That never air or ocean felt the wind;

That never paffion discompos'd the mind.

COMMENTARY.

But

perhaps appear better to us, that there were nothing in this world but peace and virtue:

"That never air or ocean felt the wind;

That never paffion difcompos'd the mind."

But then confider, that as our material fyflem is fupported by the ftrife of its elementary particles; fo is our intellectual fyftem by the conflict of our Paffions, which are the elements of human action.

In a word, as without the benefit of tempeftuous winds, both air and ocean would ftagnate, corrupt, and spread universal contagion throughout all the ranks of animals that inhabit, or are fupported by, them; fo, without the benefit of the Paffions, fuch Virtue as was merely the effect of the abfence of thofe Paffions, would be a lifelefs calm, a ftoical Apathy.

"Contracted all, retiring to the breast :

But health of mind is Exercife, not Reft."

Epiftle ii. ver. 103.

Therefore, instead of regarding the conflicts of the elements, and the Paffions of the mind, as diforders, you ought to confider them. as part of the general order of Providence: and that they are so, appears from their always preferving the fame unvaried courfe, throughout all ages, from the creation to the present time: "The gen'ral Order, fince the Whole began,

Is kept in Nature, and is kept in Man."

We fee, therefore, it would be doing great injustice to our author to fufpect that he intended by this to give any encouragement to Vice. His fyftem, as all his Ethic Epiftles fhew, is this: That the Paffions, for the reafons given above, are neceffary to the fupport of Virtue: That, indeed, the Paffions in excefs produce Vice, which is, in its own nature, the greatest of all evils, and comes into the world from the abuse of Man's free-will; but that God, in his infinite wisdom and goodness, deviously turns the natural bias of

NOTES.

VER. 167. That never air or ocean] An acute critic afks if it fhould not be-That never earth or ocean?-not air. WARTON.

But ALL fubfifts by elemental ftrife;

And Paffions are the elements of Life.

The gen❜ral ORDER, fince the whole began,
Is kept in Nature, and is kept in Man.

170

VI. What

COMMENTARY.

of its malignity to the advancement of human happiness, and makes it productive of general Good:

"TH'ETERNAL ART EDUCES GOOD FROM ILL."

Epiftle ii. ver. 175. This, fet against what we have obferved of the Poet's doctrine of a future ftate, will furnish us with an inftance of his fleering (as he well expreffes it in his preface) between doctrines feemingly oppofite: if his Effay has any merit, he thinks it is in this. And doubtless it is uncommon merit to reject the vifions and abfurdities of every System, and take in only what is rational and real.

The CHARACTERISTICS and the FABLE OF THE BEES are two feemingly inconfiftent fyftems; the folly of the firft is in giving fcheme of Virtue without Religion; and the knavery of the latter, in giving a scheme of Religion without Virtue. These our Poet leaves to any that will take them up; but agrees, however, fo far with the first, that "Virtue would be worth having, though itself was its only reward;" and fo far with the latter, that “ God makes Evil, against its nature, productive of Good."

NOTES.

WARBURTON.

VER. 169. But ALL fubfifis, &c.] See this fubject extended in Epiftle ii. from ver. 90 to 112. 155, &c. WARBURTON.

VER, 171. The gen'ral ORDER,] It feems utterly impoffible to explain these two remarkable lines in a way at all reconcileable to the doctrine of a lapsed condition of man, which opinion is the chief foundation of the Chriftian revelation, and the capital argument for the neceffity of redemption.

"That fyftem of philofophy," fays an able writer, "which profeffes to justify the ways of God to man, without having recourse to the doctrine of a future ftate, must ever be confidered as in the highest degree inimical to religion, whofe very nature and effence it is to direct our views beyond the narrow limits of the prefent D 3 ftate

VI. What would this Man? Now upward will he

foar,

And little less than Angels, would be more;

COMMENTARY.

Now

VER. 173. What would this Man? &c.] Having thus juftified Providence in its permiffion of partial MORAL EVIL, our author employs the remaining part of his Epiftle in vindicating it from the imputation of certain fuppofed NATURAL EVILS. For now he fhews (from ver. 172 to 207.), that though the complaint of his adverfaries against Providence be on pretence of real moral evils; yet, at bottom, it all proceeds from their impatience under imaginary natural ones, the iffue of a depraved appetite for visionary advantages, which if Man had, they would be either ufelefs or pernicious to him, as repugnant to his ftate, or unfuitable to his condition. Though God (fays he) hath fo bountifully beftowed on Man faculties little lefs than angelic, yet he ungratefully grafps at higher; and then, extravagant in another extreme, with a paffion as ridiculous as that is impious, envies, as what would be advantages to himself, even the pcculiar accommodations of brutes. But here his own falfe principles expose the folly of his falfer appetites. He fuppofes them all made for his ufe: now what ufe could he have of them, when he had robbed them of all their qualities? Qualities diftributed with the highest wisdom, as they are divided at prefent; but which, if beftowed according to the froward

NOTES.

ftate of existence." See Eflays Philofophical, Historical, and Literary, p. 399, for some very acute observations on the Essay on Man.

Pope in thefe lines uses almoft the very words of Bolingbroke : "To think worthily of God, we must think that the natural order of things has always been the fame; and that a being of infinite wisdom and knowledge, to whom the past and the future are like the present, and who wants no experience to inform him, can have no reason to alter what infinite wisdom and knowledge have once done." Section 58. Effays to Pope. WARTON.

VER. 174. And little less than Angels, &c.] Thou haft made him a little lower than the Angels, and haft crowned him with glory and honour. Pfalm viii. 9. WARBURTON.

Now looking downwards, just as griev'd appears 175
To want the strength of bulls, the fur of bears.
Made for his use all creatures if he call,
Say, what their use, had he the pow'rs of all;
Nature to thefe, without profufion, kind,
The proper organs, proper pow'rs affign'd;
Each seeming want compenfated of course,
Here with degrees of swiftness, there of force;
All in exact proportion to the state;

Nothing to add, and nothing to abate.
Each beast, each infect, happy in its own:

180

Is Heav'n unkind to Man, and Man alone?

COMMENTARY.

185

Shall

froward humour of these childish complainers, would be every where found to be either wanting or fuperfluous. But even though endowed with thefe brutal qualities, Man would not only be no gainer, but a confiderable loser; as the Poet fhews, in explaining the confequences which would follow from his having his fenfations in that exquifite degree, in which this or the other animal is obferved to poffefs them. WARBURTON.

NOTES.

VER. 182. Here with degrees of fwiftness, &c.] It is a certain axiom in the anatomy of creatures, that in proportion as they are formed for ftrength, their swiftness is leffened; or as they are formed for fwiftnefs, their ftrength is abated. РОРЕ.

VER. 183. All in exact proportion] I cannot forbear thinking, that a little French treatife on Providence, published at Paris, 1728, formed on the principles of Leibnitz, fomewhat moderated, had fallen into the hands both of Bolingbroke and Pope, from the great fimilarity of the reasoning there employed. WARTON, VER. 186. Is Heav'n unkind to Man,] Cudworth, Leibnitz, King, Shaftesbury, Hutchefon, Balguy, have all ftrenuously argued for the prepollency of good to evil in our prefent system ;

Shall he alone, whom rational we call,

Be pleas'd with nothing, if not bless'd with all? The blifs of Man (could Pride that bleffing find) Is not to act or think beyond mankind;

No pow'rs of body or of foul to fhare,

But what his nature and his ftate can bear.
Why has not Man a microfcopic eye?

For this plain reafon, Man is not a Fly.

190

Say what the ufe, were finer optics giv'n,

195

T'inspect a mite, not comprehend the heav'n?
Or touch, if tremblingly alive all o'er,
To fmart and agonize at ev'ry pore?

Or quick effluvia darting through the brain,
Die of a rofe in aromatic pain?

200

If Nature thunder'd in his op'ning ears,

And stunn'd him with the mufic of the fpheres,
How would he wish that Heav'n had left him ftill
The whifp'ring Zephyr, and the purling rill?
Who finds not Providence all good and wife,
Alike in what it gives, and what denies?

NOTES.

205

VII. Far

but none more forcibly than Balguy from p. 103 to p. 125 of his Divine Benevolence. WARTON.

VER. 202. And tunn'd him] The argument certainly required an inftance drawn from real found, and not from the imaginary mufic of the fpheres. Locke's illuftration of this doctrine is not only proper but poetical : "If our fenfe of hearing were but one thousand times quicker than it is, how would a perpetual noise distract us; and we fhould, in the quieteft retirement, be less able to fleep or meditate, than in the middle of a fea-fight." In line before 193, the expreffion of microscopic eye is from Locke.

WARTON