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This I might have done in prose; but I chose verse, and even rhyme, for two reasons: The one will appear obvious; that principles, maxims, or precepts so written both strike the reader more strongly at first, and are more easily retained by him afterwards. The other may feem odd, but it is true; I found I could express them more shortly this way than in prose itself, and nothing is truer than that much of the force, as well as grace, of arguments or instructions depends on their conciseness. I was unable to treat this part of my subject more in detail, without becoming dry and tedious; or more poetically, without facrificing perfpicuity to ornament, without wandering from the precision, or breaking the chain of reasoning. If any man can unite all these, without diminution of any of them, I freely confefs he will compass a thing above my capacity.

What is now published, is only to be confidered as a general map of MAN, marking out no more that the greater parts, their extent, their limits, and their connexion, but leaving the particular to be more fully delineated in their charts which are to follow. Consequently these Epistles in their progress (if I make any progress) will be less dry, and more susceptible of poetical ornament. I am here only opening the fountains, and clearing the passage: to deduce the rivers, to follow them in their course, and to observe their effects, would be a task more agreeable.

THE

F. Man in the abstract,-That we can judge only
with regard to our own system, being ignorant

of the relations of systems and things, ver. 17, &c.

That Man is not to be deemed imperfect, but a Being

fuited to his place and rank in the creation, agreea-

ble to the general Order of Things, and conformable

to Ends and Relations to himunknown, ver. 33 &c.

That it is partly upon his Ignorance of future events,
and partly upon the Hope of a future ftate, that all
his Happiness in the present depends, ver. 77, &c.

The pride of aiming at more knowledge, and pretend-
ing to more Perfection, the cause of Man's error
and misery. The impiety of putting himself in the
place of God, and judging of the fitness or unfitness,
perfection or imperfection, justice or injustice of his
difpenfations,
ver. 113, &c.

The abfurdity of conceiting himself the final cause of the
creation, or expecting that perfection in the moral
world, which is not in the natural, ver. 137, &c.
The unreasonableness of his complaints against Provi-
dence, while, on the one hand, he demands the Per-
fections of the Angels; and, on the other, the bodily
qualification of the Brutes; though to poffefs any of
the sensitive faculties in a higher degree, would ren-
der him miferable,
ver. 173, &c.

That throughout the whole visible world, an uni-
verfal order and gradation in the sensual and
mental faculties is observed, which caufes a fub- -
ordination of creature to creature, and of all crea-
tures to Man. The gradation of sense, instinct,
thought, reflection, reason; that Reafon alone
countervails all the other faculties,
ver. 207.

How much farther this order and fubordination of
living creatures may extend, above and below us;
were any part of which broken, not that part only,
but the whole connected creation must be destroyed,

ver. 233.

The extravagance, madness and pride of such a de-

fire.

ver. 259

The confequence of all, the absolute submission due to
Providence, both as to our present and future state,
v. 281, &c. to the end.

EPISTLE II.

Of the Nature and State of Man, with respect
to Himself, as an Individual.

THE business of Man not to pry into God, but

to study himself, his Middle Nature; his Porver

Its providential Use, in fixing our Principle, and

ascertaining our Virtue,

ver. 175.

Virtue and Vice joined in our mixed Nature; the

limits near, yet the things separate and evident :
What is the office of Reason,

ver 195, &c.

Horu odious Vice in itself, and how we deceive our

selves into it,

ver. 217, &c.

That, however, the Ends of Providence and general

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In every state, and every age of life, ver. 271, &c.

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