View thy own World: Behold the Chain of Love Combining all below, and all above.
See, lifeless Matter moving to one End,
The fingle Atoms each to other tend,
Attract, attracted to, the next in place,
By Nature form'd its Neighbour to embrace.
Behold it next, with various Life endu❜d,
Prefs to one Centre ftill, the Gen'ral Good.
See dying Vegetables Life sustain,
See Life diffolving vegetatę again.
All Forms that perifh other Forms fupply,
By turns they catch the vital Breath, and die;
Like Bubbles on the Sea of Matter born,
They rife, they break, and to that Sea return.
Nothing is foreign: Parts relate to Whole:
One All-extending, All-preferving Soul
Connects all Being, greatest with the least ;
Made Beaft in Aid of Man, and Man of Beaft:
Each ferv'd, and ferving; nothing ftands alone; 25
The Chain holds. on, and where it ends, unknown!
Has God, thou. Fool! work'd folely for thy Good, Thy Joy, thy Bastime, thy Attire, thy Food?
Who for thy Table feeds the wanton Fawn,
For him, as kindly, spreads the flow'ry Lawn.
Is it for thee the Lark afcends and fings?
Joy tunes his Voice, Joy elevates his Wings:
Is it for thee the Linnet pours his Throat?
Loves of his own, and Raptures, fwell the Note.
The bounding Steed you pompously bestride,
Shares with his Lord the Pleasure and the Pride.
Is thine alone the Seed that ftrows the Plain?
The Birds of Heav'n fhall vindicate their Grain.
Thine the full Harvest of the Golden Year?
Part pays, and juftly, the deferving Steer.
The Hog that plows not, nor obeys thy Call,
Lives on the Labours of this Lord of AI.
Know, Nature's Children all divide her Care;
The Furr that warms a Monarch, warm'd a Bear.
While Man exclaims, fee all Things for my Ufe!
See Man for mine, replies a pamper'd Goofe:
What care to tend, to lodge, to cran, to treat him,
AH this he knew; but not that 'twas to eat him.
As far as Goofe could judge, he' reafon'd' right, But as to Man, miftook the Matter' quite :
And just as short of Reason, Man will fall,
Who thinks All made for One, not One for All.
Grant, that the Pow'rful ftill the Weak controul,
Be Man the Wit and Tyrant of the Whole.
NATURE that Tyrant checks; He only knows
And feels, another Creature's Wants and Woes.
Say, will the Falcon ftooping from above,
Smit with her varying Plumage, fpare the Dove?.
Admires the Jay the Infect's gilded Wings,
Or hears the Hawk, when Philomela fings?
Man cares for All: To Birds he gives his Woods,
To Beafts his Paftures, and to Fish his Floods,
For fome, his Int'reft prompts him to provide,
For more, his Pleasure, yet for more his Pride :
All feed on one vain Patron, and enjoy
Th' extensive Blefling of his Luxury.
That very Life his learned Hunger craves
He faves from Famine, from the Savage faves:
Nay, feafts the Animal he dooms his Feaft,
And 'till he ends the Being, makes it bleft.
The favour'd Man, by Touch Etherial flain,
Not lefs forefees the Stroke, or feels the Pain.:
The Creature had his Feaft of Life before;
Thou too must perish, when thy Feaft is o'er!
To each unthinking Being Heav'n a Friend,
Gives not the useless Knowledge of its End ;
To Man imparts it; but with fuch a View,
As while he dreads it, makes him hope it too.
The Hour conceal'd, and fo remote the Fear,
Death ftill draws nearer, never feeming near.
Great standing Miracle! that Heav'n aflign'd
Its only Thinking Thing, this Turn of Mind.
Whether with Reafon, or with Instinct blest,
Know, all enjoy that Pow'r which fuits 'em beft,
To Blifs, alike, by that Direction tend,
And find the Means proportion'd to their End.
Say, where full Inftinct is th'unerring Guide,
What Pope or Council can they need beside ?
Reason, however able, cool at best,
Cares not for Service, or but ferves when prest ;
Stays till we call, and then not often near ;
But honeft Inftin&t comes a Volunteer.
This too ferves always, Reafon never long;
One must go right, the other may go wrong.
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See then the acting and comparing Pow'rs,
One in their Nature, which are two in ours ;
And Reason raise o'er Instinct, as you can;
In this, 'tis God directs, in that, 'tis Man.
Who taught the Nations of the Field and Wood, To fhun their Poifon, and to chufe their Food? Prefcient, the Tydes or Tempests to withstand, Build on the Wave, or Arch beneath the Sand? Who made the Spider Parallels defign,
Sure as De-Moivre, without Rule or Line?
Who bid the Stork, Columbus-like, explore
Heav'ns not his own, and Worlds unknown before?
Who calls the Council, states the certain Day,
Who forms the Phalanx, and who points the Way?
GOD, in the Nature of each Being, founds
Its proper Bliss, and fets its proper Bounds :
But as he fram'd a Whole, the Whole to blefs
On mutual Wants built mutual Happiness:
So from the first, Eternal ORDER ran,
And Creature link'd to Creature, Man to Man.
What'ere of Life all-quickening Æther keeps,
Or breathes thro' Air, or shoots beneath the Deeps,
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