Thought, virtue, knowledge!--blessings, by thy scheme, All poison'd into pains. First, knowledge, once 675 My soul's ambition, now her greatest dread. To know myself, true wisdom?--No, to shun That shocking science, parent of despair! Avert thy mirror: if I see, I die. "Know my Creator! climb his bless'd abode By painful speculation, pierce the veil, Dive in his nature, read his attributes, And gaze in admiration--on a foe, 683 Obtruding life, withholding happiness! From the full rivers that surround his throne, Not letting fall one drop of joy on man; Man gasping for one drop, that he might cease To curse his birth, nor envy reptiles more! Ye sable clouds! ye darkest shades of night! Hide him, for ever hide him, from my thought, 690 Once all my comfort; source, and soul of joy! Now leagued with furies, and with thee,[36] against me. "Know his achievements? study his renown? Contemplate this amazing universe, Dropp'd from his hand, with miracles replete! For what? 'Mid miracles of nobler name, To find one miracle of misery? To find the being, which alone can know And praise his works, a blemish on his praise? Through nature's ample range, in thought, to stroll, 700 And start at man, the single mourner there, Breathing high hope, chain'd down to pangs, and death? Knowing is suffering: and shall Virtue share The sigh of knowledge?--Virtue shares the sigh. By straining up the steep of excellent, By battles fought, and, from temptation won, What gains she, but the pang of seeing worth, 707 Angelic worth, soon shuffled in the dark With every vice, and swept to brutal dust? Merit is madness; virtue is a crime; A crime to reason, if it costs us pain Unpaid: what pain, amidst a thousand more, To think the most abandon'd, after days 713 Of triumph o'er their betters, find in death As soft a pillow, nor make fouler clay! "Duty! Religion!--these, our duty done, Imply reward. Religion is mistake. Duty!--there's none, but to repel the cheat. Ye cheats, away! ye daughters of my pride! Who feign yourselves the favourites of the skies: 720 Ye towering hopes! abortive energies! That toss, and struggle, in my lying breast, To scale the skies, and build presumptions there, As I were heir of an eternity. Vain, vain ambitions! trouble me no more. Why travel far in quest of sure defeat? As bounded as my being, be my wish. All is inverted; wisdom is a fool. Sense! take the rein; blind Passion! drive us on; And, Ignorance! befriend us on our way; 730 Ye new, but truest patrons of our peace! Yes; give the pulse full empire; live the brute, Since, as the brute, we die. The sum of man, Of godlike man! to revel, and to rot. "But not on equal terms with other brutes: