What differ more (you cry) than crown and "cowl!" I'll tell you, friend! a wife man and a fool. Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow; Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with ftrings, That thou may'ft be by kings, or whores of kings. Boaft the pure blood of an illuftrious race, In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece: But by your father's worth if your's you rate, Has crept through scoundrels ever fince the flood, Look next on Greatness; say where Greatnefs lies. "Where, but among the Heroes and the Wife ?". Heroes are much the fame, the point's agreed, From Macedonia's madman to the Swede; The whole ftrange purpose of their lives, to find, Not one looks backward, onward ftill he goes, All fly flow things, with circumfpective eyes: Men Men in their loofe unguarded hours they take; What's Fame? a fancy'd life in others breath, In the fmall circle of our foes or friends; An Eugene living, as a Cæfar dead; Alike or when, or where, they fhone, or fhine, A Wit's a feather, and a Chief a rod; Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart : In Parts fuperior what advantage lies? Tell (for you can) what is it to be wife? 'Tis but to know how little can be known; To fee all others faults, and feel our own : Condemn'd in bus'ness or in arts to drudge, Without a fecond, or without a judge: Truths would you teach, or fave a sinking land? All fear, none aid you, and few understand. Painful pre-eminence! yourself to view Above life's weaknefs, and its comforts too. Bring then these bleffings to a ftri&t account; Make fair deductions; fee to what they mount: How much of other each is fure to coft; . How each for other oft is wholly loft; How inconfiftent greater goods with thefe; How fometimes life is rifqu'd, and always ease: Think, and if ftill the things thy envy call, Say, would't thou be the Man to whom they fall? To figh for ribbands if thou art fo filly, Mark how they grace Lord Umbra, or Sir Billy. Is yellow dirt the paffion of thy life; Look but on Gripus, or on Gripus' wife. If Parts allure thee, think how Bacon shin'd, The wifeft, brightest, meaneft of mankind: Or ravish'd with the whistling of a Name, See Cromwell, damn'd to everlasting fame! If all, united, thy ambition call, From ancient story, learn to fcorn them all. There, in the rich, the honour'd, fam'd and great, See the falfe fcale of Happiness complete! In hearts of Kings, or arms of Queens who lay, How happy those to ruin, these betray. IBID. P. 91. HUMAN FELICITY. KNOW then this truth (enough for Man to know) "Virtue alone is happiness below.” The only point where human bliss stands ftill, Never elated, while one man's opprefs'd; IBID. P. 95. PREJUDICE. YET more; the diff'rence is as great between All All Manners take a tincture from our own, Contracts, inverts, and gives ten thousand dyes. MORAL ESSAYS, V. 2. p. 114. INCONSISTENCY. SEE the fame man, in vigour, in the gout; Catius is ever moral, ever grave, Thinks who endures a knave, is next a knave, Who would not praise Patricio's high desert, IBID. P.115. PRE-EMINENCE. 'TIS from high Life high characters are drawn ;' A Saint in Crape is twice a Saint in Lawn; |