Know then thyself, presume not God to scan;
  The proper study of mankind is Man. 
  Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,
  A being darkly wise, and rudely great: 
  With too much knowledge for the sceptic side,
  With too much weakness for the stoic’s pride,
  He hangs between; in doubt to act or rest,
  In doubt to deem himself a god or beast;
  In doubt his mind or body to prefer,
  Born but to die, and reasoning but to err;
  Alike in ignorance, his reason such
  Whether he thinks too little or too much: 
  Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;
  Still by himself abused, or disabused;
  Created half to rise, and half to fall;
  Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
  Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled: 
  The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!

  [VIRTUE AND HAPPINESS]

  Oh blind to truth, and God’s whole scheme below,
  Who fancy bliss to vice, to virtue woe! 
  Who sees and follows that great scheme the best,
  Best knows the blessing, and will most be blessed. 
  But fools, the good alone unhappy call,
  For ills or accidents that chance to all. 
  See Falkland dies, the virtuous and the just! 
  See godlike Turenne prostrate on the dust! 
  See Sidney bleeds amid the martial strife! 
  Was this their virtue, or contempt of life? 
  Say, was it virtue, more though Heaven ne’er gave,
  Lamented Digby! sunk thee to the grave? 
  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 sickened, and each gale was death? 
  Or why so long (in life if long can be)
  Lent Heaven a parent to the poor and me? 
  What makes all physical or moral ill? 
  There deviates nature, and here wanders will. 
  God sends not ill; if rightly understood,
  Or partial ill is universal good. 
  Or change admits, or nature lets it fall,
  Short, and but rare, till man improved it all. 
  We just as wisely might of Heaven complain
  That righteous Abel was destroyed by Cain,
  As that the virtuous son is ill at ease,
  When his lewd father gave the dire disease. 
  Think we, like some weak prince, th’ Eternal Cause
  Prone for his favourites to reverse his laws? 
  Shall burning Etna, if a sage requires,
  Forget to thunder, and recall her fires? 
  On air or sea new motions be impressed,
  Oh blameless Bethel! to relieve thy breast? 
  When the loose mountain trembles from on high,
  Shall gravitation cease, if you go by? 
  Or some old temple, nodding to its fall,
  For Chartres’ head reserve the hanging wall? 
  But still this world (so fitted for the knave)
  Contents us not.  A better shall we have? 
  A kingdom of the just then let it be: 
  But first consider how those just agree.