The very

beft will variously incline,

And what rewards your Virtue, punish mine. WHATEVER IS, IS RIGHT. -This world, 'tis true, Was made for Cæfar, but for Titus too: 146

And which more bleft? who chain'd his country, fay, Or he whose Virtue figh'd to lofé a day?

150

"But fometimes Virtue ftarves, while Vice is fed." What then? Is the reward of Virtue bread? That Vice may merit, 'tis the price of toil;

The knave deferves it,

The knave deferves it,

when he tills the foil,

when he tempts the main,

Where folly fights for kings, or dives for gain.
The good man may be weak, be indolent;
Nor is his claim to plenty, but content.

155

But grant him riches, your demand is o'er? "No-fhall the good want Health, the good want Pow'r?"

Add Health, and Pow'r, and ev'ry earthly thing, "Why bounded Pow'r? why private? why no king? "Nay, why external for internal 'giv❜n?

rr

161

Why is not man a God, and Earth a Heav'n?" Who afk and reafon thus, will fcarce conceive God gives enough, while he has more to give:

NOTES.

เ

who both perished by too near an approach to Etna and Vefuvius, while they were exploring the caufe of their eruptions.

Immenfe the pow'r, immenfe were the demand; 165 Say, at what part of nature will they stand?

170

What nothing carthly gives, or can deftroy, The foul's calm fun-fhine, and the heart-felt joy, Is Virtue's prize: A better would you fix, Then give humility a coach and fix, Juftice a Conqu❜ror's fword, or Truth a gown, Or public Spirit its great cure, a Crown. Weak, foolish Man! will Heav'n reward us there With the fame trash mad mortals wifh for here? 'The Boy and Man an individual makes,

175

Yet figh'ft thou now for apples and for cakes?
Go, like the Indian, in another life

Expect thy dog, thy bottle, and thy wife:
As well as dream such trifles are affign'd,
As toys and empires, for a god-like mind.

VARIATIONS.

After ver. 172. in the MS.

Say, what rewards this idle world imparts
Or fit for fearching heads or honeft hearts.

NOTES.

180

VER. 177. Go, like the Indian, &c.] Alluding to the example of the Indian, in Epift. i. ver. 99. and fhewing, that that example was not given to difcredit any rational hopes of future happiness, but only to reprove the folly of separating them from charity as when

-Zeal, not charity, became the guide,

And hell was built on fpite, and heav'n on pride.

4

Rewards, that either would to Virtue bring
No joy, or be deftructive of the thing:
How oft by these at fixty are undone
The Virtues of a faint at twenty-one!

To whom can Riches give Repute or Trust,
Content or Pleasure, but the Good and Just?
Judges and Senates have been bought for gold,
Efteem and Love were never to be fold.
Oh fool! to think God hates the worthy mind,
The lover and the love of human kind,

185

190

Whofe life is healthful, and whofe confcience clear, Because he wants a thoufand pounds a-year.

Honour and fhame from no Condition rife,

A&t well your part, there all the honour lies. Fortune in Men has some small diff'rence made, 195 One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade;

NOTES..

VER. 193. Honour and Jhame from no condition rife, &c.] What power then has fortune over the Man? None at all. For as her favours can confer neither worth nor wisdom; fo neither can her difpleafure cure him of any of his follies. On his Garb indeed the hath fome little influence; but his Heart still remains the fame :

Fortune in Men has fome fmall difference made,

One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade.

But this difference extends no further than to the habit; the pride of heart is the fame, both in the flaunter and flutterer, as it is the poet's intention to infinuate by the ufe of those terms.

The cobler apron'd, and the parfon gown'd,

200

The frier hooded, and the monarch crown'd.
"What differ more (you cry) than crown and cowl?"
I'll tell you, friend; a wife man and a fool.
You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk,
Or, cobler-like, the parfon will be drunk,
Worth makes the man, and want of it, the fellow;
The reft is all but leather or prunella.

1

204

Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with ftrings,

That thou may'st be by kings, or whores of kings. Boaft the pure blood of an illuftrious race,

In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece :

But by your father's worth, if your's you rate,
Count me those only who were good and great. 210
Go; if your ancient, but ignoble blood

Has crept thro' fcoundrels ever fince the flood,
Go! and pretend your family is young;

Nor own, your fathers have been fools fo long.

VER. 207. Boaft the pure blood, &c.] In the MS. thus:
The richest blood, right-honourably old,
Down from Lucretia to Lucretia roll'd,
May fwell thy heart and gallop in thy-breast,
+ Without one dafh of ufher or of priest:
Thy pride as much defpife all other pride
As Chrift-Church once all colleges befide.

What can ennoble fots, or flaves, or cowards? 215 Alas! not all the blood of all the HOWARDS.

220

Look next on Greatness; fay where Greatness lies "Where but among the Heroes and the wife?" Heroes are much the fame, the point's agreed, From Macedonia's madman to the Swede; The whole strange purpose of their lives, to find Or make, an enemy of all mankind? Not one looks backward, onward still he goes, Yet ne'er looks forward further than his nose.. No lefs alike the Politic and Wife; All fly flow things, with circumfpective eyes; Men in their loose unguarded hours they take, Not that themselves are wife, but others weak. But grant that those can conquer, these can cheat;

225

'Tis phrase abfurd to call a Villain Great:

Who wickedly is wife, or madly brave,

230

Is but the more a fool, the more a knave.
Who noble ends by noble means obtains,
Or failing, fimiles in exile or in chains,
Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed
Like Socrates, that Man is great indeed.

235

What's Fame! a fancy'd life in other's breath, A thing beyond us, ev'n before our death. Just what you hear, you have, and what's unknown The fame (my Lord) if Tully's or your own. 240