Error like this ev'n Truth can scarce reprove;
'Tis almoft Virtue when it flows from Love.
Ye deathless Names, ye Sons of endless praise,
By Virtue crown'd with never-fading bays!
Say, shall an artless Muse, if you inspire,
Light her pale lamp at your immortal fire?
Or if, O Warburton, inspir'd by You,
The daring Muse a nobler path pursue,
By You infpir'd, on trembling pinions foar,
The facred founts of social bliss explore,
In her bold numbers chain the Tyrant's rage,
And bid her Country's glory fire her page:
If fuch her fate, do thou, fair Truth, defcend,
And watchful guard her in an honest end:
Kindly fevere, inftruct her equal line

510

515

520

To court no Friend, nor own a Foe but thine.

But if her giddy eye should vainly quit

Thy facred paths, to run the maze of wit;

If her apoftate heart should e'er incline

525

To offer incenfe at Corruption's fhrine ;

Urge, urge thy power, the black attempt confound,
And dafh the fmoaking Censer to the ground.

Thus aw'd to fear, instructed Bards may
That guilt is doom'd to fink in Infamy.

fee

530

H

THE

DESIGN.

AVING proposed to write some pieces on Human Life and Manners, such as (to use my lord Bacon's expreffion)" come home to Men's Bufinefs and Bofoms," I thought it more fatisfactory to begin with confidering Man in the abstract, his Nature, and his State; fince, to prove any moral Duty, to enforce any moral precept, or to examine the perfection or imperfection of any creature whatsoever, it is neceffary first to know what condition and relation it is placed in, and what is the proper end and purpose of its being.

The science of Human Nature is, like all other sciences, reduced to a few clear points: There are not many certain truths in this world. It is therefore in the Anatomy of the Mind as in that of the Body; more good will accrue to mankind by attending to the large, open, and perceptible parts, than by studying too much fuch finer nerves and veffels, the conformations and uses of which will for ever escape our observation. The difputes are all upon these laft; and I will venture to fay, they have less sharpened the wits than the hearts of men against each other, and have diminished the practice, more than advanced the theory of Morality. If I could flatter myself that this Effay has any merit, it is in fteering betwixt the extremes of doctrines feemingly oppofite, in paffing over terms utterly unintelligible,

and