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Heav'n breathes thro' every member of the whole
One common bleffing, as one common foul..
But Fortune's gifts if each alike poffeft,
And each were equal, must not all conteft?
If then to all men Happiness was meant,
God in Externals could not place Content.
Fortune her gifts may variously difpofe,
And these be happy call'd, unhappy those ;
But Heav'n's juft balance equal will appear,
While thofe are plac'd in Hope, and these in Fear:
Not prefent good or ill, the joy or curfe,

But future views of better, or of worse..
Oh fons of earth! attempt ye ftill to rise,
By mountains pil'd on mountains, to the skies?
Heav'n ftill with laughter the vain toil furveys,
And buries madmen in the heaps they raise.
Know, all the good that individuals find,
Or God and Nature meant to mere mankind,
Reafon's whole pleasure, all the joys of Senfe,
Lie in three words, Health, Peace, and Competence.

POPE.

ON

С НА Р. XVI.

VIRTUE.

NOW thou this truth (enough for man to know)

KNO

"Virtue alone is Happiness below."

The only point where human blifs ftands ftill,
And taftes the good without the fall to ill;
Where only Merit conftant pay receives,
Is bleft in what it takes, and what it gives;
F 6

The

The joy unequall'd, if its end it gain,
And if it lose, attended with no pain:
Without fatiety, tho' e'er fo bless'd,

And but more relifh'd as the more diftrefs'd:
The broadeft mirth unfeeling Folly wears,
Lefs pleafing far than Virtue's very tears;
Good, from each object, from each place acquir'd,
For ever exercis'd, yet never tir'd;

Never elated, while one man's opprefs'd;
Never dejected, while another's blefs'd;
And where no wants, no wishes can remain,.
Since but to with more Virtue, is to gain.

See the fole blifs. Heav'n could on all beftow!
Which who but feels can tafte, but thinks can know::
Yet poor with fortune, and with learning blind,
The bad must mifs; the good, untaught, will find;
Slave to no fect, who takes no private road,
But looks thro' Nature, up to Nature's God;
Pursues that Chain which links th' immense design,
Joins heav'n and earth, and mortal and divine;
Sees, that no Being any blifs can know,
But touches fome above, and some below;
Learns, from this union of the rifing Whole,
The firft, laft purpose of the human foul;
And knows where Faith, Law, Morals, all began,
All end, in LOVE OF GOD, and LOVE OF Man.
For him alone, Hope leads from goal to goal,
And opens ftill, and opens on his foul;
"Till lengthen'd on to Faith, and unconfin'd,
It pours the blifs that fills up all the mind.
He fees, why Nature plants in Man alone
Hope of known blifs, and Faith in bliss unknown :

(Nature,

(Nature, whofe dictates to no other kind

Are given in vain, but what they seek they find)
Wife is her prefent; fhe connects in this
His greatest Virtue with his greateft Blifs;
At once his own bright prospect to be bleft,
And strongest motive to affift the rest.

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Self-love thus push'd to focial, to divine,

Gives thee to make thy neighbour's bleffing thine.

Is this too little for the boundless heart?
Extend it, let thy enemies have part:

Grafp the whole worlds of Reason, Life, and Sense,
In one clofe fyftem of Benevolence::.

Happier as kinder, in whate'er degree,

And height of Blifs but height of Charity.

God loves from, Whole to Parts: But human foul
Muft rife from Individual to the Whole.

Self-love but ferves the virtuous mind to wake,
As the fmall pebble ftirs the peaceful lake; :
'The centre mov'd, a circle strait fucceeds,,.
Another ftill, and ftill another spreads;

Friend, parent, neighbour, firft it will embrace;
His country next; and next all human race;
Wide and more wide, th' o'erflowings of the mind
Take ev'ry creature in, of ev'ry kind;

Earth fmiles around, with boundless bounty bleft,
And Heav'n beholds its image in his breast.

POPE.

С НАР.

M

CHA P. XVII.

ON VERSIFICATION.

ANY by Numbers judge a Poet's fong;

And smooth or rough, with them, is right or wrong;

In the bright Mufe tho' thousand charms confpire,

Her voice is all these tuneful fools admire ;
Who haunt Parnaffus but to please their ear,
Not mend their minds; as fome to Church repair
Not for the doctrine, but the mufic there.
Thefe equal fyllables alone require,

Tho' oft the ear the open vowels tire;
While expletives their feeble aid do join ;.

And ten low words oft creep in one dull line :
While they ring round the fame unvary'd chimes,
With fure returns of ftill expected rhimes;
Where'er you find "the cooling western breeze,'
In the next line, it "whispers thro' the trees :"
If crystal streams "with pleafing murmurs creep,"
The reader's threaten'd (not in vain) with " fleep :"
Then, at the last and only couplet fraught

With fome unmeaning thing they call a thought,

A needlefs Alexandrine ends the fong,

That, like a wounded fnake, drags its flow length along..
Leave fuch to tune their own dull rhimes, and know
What's roundly fmooth, or languishingly flow;
And praise the eafy vigour of a line,

Where Denham's ftrength, and Waller's sweetness join.
True eafe in writing comes from art, not chance,
As thofe move eafieft who have learn'd to dance

'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence,
The found must seem an echo to the fense:
Soft is the ftrain when Zephyr gently blows,
And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;
But when loud furges lash the founding shore,
The hoarse, rough verfe should like the torrent roar:
When Ajax ftrives fome rock's vaft weight to throw,
The line too labours, and the words move flow;
Not fo, when swift Camilla fcours the plain,

Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main. Hear how Timotheus vary'd lays furprise,

And bid alternate paffions fall and rife!

While, at each change, the fon of Libyan Jove
Now burns with glory, and then melts with love;
Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,
Now fighs fteal out, and tears begin to flow:
Perfians and Greeks like turns of nature found,
And the World's victor stood fubdued by Sound!

POPE.

CHA P.

xviii.

LESSONS OF

WISDOM.

OW to live happiest; how avoid the pains,
The difappointments, and difgufts of thofe
Who would in pleasure all their hours employ;
The precepts here of a divine old man
I could recite. Tho' old, he still retain'd
His manly fenfe, and energy of mind.
Virtuous and wife he was, but not severe;
He still remember'd that he once was young;
His eafy prefence check'd no decent joy.

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