'As hardly, too, may he the dogma hold That fetters reason with a graduate chain Of beings, linked in order manifold, Where, to each link, 'tis given to sustain A part subservient to the general weal,-- Duly to share the mutual burthen's strain:-- Though who from such allotment would appeal, Could it be truth that wisdom's masterpiece Such aid could lack, such feebleness conceal, Suing its own constituents for release From wrong innate, throughout its texture wove, By hard necessity, not light caprice? But to what purport could premonished Love A system twined with mutual suffering weave, When but a word all suffering would remove? And wherefore yet delayeth the reprieve Of Love, that doth not willingly afflict Its children, neither wantonly aggrieve? Can aught the gracious purpose interdict Of Him, whose piercing eye, whose boundless sway, No cloud can dim, no barrier restrict? Say'st thou, "By path inscrutable, and way Past finding out, perchance, may mercy bend To its own use, whate'er its course would stay, And through the labouring world high mandate send That all things work together unto good, Work, though by means corrupt, to righteous end?" Beware how such conjectures must conclude. Can means impure Omnipotence befit, And clog the range of its solicitude? Can finite bonds confine the Infinite? Though man, by choice of ill, must needs offend, Need God do ill that good may come of it? Must havoc's mad typhoon perforce descend? May naught else serve to fan the stagnant air? Must captive flame earth's quaking surface rend, Or seek escape in lava flood? and ere Effete society new structure raise, Must dearth or pestilence the ground prepare? Thus is it that a parent's care purveys His bounty, and, exacting rigorously The price in tears, each boon's full cost defrays? Thus, with vain thrift withholding the decree, That from his treasury's exhaustless store To all could grant unbought felicity?