Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of - TopicsExpress



          

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man. Placd on this isthmus of a middle state, A being darkly wise, and rudely great: With too much knowledge for the sceptic side, With too much weakness for the stoics pride, He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest; In doubt to deem himself a god, or beast; In doubt his mind or body to prefer; Born but to die, and reasning but to err; Alike in ignorance, his reason such, Whether he thinks too little, or too much: Chaos of thought and passion, all confusd; Still by himself abusd, or disabusd; Created half to rise, and half to fall; Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all; Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurld: The glory, jest, and riddle of the world! Go, wondrous creature! mount where science guides, Go, measure earth, weigh air, and state the tides; Instruct the planets in what orbs to run, Correct old time, and regulate the sun; Go, soar with Plato to th empyreal sphere, To the first good, first perfect, and first fair; Or tread the mazy round his followrs trod, And quitting sense call imitating God; As Eastern priests in giddy circles run, And turn their heads to imitate the sun. Go, teach Eternal Wisdom how to rule— Then drop into thyself, and be a fool! Superior beings, when of late they saw A mortal Man unfold all Natures law, Admird such wisdom in an earthly shape, And showed a Newton as we shew an Ape. Could he, whose rules the rapid comet bind, Describe or fix one movement of his mind? Who saw its fires here rise, and there descend, Explain his own beginning, or his end? Alas what wonder! Mans superior part Uncheckd may rise, and climb from art to art; But when his own great work is but begun, What Reason weaves, by Passion is undone. Trace science then, with modesty thy guide; First strip off all her equipage of pride; Deduct what is but vanity, or dress, Or learnings luxury, or idleness; Or tricks to show the stretch of human brain, Mere curious pleasure, or ingenious pain; Expunge the whole, or lop th excrescent parts Of all our Vices have created Arts; Then see how little the remaining sum, Which servd the past, and must the times to come! II. Two principles in human nature reign; Self-love, to urge, and reason, to restrain; Nor this a good, nor that a bad we call, Each works its end, to move or govern all: And to their proper operation still, Ascribe all good; to their improper, ill. Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul; Reasons comparing balance rules the whole. Man, but for that, no action could attend, And but for this, were active to no end: Fixd like a plant on his peculiar spot, To draw nutrition, propagate, and rot; Or, meteor-like, flame lawless through the void, Destroying others, by himself destroyd. Most strength the moving principle requires; Active its task, it prompts, impels, inspires. Sedate and quiet the comparing lies, Formd but to check, delibrate, and advise. Self-love still stronger, as its objects nigh; Reasons at distance, and in prospect lie: That sees immediate good by present sense; Reason, the future and the consequence. Thicker than arguments, temptations throng, At best more watchful this, but that more strong. The action of the stronger to suspend, Reason still use, to reason still attend. Attention, habit and experience gains; Each strengthens reason, and self-love restrains. Let subtle schoolmen teach these friends to fight, More studious to divide than to unite, And grace and virtue, sense and reason split, With all the rash dexterity of wit: Wits, just like fools, at war about a name, Have full as oft no meaning, or the same. Self-love and reason to one end aspire, Pain their aversion, pleasure their desire; But greedy that its object would devour, This taste the honey, and not wound the flowr: Pleasure, or wrong or rightly understood, Our greatest evil, or our greatest good. III. Modes of self-love the passions we may call: Tis real good, or seeming, moves them all: But since not every good we can divide, And reason bids us for our own provide; Passions, though selfish, if their means be fair, List under reason, and deserve her care; Those, that imparted, court a nobler aim, Exalt their kind, and take some virtues name. In lazy apathy let Stoics boast Their virtue fixd, tis fixd as in a frost; Contracted all, retiring to the breast; But strength of mind is exercise, not rest: The rising tempest puts in act the soul, Parts it may ravage, but preserves the whole. On lifes vast ocean diversely we sail, Reason the card, but passion is the gale; Nor God alone in the still calm we find, He mounts the storm, and walks upon the wind. Passions, like elements, though born to fight, Yet, mixd and softend, in his work unite: These tis enough to temper and employ; But what composes man, can man destroy? Suffice that reason keep to natures road, Subject, compound them, follow her and God. Love, hope, and joy, fair pleasures smiling train, Hate, fear, and grief, the family of pain, These mixd with art, and to due bounds confind, Make and maintain the balance of the mind: The lights and shades, whose well accorded strife Gives all the strength and colour of our life. Pleasures are ever in our hands or eyes, And when in act they cease, in prospect, rise: Present to grasp, and future still to find, The whole employ of body and of mind. All spread their charms, but charm not all alike; On diffrent senses diffrent objects strike; Hence diffrent passions more or less inflame, As strong or weak, the organs of the frame; And hence one master passion in the breast, Like Aarons serpent, swallows up the rest. As man, perhaps, the moment of his breath, Receives the lurking principle of death; The young disease, that must subdue at length, Grows with his growth, and strengthens with his strength: So, cast and mingled with his very frame, The minds disease, its ruling passion came; Each vital humour which should feed the whole, Soon flows to this, in body and in soul. Whatever warms the heart, or fills the head, As the mind opens, and its functions spread, Imagination plies her dangrous art, And pours it all upon the peccant part. Nature its mother, habit is its nurse; Wit, spirit, faculties, but make it worse; Reason itself but gives it edge and powr; As Heavns blest beam turns vinegar more sour. We, wretched subjects, though to lawful sway, In this weak queen some favrite still obey: Ah! if she lend not arms, as well as rules, What can she more than tell us we are fools? Teach us to mourn our nature, not to mend, A sharp accuser, but a helpless friend! Or from a judge turn pleader, to persuade The choice we make, or justify it made; Proud of an easy conquest all along, She but removes weak passions for the strong: So, when small humours gather to a gout, The doctor fancies he has drivn them out. Yes, natures road must ever be preferrd; Reason is here no guide, but still a guard: Tis hers to rectify, not overthrow, And treat this passion more as friend than foe: A mightier powr the strong direction sends, And sevral men impels to sevral ends. Like varying winds, by other passions tossd, This drives them constant to a certain coast. Let powr or knowledge, gold or glory, please, Or (oft more strong than all) the love of ease; Through life tis followed, evn at lifes expense; The merchants toil, the sages indolence, The monks humility, the heros pride, All, all alike, find reason on their side. Th eternal art educing good from ill, Grafts on this passion our best principle: Tis thus the mercury of man is fixd, Strong grows the virtue with his nature mixd; The dross cements what else were too refind, And in one interest body acts with mind. As fruits, ungrateful to the planters care, On savage stocks inserted, learn to bear; The surest virtues thus from passions shoot, Wild natures vigor working at the root. What crops of wit and honesty appear From spleen, from obstinacy, hate, or fear! See anger, zeal and fortitude supply; Evn avrice, prudence; sloth, philosophy; Lust, through some certain strainers well refind, Is gentle love, and charms all womankind; Envy, to which th ignoble minds a slave, Is emulation in the learnd or brave; Nor virtue, male or female, can we name, But what will grow on pride, or grow on shame. Thus nature gives us (let it check our pride) The virtue nearest to our vice allied: Reason the byass turns to good from ill, And Nero reigns a Titus, if he will. The fiery soul abhorrd in Catiline, In Decius charms, in Curtius is divine: The same ambition can destroy or save, And make a patriot as it makes a knave. IV. This light and darkness in our chaos joind, What shall divide? The God within the mind. Extremes in nature equal ends produce, In man they join to some mysterious use; Though each by turns the others bound invade, As, in some well-wrought picture, light and shade, And oft so mix, the diffrence is too nice Where ends the virtue, or begins the vice. Fools! who from hence into the notion fall, That vice or virtue there is none at all. If white and black blend, soften, and unite A thousand ways, is there no black or white? Ask your own heart, and nothing is so plain; Tis to mistake them, costs the time and pain. V. Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As, to be hated, needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace. But where th extreme of vice, was neer agreed: Ask wheres the North? at York, tis on the Tweed; In Scotland, at the Orcades; and there, At Greenland, Zembla, or the Lord knows where: No creature owns it in the first degree, But thinks his neighbour farther gone than he! Evn those who dwell beneath its very zone, Or never feel the rage, or never own; What happier natures shrink at with affright, The hard inhabitant contends is right. VI. Virtuous and vicious evry man must be, Few in th extreme, but all in the degree; The rogue and fool by fits is fair and wise; And evn the best, by fits, what they despise. Tis but by parts we follow good or ill, For, vice or virtue, self directs it still; Each individual seeks a sevral goal; But heavns great view is one, and that the whole: That counterworks each folly and caprice; That disappoints th effect of evry vice; That, happy frailties to all ranks applied, Shame to the virgin, to the matron pride, Fear to the statesman, rashness to the chief, To kings presumption, and to crowds belief, That, virtues ends from vanity can raise, Which seeks no intrest, no reward but praise; And build on wants, and on defects of mind, The joy, the peace, the glory of mankind. Heavn forming each on other to depend, A master, or a servant, or a friend, Bids each on other for assistance call, Till one mans weakness grows the strength of all. Wants, frailties, passions, closer still ally The common intrest, or endear the tie: To these we owe true friendship, love sincere, Each home-felt joy that life inherits here; Yet from the same we learn, in its decline, Those joys, those loves, those intrests to resign; Taught half by reason, half by mere decay, To welcome death, and calmly pass away. Whateer the passion, knowledge, fame, or pelf, Not one will change his neighbour with himself. The learnd is happy nature to explore, The fool is happy that he knows no more; The rich is happy in the plenty givn, The poor contents him with the care of heavn. See the blind beggar dance, the cripple sing, The sot a hero, lunatic a king; The starving chemist in his golden views Supremely blest, the poet in his Muse. See some strange comfort evry state attend, And pride bestowd on all, a common friend; See some fit passion evry age supply, Hope travels through, nor quits us when we die. Behold the child, by natures kindly law, Pleasd with a rattle, tickld with a straw: Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight, A little louder, but as empty quite: Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage, And beads and prayr books are the toys of age: Pleasd with this bauble still, as that before; Till tird he sleeps, and lifes poor play is oer! Meanwhile opinion gilds with varying rays Those painted clouds that beautify our days; Each want of happiness by hope supplied, And each vacuity of sense by Pride: These build as fast as knowledge can destroy; In follys cup still laughs the bubble, joy; One prospect lost, another still we gain; And not a vanity is givn in vain; Evn mean self-love becomes, by force divine, The scale to measure others wants by thine. See! and confess, one comfort still must rise, Tis this: Though mans a fool, yet God is wise. poetryfoundation.org/poem/174166
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 06:48:25 +0000

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