But as he fram'd a Whole, the Whole to bless.
On mutual Wants built mutual Happiness:

So from the firft, eternal ORDER ran,

And creature link'd to creature, man to man.
Whate'er of life all-quick'ning æther keeps, 115
Or breathes thro' air, or shoots beneath the deeps,
Or pours profufe on earth, one nature feeds
The vital flame, and fwells the genial feeds.
Not man alone, but all that roam the wood,
Or wing the sky, or roll along the flood,
Each loves itself, but not itself alone,

Each fex defires alike, 'till two are one.

COMMENTARY.

120

tural a manner, as fheweth him to have the art of giving all the grace to the drynefs and feverity of Method, as well as wit to the strength and depth of Reason. The philofophic nature of his work requiring he should shew by what means those Societies were introduced, this affords him an opportunity of fliding gracefully and eafily from the preliminaries into the main fubject; and fo of giving his work that perfection of method, which we find only in the compositions of great writers. For having juft before, though to a different purpose, defcribed the power of beftial Instinct to attain the happiness of the Individual, he goeth on, in fpeaking of Inftinct as it is ferviceable both to that, and to the Kind (from y 108 to 147) to illustrate the original of Society. He fheweth, that though, as he had before obferved, God had found the proper blifs of each creature in the nature of its own existence; yet these not being independent individuals, but parts of a Whole, God, to blefs that Whole, built mutual happinefs on mutual wants: Now, for the fupply of mutual wants, creatures muft neceffarily come together; which is the firft ground of Society amongst Men. He then proceeds to that called natural, fubject to paternal authority, and arifing from the union of the two fexes; defcribes the

Nor ends the pleasure with the fierce embrace;
They love themselves, a third time, in their race.
Thus beaft and bird their common charge attend,
The mothers nurfe it, and the fires defend; 126
The young difinifs'd to wander earth or air,
There ftops the Instinct, and there ends the care;
The link diffolves, each feeks a fresh embrace,
Another love fucceeds, another race.

130

A longer care Man's helpless kind demands;
That longer care contracts more lasting bands:
Reflection, Reason, still the ties improve,

At once extend the int'reft, and the love;
With choice we fix, with fympathy we burn; 135
Each Virtue in each Paffion takes its turn;
And ftill new needs, new helps, new habits rife,
That graft benevolence on charities.

Still as one brood, and as another rose,

These natʼral love maintain'd, habitual those: 140
The laft, fcarce ripen'd into perfect Man,
Saw helpless him from whom their life began:

COMMENTARY.

imperfect image of it in brutes; then explains it at large in all its caufes and effects. And laftly fhews, that, as in fact, like mere animal fociety, it is founded and preferved by mutual wants, the fupplial of which caufeth mutual happinefs; fo is it likewife in right, as a rational Society, by equity, gratitude, and the ob fervance of the relation of things in general.

Mem'ry and fore-cast just returns engage,
That pointed back to youth, this on to age;
While pleasure, gratitude, and hope, combin'd,145
Still spread the int'reft, and preferv'd the kind.
IV. Nor think, in NATURE'S STATE they
blindly trod ;

The state of Nature was the reign of God:
Self-love and Social at her birth began,

Union the bond of all things, and of Man. 150
Pride then was not; nor Arts, that Pride to aid;
Man walk'd with beast, joint tenant of the shade;

COMMENTARY.

VER. 147. Nor think in Nature's ftate they blindly trod ;] But the Atheist and Hobbift, against whom Mr. Pope argueth, deny the principle of Right, or of natural Juftice, before the invention of civil compact; which, they fay, gave being to it: And accordingly have had the effrontery publicly to declare, that a ftate of Nature was a state of War. This quite fubverteth the

NOTES.

VER. 152. Man walk'd with beast, joint tenant of the fhade ;] The poet ftill takes his imagery from Platonic ideas, for the reafon given above. Plato had faid from old tradition, that, during the Golden age, and under the reign of Saturn, the primitive language then in ufe was common to man and beafts. Moral Inftructors took advantage of the popular fenfe of this tradition, to convey their precepts under thofe fables, which give speech to the whole brute-creation. The naturalifts underftood the tradition to fignify, that, in the firft ages, Men ufed inarticulate founds like beafts to exprefs their wants and fenfations; and that it was by flow degrees they came to the ufe of fpeech. This opinion was afterwards held by Lucretius, Diodorus Sic. and Gregory of Nyff.

The fame his table, and the fame his bed;

No murder cloath'd him, and no murder fed.
In the fame temple, the refounding wood, 155
All vocal beings hymn'd their equal God:

COMMENTARY.

poet's natural Society: Therefore, after this account of that ftate, he proceedeth to fupport the reality of it by overthrowing the oppugnant principle of no natural fuftice; which he doth (from 146 to 169) in fhewing, by a fine defcription of the ftate of Innocence, as reprefented in Scripture, that a state of Nature was fo far from being without natural Juftice, that it was, at firft, the reign of God, where Right and Truth univerfally prevailed.

NOTES.

VER. 156. All vocal beings, &c.] This may be well explained by a fublime paffage of the Pfalmift, who, calling to mind the age of Innocence, and full of the great ideas of those -Chains of Love,

Combining all below, and all above,

Which to one point and to one centre bring

Beaft, Man, or Angel, Servant, Lord, or King; breaks out into this rapturous and divine apoftrophe, to call back the devious creation to its priftine rectitude (that very ftate our author describes above) "Praife the Lord, all an"gels; praise him, all ye hofts. Praife ye him, fun and "moon; praise him, all ye ftars of light. Let them praise "the name of the Lord, for he commanded, and they were "created. Praise the Lord, from the earth, ye dragons, and "all deeps; fire and hail, fnow and vapour, ftormy wind ful"filling his word; Mountains, and all hills, fruitful trees and

all cedars: Beafts and all cattle, creeping things and flying fowl: Kings of the earth, and all people; princes, and all "judges of the earth. Let them praife the name of the Lord; "for his name alone is excellent, his glory is above the earth "and heaven." Pfal. cxlviii,

The shrine with gore unftain'd, with gold undrest, Unbrib'd, unbloody, ftood the blameless priest: Heav'n's attribute was Universal Care,

And man's prerogative to rule, but fpare.

Ah! how unlike the man of times to come!
Of half that live the butcher and the tomb;

NOTES.

160

VER. 158. Unbrib'd, unbloody, &c.] i. e. The ftate described, from 261 to 269, was not yet arrived. For then when Superftition was become fo extreme as to bribe the Gods with human facrifices (fee 267) Tyranny became neceffitated to woo the prieft for a favourable answer:

And play'd the God an engine on his foe.

VER. 159. Heaven's attribute, &c.] The poet fuppofes the truth of the Scripture account, that Man was created Lord of this inferior world (Ep. i. 230.)

Subjected these to thofe, and all to thee.

What hath misled fome to imagine him here fallen into a contradiction, was, I fuppofe, fuch paffages as these,

Afk for what end the heav'nly bodies fhine, &c. And again, Has God, thou fool! work'd folely for thy good, &c. But in truth this is fo far from contradicting what is here faid. of Man's prerogative, that it greatly confirms it, and the Scripture account concerning it. And because this matter has been mistaken, to the difcredit of the poet's religious fentiments, by readers, whom the conduct of certain licentious writers, treating this fubject in an abufive way, hath rendered jealous and mistrustful, I fhall endeavour to explain it. Scripture fays, that Man was made Lord of All. But this Lord become intoxicated with Pride, the common effect of fovereignty, erected himself, like more partial monarchs, into a tyrant. And as Tyranny confifts in fuppofing all made for the use of one; he took thofe freedoms with all, that are confequent on fuch a