Extremes in nature equal good produce, Extremes in man concur to gen'ral use."Ask we what makes one keep, and one bestow?
That POWER who bids the ocean ebb and flow, Bids seed-time, harvest, equal course maintain, Through reconciled extremes of drought and rain, Builds life on death, on change duration founds, And gives th' eternal wheels to know their rounds.
Riches, like insects, when concealed they lie, Wait but for wings, and in their season fly.
Who sees pale Mammon pine amidst his store, Sees but a backward steward for the poor;This year a reservoir, to keep and spare;The next, a fountain, spouting through his heir, In lavish streams to quench a country's thirst, And men and dogs shall drink him till they burst.
Old Cotta shamed his fortune and his birth, Yet was not Cotta void of wit or worth:
What though (the use of barbarous spits forgot)His kitchen vied in coolness with his grot?
His court with nettles, moats with cresses stored, With soups unbought and salads blessed his board?
If Cotta lived on pulse, it was no more Than Brahmins, saints, and sages did before;To cram the rich was prodigal expense, And who would take the poor from Providence?
Like some lone Chartreux stands the good old hall, Silence without, and fasts within the wall;No raftered roofs with dance and tabor sound, No noontide bell invites the country round;Tenants with sighs the smokeless towers survey, And turn th' unwilling steeds another way;Benighted wanderers, the forest o'er, Curse the saved candle and unopening door;While the gaunt mastiff growling at the gate, Affrights the beggar whom he longs to eat.
Not so his son; he marked this oversight, And then mistook reverse of wrong for right.
(For what to shun will no great knowledge need;But what to follow is a task indeed.)
Yet sure, of qualities deserving praise, More go to ruin fortunes, than to raise.
What slaughtered hecatombs, what floods of wine, Fill the capacious squire, and deep divine!
Yet no mean motive this profusion draws;
His oxen perish in his country's cause;
'Tis George and Liberty that crowns the cup, And zeal for that great house which eats him up.
The woods recede around the naked seat;
The sylvans groan--no matter--for the fleet;Next goes his wool--to clothe our valiant bands;Last, for his country's love, he sells his lands.
To town he comes, completes the nation's hope, And heads the bold train-bands, and burns a Pope.
And shall not Britain now reward his toils, Britain, that pays her patriots with her spoils?
In vain at Court the bankrupt pleads his cause, His thankless country leaves him to her laws.
The sense to value riches, with the art T' enjoy them, and the virtue to impart, Not meanly, nor ambitiously pursued, Not sunk by sloth, nor raised by servitude;To balance fortune by a just expense, Join with economy, magnificence;With splendour, charity; with plenty, health;O teach us, Bathurst! yet unspoiled by wealth!
That secret rare, between the extremes to move Of mad good-nature, and of mean self-love.
B. To worth or want well weighed, be bounty given, And ease, or emulate, the care of Heaven (Whose measure full o'erflows on human race);Mend Fortune's fault, and justify her grace.
Wealth in the gross is death, but life diffused;As poison heals, in just proportion used:
In heaps, like ambergrise, a stink it lies, But well dispersed, is incense to the skies.
P. Who starves by nobles, or with nobles eats?
The wretch that trusts them, and the rogue that cheats.
Is there a lord who knows a cheerful noon Without a fiddler, flatterer, or buffoon?
Whose table, wit or modest merit share, Unelbowed by a gamester, pimp, or play'r?
Who copies yours or Oxford's better part, To ease the oppressed, and raise the sinking heart?
Where'er he shines, O Fortune, gild the scene, And angels guard him in the golden mean!
There, English bounty yet awhile may stand, And Honour linger ere it leaves the land.
But all our praises why should lords engross?
Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross:
Pleased Vaga echoes through her winding bounds, And rapid Severn hoarse applause resounds.
Who hung with woods you mountain's sultry brow?
From the dry rock who bade the waters flow?
Not to the skies in useless columns tost, Or in proud falls magnificently lost, But clear and artless, pouring through the plain Health to the sick, and solace to the swain.
Whose causeway parts the vale with shady rows?
Whose seats the weary traveller repose?
Who taught that heaven-directed spire to rise?
"The Man of Ross," each lisping babe replies.
Behold the market-place with poor o'erspread!
The Man of Ross divides the weekly bread;He feeds yon almshouse, neat, but void of state, Where age and want sit smiling at the gate;Him portioned maids, apprenticed orphans blest, The young who labour, and the old who rest.
Is any sick? the Man of Ross relieves, Prescribes, attends, the medicine makes, and gives.
Is there a variance? enter but his door, Baulked are the courts, and contest is no more.
Despairing quacks with curses fled the place, And vile attorneys, now a useless race.
B. Thrice happy man! enabled to pursue What all so wish, but want the power to do!
Oh say, what sums that generous hand supply?
What mines, to swell that boundless charity?
P. Of debts, and taxes, wife and children clear, This man possest--five hundred pounds a year.
Blush, grandeur, blush! proud courts, withdraw your blaze!
Ye little stars, hide your diminished rays!
B. And what? no monument, inion, stone?
His race, his form, his name almost unknown?
P. Who builds a church to God, and not to Fame, Will never mark the marble with his name;Go, search it there, where to be born and die, Of rich and poor makes all the history;Enough, that virtue filled the space between;Proved, by the ends of being, to have been.
When Hopkins dies, a thousand lights attend The wretch, who living saved a candle's end:
