211

Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race,
In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece :
But by your father's worth if your's you rate,
Count me those only who were good and great.
Go! if your ancient, but ignoble blood
Has crept thro' fcoundrels ever fince the flood,
Go! and pretend your family is young;
Nor own, your fathers have been fools so long.
What can ennoble fots, or flaves, or cowards?
Alas! not all the blood of all the HOWARDS. 215
Look next on Greatness; say where Greatness
lies?

"Where, but among the Heroes and the Wise?"

VARIATIONS.

VER. 207. Boaft the pure blood, &c.] in the MS. thus,
The richest blood, right-honourably old,

Down from Lucretia to Lucretia roll'd,
May fwell thy heart and gallop in thy breast,
Without one dafh of ufher or of priest:
Thy pride as much despise all other pride
As Chrift-Church once all colleges befide.

COMMENTARY.

(from Ver. 204 to 217.) is in itself as devoid of all real worth as the reft; because, in the first case, the Title is generally gained by no merit at all; in the second, by the merit of the firft Founder of the Family; which, when reflected on, is generally the subject rather of humiliation than of glory.

VER. 217. Look next on Greatness, &c.] III. The Poet now unmasks (from Ver. 216 to 237.) the falfe pretences of GREATNESS, whereby it is feen that the Hero and the Politician (the two characters which would monopolize that quality) do, after all their bustle, if they want Virtue, effect only

220

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
Or make, an enemy of all mankind!

Not one looks backward, onward still he goes,
Yet ne'er looks forward further than his nose.
No lefs alike the Politic and Wife;

225

All fly flow things, with circumfpective eyes:
Men in their loose unguarded hours they take,
Not that themselves are wife, but others weak.
But
grant that thofe can conquer, thefe can cheat;
"Tis phrafe abfurd to call a Villain Great :
Who wickedly is wife, or madly brave,
Is but the more a fool, the more a knave.
Who noble ends by noble means obtains,
Or failing, fmiles in exile or in chains,

COMMENTARY.

239

this, that the one proves himself a Fool, and the other a Knave: And Virtue they but too generally want; the art of Heroifm being understood to confift in Ravage and Defolation; and the art of Politics, in Circumvention.

It is not fuccefs, therefore, that conftitutes true Greatness; but the end aimed at, and the means which are employed: And if thefe be right, Glory will be the reward, whatever be the iffue:

"Who noble ends by noble means obtains,
"Or failing, fmiles in exile or in chains,
"Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed
"Like Socrates, that man is great indeed."

Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed 235 Like Socrates, that Man is great indeed.

What's Fame? a fancy'd life in others breath, A thing beyond us, ev'n before our death. Just what you hear, you have, and what's unknown

The fame (my Lord) if Tully's, or your own. 240
All that we feel of it begins and ends

In the small circle of our foes or friends;
To all befide as much an empty fhade

An Eugene living, as a Cæfar dead:

Alike or when, or where, they fhone, or shine, 245 Or on the Rubicon, or on the Rhine.

A Wit's a feather, and a Chief a rod;

An honeft Man's the nobleft work of God. Fame but from death a villain's name can fave, As Justice tears his body from the

grave;

When what t'oblivion better were refign'd,
Is hung on high, to poison half mankind.
All fame is foreign, but of true desert;

250

Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart:

COMMENTARY.

VER. 237. What's Fame?] IV. With regard to FAME, that ftill more fantastic bleffing, he fheweth (from Ver. 236 to 259.) that all of it, befides what we hear ourselves, is merely nothing: and that even of this fmall portion, no more of it giveth the poffeffor a real fatisfaction, than

256

One felf-approving hour whole years outweighs
Of stupid ftarers, and of loud huzzas;
And more true joy Marcellus exil'd feels,
Than Cæfar with a fenate at his heels.

In Parts fuperior what advantage lies?
Tell (for You can) what is it to be wife? 260
"Tis but to know how little can be known;
To fee all others faults, and feel our own:
Condemn'd in business or in arts to drudge,
Without a second, or without a judge:
Truths would you teach, or fave a finking land?
All fear, none aid you, and few understand. 266
Painful preheminence! yourself to view
Above life's weakness, and its comforts too.

COMMENTARY.

what is the fruit of Virtue. Thus he fhews, that Honour, Nobility, Greatnefs, Glory, fo far as they have any thing real and fubftantial, that is, fo far as they contribute to the Happiness of the poffeffor, are the fole iffue of Virtue; and that neither Riches, Courts, Armies, nor the Populace, are capable of conferring them.

VER 259. In Parts fuperior what advantage lies ?] V. But laftly, the Poet fhews (from Ver. 258 to 269.) that as no external goods can make man happy, fo neither is it in the power of all internal. For that even SUPERIOR PARTS bring no more real happiness to the poffeffor than the reft; nay, that they put him into a worfe condition; for that the quickness

NOTES.

VER. 267. Painful preheminence! &c.] This, to his friend: -nor does it at all contradict what he had faid to him concern. ipg Happiness, in the beginning of the epistle:

Bring then these bleffings to a strict 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;

COMMENTARY.

271

of apprehenfion and depth of penetration do but sharpen the miferies of life.

VER. 269. Bring then thefe bleffings to a ftrict account, &c.] Having thus proved how empty and unfatisfactory all these greatest external goods are, from an examination of their nature; he proceeds to strengthen his argument (from Ver. 268 to 309.) by thefe three further confiderations:

1. That the acquirement of these goods is made with the lofs of one another, or of greater; either as inconfiftent with them, or as spent in attaining them.

2. That the poffeffors of each of these goods are generally fuch, as are fo far from raising envy in a good man, that he would refuse to take their perfons, though accompanied with their poffeffions: and this the Poet illuftrates by examples.

3. That even the poffeffion of them altogether, where they have excluded Virtue, only terminates in more enormous mifery.

NOTES.

" "Tis never to be bought, but always free,

"And fled from Monarchs, St. John! dwells with thee." For he is now proving, that nothing either external to man, or what is not in man's power, and of his own acquirement, can make him happy here. The most plaufible rival of Virtue is Knowledge: yet even this is fo far from giving any degree of real happiness, that it deprives us of thofe common comforts of life, which are a kind of fupport, under the want of happiness. Such as the more innocent of those delufions which he speaks of in the fecond Epistle :

"Thofe painted clouds that beautify our days," &c.

Now Knowledge deftroyeth all thofe comforts, by setting man above life's weakneffes: So that in him, who thinketh to