The Realm of Reason
EPISTLE 2
— Alexander Pope
“Words are like leaves, and where they most abound,
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.”
Comply with the decree of Master Pope,
And squander not words, nor waste precious time,
And blight not Doctrine put to verse and rhyme.
For Canons ought not the foolish to bear;
So, please God, as I write this prayer,
Give content, balance, junction to each part,
And let faith be enhanc’d by reason’s art.
That God is, is prov’d by bare reason ‘lone
With demonstrations eight, as have been shown,
By Thomas from effects, Cause God deduc’d;
And other sages by whom God educ’d:
By Anselm’s concept perfect God inferr’d;
And Newman by the conscience God e’er stirr’d.
There must a Causer First aye to obtain.
Else we regress in expectation vain
In hopeless and perpetual refrain.
For whirlpool Hylotheism swirls in
The careless to a mean oblivion.
A fell Charybdis, reason it engorges
And in exchange, pretension it disgorges.
And from its vortex it detritus hurls
“The wrecks of matter and the crush of worlds.”
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