Alexander Pope - Delphi Poets Series

by Alexander Pope

  When Love was liberty, and Nature law.

  Thus states were form’d, the name of King unknown,

  Till common int’rest placed the sway in one. 210

  ‘T was Virtue only (or in arts or arms,

  Diffusing blessings, or averting harms),

  The same which in a sire the sons obey’d,

  A prince the father of a people made.

  VI. Till then, by Nature crown’d, each patriarch sate 215

  King, priest, and parent of his growing state;

  On him, their second Providence, they hung,

  Their law his eye, their oracle his tongue.

  He from the wond’ring furrow call’d the food,

  Taught to command the fire, control the flood, 220

  Draw forth the monsters of th’ abyss profound,

  Or fetch th’ aërial eagle to the ground;

  Till drooping, sick’ning, dying, they began

  Whom they revered as God to mourn as Man:

  Then, looking up from sire to sire, explor’d 225

  One great first Father, and that first ador’d:

  Or plain tradition that this all begun,

  Convey’d unbroken faith from sire to son;

  The worker from the work distinct was known,

  And simple Reason never sought but one. 230

  Ere Wit oblique had broke that steady light,

  Man, like his Maker, saw that all was right,

  To virtue in the paths of pleasure trod,

  And own’d a father when he own’d a God.

  Love all the faith, and all th’ allegiance then, 235

  For Nature knew no right divine in men;

  No ill could fear in God, and understood

  A sov’reign being but a sov’reign good;

  True faith, true policy, united ran;

  That was but love of God, and this of Man. 240

  Who first taught souls enslaved, and realms undone,

  Th’ enormous faith of many made for one;

  That proud exception to all Nature’s laws,

  ‘T invert the world, and counterwork its cause?

  Force first made conquest, and that conquest law; 245

  Till Superstition taught the tyrant awe,

  Then shared the tyranny, then lent it aid,

  And Gods of conquerors, Slaves of subjects made.

  She, ‘midst the lightning’s blaze and thunder’s sound,

  When rock’d the mountains, and when groan’d the ground, 250

  She taught the weak to bend, the proud to pray,

  To Power unseen, and mightier far than they:

  She, from the rending earth and bursting skies,

  Saw Gods descend, and Fiends infernal rise:

  Here fix’d the dreadful, there the bless’d abodes; 255

  Fear made her Devils, and weak hope her Gods;

  Gods, partial, changeful, passionate, unjust,

  Whose attributes were rage, revenge, or lust;

  Such as the souls of cowards might conceive,

  And, form’d like tyrants, tyrants would believe. 260

  Zeal then, not Charity, became the guide,

  And Hell was built on spite, and Heav’n on pride:

  Then sacred seem’d th’ ethereal vault no more;

  Altars grew marble then, and reek’d with gore:

  Then first the flamen tasted living food, 265

  Next his grim idol smear’d with human blood;

  With Heav’n’s own thunders shook the world below,

  And play’d the God an engine on his foe.

  So drives Self-love thro’ just and thro’ unjust,

  To one man’s power, ambition, lucre, lust: 270

  The same Self-love in all becomes the cause

  Of what restrains him, government and laws.

  For, what one likes if others like as well,

  What serves one will, when many wills rebel?

  How shall he keep what, sleeping or awake, 275

  A weaker may surprise, a stronger take?

  His safety must his liberty restrain:

  All join to guard what each desires to gain.

  Forc’d into virtue thus by self-defence,

  Ev’n kings learn’d justice and benevolence: 280

  Self-love forsook the path it first pursued,

  And found the private in the public good.

  ‘T was then the studious head, or gen’rous mind

  Follower of God, or friend of human kind,

  Poet or patriot, rose but to restore 285

  The faith and moral Nature gave before;

  Relumed her ancient light, not kindled new;

  If not God’s image, yet his shadow drew;

  Taught power’s due use to people and to kings,

  Taught nor to slack nor strain its tender strings, 290

  The less or greater set so justly true,

  That touching one must strike the other too;

  Till jarring int’rests of themselves create

  Th’ according music of a well-mix’d state.

  Such is the world’s great harmony, that springs 295

  From order, union, full consent of things;

  Where small and great, where weak and mighty made

  To serve, not suffer, strengthen, not invade;

  More powerful each as needful to the rest,

  And, in proportion as it blesses, blest; 300

  Draw to one point, and to one centre bring

  Beast, man, or angel, servant, lord, or king.

  For forms of government let fools contest;

  Whate’er is best administer’d is best:

  For modes of faith let graceless zealots fight; 305

  His can’t be wrong whose life is in the right.

  In Faith and Hope the world will disagree,

  But all mankind’s concern is Charity:

  All must be false that thwart this one great end,

  And all of God that bless mankind or mend. 310

  Man, like the gen’rous vine, supported lives;

  The strength he gains is from th’ embrace he gives.

  On their own axis as the planets run,

  Yet make at once their circle round the sun;

  So two consistent motions act the soul, 315

  And one regards itself, and one the Whole.

  Thus God and Nature link’d the gen’ral frame,

  And bade Self-love and Social be the same.

  Essay on Man: Epistle IV.

  Of the Nature and State of Man, with Respect to Happiness

  ARGUMENT

  I. False notions of Happiness, philosophical and popular, answered, from verses 19 to 26. II. It is the end of all men, and attainable by all. God intends Happiness to be equal; and, to be so, it must be social, since all particular Happiness depends on general, and since he governs by general, not particular laws. As it is necessary for order, and the peace and welfare of Society, that external goods should be unequal, Happiness is not made to consist in these. But notwithstanding that inequality, the balance of Happiness among mankind is kept even by Providence, by the two passions of Hope and Fear, verse 29, etc. III. What the Happiness of individuals is, as far as is consistent with the constitution of this world; and that the good man has here the advantage. The error of imputing to virtue what are only the calamities of Nature, or of Fortune, verse 77, etc. IV. The folly of expecting that God should alter his general laws in favour of particulars, verse 123, etc. V. That we are not judges who are good; but that whoever they are, they must be happiest, verse 131, etc. VI. That external goods are not the proper rewards, but often inconsistent with, or destructive of Virtue. That even these can make no man happy without Virtue: — instanced in Riches; Honours; Nobility; Greatness; Frame; Superior Talents, with pictures of human infelicity in men possessed of them all, verse 149, etc. VII. That Virtue only constitutes a Happiness, whose object is universal, and whose prospect eternal. That the perfection of Virtue and Happiness consists in a conformi
ty to the Order of Providence here, and a resignation to it here and hereafter, verse 327, etc.

  O HAPPINESS! our being’s end and aim!

  Good, Pleasure, Ease, Content! whate’er thy name,

  That something still which prompts th’ eternal sigh,

  For which we bear to live, or dare to die;

  Which still so near us, yet beyond us lies, 5

  O’erlook’d, seen double, by the fool and wise:

  Plant of celestial seed! if dropt below,

  Say in what mortal soil thou deign’st to grow?

  Fair opening to some court’s propitious shine,

  Or deep with diamonds in the flaming mine? 10

  Twin’d with the wreaths Parnassian laurels yield,

  Or reap’d in iron harvests of the field?

  Where grows? — where grows it not? If vain our toil,

  We ought to blame the culture, not the soil:

  Fix’d to no spot is Happiness sincere; 15

  ‘T is nowhere to be found, or ev’rywhere:

  ‘T is never to be bought, but always free,

  And fled from monarchs, ST. JOHN! dwells with thee.

  I. Ask of the Learn’d the way? the Learn’d are blind,

  This bids to serve, and that to shun mankind: 20

  Some place the bliss in Action, some in Ease,

  Those call it Pleasure, and Contentment these;

  Some sunk to beasts, find pleasure end in Pain;

  Some swell’d to Gods, confess ev’n Virtue vain;

  Or indolent, to each extreme they fall, 25

  To trust in everything, or doubt of all.

  Who thus define it, say they more or less

  Than this, that happiness is happiness?

  II. Take Nature’s path and mad Opinion’s leave;

  All states can reach it, and all heads conceive; 30

  Obvious her goods, in no extreme they dwell;

  There needs but thinking right and meaning well:

  And, mourn our various portions as we please,

  Equal is common sense and common ease.

  Remember, Man, ‘the Universal Cause 35

  Acts not by partial but by gen’ral laws,’

  And makes what Happiness we justly call

  Subsist not in the good of one, but all.

  There ‘s not a blessing individuals find,

  But some way leans and hearkens to the kind; 40

  No bandit fierce, no tyrant mad with pride,

  No cavern’d hermit, rests self-satisfied;

  Who most to shun or hate mankind pretend,

  Seek an admirer, or would fix a friend.

  Abstract what others feel, what others think, 45

  All pleasures sicken, and all glories sink:

  Each has his share; and who would more obtain,

  Shall find the pleasure pays not half the pain.

  Order is Heav’n’s first law; and, this confest,

  Some are and must be greater than the rest, 50

  More rich, more wise: but who infers from hence

  That such are happier, shocks all common sense.

  Heav’n to mankind impartial we confess,

  If all are equal in their happiness:

  But mutual wants this happiness increase; 55

  All Nature’s diff’rence keeps all Nature’s peace.

  Condition, circumstance, is not the thing;

  Bliss is the same in subject or in king,

  In who obtain defence, or who defend,

  In him who is, or him who finds a friend: 60

  Heav’n breathes thro’ every member of the whole

  One common blessing, as one common soul.

  But Fortune’s gifts, if each alike possest,

  And each were equal, must not all contest?

  If then to all men happiness was meant, 65

  God in externals could not place content.

  Fortune her gifts may variously dispose,

  And these be happy call’d, unhappy those;

  But Heav’n’s just balance equal will appear,

  While those are placed in hope and these in fear: 70

  Not present good or ill the joy or curse,

  But future views of better or of worse.

  O sons of earth! attempt ye still to rise

  By mountains piled on mountains to the skies?

  Heav’n still with laughter the vain toil surveys, 75

  And buries madmen in the heaps they raise.

  Know all the good that individuals find,

  Or God and Nature meant to mere mankind,

  Reason’s whole pleasure, all the joys of sense,

  Lie in three words — Health, Peace, and Competence. 80

  But health consists with temperance alone,

  And peace, O Virtue! peace is all thy own.

  The good or bad the gifts of fortune gain;

  But these less taste them as they worse obtain.

  Say, in pursuit of profit or delight, 85

  Who risk the most, that take wrong means or right?

  Of vice or virtue, whether blest or curst,

  Which meets contempt, or which compassion first?

  Count all th’ advantage prosp’rous vice attains,

  ‘T is but what virtue flies from and disdains: 90

  And grant the bad what happiness they would,

  One they must want, which is, to pass for good.

  O blind to truth and God’s whole scheme below,

  Who fancy bliss to vice, to virtue woe!

  Who sees and follows that great scheme the best, 95

  Best knows the blessing, and will most be blest.

  But fools the good alone unhappy call,

  For ills or accidents that chance to all.

  See Falkland dies, the virtuous and the just!

  See Godlike Turenne prostrate on the dust! 100

  See Sidney bleeds amid the martial strife! —

  Was this their virtue, or contempt of life?

  Say, was it virtue, more tho’ Heav’n ne’er gave,

  Lamented Digby! sunk thee to the grave?

  Tell me, if virtue made the son expire, 105

  Why full of days and honour lives the sire?

  Why drew Marseilles’ good bishop purer breath

  When Nature sicken’d, and each gale was death?

  Or why so long (in life if long can be)

  Lent Heav’n a parent to the poor and me? 110

  What makes all physical or moral ill?

  There deviates Nature, and here wanders Will.

  God sends not ill, if rightly understood,

  Or partial ill is universal good,

  Or change admits, or Nature lets it fall, 115

  Short and but rare till man improv’d it all.

  We just as wisely might of Heav’n complain

  That Righteous Abel was destroy’d by Cain,

  As that the virtuous son is ill at ease

  When his lewd father gave the dire disease. 120

  Think we, like some weak prince, th’ Eternal Cause

  Prone for his fav’rites to reverse his laws?

  IV. Shall burning Ætna, if a sage requires,

  Forget to thunder, and recall her fires?

  On air or sea new motions be imprest, 125

  O blameless Bethel! to relieve thy breast?

  When the loose mountain trembles from on high,

  Shall gravitation cease if you go by?

  Or some old temple, nodding to its fall,

  For Chartres’ head reserve the hanging wall? 130

  V. But still this world, so fitted for the knave,

  Contents us not. — A better shall we have?

  A kingdom of the just then let it be;

  But first consider how those just agree.

  The good must merit God’s peculiar care; 135

  But who but God can tell us who they are?

  One thinks on Calvin Heav’n’s own spirit fell;

  Another deems him instrument of He
ll:

  If Calvin feel Heav’n’s blessing or its rod,

  This cries there is, and that, there is no God. 140

  What shocks one part will edify the rest;

  Nor with one system can they all be blest.

  The very best will variously incline,

  And what rewards your virtue punish mine.

  Whatever is, is right. — This world, ‘t is true, 145

  Was made for Cæsar — but for Titus too:

  And which more bless’d? who chain’d his country, say,

  Or he whose virtue sigh’d to lose a day?

  VI. ‘But sometimes Virtue starves while Vice is fed.’

  What then? is the reward of virtue bread? 150

  That vice may merit; ‘t is the price of toil;

  The knave deserves it when he tills the soil,

  The knave deserves it when he tempts the main,

  Where Folly fights for kings or dives for gain.

  The good man may be weak, be indolent; 155

  Nor is his claim to plenty but content.

  But grant him riches, your demand is o’er.

  ‘No: shall the good want health, the good want power?’

  Add health and power, and every earthly thing.

  ‘Why bounded power? why private? why no king? 160

  Nay, why external for internal giv’n?

  Why is not man a God, and earth a Heav’n?’

  Who ask and reason thus will scarce conceive

  God gives enough while he has more to give:

  Immense the power, immense were the demand; 165

  Say at what part of Nature will they stand?

  What nothing earthly gives or can destroy,

  The soul’s calm sunshine and the heartfelt joy,

  Is Virtue’s prize. A better would you fix?

  Then give humility a coach and six, 170

  Justice a conqueror’s sword, or truth a gown,

  Or public spirit its great cure, a crown.

  Weak, foolish man! will Heav’n reward us there

  With the same trash mad mortals wish for here?

  The boy and man an individual makes, 175

  Yet sigh’st thou now for apples and for cakes?

  Go, like the Indian, in another life

  Expect thy dog, thy bottle, and thy wife;

  As well as dream such trifles are assign’d,

  As toys and empires, for a godlike mind: 180

  Rewards, that either would to Virtue bring

  No joy, or be destructive of the thing:

  How oft by these at sixty are undone

  The virtues of a saint at twenty-one!

  To whom can Riches give repute or trust, 185

  Content or pleasure, but the good and just?

  Judges and senates have been bought for gold,

  Esteem and Love were never to be sold.