VI. What nothing earthly gives, or can destroy, The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy, Is virtue's prize: a better would you fix? Then give humility a coach and six, 170 Justice a conqueror's sword, or truth a gown, Or public spirit its great cure, a crown. Weak, foolish man! will Heaven reward us there With the same trash mad mortals wish for here? The boy and man an individual makes, Yet sigh'st thou now for apples and for cakes? Go, like the Indian, in another life Expect thy dog, thy bottle, and thy wife; As well as dream such trifles are assign'd, As toys and empires, for a godlike mind. 180 Rewards, that either would to virtue bring No joy, or be destructive of the thing; How oft by these at sixty are undone The virtues of a saint at twenty-one! To whom can riches give repute, or trust, Content, or pleasure, but the good and just? Judges and senates have been bought for gold, Esteem and love were never to be sold. O fool! to think God hates the worthy mind, The lover and the love of human kind, 190 Whose life is healthful, and whose conscience clear, Because he wants a thousand pounds a year. Honour and shame from no condition rise; Act well your part; there all the honour lies. Fortune in men has some small difference made-- One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade; The cobbler apron'd, and the parson gown'd, The friar hooded, and the monarch crown'd. 'What differ more' (you cry) 'than crown and cowl?' I'll tell you, friend!--a wise man and a fool. 200 You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk, Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk, Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow; The rest is all but leather or prunella. Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with strings, That thou may'st be by kings, or whores of kings, Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race, In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece: But by your fathers' worth if yours you rate, Count me those only who were good and great. 210 Go! if your ancient but ignoble blood Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood, Go! and pretend your family is young; Nor own, your fathers have been fools so long. What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards? Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards.