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10

ESSAY ON MAN.

EP. II.

Deduct what is but Vanity, or Dress,

Or Learning's Luxury, or Idleness;

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Or tricks to fhew the ftretch of human brain,
Mere curious pleasure, or ingenious pain;

Expunge the whole, or lop the excrefceut parts
Of all our Vices have created Arts;

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Then fee how little the remaining fum,

Which ferv'd the past, and muft the times to come!
II. Two principles in human nature reign;

Self-love, to urge, and Reason, to restrain;
Nor this a good, nor that a bad we call,
Each works its end, to move or govern all:
And to their proper operation ftill,

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Afcribe all good to their improper, Ilk

Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the foul;

Reafon's comparing balance rules the whole.

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Man, but for that, no action could attend,
And, but for this, were active to no end:
Fix'd like a plant on his peculiar spot,
To draw nutrition, propagate, and rot;
Or, meteor-like, flame lawless thro' the void,
Destroying others by himself destroy'd.

Moft ftrength the moving principle requires;
Active its talk, it prompts, impels, infpires:
Sedate and quiet, the comparing lies,
Form'd but to check, delib'rate and advise.
Self-love still ftronger, as its objects nigh;
Reafon's at distance, and in profpect lie:
That fees immediate good by present sense;
Reason, the future and the confequence.

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Thicker than arguments, temptations throng,

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At best more watchful this, but that more ftrong,

The action of the stronger to fufpend

Reason still use, to Reafon ftill attend.

Attention, habit, and experience gains;

Each strengthens Reafon, and Self-love reftrains

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Let fubtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight,
More ftudious to divide than to unite;
And Grace and Virtue, Senfe and Reason split,
With all the rafh dexterity of wit.

Wits, juft like fools, at war about a name,
Have full as oft no meaning, or the fame.
Self-love and Reason to one end aspire,
Pain their averfion, Pleasure their defire;
But greedy That its object would devour,
This taste the honey, and not wound the flow'r :
Pleasure, or wrong or rightly understood,
Our greaft evil, or our greatest good.

III. Modes of Self-love the Paffions we may call;
'Tis real good, or feeming, moves them all;
But fince not ev'ry good, we can divide;
And Reafon bids us for our own provide;
Paffions, tho' felfish, if their means be fair,
Lift under Reason, and deferve her care;
Thofe, that imparted court a nobler aim,
Exalt their kind, and take fome Virtue's name.
In lazy Apathy let Stoics boast

Their Virtue fix'd; 'tis fix'd as in a froft;
Contracted all, retiring to the breast ;
But ftrength of mind is Exereife, not Reft:
The rifing tempeft puts in act the foul,
Parts it may ravage, but preferves the whole.
On life's vaft ocean diverfely we fail,
Reason the card, but paffion is the gale;
Nor God alone in the ftill calm we find,

He mounts the ftorms, and walks upon the wind.
Paffions, like elements, tho' born to fight,

Yet, mix'd and foften'd, in his work unite:
Thefe 'tis enough to temper and employ;
But what composes Man, can Man destroy?
Suffice that Reason keep to Nature's road,
Subject, compound them, follow her and God.
Love, Hope, and Joy, fair pleafure's fmiling train,
Hate, Fear, and Grief, the family of pain;
Thefe mix'd with art, and to due bounds confin'd,
Make and maintain the balance of the mind:
The lights and fhades, whose well accorded ftrife
Gives all the strength and colour of our life.

Pleasures are ever in our hands or eyes;

And when, in act, they ceafe, in profpect, rife:

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12

ESSAY ON MAN.

Ep.

Prefent to grafp, add future ftill to find,
The whole employ of body and of mind.
All spread their charms, but charm not all alike;
On diff'rent fenfes diff'rent objects ftrike;
Hence diff'rent paffions more or lefs inflame,
As ftrong or weak, the organs of the frame;
And hence our MASTER PASSION in the breaft,
Like Aaron's ferpent, fwallows up the reft.

As Man, perhaps, the moment of his breath,
Receives the lurking principle of death;
The young disease, that must fubdue at length,

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Grows with his growth, and ftrengthens with his ftrengl. So, caft and mingled with his very frame,

The Mind's difeafe, its RULING PASSION Came;

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Each vital humour which fhould feed the whole,
Soon flows to this, in body and in foul:
Whatever warms the heart, or fills the head,
As the mind opens, and its functions spread,
Imagination plies her dang'rous art,
And pours it all upon the peccant part.
Nature its mother, Habit is its nurfe;
Wit, Spirit, Faculties but make it worse;
Reafon itself but gives it edge and pow'r;
As Heav'n's bleft beam turns vinegar more four.
We, wretched fubjects tho' to lawful fway,
In this weak queen, fome fav'rite still obey;
Ah! if the lend not arms, as well as rules,
What can fhe more than tell us we are fools?
Teach us to mourn our Nature, nor to mend,
A fharp accufer, but a helpless friend

Or from a judge turn pleader, to perfuade
The choice we make, or juftify it made;
Proud of an eafy conqueft all along,

She but removes weak paffions for the ftrong:
So, when small humours gather to a gout,
The doctor fancies he has driv'n them out.

Yes, Nature's road must ever be prefer'd; Reafon is here no guide, but ftill a guard: 'Tis hers to rectify, not overthrow,

And treat this paffion more as friend than foe:

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A mightier Pow'r the ftrong direction fends,
And fev'ral Men impels to sev'ral ends :
Like varying winds, by other paffions toft,
This drives them conftant to a certain coaft.

Let pow'r or knowledge, gold or glory, please,
Or (oft more ftrong than all) the love of eafe;
Thro' life 'tis follow'd, ev'n at life's expence;
The merchant's toil, the fage's indolence,
The monk's humility, the hero's pride,
All, all alike, find Reafon on their fide.

Th' Eternal Art educing good from ill,
Grafts on this Paffion our beft Principle:
'Tis thus the Mercury of Man is fix'd,
Strong grows the Virtue with his nature mix'd;
The drofs cements what else were too refin'd,
And in one int'reft body acts with mind.

As fruits, ungrateful to the planter's care,
On favage ftock inferted, learn to bear;
The fureft Virtues thus from paffions shoot,
Wild Nature's vigour working at the root.
What crops of wit and honesty appear
From fpleen, from obftinacy, hate, or fear!
See anger, zeal and fortitude supply;
Ev'n av'rice, prudence; floth, philofophy;
Luft, thro' fome certain ftrainers well refin'd,
Is gentle love, and charms all womankind;
Envy, to which th' ignoble mind's a flave,
Is emulation in the learn'd or brave;

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Nor Virtue, male or female, can we name,

But what will grow on Pride, or grow on Shame.

Thus Nature gives us (let it check our pride)

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The virtue nearest to our vice ally'd:

Reason the bias turns to good from ill,
And Nero reigns a Titus, if he will.
The fiery foul abhorr'd in Catiline,
In Decius charms, in Curtius is divine
The fame ambition can deftroy or fave,
And make a patriot as it makes a knave.
This light and darknefs in our chaos join'd,
What fhall divide? The God within the mind.

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14

ESSAY

ON MAN.

EP. II.

Extremes in Nature equal ends produce,

In Man they join to fome mysterious ufe;
Tho' each by turns the other's bound invade,
As, in fome well-wrought picture, light and fhade,
And oft fo mix, the diff'rence is too nice
Where ends the Virtue, or begins the Vice.

Fools who from hence into the notion fall,
That Vice or Virtue there is none at all.
If white and black blend, foften, and unite
A thousand ways, is there no black or white?
Afk your own heart, and nothing is fo plain;
'Tis to mistake them cofts the time and pain.
Vice is a monster of fo frightful mien,
As, to be hated, needs but to be feen;
Yet feen too oft, familiar with her face,

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We first endure, then pity, then embrace.

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But where th' Extreme of Vice, was ne'er agreed:

Afk where's the North! at York, 'tis on the Tweed;

In Scotland, at the Orcades; and there,

At Greenland, Zembla, or the Lord knows where.

No Creature owns it in the first degree,

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But thinks his neighbour farther gone than he;

Ev'n those who dwell beneath its very zone,
Or never feel the rage, or never own;
What happier natures fhrink at with affright,
The hard inhabitant contends its right.

Virtuous and vicious ev'ry Man must be,
Few in th' extreme, but all in the degree:
The rogue and fool, by fits is fair and wife;
And ev❜n the best, by fits, what they despise.
"Tis but by parts we follow good or ill;
For, Vice or Virtue, Self directs it ftill;
Each individual feeks a fev'ral goal;

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But HEAV'N's great view is One, and that the Whole:
That counterworks each folly and caprice;
That disappoints th' effect of ev'ry vice;
That, happy frailties to all ranks apply'd;
Shame to the virgin, to the matron pride,
Fear to the ftatéfman, rafhness to the chief,
To kings prefumption, and to crowds belief:

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