If Parts allure thee, think how Bacon shin'd,
The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind1:
Or ravish'd with the whistling of a Name?,
See Cromwell, damn'd to everlasting fame!
If all, united, thy ambition call,

From ancient story learn to scorn them all.
There, in the rich, the honour'd, fam'd, and great,
See the false scale of Happiness complete!
In hearts of Kings, or arms of Queens who lay,
How happy! those to ruin, these betray.
Mark by what wretched steps their glory grows,
From dirt and sea-weed as proud Venice rose3;
In each how guilt and greatness equal ran,
And all that rais'd the Hero, sunk the Man:
Now Europe's laurels on their brows behold,
But stain'd with blood, or ill exchang'd for gold:

285

290

295

Then see them broke with toils, or sunk in ease,
Or infamous for plunder'd provinces.

Oh wealth ill-fated! which no act of fame

A Tale, that blends their glory with their shame!

Know then this truth (enough for Man to know) "Virtue alone is Happiness below."

310

The only point where human bliss stands still,
And tastes the good without the fall5 to ill;
Where only Merit constant pay receives,
Is blest in what it takes, and what it gives;
The joy unequall'd, if its end it gain,
And if it lose, attended with no pain":

1 That part of Macaulay's brilliant essay on Bacon, which may be described as a paraphrase of the above famous line, has been criticised by many writers, by none more keenly than by Kuno Fischer, (whose book has been translated into English by Mr Oxenford) with the object of showing the fallacy involved in the antithesis.]

From Cowley, in his imitation of Virgil; 'Charm'd with the foolish whistlings of a name.' Warton.

3 [The city of Venice was built in 809 on the island of the Rialto, in the midst of the marshes called Lagune, where the inhabitants of the great cities of Venetia had taken refuge from the Huns three centuries and a half before that date.] 4 In the MSS. it was thus:

-'or sunk in years,

Lost in unmeaning, unrepenting tears.'

315

Without satiety, tho' e'er so bless'd,

And but more relish'd as the more distress'd:

The broadest mirth unfeeling Folly wears,

Less pleasing far than Virtue's very tears:

320

Good, from each object, from each place acquir'd,

Which who but feels can taste, but thinks can know:
Yet poor with fortune, and with learning blind,
The bad must miss; the good, untaught, will find;
Slave to no sect, who takes no private road,
But looks thro' Nature up to Nature's God1;
Pursues that Chain which links th' immense design,
Joins heav'n and earth, and mortal and divine;
Sees, that no Being any bliss can know,
But touches some above, and some below;
Learns, from this union of the rising Whole,
The first, last purpose of the human soul;

330

335

And knows, where Faith, Law, Morals, all began,
All end, in LOVE OF GOD, and LOVE OF MAN.
For him alone, Hope leads from goal to goal,
And opens still, and opens on his soul;
'Till lengthen'd on to Faith, and unconfin'd,
It pours the bliss that fills up all the mind.
He sees, why Nature plants in Man alone

340

345

Hope of known bliss, and Faith in bliss unknown:
(Nature, whose dictates to no other kind

Are giv'n in vain, but what they seek they find)

Wise is her present; she connects in this

His greatest Virtue with his greatest Bliss;

350

At once his own bright prospect to be blest,

And strongest motive to assist the rest.

Self-love thus push'd to social, to divine,

Gives thee to make thy neighbour's blessing thine.

Is this too little for the boundless heart?

355

Extend it, let thy enemies have part:

Grasp the whole worlds of Reason, Life, and Sense,

In one close system of Benevolence:

Happier as kinder, in whate'er degree,

And height of Bliss but height of Charity.

360

God loves from Whole to Parts: but human soul

Must rise from Individual to the Whole.
Self-love but serves the virtuous mind to wake,
As the small pebble stirs the peaceful lake;

1 Verbatim from Bolingbroke's Letters to Pope. Warton.

[Warburton compares Plato de Republ. 1. c. 5, in which a beautiful passage is quoted from

Pindar (Fragm. 130; and Euripides, Herc. Fur. vv. 105-6. The sublimation of Hope into Faith, of which Pope speaks, constitutes the climax of Campbell's noble poem.]

The centre mov'd, a circle straight succeeds,
Another still, and still another spreads1;
Friend, parent, neighbour, first it will embrace;
His country next; and next all human race;

365

Wide and more wide, th' o'erflowings of the mind
Take ev'ry creature in, of ev'ry kind;
Earth smiles around, with boundless bounty blest,
And Heav'n beholds its image in his breast.

370

Come then, my Friend! my Genius! come along;

Oh master of the poet, and the song!

And while the Muse now stoops, or now ascends,
To Man's low passions, or their glorious ends,
Teach me, like thee, in various nature wise,
To fall with dignity, with temper rise;
Form'd by thy converse, happily to steer
From grave to gay, from lively to severe;
Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease,

375

380

Intent to reason, or polite to please.

Oh! while along the stream of Time thy name

Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame,

Say, shall my little bark attendant sail,

385

Pursue the triumph, and partake the gale?

When statesmen, heroes, kings, in dust repose,

Whose sons shall blush their fathers were thy foes,
Shall then this verse to future age pretend
Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend?
That urg'd by thee, I turn'd the tuneful art.
From sounds to things, from fancy to the heart;
For Wit's false mirror held up Nature's light;
Shew'd erring Pride, WHATEVER IS, IS RIGHT;
That REASON, PASSION, answer one great aim;
That true SELF-LOVE and SOCIAL are the same;
That VIRTUE only makes our Bliss below;
And all our Knowledge is, OURSELVES TO KNOW 2.

390

395

THE UNIVERSAL PRAYER3.

DEO OPT. MAX.

[THE Universal Prayer, put forth in 1738, may be fairly ascribed to Pope's desire to avail himself of the Commentary of Warburton, which had been designed to show that the system developed in the Essay on Man recognises freewill and does not logically tend to the establishment of fatalism. It can hardly be called a

'Pope took the simile of the Lake from Chaucer, whose House of Fame he had imitated. (Book II. vv. 280 ff.) Bowles.

That Virtue only, &c.] In the MS. thus,

'That just to find a God is all we can And all the Study of Mankind is Man.' Warburton.

3 Universal Prayer.] Concerning this poem,

Paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer, which it only follows at the commencement, and in the last four stanzas. Warton states that the prayer was by 'many orthodox persons' called the Deist's Prayer, and that on account of translating it a French advocate, Le Franc de Pompignan, incurred a reprimand from the Chancellor Aguesseau.]

MORAL ESSAYS,

IN FOUR EPISTLES TO SEVERAL PERSONS.

Est brevitate opus, ut currat sententia, neu se
Impediat verbis lassis onerantibus aures:
Et sermone opus est modo tristi, sæpe jocoso,
Defendente vicem modo Rhetoris atque Poeta,
Interdum urbani, parcentis viribus, atque

Extenuantis eas consultò.-HOR. [Sat. 1. x. 17—22.]

EPISTLE I.

To SIR RICHARD TEMPLE, LORD COBHAM1.

ARGUMENT.

Of the Knowledge and Characters of MEN.

Some Pecu

THAT it is not sufficient for this knowledge to consider Man in the Abstract: Books will not serve the purpose, nor yet our own Experience singly, v. I. General maxims, unless they be formed upon both, will be but notional, v. 10. liarity in every man, characteristic to himself, yet varying from himself, v. 15. Difficulties arising from our own Passions, Fancies, Faculties, &c. v. 31. The shortness of Life, to observe in, and the uncertainty of the Principles of action in men, to observe by, v. 37, &c. Our own Principle of action often hid from ourselves, v. 41. Some few Characters plain, but in general confounded, dissem bled, or inconsistent, v. 51. The same man utterly different in different places and seasons, v. 71. Unimaginable weaknesses in the greatest, v. 70, &c. Nothing constant and certain but God and Nature, v. 95. No judging of the Motives from the actions; the same actions proceeding from contrary Motives, and the same Motives influencing contrary actions, v. 100. II. Yet to form Characters, we can only take the strongest actions of a man's life, and try to make them agree: The utter uncertainty of this, from Nature itself, and from Policy, v. 120. Characters given according to the rank of men of the world, v. 135. And some reason for it, v. 140.

[Sir Richard Temple, created Viscount Cobham by George I. in 1718, and made a Field Marshal in 1742, was on intimate terms with Pope during the latter part of the Poet's life. Pope speaks, in his last letter to Swift, of 'generally rambling in the summer for a month to Lord Cobham's, the Bath, or elsewhere.' (The beauties of Lord Cobham's seat at Stowe are enthusiastically described in the 4th of these Epistles, v. 70 and foll.) Lord Cobham, writing

to Pope from Stowe Nov. 1, 1733, gracefully says that though he has not modesty enough to be pleased with the extraordinary compliment paid him, he has wit enough to know how little he deserves it;' and after declaring the Epistle to be 'the clearest and cleanest of all' Pope has written, recommends a judicious alteration of a passage which might have militated against the applicability of one of these epithets.]