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Follower Spinoza. And fimple Reason teaching them, that the Creator was but One, they easily faw that all was right; and were in as little Danger of falling into the Manichean Error, which, when oblique Wit had broke the steddy Light of Reafon, imagined all was not right, having before imagined all was not the Work of One. 2dly, What they understood of God's Attributes; that they eafily conceived a Father where they had found a Deity, and that a fovereign Being could only be a fovereign Good.

Till then, by Nature crown'd, each Patriarch fate, King, Prieft, and Parent of his growing State: On him, their fecond Providence, they hung, Their Law his Eye; their Oracle his Tongue, &c. Till drooping, fick'ning, dying, they began Whom they rever'd as God, to mourn as Man.

I.

Then, looking up from Sire to Sire, explor'd
One great firft Father, and that First ador'd.

II.

Or plain Tradition that this all begun,
Convey'd unbroken Faith from Sire to Son.

I.

The Worker from the Work diftinct was known,
And fimple Reafon never fought but one.
E're Wit oblique had broke that steddy Light,
Man, like his Maker, faw that all was right.

II.

II.

To Virtue in the Paths of Pleasure trod,
And own'd a Father when he own'd a God.'
Love all the Faith, &c.

Our methodical Tranflator not apprehending that the Poet was here returned to finish his Defcription of the State of Nature, has fallen into one of the groffeft Miftakes that ever was committed. He has taken this Account of true Religion, for an Account of the Origin of Idolatry, and thus fatally embellishes his own Blunder,

Jaloux d'en conferver les traits et la figure,
Leur zele induftrieux inventa la Peinture.
Leurs neveux, attentifs à ces hommes fameux,
Qui par le droit du fang avoient régné fur eux,
Trouvent-ils dans leur fuite un grand, un premier
pere,

Leur aveugle refpect l'adore et le révere.

Here you have one of the finest Pieces of Reafoning in the World, turn'd, at once, into as mere a Heap of Nonsense. You will wonder

how it came about: The unlucky Term of Great firft Father confounded our Tranflator, and he took it to fignify a Great-Grandfather. But he fhould have confidered that Mr. Fope always reprefents God as every wife and good Man would do, and as our Religion directs us to do, under the Idea of a FATHER: He fhould have obferved that the Poet is here defcribing thofe Men, who

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To Virtue in the Paths of Pleasure trod, And own'd a Father, where they own'd a God. You may be fure Mr. De Croufaz has not let these fine Strokes about the Original of Painting escape him. But here the Critic (which is a Wonder) proves clearer-fighted than the Tranflator; he faw that the Lines in Question were a Continuation of fomething not immediately preceding; but that was all he faw, as may appear by his fagacious Remark. "We shall be mistaken (fays he) if we regard "this Paffage as a Continuation of the Hiftory im"mediately going before. It would be too great <c an Anachronism to fuppofe it. The Govern<ment of Fathers of Families did not fucceed that "of Kings; on the contrary, the Reign of these ck was established on the Government of those "

Order leads the Poet to speak next [from 1. 241 to 246] of the Corruption of civil Society into Tyranny, and its Caufes; and here, with all the Art of Addrefs, as well as Truth, he observes, it arofe from the Violation of that great Principle, which he so much infifts upon throughout his Effay, That each was made for the Use of all:

Who first taught Souls enflav'd, and Realms undone,

Th' enormous Faith of many made for one? That proud Exception to all Nature's Laws, T'invert the World, and counterwork its Caufe.

k Commentaire, p. 249.

And

And in this Ariftotle places the Difference between a King and a Tyrant; that the first supposes himself made for the People; the other, that the People are made for him '.

But we may be fure, that in this Corruption, where natural Juftice was thrown afide, and Force, the Atheist's Justice, prefided in its ftead, Religion would follow the Fate of civil Society. We know, from ancient Hiftory, it did fo. Accordingly, Mr. Pope [from 1. 245 to 270] with corrupt Politics describes corrupt Religion and its Causes; he first informs us, agreeable to his exact Knowledge of Antiquity, that it was the POLITICIAN and not the PRIEST (as our illiterate Tribe of Free-thinkers would make us believe) who first corrupted Religion. Secondly, that the SUPERSTITION, he brought in, was not invented by him, as an Engine to play upon others (as the dreaming Atheist feigns, who would thus miferably account for the Origin of Religion) but was a Trap he firft fell into himself.

Force first made Conquest, and that Conqueft,
Law;

Till Superftition taught the Tyrant awe,
Then fhar'd the Tyranny, then lent it aid,

And Gods of Conqu'rors, Slaves of Subjects
made.

1 Βάλεται δ ̓ ὁ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΥΣ εἶναι φύλαξ, ὅπως οἱ μὲν κεκτημέ νοι τὰς ἐσίας, μηθὲν ἄδικον πάσχωσιν, ὁ ἢ Δῆμος μὴ ὑβρίζεται μηθέν, ἡ δὲ ΤΥΡΑΝΝΙΣ, πρὸς ἐδὲν ἀποβλέπει κοινὸν; εἰ μὴ τῆς ἰδίας ὠφελείας χάριν, Pol. L. v. 6. 10.

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All

All this is agreeable to the Poet's vaft Knowledge of human Nature. For that Impotency of Mind, as the Latin Writers call it ", which gives Birth to the enormous Crimes neceffary to fupport a Tyranny, naturally fubjects its Owner to all the vain, as well as real Terrors of Confcience. Hence the whole Machinery of Superftition.

She, 'midft the Lightning's Blaze and Thunder's Sound,

When rock'd the Mountains, and when groan'd the Ground,

She, from the rending Earth and burfting Skies, Saw Gods defcend, and Fiends infernal rise. And it is no Wonder that thofe, who had fo impiously attempted to counterwork the Design of Nature, by acting as if many were made for one, fhould now imagine they faw all Nature arming in Vengeance against them.

It is true, the Poet obferves, that afterwards, when the Tyrant's Fright was over, he had Cunning enough, from the Experience of the Effect of Superftition upon himself, to turn it by the Affistance of the Priest (who for his Reward went Shares with him in the Tyranny) as his best Defence against his Subjects.

m They expreffed the Paffion for tyrannizing by this Word. A fine Roman Hiftorian fays of Marius, that he was Gloria infatiabilis, IMPOTENS femperque inquietus. And of Pompey, Potentiâ fuâ nunquam aut raro ad IMPOTENTIAM ufus.

With

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