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But of this frame, the bearings and the ties,
The strong connexions, nice dependencies,
Gradations just, has thy pervading soul
Look'd thro'? or can a part contain the whole ?
Is the great chain that draws all to agree,
And drawn, supports, upheld by God or thee?

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II. Presumptuous man? the reason wouldst thou find, Why form'd so weak, so little, and so blind? First, if thou canst, the harder reason guess, Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no less? Ask of thy mother earth, why oaks are made

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Taller or stronger than the weeds they shade?
Or ask of yonder argent fields above,

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Why Jove's satellites are less than Jove?

Of systems possible, if 'tis confest,

That wisdom infinite must form the best,
Where all must fall or not coherent be,
And all that rises, rise in due degree:

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Then, in the scale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain,
There must be, somewhere, such a rank as man;
And all the questions (wrangle e'er so long)
Is only this, If God has plac'd him wrong?

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Respecting man, whatever wrong we call,

May, must be right, as relative to all.

In human works, though labor'd on with pain,

A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain;

In God's one single can its end produce;

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Yet serves to second too some other use.

So man, who here seems principal alone,
Perhaps acts second to some sphere unknown,
Touches some wheel, or verges to some goal;
'Tis but a part we see, and not a whole.

When the proud steed shall know why man restrains
His fiery course, or drives him o'er the plains;
When the dull ox, why now he breaks the clod,

Is now a victim, and now Egypt's god:

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Then shall man's pride and dullness comprehend 65
His actions', passions', being's, use and end;

Why doing, suffering, check'd, impell'd: and why?
This hour a slave, the next a deity.

Then say not man's imperfect, heav'n in fault;

Say rather, man's as perfect as he ought;
His knowledge measur'd to his state and place;
His time a moment, and a point his space.

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If to be perfect in a certain sphere,

What matter soon or late, or here or there :
The blest to-day is as completely so,

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As who began a thousand years ago.

III. Heav'n from all creatures hides the book of fate, All but the page prescrib'd their present state; From brutes what men, from men what spirits know,

Or who could suffer being here below?

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The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day,
Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?
Pleas'd to the last he crops the flow'ry food,
And licks the hand just rais'd to shed his blood.

Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv❜n,

That each may fill the circle mark'd by heav'n;

Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,

A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

Atoms or systems into ruin hurl'd,

And now a bubble burst, and now a world.

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Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar;
Wait the great teacher, death; and God adore.
What future bliss, he gives not thee to know,
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never is, but always to be blest;
The soul, uneasy and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

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Lo, the poor Inclian! whose untutor❜d mind,
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind;

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His soul proud science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk, or milky way;

Yet simple nature to his hope has giv❜n,

Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler heav'n :
Some safer world, in depth of woods embrac'd,

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Some happier island in the watʼry waste,

Where slaves once more their native land behold,

No fiends torment, no christians thirst for gold.
To be, content's his natural desire,

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He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.

IV. Go, wiser thou! and in thy scale of sense, Weigh thy opinion against providence ;

Call imperfection what thou fancy'st such,

Say, here he gives too little, there too much :
Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust,
Yet cry, If man's unhappy, God's unjust;
If man alone engross not heav'n's high care,
Alone made perfect here, immortal there :
Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod,
Re-judge his justice, be the God of God.

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In pride, in reas❜ning pride, our error lies; All quit their sphere, and rush into the skies. Pride still is aiming at the blest abodes :

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Men would be angels, angels would be Gods.

Aspiring to be Gods, if angels fell,

Aspiring to be angels, men rebel:

And who but wishes to invert the laws

Of ORDER, Sins against th' Eternal Cause.

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V. Ask for what end the heav'nly bodies shine, Earth for whose use ? Pride answers, ""Tis for mine: "For me kind nature wakes her genial pow'r, "Suckles each herb, and spreads out every flow'r; "Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew "The juice nectarious, and the balmy dew: "For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings: "For me, health gushes from a thousand springs; "Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise:

"My footstool earth, my canopy the skies."

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But errs not nature from this gracious end, From burning suns when livid deaths descend, When earthquakes swallow, or when tempests sweep Towns to one grave, whole nations to the deep? "No ('tis reply'd) the first Almighty Cause

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Acts not by partial, but by genʼral laws :

Th' exceptions few; some change since all began;
And what created perfect ?"-Why then man?
If the great end be human happiness,

Then nature deviates-and can man do less?
As much that end a constant course requires
Of show'rs and sunshine, as of man's desires :
As much eternal springs, and cloudless skies,

As man forever temp'rate, calm, and wise

If plagues or earthquakes break not heav'n's design,
Why then a Borgia, or a Cataline?

Who knows but he, whose hand the light'ning forms,
Who heaves old ocean, and who wings the storms;
Pours fierce ambition in a Cæsar's mind,

Or turns young Ammon loose to scourge mankind?
From pride, from pride, our very reas'ning springs;
Account for moral, as for natʼral things:

Why charge we heav'n in those, in these acquit?
In both, to reason right, is to submit.

Better for us, perhaps, it might appear,
Were there all harmony, all virtue here;
That never air or ocean felt the wind;
That never passion discompos'd the mind.
But ALL Subsists by elemental strife;
And passions are the elements of life.

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