Involves the combatants, each claiming truth,
And truth disclaiming both. And thus they spend
The little wick of life's poor fhallow lamp,
In playing tricks with nature, giving laws
To diftant world's, and trifling in their own.
Is't not a pity now that tickling rheums
Should ever teaze the lungs, and blear the fight
Of oracles like these? Great pity too,
That having wielded th' elements, and built
A thousand fyftems, each in his own way,
They should go out in fume, and be forgot?
Ah! what is life thus fpent? and what are they,
But frantic who thus fpend it? all for smoke-
Eternity for bubbles, proves at last

A senseless bargain. When I fee fuch games
Play'd by the creatures of a Pow'r who fwears,
That he will judge the earth, and call the fool
To a fharp reck'ning that has liv'd in vain,
And when I weigh this feeming wifdom well,
And prove it in th' infallible refult

So hollow and fo falfe-I feel my heart
Diffolve in pity, and account the learn'd
If this be learning, most of all deceiv'd.
Great crimes alarm the confcience, but fhe fleeps
While thoughtful man is plaufibly amus'd.
Defend me therefore, common sense, say I,
From reveries fo airy, from the toil
Of dropping buckets into empty wells,
And growing old in drawing nothing up!

"Twere well, fays one fage erudite, profound,
Terribly arch'd and aquiline his nofe,
And overbuilt with most impending brows,
'Twere well could you permit the world to live
As the world pleases. What's the world to you?
Much. I was born of woman, and drew milk
As fweet as charity from human breasts.
I think, articulate, I laugh and weep,
And exercise all functions of a man.
How then should I, and any man that lives,
Be ftrangers to each other? pierce my vein,
Take of the crimson ftream meandring there,
And catechife it well. Apply your glass,
Search it, and prove now if it be not blood
Congenial with thine own. And if it be,
What edge of fubtlety canft thou suppose
Keen enough, wife and skilful as thou art,
To cut the link of brotherhood, by which
One common Maker bound me to the kind.
True; I am no proficient, I confefs,

In arts like yours. I cannot call the swift
And perilous lightnings from the angry clouds,
And bid them hide themfelves in th' earth beneath,
I cannot analyse the air, nor catch

The parallax of yonder luminous point,

That feems half quench'd in the immenfe abyfs;
Such powers I boaft not-neither can I reft
A filent witnefs of the headlong rage,
Or heedlefs folly by which thoufands die,
Bone of my bone, and kindred fouls to mine.

God

God never meant that man fhould fcale the heav'ns By ftrides of human wifdom. In his works, Though wond'rous, he commands us in his word To feek him rather, where his mercy fhines.

The mind indeed,

Views him in all.

The grand effect.

enlighten'd from above,
Afcribes to the grand cause,

Acknowledges with joy

His manner, and with rapture taftes his ftile.
But never yet did philofophic tube
That brings the planets home into the eye
Of obfervation, and difcovers, elf:
Not visible, his family of worlds,

Discover him that rules them; fuch a veil
Hangs over mortal eyes, blind from the birth,
And dark in things divine. Full often too
Our wayward intellect, the more we learn.
Of nature, overlooks her author more,
From inftrumental caufes proud to draw
Conclufions retrograde, and mad mistake.
But if his word once teach us, fhoot a ray
Through all the heart's dark chambers, and reveal
Truths undifcern'd, but by that holy light,
Then all is plain. Philofophy baptiz'd
In the pure fountain of eternal love,
Has eyes indeed; and viewing all fhe fees.
As meant to indicate a God to man,

Gives him his praise, and forfeits not her own..
Learning has borne such fruit in other days
On all her branches. Piety has found

Friends in the friends of fcience, and true pray'r

Has flow'd from lips wet with Caftalian dews.
Such was thy wifdom, Newton, childlike fage!~
Sagacious reader of the works of God,

And in his word fagacious. Such too thine,
Milton, whofe genius had angelic wings,
And fed on manna. And fuch thine, in whom
Our British Themis glory'd with just cause,
Immortal Hale! for deep difcernment prais'd
And found integrity not more, than fam'd.
For fanctity of manners undefil'd.

All flesh is grafs, and all its glory fades
Like the fair flow'r difhevell'd in the wind;
Riches, have wings, and grandeur is a dream;
The man we celebrate must find a tomb,.
And we that worship him, ignoble graves.
Nothing is proof against the gen'ral curse.
Of vanity, that feizes all below.

The only amaranthine flow'r on earth
Is virtue, th' only lasting treasure, truth.
But what is truth? 'twas Pilate's question put
To truth itself, that deign'd him no reply..
And wherefore? will not God impart his light
To them that ask it?-Freely-'tis his joy,
His glory, and his nature to impart.
But to the proud, uncandid, infincere,,
Or negligent enquirer, not a spark.

What's that which brings contempt upon a book,
And him that writes it, though the stile be neat,
The method clear, and argument exact?

That

That makes a minifter in holy things

The joy of many, and the dread of more,
His name a theme for praise and for reproach ?-
That while it gives us worth in God's account,
Depreciates and undoes us in our own?
What pearl is it that rich men cannot buy,
That learning is too proud to gather up,
But which the poor and the defpis'd of all
Seek and obtain, and often find unfought?
Tell me, and I will tell thee, what is truth...

Oh friendly to the best pursuits of man,
Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace,
Domestic life in rural leifure pass'd!

Few know thy value, and few tafte thy fweets,
Though many boast thy favours, and affect
To understand and chufe thee for their own.
But foolish man foregoes his proper blifs
Ev'n as his firft progenitor, and quits,
Though plac'd in paradife, (for earth has ftill
Some traces of her youthful beauty left)
Subftantial happiness for tranfient joy.

Scenes form'd for contemplation, and to nurse'
The growing feeds of wisdom; that suggest
By ev'ry pleafing image they present
Reflections.fuch as meliorate the heart,
Compose the paffions, and exalt the mind,
Scenes fuch as thefe, 'tis his fupreme delightTM
To fill with riot and defile with blood.
Should fome. contagion kind to the poor brutes

We