ARGUMENT

OF

EPISTLE

I.

Of the Nature and State of Man with respect to the Universe.

OF MAN IN THE ABSTRACT.

I. That we can judge only with regard to our own fyftem, being ignorant of the relations of fyftems and things, ver. 17. &c.

II. That Man is not to be deemed imperfect, but a Being fuited to his place and rank in the creation, agreeable to the general Ordre of things, and conformable to Ends and Relations to him unknown, ver. 35. &c.

III. That it is partly upon his ignorance of future events, and partly upon the hope of a future ftate, that all his happiness in the prefent depends, ver. 77. &c.

IV. The pride of aiming at more knowledge, and pretending to more Perfection, the cause of Man's error and mifery. The impiety of putting himself in the place of God, and judging of the fitness or unfitness, perfection or imperfection, juftice or injustice, of his difpenfations, ver. 109. &c.

V. The abfurdity of conceiting himself the final cause of the creation, or expecting that perfection in the moral world, which is not in the natural, ver. 131. &c.

A

2

VI. The unreasonableness of his complaints against Providence, while on the one hand he demands the Perfections of the Angels, and on the other the bodily qualifications of the Brutes; though, to poffefs any of the fenfitive faculties in a higher degree, would render him miferable, ver. 137. &c.

VII. That throughout the whole vifible world, an univerfel order and gradation in the fenfual and mental faculties is obferved, which caufes a fubordination of creature to creature, and of all creatures to Man. The gradations of sense, instinct, thought, reflection, reafon; that Reafon alone countervails all the other faculties: ver. 207.

VIII. How much farther this order and subordination of living creatures may extend, above and below us; were any part of which broken, not that part only, but the whole connected creation must be deftroyed, ver. 233.

IX. The extravagance, madness, and pride of fuch a defire, ver. 250.

X. The confequence of all, the abfolute fubmiffion due to Providence, both as to our prefent and future ftate, ver. 281. &c. to the end.

Perfius Satyr. III. v. 66. fq.

Difcite o miferi, & caufas cognofcite rerum, Quid fumus, & quidnam viêturi gignimur; ordo Quis datus ; aut metæ quà mollis flexus, & unde: quid fas optare

patriæ, charifque propinquis Quantum elargiri deceat: quem te Deus effe Juffit, & humana qua parte locatus es in re.

EPISTLE I.

A WAKE, my ST. JOHN ! leave all meaner things

To low ambition, and the pride of Kings.
Let us (fince Life can little more fupply
Than juft to look about us, and to die)
Expatiate free o'er all this fcene of Man;
A mighty maze! but not without a plan;
A Wild, where weeds and flow'rs promifcuous shoot;
Or Garden, tempting with forbidden fruit.

Together let us beat this ample field,

Try what the open, what the covert yield;
The latent tracts, the giddy heights explore
Of all who blindly creep, or fightless foar;

10

Eye Nature's walks, shoot Folly as it flies,
And catch the manners living as they rife;
Laugh where we must, be candid where we can,
But vindicate the ways of God to man.

IS

'

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 Station here,
From which to reafon, or to which refer?
Thro' worlds unnumber'd tho' the God be known,

20

'Tis ours to trace him only in our own.

He, who thro' vaft immenfity can pierce, See worlds on worlds compofe one universe, Obferve how fyftem into fyftem runs,

25

What other planets circle other funs,

What vary'd Being peoples every star,
May tell, why Heav'n has made us as we are.
But of this frame the bearings, and the ties,
The ftrong connections, 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 fupports, upheld by God, or thee?

3༠

II. Prefumptuous man! the reafon wouldst thou find, 35
Why form'd fo weak, fo little, and fo blind?
First, if thou canft, the harder reafon guess,
Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no lefs?
Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made
Taller or ftronger than the weeds they shade?
Or ask of yonder argent fields above,
Why Jove's Satellites are lefs than Jove?

Of Systems poffible, if 'tis confeft
That Wifdom infinite muft form the best,
Where all muft full or not coherent be,
And all that rises, rife in due degree;

40

45

Then, in the fcale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain,

There must be, fome where, fuch a rank as Man;

And all the question (wrangle e'er fo long)

Is only this, if God has plac'd him wrong?
Refpecting man, whatever wrong we call,

50

May, must be right, as relative to all.

In human works, though 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 fphere unknown,

Touches fome wheel, or verges to fome goal; 'Tis but a part we fee, and not a whole.

60