthen, not invade;


s: More powerful each as needful to the rest,


s: And, in proportion as it blesses, blest;


s: Draw to one point, and to one centre bring


s: Beast, man, or angel, servant, lord, or king.


s: For forms of government let fools contest;


s: For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight;


s: His can't be wrong whose life is in the right:


s: In faith and hope the world will disagree,


s: All must be false that thwart this one great end;


s: And all of God, that bless mankind or mend.


s: Man, like the generous vine, supported lives;


s: The strength he gains is from the embrace he gives.


s: Yet make at once their circle round the sun;


s: And one regards itself, and one the whole.


s: Thus God and Nature linked the general frame,


s: And bade self-love and social be the same.


s: Of the Nature and State of Man with respect to Happiness.


s: Good, pleasure, ease, content! whate'er thy name:


s: That something still which prompts the eternal sigh,


s: For which we bear to live, or dare to die,


s: Which still so near us, yet beyond us lies,


s: O'erlooked, seen double, by the fool, and wise.


s: Plant of celestial seed! if dropped below,


s: Say, in what mortal soil thou deign'st to grow?


s: Fair opening to some Court's propitious shine,


s: Or deep with diamonds in the flaming mine?


s: Twined with the wreaths Parnassian laurels yield,


s: Or reaped in iron harvests of the field?


s: Where grows?--where grows it not?  If vain our toil,


s: We ought to blame the culture, not the soil:


s: 'Tis nowhere to be found, or everywhere;


s: 'Tis never to be bought, but always free,


s: And fled from monarchs, St. John! dwells with thee.


s: Ask of the learned the way?  The learned are blind;


s: This bids to serve, and that to shun mankind;


s: Some place the bliss in action, some in ease,


s: Those call it pleasure, and contentment these;


s: Some, sunk to beasts, find pleasure end in pain;


s: Some, swelled to gods, confess even virtue vain;


s: To trust in everything, or doubt of all.


s: Who thus define it, say they more or less


s: Take Nature's path, and mad opinions leave;


s: All states can reach it, and all heads conceive;


s: Obvious her goods, in no extreme they dwell;


s: There needs but thinking right, and meaning well;


s: And mourn our various portions as we please,


s: Acts not by partial, but by general laws;"


s: Subsist not in the good of one, but all.


s: There's not a blessing individuals find,


s: But some way leans and hearkens to the kind:


s: No bandit fierce, no tyrant mad with pride,


s: No caverned hermit, rests self-satisfied:


s: Who most to shun or hate mankind pretend,


s: Abstract what others feel, what others think,


s: All pleasures sicken, and all glories sink:


s: Each has his share; and who would more obtain,


s: Shall find, the pleasure pays not half the pain.


s: Order is Heaven's first law; and this confest,


s: Some are, and must be, greater than the rest,


s: More rich, more wise; but who infers from hence


s: That such are happier, shocks all common sense.


s: But mutual wants this happiness increase;


s: All Nature's difference keeps all Nature's peace.


s: Condition, circumstance is not the thing;


s: Bliss is the same in subject or in king,


s: In him who is, or him who finds a friend:


s: Heaven breathes through every member of the whole


s: One common blessing, as one common soul.


s: But fortune's gifts if each alike possessed,


s: And each were equal, must not all contest?


s: God in externals could not place content.


s: Fortune her gifts may variously dispose,


s: And these be happy called, unhappy those;


s: But Heaven's just balance equal will appear,


s: While those are placed in hope, and these in fear:


s: Nor present good or ill, the joy or curse,


s: Oh, sons of earth! attempt ye still to rise,


s: By mountains piled on mountains, to the skies,


s: Heaven still with laughter the vain toil surveys,


s: And buries madmen in the heaps they raise.


s: Know, all the good that individuals find,


s: Or God and Nature meant to mere mankind,


s: Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense,


s: Lie in three words, health, peace, and competence.


s: But health consists with temperance alone;


s: And peace, oh, virtue! peace is all thy own.


s: The good or bad the gifts of fortune gain;


s: But these less taste them, as they worse obtain.


s: Who risk the most, that take wrong means, or right;


s: Of vice or virtue, whether blessed or cursed,


s: Which meets contempt, or which compassion first?


s: Count all the advantage prosperous vice attains,


s: 'Tis but what virtue flies from and disdains:


s: And grant the bad what happiness they would,


s: One they must want, which is, to pass for good.


s: Oh, blind to truth, and God's whole scheme below,


s: Who sees and follows that great scheme the best,


s: Best knows the blessing, and will most be blest.


s: For ills or accidents that chance to all.


s: See Falkland dies, the virtuous and the just!


s: See god-like Turenne prostrate on the dust!


s: See Sidney bleeds amid the martial strife!


s: Was this their virtue, or contempt of life?


s: Say, was it virtue, more though Heaven ne'er gave,


s: Why, full of days and honour, lives the sire?


s: Why drew Marseilles' good bishop purer breath,


s: When Nature sickened, and each gale was death?


s: Lent Heaven a parent to the poor and me?


s: There deviates Nature, and here wanders will.


s: God sends not ill; if rightly understood,


s: Or change admits, or Nature lets it fall;


s: Short, and but rare, till man improved it all.


s: We just as wisely might of Heaven complain


s: That righteous Abel was destroyed by Cain,


s: When his lewd father gave the dire disease.


s: Think we, like some weak prince, the Eternal Cause


s: Prone for His favourites to reverse His laws?


s: Forget to thunder, and recall her fires?


s: Oh, blameless Bethel! to relieve thy breast?


s: When the loose mountain trembles from on high,


s: Or some old temple, nodding to its fall,


s: For Chartres' head reserve the hanging wall?


s: But still this world (so fitted for the knave)


s: Contents us not.  A better shall we have?


s: But first consider how those just agree.


s: The good must merit God's peculiar care:


s: But who, but God, can tell us who they are?


s: One thinks on Calvin Heaven's own spirit fell;


s: If Calvin feel Heaven's blessing, or its rod.


s: This cries there is, and that, there is no God.


s: What shocks one part will edify the rest,


s: Nor with one system can they all be blest.


s: And what rewards your virtue, punish mine.


s: Whatever is, is right.  This world, 'tis true,


s: And which more blest? who chained his country, say,


s: Or he whose virtue sighed to lose a day?


s: "But sometimes virtue starves, while vice is fed."


s: What then?  Is the reward of virtue bread?


s: That, vice may merit, 'tis the price of toil;


s: The knave deserves it, when he tills the soil,


s: The knave deserves it, when he tempts the main,


s: Where folly fights for kings, or dives for gain.


s: Nor is his claim to plenty, but content.


s: But grant him riches, your demand is o'er?


s: "No--shall the good want health, the good want power?"


s: Add health, and power, and every earthly thing,


s: "Why bounded power? why private? why no king?"


s: Why is not man a god, and earth a heaven?


s: Who ask and reason thus, will scarce conceive


s: God gives enough, while He has more to give:


s: Immense the power, immense were the demand;


s: Say, at what part of nature will they stand?


s: What nothing earthly gives, or can destroy,


s: The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy,


s: Is virtue's prize: A better would you fix?


s: Justice a conqueror's sword, or truth a gown,


s: Or public spirit its great cure, a crown.


s: Weak, foolish man! will heaven reward us there


s: With the same trash mad mortals wish for here?


s: Yet sighest thou now for apples and for cakes?


s: Expect thy dog, thy bottle, and thy wife:


s: As well as dream such trifles are assigned,


s: As toys and empires, for a God-like mind.


s: Rewards, that either would to virtue bring


s: To whom can riches give repute or trust,


s: Content, or pleasure, but the good and just?


s: Judges and senates have been bought for gold,


s: Oh, fool! to think God hates the worthy mind,


s: Whose life is healthful, and whose conscience clear,


s: Because he wants a thousand pounds a year.


s: Honour and shame from no condition rise;


s: Act well your part, there all the honour lies.


s: Fortune in men has some small difference made,


s: One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade;


s: The cobbler aproned, and the parson gowned,


s: The friar hooded, and the monarch crowned,


s: "What differ more (you cry) than crown and cowl?"


s: I'll tell you, friend! a wise man and a fool.


s: You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk,


s: Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk,


s: Worth makes the man, and want of it, the fellow;


s: The rest is all but leather or prunella.


s: Stuck o'er with titles and hung round with strings,


s: That thou mayest be by kings, or wh***s of kings.


s: Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race,


s: But by your fathers' worth if yours you rate,


s: Count me those only who were good and great.


s: Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood,


s: Nor own, your fathers have been fools so long.


s: What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards?


s: Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards.


s: Look next on greatness; say where greatness lies?


s: "Where, but among the heroes and the wise?"


s: Heroes are much the same, the points agreed,


s: The whole strange purpose of their lives, to find


s: Not one looks backward, onward still he goes,


s: Yet ne'er looks forward farther than his nose.


s: All sly slow things, with circumspective eyes;


s: Men in their loose unguarded hours they take,


s: Not that themselves are wise, but others weak.


s: But grant that those can conquer, these can cheat;


s: 'Tis phrase absurd to call a villain great:


s: Is but the more a fool, the more a knave.


s: Or failing, smiles in exile or in chains,


s: Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed


s: Like Socrates, that man is great indeed.


s: What's fame? a fancied life in others' breath,


s: A thing beyond us, even before our death.


s: Just what you hear, you have, and what's unknown


s: The same (my Lord) if Tully's, or your own.


s: In the small circle of our foes or friends;


s: Alike or when, or where, they shone, or shine,


s: An honest man's the noblest work of God.


s: Fame but from death a villain's name can save,


s: As justice tears his body from the grave;


s: When what the oblivion better were resigned,


s: Is hung on high, to poison half mankind.


s: All fame is foreign, but of true desert;


s: Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart:


s: One self-approving hour whole years outweighs


s: And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels,


s: Tell (for you can) what is it to be wise?


s: 'Tis but to know how little can be known;


s: To see all others' faults, and feel our own;


s: Condemned in business or in arts to drudge,


s: Truths would you teach or save a sinking land,


s: All fear, none aid you, and few understand.


s: Above life's weakness, and its comforts too.


s: Bring, then, these blessings to a strict account;


s: Make fair deductions; see to what they mount;


s: How inconsistent greater goods with these;


s: How sometimes life is risked, and always ease;


s: Think, and if still the things thy envy call,


s: Say, would'st thou be the man to whom they fall?


s: To sigh for ribands if thou art so silly,


s: Mark how they grace Lord Umbra, or Sir Billy:


s: If parts allure thee, think how Bacon shined,


s: The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind:


s: Or ravished with the whistling of a name,


s: See Cromwell; damned to everlasting fame!


s: From ancient story learn to scorn them all.


s: There, in the rich, the honoured, famed, and great,


s: See the false scale of happiness complete!


s: In hearts of kings, or arms of queens who lay,


s: Mark by what wretched steps their glory grows,


s: From dirt and seaweed as proud Venice rose;


s: In each how guilt and greatness equal ran,


s: And all that raised the hero, sunk the man:


s: Now Europe's laurels on their brows behold,


s: But stained with blood, or ill exchanged for gold;


s: Then see them broke with toils or sunk with ease,


s: Oh, wealth ill-fated! which no act of fame


s: E'er taught to shine, or sanctified from shame;


s: What greater bliss attends their close of life?


s: The trophied arches, storeyed halls invade


s: And haunt their slumbers in the pompous shade.


s: Alas! not dazzled with their noontide ray,


s: Compute the morn and evening to the day;


s: A tale, that blends their glory with their shame;


s: Know, then, this truth (enough for man to know)


s: The only point where human bliss stands still,


s: And tastes the good without the fall to ill;


s: Is blest in what it takes, and what it gives;


s: Without satiety, though e'er so blessed,


s: And but more relished as the more distressed:


s: The broadest mirth unfeeling folly wears,


s: Less pleasing far than virtue's very tears:


s: Good, from each object, from each place acquired


s: Never elated, while one man's oppressed;


s: And where no wants, no wishes can remain,


s: Since but to wish more virtue, is to gain.


s: See the sole bliss Heaven could on all bestow!


s: Which who but feels can taste, but thinks can know:


s: Yet poor with fortune, and with learning blind,


s: The bad must miss; the good, untaught, will find;


s: Slave to no sect, who takes no private road,


s: But looks through Nature up to Nature's God;


s: Pursues that chain which links the immense design,


s: Joins heaven and earth, and mortal and divine;


s: Learns, from this union of the rising whole,


s: The first, last purpose of the human soul;


s: And knows, where faith, law, morals, all began,


s: All end, in love of God, and love of man.


s: For Him alone, hope leads from goal to goal,


s: Till lengthened on to faith, and unconfined,


s: It pours the bliss that fills up all the mind


s: Hope of known bliss, and faith in bliss unknown:


s: (Nature, whose dictates to no other kind


s: Are given in vain, but what they seek they find)


s: Wise is her present; she connects in this


s: His greatest virtue with his greatest bliss;


s: At once his own bright prospect to be blest,


s: And strongest motive to assist the rest.


s: Self-love thus pushed to social, to divine,


s: Gives thee to make thy neighbour's blessing thine.


s: Is this too little for the boundless heart?


s: Grasp the whole worlds of reason, life, and sense,


s: And height of bliss but height of charity.


s: God loves from whole to parts: but human soul


s: Self-love but serves the virtuous mind to wake,


s: As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake!


s: The centre moved, a circle straight succeeds,


s: Another still, and still another spreads;


s: Friend, parent, neighbour, first it will embrace;


s: His country next; and next all human race;


s: Wide and more wide, the o'erflowings of the mind


s: Earth smiles around, with boundless bounty blest,


s: And Heaven beholds its image in his breast.


s: Come, then, my friend! my genius! come along;


s: And while the muse now stoops, or now ascends,


s: To man's low passions, or their glorious ends,


s: Teach me, like thee, in various nature wise,


s: Formed by thy converse, happily to steer


s: From grave to gay, from lively to severe;


s: Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease,


s: Oh! while along the stream of time thy name


s: Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame,


s: Say, shall my little bark attendant sail,


s: Pursue the triumph, and partake the gale?


s: When statesmen, heroes, kings, in dust repose,


s: Whose sons shall blush their fathers were thy foes,


s: Shall then this verse to future age pretend


s: Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend?


s: That urged by thee, I turned the tuneful art


s: From sounds to things, from fancy to the heart;


s: From wit's false mirror held up Nature's light;


s: Showed erring pride, whatever is, is right;


s: That reason, passion, answer one great aim;


s: That true self-love and social are the same;


s: And all our knowledge is, ourselves to know.


s: Thou Great First Cause, least understood,


s: Est brevitate opus, ut currat sententia, neu se


s: Impediat verbis lassas onerantibus aures:


s: Et sermone opus est modo tristi, saepe jocoso,


s: Defendente vicem modo Rhetoris atque Poetae,


s: Interdum urbani, parcentis viribus, atque


s: Yes, you despise the man to books confined,


s: Though what he learns he speaks, and may advance


s: Some general maxims, or be right by chance.


s: The coxcomb bird, so talkative and grave,


s: That from his cage cries c**d, w**e, and knave,


s: Though many a passenger he rightly call,


s: And yet the fate of all extremes is such,


s: Men may be read as well as books, too much.


s: To observations which ourselves we make,


s: We grow more partial for the observer's sake;


s: Maxims are drawn from notions, those from guess.


s: There's some peculiar in each leaf and grain,


s: Some unmarked fibre, or some varying vein:


s: Grant but as many sorts of mind as moss.


s: That each from other differs, first confess;


s: Next, that he varies from himself no less:


s: Add Nature's, custom's reason's passion's strife,


s: Our depths who fathoms, or our shallows finds,


s: Quick whirls, and shifting eddies, of our minds?


s: That instant 'tis his principle no more.


s: Like following life through creatures you dissect,


s: Yet more; the difference is as great between


s: All manners take a tincture from our own;


s: Or come discoloured through our passions shown.


s: Contracts, inverts, and gives ten thousand dyes.


s: Nor will life's stream for observation stay,


s: It hurries all too fast to mark their way:


s: In vain sedate reflections we would make,


s: When half our knowledge we must snatch, not take.


s: Oft, in the passion's wild rotation tost,


s: Our spring of action to ourselves is lost:


s: Tired, not determined, to the last we yield,


s: And what comes then is master of the field.


s: As the last image of that troubled heap,


s: When sense subsides, and fancy sports in sleep


s: (Though past the recollection of the thought),


s: Becomes the stuff of which our dream is wrought:


s: Is thus, perhaps, the cause of most we do.


s: True, some are open, and to all men known;


s: Others so very close, they're hid from none


s: (So darkness strikes the sense no less than light),


s: Thus gracious Chandos is beloved at sight;


s: And every child hates Shylock, though his soul


s: Still sits at squat, and peeps not from its hole.


s: At half mankind when generous Manly raves,


s: All know 'tis virtue, for he thinks them knaves:


s: All see 'tis vice, and itch of vulgar praise.


s: When flattery glares, all hate it in a queen,


s: While one there is who charms us with his spleen.


s: But these plain characters we rarely find;


s: Though strong the bent, yet quick the turns of mind:


s: Or puzzling contraries confound the whole;


s: The dull, flat falsehood serves for policy;


s: And in the cunning, truth itself's a lie:


s: Unthought-of frailties cheat us in the wise;


s: See the same man, in vigour, in the gout;


s: Friendly at Hackney, faithless at Whitehall.


s: Thinks who endures a knave is next a knave,


s: Save just at dinner--then prefers, no doubt,


s: A rogue with venison to a saint without.


s: Who would not praise Patritio's high desert,


s: His hand unstained, his uncorrupted heart,


s: His comprehensive head! all interests weighed,


s: All Europe saved, yet Britain not betrayed.


s: He thanks you not, his pride is in piquet,


s: What made (say Montagne, or more sage Charron)


s: A perjured prince a leaden saint revere,


s: Faithless through piety, and duped through wit?


s: And just her wisest monarch made a fool?


s: In man, the judgment shoots at flying game,


s: A bird of passage! gone as soon as found,


s: Now in the moon, perhaps, now under ground.


s: In vain the sage, with retrospective eye,


s: Would from the apparent what conclude the why,


s: Infer the motive from the deed, and show,


s: That what we chanced was what we meant to do.


s: Behold! if fortune or a mistress frowns,


s: Some plunge in business, others shave their crowns:


s: To ease the soul of one oppressive weight,


s: This quits an empire, that embroils a state:


s: Charles to the convent, Philip to the field.


s: Not always actions show the man: we find


s: Who does a kindness, is not therefore kind;


s: Perhaps the wind just shifted from the east:


s: Not therefore humble he who seeks retreat,


s: Pride guides his steps, and bids him shun the great:


s: Who combats bravely is not therefore brave,


s: He dreads a death-bed like the meanest slave:


s: Who reasons wisely is not therefore wise,


s: His pride in reasoning, not in acting lies.


s: But grant that actions best discover man;


s: Take the most strong, and sort them as you can.


s: The few that glare each character must mark;


s: Must then at once (the character to save)


s: The plain rough hero turn a crafty knave?


s: Alas! in truth the man but changed his mind,


s: Perhaps was sick, in love, or had not dined.


s: Ask why from Britain Caesar would retreat?


s: Caesar himself might whisper he was beat.


s: Why risk the world's great empire for a punk?


s: Caesar perhaps might answer he was drunk.


s: But, sage historians! 'tis your task to prove


s: 'Tis from high life high characters are drawn;


s: A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn;


s: A judge is just, a chancellor juster still;


s: A gownman, learn'd; a bishop, what you will;


s: More wise, more learned, more just, more everything.


s: Court-virtues bear, like gems, the highest rate,


s: Born where Heaven's influence scarce can penetrate:


s: In life's low vale, the soil the virtues like,


s: They please as beauties, here as wonders strike.


s: Though the same sun with all-diffusive rays


s: Blush in the rose, and in the diamond blaze,


s: We prize the stronger effort of his power,


s: And justly set the gem above the flower.


s: Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined.


s: Boastful and rough, your first son is a squire;


s: The next a tradesman, meek, and much a liar;


s: Tom struts a soldier, open, bold, and brave;


s: Will sneaks a scrivener, an exceeding knave:


s: Is he a Churchman? then he's fond of power: }


s: A smart Freethinker? all things in an hour. }


s: Ask men's opinions: Scoto now shall tell


s: How trade increases, and the world goes well;


s: Strike off his pension, by the setting sun,


s: That gay Freethinker, a fine talker once,


s: What turns him now a stupid silent dunce?


s: Some god, or spirit he has lately found:


s: Or chanced to meet a minister that frowned.


s: Interest o'ercome, or policy take place:


s: Opinions? they still take a wider range:


s: Find, if you can, in what you cannot change.


s: Manners with fortunes, humours turn with climes,


s: Tenets with books, and principles with times.


s: Search then the ruling passion: there, alone,


s: The wild are constant, and the cunning known;


s: The fool consistent, and the false sincere;


s: Priests, princes, women, no dissemblers here.


s: This clue once found, unravels all the rest,


s: The prospect clears, and Wharton stands confest.


s: Wharton, the scorn and wonder of our days,


s: Whose ruling passion was the lust of praise:


s: Born with whate'er could win it from the wise,


s: Women and fools must like him or he dies;


s: Though wondering senates hung on all he spoke,


s: The club must hail him master of the joke.


s: Shall parts so various aim at nothing new!


s: Then turns repentant, and his God adores


s: With the same spirit that he drinks and wh***s;


s: And now the punk applaud, and now the friar.


s: Thus with each gift of nature and of art,


s: And wanting nothing but an honest heart;


s: Grown all to all, from no one vice exempt;


s: And most contemptible, to shun contempt:


s: His passion still, to covet general praise,


s: His life, to forfeit it a thousand ways;


s: A constant bounty which no friend has made;


s: An angel tongue, which no man can persuade;


s: A fool, with more of wit than half mankind,


s: Too rash for thought, for action too refined:


s: A tyrant to the wife his heart approves;


s: He dies, sad outcast of each church and state,


s: And, harder still! flagitious, yet not great.


s: Ask you why Wharton broke through every rule?


s: 'Twas all for fear the knaves should call him fool.


s: Yet, in this search, the wisest may mistake,


s: If second qualities for first they take.


s: When Catiline by rapine swelled his store;


s: Were means, not ends; ambition was the vice.


s: That very Caesar, born in Scipio's days,


s: Had aimed, like him, by chastity at praise.


s: In vain the observer eyes the builder's toil,


s: But quite mistakes the scaffold for the pile.


s: In this one passion man can strength enjoy,


s: As fits give vigour, just when they destroy.


s: Time, that on all things lays his lenient hand,


s: Yet tames not this; it sticks to our last sand.


s: As weak, as earnest, and as gravely out,


s: As sober Lanesb'row dancing in the gout.


s: Behold a reverend sire, whom want of grace


s: Shoved from the wall perhaps, or rudely pressed


s: By his own son, that passes by unblessed:


s: Still to his haunt he crawls on knocking knees,


s: The doctor called, declares all help too late:


s: "Mercy!" cries Helluo, "mercy on my soul!


s: Is there no hope!--Alas!--then bring the jowl."


s: The frugal crone, whom praying priests attend,


s: Still tries to save the hallowed taper's end,


s: Collects her breath, as ebbing life retires,


s: For one puff more, and in that puff expires.


s: "Odious! in woollen! 'twould a saint provoke"


s: (Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke);


s: "No, let a charming chintz, and Brussels lace


s: Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face:


s: One would not, sure, be frightful when one's dead--


s: And--Betty--give this cheek a little red."


s: The courtier smooth, who forty years had shined


s: Just brought out this, when scarce his tongue could stir,


s: "If--where I'm going--I could serve you, sir?"


s: And sighed) "my lands and tenements to Ned."


s: "Your money, sir?"  "My money, sir? what, all?


s: Why--if I must" (then wept)--"I give it Paul."


s: "The Manor, sir?"--"The Manor! hold," he cried,


s: "Not that,--I cannot part with that"--and died.


s: And you! brave Cobham, to the latest breath


s: Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death:


s: Such in those moments as in all the past,


s: "Oh, save my country, Heaven!" shall be your last.


s: Nothing so true as what you once let fall,


s: And best distinguished by black, brown, or fair.


s: All how unlike each other, all how true!


s: Arcadia's countess, here, in ermined pride,


s: Here Fannia, leering on her own good man,


s: In Magdalen's loose hair, and lifted eye,


s: Or dressed in smiles of sweet Cecilia shine,


s: With simpering angels, palms, and harps divine;


s: Whether the charmer sinner it, or saint it,


s: If folly grow romantic, I must paint it.


s: Come then, the colours and the ground prepare!


s: Dip in the rainbow, trick her off in air;


s: Choose a firm cloud, before it fall, and in it


s: Catch, ere she change, the Cynthia of this minute.


s: Rufa, whose eye, quick-glancing o'er the park


s: Attracts each light gay meteor of a spark,


s: As Sappho's diamonds with her dirty smock;


s: With Sappho fragrant at an evening masque:


s: Shine, buzz, and fly-blow in the setting sun.


s: The frail one's advocate, the weak one's friend:


s: To her, Calista proved her conduct nice;


s: Sudden, she storms! she raves!  You tip the wink,


s: But spare your censure; Silia does not drink.


s: All eyes may see from what the change arose,


s: Sighs for the shades--"How charming is a park!"


s: A park is purchased, but the fair he sees


s: All bathed in tears--"Oh, odious, odious trees!"


s: 'Tis to their changes half their charms we owe;


s: Their happy spots the nice admirer take,


s: 'Twas thus Calypso once each heart alarmed,


s: Awed without virtue, without beauty charmed;


s: Her tongue bewitched as oddly as her eyes,


s: Less wit than mimic, more a wit than wise;


s: Strange graces still, and stranger flights she had,


s: Was just not ugly, and was just not mad;


s: Yet ne'er so sure our passion to create,


s: As when she touched the brink of all we hate.


s: To make a wash, would hardly stew a child;


s: Has even been proved to grant a lover's prayer,


s: And paid a tradesman once to make him stare;


s: Gave alms at Easter, in a Christian trim,


s: Why then declare good-nature is her scorn,


s: When 'tis by that alone she can be borne?


s: Why pique all mortals, yet affect a name?


s: A fool to pleasure, yet a slave to fame:


s: Now deep in Taylor and the Book of Martyrs,


s: Now drinking citron with his grace and Chartres:


s: Now Conscience chills her, and now Passion burns;


s: And Atheism and Religion take their turns;


s: Yet still a sad, good Christian at her heart.


s: What then? let blood and body bear the fault,


s: Her head's untouched, that noble seat of thought:


s: Such this day's doctrine--in another fit


s: She sins with poets through pure love of wit.


s: What has not fired her bosom or her brain?


s: Caesar and Tall-boy, Charles and Charlemagne.


s: The nose of Hautgout, and the tip of taste,


s: Critic'd your wine, and analysed your meat,


s: Yet on plain pudding deigned at home to eat;


s: On the soft passion, and the taste refined,


s: The address, the delicacy--stoops at once,


s: Flavia's a wit, has too much sense to pray;


s: To toast our wants and wishes, is her way;


s: Nor asks of God, but of her stars, to give


s: The mighty blessing, "while we live, to live."


s: Then all for death, that opiate of the soul!


s: Say, what can cause such impotence of mind?


s: A spark too fickle, or a spouse too kind.


s: Wise wretch! with pleasures too refined to please;


s: With too much spirit to be e'er at ease;


s: With too much quickness ever to be taught;


s: With too much thinking to have common thought:


s: You purchase pain with all that joy can give,


s: Turn then from wits; and look on Simo's mate,


s: Or her, that owns her faults, but never mends,


s: Because she's honest, and the best of friends.


s: Or her, whose life the Church and scandal share,


s: Or her, who laughs at hell, but (like her Grace)


s: Cries, "Ah! how charming, if there's no such place!"


s: To kill those foes to fair ones, time and thought.


s: Woman and fool are two hard things to hit;


s: For true no-meaning puzzles more than wit.


s: But what are these to great Atossa's mind?


s: Scarce once herself, by turns all womankind!


s: Who, with herself, or others, from her birth


s: Finds all her life one warfare upon earth:


s: Shines in exposing knaves, and painting fools,


s: Yet is, whate'er she hates and ridicules.


s: Whisks it about, and down it goes again.


s: Full sixty years the world has been her trade,


s: The pleasure missed her, and the scandal hit.


s: Who breaks with her, provokes revenge from hell,


s: But he's a bolder man who dares be well.


s: Nor more a storm her hate than gratitude:


s: To that each passion turns, or soon or late;


s: Love, if it makes her yield, must make her hate:


s: Superiors? death! and equals? what a curse!


s: Offend her, and she knows not to forgive;


s: Oblige her, and she'll hate you while you live:


s: But die, and she'll adore you--then the bust


s: And temple rise--then fall again to dust.


s: Last night, her lord was all that's good and great;


s: A knave this morning, and his will a cheat.


s: Strange! by the means defeated of the ends,


s: By spirit robbed of power, by warmth of friend


s: By wealth of followers! without one distress


s: Sick of herself through very selfishness!


s: Atossa, cursed with every granted prayer,


s: Childless with all her children, wants an heir.


s: To heirs unknown descends the unguarded store,


s: Or wanders, Heaven-directed, to the poor.


s: Pictures like these, dear madam, to design,


s: Asks no firm hand, and no unerring line;


s: Some wandering touches, some reflected light,


s: Some flying stroke alone can hit 'em right:


s: For how should equal colours do the knack?


s: Chameleons who can paint in white and black?


s: "Yet Chloe sure was formed without a spot"--


s: Nature in her then erred not, but forgot.


s: "With every pleasing, every prudent part,


s: Say, what can Chloe want?"--She wants a heart.


s: She speaks, behaves, and acts just as she ought;


s: But never, never, reached one generous thought.


s: Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour,


s: She, while her lover pants upon her breast,


s: Can mark the figures on an Indian chest;


s: And when she sees her friend in deep despair,


s: Observes how much a chintz exceeds mohair.


s: She e'er should cancel--but she may forget.


s: Safe is your secret still in Chloe's ear;


s: But none of Chloe's shall you ever hear.


s: Of all her dears she never slandered one,


s: Would Chloe know if you're alive or dead?


s: She bids her footman put it in her head.


s: Chloe is prudent--would you too be wise?


s: Then never break your heart when Chloe dies.


s: One certain portrait may (I grant) be seen,


s: Which Heaven has varnished out, and made a _Queen_.


s: With truth and goodness, as with crown and ball.


s: Poets heap virtues, painters gems at will,


s: And show their zeal, and hide their want of skill.


s: 'Tis well--but, artists! who can paint or write,


s: That robe of quality so struts and swells,


s: None see what parts of nature it conceals:


s: If Queensbury to strip there's no compelling,


s: 'Tis from a handmaid we must take a Helen,


s: To draw the man who loves his God or king:


s: From honest Mah'met, or plain Parson Hale.


s: But grant in public men sometimes are shown,


s: Our bolder talents in full light displayed;


s: Bred to disguise, in public 'tis you hide;


s: There, none distinguish 'twixt your shame or pride,


s: In men, we various ruling passions find;


s: Those, only fixed they first or last obey--


s: The love of pleasure, and the love of sway.


s: That, Nature gives; and where the lesson taught


s: Is but to please, can pleasure seem a fault?


s: Experience, this; by man's oppression curst,


s: They seek the second not to lose the first.


s: Men, some to business, some to pleasure take;


s: Men, some to quiet, some to public strife;


s: Yet mark the fate of a whole sex of queens!


s: Power all their end, but beauty all the means:


s: In youth they conquer, with so wild a rage,


s: As leaves them scarce a subject in their age:


s: For foreign glory, foreign joy, they roam;


s: No thought of peace or happiness at home.


s: But wisdom's triumph is well-timed retreat,


s: Beauties, like tyrants, old and friendless grown,


s: Nor leave one sigh behind them when they die.


s: Pleasures the sex, as children birds, pursue,


s: Still out of reach, yet never out of view;


s: Sure, if they catch, to spoil the toy at most,


s: At last, to follies youth could scarce defend,


s: It grows their age's prudence to pretend;


s: Ashamed to own they gave delight before,


s: Reduced to feign it, when they give no more:


s: As hags hold Sabbaths, less for joy than spite,


s: Still round and round the ghosts of beauty glide,


s: And haunt the places where their honour died.


s: A youth of frolics, an old age of cards;


s: Young without lovers, old without a friend;


s: A fop their passion, but their prize a sot;


s: Ah! friend! to dazzle let the vain design;


s: To raise the thought and touch the heart be thine!


s: That charm shall grow, while what fatigues the ring,


s: Flaunts and goes down, an unregarded thing:


s: So when the sun's broad beam has tired the sight,


s: All mild ascends the moon's more sober light;


s: And unobserved the glaring orb declines.


s: Oh! blest with temper whose unclouded ray


s: She, who can love a sister's charms, or hear


s: Sighs for a daughter with unwounded ear;


s: She, who ne'er answers till a husband cools,


s: Or, if she rules him, never shows she rules;


s: Charms by accepting, by submitting sways,


s: Yet has her humour most, when she obeys;


s: Let fops or fortune fly which way they will;


s: Disdains all loss of tickets, or Codille:


s: Spleen, vapours, or small-pox, above them all,


s: And mistress of herself, though China fall.


s: And yet, believe me, good as well as ill,


s: Heaven, when it strives to polish all it can


s: Its last best work, but forms a softer man;


s: Picks from each sex, to make the fav'rite blest,


s: Your love of pleasure, or desire of rest:


s: Blends, in exception to all general rules,


s: Your taste of follies, with our scorn of fools:


s: Reserve with frankness, art with truth allied,


s: Courage with softness, modesty with pride;


s: Be this a woman's fame: with this unblest,


s: Toasts live a scorn, and queens may die a jest.


s: This Phoebus promised (I forget the year)


s: When those blue eyes first opened on the sphere;


s: Ascendant Phoebus watched that hour with care,


s: Averted half your parents' simple prayer,


s: And gave you beauty, but denied the pelf


s: That buys your sex a tyrant o'er itself.


s: The gen'rous god, who wit and gold refines,


s: Kept dross for duchesses--the world shall know it--


s: To you gave sense, good-humour, and a poet.


s: P. Who shall decide, when doctors disagree,


s: And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me?


s: You hold the word, from Jove to Momus given,


s: That man was made the standing jest of Heaven;


s: And gold but sent to keep the fools in play,


s: For some to heap, and some to throw away.


s: But I, who think more highly of our kind,


s: (And surely, Heaven and I are of a mind)


s: Deep hid the shining mischief under ground:


s: Flamed forth this rival to its sire, the sun,


s: Then careful Heaven supplied two sorts of men,


s: To squander these, and those to hide again.


s: Like doctors thus, when much dispute has past,


s: We find our tenets just the same at last.


s: No grace of Heaven or token of th' elect;


s: Given to the fool, the mad, the vain, the evil,


s: To Ward, to Waters, Chartres, and the devil.


s: B. What Nature wants, commodious gold bestows,


s: 'Tis thus we eat the bread another sows.


s: 'Tis thus we riot, while, who sow it, starve:


s: What Nature wants (a phrase I much distrust)


s: Useful, I grant, it serves what life requires,


s: But, dreadful too, the dark assassin hires.


s: P. But lures the pirate, and corrupts the friend.


s: P. But bribes a senate, and the land's betrayed.


s: In vain may heroes fight, and patriots rave;


s: If secret gold sap on from knave to knave.


s: Once, we confess, beneath the patriot's cloak,


s: From the cracked bag the dropping guinea spoke,


s: And jingling down the back-stairs, told the crew,


s: Blest paper-credit! last and best supply!


s: That lends corruption lighter wings to fly!


s: Gold imped by thee can compass hardest things,


s: Can pocket states, can fetch or carry kings;


s: A leaf, like Sibyl's, scatter to and fro


s: Our fates and fortunes, as the winds shall blow:


s: Pregnant with thousands flits the scrap unseen,


s: And silent sells a king, or buys a queen.


s: Oh! that such bulky bribes as all might see,


s: Could France or Rome divert our brave designs,


s: With all their brandies or with all their wines?


s: What could they more than knights and squires confound,


s: Or water all the Quorum ten miles round?


s: A statesman's slumbers how this speech would spoil!


s: "Sir, Spain has sent a thousand jars of oil;


s: Huge bales of British cloth blockade the door;


s: Poor Avarice one torment more would find;


s: Nor could Profusion squander all in kind.


s: Astride his cheese Sir Morgan might we meet;


s: And Worldly crying coals from street to street,


s: Whom with a wig so wild, and mien so mazed,


s: Pity mistakes for some poor tradesman crazed.


s: Had Colepepper's whole wealth been hops and hogs,


s: Could he himself have sent it to the dogs?


s: His Grace will game: to White's a bull be led,


s: With spurning heels and with a butting head.


s: To White's be carried, as to ancient games,


s: Fair coursers, vases, and alluring dames.


s: Shall then Uxorio, if the stakes he sweep,


s: Bear home six w****s, and make his lady weep?


s: Drive to St. James's a whole herd of swine?


s: Oh, filthy cheek on all industrious skill,


s: To spoil the nation's last great trade, Quadrille!


s: Since then, my lord, on such a world we fall,


s: What say you?  B. Say?  Why, take it, gold and all.


s: P. What Riches give us let us then inquire:


s: Alas! 'tis more than Turner finds they give.


s: Alas! 'tis more than (all his visions past)


s: What can they give? to dying Hopkins, heirs;


s: Can they in gems bid pallid Hippia glow,


s: In Fulvia's buckle ease the throbs below;


s: With all th' embroid'ry plastered at thy tail?


s: They might (were Harpax not too wise to spend)


s: Give Harpax' self the blessing of a friend;


s: Or find some doctor that would save the life


s: Of wretched Shylock, spite of Shylock's wife:


s: But thousands die, without or this or that,


s: To some, indeed, Heaven grants the happier fate,


s: Perhaps you think the poor might have their part?


s: Bond damns the poor, and hates them from his heart:


s: The grave Sir Gilbert holds it for a rule,


s: That "every man in want is knave or fool:"


s: "God cannot love," says Blunt, with tearless eyes,


s: "The wretch He starves"--and piously denies:


s: Admits, and leaves them--Providence's care.


s: Yet, to be just to these poor men of pelf,


s: Each does but hate his neighbour as himself:


s: Damned to the mines, an equal fate betides


s: The slave that digs it, and the slave that hides.


s: B. Who suffer thus, mere charity should own,


s: Must act on motives powerful, though unknown.


s: P. Some war, some plague, or famine they foresee,


s: Why Shylock wants a meal, the cause is found--


s: He thinks a loaf will rise to fifty pound.


s: What made directors cheat in South-Sea year?


s: To live on venison when it sold so dear.


s: Ask you why Phryne the whole auction buys?


s: Why she and Sappho raise that monstrous sum?


s: Wise Peter sees the world's respect for gold,


s: And therefore hopes this nation may be sold:


s: Glorious ambition! Peter, swell thy store,


s: And be what Rome's great Didius was before.


s: The crown of Poland, venal twice an age,


s: To just three millions stinted modest Gage.


s: But nobler scenes Maria's dreams unfold,


s: Congenial souls! whose life one av'rice joins,


s: And one fate buries in th' Asturian mines.


s: Much injured Blunt! why bears he Britain's hate?


s: A wizard told him in these words our fate:


s: "At length corruption, like a gen'ral flood


s: (So long by watchful Ministers withstood),


s: Shall deluge all; and av'rice, creeping on,


s: Spread like a low-born mist, and blot the sun;


s: Statesman and patriot ply alike the stocks,


s: And judges job, and bishops bite the town,


s: And mighty dukes pack cards for half-a-crown.


s: See Britain sunk in Lucre's sordid charms,


s: And France revenged of Anne's and Edward's arms!"


s: 'Twas no Court-badge, great Scriv'ner! fired thy brain,


s: No, 'twas thy righteous end, ashamed to see


s: To buy both sides, and give thy country peace.


s: "All this is madness," cries a sober sage:


s: But who, my friend, has reason in his rage?


s: "The ruling passion, be it what it will,


s: The ruling passion conquers reason still."


s: Less mad the wildest whimsey we can frame,


s: Than even that passion, if it has no aim;


s: For though such motives folly you may call,


s: The folly's greater to have none at all.


s: Hear then the truth: "'Tis Heaven each passion sends,


s: And different men directs to different ends.


s: Ask we what makes one keep, and one bestow?


s: That POWER who bids the ocean ebb and flow,


s: Bids seed-time, harvest, equal course maintain,


s: Through reconciled extremes of drought and rain,


s: Builds life on death, on change duration founds,


s: And gives th' eternal wheels to know their rounds.


s: Riches, like insects, when concealed they lie,


s: Wait but for wings, and in their season fly.


s: Who sees pale Mammon pine amidst his store,


s: Sees but a backward steward for the poor;


s: This year a reservoir, to keep and spare;


s: The next, a fountain, spouting through his heir,


s: In lavish streams to quench a country's thirst,


s: And men and dogs shall drink him till they burst.


s: Old Cotta shamed his fortune and his birth,


s: What though (the use of barbarous spits forgot)


s: His kitchen vied in coolness with his grot?


s: His court with nettles, moats with cresses stored,


s: With soups unbought and salads blessed his board?


s: Than Brahmins, saints, and sages did before;


s: And who would take the poor from Providence?


s: Like some lone Chartreux stands the good old hall,


s: Silence without, and fasts within the wall;


s: No raftered roofs with dance and tabor sound,


s: No noontide bell invites the country round;


s: Tenants with sighs the smokeless towers survey,


s: And turn th' unwilling steeds another way;


s: Curse the saved candle and unopening door;


s: While the gaunt mastiff growling at the gate,


s: Affrights the beggar whom he longs to eat.


s: Not so his son; he marked this oversight,


s: And then mistook reverse of wrong for right.


s: (For what to shun will no great knowledge need;


s: Yet sure, of qualities deserving praise,


s: More go to ruin fortunes, than to raise.


s: What slaughtered hecatombs, what floods of wine,


s: Fill the capacious squire, and deep divine!


s: Yet no mean motive this profusion draws;


s: 'Tis George and Liberty that crowns the cup,


s: And zeal for that great house which eats him up.


s: The sylvans groan--no matter--for the fleet;


s: Next goes his wool--to clothe our valiant bands;


s: Last, for his country's love, he sells his lands.


s: To town he comes, completes the nation's hope,


s: And heads the bold train-bands, and burns a Pope.


s: And shall not Britain now reward his toils,


s: Britain, that pays her patriots with her spoils?


s: In vain at Court the bankrupt pleads his cause,


s: His thankless country leaves him to her laws.


s: T' enjoy them, and the virtue to impart,


s: Not sunk by sloth, nor raised by servitude;


s: With splendour, charity; with plenty, health;


s: O teach us, Bathurst! yet unspoiled by wealth!


s: That secret rare, between the extremes to move


s: Of mad good-nature, and of mean self-love.


s: B. To worth or want well weighed, be bounty given,


s: And ease, or emulate, the care of Heaven


s: (Whose measure full o'erflows on human race);


s: Mend Fortune's fault, and justify her grace.


s: Wealth in the gross is death, but life diffused;


s: As poison heals, in just proportion used:


s: In heaps, like ambergrise, a stink it lies,


s: But well dispersed, is incense to the skies.


s: P. Who starves by nobles, or with nobles eats?


s: The wretch that trusts them, and the rogue that cheats.


s: Is there a lord who knows a cheerful noon


s: Without a fiddler, flatterer, or buffoon?


s: Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or play'r?


s: Who copies yours or Oxford's better part,


s: To ease the oppressed, and raise the sinking heart?


s: Where'er he shines, O Fortune, gild the scene,


s: And angels guard him in the golden mean!


s: There, English bounty yet awhile may stand,


s: And Honour linger ere it leaves the land.


s: But all our praises why should lords engross?


s: Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross:


s: Pleased Vaga echoes through her winding bounds,


s: And rapid Severn hoarse applause resounds.


s: Who hung with woods you mountain's sultry brow?


s: From the dry rock who bade the waters flow?


s: Not to the skies in useless columns tost,


s: But clear and artless, pouring through the plain


s: Health to the sick, and solace to the swain.


s: Whose causeway parts the vale with shady rows?


s: Who taught that heaven-directed spire to rise?


s: "The Man of Ross," each lisping babe replies.


s: Behold the market-place with poor o'erspread!


s: The Man of Ross divides the weekly bread;


s: He feeds yon almshouse, neat, but void of state,


s: Where age and want sit smiling at the gate;


s: Him portioned maids, apprenticed orphans blest,


s: The young who labour, and the old who rest.


s: Prescribes, attends, the medicine makes, and gives.


s: Is there a variance? enter but his door,


s: Baulked are the courts, and contest is no more.


s: Despairing quacks with curses fled the place,


s: What all so wish, but want the power to do!


s: Oh say, what sums that generous hand supply?


s: What mines, to swell that boundless charity?


s: P. Of debts, and taxes, wife and children clear,


s: This man possest--five hundred pounds a year.


s: Blush, grandeur, blush! proud courts, withdraw your blaze!


s: Ye little stars, hide your diminished rays!


s: B. And what? no monument, inscription, stone?


s: His race, his form, his name almost unknown?


s: P. Who builds a church to God, and not to Fame,


s: Will never mark the marble with his name;


s: Go, search it there, where to be born and die,


s: Enough, that virtue filled the space between;


s: Proved, by the ends of being, to have been.


s: When Hopkins dies, a thousand lights attend


s: The wretch, who living saved a candle's end:


s: Shouldering God's altar a vile image stands,


s: Belies his features, nay, extends his hands;


s: That livelong wig, which Gorgon's self might own,


s: Behold what blessings wealth to life can lend!


s: And see what comfort it affords our end.


s: In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half-hung,


s: The floors of plaster, and the walls of dung,


s: On once a flock-bed, but repaired with straw,


s: With tape-tied curtains, never meant to draw,


s: The George and Garter dangling from that bed


s: Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red,


s: Great Villiers lies--alas! how changed from him,


s: That life of pleasure, and that soul of whim!--


s: Gallant and gay, in Cliveden's proud alcove,


s: The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love;


s: Of mimic'd statesmen and their merry king.


s: No wit to flatter left of all his store!


s: No fool to laugh at, which he valued more.


s: There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends,


s: And fame, this lord of useless thousands ends.


s: His grace's fate sage Cutler could foresee,


s: And well (he thought) advised him, "Live like me."