159

Who knows but he, whose hand the light'ning forms,
Who heaves old Ocean, and who wings the storms;
Pours fierce Ambition in a Cæfar's mind,
Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge mankind?
From pride, from pride, our very reas'ning springs;
Account for moral, as for nat'ral things:
Why charge we Heav'n in those, in these acquit?
In both, to reason right is to submit.

Better for Us, perhaps, it might appear,
Were there all harmony, all virtue here;

COMMENTARY.

165.

VER. 165. Better for Us, &c.] But, secondly, to ftrengthen the foregoing analogical argument, and to make the wisdom and goodness of God still more apparent, he

NOTE9.

But the poet reasons at another rate: The way to prove his point, he knew, was to illuftrate the effect of partial moral evil in the universe, by partial natural evil in a particular system. Whether partial moral evil tend to the good of the Universe, being a question which, by reason of our ignorance of many parts of that Universe, we cannot decide, but from known effects; the rules of argument require that it be proved by analogy, i. e. fetting it by, and comparing it with, a thing clear and certain; and it is a thing clear and certain, that partial natural evil tends to the good of our particular System.

VER. 157. Who knows but he, &c.] The fublimity with which the great Author of Nature is here characterised, is but the second beauty of this fine passage. The greatest is the making the very dispensation objected to, the periphrafis of his Title.

That never air or ocean felt the wind;

That never paffion discompos'd the mind.

COMMENTARY.

obferves (from 165 to 172.) that moral evil is not only productive of good to the Whole, but is even productive of good in our own system. It might, says he, perhaps, appear better to us, that there were nothing in this world but peace and virtue:

"That never air or ocean felt the wind;
"That never paffion discompos'd the mind.

But then confider, that as our material system is supported by the ftrife of its elementary particles; so is our intellectual system by the conflict of our Passions, which are the elements of human action.

In a word, as without the benefit of tempestuous winds, both air and ocean would stagnate, corrupt, and spread universal contagion throughout all the ranks of animals that inhabit, or are supported by, them; so, without the benefit of the Passions, such Virtue as was merely the effect of the absence of those Passions, would be a lifeless calm, a stoical Apathy:

"Contracted all, retiring to the breaft:

"But health of Mind is Exercise, not Reft.

Ep. ii. y 103. Therefore, instead of regarding the conflict of the elements, and the Passions of the mind as disorders, you ought to confider them as part of the general order of Providence: And that they are so, appears from their always preserving the same unvaried course, throughout all ages, from the creation to the present time:

"The gen'ral order, since the Whole began, "Is kept in Nature, and is kept in Man.

We fee, therefore, it would be doing great injustice to our author to suspect that he intended, by this, to give any encouragement to Vice. His system, as all his Ethic Epistles shew, is this: That the Passions, for the reasons given above, are necessary to the fupport of Virtue;

170

But ALL fubfifts by elemental strife;
And paffions are the elements of Life.
The gen'ral ORDER, fince the whole began,
Is kept in Nature, and is kept in Man.

COMMENTARY.

That, indeed, the Passions in excess produce Vice, which is, in its own Nature, the greatest of all Evils, and comes into the world from the abuse of Man's free-will; but that God, in his infinite wisdom and goodness, devioufly turns the natural bias of its malignity to the advancement of human happiness, and makes it productive of general Good:

TH' ETERNAL ART EDUCES GOOD FROM ILL.

Ep. ii. $ 175.

This, set against what we have observed of the Poet's doctrine of a future State, will furnish us with an instance of his fteering (as he well expresses it in his preface) between doctrines feemingly opposite: If bis Effay has any merit, he thinks it is in this. And doubtless it is uncommon merit to reject the visions and absurdities of every System, and take in what is rational and real.

The CHARACTERISTICS and the FABLE OF THE BEES are two seemingly inconsistent systems; the extravagancy of the first is in giving a scheme of Virtue without Religion; and of the latter, in giving a scheme of Religion without Virtue. These our Poet leaves to Any that will take them up; but agrees however so far with the first, that " Vir" tue would be worth having, though itself was its only " reward;" and so far with the latter, that "God makes "Evil, againft its nature, productive of Good."

NOTES.

VER. 169. But all fubfifts, &c.] See this subject extended in Ep. ii. from $ 90 to 112, 155, &c.

VI. What would this Man? Now upward will he

foar,

And little less than Angels, would be more;
Now looking downwards, just as griev'd appears 175
To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears.
Made for his use all creatures if he call,

Say, what their use, had he the pow'rs of all;
Nature to these, without profufion, kind,
The proper organs, proper pow'rs affign'd;

COMMENTARY.

180

VER. 173. What would this Man? &c.] Having thus juftified Providence in its permission of partial MORAL EVIL, our Author employs the remaining part of his Epiftle in vindicating it from the imputation of certain supposed NATURAL EVILS. For now he shews (from $ 172 to 207.) that though the complaint of his adversaries against Providence be on pretence of real moral evils; yet, at bottom, it all proceeds from their impatience under imaginary natural ones, the issue of a depraved appetite for vifionary advantages, which if Man had, they would be either uselefs or pernicious to him, as repugnant to his ftate, or unfuitable to his condition. Though God (fays he) hath fo bountifully bestowed, on Man, Faculties little less than angelic, yet he ungratefully grafps at higher, and then, extravagant in another extreme, with a passion as ridiculous as that is impious, envies as advantages, even the peculiar accommodations of brutes. But here his own principles shew his folly. He supposes them all made

NOTES.

VER. 174. And little less than Angels, &c.] Thou hast made bim a little lower than the Angels, and haft crowned him with glory and honour, Pfalm viii. 9.

Each feeming want compenfated of course,
Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force;
All in exact proportion to the state;
Nothing to add, and nothing to abate.
Each beaft, each infect, happy in its own:
Is Heav'n unkind to Man, and Man alone?
Shall he alone, whom rational we call,

Be pleas'd with nothing, if not bless'd with all?

185

190

The blifs of Man (could Pride that bleffing find) Is not to act or think beyond mankind; No pow'rs of body or of foul to share, But what his nature and his state can bear.

COMMENTARY.

for his ufe: Now what use could he have of them, when he had robbed them of all their qualities? Qualities, diftributed with the highest wisdom, as they are divided at present; but which, if bestowed according to the froward humour of these childish complainers, would be found to be, every where, either wanting or fuperfluous. But even with these brutal qualities, Man would not only be no gainer, but a confiderable lofer; as the Poet shews, in explaining the confequences which would follow from his having his sensations in that exquifite degree, in which this or the other animal is observed to poffefs them.

NOTES.

VER. 182. Here with degrees of fwiftness, &c.] It is a certain axiom in the anatomy of creatures, that in proportion as they are formed for strength, their swiftness is leffened; or as they are formed for swiftness, their strength is abated.

P.