# Moral Essays

Moral Essays (also known as Epistles to Several Persons) is a series of four poems on ethical subjects by Alexander Pope, published between 1731 and 1735.

## Epistle I, To Lord Cobham (1734)

* The fate of all extremes is such, Men may read, as well as books, too much. To observations which ourselves we make, We grow more partial for th' observer's sake.
** Line 9.
* That each from other differs, first confess; Next, that he varies from himself no less.
** Line 19.
* Like following life through creatures you dissect, You lose it in the moment you detect.
** Line 29.
* In vain sedate reflections we would make When half our knowledge we must snatch, not take.
** Line 39.
* Not always actions show the man: we find Who does a kindness is not therefore kind.
** Line 109.
* Who combats bravely is not therefore brave, He dreads a death-bed like the meanest slave: Who reasons wisely is not therefore wise,— His pride in reasoning, not in acting lies.
** Line 115.
* 'Tis from high life high characters are drawn; A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn.
** Line 135.
* 'Tis education forms the common mind: Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclined.
** Line 149.
* Manners with fortunes, humours turn with climes, Tenets with books, and principles with times.
** Line 172. Compare: "Omnia mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis" (translated: "All things change, and we change with them"), Matthias Borbonius, Deliciæ Poetarum Germanorum, i, 685.
* "Odious! in woollen! 't would a saint provoke", Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke.
** Line 246.
* And you, brave Cobham! to the latest breath Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death.
** Line 262.

## Epistle II, To Mrs. M. Blount (1735)

* Nothing so true as what you once let fall, "Most women have no characters at all".
** Line 1.
* Whether the charmer sinner it or saint it, If folly grow romantic, I must paint it.
** Line 15.
* Choose a firm cloud before it fall, and in it Catch, ere she change, the Cynthia of this minute.
** Line 19.
* Fine by defect, and delicately weak.
** Line 43. Compare: "That air and harmony of shape express, Fine by degrees, and beautifully less", Matthew Prior, Henry and Emma.
* Chaste to her husband, frank to all beside, A teeming mistress, but a barren bride.
** Line 71.
* Wise wretch! with pleasures too refined to please; With too much spirit to be e'er at ease; With too much quickness ever to be taught; With too much thinking to have common thought. You purchase pain with all that joy can give, And die of nothing but a rage to live.
** Line 95.
* Atossa, cursed with every granted prayer, Childless with all her children, wants an heir; To heirs unknown descends the unguarded store, Or wanders heaven-directed to the poor.
** Line 147.
* "With ev'ry pleasing, ev'ry prudent part, Say, what can Chloe want?" — She wants a heart.
** Line 159.
* Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour, Content to dwell in decencies forever.
** Line 163.
* In men, we various ruling passions find; In women, two almost divide the kind; Those, only fixed, they first or last obey, The love of pleasure, and the love of sway.
** Line 207.
* Men, some to business, some to pleasure take; But every woman is at heart a rake.
** Line 215.
* See how the world its veterans rewards! A youth of frolics, an old age of cards.
** Line 243.
* Oh, blest with temper whose unclouded ray Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day!
** Line 257.
* She who ne'er answers till a husband cools, Or, if she rules him, never shows she rules; Charms by accepting, by submitting, sways, Yet has her humor most, when she obeys.
** Line 261.
* And mistress of herself though china fall.
** Line 268.
* And yet, believe me, good as well as ill, Woman's at best a contradiction still.
** Line 269.

## Epistle III, To Lord Bathurst (1732)

* Who shall decide when doctors disagree, And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me?
** Line 1.
* Blest paper-credit! last and best supply! That lends corruption lighter wings to fly.
** Line 39.
* P. What riches give us let us then inquire: Meat, fire, and clothes. B. What more? P. Meat, fine clothes, and fire.
** Line 79.
* But thousands die, without this or that, Die, and endow a college, or a cat.
** Line 95.
* The ruling passion, be it what it will, The ruling passion conquers reason still.
** Line 153.
* Extremes in Nature equal good produce; Extremes in man concur to general use.
** Line 161.
* Rise, honest muse! and sing The Man of Ross.
** Line 250.
* Ye little stars! hide your diminish'd rays.
** Line 282. Compare: "At whose sight all the stars / Hide their diminish’d heads", John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book iv, Line 34.
* Who builds a church to God and not to fame, Will never mark the marble with his name.
** Line 285.
* In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half hung.
** Line 299.
* Where London's column, pointing at the skies, Like a tall bully, lifts the head and lies.
** Line 339.
* But Satan now is wiser than of yore, And tempts by making rich, not making poor.
** Line 351.

## Epistle IV, To Lord Burlington (1731)

* Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven, And though no science, fairly worth the seven.
** Line 43.
* Tis use alone that sanctifies expense, And splendor borrows all her rays from sense.
** Ver. 180.
* To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite, Who never mentions hell to ears polite.
** Line 149. Compare: "In the reign of Charles II, a certain worthy divine at Whitehall thus addressed himself to the auditory at the conclusion of his sermon: 'In short, if you don't live up to the precepts of the Gospel, but abandon yourselves to your irregular appetites, you must expect to receive your reward in a certain place which 'tis not good manners to mention here'", Tom Brown, Laconics.

## Epistle VII, To Mr. Addison (1720)

* Statesman, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere, In action faithful, and in honor clear; Who broke no promise, served no private end, Who gained no title, and who lost no friend.
** Line 67.