University of Virginia Library

A PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY.

TO ---.
If Virtue be measured by what we resist,
When against Inclination we strive,
You and I have been proved, we may fairly insist,
The most virtuous mortals alive!
Now Virtue, we know, is the brightest of pearls,
But as Pleasure is hard of evasion,
Should we envy, or pity, the stoical churls
Who never have known a temptation?