Sheer o'er the craggy barrier; and immers'd
Deep in the flood, found, when he sought it not,
The death he had deserv'd, and died alone.

So God wrought double justice; made the fool
The victim of his own tremendous choice,
And taught a brute the way to safe revenge.

I would not enter on my list of friends (Though grac'd with polish'd manners and fine sense, Yet wanting sensibility) the man,

Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail,
That crawls at ev'ning in the public path;
But he that has humanity, forwarn'd,
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight,
And charg'd perhaps with venom, that intrudes,
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes

Sacred to neatness and repose, th' alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die:

A necessary act incurs no blame.

Not so when, held within their proper bounds,
And guiltless of offence, they range the air,

Or take their pastime in the spacious field:

There they are privileg'd; and he that hunts
Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong,
Disturbs th' economy of Nature's realm,
Who, when she form'd, design'd them an abode.
The sum is this. If man's convenience, health,
Or safety, interfere, his rights and claims
Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs.
Else they are all-the meanest things that are,
As free to live, and to enjoy that life,

As God was free to form them at the first,
Who in his sov'reign wisdom made them all.
Ye therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too. The springtime of our years
Is soon dishonour'd and defil'd in most

By budding ills, that ask a prudent hand
To check them. But alas! none sooner shoots,
If unrestrain'd, into luxuriant growth,

Than cruelty, most dev'lish of them all.
Mercy to him, that shows it, is the rule
And righteous limitation of it's act,

By which Heav'n moves in pard'ning guilty man;
And he that shows none, being ripe in years,
And conscious of the outrage he commits,
Shall seek it, and not find it, in his turn.

Distinguish'd much by reason, and still more By our capacity of Grace divine,

From creatures, that exist but for our sake,
Which, having serv'd us, perish, we are held
Accountable; and God some future day
Will reckon with us roundly for th' abuse
Of what he deems no mean or trivial trust.
Superior as we are, they yet depend

Not more on human help than we on theirs.
Their strength, or speed, or vigilance, were giv'n
In aid of our defects. In some are found
Such teachable and apprehensive parts,

That man's attainments in his own concerns,
Match'd with th' expertness of the brutes in theirs,
Are ofttimes vanquish'd and thrown far behind.
Some show that nice sagacity of smell,
And read with such discernment, in the port
And figure of the man, his secret aim,
That oft we owe our safety to a skill

We could not teach, and must despair to learn.
But learn we might, if not too proud to stoop
To quadruped instructors, many a good
And useful quality, and virtue too,

Rarely exemplified among ourselves.

Attachment never to be wean'd, or chang'd
By any change of fortune; proof alike
Against unkindness, absence, and neglect;
Fidelity, that neither bribe nor threat
Can move or warp; and gratitude for small
And trivial favours, lasting as the life,
And glist'ning even in the dying eye.

Man praises man.

Desert in arts or arms

Wins public honour; and ten thousand sit
Patiently present at a sacred song,
Commemoration mad; content to hear

(O wonderful effect of music's power!)
Messiah's eulogy for Handel's sake.
But less, methinks, than sacrilege might serve—
(For was it less? what heathen would have dar'd
To strip Jove's statue of his oaken wreath,
And hang it up in honour of a man?)

Much less might serve, when all that we design
Is but to gratify an itching ear,

And give the day to a musician's praise.
Remember Handel? Who, that was not born
Deaf as the dead to harmony, forgets,

Or can, the more than Homer of his age?

Yes-we remember him; and while we praise
A talent so divine, remember too

That His most holy book, from whom it came,
Was never meant, was never us'd before,
To buckram out the mem'ry of a man.
But hush!-the muse perhaps is too severe;
And with a gravity beyond the size

And measure of th' offence, rebukes a deed
Less impious than absurd, and owing more
To want of judgment than to wrong design.
So in the chapel of old Ely House,
When wand'ring Charles, who meant to be the third,
Had fled from William, and the news was fresh,
The simple clerk, but loyal, did announce,
And eke did rear right merrily, two staves,
Sung to the praise and glory of King George!
-Man praises man; and Garrick's mem❜ry next,
When time hath somewhat mellow'd it, and made
The idol of our worship while he liv'd

The God of our idolatry once more,

Shall have it's altar; and the World shall go
In pilgrimage to bow before his shrine.

The theatre too small shall suffocate

It's squeez'd contents, and more than it admits