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

Expunge the whole, or lop th' excrefcent parts
Of all our Vices have created Arts;

50

Then fee how little the remaining fum,
Which ferv'd the paft, and muft the times to come!
II. Two principles in human nature reign;
Self-love, to urge, and Reafon, to restrain;
Nor this a good, nor that a bad we call,
Each works its end, to move or govern all:

NOTES.

55

ments, as the best vehicles of Truth. Shakespear touches upon this latter advantage with great force and humour. The Flatterer fays to Timon in diftrefs, " I cannot cover "the monstrous bulk of their ingratitude with any fize of "words, "The other replies, " Let it go naked, men may

"fee't the better.

VER. 46. Or Learning's Luxury, or Idleness;] The Luxury of Learning confifts in dreffing up and difguifing old notions in a new way, fo as to make them more fashionable and palateable; inftead of examining and fcrutinizing their truth. As this is often done for pomp and fhew, it is called luxury; as it is often done to fave pains and labour, it is called idleness.

VER. 47. Or tricks to fhew the firetch of human brain.] Such as the mathematical demonftrations concerning the small quantity of matter; the endless divifibility of it, &c.

VER. 48. Mere curious pleasure, or ingenious pain ;] That is, when Admiration fets the mind on the rack.

VER. 49. Expunge the whole, or lop th' excrefcent parts -Of all our vices have created Arts;] i. e. Thofe parts of natural Philofophy, Logic, Rhetoric, Poetry, &c. that ad minister to luxury, deceit, ambition, effeminacy, &c.

And to their proper operation ftill,

Afcribe all Good, to their improper, Ill.
Se f-love, the fpring of motion, acts the foul;
Reafon's comparing balance rules the whole.
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;

60

Or, meteor-like, flame lawless thro' the void, 65
Destroying others, by himself destroy'd.
Moft ftrength the moving principle requires ;
Active it's task, it prompts, impels, infpires;
Sedate and quiet, the comparing lies,
Form'd but to check, delib'rate, and advise.
Self-love still stronger, as its objects nigh;
Reafon's at diftance, and in prospect lie:
That fees immediate good by prefent fenfe;
Reason, the future and the confequence.

70

Thicker than arguments, temptations throng, 75 At best more watchful this, but that more strong, The action of the ftronger to fufpend

Reafon ftill ufe, to Reason still attend.

NOTES.

VER. 74. Reason, the future and the confequence.] i. e. By experience, Reafon collects the future; and by argumentation, the confequence.

Attention, habit, and experience gains;

Each strengthens Reason, and Self-love reftrains. So
Let fubtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight,
More ftudious to divide than to unite;

And Grace and Virtue, Sense and Reason split,
With all the rafh dexterity of wit.

85

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, Pleafure their defire;
But greedy That, its object would devour,
This tafte the honey, and not wound the flow'r: 90

VARIATIONS,

After ver. 86 in the MS.

Of good and evil Gods what frighted Fools
Of good and evil Reafon puzzled Schools,
Deceiv'd, deceiving, taught

NOTES.

VER. 81. Let fubtle Schoolmen, &c.] This obfervation on the folly of the schoolmen, who confider reason and the paffions as two oppofite principles, the one good and the other evil, is feafonable and judicious; for this folly gives great fupport to the Manichæan or Zoroastrian error, the confutation of which was one of the author's chief ends in writing. For if there be two principles in Man, a good and bad, it is natural to think him the joint product of the two Manichæan deities (the firft of which contributed to his Reason, the other to his Paffions) rather than the creature of one Individual Caufe. This was Plutarch's notion, and, as we may fee in him, of the more ancient

a

Pleasure, or wrong, or rightly understood,
Our greatest evil, or our greatest good.

95

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' felfifh, if their means be fair, Lift under Reafon, and deferve her care;

Thofe that imparted, court a nobler aim,

Exalt their kind, and take fome Virtue's name. 100

In lazy Apathy let Stoics boast

Their Virtue fix'd; 'tis fix'd as in a frost;
Contracted all, retiring to the breaft;
But ftrength of mind is Exercife, 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.

VARIATIONS.

After ver. 103. in the MS.

A tedious Voyage! where how useless lies
The compass, if no pow'rful gufts arise ?

NOTES.

105

Manichæans. It was of importance, therefore, to reprobate and fubvert a notion that ferved to the fupport of fo dangerous an error.

J

Nor God alone in the ftill calm we find,

He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind. 110

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 compofes Man, can Man destroy?
Suffice that Reafon keep to Nature's road,
Subject, compound them, follow her and God.

VARIATION S.

After ver. 112. in the MS.

The foft reward the virtuous, or invite;
The fierce, the vicious punish or affright.

NOTES.

115

VER. 109. Nor God alone, &c.] Thefe words are only a fimple affirmation in the poetic dress of a fimilitude, to this purpose: Good is not only produced by the fubdual of the paffions, but by the turbulent exercise of them. A truth conveyed under the most fublime imagery that poetry could conceive or paint. For the author is here only fhewing the providential iffue of the Paffions, and how, by God's gracious difpofition, they are turned away from their natural bias, to promote the happiness of Mankind. As to the method in which they are to be treated by Man in whom they are found, all that he contends for, in favour of them, is only this, that they should not be quite rooted up and deftroyed, as the Stoics, and their followers in all religions, foolishly attempted. For the reft, he conftantly repeats this advice,

The action of the ftronger to fufpend,
Reason still use, to Reason ftill attend.