Together let us beat this ample field,

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Try what the open, what the covert yield;
The laten tracts, the giddy heights, explore
Of all who blindly creep, or fightless foar;
Eye Nature's walks, fhoot Folly as it flies,
And catch the Manners living as they rife;
Laugh where we muft, be candid where we can ; 15
But vindicate the ways of God to Man.

I. Say firft, of God above, or Man below,
What can we reafon, but from what we know?
Of Man, what fee we but his ftation here,
From which to reason, or to which refer?

NOTES,

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VER. 12. Of all who blindly creep, &c.] i. e. Those who only follow the blind guidance of their Paffions; or those who leave behind them common fenfe and fober reafon, in their high flights through the regions of Metaphyfies. Both which follies are expofed in the fourth epistle, where the popular and philofophical errors concerning Happinefs are detected. The figure is taken from animal Life,

VER. 15. Laugh where we must, &c.] Intimating that human follies are fo ftrangely abfurd, that it is not in the power of the most compaffionate, on fome occafions, to reftrain their mirth: And that human crimes are fo flagitious, that the most candid have seldom an opportunity, on this fubject, to exercise their virtue.

VER. 19, 20, Of Man, what fee we but his ftation here, From which to reafon, or to which refer?] the fenfe is, We fee nothing of Man, but as he ftands at prefent in his ftation here: From which station, all our reasonings on his nature and end must be drawn; and to this flation they

Thro' worlds unnumber'd tho' the God be knowns

'Tis ours to trace him only in our own.
He, who thro' vaft immenfity can pierce,
See worlds on worlds compofe one universe,

Observe how system into system runs,

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What other planets circle other funs,

What vary'd Being peoples ev'ry ftar,
May tell why Heav'n has made us as we are.
But of this frame, the bearings, and the ties,
The strong connexions, nice dependencies,
Gradations juft, has thy pervading foul
Look'd thro' ? or can a part contain the whole?
Is the great chain, that draws all to agree,
And drawn supports, upheld by God, or thee?

NOTES.

30

must be all referred. The confequence is, all our reasonings on his nature and end muft needs be very imperfect.

VER. 21. Thro' worlds unnumber'd, &c.] Hunc cognofcimus folummodo per Proprietates fuas & Attributa, & per fapientiffimas & optimas rerum ftructuras & caufas finales. Newtoni Princ. Schol. gen. fub fin.

VER. 30. The strong connexions, nice dependencies,] The thought is very noble, and expreffed with great philofophic beauty and exactness. The fyftem of the Universe is a combination of natural and moral Fitneffes, as the human fyftem is, of body and spirit. By the ftrong connexions, therefore, the Poet alluding to the natural part; and by the nice dependencies to the moral. For the Essay on man is not a fyftem of Naturalifm, but of natural Religion. Hence it is, that, where he fuppofes diforders may tend to fome greater

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II. Prefumptuous Man! the reason wouldst thou find, Why form'd fo weak, fo little, and fo blind? 36 First, if thou canft, the harder reafon guess, Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no less.

Afk of thy mother earth, why oaks are made Taller or stronger than the weeds they fhade? 40 Or afk of yonder argent fields above,

Why Jove's Satellites are less than Jove?

Of Systems poffible, if 'tis confeft

That Wisdom infinite muft form the best,
Where all muft full or not coherent be,

And all that rifes, rife in due degree;

NOTES.

45

good in the natural world, he fuppofes they may tend likewife to fome greater good in the moral, as appears from thefe fublime images in the following lines,

If plagues or earthquakes break not Heav'n's defign, Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline?

Who knows, but he, whofe 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?

VER: 35 to 42.] In these lines the poet has joined the beauty of argumentation to the fublimity of thought; where the fimilar inftances, propofed for his adverfaries examination, fhew as well the abfurdity of their complaints against Order, as the fruitleffness of their enquiries into the arcana of the Godhead.

Then in the scale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain,
There must be, fomewhere, fuch a rank as Man;
And all the queftion (wrangle e'er so long)
Is only this, if God has plac'd him wrong?
Refpecting Man, whatever wrong we call,
May, must be right, as relative to all.

In human works, tho' labour'd on with pain,
A thousand movements fcarce one purpose gain;
In God's, one fingle can its end produce;
Yet ferves to fecond too fome other use.

So Man, who here feems principal alone,
Perhaps acts fecond to fome sphere unknown,
Touches fome wheel, or verges to fome goal;
Tis but a part we fee, and not a whole.

50

55

60

When the proud steed fhall know why Man reftrains His fiery course, or drives him o'er plains uit 'When the dull Ox, why now he breaks the clod, Is now a victim, and now Egypt's God: Then shall Man's pride and dulness comprehend 65 His actions', paffions', being's, use and end

VARIATIONS.

In the former Editions, ver. 64.

Now wears a garland, an Ægyptian God: altered as above for the reafon given in the note.

NOTES.

VER. 64.-Egypt's God] Called fo, because the God

Apis was worshiped univerfally over the whole land.

Why doing, fuff'ring, check'd, impell'd; and why This hour a flave, the next a deity.

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Then say not Man's imperfect, Heav'n in fault; Say rather, Man's as perfect as he ought: His knowledge measur'd to his ftate and place; His time a moment, and a point his space.

If to be perfect in a certain sphere,

What matter, foon or late, or here or there;
The bleft to day is as completely fo,

75

As who began a thousand years ago.

III. Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of Fate, All but the page prefcib'd, their present state: From brutes what men, from men what spirits know: Or who could fuffer Being here below?

The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to day,

Had he thy reason, would he skip and play ?

Pleas'd to the laft, he crops the flow'ry food,
And licks the hand just rais'd to shed his blood.
Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv❜n,
That each may fill the circle mark'd by Heav'n:

VARIATIONS,

After ver. 68. the following lines in the first Ed.

If to be perfect in a certain fphere,
What matters foon or late, or here or there?
The bleft to day is as completely fo,

As who began ten thousand years ago.

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