250 From Nature's chain whatever link you strike, 245 NOTES. VER. 247. And, if each system in gradation roll] The verb is exactly chosen, as not only alluding to the motion of the planetary bodies of each system; but to the figures described by that motion. VER. 251. Let earth unbalanc'd] i. e. Being no longer kept within its orbit by the different directions of its progreffive and attractive motions; which, like equal weights in a balance, keep it in an equilibre. VER. 253. Let ruling Angels, &c.] The Poet, throughout this Work has, with great art, used an advantage which his employing a Platonic principle for the foundation of his Essay, had afforded him; and that is the expreffing himself (as here) in Platonic language; which, luckily for his purpose, is highly poetical, at the fame time that it adds a grace to the uniformity of his reasoning. VOL. III. E : IX. What if the foot, ordain'd the dust to tread, Or hand, to toil, afpir'd to be the head? What if the head, the eye, or ear repin'd 260 Just as abfurd, to mourn the tasks or pains, 265 The great directing MIND OF ALL ordains. All are but parts of one ftupendous whole, Whose body Nature is, and God the foul; COMMENTARY. VER. 267. All are but parts of one ftupendous whole,] Our Author having thus given a representaton of God's Work, as one entire whole, where all the parts have a necessary dependence on, and relation to each other, and where each particular part works and concurs to the perfection of the Whole; as such a system transcends vulgar ideas; to reconcile it to common conceptions, he shews (from 266 to 281.) that God is equally and intimately present to every fort of fubftance, to every particle of mat NOTES. VER. 259. What if the foot, &c.] This fine illustration in defence of the System of Nature, is taken from St. Paul, who employed it to defend the System of Grace. VER. 265. Just as abfurd, &c.] See the profecution and application of this in Ep iv. P VER. 266. The great directing Mind, &c.] “Veneramur autem & colimus ob dominium. Deus enim fine do" minio, providentia, & caufis finalibus, nihil aliud eft quam FATUM & NATURA." Newtoni Princip. Schol. gener. fub finem. 66 VER. 268. Whose body Nature is, &c.] A certain Examiner remarks, on this line, that, "A Spinozist would That, chang'd thro' all, and yet in all the same; Great in the earth, as in th' æthereal frame; 270 COMMENTARY. tèr, and in every instant of being; which eases the labouring imagination, and makes us expect no less, from fuch a Prefence, than such a Difpenfation. NOTES. express himself in this Manner." I believe he would, and so, we know, would St. Paul too, when writing on the same subject, namely the omniprefence of God in his Providence, and in his Substance. In him we live, and move, and have our being; i. e. we are parts of him, his offspring, as the Greek poet, a pantheist quoted by the Apostle, obferves: And the reason is, because a religious theist and an impious pantheist both profess to believe the omnipresence of God. But would Spinoza, as Mr. Pope does, call God the great directing Mind of all, who hath intentionally created a perfect Universe? Or would a Spinozift have told us, "The workman from the work distinct was known, a line that overtunes all Spinozism from its very foundations. But this fublime description of the Godhead contains hot only the divinity of St. Paul; but, if that will not fatisfy the men he writes against, the philosophy likewife of Sir Ifaac Newton. The Poet fays, "All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Spreads undivided, operates unspent. The Philofopher:-" In ipfo continentur & moventur uni Warms in the fun, refreshes in the breeze, NOTES. "versa, sed absque mutua paffione. Deus nihil patitur " ex corporum motibus; illa nullam fentiunt refiftentiam " ex omnipræfentia Dei. -Corpore omni & figura corpo"rea deftituitur.--Omnia regit & omnia cognofcit.--Cum unaquæque Spatii particula sit semper, & unumquodque " Durationis indivisibile momentum, ubique certe rerum " omnium Fabricator ac Dominus non erit nunquam, nuf quam." Mr. Pope; " Breathes in our foul, informs our mortal part, "He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. Sir Ifaac Newton: -" Annon ex phænomenis conftat effe "entem incorporeum, viventem, intelligentem, omnipræ" fentem, qui in spatio infinito, tanquam sensorio fuo, res " ipfas intime cernat, penitusque perfpiciat, totasque intra "se præfens præsentes complectatur." But now admitting, there was an ambiguity in these expreffions, fo great, that a Spinozist might employ them to express his own particular principles; and such a thing might well be, beause the Spinozists, in order to hide the impiety of their principle, are wont to express the Omniprefence of God in terms that any religious Theift might employ; in this cafe, I say, how are we to judge of the Poet's meaning? Surely by the whole tenor of his argument. Now take the words in the sense of the Spinozifts, and he is made, in the conclufion of his epiftle, to overthrow all he has been advancing throughout the body of it: For Spinozism is the deftruction of an Universe, where every thing tends, by a foreseen contrivance in all its parts, to the perfection of the Whole. But allow him to em Lives thro' all life, extends thro' all extent, Breathes in our foul, informs our mortal part, 275 As full, as perfect, in vile Man that mourns, As the rapt Seraph that adores and burns: NOTES. ploy the passage in the sense of St. Paul, That we and all creatures live, and move, and have our being in God; and then it will be seen to be the most logical fupport of all that had preceded. For the poet having, as we say, laboured through his epistle to prove, that every thing in the Universe tends, by a foreseen contrivance, and a present direction of all its parts, to the perfection of the Whole; it might be objected, that such a disposition of things im-. plying in God a painful, operofe, and inconceivable extent of Providence, it could not be supposed that such care extended to all, but was confined to the more noble parts of the creation. This gross conception of the First Cause the poet exposes, by shewing that God is equally and intimately present to every particle of Matter, to every-fort of Substance, and in every instant of Being. VER. 277. As full as perfect in vile Man that mourns, As the rapt Seraph that adores and burns.] Which M. Du Resnel translates thus, " Dans un homme ignoré sous une humble Chaumiere, "Que dans le Seraphin, rayonnant de lumiere. i. e. As well in the ignorant man, who inhabits an humble Cottage, as in the Seraphim encompaffed with rays of light. The Tranflator in good earnest thought, that a vile man that mourn'd could be no other than fome poor Country Cottager. Which has betrayed M. de Crousaz into this important remark." For all that, we sometimes find in persons of the lowest rank, a fund of probity and re" fignation which preserves them from contempt; their 66 |