Note 1007 — AN ESSAY ON MAN, IN FOUR EPISTLES (continued 3)
Reading edition
This line is the application to man of the language which the schoolmen applied to the Deity,—that his eternity was a moment, and his immensity a point. The couplet in the MS. was at first as follows:
Lord of a span, and hero of a day, In one short scene to strut and pass away,