No More Learning

IX. What if the foot, ordain'd the dust to tread,
Or hand, to toil, aspir'd to be the head? 260
What if the head, the eye, or ear repin'd
To serve mere engines to the ruling Mind?
Just as absurd for any part to claim
To be another, in this gen'ral frame:
Just as absurd, to mourn the tasks or pains, 265
The great directing MIND of ALL ordains.

All are but parts of one stupendous whole,
Whose body Nature is, and God the soul;
That, chang'd thro' all, and yet in all the same;
Great in the earth, as in th' ethereal frame; 270
Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze,
Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees,
Lives thro' all life, extends thro' all extent,
Spreads undivided, operates unspent;
Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, 275
As full, as perfect, in a hair as heart:
As full, as perfect, in vile Man that mourns,
As the rapt Seraph that adores and burns:
To him no high, no low, no great, no small;
He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. 280

X. Cease then, nor ORDER Imperfection name:
Our proper bliss depends on what we blame.
Know thy own point: This kind, this due degree
Of blindness, weakness, Heav'n bestows on thee.
Submit. --In this, or any other sphere, 285
Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear:
Safe in the hand of one disposing Pow'r,
Or in the natal, or the mortal hour.
All Nature is but Art, unknown to thee;
All Chance, Direction, which thou canst not see; 290
All Discord, Harmony not understood;
All partial Evil, universal Good:
And, spite of Pride, in erring Reason's spite,
One truth is clear, WHATEVER IS, IS RIGHT.





* * * * *





EPISTLE TO DR ARBUTHNOT


Advertisement to the first publication of this _Epistle_


This paper is a sort of bill of complaint, begun many years since, and
drawn up by snatches, as the several occasions offered. I had no
thoughts of publishing it, till it pleased some Persons of Rank and
Fortune (the Authors of _Verses to the Imitator of Horace_, and of an
_Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a Nobleman at Hampton Court_) to
attack, in a very extraordinary manner, not only my Writings (of which,
being public, the Public is judge), but my P_erson, Morals_, and
_Family_, whereof, to those who know me not, a truer information may be
requisite. Being divided between the necessity to say something of
_myself_, and my own laziness to undertake so awkward a task, I thought
it the shortest way to put the last hand to this Epistle. If it have any
thing pleasing, it will be that by which I am most desirous to please,
the _Truth_ and the _Sentiment_; and if any thing offensive, it will be
only to those I am least sorry to offend, _the vicious_ or _the
ungenerous_.
Many will know their own pictures in it, there being not a circumstance
but what is true; but I have, for the most part, spared their _Names_,
and they may escape being laughed at, if they please.

I would have some of them know, it was owing to the request of the
learned and candid Friend to whom it is inscribed, that I make not as
free use of theirs as they have done of mine. However, I shall have this
advantage, and honour, on my side, that whereas, by their proceeding,
any abuse may be directed at any man, no injury can possibly be done by
mine, since a nameless character can never be found out, but by its
_truth_ and _likeness_.

P.





P. shut, shut the door, good John! fatigu'd, I said,
Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm dead.
The Dog-star rages! nay't is past a doubt,
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out:
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand, 5
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.

What walls can guard me, or what shade can hide?
They pierce my thickets, thro' my Grot they glide;
By land, by water, they renew the charge;
They stop the chariot, and they board the barge. 10
No place is sacred, not the Church is free;
Ev'n Sunday shines no Sabbath-day to me;
Then from the Mint walks forth the Man of rhyme,
Happy to catch me just at Dinner-time.

Is there a Parson, much bemus'd in beer, 15
A maudlin Poetess, a rhyming Peer,
A Clerk, foredoom'd his father's soul to cross,
Who pens a Stanza, when he should _engross_?
Is there, who, lock'd from ink and paper, scrawls
With desp'rate charcoal round his darken'd walls? 20
All fly to TWIT'NAM, and in humble strain
Apply to me, to keep them mad or vain.
Arthur, whose giddy son neglects the Laws,
Imputes to me and my damn'd works the cause:
Poor Cornus sees his frantic wife elope, 25
And curses Wit, and Poetry, and Pope.