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All feed on one vain patron, and enjoy
Th' extenfive bleffing of his luxury,

That very life his learned hunger craves,
He faves from famine, from the favage faves;
Nay, feasts the animal he dooms his feast,
And, till he ends the being, makes it bleft:
Which fees no more the stroke, or feels the pain,
Than favour'd man by touch ethereals flain,
The creature had his feast of life before;
Thou too must perish, when thy feast is o'er!
To each unthinking being, heaven a friend,
Gives not the useless knowledge of its end;
To man imparts it; but with fuch 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 heaven affign'd
Its only thinking thing this turn of mind.

II. Whether with reason, or with instinct bleft, Know, all enjoy that power which fuits them 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!
Reason, however able, cool at best,
Cares not for fervice, or but ferves when prest,
Stays till we call, and then not often near;
But honest instinct comes a volunteer,
Sure never to o'er-shoot, but just to hit;
While still too wide or fhort is human wit;

Sure by quick nature happiness to gain,
Which heavier reafon labours at in vain.
This too ferves always, reafon never long;
One must go right, the other may go wrong.
See then the acting and comparing powers
One in their nature, which are two in ours!
And reafon 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 fhun their poison, and to chufe their food?
Prefcient, the ties or tempefts to withstand,
Build on the wave, or arch beneath the fand?
Who made the fpider parallels defign,

Sure as De Moivre, without rule or line?
Who bid the ftork, Columbus-like, explore

Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before?
Who calls the council, ftates the certain day,
Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way?
III. God, in the nature of each being, founds
Its proper blifs, and fets its proper bounds:

But as he fram'd a whole, the whole to blefs,
On mutual wants built mutual happiness :
So from the firft, eternal ORDER ran,

And creature link'd to creature, man to man.
Whate'er of life all quick'ning aether keeps,
Or breathes thro' air, or fhoots beneath the deeps,
Or pours profufe on earth, one nature feeds
The vital flame, and fwells the genial feeds.
Not man alone, but all that roam the wood,
Or wing the sky, or roll along the flood,

Each loves itself, but not itself alone,
Each fex defires alike, 'till two are one.
Nor ends the pleasure with the fierce embrace;
They love themselves, a third time, in their race.
Thus beast and bird their common charge attend,
The mothers nurse it, and the fires defend;
The young difmifs'd to wander earth or air,
There ftops the instinct, and there ends the care;
The link diffolves, each seeks a fresh embrace,
Another love fucceeds, another race.

A longer care man's helpless kind demands;
That longer care contracts more lasting bands:
Reflection, reason, still the ties improve,
At once extend the intereft and the love:
With choice we fix, with fympathy we burn;
Each virtue in each paffion takes its turn;

And still new needs, new helps, new habits rise,
That graft benevolence on charities.

Still as one brood, and as another rofe,
These nat'ral love maintain'd, habitual thofe :
The last, scarce ripen'd into perfect man,
Saw helpless him from whom their life began:
Mem'ry and fore-cast just returns engage,
That pointed back to youth, this on to age:
While pleasure, gratitude, and hope combin'd,
Still spread the interest and preserv'd the kind. [trod;
IV. Nor think, in NATURE'S STATE they blindly
The state of nature was the reign of God:
Self-love and focial at her birth began,

Union the bond of all things, and of man.

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Pride then was not; nor arts, that pride to aid :
Man walk'd with beast, joint tenant of the fhade;
The fame his table, and the fame his bed;
No murder cloath'd him, and no murder fed.
In the fame temple, the refounding wood,

All vocal beings hym'd their equal God:

The fhrine with gore unftain 'd, with gold undrest,
Unbrib'd, unbloody, stood the blameless priest :
Heaven's attribute was univerfal care,

And man's prerogative, to rule, but fpare.
Ah! how unlike the man of times to come!
Of half that live, the butcher and the tomb;
Who, foe to nature, hears the general groan,
Murders their fpecies, and betrays his own.
But juft disease to luxury fuccceds,
And every death its own avenger breeds;
The fury-paffions from that blood began,
And turn'd on man, a fiercer favage, man.

See him from nature rifing flow to art!
To copy instinct then was reason's part;
Thus then to man the voice of nature fpake-

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Go, from the creatures thy inftructions take :

"Learn from the birds what food the thickets yield; "Learn from the beasts the physic of the field;

"Thy arts of building from the bee receive; "Learn of the mole to plow, the worm to weave; "Learn of the little Nautilus to fail,

"Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale. "Here too all forms of focial union find,

"And hence let realon, late, inftruct mankind:

"Here fubterranean works and cities fee;
"There towns aërial on the waving tree.
"Learn each small people's genius, policies,
"The ants republic and the realm of bees;

How thofe in common all their wealth bestow,
"And anarchy without confufion know;
"And these for ever tho' a monarch reign,
66 Their fep'rate cells and properties maintain.
"Mark what unvary'd laws preferve each state,

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Laws wife as nature, and as fix'd as fate.

86 In vain thy reafon finer webs shall draw, "Entangle justice in her net of law,

"And right, too rigid, harden into wrong:
"Still for the strong too weak, the weak too strong.
"Yet go! and thus o'er all the creatures fway,
"Thus let the wifer make the rest obey;

"And for thofe arts mere instinct could afford,
Be crown'd as monarchs, or as gods ador'd."
V. Great nature spoke; obfervant man obey'd;
Cities were built, focieties were made:
Here rofe one little state; another near

Grew by like means, and join'd, thro' love or feari
Bid here the trees with ruddier burdens bend,
And there the streams in purer rills defcend?
What war could ravish, commerce could heftow,
And he return'd a friend, who came a foe.
Converfe and love mankind might strongly draw,
When love was liberty, and nature law.

Thus ftates were form'd; the name of king unknown,
Till common interest plac'd the sway in one.

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