Having expofed the abfurdity of prying into the manner in which God conducts this wonderful fyftem, he proceeds to fhew that fuch knowledge, if attainable, would be injurious to our happiness, which he proves by the following ftrong and beautiful exemplifications.

1

"Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of "fate,

"All but the page prefcrib'd, their present "ftate:

"From brutes what men, from men what fpirits 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 juft 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:

"Who fees with equal eye, as God of all,
"A hero perish, or a fparrow fall,

"Atoms or fyftems into ruin hurl'd,

"And now a bubble burst, and now a world.”

It argues a fine imagination to be capable of felecting fuch ftriking contrafts.

The poet goes on to fhew that our best comfort is the hope of a happy futurity, which he recommends by the example of the poor Indian,

to whom also nature hath given this common hope of mankind.

the

"Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutor❜d mind
"Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the
"wind;

"His foul, proud Science never taught to ftray
"Far as the folar walk, or milky way;
"Yet fimple Nature to his hope has giv'n,
"Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler
"heav'n;

"Some fafer world in depth of woods embrac'd,
"Some happier ifland in the watry wafte;
Where flaves once more their native land
"behold,

No fiends torment, no Chriftians thirst for "gold.

"To Be, contents his natural defire,

"He afks no Angel's wing, no Seraph's fire; "But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, "His faithful dog fhall bear him company."

The fimplicity, humility and humanity of poor Indian are admirably pictured in these lines, of which the fine verfification is perhaps the leaft beauty. There is fomething exquifitely plaintive and pathetic in his humble hope for that fafer world, where flaves may once more behold their native land; and in the next line,

the

poet has with great addrefs turned his indignant fatire against the diabolical barbarities practifed on that part of our species, who only differ from us in complexion: while they who enflave and torment them, are no more like Q& men,

men, than they are like Chriftians. Our poet calls them Chriftians, to fhew their cruelty in a more affecting light. Satire never cuts fo keenly, as when humanity gives it an edge †.

Our author having, in the next place, traced the fource of moral evil, which proceeds from the abuse of man's free will, he then fhews, by way of analogy, that it tends to the good of the univerfe, in like manner as natural evil tends to the good of this globe.

"If

If plagues or earthquakes break not Heav'n's defign,

Why then a Borgia, or a Catiline?

"Who knows but He, whose hand the light"ning forms,

"Who heaves old Ocean, and who wings the "ftorms;

"Pours fierce Ambition in a Cæfar's mind, "Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge "mankind?"

How admirably, in thefe lines, are the reafonings of moral philofophy exemplified with all the force and beauty of analogical argument, and illuftrated with all the fublime of

poetry!

+ Witness thefe lines, among others, in one of his fatires, where he speaks of a great man who had loft his stomach by intemperance, on feeing the hearty appetite of a beggar:

"Call'd happy dog the Beggar at his door;
"And envy'd thirst and hunger to the poor."

The

The folly of man's wishing for visionary advantages, not adapted to his nature, is next exposed.

"The blifs of Man (could Pride that bleffing

find)

"Is not to act or think beyond mankind ;
"No pow'rs of body or of foul to share,
"But what his nature and his ftate can bear.
Why has not Man a microscopic Eye?
"For this plain reason, Man is not a Fly.
Say what the ufe, were finer optics giv'n,
"T'infpect a mite, not comprehend the
“heav'n?

"Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o'er,
"To fmart and agonize at ev'ry pore?
"Or quick effluvia darting thro' the brain,
"Die of a rofe in aromatic pain?

"If Nature thunder'd in his op'ning ears,
"And stunn'd him with the music of the
spheres,

"How would he wish that Heav'n had left " him ftill

"The whisp'ring Zephyr, and the purling "rill?

"Who finds not Providence all good and wife, "Alike in what it gives, and what denies ?"

With what sprightly raillery, with what exquifite imagination, has the poet ridiculed the abfurdity of those discontented mortals, who covet fuperfluous, nay pernicious endowments? The whole paffage is fo animated, so ornate and poetical, that it is with regret we point out any imper

Q3

imperfection in it. Nevertheless, as the learned commentator has remarked, the illuftration drawn from the mufic of the spheres, is certainly mifplaced, as the precifion of philofophical argument required the poet to employ the real objects of sense only.

The poet farther fhews that the indulging of man's extravagant defires would not only be useless and injurious to him, but that it would break into the order of the creation, wherein all fyftems and beings, from the higheft to the loweft, are connected as by a link or chain; and that the least confufion in one fyftem, would be attended with the deftruction of the whole; which he illuftrates by the following fublime paffage.

"Let Earth unbalanc'd from her orbit fly, "Planets and stars run lawless through the sky; "Let ruling Angels from their spheres be "hurl'd,

"Being on Being wreck'd, and world on world; "Heav'n's whole foundations to their centre "nod,

"And Nature trembles to the throne of God."

There is no reading these lines without being ftruck with a momentary apprehenfion. We feel the dreadful diforder here defcribed, and old, Chaos rushes to our view.

The fecond Epiftle treats of the nature and ftate of man with respect to himself, as an individual.