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Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod,

Re-judge his justice, be the God of God. In pride, in reas'ning pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes, Men would be angels, angels would be Gods. Aspiring to be Gods, if angels fell, Aspiring to be angels, men rebel; And who but wishes to invert the laws Of Order, sins against th' Eternal Cause. 5. Ask for what end the heav'nly bodies shine? Earth for whose use? Pride answers, "Tis for mine. " For me kind Nature wakes her genial pow'r, "Suckles each herb, and spreads out ev'ry flow'r; `" Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew "The juice nectareous and the balmy dew;

" For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings;'.

" For me, health gushes from a thousand springs; " Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise; "My footstool earth, my canopy the skies." But errs not nature from this gracious end, From burning suns when livid deaths descend? When earthquakes swallow, or when tempests

sweep

Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep? "No ('tis reply'd) the first Almighty Cause "Acts not by partial, but by gen'ral laws; "Th'exceptions few; some change since all began, " And what created perfect?"---Why then man? If the great end be human happiness,

Then nature deviates; and can man do less?

As much that end a constant course requires

Of show'rs and sunshine, as of man's desires:

As much eternal springs and cloudless skies,

As men for ever temp'rate, calm, and wise.

If plagues or earthquakes break not heav'n's design,

Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline ?

Who knows but he, whose hand the lightning forms,

Who heaves old Ocean, and who wings the storms,
Pours fierce ambition in a Cæsar'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;

That never air or ocean felt the wind;

That never passion discomposed the mind:

But all subsists by elemental strife;

And passions are the elements of life.

The gen'ral Order, since the whole began,

Is kept in nature, and is kept in man.

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6. What would this man? Now upward will he soar,

And little less than angel, would be more;

Now looking downwards just as griev'd appears,
To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears.
Made for his use, all creatures if we call,
Say what their use, had he the pow'rs of all?

Nature to these, without profusion kind,
The proper organs, proper pow'rs assign'd;
Each seeming want compensated of course,
Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force:

All in exact proportion to their state;
Nothing to add, and nothing to abate.
Each beast, each insect 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?
The bliss of man (could pride that blessing find)
Is not to act or think beyond mankind;
No pow'rs of body or of soul to share,
But what his nature and his state can bear,
Why has not man a microscopic eye?
For this plain reason, man is not a fly.

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