Gradations juft, has thy pervading foul

Look'd through? or can a part contain the whole?
Is the great chain, that draws all to agree,
And drawn supports, upheld by God, or thee?
II. Presumptuous Man the reason wouldft
thou find,

Why form'd fo weak, fo little, and fo blind?
First, if thou canft, the harder reafon guefs,
Why form'd no weaker, blinder, and no lefs.
Afk of thy mother earth, why oaks are made
Taller or ftronger than the weeds they fhade?
Or afk of yonder argent fields above,
Why Jove's fatellites are lefs than Jove?
Of fyftems poffible, if 'tis confeft

That Wisdom infinite must form the best,
Where all must full or not coherent be,

And all that rises, rife in due degree;

Then in the scale of reas'ning life, 'tis plain,

There must be, fomewhere, fuch a rank as Man :

And all the question (wrangle e'er fo long)
Is only this, if God has plac'd him wrong?
Respecting Man, whatever wrong we call,
May, must be right, as relative to all.

In human works, tho' labour'd on with pain,
A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain;
In God's, one fingle can its end produce;
Yet ferves to fecond too fome other use.
So Man, who here feems principal alone,
Perhaps acts fecond to some sphere unknown,
Touches fome wheel, or verges to fome goal;
'Tis but a part we fee, and not a whole.

When the proud steed shall know why Man
reftrains

His fiery course, or drives him o'er the plains;
When the dull ox, why now he breaks the clod,
Is now a victim, and now Ægypt's god :

Then fhall Man's pride and dulness comprehend
His actions', paffions', being's, use and end;

Why doing, suff'ring, check'd, impell'd; and why This hour a flave, the next a deity.

Then say not Man's imperfect, Heav'n in fault;
Say rather, Man's as perfect as he ought:
His knowledge measur'd to his state and place;
His time a moment, and a point his space.
If to be perfect in a certain sphere,

What matter, foon or late, or here or there;
The bleft to day is as completely fo,

As who began a thousand years ago.

III. Heav'n from all creatures hides the book

of fate,

All but the page prescrib'd, their present state :

From brutes what men, from men what spirits

know:

Or who could fuffer being here below?
The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to day,
Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?
Pleas'd to the last, he crops the flow'ry food,
And licks the hand just rais'd to shed his blood.

Oh blindness to the future! kindly giv'n,

That each may fill the circle mark'd by Heav'n :

Who fees with equal eye, as God of all,

A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

Atoms or fyftems into ruin hurl'd,

And now a bubble burft, and now a world.

Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions foar; Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore. What future blifs he gives not thee to know, But gives that hope to be thy blessing now. Hope fprings eternal in the human breast: Man never Is, but always To be bleft: The foul, uneafy and confin'd, from home, Refts and expatiates in a life to come.

Lo, the poor Indian whofe untutor'd mind Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind; His foul, proud science never taught to ftray Far as the folar walk, or milky way;

Yet fimple nature to his hope has giv'n,
Behind the cloud-topt hill, an humbler heav'n,

Danguid & Engravd by Hi. Richters.

Lo the poor Indian whose untutorid mind Soes God in clouds, or hears him in the wino :

Epifle L. 99.

Publish'd May 11796, by Vernor & Hood,