good Men, on the other Hand, unhappy and op prefs'd; from which Objections would be made aagainst Providence. So that he endeavours to folve all Objections that might be made to his Argument, that Happiness does not confift in Exteruals. His Commentator divides it thus:

I. He begins, firft of all, with the Atheistical Complainers, and pursues their Impiety, [from L. 90 to 129] with all the Vengeance of his Eloquence:

Oh blind to Truth, and God's whole Scheme beWho fancy Bliss to Vice, to Virtue Woe: [low! Who fees and follows that great Scheme the best, Best knows the Bleffing, and will most be blest. He exposes their Folly, even on their own Notions of external Goods.

1. By Examples [from L. 96 to 109] where he fhews firft; that, if good Men have been untimely cut off, this is not to be ascrib'd to their Virtues, but to a Contempt of Life that hurried them into Dangers. Secondly, that if they will ftill perfist in afcribing untimely Death to Virtue, they must needs, on the fame Principle, afcribe long Life to it. Confequently as the Argument, in Fact, concludes both Ways, in Logick, it concludes neither.

But Fools the Good alone unhappy call, From Ills or Accidents that chance to all. Say, was it Virtue, more tho' Heav'n ne'er gave, Lamented Digby! funk thee to the Graae? Tell me, if Virtue made the Son expire, Why full of Days and Honour lives the Sire? Why drew Marseilles' good Bishop purer Breath, When Nature ficken'd, and each Gale was Death? Or why fo long (in Life if long can be) Lent Heav'n a Parent to the Poor and me?

A a 4

This

This laft Inftance of the Poet's Illustration of the Ways of Providence, the Reader fees has a peculiar Elegance; where a Tribute of Piety to a Parent, is paid in a Return of Thanks to [Lent Heav'n a Parent, &c.] and made fubfervient of [Or why fo long] his Vindication of, the Great Father of all Things.

2. He exposes their Folly [from L. 108 to 129] by Confiderations drawn from the System of Nature ; and these twofold, Natural and Moral. You accufe God, fays the Poet, becaufe the good Man is fubject to natural and moral Evil: Let us fee whence these proceed. Natural Evil is the neceflary Confequence of a material World fo conftituted: But that this Conftitution was beft, we have prov'd in the first Epiftle. Moral Evil arifeth from the deprav'd Will of Man: Therefore neither the one nor the other from God.

What makes all phyfical or morál Ill?
There deviates Nature, and here wanders Will.
God fends not Ill, if rightly understood
Or partial Ill is univerfal Good;

;

Or Chance admits, or Nature lets it fall;
Short, and but rare, 'till Man improv'd it all.

But you fay, (adds the Poet to these impious Complainers) that tho' it be fit Man should suffer the Miferies which he brings upon himself, by the Commismiffion of moral Evil, yet it feems to be unfit his innocent Pofterity fhould bear a Share of them. To this, fays he, I reply,

We just as wifely might of Heav'n complain,
That righteous Abel was deftroy'd by Cain,
As that the virtuous Son is ill at Eafe,
When his lewd Father gave the dire Disease.

But you will still fay, (continues the Poet) why does

not

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not God either prevent, of immediately repair thefe Evils? You may as well afk, why he doth not work continual Miracles, and every Moment reverse the eftablifh'd Laws of Nature:

Shall burning Etna, if a Sage requires, Forget to thunder, and recall her Fires? On Air or Sea new Motions be impreft, O blameless Bethel to relieve thy Breast? When the loose Mountain trembles from on high, Shall Gravitation ceafe, if you go by? Or, fome old Temple nodding to its Fall, For Chartres' Head referve the hanging Wall?

This is the Force of the Poet's Reaforing, and thefe the Men to whom he addreffes it, namely, the Libertine Cavillers against Providence.

II. But now, fo unhappy is the Condition of our corrupt Nature, that thefe are not the only Complainers. Religious Men are but too apt, if not to fpeak out, yet fometimes fecretly to murmur against Providence, its Ways are not equal: Efpecially thofe more inordinately devoted to a Sect or Party are scandaliz'd, that the Juft (for fuch they efteem themfelves) who are to judge the World, have no better Portion in their own Inheritance. The Poet therefore now leaves thofe more profligate Complainers, and turns [from L. 128 to 147] to the Religious, in these Words:

But ftill this World (fo fitted for the Knave)
Contents us not. A better shall we have?
A Kingdom of the Just then let it be,
But firft confider how thofe Juft agree.

As the more impious Complainers wanted external Goods to be the Reward of Virtue for the moral

Man;

Man; fo thefe want them for the Pious, in order to have a Kingdom of the Juft. To this the Poet holds it fufficient to answer: Pray, Gentlemen, first agree amongst yourselves, who those Just are. We allow,

The Good muft merit God's peculiar Care, But who but God can tell us who they are? One thinks on Calvin Heav'ns own Spirit fell, Another deems him Inftrument of Hell : If Calvin feels Heav'n's Bleffing or its Rod, This cries, There is, and That, there is no God.

As this is the Cafe, he even bids them reft fatisfy'd; remember his fundamental Principle, That whatever is, is right; and content themselves (as their Religion teaches them to profess a more than ordinary Submiffion to the Ways of Providence) with that common Answer, which he with fo much Reason and Piety gives to every Kind of Complainer.

However, tho' there be yet no Kingdom of the Juft, there is still no Kingdom of the Unjuft. That both the Virtuous and the Vicious, whatsoever becomes of those whom every Sect calls the Faithful, have their Shares in external Goods; and, what is more, the Virtuous have infinitely the most Enjoyment in them:

This World, 'tis true, Was made for Cæfar, but for Titus too: [fay, And which more bleft?, who chain'd his Country, Or he, whose Virtue figh'd to lose a Day?

I have been the more careful to explain this laft Argument, and to whom it is directed, because much depends upon it for the Illuftration of the Senfe, and the juft Defence of the Poet. For if we suppose him ftill addreffing himself to those impious Complainers, confuted in the thirty-eight preceding Lines,

we

we should make him guilty of a Parallogifm in the Argument about the Juft, and in the Illuftration of it by the Cafe of Calvin. For then the Libertines afk, why the juft, that is, the moral Man, is not rewarded? The Answer is, that none but God can tell, who the juft, that is, the truly faithful Man, is. Where the Term is chang'd, in order to fupport the Argument; for about the truly moral Man there is no Difpute; about the truly faithful, or the Orthodox, a great deal. But take the Poet right, as arguing here against religious Complainers, and the Reasoning is ftrict and logical. They afk, why the truly Faithful are not rewarded? He anfwers, they may be for ought you know, for none but God can tell who they are.

&

And the Beginning of the first four Lines juft quoted, is his grand Propofition, WHATEVER IS, IS RIGHT. This, tho' fo often repeated, wants more Proof than that Virtue is Happiness. Virtue is doubtlefs the chief Happiness, the Queftion is, Whether it be the only Happiness? He feems to fay, No, there must be Competence and Health: for without Question, Virtue will give inward Peace; but, fhould many (as we fee there are) be fo unwise, as to feek their chief Pleasure out of the Ways of Virtue, yet he does not recall the Sentence, whatever is, is right, and is now tending, as all Things always will, to the Good of the Whole. Of this Mind Guarini feems to be, when he makes Nicandro, as he is leading Amarillis as fuppos'd to her Death, give her the following Counsel :

Drizza gli occhi nel cielo,

Se derivi dal cielo.

"Tutto quel che c' incontra, "O di bene, ò di male,

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