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With brutal acquiefcence in the mire ?
Lorenzo! no! they shall be nobly pain'd;
The glorious foreigners, diftrefs'd, shall figh
On thrones; and thou congratulate the figh:
Man's mifery declares him born for bliss
His anxious heart afferts the truth I fing,
And gives the Sceptic in his head the lye.

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Our heads, our hearts, our paffions, and our power's, Speak the fame language; call us to the fkies;

Unripen'd thefe in this inclement clime,

Scarce rife above conjecture and mistake;
And for this land of trifles those too strong
Tumultuous rife, and tempeft human life :
What prize on earth can pay us for the ftorm?
Meet objects for our paffions, heaven ordain'd,
Objects that challenge all their fire, and leave
No fault, but in defect: Bleft Heaven! avert
A bounded ardour for unbounded blifs!

O for a bliss unbounded! far beneath

A. foul immortal, is a mortal joy.

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Nor are our powers to perish immature ;

But, after feeble effort bere, beneath

A brighter fun, and in a nobler foil,
Transplanted from this fublunary bed,

Shall flourish fair, and put forth all their bloom.
Reafon progreffive, inftinct is complete ;
Swift inftinct leaps; flow reafon feebly climbs.
Brutes foon their zenith reach; their little all
Flows in at once; in ages they no more
Could know, or do, or covet, or enjoy,

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Were

Were man to live coëval with the fun,
The patriarch-pupil would be learning ftill;
Yet, dying, leave his leffon half unlearnt.
Men perish in advance, as if the fun

Should fet ere noon, in eastern oceans drown'd;
If fit, with dim, illuftrious to compare,

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The fun's meridian with the foul of man.

To man, why, ftep-dame nature! fo fevere?

Why thrown afide thy mafter-piece half-wrought,
While meaner efforts thy last hand enjoy?

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Or, if abortively poor man must die,

Nor reach, what reach he might, why die in dread? Why curft with forefight? Wife to mifery?

Why of his proud prerogative the prey?

Why lefs pre-eminent in rank, than pain?
His immortality alone can tell;

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Full ample fund to balance all amifs,
And turn the scale in favour of the just !

His immortality alone can folve
The darkest of ænigmas, human hope;.
Of all the darkest, if at death we die.
Hope, eager hope, th' affaffin of our joy,
All prefent bleffings treading under foot,
Is fcarce a milder tyrant than despair.
With no past toils content, ftill planning new,
Hope turns us o'er to death alone for ease.
Poffeffion, why more taftless than pursuit ?
Why is a wifh far dearer than a crown?

That wish accomplish'd, why, the grave of blifs?
Becaufe, in the great future bury'd deep,

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Beyond our plans of empire, and renown,
Lies all that man with ardour should pursue;
And He who made him, bent him to the right.
Man's heart th' Almighty to the future sets,
By fecret and inviolable springs;

And makes his hope his fublunary joy.

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Man's heart eats all things, and is hungery still;
More, more!" the glutton cries: for fomething new
So rages appetite, if man can't mount,
He will defeend. He ftarves on the poffeft.
Hence, the world's mafter, from ambition's fpire,
In Caprea plung'd; and div'd beneath the brute.
In that rank fty why wallow'd empire's fon
Supreme? Because he could no higher fly;
His riot was ambition in despair.

Old Rome consulted birds; Lorenzo! thou,
With more fuccefs, the flight of hope furvey;
Of reftless hope, for ever on the wing.
High-perch'd o'er every thought that falcon fits,
To fly at all that rises in her fight;
And, never stooping, but to mount again
Next moment, she betrays her aim's mistake,
And owns her quarry lodg❜d beyond the grave.
There should it fail us (it muft fail us there,
If being fails) more mournful riddles rife,
And virtue vies with hope in mystery.

Why virtue? Where its praise, its being, fled?
Virtue is true felf-interest pursued:

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What true self-interest of quite-mortal man?

To clofe with all that makes him happy here.

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If vice (as fometimes) is our friend on earth,
Then vice is virtue; 'tis our fovereign good.
In felf-applaufe is virtue's golden prize;
No felf-applaufe attends it on thy scheme:
Whence felf-applaufe? From confcience of the right. 150-
And what is right, but means of happiness ?
No means of happiness when virtue yields;
That bafis failing, falls the building too,
And lays in ruin every virtuous joy.

The rigid guardian of a blameless heart,

So long rever'd, fo long reputed wife,

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Is weak; with rank knight-errantries o'er-run.
Why beats thy bofom with illuftrious dreams
Of felf-expofure, laudable, and great?
Of gallant enterprize, and glorious death?
Die for thy country?-Thou romantic fool!
Seize, feize the plank thyfelf, and let her fink:
Thy country! what to Thee?-The Godhead, what?
(I fpeak with awe!) though He fhould bid thee bleed?.
If, with thy blood, thy final hope is fpilt,
Nor can Omnipotence reward the blow,
Be deaf; preferve thy being; difobey.
Nor is it disobedience: know, Lorenzo!

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Whate'er th' Almighty's fubfequent command,
His firft command is this :-" Man, love thyself." 170

In this alone, free-agents are not free.
Existence is the bafis, blifs the prize;

If virtue cofts exiftence, 'tis a crime;
Bold violation of our law fupreme,

Black fuicide; though nations, which confult

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Their gain, at thy expence, refound applause.
Since virtue's recompence is doubtful, here,
If man dies wholly, well may we demand,
Why is man fuffer'd to be good in vain ?
Why to be good in vain, is man injoin'd?
Why to be good in vain, is man betray'd?
Betray'd by traitors lodg'd in his own breast,
By fweet complacencies from virtue felt?
Why whispers nature lyes on virtue's part?
Or if blind instinct (which affumes the name:
Of facred confcience) plays the fool in man,
Why reafon made accomplice in the cheat?
Why are the wifeft loudest in her praise ?.
Can man by reason's beam be led aftray ?
Or, at his peril, imitate his God?
Since virtue fometimes ruins us on earth,
Or both are true; or man furvives the

grave.

Or man survives the grave; or own, Lorenzo, Thy boast fupreme, a wild abfurdity.

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Dauntless thy fpirit; cowards are thy fcorn.

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Grant man immortal, and thy scorn is just,

The man immortal, rationally brave,

Dares rush on death-because he cannot die.
But if man lofes All, when life is loft,

He lives a coward, or a fool expires.
A daring infidel (and such there are,
From pride, example, lucre, rage, revenge,
Or pure heroical defect of thought),

Of all earth's madmen, most deserves a chain..
When to the grave we follow the renown'd

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