Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze, Ep i. 1. 259, & seq. On which our Examiner, blind to the light of reason, as well as deaf to the charms of harmony-A Spinozist (says he) would express himself in this manner*. I believe, he would, and so would St. Paul too, writing on the same subject, namely, the omnipresence of God in his providence, and in his substance. In him we live and move, and have our being †; i. e. we are parts of him, his offspring, as the Greek poet a Pantheist, quoted by the apostle, observes: and the reason is, because a religious theist, and an impious Pantheist, both profess to believe the omnipresence of God. But would Spinoza, as Mr. Pope does, call God the great directing mind of all, who hath intentionally created a perfect universe?" Or would Mr. Pope, like Spinoza, say there is but one universal substance in the universe, and that blind too? We know Spinoza would not say the first; and we ought not to think Mr. Pope would say the latter, because he says the direct contrary throughout the Poem. Now it is this latter only that is Spinozism, But this sublime description of the Godhead contains not only the divinity of St. Paul; but, if that will not satisfy, the philosophy likewise of Sir Isaac Newton, The Poet says, All are but parts of one stupendous whole, Examen de l'Essai, ↑ For in him we live and more, and have our being; as certain also of your own Poets have said: For we are also his offspring, Acts xvii. 28, For that is the meaning of All Nature is but art, unknown to thee; E 3 The The Philosopher, "Deus omnipræsens est, non per "virtutem solam, sed etiam per SUBSTANTIAM: nam “virtus sine substantia subsistere non potest*. * " Mr. Pope, That, chang'd through all, and yet in all the same, Sir Isaac Newton-" In ipso continentur et moventur "universa, sed absque mutua passione. Deus nihil pa"titur ex corporum motibus; illa nullam sentiunt resis"tentiam ex omni-præsentia Dei.-Corpore omni et "figura corporea destituitur t.-Omnia regit et omnia "cognoscit.-Cum unaquæque spatii particula sit semper, et unumquodque durationis indivisibile momentum, ubique, certe rerum omnium fabricator ac dominus non erit nunquam, nusquam‡.” Mr. Pope, Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, Sir Isaac Newton-" Annon ex phænomenis constat "esse entem incorporeum, viventem, intelligentem, om"nipræsentem, qui in spatio infinito, tanquam sensorio suo, res ipsas intime cernat, penitusque perspiciat, "totasque intra se præsens præsentes complectatur§." But now admitting, for argument's sake, that there was an ambiguity in these expressions, so great, as that a Spinozist might employ them to express his own particular principles; and such a thing might well be, without any Newtoni Principia Schol. gener. sub finem. + Id. ib. reflection reflection on the Poet's religion, or exactness as a writer, because it is none on the apostle's, who actually did that which Mr. Pope is not only falsely, but, as we see from this instance, foolishly accused of doing, and because the Spinozists, in order to hide the impiety of their principle, are used to express the omnipresence of God in terms that any religious theist might employ in this case, I say, how are we to judge of the Poet's meaning? Surely by the whole tenor of his argument. Now take the words in the sense of the Spinozists, and he is made, in the conclusion of his Epistle, to overthrow all he has been advancing throughout the body of it: for Spinozism is the destruction of an universe, where every thing tends, by a foreseen contrivance in all its parts, to the perfection of the whole. But allow him to employ the passage in the sense of St. Paul, that we and all creatures live and move, and have our being in God, and then it will be seen to be the most logical support of all that had preceded. For the Poet having, as we say, laboured through his Epistle, to prove that every thing in the universe tends, by a foreseen contrivance, and a present direction of all its parts, to the perfection of the whole; it might be objected that such a disposition of things implying in God a painful, operose, and inconceivable extent of providence, it could not be supposed that such care extended to all, but was confined to the more noble parts of the Creation. This gross conception of the first cause, the Poet exposes, by shewing that God is equally and intimately present to every particle of matter, to every sort of substance, and in every instant of being. And how truly, may be seen by the Inquiry into the Nature of the human Soul, wrote expressly against Spi pozism, where the excellent author has shewn the necessity of the immediate influence of God, in every moment of time, to keep matter from falling back into its primitive nothing. The Examiner goes on: "Mr. Pope hath reason tọ "call this whole, a stupendous whole; nothing being more paradoxical and incredible, if we take his de"scription literally*." I will add, nor nothing more so than St. Paul's, in him we live and move, and have our being, if taken literally. I have met with one who took it so, and from thence concluded, with great reach of wit, that SPACE was GOD, But Mr. Pope having said of God, that he, Breathes in our soul, informs our mortal part, the Commentator remarks, that "one should make a "criminal abuse of these pompous expressions, if once "launched out, with SPINOZA, to confound the substance "of God with our own; and to imagine that the "substance of what we call creature, is the same with "that Being's, to which we give the name of Creator*' Spinoza is still the burthen of the song. To cut this matter short, we shall therefore give Mr. Pope's own plain words and sentiments, in a line of this very Essay, that overturn all Spinozism from its very foundations where, speaking of what common sense taught mankind, before false sense had depraved the understanding, he says, THE WORKER FROM THE WORK DISTINCT WAS And simple reason never sought but one. [KNOWN, Ep. iii. 1. 230. But the Commentator is, at every turn, crying out, A follower of Spinoza would express himself just so. I believe he might; and sure Mr. Crousaz could not be ignorant of the reason. It being It being so well known that that unhappy man, the better to disguise his atheism, covered it with such expressions as kept it long concealed even from those friends and acquaintance with whom he most intimately corresponded. Hence it must necessarily happen, that every the best intentioned, most religious writer will employ many phrases, that a Spinozist would use, in the explanation of his impiety. To persist, therefore, from henceforth, in this accusation, will deserve a name, which it is not my business to bestow. Mr. Pope concludes thus: Cease then, nor order imperfection name: Our proper pliss depends on what we blame. Commentaire. Know Know thy own point: this kind, this due degree Secure to be as blest as thou canst bear: Or in the natal, or the mortal hour. 1. 273, & seq. "The heart gives itself up (says Mr. De Crousaz) to "the magnificence of these words.-But I ask Mr. Pope, "with regard to such consolatory ideas, whether he was "not beholden, in some measure, to religion for them *?" This is in the true spirit of modern controversy.-Our logician had taken it into his head, that the Poet had no religion; though he does not pretend his proofs rise higher than to a legitimate suspicion; and finding here a passage that spoke plainly to the contrary, instead of retracting that rash uncharitable opinion, he would turn this very evidence of his own mistake into a new proof for the support of it; and so insinuate, you see, that Mr. Pope had here contradicted himself. He then preaches, for two pages together, on the passage, and ends in these words: "From all this I conclude, that "the verses' in question are altogether edifying in the "mouth of an honest man, but that they give scandal "and appear profane in the mouth of an ill one t.' How exactly can Rome and Geneva jump on occasion! So the conclave adjudged, that those propositions, which in the mouth of St. Austin were altogether edifying, became scandalous and profane in the mouth of Jansenius. But the Examiner pursues the Poet to the very end, and cavils even at those lines, which might have set him right in his mistakes about the sense of all the rest, All Nature is but art, unknown to thee; All partial evil, universal good; And, spite of pride, in erring reason's spite, "See (says our Examiner) Mr. Pope's general conclusion, "all that is, is right. So that at the sight of Charles "the First losing his head on the scaffold, Mr. Pope Commentaire, p. 124, 125, + Ib. p. 127. "must |