View thy own World: Behold the Chain of Love
Combining all below, and all above.
See, lifeless Matter moving to one End,
The fingle Atoms each to other tend,
Attract, attracted to, the next in place,
By Nature form'd its Neighbour to embrace.
Behold it next, with various Life endu'd,
Press to one Centre still, the Gen'ral Good.
See dying Vegetables Life sustain,
See Life diffolving vegetate again.
All Forms that perish other Forms fupply,
By turns they catch the vital Breath, and die;
Like Bubbles on the Sea of Matter born,
They rife, they break, and to that Sea return.
Nothing is foreign : Parts relate to Whole:
One All-extending, All-preferving Soul
Connects all Being, greatest with the least ;
Made Beast in Aid of Man, and Man of Beaft:
Each ferv'd, and ferving; nothing stands alone, 25
The Chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown!
Has God, thou Fool! work'd folely for thy Good,
Thy Joy, thy Pastime, thy Attire, thy Food?
Who for thy Table feeds the wanton Fawn,
For him, as kindly, spreads the flow'ry Lawn.
Is it for thee the Lark afcends and fings?
Joy tunes his Voice, Joy elevates his Wings:
Is it for thee the Linnet pours his Throat?
Loves of his own, and Raptures, swell the Note.
The bounding Steed you pompously bestride, 35
Shares with his Lord the Pleasure and the Pride.
Is thine alone the Seed that strows the Plain?
The Birds of Heav'n fhall vindicate their Grain.
Thine the full Harvest of the Golden Year?
Part pays, and juftly, the deserving Steer.
The Hog that plows not, nor obeys thy Call,
Lives on the Labours of this Lord of All.
Know, Nature's Children all divide her Care;
The Furr that warms a Monarch, warm'd a Bear.
While Man exclaims, fee all Things for my Ufe! 45
See Man for mine, replies a pamper'd Goofe:
What care to tend, to lodge, to cram, to treat him,
All this he knew; but not that 'twas to eat him.
As far as Goofe could judge, he reason'd right,
But as to Man, mistook the Matter quite :
And just as short of Reafon, Man will fall,
Who thinks All made for One, not One for All.
Grant, that the Pow'rful still the Weak controul,
Be Man the Wit and Tyrant of the Whole.
NATURE that Tyrant checks; He only knows
And feels, another Creature's Wants and Woes.
Say, will the Falcon stooping from above,
Smit with her varying Plumage, spare the Dove?
Admires the Jay the Infect's gilded Wings,
Or hears the Hawk, when Philomela fings?
Man cares for All: To Birds he gives his Woods,
To Beasts his Pastures, and to Fish his Floods,
For fome, his Int'rest prompts him to provide,...
For more, his Pleasure, yet for more his Pride:
All feed on one vain Patron, and enjoy
Th' extensive Blefling of his Luxury.
That very Life his learned Hunger craves
He saves from Famine, from the Savage faves:
Nay, feafts the Animal he dooms his Feaft,
And 'till he ends the Being, makes it bleft.
The favour'd Man, by Touch Ætherial flain,
Not less forefees the Stroke, or feels the Pain
The Creature had his Feast of Life before ;
Thou too muft perish, when thy Feast is o'er!
To each unthinking Being Heav'n a Friend,
Gives not the useless Knowledge of its End;
To Man imparts it; but with such a View,
As while he dreads it, makes him hope it too.
The Hour conceal'd, and fo remote the Fear,
Death still draws nearer, never feeming near.
Great standing Miracle! that Heav'n affign'd
Its only Thinking Thing, this Turn of Mind.
Whether with Reason, or with Instinct blest,
Know, all enjoy that Pow'r which suits 'em best,
To Blifs, alike, by that Direction tend,
And find the Means proportion'd to their End.
Say, where full Instinct is th'unerring Guide,
What Pope or Council can they need beside ?
Reafon, however able, cool at best,
Cares not for Service, or but ferves when preft;
Stays till we call, and then not often near;
But honeft Instinct comes a Volunteer.
This too ferves always, Reason never long;
One must go right, the other may go wrong.
See then the affing and comparing Pow'rs,
One in their Nature, which are two in ours ;
And Reason raise o'er Instinct, as you can ;
In this, 'tis God directs, in that, 'tis Man.
Who taught the Nations of the Field and Wood,
To shun their Poifon, and to chuse their Food?
Prescient, the Tydes or Tempefts to withstand,
Build on the Wave, or Arch beneath the Sand?
Who made the Spider Parallels design,
Sure as De-Moivre, without Rule or Line?
Who bid the Stork, Columbus-like, explore
Heav'ns not his own, and Worlds unknown before?
Who calls the Council, states the certain Day,
Who forms the Phalanx, and who points the Way ?
GOD, in the Nature of each Being, founds
Its proper Bliss, and fets its proper Bounds :
But as he fram'd a Whole, the Whole to bless
On mutual Wants built mutual Happiness :
So from the first, Eternal Order ran,
And Creature link'd to Creature, Man to Man.
What'ere of Life all-quickening Æther keeps,
Or breathes thro' Air, or shoots beneath the Deeps,
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