Together let us beat this ample field,
Try what the open, what the covert yield;
The latent tracts, the giddy heights, explore
Of all who blindly creep, or fightless foar
Eye Nature's walks, fhoot Folly as it flies,

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And catch the Manners living as they rife;
Laugh where we muft, be candid where we can; 15
But vindicate the ways of God to Man.

I. Say first, of God above, or Man below,
What can we reason, but from what we know?
Of Man, what fee we but his station here,
From which to reafon, or to which refer?

NOTES.

VER. 12. Of all who blindly creep, &c.] i. e. Thofe who only follow the blind guidance of their Paffions; or those who leave behind them common fenfe and fober reason, in their high flights through the regions of Metaphyfics. Both which follies are expofed in the fourth epiftle, where the popular and philofophical errors concerning Happiness are fpoken of. The figure here is taken from animal life.

VER. 15. Laugh where we must, &c.] Intimating

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that human follies are fo ftrangely abfurd and ridiculous, that it is not in the power of the most compassionate, on fome occafions, to reftrain their mirth: And that human crimes are fo flagitious, that the most candid have feldom an opportunity, on this fubject, to exercise their virtue.

VER. 19, 20. Of Man, what fee we but his ftation here, From which to reason, or to which refer?]

The fenfe is, we fee nothing of Man, but as he stands at

'Thro' worlds unnumber'd tho' the God be known,

'Tis ours to trace him only in our own.
He, who thro' vast immensity can pierce,
See worlds on worlds compofe one universe,
Obferve how fyftem into system runs,

What other Planets circle other funs,
What vary'd Being peoples ev'ry ftar,
May tell why Heav'n has made us as we are.
But of this frame the bearings, and the ties,
The strong connections, nice dependencies,
Gradations juft, has thy pervading foul

Look'd thro'? or can a part contain the whole ?

NOTES.

2.5

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nections, nice dependencies,] The thought is very noble, and expreffed with great philofophic beauty and exactnefs. The fyftem of the Univerfe is a combination of natural and moral Fitneffes, as the human fyftem is of body and spirit. By the ftrong connections, therefore, the Poet alluded to the natural part; and by the nice dependencies to the moral. For the Essay on Man is not a fyftem of Naturalism, but of natural Religion. Hence it is, that, where he supposes disorders may tend to fome

VER. 21. Thro' worlds unnumber'd, &c.] Hunc cognofcimus folummodo per Proprietates fuas & Attributa, & per fapientiffimas & opti- | mas rerum ftructuras & caufas finales. Newtoni Princ. Schol. gen. fub fin.

VER. 30. The ftrong con

Is the great chain, that draws all to agree, And drawn fupports, upheld by God, or thee?

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II. Prefumptuous Man! the reafon wouldst thou find,
Why form'd fo weak, fo little, and fo blind?
First, if thou canft, the harder reason guess,

Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no less?
Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made
Taller or ftronger than the weeds they shade?
Or afk of yonder argent fields above,
Why Jove's Satellites are less than JOVE?
Of Syftems poffible, if 'tis confest

That Wisdom infinite muft form the best,
Where all must full or not coherent be,

And all that rifes, rife in due degree;

Then, in the scale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain,
There must be, fomewhere, fuch a rank as Man:
And all the queftion (wrangle e'er fo long)
Is only this, if God has plac'd him wrong?

NOTES.

greater good in the natural | world, he fuppofes they may tend likewife to fome greater

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45

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good in the moral, as appears
from thefe fublime images in
the following lines,

If plagues or earthquakes break not Heav'n's defign,
Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline?

Who knows, but he, whofe hand the light'ning forms »
Who heaves old Ocean, and who wings the ftorms;
Pours fierce Ambition in a Cæfar's mind,

Or turns young Amman loose to fcourge mankind ?

Refpecting Man, whatever wrong we call, May, must be right, as relative to all.

In human works, tho' labour'd on with pain,

A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain;
In God's, one fingle can it's end produce;
Yet ferves to fecond too fome other use.
So Man, who here feems principal alone,
Perhaps acts fecond to fome sphere unknown,
Touches fome wheel, or verges to fome goal;
'Tis but a part we fee, and not a whole.

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60

When the proud fteed fhall know why Man reftrains
His fiery course, or drives him o'er the plains;
When the dull Ox, why now he breaks the clod,
Is now a victim, and now Ægypt's God:

Then shall Man's pride and dulness comprehend 65
His actions', paffions', being's, use and end;
Why doing, fuff'ring, check'd, impell'd; and why
This hour a flave, the next a deity.

VARIATIONS.

In the former Editions

64.

Now wears a garland an Ægyptian God.

After

68. the following lines in first Ed.

If to be perfect in a certain sphere,

What matters foon or late, or here or there?
The bleft to-day is as completely fo
As who began ten thousand years ago.

༡༠

Then fay not Man's imperfect, Heav'n in fault;
Say rather, Man's as perfect as he ought:
His knowledge measur❜d to his state and place;
His time a moment, and a point his space.
If to be perfect in a certain sphere,

What matter, foon or late, or here or there?
The bleft to-day is as completely fo,

As who began a thousand years ago.

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III. Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of Fate, All but the page prefcrib'd, their present state: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know: Or who could fuffer Being here below?

The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day,

Had he thy Reason, would he skip and play?
Pleas'd to the laft, he crops the flow'ry food,
And licks the hand juft rais'd to fhed his blood.
Oh blindness to the future! kindly given,
That each may fill the circle mark'd by Heav'n:
Who fees with equal eye, as God of all,

A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

VARIATIONS.

After 88, in the MS.

No great, no little; 'tis as much decreed
That Virgil's Gnat should die as Cæfar bleed.

NOTES.

VER. 87. Who fees with equal eye, &c.] Mat. x. 29.

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