To each unthinking being, heav'n a friend, Gives not the useless knowledge of its end :· To man imparts it; but with such a view As, while he dreads it, makes him hope it too; The hour conceal'd, and so remote the fear, Death still draws nearer, never seeming near. Great standing miracle! that heav'n assign'd Its only thinking thing this turn of mind.

2. Whether with reason or with instinct. blest, Know, all enjoy the pow'r which suits them best; To bliss alike by that direction tend,

And find the means proportion'd to their end.
Say, where full instinct is th' unerring guide,
What pope or council can they need beside?
Reason, however able, cool at best,

Cares not for service, or but serves when prest,

Stays till we call, and then not often near;

But honest instinct comes a volunteer,

Sure never to o'er-shoot, but just to hit;'
While still toa wide or short is human wit;
Sure by quick nature happiness to gain,
Which heavier reason labours at in vain.
This too serves always, reason never long;
One must go right, the other may go wrong
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 shun their poison, and to chuse their food? Prescient the tides or tempests to withstand,

Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand?

H

f

Who made the spider parallels design,

Sure as Demoivre, without rule or line?

Who bids 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?

Its

3. God, in the nature of each being, founds

proper bliss, and sets its

proper bounds:

But as he fram'd a whole, the whole to bless,

On mutual wants built mutual happiness:

So from the first, eternal Order ran,

And creature link'd to creature, man to man.'
Whate'er of life all quick'ning ether keeps,
Or breathes thro' air, or shoots beneath the deeps,
Or pours profuse on earth, one nature feeds

The vital flame, and swells the genial seeds.

Not man alone, but all that roam the wood,

Or wing the sky, or roll along the flood,

Each loves itself, but not itself alone,

Each sex desires alike, 'till two are one.

Nor ends the pleasure with the fierce embrace;
They love themselves a third time in their race.
Thus beast and bird their common charge attend,
The mothers nurse it, and the sires defend;
The young dismiss'd, to wander earth or air,
There stops the instinct, and there ends the care:
The link dissolves, each seeks a fresh embrace,
Another love succeeds, another race,

A longer care man's helpless kind demands;
That longer care contracts more lasting bands:
Reflection, reason, still the ties improve,

At once extend the int'rest, and the love;

With choice we fix, with sympathy we burn';

Each virtue in each passion takes its turn;

།

And still new needs, new helps, new habits rise,

That graft benevolence on charities.

Still as one brood, and as another rose,

These nat'ral love maintain'd, habitual those:
The last scarce ripen'd into perfect man,
Saw helpless him from whom their life began:
Mem'ry and force-cast just returns engage,
That pointed back to youth, this on to age;
While pleasure, gratitude, and hope, combin'd,
Still spread the int'rest, and preserv'd the kind.

4. Nor think in Nature's state they blindly trod;

The state of nature was the reign of God:

Self-love and social at her birth began,

Union the bond of all things, and of man,