And grant the bad what happiness they wou'd, One they must want, which is, to pass for good. Oh blind to truth, and God's whole scheme below, Who fancy Blifs to Vice, to Virtue Woe! Who fees and follows that great scheme the best, 95 Beft knows the blessing, and will most be bleft. But fools, the Good alone, unhappy call, For ills or accidents that chance to all. See FALKLAND dies, the virtuous and the just ! See god-like TURENNE proftrate on the duft! See SIDNEY bleeds amid the martial ftrife! Was this their Virtue, or Contempt of Life? Say, was it Virtue, more tho' Heav'n ne'er gave, Lamented DIGBY! funk thee to the grave? Tell me, if Virtue made the Son expire, Why, full of days and honour, lives the Sire? ICO 105 VER. 100. See god-like Turenne] This epithet has a peculiar juftness; the great man to whom it is applied not being diftinguifhed, from other generals, for any of his fuperior qualities fo much as for his providential care of those whom he led to war; which was fo uncommon, that his chief purpose in taking on himself the command of armies, feems to have been the Prefervation of Mankind. In this god-like care he was more diftinguishably employed throughout the whole course of that famous campaign in which he loft his life. Let fober Moralifts correct their speech, Why drew Marseilles' good bifhop purer breath, Lent Heav'n a parent to the poor and me? Or partial Ill is univerfal Good, Or Change admits, or Nature lets it fall; 110 115 120 When his lewd father gave the dire disease. VER. 110. Lent Heav'n a parent, etc.] This laft inftance of the poet's illuftration of the ways of Providence, the reader fees, has a peculiar elegance, where a tribute of piety to a parent is paid in a return of thanks to, and made fubfervient of, his vindication of, the Great Giver and Father of all things. The Mother of the author, a person of great piety and charity, died the year this poem was finished, viz. 1733. VARIATIONS, After 116. in the MS. Of ev'ry evil, fince the world began, Shall burning Ætna, if a fage requires, Or fome old temple, nodding to its fall, 125 135 For Chartres' head referve the hanging wall? 139 Nor with one system can they all be blest. VER. 123. Shall burning Ætna, etc.] Alluding to the fate of those two great Naturalifts, Empedocles and Pliny, who both perished by too near an approach to Ætna and Vefuvius, while they were exploring the caufe of their cruptions. VARIATIONS. After 142. in fome Editions, Give each a Syftem, all must be at ftrife; What diff'rent Systems for a Man and Wife? The joke, tho' lively, was ill plac'd, and therefore ftruck out of the text. The very beft will varioufly 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 whofe Virtue figh'd to lose 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 deserves it, when he tills the foil, The knave deferves it, 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. 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, 66 155 Nay, why external for internal giv'n? 1 ба Why is not Man a God, and Earth a Heav'n? Is Virtue's prize: A better would you fix? Justice a Conqu❜ror's fword, or Truth a gown, 170 Weak, foolish man! will Heav'n reward us there With the fame trash mad mortals wifh for here? 175 The Boy and Man an individual makes, 180 To whom can Riches give Repute, or Truft, 185 Content, or Pleasure, but the Good and Just? VER. 177. Go, like the Indian, etc.] Alluding to the example of the Indian, in Epift. i. y 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 spite, and heav'n on pride. Say, what rewards this idle world imparts, |