Reflection, reafon, ftill the ties improve,
At once extend the int'reft, and the love;
With choice we fix, with fympathy we burn;
Each virtue in each paflion takes its turn:
And ftill new needs, new helps, new habits rife,
That graft benevolence on charities.
Still as one brood, and as another rofe,
These nat'ral love maintain'd, habitual those :
The laft, fcarce ripen'd into perfe&t Man,
Saw helpless him from whom their life began;
Mem'ry and forecast just returns engage,
That pointed back to youth, this on to age,
While pleasure, gratitude, and hope, combin'd,
Still spread the int'reft, and preferv'd the kind.
IV. Nor think, in NATURE'S STATE they blindly
The ftate of nature was the reign of God:
Self-love and focial at her birth began,
Union the bond of all things, and of Man.
Pride then was not; nor arts, that pride to aid;
Man walk'd with beast, joint tenant of the shade;
The fame his table, and the fame his bed;
No murder cloth'd him, and no murder fed.
In the fame temple, the refounding wood,
All vocal beings hymn'd their equal God:
The fhrine with gore unftain'd, with gold undreft,
Unbrib'd, unbloody, stood the blameless priest :
Heav'n's attribute was universal care,
And man's prerogative to rule, but spare.
Ah! how unlike the man of times to come!
Of half that live the butcher and the tomb;
Who, foe to nature, hears the gen'ral groan,
Murders their fpecies, and betrays his own.
But just disease to luxury fucceeds,
And ev'ry death its own avenger breeds;
The fury-paffions from that blood began,
And turn'd on Man a fiercer favage Man.
See him from nature rifing flow to art!
copy instinct then was reafon's part;
Thus then to Man the voice of Nature spake"Go, from the creatures thy inftructions take: "Learn from the birds what food the thickets yield; "Learn from the beasts the physic of the field;
Thy arts of building from the bee receive; "Learn of the mole to plow, the worm to weave; "Learn of the little Nautilus to fail,
"Spread the thin oar, and catch the driving gale. "Here too all forms of social union find,
"And hence let Reason, late, inftruct Mankind : "Here fubterranean works and cities fee:
"There towns aërial on the waving tree.
“Learn each finall people's genius, policies,
"The ants' republic, and the realm of bees;
"How thofe in common all their wealth bestow,
"And anarchy without confufion know;
"And these for ever, tho' a monarch reign,
"Their fep'rate cells and properties maintain.
"Mark what unvary'd laws preferve each state,
"Laws wife as nature, and as fix'd as fate.
"In vain thy reason finer webs shall draw,
"Entangle juftice in her net of law;
"And right, too rigid, harden into wrong;
"Still for the ftrong too weak, the weak too ftrong. "Yet go! and thus o'er all the creatures fway, "Thus let the wifer make the rest obey;
"And for thofe arts mere inftinct could afford, "Be crown'd as monarchs, or as gods ador'd." V. Great Nature spoke; obfervant Men obey'd; Cities were built, focieties were made:
Here rofe one little state; another near
Grew by like means, and join'd, thro' love or fear.
Did here the trees with ruddier burdens bend,
And there the ftreams in purer rills defcend?
What war could ravish, commerce could bestow,
And he return'd a friend, who came a foe.
Converse and love mankind might strongly draw,
When love was liberty, and nature law.
Thus ftates were form'd; the name of king unknown,
'Till common int'reft plac'd the sway in one:
'Twas VIRTUE ONLY (or in arts or arms,
Diffufing bleffings, or averting harms),
The fame which in a fire the fons obey'd,
A prince the father of a people made.
VI. Till then, by nature crown'd, each patriarch fate
King, priest, and parent, of his growing state;
On him their fecond providence they hung,
Their law his eye, their oracle his tongue.
He from the wond'ring furrow call'd the food,
Taught to command the fire, controul the flood,
Draw forth the monsters of th' abyfs profound,
Or fetch th' aërial eagle to the ground.
"Till, drooping, fick'ning, dying, they began
Whom they rever'd as God to mourn as Man:
Then, looking up from fire to fire, explor'd
One great firft Father, and that first ador'd.
Or plain tradition that this All begun,
Convey'd unbroken faith from fire to fon;
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