On the Origin of Evil: Part II

But grant that man is justly frail below.
Still imperfection is not all our woe. no
If final good be God’s eternal plan.
Why is the power of ill bestowed on man?
Why is revenge an inborn passion found?
And why the means to spread that passion round?
Whence in man’s breast the constant wish we find
That tends to work the ruin of his kind?
Whence flows the ambition of a Caesar’s soul,
Or Sylla’s wish to ravage and control?
Whence, monster vice! originates thy course?
Art thou from God? is purity thy source?
No! let not blasphemy that cause pursue!
A simpler source in man himself we view.
If man, endowed with freedom, basely act,
Can such from blameless purity detract?
An ample liberty of choice is given;
Man chooses ill; — and where the fault of Heaven?
Say not the human heart is prone to sin —
Virtue by nature reigns as strong within;
The passions, if perverted, tend to woe —
What then? did God perversion, too, bestow?
No! blame thyself if guilt distract thy lot;
Man may be virtuous — Heaven forbids it not.
Blind as thou art in this imperfect state.
Still conscious virtue might support thy fate;
Give reason strength thy passions to control —
Vice is not inborn: drive it from thy soul!
Yet you reply — Though ample freedom’s mine.
The fault of evil still is half divine:
If Heaven foresaw that, from the scope of choice,
Perversion, vice, and misery should rise,
Why then on man, if prone to good, bestow
The possibility of working woe?
Ask not — ’tis answered: arrogantly blind
To scan the secrets of the eternal Mind, —
If Heaven be just, then reason tells us this,
That man by merit must secure his bliss.
Cease, then, with evil to upbraid the skies:
That to the vice of mortals owes its rise.
Is God to blame if man’s inhuman heart
Deny the boon that pity should impart?
If patriots to brutality should change
And grasp the lawless dagger of revenge?
If frantic murderers mingle from afar
To palliate carnage by the name of war?
If pampered pride disdain a sufferer’s fate
And spurn imploring misery from her gate?
No! Heaven hath placed compassion in the breast;
The means are given, and ours is all the rest.
But what, to ease thy sorrow, shall avail
For human lot the misanthropic wail?
Since all complain, and all are vicious, too,
Each hates the vile pursuit, but all pursue, —
Let actions then, and not complaints, prevail!
Let each his part withdraw — the whole shall fail.