Fair op'ning to some Court's propitious shine, 10 Or reap'd in iron harvests of the field? Where grows where grows it not? If vain our toil," We ought to blame the culture, not the foil: Fix'd to no fpot is happiness sincere, 15 'Tis no where to be found, or ev'ry where: 'Tis never to be bought, but always free, And fled from monarchs, ST. JOHN! dwells with thee. Afk of the Learn'd the way? The Learn'd are blind; 20 This bids to ferve, and that to shun mankind; COMMENTARY. fide, is a summary of false happiness placed in Externals: " Plant of celestial feed! if dropt below, Say, in what mortal foil thou deign'st to grow? Fair op'ning to some Court's propitious shine, "Or deep with Di'monds in the flaming mine ? " "Twin'd with the wreaths Parnassian laurels yield, "Or reap'd in iron harvests of the field? The fix remaining lines deliver the true notion of Happiness to be in Virtue. Which is summed up in these two: "Fix'd to no spot is Happiness fincere; "'Tis no where to be found, or ev'ry where. The Poet having thus defined his terms, and laid down his propofition, proceeds to the support of his Thefis; the various arguments of which make up the body of the Epiftle.. VER. 19. Afk of the Learn'd, &c.] He begins (from y 18 to 29.) with detecting the false notions of Happiness. These are of two kinds, the Philofophical and Popular: : Some place the bliss in action, some in ease, COMMENTARY. The popular he had recapitulated in the invocation, when Happiness was called upon, at her several supposed places of abode: the philosophical only remained to be delivered : "Afk of the Learn'd the way? the Learn'd are blind; This bids to serve, and that to shun Mankind: 66 66 Some place the bliss in action, some in ease; Those call it Pleasure, and Contentment these. They differed as well in the means, as in the nature of the end. Some placed happiness in action, some in contemplation; the first called it pleasure, the second eafe. Of those who placed it in action and called it pleasure, the rout they pursued either funk them into fenfual pleafures, which ended in Pain; or led them in fearch of imaginary perfections, unfuitable to their nature and station, (fee Ep. i.) which ended in Vanity. Of those who placed it in ease, the contemplative station they were fixed in, made fome, for their quiet, find truth in every thing; others in nothing. "Who thus define it, say they more or less "Than this, that Happiness is Happiness? The confutation of these Philofophic errors he shews to be very eafy, one common fallacy running through them all; namely this, that instead of telling us in what the happiness of human nature confifts, which was what was asked of them, each bufies himself in explaining in what he placed his own. NOTES. VER. 21, 23. Some place the bliss in action, Some funk to beafts, &c.] 1. Those who place Happiness, or the fummum bonum, in Pleasure, Ἡδονὴ; such as the Cyrenaic sect, called, on that account, the Hedonic. 2. Those who place it in a Some funk to Beasts, find pleasure end in pain; Who thus define it, say they more or less Than this, that Happiness is Happiness? 25 Take Nature's path, and mad Opinion's leave; All states can reach it, and all heads conceive; 30 COMMENTARY. VER. 29. Take Nature's path, &c.] The Poet then proceeds (from 28 to 35.) to reform their mistakes; and shews them that, if they will but take the road of Nature and leave that of mad Opinion, they will foon find Hap NOTES. certain tranquillity or calmness of Mind, which they call Ευθυμία, such as the Democritic sect. 3. The Epicurean. 4. The Stoic. 5. The Protagorean, which held that Man was πάντων χρημάτων μέτρον, the measure of all things; for that all things which appear to him, are, and those things which appear not to any Man, are not; so that every imagination or opinion of every man was true. 6. The Sceptic: Whose absolute doubt is, with great judgment, faid to be the effect of indolence, as well as the absolute truft of the Protagorean: For the fame dread of labour attending the search of truth, which makes the Protagorean prefume it is always at hand, makes the Sceptic to conclude it is never to be found. The only difference is, that the laziness of the one is desponding, and the laziness of the other sanguine; yet both can give it a good name, and call it HAPPINESS. VER. 23. Some funk to Beasts, &c.] These four lines add. ed in the last Edition, as necessary to complete the summary of the false pursuits after happiness amongst the greek Philosophers. Obvious her goods, in no extreme they dwell; 35 A But fome way leans and hearkens to the kind; 40 No Bandit fierce, no Tyrant mad with pride, No cavern'd Hermit, rests self-fatisfy'd: COMMENTARY. ; piness to be a good of the species, and, like Common Senfe, equally diftributed to all mankind. VER. 35. Remember, Man, &c.] Having exposed the two false species of Happiness, the Philofophical and Popular, and denounced the true; in order to establish the laft he goes on to a confutation of the two former. I. He first (from $ 34 to 49.) confutes the Philofophical; which, as we faid, makes happiness a particular, not a general good: And this two ways; 1. From his grand principle, that God acts by general laws; the consequence of which is, that happiness, which supports the well-being of every system, must needs be universal; and not partial, as the Philosophers conceived. 2. From fact, that Man instinctively concurs with this designation of Providence, to make happiness universal, by his having no delight in any thing uncommunicated or uncommunicable. NOTES. VER. 35. Remember, Man! "the Universal Cause, “ Acts not by partial, but by gen'ral laws;"] I reckon it nothing that M, Du Resnel faw none of the Who most to shun or hate Mankind pretend, Each has his share; and who would more obtain, Shall find, the pleasute pays not half the pain. ORDER is Heav'n's first law; and this confeft, Some are, and must be, greater than the rest, 50 VARIATIONS. After $ 52. in the MS. Say not, "Heav'n's here profuse, there poorly saves, "And for one Monarch makes a thousand flaves." You'll find, when Causes and their Ends are known, 'Twas for the thousand Heav'n has made that one. COMMENTARY. VER. 49. Order is Heav'n's first law;) II In the second place (from 48 to 67.) he confutes the popular error concerning happiness, namely, that it confists in exter NOTES. fine reasoning from these two lines, to ver. 73. in which the Poet confutes both the philofophic and popular errors concerning happiness; what I can leaft bear is his perverting these two lines to a horrid and fenfeless fatalism, - foreign to the argument in hand, and directly contrary to the Poet's general principles. |