s: As well his grace replied, "Like you, Sir John?


s: That I can do, when all I have is gone."


s: Resolve me, Reason, which of these is worse,


s: Want with a full, or with an empty purse?


s: Thy life more wretched, Cutler, was confessed,


s: Arise, and tell me, was thy death more blessed?


s: Cutler saw tenants break, and houses fall,


s: For very want; he could not build a wall.


s: His only daughter in a stranger's power,


s: For very want; he could not pay a dower.


s: A few grey hairs his reverend temples crowned,


s: 'Twas very want that sold them for two pound.


s: Banished the doctor, and expelled the friend?


s: What but a want, which you perhaps think mad,


s: Yet numbers feel the want of what he had!


s: "Virtue! and wealth! what are ye but a name!"


s: Say, for such worth are other worlds prepared?


s: Or are they both in this their own reward?


s: A knotty point! to which we now proceed.


s: But you are tired--I'll tell a tale.   B. Agreed.


s: P. Where London's column, pointing at the skies,


s: Like a tall bully, lifts the head, and lies;


s: A plain good man, and Balaam was his name;


s: Religious, punctual, frugal, and so forth;


s: His word would pass for more than he was worth.


s: One solid dish his week-day meal affords,


s: Constant at church, and Change; his gains were sure,


s: His givings rare, save farthings to the poor.


s: The devil was piqued such saintship to behold,


s: And longed to tempt him like good Job of old:


s: And tempts by making rich, not making poor.


s: Roused by the prince of Air, the whirlwinds sweep


s: The surge, and plunge his father in the deep;


s: Then full against his Cornish lands they roar,


s: And two rich shipwrecks bless the lucky shore.


s: Sir Balaam now, he lives like other folks,


s: He takes his chirping pint, and cracks his jokes;


s: "Live like yourself," was soon my lady's word;


s: And lo! two puddings smoked upon the board.


s: He pledged it to the knight; the knight had wit,


s: So kept the diamond, and the rogue was bit.


s: Some scruple rose, but thus he eased his thought,


s: "I'll now give sixpence where I gave a groat;


s: Where once I went to church, I'll now go twice--


s: And am so clear, too, of all other vice."


s: The Tempter saw his time; the work he plied;


s: Stocks and subscriptions pour on every side,


s: 'Till all the demon makes his full descent


s: In one abundant shower of cent. per cent.,


s: Sinks deep within him, and possesses whole,


s: Then dubs director, and secures his soul.


s: Ascribes his gettings to his parts and merit;


s: What late he called a blessing, now was wit,


s: Things change their titles, as our manners turn;


s: His counting-house employed the Sunday morn;


s: Seldom at church ('twas such a busy life),


s: There (so the devil ordained) one Christmas tide


s: My good old lady catched a cold and died.


s: He marries, bows at court, and grows polite:


s: Leaves the dull cits, and joins (to please the fair)


s: The well bred c*ck**ds in St. James's air;


s: First, for his son a gay commission buys,


s: Who drinks and fights, and in a duel dies;


s: His daughter flaunts a viscount's tawdry wife;


s: And one more pensioner St. Stephen gains.


s: My lady falls to play; so bad her chance,


s: He must repair it; takes a bribe from France;


s: The House impeach him; Coningsby harangues;


s: The Court forsake him, and Sir Balaam hangs;


s: Wife, son, and daughter, Satan! are thine own,


s: His wealth, yet dearer, forfeit to the Crown:


s: The Devil and the King divide the prize,


s: preceding this, v.159, etc.).  What are the proper objects of


s: 'Tis strange, the miser should his cares employ


s: To gain those riches he can ne'er enjoy:


s: Is it less strange, the prodigal should waste


s: His wealth, to purchase what he ne'er can taste?


s: Not for himself he sees, or hears, or eats;


s: Artists must choose his pictures, music, meats:


s: He buys for Topham, drawings and designs,


s: For Pembroke, statues, dirty gods, and coins;


s: Rare monkish manuscripts for Hearne alone,


s: And books for Mead, and butterflies for Sloane.


s: Think we all these are for himself? no more


s: Than his fine wife, alas! or finer w***e.


s: For what has Virro painted, built, and planted?


s: Only to show, how many tastes he wanted.


s: What brought Sir Visto's ill-got wealth to waste?


s: Some demon whispered, "Visto! have a taste."


s: Heaven visits with a taste the wealthy fool,


s: And needs no rod but Ripley with a rule.


s: See! sportive Fate, to punish awkward pride,


s: Bids Bubo build, and sends him such a guide.


s: A standing sermon, at each year's expense,


s: That never coxcomb reached magnificence!


s: You show us, Rome was glorious, not profuse,


s: And pompous buildings once were things of use.


s: Yet shall, my lord, your just, your noble rules


s: Fill half the land with imitating fools;


s: Who random drawings from your sheets shall take,


s: Load some vain church with old theatric state,


s: Reverse your ornaments, and hang them all


s: On some patched dog-hole eked with ends of wall;


s: Then clap four slices of pilaster on 't,


s: That, laced with bits of rustic, makes a front


s: Shall call the winds through long arcades to roar,


s: Conscious they act a true Palladian part,


s: And, if they starve, they starve by rules of art.


s: Oft have you hinted to your brother peer


s: A certain truth, which many buy too dear:


s: Something there is more needful than expense,


s: And something previous even to taste--'tis sense.


s: Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven,


s: And though no science, fairly worth the seven:


s: A light, which in yourself you must perceive:


s: To build, to plant, whatever you intend,


s: To rear the column, or the arch to bend,


s: To swell the terrace, or to sink the grot;


s: But treat the goddess like a modest fair,


s: Nor over-dress, nor leave her wholly bare;


s: Let not each beauty everywhere be spied,


s: Where half the skill is decently to hide.


s: He gains all points, who pleasingly confounds,


s: Surprises, varies, and conceals the bounds.


s: That tells the waters or to rise or fall,


s: Or helps the ambitious hill the heavens to scale,


s: Or scoops in circling theatres the vale;


s: Calls in the country, catches opening glades,


s: Joins willing woods, and varies shades from shades;


s: Now breaks, or now directs, the intending lines;


s: Paints as you plant, and, as you work, designs.


s: Still follow sense, of every art the soul,


s: Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole,


s: Spontaneous beauties all around advance,


s: Start even from difficulty, strike from chance;


s: Nature shall join you; Time shall make it grow


s: Without it, proud Versailles, thy glory falls;


s: The vast parterres a thousand hands shall make;


s: Lo! Cobham comes, and floats them with a lake:


s: Or cut wide views through mountains to the plain,


s: You'll wish your hill or sheltered seat again.


s: Behold Villario's ten years' toil complete:


s: His quincunx darkens, his espaliers meet;


s: The wood supports the plain, the parts unite,


s: And strength of shade contends with strength of light;


s: With silver-quivering rills meandered o'er--


s: Tired of the scene parterres and fountains yield,


s: He finds at last he better likes a field.


s: Through his young woods how pleased Sabinus strayed,


s: Or sat delighted in the thickening shade,


s: With annual joy the reddening shoots to greet,


s: Or see the stretching branches long to meet!


s: His son's fine taste an opener vista loves,


s: Foe to the Dryads of his father's groves;


s: One boundless green, or flourished carpet views,


s: The thriving plants, ignoble broomsticks made,


s: Now sweep those alleys they were born to shade.


s: Where all cry out, "What sums are thrown away!"


s: So proud, so grand; of that stupendous air,


s: Greatness, with Timon, dwells in such a draught


s: As brings all Brobdingnag before your thought.


s: To compass this, his building is a town,


s: Who but must laugh, the master when he sees,


s: Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around!


s: The whole, a laboured quarry above ground;


s: Improves the keenness of the northern wind.


s: On every side you look, behold the wall!


s: No artful wildness to perplex the scene;


s: Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother,


s: And half the platform just reflects the other.


s: Trees cut to statues, statues thick as trees


s: With here a fountain, never to be played;


s: And there a summer-house, that knows no shade;


s: Here Amphitrite sails through myrtle bowers;


s: There gladiators fight or die in flowers;


s: Unwatered see the drooping sea-horse mourn,


s: Smit with the mighty pleasure to be seen:


s: But soft--by regular approach--not yet--


s: First through the length of yon hot terrace sweat;


s: And when up ten steep slopes you've dragged your thighs,


s: Just at his study door he'll bless your eyes.


s: His study! with what authors is it stored?


s: In books, not authors, curious is my lord;


s: To all their dated backs he turns you round:


s: These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound,


s: Lo, some are vellum, and the rest as good


s: For all his lordship knows, but they are wood.


s: For Locke or Milton 'tis in vain to look;


s: These shelves admit not any modern book.


s: And now the chapel's silver bell you hear,


s: That summons you to all the pride of prayer;


s: Light quirks of music, broken and uneven,


s: Make the soul dance upon a jig to heaven.


s: Where sprawl the saints of Verrio or Laguerre,


s: To rest, the cushion and soft Dean invite,


s: But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call;


s: A hundred footsteps scrape the marble hall:


s: The rich buffet well-coloured serpents grace,


s: And gaping Tritons spew to wash your face.


s: You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.


s: So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear


s: Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there.


s: Between each act the trembling salvers ring,


s: From soup to sweet-wine, and God bless the King.


s: In plenty starving, tantalised in state,


s: Treated, caressed, and tired, I take my leave,


s: Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve;


s: I curse such lavish cost and little skill,


s: Yet hence the poor are clothed, the hungry fed;


s: Health to himself, and to his infants bread


s: The labourer bears; what his hard heart denies


s: Embrown the slope, and nod on the parterre,


s: Deep harvests bury all his pride has planned,


s: Who then shall grace, or who improve the soil?


s: Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle.


s: And splendour borrows all her rays from sense.


s: Or makes his neighbours glad, if he increase:


s: Whose cheerful tenants bless their yearly toil,


s: Yet to their lord owe more than to the soil;


s: Whose ample lawns are not ashamed to feed


s: Whose rising forests, not for pride or show,


s: But future buildings, future navies, grow:


s: Let his plantations stretch from down to down,


s: First shade a country, and then raise a town.


s: You too proceed! make falling arts your care,


s: Jones and Palladio to themselves restore,


s: 'Till kings call forth the ideas of your mind


s: (Proud to accomplish what such hands denied)


s: Bid temples, worthier of the god, ascend;


s: Bid the broad arch the dangerous flood contain,


s: The mole projected break the roaring main;


s: Back to his bounds their subject sea command,


s: And roll obedient rivers through the land:


s: These honours peace to happy Britain brings,


s: These are imperial works, and worthy kings.


s: See the wild waste of all-devouring years!


s: With nodding arches, broken temples spread!


s: The very tombs now vanished like their dead!


s: Imperial wonders raised on nations spoiled,


s: Where mixed with slaves the groaning martyr toiled:


s: Huge theatres, that now unpeopled woods,


s: Now drained a distant country of her floods:


s: Fanes, which admiring gods with pride survey,


s: Statues of men, scarce less alive than they!


s: Some felt the silent stroke of mouldering age,


s: Barbarian blindness, Christian zeal conspire,


s: Perhaps, by its own ruins saved from flame,


s: Some buried marble half preserves a name;


s: That name the learned with fierce disputes pursue,


s: Ambition sighed: she found it vain to trust


s: The faithless column and the crumbling bust:


s: Huge moles, whose shadow stretched from shore to shore,


s: Their ruins perished, and their place no more;


s: Convinced, she now contracts her vast design,


s: And all her triumphs shrink into a coin.


s: A narrow orb each crowded conquest keeps;


s: Now scantier limits the proud arch confine,


s: And scarce are seen the prostrate Nile or Rhine;


s: A small Euphrates through the piece is rolled,


s: And little eagles wave their wings in gold.


s: The medal, faithful to its charge of fame,


s: Through climes and ages bears each form and name:


s: Gods, emperors, heroes, sages, beauties, lie.


s: With sharpened sight pale antiquaries pore,


s: The inscription value, but the rust adore.


s: This the blue varnish, that the green endears,


s: The sacred rust of twice ten hundred years!


s: To gain Pescennius one employs his schemes,


s: One grasps a Cecrops in ecstatic dreams.


s: Poor Vadius, long with learned spleen devoured,


s: Can taste no pleasure since his shield was scoured;


s: And Curio, restless by the fair one's side,


s: Sighs for an Otho, and neglects his bride.


s: Theirs is the vanity, the learning thine:


s: Touched by thy hand, again Rome's glories shine;


s: Her gods and god-like heroes rise to view,


s: Nor blush, these studies thy regard engage;


s: These pleased the fathers of poetic rage;


s: The verse and sculpture bore an equal part,


s: Oh, when shall Britain, conscious of her claim,


s: And vanquished realms supply recording gold?


s: Here, rising bold, the patriot's honest face;


s: There warriors frowning in historic brass?


s: How Plato's, Bacon's, Newton's looks agree;


s: Or in fair series laurelled bards be shown,


s: Then shall thy Craggs (and let me call him mine)


s: And round the orb in lasting notes be read,


s: "Statesmen, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere,


s: In action faithful, and in honour clear;


s: Who broke no promise, served no private end,


s: Who gained no title and who lost no friend;


s: And praised, unenvied, by the muse he loved."


s: To the first publication of this Epistle.


s: P. Shut, shut the door, good John! fatigued, I said,


s: Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm dead.


s: The dog-star rages! nay 'tis past a doubt,


s: Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand,


s: They rave, recite, and madden round the land.


s: What walls can guard me, or what shades can hide?


s: They pierce my thickets, through my grot they glide;


s: By land, by water, they renew the charge;


s: They stop the chariot, and they board the barge.


s: No place is sacred, not the Church is free;


s: Even Sunday shines no Sabbath Day to me;


s: Then from the Mint walks forth the man of rhyme,


s: Is there a parson, much bemused in beer,


s: A clerk, foredoomed his father's soul to cross,


s: Who pens a stanza when he should engross?


s: Is there, who, locked from ink and paper, scrawls


s: With desperate charcoal round his darkened walls?


s: All fly to Twitenham, and in humble strain


s: Arthur, whose giddy son neglects the laws,


s: Imputes to me and my damned works the cause:


s: Poor Cornus sees his frantic wife elope,


s: Friend to my life! (which did not you prolong,


s: What drop or nostrum can this plague remove?


s: Or which must end me, a fool's wrath or love?


s: If foes, they write, if friends, they read me dead.


s: Seized and tied down to judge, how wretched I!


s: Who can't be silent, and who will not lie.


s: To laugh, were want of goodness and of grace,


s: And to be grave, exceeds all power of face.


s: With honest anguish, and an aching head;


s: And drop at last, but in unwilling ears,


s: This saving counsel, "Keep your piece nine years."


s: "Nine years!" cries he, who high in Drury Lane,


s: Lulled by soft zephyrs through the broken pane,


s: Rhymes ere he wakes, and prints before term ends,


s: Obliged by hunger, and request of friends:


s: "The piece, you think, is incorrect? why, take it,


s: I'm all submission, what you'd have it, make it."


s: Three things another's modest wishes bound,


s: My friendship, and a prologue, and ten pound.


s: Pitholeon sends to me: "You know his Grace,


s: 'Pitholeon libelled me'--"but here's a letter


s: Informs you, sir, 'twas when he knew no better.


s: Dare you refuse him?  Curll invites to dine,


s: He'll write a journal, or he'll turn divine."


s: Bless me! a packet.--"'Tis a stranger sues,


s: If I dislike it, "Furies, death and rage!"


s: If I approve, "Commend it to the stage."


s: There (thank my stars) my whole commission ends,


s: The players and I are, luckily, no friends,


s: Fired that the house reject him, "'Sdeath I'll print it,


s: And shame the fools--Your interest, sir, with Lintot!"


s: 'Lintot, dull rogue! will think your price too much:'


s: "Not, sir, if you revise it, and retouch."


s: At last he whispers, "Do; and we go snacks."


s: Glad of a quarrel, straight I clap the door,


s: Sir, let me see your works and you no more.


s: 'Tis sung, when Midas' ears began to spring


s: (Some say his queen) was forced to speak, or burst.


s: And is not mine, my friend, a sorer case,


s: When every coxcomb perks them in my face?


s: A.  Good friend, forbear! you deal in dangerous things.


s: I'd never name queens, ministers, or kings;


s: Keep close to ears, and those let asses prick;


s: 'Tis nothing-- P. Nothing? if they bite and kick?


s: Out with it, Dunciad! let the secret pass,


s: That secret to each fool, that he's an ass:


s: The truth once told (and wherefore should we lie?)


s: You think this cruel? take it for a rule,


s: Let peals of laughter, Codrus! round thee break,


s: Thou unconcerned canst hear the mighty crack:


s: Pit, box, and gallery in convulsions hurled,


s: Thou stand'st unshook amidst a bursting world.


s: Who shames a scribbler? break one cobweb through,


s: He spins the slight, self-pleasing thread anew:


s: Throned in the centre of his thin designs,


s: Whom have I hurt? has poet yet, or peer,


s: Lost the arched eyebrow, or Parnassian sneer?


s: And has not Colley still his lord, and w***e?


s: His butchers Henley, his free-masons Moore?


s: Still Sappho--  A. Hold! for God's sake--you'll offend,


s: No names!--be calm!--learn prudence of a friend!


s: I too could write, and I am twice as tall;


s: But foes like these--  P. One flatterer's worse than all.


s: Of all mad creatures, if the learned are right,


s: It is the slaver kills, and not the bite.


s: Alas! 'tis ten times worse when they repent.


s: One from all Grubstreet will my fame defend,


s: And more abusive, calls himself my friend.


s: This prints my letters, that expects a bribe,


s: And others roar aloud, "Subscribe, subscribe."


s: There are, who to my person pay their court:


s: I cough like Horace, and, though lean, am short,


s: Ammon's great son one shoulder had too high,


s: Such Ovid's nose, and "Sir! you have an eye"--


s: All that disgraced my betters, met in me.


s: Great Homer died three thousand years ago.


s: Dipped me in ink, my parents', or my own?


s: I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.


s: The Muse but served to ease some friend, not wife,


s: To help me through this long disease, my life,


s: And teach the being you preserved, to bear.


s: But why then publish? Granville the polite,


s: And knowing Walsh, would tell me I could write;


s: Well-natured Garth, inflamed with early praise;


s: And Congreve loved, and Swift endured my lays;


s: The courtly Talbot, Somers, Sheffield, read;


s: Even mitred Rochester would nod the head,


s: And St. John's self (great Dryden's friends before)


s: Happy my studies, when by these approved!


s: Happier their author, when by these beloved!


s: From these the world will judge of men and books,


s: Not from the Burnets, Oldmixons, and Cookes.


s: Soft were my numbers; who could take offence,


s: While pure description held the place of sense?


s: Like gentle Fanny's was my flowery theme,


s: A painted mistress, or a purling stream.


s: Yet then did Gildon draw his venal quill;--


s: I wished the man a dinner, and sat still.


s: Yet then did Dennis rave in furious fret;


s: If want provoked, or madness made them print,


s: If wrong, I smiled; if right, I kissed the rod.


s: Pains, reading, study, are their just pretence,


s: And all they want is spirit, taste, and sense.


s: Commas and points they set exactly right,


s: And 'twere a sin to rob them of their mite.


s: Yet ne'er one sprig of laurel graced these ribalds,


s: From slashing Bentley down to p---g Tibalds:


s: Each wight, who reads not, and but scans and spells,


s: Each word-catcher, that lives on syllables,


s: Even such small critics some regard may claim,


s: Preserved in Milton's or in Shakespeare's name.


s: Of hairs, or straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms!


s: The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare,


s: But wonder how the devil they got there.


s: Well might they rage, I gave them but their due.


s: A man's true merit 'tis not hard to find;


s: But each man's secret standard in his mind,


s: That casting-weight pride adds to emptiness,


s: This, who can gratify? for who can guess?


s: The bard whom pilfered pastorals renown,


s: Who turns a Persian tale for half a crown,


s: Just writes to make his barrenness appear,


s: And strains, from hard-bound brains, eight lines a year;


s: He, who still wanting, though he lives on theft,


s: Steals much, spends little, yet has nothing left:


s: And he, who now to sense, now nonsense leaning,


s: Means not, but blunders round about a meaning:


s: And he, whose fustian's so sublimely bad,


s: All these, my modest satire bade translate,


s: And owned that nine such poets made a Tate.


s: How did they fume, and stamp, and roar, and chafe


s: Peace to all such! but were there one whose fires


s: True genius kindles, and fair fame inspires;


s: Blessed with each talent and each art to please,


s: And born to write, converse, and live with ease:


s: Should such a man, too fond to rule alone,


s: Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne.


s: View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes,


s: And hate for arts that caused himself to rise;


s: Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,


s: And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;


s: Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,


s: Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike;


s: A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend;


s: Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged,


s: While wits and templars every sentence raise,


s: And wonder with a foolish face of praise:--


s: Who but must laugh, if such a man there be?


s: What though my name stood rubric on the walls,


s: Or plaistered posts, with claps, in capitals?


s: Or smoking forth, a hundred hawkers' load,


s: On wings of winds came flying all abroad?


s: I sought no homage from the race that write;


s: I kept, like Asian monarchs, from their sight:


s: No more than thou, great George! a birthday song.


s: I ne'er with wits or witlings passed my days,


s: To spread about the itch of verse and praise;


s: Nor like a puppy, daggled through the town,


s: To fetch and carry sing-song up and down;


s: Nor at rehearsals sweat, and mouthed, and cried,


s: With handkerchief and orange at my side;


s: But sick of fops, and poetry, and prate,


s: Sat full-blown Bufo puffed by every quill;


s: Horace and he went hand in hand in song.


s: Received of wits an undistinguished race,


s: Who first his judgment asked, and then a place:


s: Much they extolled his pictures, much his seat,


s: And flattered every day, and some days eat:


s: Till grown more frugal in his riper days,


s: He paid some bards with port, and some with praise;


s: And others (harder still) he paid in kind.


s: Dryden alone (what wonder?) came not nigh,


s: But still the great have kindness in reserve,


s: He helped to bury whom he helped to starve.


s: May some choice patron bless each grey goose quill!


s: So, when a statesman wants a day's defence,


s: Or envy holds a whole week's war with sense,


s: Or simple pride for flattery makes demands,


s: May dunce by dunce be whistled off my hands!


s: Blessed be the great! for those they take away,


s: And those they left me; for they left me gay;


s: Of all thy blameless life the soul return


s: My verse, and Queensbury weeping o'er thy urn!


s: And see what friends, and read what books I please;


s: I was not born for courts or great affairs;


s: I pay my debts, believe, and say my prayers;


s: Why am I asked what next shall see the light?


s: Heavens! was I born for nothing but to write?


s: Has life no joys for me! or (to be grave)


s: Have I no friend to serve, no soul to save?


s: "I found him close with Swift."--'Indeed? no doubt,'


s: (Cries prating Balbus) 'something will come out.'


s: 'No, such a genius never can lie still;'


s: The first lampoon Sir Will. or Bubo makes.


s: Poor guiltless I! and can I choose but smile


s: When every coxcomb knows me by my style?


s: Cursed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow


s: That tends to make one worthy man my foe,


s: Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear!


s: But he who hurts a harmless neighbour's peace,


s: Insults fallen worth, or beauty in distress,


s: Who loves a lie, lame slander helps about,


s: That fop, whose pride affects a patron's name,


s: Yet absent, wounds an author's honest fame:


s: And show the sense of it without the love;


s: Yet wants the honour, injured, to defend;


s: Who tells whate'er you think, whate'er you say,


s: And, if he lie not, must at least betray:


s: Who to the Dean, and silver bell can swear,


s: And sees at Canons what was never there;


s: Make satire a lampoon, and fiction, lie.


s: A lash like mine no honest man shall dread,


s: But all such babbling blockheads in his stead.


s: Let Sporus tremble--  A. What? that thing of silk,


s: Sporus, that mere white curd of ass's milk,


s: P. Yet let me flap this bug with gilded wings,


s: This painted child of dirt, that stinks and stings;


s: Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys,


s: Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'er enjoys:


s: In mumbling of the game they dare not bite:


s: As shallow streams run dimpling all the way.


s: And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet squeaks;


s: Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad,


s: In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies,


s: Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies.


s: His wit all see-saw, between that and this, }


s: Now high, now low, now master up, now miss, }


s: Amphibious thing! that acting either part,


s: The trifling head or the corrupted heart,


s: Fop at the toilet, flatterer at the board,


s: Now trips a lady, and now struts a lord.


s: Eve's tempter thus the rabbins have expressed,


s: A cherub's face, a reptile all the rest;


s: Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust;


s: Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust.


s: Not fortunes worshipper, nor fashion's fool,


s: Not lucre's madman, nor ambition's tool,


s: Not proud, nor servile;--be one poet's praise,


s: That, if he pleased, he pleased by manly ways:


s: That flattery, even to kings, he held a shame,


s: And thought a lie in verse or prose the same.


s: That not in fancy's maze he wandered long:


s: But stooped to truth, and moralised his song:


s: That not for fame, but virtue's better end,


s: He stood the furious foe, the timid friend,


s: Laughed at the loss of friends he never had,


s: The dull, the proud, the wicked, and the mad;


s: The distant threats of vengeance on his head,


s: The blow unfelt, the tear he never shed;


s: The tale revived, the lie so oft o'erthrown,


s: The imputed trash, and dulness not his own;


s: The morals blackened when the writings scape,


s: The libelled person, and the pictured shape;


s: Abuse, on all he loved, or loved him, spread,


s: The whisper, that to greatness still too near,


s: Perhaps, yet vibrates, on his sovereign's ear:--


s: Welcome for thee, fair virtue! all the past;


s: For thee, fair virtue! welcome even the last!


s: A. But why insult the poor, affront the great?


s: P. A knave's a knave, to me in every state:


s: A hireling scribbler, or a hireling peer,


s: Knight of the post corrupt, or of the shire;


s: He gain his prince's ear, or lose his own.


s: Yet soft by nature, more a dupe than wit,


s: Sappho can tell you how this man was bit;


s: This dreaded satirist Dennis will confess


s: Foe to his pride, but friend to his distress:


s: So humble, he has knocked at Tibbald's door,


s: Has drunk with Cibber, nay has rhymed for Moore.


s: Full ten years slandered, did he once reply?


s: Three thousand sons went down on Welsted's lie.


s: To please a mistress one aspersed his life;


s: He lashed him not, but let her be his wife.


s: Let Budgel charge low Grubstreet on his quill,


s: And write whate'er he pleased, except his will;


s: Let the two Curlls of town and court abuse


s: His father, mother, body, soul, and muse.


s: Yet why? that father held it for a rule,


s: It was a sin to call our neighbour fool:


s: That harmless mother thought no wife a w***e:


s: Hear this, and spare his family, James Moore!


s: If there be force in virtue, or in song.


s: Of gentle blood (part shed in honour's cause


s: While yet in Britain honour had applause)


s: Each parent sprung-- A. What fortune, pray?-- P. Their own,


s: And better got, than Bestia's from the throne.


s: The good man walked innoxious through his age.


s: Nor courts he saw, no suits would ever try,


s: Unlearned he knew no schoolman's subtle art,


s: No language, but the language of the heart.


s: His life, though long, to sickness past unknown,


s: His death was instant, and without a groan.


s: O grant me thus to live, and thus to die!


s: Who sprung from kings shall know less joy than I.


s: O friend! may each domestic bliss be thine!


s: With lenient arts extend a mother's breath,


s: Make languor smile, and smooth the bed of death,


s: Explore the thought, explain the asking eye,


s: And keep a while one parent from the sky!


s: On cares like these if length of days attend,


s: May Heaven, to bless those days, preserve my friend,


s: Preserve him social, cheerful, and serene,


s: And just as rich as when he served a queen.


s: A. Whether that blessing be denied or given,


s: Thus far was right, the rest belongs to Heaven.


s: Uni aequus Virtuti atque ejus Amicis.  P.


s: P. There are (I scarce can think it, but am told),


s: There are, to whom my satire seems too bold:


s: Scarce to wise Peter complaisant enough,


s: And something said of Chartres much too rough.


s: The lines are weak another's pleased to say,


s: You'll give me, like a friend both sage and free,


s: F. I'd write no more.  P. Not write? but then I think,


s: Fools rush into my head, and so I write.


s: F. You could not do a worse thing for your life.


s: Why, if the nights seem tedious--take a wife:


s: But talk with Celsus, Celsus will advise


s: Hartshorn, or something that shall close your eyes.


s: Or, if you needs must write, write Caesar's praise,


s: You'll gain at least a knighthood, or the bays.


s: P. What? like Sir Richard, rumbling, rough, and fierce,


s: With arms, and George, and Brunswick crowd the verse,


s: Rend with tremendous sound your ears asunder,


s: With gun, drum, trumpet, blunderbuss, and thunder?


s: Or nobly wild, with Budgel's fire and force,


s: Paint angels trembling round his falling horse?


s: F. Then all your muse's softer art display,


s: Lull with Amelia's liquid name the nine,


s: And sweetly flow through all the royal line.


s: P. Alas! few verses touch their nicer ear;


s: They scarce can bear their laureate twice a year;


s: And justly Caesar scorns the poet's lays:


s: F. Better be Cibber, I'll maintain it still,


s: Than ridicule all taste, blaspheme quadrille,


s: Abuse the city's best good men in metre,


s: And laugh at peers that put their trust in Peter.


s: Even those you touch not, hate you.  P. What should ail 'em?


s: F. A hundred smart in Timon and in Balaam:


s: The fewer still you name, you wound the more;


s: P. Each mortal has his pleasure: none deny


s: Scarsdale his bottle, Darty his ham-pie;


s: The doubling lustres dance as fast as she;


s: F---- loves the senate, Hockley-hole his brother,


s: Like in all else, as one egg to another.


s: As downright Shippen, or as old Montaigne:


s: In them, as certain to be loved as seen,


s: The soul stood forth, nor kept a thought within;


s: In me what spots (for spots I have) appear,


s: Will prove at least the medium must be clear.


s: In this impartial glass, my muse intends


s: Fair to expose myself, my foes, my friends;


s: Publish the present age; but where my text


s: Is vice too high, reserve it for the next:


s: My foes shall wish my life a longer date,


s: And every friend the less lament my fate.


s: My head and heart thus flowing through my quill,


s: Verse-man or prose-man, term me which you will,


s: While Tories call me Whig, and Whigs a Tory.


s: Satire's my weapon, but I'm too discreet


s: Thieves, supercargoes, sharpers, and directors.


s: Swords, pikes, and guns, with everlasting rust!


s: Peace is my dear delight--not Fleury's more:


s: Slides into verse, and hitches in a rhyme,


s: Slander or poison dread from Delia's rage


s: Hard words or hanging, if your judge be Page.


s: From furious Sappho scarce a milder fate,


s: Plagued by her love, or libelled by her hate.


s: Its proper power to hurt, each creature feels;


s: Bulls aim their horns, and asses lift their heels;


s: 'Tis a bear's talent not to kick, but hug;


s: And no man wonders he's not stung by pug.


s: So drink with Walters, or with Chartres eat,


s: They'll never poison you, they'll only cheat.


s: Then, learned sir! (to cut the matter short)


s: Whate'er my fate, or well or ill at Court,


s: Whether old age, with faint but cheerful ray,


s: Or death's black wing already be displayed,


s: Whether the darkened room to muse invite,


s: Or whitened wall provoke the skewer to write:


s: Like Lee or Budgel, I will rhyme and print.


s: F. Alas, young man! your days can ne'er be long,


s: Plums and directors, Shylock and his wife,


s: Will club their testers, now, to take your life!


s: P. What? armed for virtue when I point the pen,


s: Brand the bold front of shameless guilty men;


s: Dash the proud gamester in his gilded car;


s: Bare the mean heart that lurks beneath a star;


s: Can there be wanting, to defend her cause,


s: Lights of the Church, or guardians of the laws?


s: Could pensioned Boileau lash in honest strain


s: Flatterers and bigots even in Louis' reign?


s: Could Laureate Dryden pimp and friar engage,


s: Yet neither Charles nor James be in a rage?


s: And I not strip the gilding off a knave,


s: Unplaced, unpensioned, no man's heir, or slave?


s: I will, or perish in the generous cause:


s: Hear this, and tremble! you, who 'scape the laws.


s: Yes, while I live, no rich or noble knave


s: Shall walk the world, in credit, to his grave.


s: To Virtue only and her friends a friend,


s: The world beside may murmur, or commend.


s: Know, all the distant din that world can keep


s: Rolls o'er my grotto, and but soothes my sleep.


s: There, my retreat the best companions grace,


s: Chiefs out of war, and statesmen out of place.


s: There St. John mingles with my friendly bowl


s: The feast of reason and the flow of soul:


s: And he, whose lightning pierced the Iberian lines,


s: Now forms my quincunx, and now ranks my vines


s: Or tames the genius of the stubborn plain,


s: Almost as quickly as he conquered Spain.


s: No pimp of pleasure, and no spy of state.


s: With eyes that pry not, tongue that ne'er repeats,


s: Fond to spread friendships, but to cover heats;


s: This, all who know me, know; who love me, tell;


s: Scribblers or peers, alike are mob to me.


s: This is my plea, on this I rest my cause--


s: What saith my counsel, learned in the laws?


s: F. Your plea is good; but still I say, beware!


s: Laws are explained by men--so have a care.


s: It stands on record, that in Richard's times


s: A man was hanged for very honest rhymes.


s: Consult the Statute: quart. I think it is,


s: See libels, satires--here you have it--read.


s: P. Libels and satires! lawless things indeed!


s: But grave epistles, bringing vice to light,


s: Such as a king might read, a bishop write;


s: Such as Sir Robert would approve--  F. Indeed?


s: The case is altered--you may then proceed;


s: In such a cause the plaintiff would be hissed;


s: My lords the judges laugh, and you're dismissed.


s: What, and how great, the virtue and the art


s: (A doctrine sage, but truly none of mine),


s: Let's talk, my friends, but talk before we dine.


s: Not when a gilt buffet's reflected pride


s: Not when from plate to plate your eyeballs roll,


s: And the brain dances to the mantling bowl.


s: Hear Bethel's sermon, one not versed in schools,


s: But strong in sense, and wise without the rules.


s: Go work, hunt, exercise! (he thus began)


s: Your wine locked up, your butler strolled abroad,


s: Or fish denied (the river yet unthawed),


s: If then plain bread and milk will do the feat,


s: The pleasure lies in you, and not the meat.


s: Preach as I please, I doubt our curious men


s: Will choose a pheasant still before a hen;


s: Except you eat the feathers green and gold.


s: Of carps and mullets why prefer the great


s: (Though cut in pieces ere my lord can eat),


s: Yet for small turbots such esteem profess?


s: Because God made these large, the other less.


s: Oldfield with more than harpy throat endued,


s: Cries "Send me, gods! a whole hog barbecued!


s: Oh, b---- it, south-winds! till a stench exhale


s: Rank as the ripeness of a rabbit's tail.


s: By what criterion do ye eat, d'ye think,


s: If this is prized for sweetness, that for stink?"


s: When the tired glutton labours through a treat,


s: He finds no relish in the sweetest meat,


s: He calls for something bitter, something sour,


s: And the rich feast concludes extremely poor:


s: Cheap eggs, and herbs, and olives still we see;


s: The robin-redbreast till of late had rest,


s: And children sacred held a martin's nest,


s: To one that was, or would have been a peer.


s: Or even to crack live crawfish recommend;


s: I'd never doubt at Court to make a friend.


s: 'Tis yet in vain, I own, to keep a pother


s: About one vice, and fall into the other:


s: Plain, but not sordid; though not splendid, clean.


s: Sell their presented partridges, and fruits,


s: And humbly live on rabbits and on roots:


s: One half-pint bottle serves them both to dine,


s: But on some lucky day (as when they found


s: A lost bank-bill, or heard their son was drowned)


s: Is what two souls so generous cannot bear:


s: Oil, though it stink, they drop by drop impart,


s: But souse the cabbage with a bounteous heart.


s: He knows to live, who keeps the middle state,


s: And neither leans on this side, nor on that;


s: Nor stops, for one bad cork, his butler's pay,


s: Swears, like Albutius, a good cook away;


s: Nor lets, like Naevius, every error pass,


s: The musty wine, foul cloth, or greasy glass.


s: Now hear what blessings temperance can bring:


s: (Thus said our friend, and what he said I sing,)


s: First health: The stomach (crammed from every dish,


s: A tomb of boiled and roast, and flesh and fish,


s: Where bile, and wind, and phlegm, and acid jar,


s: Remembers oft the schoolboy's simple fare,


s: The temperate sleeps, and spirits light as air.


s: How pale, each worshipful and reverend guest


s: What heavenly particle inspires the clay?


s: The soul subsides, and wickedly inclines


s: To seem but mortal, even in sound divines.


s: On morning wings how active springs the mind


s: That leaves the load of yesterday behind!


s: Or tired in search of truth, or search of rhyme;


s: Ill health some just indulgence may engage,


s: And more the sickness of long life, old age;


s: For fainting age what cordial drop remains,


s: If our intemperate youth the vessel drains?


s: Our fathers praised rank venison.  You suppose,


s: Perhaps, young men! our fathers had no nose.


s: Not so: a buck was then a week's repast,


s: And 'twas their point, I ween, to make it last;


s: More pleased to keep it till their friends could come,


s: Than eat the sweetest by themselves at home.


s: Why had not I in those good times my birth,


s: Ere coxcomb pies or coxcombs were on earth?


s: (For 'faith, Lord Fanny! you are in the wrong


s: The world's good word is better than a song)


s: Who has not learned fresh sturgeon and ham-pie


s: Cursed by thy neighbours, thy trustees, thyself,


s: To friends, to fortune, to mankind a shame,


s: Think how posterity will treat thy name;


s: And buy a rope, that future times may tell,


s: Thou hast at least bestowed one penny well.


s: "Right," cries his lordship, "for a rogue in need


s: In me 'tis noble, suits my birth and state,


s: My wealth unwieldy, and my heap too great."


s: Then, like the sun, let bounty spread her ray,


s: Oh, impudence of wealth! with all thy store,


s: How dar'st thou let one worthy man be poor?


s: Shall half the new-built churches round thee fall?


s: Make quays, build bridges, or repair Whitehall:


s: Or to thy country let that heap be lent,


s: As M**o's was, but not at five per cent.


s: Who thinks that Fortune cannot change her mind,


s: Prepares a dreadful jest for all mankind.


s: And who stands safest? tell me, is it he


s: That spreads and swells in puffed posterity,


s: Or blest with little, whose preventing care


s: In peace provides fit arms against a war?


s: Thus Bethel spoke, who always speaks his thought,


s: And always thinks the very thing he ought:


s: In South-Sea days not happier, when surmised


s: The lord of thousands, than if now excised;


s: But ancient friends (though poor, or out of play)


s: 'Tis true, no turbots dignify my boards,


s: But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames affords:


s: To Hounslow Heath I point and Banstead Down,


s: Thence comes your mutton, and these chicks my own:


s: From yon old walnut-tree a shower shall fall;


s: And grapes, long lingering on my only wall,


s: And figs from standard and espalier join;


s: Then cheerful healths (your mistress shall have place),


s: And, what's more rare, a poet shall say grace.


s: Fortune not much of humbling me can boast;


s: Though double taxed, how little have I lost?


s: My life's amusements have been just the same,


s: Before, and after, standing armies came.


s: My lands are sold, my father's house is gone;


s: I'll hire another's; is not that my own,


s: And yours, my friends? through whose free-opening gate


s: None comes too early, none departs too late;


s: (For I, who hold sage Homer's rule the best,


s: Welcome the coming, speed the going guest).


s: "Pray Heaven it last!" (cries Swift!) "as you go on;


s: I wish to God this house had been your own:


s: Why, you'll enjoy it only all your life."


s: Well, if the use be mine, can it concern one,


s: Whether the name belong to Pope or Vernon?


s: What's property? dear Swift! you see it alter


s: From you to me, from me to Peter Walter;


s: Or, in a mortgage, prove a lawyer's share;


s: Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir;


s: The Chancery takes your rents for twenty year:


s: At best, it falls to some ungracious son,


s: Who cries, "My father's damned, and all's my own."


s: Shades, that to Bacon could retreat afford,


s: And Hemsley, once proud Buckingham's delight,


s: Let lands and houses have what lords they will,


s: Let us be fixed, and our own masters still.


s: St. John, whose love indulged my labours past,


s: Matures my present, and shall bound my last!


s: Why will you break the Sabbath of my days?


s: See, modest Cibber now has left the stage:


s: Our generals now, retired to their estates,


s: Hang their old trophies o'er the garden gates,


s: In life's cool evening satiate of applause,


s: Nor fond of bleeding, even in Brunswick's cause.


s: A voice there is, that whispers in my ear,


s: ('Tis Reason's voice, which sometimes one can hear)


s: "Friend Pope, be prudent, let your muse take breath,


s: Lest stiff and stately, void of fire or force,


s: You limp, like Blackmore, on a lord mayor's horse."


s: Farewell then verse, and love, and every toy,


s: The rhymes and rattles of the man or boy;


s: What right, what true, what fit we justly call,


s: Let this be all my care--for this is all.


s: To lay this harvest up, and hoard with haste


s: What every day will want, and most, the last.


s: As drives the storm, at any door I knock:


s: And house with Montaigne now, or now with Locke.


s: Mix with the world, and battle for the State,


s: Free as young Lyttelton, her cause pursue,


s: Still true to virtue, and as warm as true:


s: Indulge my candour, and grow all to all;


s: Long, as to him who works for debt, the day,


s: Long as the night to her whose love's away,


s: Long as the year's dull circle seems to run,


s: When the brisk minor pants for twenty-one:


s: That lock up all the functions of my soul;


s: That keep me from myself; and still delay


s: Life's instant business to a future day:


s: That task, which as we follow, or despise,


s: The eldest is a fool, the youngest wise;


s: Which done, the poorest can no wants endure;


s: And which not done, the richest must be poor.


s: And feel some comfort, not to be a fool.


s: Weak though I am of limb, and short of sight,


s: To keep these limbs, and to preserve these eyes.


s: And men must walk at least before they dance.


s: Say, does thy blood rebel, thy bosom move


s: With wretched avarice, or as wretched love?


s: Know, there are words and spells, which can control


s: Between the fits this fever of the soul:


s: Know, there are rhymes, which fresh and fresh applied


s: Will cure the arrant'st puppy of his pride.


s: Be furious, envious, slothful, mad, or drunk,


s: A Switz, a High Dutch, or a Low Dutch bear;


s: And the first wisdom, to be fool no more.


s: But to the world no bugbear is so great,


s: See him, with pains of body, pangs of soul,


s: Burn through the Tropic, freeze beneath the pole!


s: To stop thy foolish views, thy long desires,


s: And ease thy heart of all that it admires?


s: Here, wisdom calls: "Seek virtue first, be bold!


s: There, London's voice: "Get money, money still!


s: And then let virtue follow, if she will."


s: This, this the saving doctrine, preached to all,


s: From low St. James's up to high St. Paul;


s: From him whose quills stand quivered at his ear,


s: To him who notches sticks at Westminster.


s: Barnard in spirit, sense, and truth abounds;


s: "Pray then, what wants he?" fourscore thousand pounds;


s: As Bug now has, and Dorimant would have.


s: Barnard, thou art a Cit, with all thy worth;


s: But Bug and D * l, their honours, and so forth.


s: "Virtue, brave boys! 'tis virtue makes a king."


s: True, conscious honour is to feel no sin,


s: He's armed without that's innocent within;


s: Be this thy screen, and this thy wall of brass;


s: And say, to which shall our applause belong,


s: This new Court jargon, or the good old song?


s: Or what was spoke at Cressy and Poitiers?


s: Who counsels best? who whispers, "Be but great,


s: With praise or infamy leave that to fate;


s: Get place and wealth, if possible, with grace;


s: If not, by any means get wealth and place--"


s: For what? to have a box where eunuchs sing,


s: Or he, who bids thee face with steady view }


s: Proud fortune, and look shallow greatness through: }


s: And, while he bids thee, sets th' example too? }


s: Should chance to make the well-dressed rabble stare;


s: If honest S * z take scandal at a spark,


s: That less admires the palace than the park:


s: Faith I shall give the answer Reynard gave:


s: "I cannot like, dread sir, your royal cave:


s: Full many a beast goes in, but none come out."


s: Adieu to virtue, if you're once a slave:


s: Send her to Court, you send her to her grave.


s: Can they direct what measures to pursue,


s: Who know themselves so little what to do?


s: Just half the land would buy, and half be sold:


s: Their country's wealth our mightier misers drain,


s: Or cross, to plunder provinces, the main;


s: The rest, some farm the poor-box, some the pews;


s: Some keep assemblies, and would keep the stews;


s: Some win rich widows by their chine and brawn;


s: While with the silent growth of ten per cent.


s: In dirt and darkness, hundreds stink content.


s: Of all these ways, if each pursues his own,


s: Satire be kind, and let the wretch alone:


s: Sir Job sailed forth, the evening bright and still,


s: "No place on earth," he cried, "like Greenwich Hill!"


s: Up starts a palace; lo, th' obedient base }


s: Slopes at its foot, the woods its sides embrace, }


s: The silver Thames reflects its marble face. }


s: Now let some whimsy, or that devil within }


s: Which guides all those who know not what they mean, }


s: But give the knight (or give his lady) spleen; }


s: "Away, away! take all your scaffolds down,


s: For snug's the word: my dear! we'll live in town."


s: At amorous Flavio is the stocking thrown?


s: The fool, whose wife elopes some thrice a quarter,


s: Transform themselves so strangely as the rich? }


s: Well, but the poor--the poor have the same itch; }


s: They change their weekly barber, weekly news,


s: Discharge their garrets, move their beds, and run


s: (They know not whither) in a chaise and one;


s: They hire their sculler, and when once aboard,


s: Grow sick, and damn the climate--like a lord.


s: You laugh, half beau, half sloven if I stand,


s: My wig all powder, and all snuff my band;


s: You laugh, if coat and breeches strangely vary,


s: White gloves, and linen worthy Lady Mary!


s: But when no prelate's lawn with hair-shirt lined,


s: When (each opinion with the next at strife,


s: One ebb and flow of follies all my life)


s: I plant, root up; I build, and then confound;


s: Turn round to square, and square again to round;


s: You never change one muscle of your face,


s: You think this madness but a common case,


s: Nor once to Chancery, nor to Hale apply;


s: Is this my guide, philosopher, and Friend?


s: This, he who loves me, and who ought to mend?


s: Who ought to make me (what he can, or none),


s: That man divine whom wisdom calls her own;


s: Great without title, without fortune blessed;


s: Rich even when plundered, honoured while oppressed;


s: Loved without youth, and followed without power;


s: At home, though exiled; free, though in the Tower;


s: In short, that reasoning, high, immortal thing,


s: Just less than Jove, and much above a king,


s: Nay, half in heaven--except (what's mighty odd)


s: To make men happy, and to keep them so."


s: (Plain truth, dear Murray, needs no flowers of speech,


s: So take it in the very words of Creech.)


s: This vault of air, this congregated ball,


s: Self-centred sun, and stars that rise and fall,


s: There are, my friend! whose philosophic eyes


s: Look through, and trust the ruler with his skies,


s: To him commit the hour, the day, the year,


s: And view this dreadful all without a fear.


s: Admire we, then, what earth's low entrails hold, }


s: Arabian shores, or Indian seas infold. }


s: All the mad trade of fools and slaves for gold? }


s: The mob's applauses, or the gifts of kings?


s: Say with what eyes we ought at courts to gaze,


s: If weak the pleasure that from these can spring,


s: The fear to want them is as weak a thing:


s: Whether we joy or grieve, the same the curse,


s: Surprised at better, or surprised at worse.


s: Th' unbalanced mind, and snatch the man away;


s: For virtue's self may too much zeal be had;


s: Go then, and if you can, admire the state


s: Of beaming diamonds, and reflected plate;


s: And gaze on Parian charms with learned eyes:


s: Be struck with bright brocade, or Tyrian dye,


s: If not so pleased, at council-board rejoice,


s: To see their judgments hang upon thy voice;


s: From morn to night, at senate, rolls, and hall,


s: Plead much, read more, dine late, or not at all.


s: But wherefore all this labour, all this strife?


s: Shall one whom nature, learning, birth, conspired


s: Sigh, while his Chloe blind to wit and worth


s: Weds the rich dulness of some son of earth?


s: Yet time ennobles, or degrades each line;


s: It brightened Craggs's, and may darken thine:


s: And what is fame? the meanest have their day,


s: The greatest can but blaze and pass away.


s: Graced as thou art, with all the power of words,


s: So known, so honoured, at the House of Lords:


s: (More silent far) where kings and poets lie;


s: Where Murray (long enough his country's pride)


s: Shall be no more than Tully, or than Hyde!


s: Racked with sciatics, martyred with the stone,


s: See Ward by battered beaux invited over,


s: And desperate misery lays hold on Dover.


s: The case is easier in the mind's disease;


s: There all men may be cured, whene'er they please,


s: Would ye be blest? despise low joys, low gains; }


s: Be virtuous and be happy for your pains. }


s: But art thou one, whom new opinions sway,


s: One who believes as Tindal leads the way,


s: Thinks that but words, and this but brick and stones?


s: Fly then on all the wings of wild desire,


s: Is wealth thy passion?  Hence! from pole to pole,


s: Where winds can carry, or where waves can roll,


s: Prevent the greedy, and out-bid the bold:


s: Advance thy golden mountain to the skies;


s: On the broad base of fifty thousand rise,


s: Add one round hundred, and (if that's not fair)


s: Add fifty more, and bring it to a square.


s: For, mark th' advantage; just so many score


s: Will gain a wife with half as many more,


s: Procure her beauty, make that beauty chaste,


s: And then such friends--as cannot fail to last.


s: A man of wealth is dubbed a man of worth,


s: Venus shall give him form, and Antis birth.


s: (Believe me, many a German Prince is worse,


s: Who proud of pedigree, is poor of purse.)


s: His wealth brave Timon gloriously confounds;


s: Asked for a groat, he gives a hundred pounds;


s: Or if three ladies like a luckless play,


s: Takes the whole house upon the poet's day.


s: Not for yourself, but for your fools and knaves:


s: Something, which for your honour they may cheat,


s: And which it much becomes you to forget.


s: If wealth alone then make and keep us blest,


s: Still, still be getting, never, never rest.


s: But if to power and place your passion lie,


s: Then hire a slave, or (if you will) a lord


s: To do the honours, and to give the word;


s: Tell at your levee, as the crowds approach,


s: To whom to nod, whom take into your coach,


s: Whom honour with your hand: to make remarks,


s: Who rules in Cornwall, or who rules in Berks:


s: "This may be troublesome, is near the chair;


s: That makes three members, this can choose a mayor."


s: Instructed thus, you bow, embrace, protest, }


s: Adopt him son, or cousin at the least, }


s: Then turn about, and laugh at your own jest. }


s: If to live well means nothing but to eat;


s: Up, up! cries gluttony, 'tis break of day,


s: Go drive the deer, and drag the finny prey;


s: With hounds and horns go hunt an appetite--


s: So Russel did, but could not eat at night,


s: Called happy dog! the beggar at his door,


s: And envied thirst and hunger to the poor.


s: Through taverns, stews, and bagnios take our round,


s: Go dine with Chartres, in each vice out-do


s: From Latian Syrens, French Circean feasts,


s: Return well travelled, and transformed to beasts.


s: And Swift cry wisely, "Vive la Bagatelle!"


s: The man that loves and laughs, must sure do well.


s: E'en take the counsel which I gave you first:


s: Why do, I'll follow them with all my heart.


s: This Epistle will show the learned World to have fallen into Two


s: While you, great patron of mankind! sustain


s: The balanced world, and open all the main;


s: Your country, chief, in arms abroad defend,


s: At home, with morals, arts, and laws amend;


s: How shall the muse from such a monarch, steal


s: An hour, and not defraud the public weal?


s: Edward and Henry, now the boast of fame,


s: And virtuous Alfred, a more sacred name,


s: Ambition humbled, mighty cities stormed,


s: Our laws established, and the world reformed;


s: Closed their long glories with a sigh, to find


s: Th' unwilling gratitude of base mankind!


s: Finds envy never conquered but by death.


s: Had still this monster to subdue at last.


s: Sure fate of all, beneath whose rising ray


s: Oppressed we feel the beam directly beat,


s: Those suns of glory please not till they set.


s: To thee, the world its present homage pays,


s: The harvest early, but mature the praise:


s: Great friend of liberty! in kings a name


s: Whose word is truth, as sacred and revered,


s: As heaven's own oracles from altars heard.


s: Wonder of kings! like whom, to mortal eyes


s: None e'er has risen, and none e'er shall rise.


s: Your people, sir, are partial in the rest:


s: Foes to all living worth except your own,


s: Authors, like coins, grow dear as they grow old;


s: Chaucer's worst ribaldry is learned by rote,


s: And beastly Skelton heads of houses quote:


s: One likes no language but the Faery Queen;


s: A Scot will fight for Christ's Kirk o' the Green:


s: And each true Briton is to Ben so civil,


s: He swears the Muses met him at the devil.


s: Though justly Greece her eldest sons admires,


s: Why should not we be wiser than our sires?


s: We build, we paint, we sing, we dance as well,


s: And learned Athens to our art must stoop,


s: Could she behold us tumbling through a hoop.


s: If time improve our wit as well as wine,


s: Shall we or shall we not account him so,


s: End all dispute; and fix the year precise


s: When British bards begin t' immortalise?


s: I hold that wit a classic, good in law."


s: Suppose he wants a year, will you compound;


s: And shall we deem him ancient, right and sound,


s: "We shall not quarrel for a year or two;


s: Then by the rule that made the horse-tail bear,


s: I pluck out year by year, as hair by hair,


s: And melt down ancients like a heap of snow:


s: While you to measure merits, look in Stowe,


s: Shakespeare (whom you and every play-house bill


s: Style the divine, the matchless, what you will)


s: For gain, not glory, winged his roving flight,


s: Ben, old and poor, as little seemed to heed


s: The life to come, in every poet's creed.


s: Who now reads Cowley? if he pleases yet,


s: But still I love the language of his heart.


s: "Yet surely, surely, these were famous men!


s: What boy but hears the sayings of old Ben?


s: In all debates where Critics bears a part,


s: Not one but nods, and talks of Jonson's art,


s: Of Shakespeare's nature, and of Cowley's wit;


s: How Beaumont's judgment checked what Fletcher writ;


s: But for the passions, Southern sure and Rowe.


s: These, only these, support the crowded stage,


s: From eldest Heywood down to Cibber's age."


s: All this may be; the people's voice is odd,


s: And yet deny the careless husband praise.


s: But let them own, that greater faults than we


s: They had, and greater virtues, I'll agree.


s: And Sidney's verse halts ill on Roman feet:


s: Milton's strong pinion now not Heaven can bound,


s: Now serpent-like, in prose he sweeps the ground,


s: And God the Father turns a school divine.


s: Not that I'd lop the beauties from his book,


s: Like slashing Bentley with his desperate hook,


s: Or damn all Shakespeare, like the affected fool


s: At court, who hates whate'er he read at school.


s: But for the wits of either Charles's days,


s: The mob of gentlemen who wrote with ease;


s: Sprat, Carew, Sedley, and a hundred more,


s: (Like twinkling stars the miscellanies o'er)


s: Or lengthened thought that gleams through many a page,


s: When works are censured, not as bad but new;


s: While if our elders break all reason's laws,


s: These fools demand not pardon, but applause.


s: On Avon's bank, where flowers eternal blow,


s: Which Betterton's grave action dignified,


s: Or well-mouthed Booth with emphasis proclaims,


s: (Though but, perhaps, a muster-roll of names)


s: And swear, all shame is lost in George's age!


s: You'd think no fools disgraced the former reign,


s: Who scorn a lad should teach his father skill,


s: And, having once been wrong, will be so still.


s: He, who to seem more deep than you or I,


s: Mistake him not; he envies, not admires,


s: And to debase the sons, exalts the sires.


s: What then was new, what had been ancient now?


s: In days of ease, when now the weary sword


s: Was sheathed, and luxury with Charles restored;


s: In every taste of foreign courts improved,


s: "All, by the king's example, lived and loved."


s: Then peers grew proud in horsemanship t' excel,


s: Newmarket's glory rose, as Britain's fell;


s: The soldier breathed the gallantries of France,


s: And every flowery courtier wrote romance.


s: Then marble, softened into life, grew warm:


s: And yielding metal flowed to human form:


s: The sleepy eye, that spoke the melting soul.


s: No wonder then, when all was love and sport,


s: The willing Muses were debauched at court:


s: On each enervate string they taught the note


s: To pant, or tremble through an eunuch's throat.


s: But Britain, changeful as a child at play,


s: Now calls in princes, and now turns away.


s: Now Whig, now Tory, what we loved we hate;


s: Now all for pleasure, now for Church and State;


s: Time was, a sober Englishman would knock


s: His servants up, and rise by five o'clock,


s: And send his wife to church, his son to school.


s: To worship like his fathers, was his care;


s: To teach their frugal virtues to his heir;


s: Now times are changed, and one poetic itch


s: Has seized the court and city, poor and rich:


s: Sons, sires, and grandsires, all will wear the bays,


s: Our wives read Milton, and our daughters plays,


s: Not ----'s self e'er tells more fibs than I;


s: When sick of Muse, our follies we deplore,


s: And promise our best friends to rhyme no more;


s: And call for pen and ink to show our wit.


s: He served a 'prenticeship, who sets up shop;


s: Ward tried on puppies, and the poor, his drop;


s: Even Radcliff's doctors travel first to France,


s: Nor dare to practise till they've learned to dance.


s: Who builds a bridge that never drove a pile?


s: (Should Ripley venture, all the world would smile)


s: But those who cannot write, and those who can,


s: All rhyme, and scrawl, and scribble, to a man.


s: Yet, sir, reflect, the mischief is not great;


s: These madmen never hurt the Church or State;


s: And rarely av'rice taints the tuneful mind.


s: He ne'er rebels, or plots, like other men:


s: Flight of cashiers, or mobs, he'll never mind;


s: And knows no losses while the Muse is kind.


s: To cheat a friend, or ward, he leaves to Peter;


s: The good man heaps up nothing but mere metre,


s: Enjoys his garden and his book in quiet;


s: Who says in verse what others say in prose;


s: Yet let me show, a poet's of some weight,


s: And (though no soldier) useful to the State.


s: What will a child learn sooner than a song?


s: What better teach a foreigner the tongue?


s: What's long or short, each accent where to place,


s: And speak in public with some sort of grace?


s: I scarce can think him such a worthless thing,


s: Unless he praise some monster of a king;


s: And in our own (excuse some courtly stains)


s: He, from the taste obscene reclaims our youth,


s: And sets the passions on the side of truth,


s: Forms the soft bosom with the gentlest art,


s: And pours each human virtue in the heart.


s: Let Ireland tell, how wit upheld her cause,


s: Her trade supported, and supplied her laws;


s: And leave on Swift this grateful verse engraved:


s: 'The rights a court attacked, a poet saved.'


s: Behold the hand that wrought a nation's cure,


s: Proud vice to brand, or injured worth adorn,


s: Not but there are, who merit other palms;


s: Hopkins and Sternhold glad the heart with psalms:


s: The boys and girls whom charity maintains,


s: Implore your help in these pathetic strains:


s: How could devotion touch the country pews,


s: Verse cheers their leisure, verse assists their work,


s: Verse prays for peace, or sings down Pope and Turk.


s: The silenced preacher yields to potent strain,


s: And feels that grace his prayer besought in vain;


s: The blessing thrills through all the lab'ring throng,


s: Patient of labour when the end was rest,


s: Indulged the day that housed their annual grain,


s: With feasts, and off'rings, and a thankful strain:


s: The joy their wives, their sons, and servants share,


s: Ease of their toil, and partners of their care:


s: The laugh, the jest, attendants on the bowl,


s: Smoothed every brow, and opened every soul:


s: With growing years the pleasing licence grew,


s: But times corrupt, and Nature, ill-inclined,


s: Produced the point that left a sting behind;


s: Till friend with friend, and families at strife,


s: Triumphant malice raged through private life.


s: Who felt the wrong, or feared it, took th' alarm,


s: Appealed to law, and justice lent her arm.


s: At length, by wholesome dread of statutes bound,


s: The poets learned to please, and not to wound:


s: Most warped to flatt'ry's side; but some more nice,


s: Preserved the freedom, and forebore the vice.


s: Hence satire rose, that just the medium hit,


s: And heals with morals what it hurts with wit.


s: We conquered France, but felt our captive's charms;


s: Her arts victorious triumphed o'er our arms;


s: Wit grew polite, and numbers learned to flow.


s: Waller was smooth; but Dryden taught to join }


s: The varying verse, the full-resounding line, }


s: The long majestic march, and energy divine. }


s: Though still some traces of our rustic vein


s: And splay-foot verse, remained, and will remain.


s: Late, very late, correctness grew our care,


s: When the tired nation breathed from civil war.


s: Exact Racine, and Corneille's noble fire,


s: Showed us that France had something to admire.


s: And full in Shakespeare, fair in Otway shone:


s: And fluent Shakespeare scarce effaced a line.


s: The last and greatest art, the art to blot.


s: Some doubt, if equal pains, or equal fire


s: The labour greater, as th' indulgence less.


s: Observe how seldom even the best succeed:


s: Tell me if Congreve's fools are fools indeed?


s: What pert, low dialogue has Farquhar writ!


s: How Van wants grace, who never wanted wit!


s: The stage how loosely does Astraea tread,


s: And idle Cibber, how he breaks the laws,


s: To make poor Pinky eat with vast applause!


s: But fill their purse, our poet's work is done,


s: On fame's mad voyage by the wind of praise,


s: With what a shifting gale your course you ply,


s: For ever sunk too low, or borne too high!


s: Who pants for glory finds but short repose,


s: A breath revives him, or a breath o'erthrows.


s: Farewell the stage! if just as thrives the play,


s: The silly bard grows fat, or falls away.


s: A senseless, worthless, and unhonoured crowd;


s: Who, to disturb their betters mighty proud,


s: Clatt'ring their sticks before ten lines are spoke,


s: Call for the farce, the bear, or the black-joke.


s: What dear delight to Britons farce affords!


s: Ever the taste of mobs, but now of lords;


s: (Taste, that eternal wanderer, which flies


s: From heads to ears, and now from ears to eyes).


s: The play stands still; damn action and discourse,


s: Back fly the scenes, and enter foot and horse;


s: Pageants on pageants, in long order drawn,


s: Peers, Heralds, Bishops, ermine, gold, and lawn;


s: The champion too! and, to complete the jest,


s: Old Edward's armour beams on Cibber's breast,


s: The people, sure, the people are the sight!


s: Ah luckless poet! stretch thy lungs and roar,


s: That bear or elephant shall heed thee more;


s: While all its throats the gallery extends,


s: Loud as the wolves, on Orcas' stormy steep,


s: Howl to the roarings of the Northern deep,


s: Such is the shout, the long-applauding note,


s: At Quin's high plume, or Oldfield's petticoat;


s: Or when from court a birthday suit bestowed,


s: Sinks the lost actor in the tawdry load.


s: What shook the stage, and made the people stare?


s: Cato's long wig, flowered gown, and lacquered chair.


s: Yet lest you think I rally more than teach,


s: Let me for once presume t' instruct the times,


s: To know the poet from the man of rhymes:


s: 'Tis he, who gives my breast a thousand pains,


s: Can make me feel each passion that he feigns;


s: Enrage, compose, with more than magic art,


s: With pity, and with terror, tear my heart;


s: And snatch me, o'er the earth, or through the air,


s: To Thebes, to Athens, when he will, and where.


s: Alone, deserves the favour of the great;


s: Think of those authors, sir, who would rely


s: More on a reader's sense, than gazer's eye.


s: Or who shall wander where the Muses sing?


s: Who climb their mountain, or who taste their spring?


s: When Merlin's cave is half unfurnished yet?


s: My liege! why writers little claim your thought,


s: I guess; and, with their leave, will tell the fault:


s: Of all mankind, the creatures most absurd:


s: The season, when to come, and when to go,


s: To sing, or cease to sing, we never know;


s: And if we will recite nine hours in ten,


s: You lose your patience, just like other men.


s: Then too we hurt ourselves, when to defend


s: A single verse, we quarrel with a friend;


s: Repeat unasked; lament, the wit's too fine


s: For vulgar eyes, and point out every line.


s: But most, when straining with too weak a wing,


s: We needs will write epistles to the King;


s: Expect a place, or pension from the Crown;


s: Or dubbed historians, by express command,


s: T' enrol your triumphs o'er the seas and land,


s: Be called to Court to plan some work divine,


s: Yet think, great sir! (so many virtues shown)


s: Ah think, what poet best may make them known?


s: Or choose at least some minister of grace,


s: Fit to bestow the laureate's weighty place.


s: Charles, to late times to be transmitted fair,


s: And great Nassau to Kneller's hand decreed


s: To fix him graceful on the bounding steed;


s: So well in paint and stone they judged of merit:


s: But kings in wit may want discerning spirit.


s: The hero William and the martyr Charles,


s: One knighted Blackmore, and one pensioned Quarles;


s: Which made old Ben, and surly Dennis swear,


s: "No Lord's anointed, but a Russian bear."


s: Not with such majesty, such bold relief,


s: The forms august, of king, or conquering chief,


s: E'er swelled on marble; as in verse have shined


s: (In polished verse) the manners and the mind.


s: Your arms, your actions, your repose to sing!


s: What seas you traversed, and what fields you fought!


s: Your country's peace, how oft, how dearly bought!


s: How barb'rous rage subsided at your word,


s: And nations wondered while they dropped the sword!


s: How, when you nodded, o'er the land and deep,


s: Peace stole her wing, and wrapped the world in sleep;


s: Till earth's extremes your mediation own,


s: And Asia's tyrants tremble at your throne--


s: But most of all, the zeal of fools in rhyme.


s: That when I aim at praise, they say I bite.


s: There's nothing blackens like the ink of fools.


s: If true, a woeful likeness; and if lies,


s: "Praise undeserved is scandal in disguise:"


s: Well may he blush, who gives it, or receives;


s: (Like journals, odes, and such forgotten things


s: As Eusden, Philips, Settle, writ of kings)


s: Clothe spice, line trunks, or, flutt'ring in a row,


s: "Ludentis speciem dabit, et torquebitur."  HOR. (v.124.)


s: Dear Colonel, Cobham's and your country's friend!


s: You love a verse, take such as I can send.


s: A Frenchman comes, presents you with his boy,


s: Bows and begins--"This lad, sir, is of Blois:


s: Observe his shape how clean! his locks how curled!


s: My only son, I'd have him see the world:


s: His French is pure; his voice too--you shall hear.


s: Sir, he's your slave for twenty pound a year.


s: Mere wax as yet, you fashion him with ease,


s: Your barber, cook, upholsterer, what you please:


s: To say too much might do my honour wrong.


s: Take him with all his virtues, on my word;


s: But, sir, to you, with what would I not part?


s: Though faith, I fear 'twill break his mother's heart.


s: Once (and but once) I caught him in a lie,


s: And then, unwhipped, he had the grace to cry:


s: (Could you o'erlook but that) it is to steal."


s: If, after this, you took the graceless lad,


s: Could you complain, my friend, he proved so bad?


s: Faith, in such case, if you should prosecute,


s: I think Sir Godfrey should decide the suit:


s: Who sent the thief that stole the cash away,


s: And punished him that put it in his way.


s: Consider then, and judge me in this light;


s: I told you when I went, I could not write;


s: You said the same; and are you discontent


s: With laws to which you gave your own assent?


s: Nay worse, to ask for verse at such a time!


s: D'ye think me good for nothing but to rhyme?


s: Had dearly earned a little purse of gold;


s: Tired with a tedious march, one luckless night,


s: He slept, poor dog! and lost it to a doit.


s: This put the man in such a desperate mind, }


s: Between revenge, and grief, and hunger joined }


s: Against the foe, himself, and all mankind, }


s: He leaped the trenches, scaled a castle wall,


s: Tore down a standard, took the fort and all.


s: "Prodigious well," his great commander cried,


s: Gave him much praise and some reward beside.


s: Next pleased his excellence a town to batter:


s: (Its name I know not, and it's no great matter).


s: "Go on, my friend," he cried, "see yonder walls,


s: Advance and conquer! go where glory calls!


s: More honours, more rewards attend the brave."


s: "D'ye think me, noble general, such a sot?


s: Let him take castles who has ne'er a groat."


s: To read in Greek the wrath of Peleus' son.


s: Besides, my father taught me from a lad,


s: The better art to know the good from bad:


s: To hunt for truth in Maudlin's learned grove).


s: But knottier points we knew not half so well,


s: And certain laws, by sufferers thought unjust,


s: Hopes after hopes of pious Papists failed,


s: While mighty William's thundering arm prevailed,


s: But (thanks to Homer) since I live and thrive,


s: Sure I should want the care of ten Monroes,


s: Years following years, steal something every day,


s: At last they steal us from ourselves away;


s: In one a mistress drops, in one a friend:


s: This subtle thief of life, this paltry time,


s: What will it leave me, if it snatch my rhyme?


s: That turned ten thousand verses, now stands still?


s: But after all, what would you have me do?


s: When out of twenty I can please not two;


s: When this heroics only deigns to praise,


s: Sharp satire that, and that Pindaric lays?


s: One likes the pheasant's wing, and one the leg;


s: The vulgar boil, the learned roast an egg;


s: Hard task! to hit the palate of such guests,


s: When Oldfield loves what Dartineuf detests.


s: But grant I may relapse, for want of grace,


s: Again to rhyme, can London be the place?


s: Who there his Muse, or self, or soul attends,


s: In crowds, and courts, law, business, feasts, and friends?


s: 'In Palace Yard at nine you'll find me there--'


s: 'At ten for certain, sir, in Bloomsbury Square--'


s: 'Before the Lords at twelve my cause comes on--'


s: 'There's a rehearsal, sir, exact at one.--'


s: "Oh, but a wit can study in the streets,


s: And raise his mind above the mob he meets."


s: Not quite so well, however, as one ought;


s: A hackney coach may chance to spoil a thought;


s: God knows, may hurt the very ablest head.


s: Have you not seen, at Guildhall's narrow pass,


s: And peers give way, exalted as they are,


s: Blackmore himself, for any grand effort,


s: Would drink and doze at Tooting or Earl's Court.


s: How match the bards whom none e'er matched before?


s: The man, who, stretched in Isis' calm retreat,


s: To books and study gives seven years complete,


s: See! strewed with learned dust, his night-cap on,


s: He walks, an object new beneath the sun!


s: The boys flock round him, and the people stare: }


s: So stiff, so mute! some statue you would swear, }


s: Stepped from its pedestal to take the air! }


s: And here, while town, and court, and city roars,


s: With mobs, and duns, and soldiers at their doors;


s: Composing songs for fools to get by heart?


s: The Temple late two brother sergeants saw,


s: With equal talents these congenial souls,


s: One lulled th' Exchequer, and one stunned the Rolls;


s: Each had a gravity would make you split,


s: "'Twas, sir, your law"--and "Sir, your eloquence--"


s: "Yours, Cowper's manner"--and "yours, Talbot's sense."


s: Yours Milton's genius, and mine Homer's spirit.


s: Call Tibbald Shakespeare, and he'll swear the nine,


s: Dear Cibber! never matched one ode of thine.


s: Lord! how we strut through Merlin's cave, to see


s: No poets there, but Stephen, you, and me.


s: Walk with respect behind, while we at ease


s: Weave laurel crowns, and take what names we please.


s: "My dear Tibullus!" if that will not do,


s: Or, I'm content, allow me Dryden's strains,


s: And you shall rise up Otway for your pains."


s: Much do I suffer, much, to keep in peace


s: This jealous, waspish, wrong-head, rhyming race;


s: And much must flatter, if the whim should bite


s: To court applause by printing what I write:


s: But let the fit pass o'er, I'm wise enough,


s: To stop my ears to their confounded stuff.


s: They treat themselves with most profound respect;


s: 'Tis to small purpose that you hold your tongue:


s: Each praised within, is happy all day long;


s: But how severely with themselves proceed


s: The men, who write such verse as we can read?


s: Their own strict judges, not a word they spare


s: That wants, or force, or light, or weight, or care,


s: Nay though at Court, perhaps, it may find grace:


s: Such they'll degrade; and sometimes, in its stead,


s: Mark where a bold expressive phrase appears,


s: Bright through the rubbish of some hundred years;


s: Command old words that long have slept, to wake,


s: Words that wise Bacon or brave Raleigh spake;


s: (For use will farther what's begot by sense)


s: Pour the full tide of eloquence along, }


s: Serenely pure, and yet divinely strong, }


s: Rich with the treasures of each foreign tongue; }


s: Prune the luxuriant, the uncouth refine,


s: Then polish all, with so much life and ease,


s: You think 'tis nature, and a knack to please:


s: "But ease in writing flows from art, not chance;


s: As those move easiest who have learned to dance."


s: If such the plague and pains to write by rule,


s: Better, say I, be pleased and play the fool;


s: Call, if you will, bad rhyming a disease,


s: It gives men happiness, or leaves them ease.


s: There lived in primo Georgii, they record,


s: Who, though the House was up, delighted sate,


s: Heard, noted, answered, as in full debate:


s: Fond of his friend, and civil to his wife;


s: Not quite a madman, though a pasty fell,


s: Him, the damned doctors and his friends immured,


s: They bled, they cupped, they purged; in short, they cured.


s: "My friends!" he cried, "plague take you for your care!


s: That from a patriot of distinguished note,


s: Have bled and purged me to a simple vote."


s: Well, on the whole, plain prose must be my fate:


s: Wisdom (curse on it) will come soon or late.


s: There is a time when poets will grow dull:


s: I'll e'en leave verses to the boys at school:


s: I learn to smooth and harmonise my mind,


s: Teach every thought within its bounds to roll,


s: My mind resumes the thread it dropt before;


s: Thoughts, which at Hyde Park Corner I forgot,


s: Meet and rejoin me, in the pensive grot.


s: I ask these sober questions of my heart.


s: If, when the more you drink, the more you crave,


s: You tell the doctor; when the more you have,


s: The more you want; why not with equal ease


s: The heart resolves this matter in a thrice,


s: "Men only feel the smart but not the vice."


s: When golden angels cease to cure the evil,


s: You give all royal witchcraft to the devil;


s: When servile chaplains cry, that birth and place


s: Endure a peer with honour, truth, and grace,


s: Look in that breast, most dirty D----! be fair,


s: Say, can you find out one such lodger there?


s: Yet still, not heeding what your heart can teach,


s: You go to church to hear these flatterers preach.


s: Indeed, could wealth bestow or wit or merit,


s: A grain of courage, or a spark of spirit,


s: The wisest man might blush, I must agree,


s: If there be truth in law, and use can give


s: A property, that's yours on which you life.


s: Delightful Abs Court, if its fields afford


s: Their fruits to you, confesses you its lord;


s: All Worldly's hens, nay partridge, sold to town:


s: His venison too, a guinea makes your own:


s: He bought at thousands, what with better wit


s: You purchase as you want, and bit by bit;


s: Now, or long since, what difference will be found?


s: Heathcote himself, and such large-acred men,


s: Buy every stick of wood that lends them heat,


s: Yet these are wights, who fondly call their own


s: Half that the Devil o'erlooks from Lincoln town.


s: The laws of God, as well as of the land,


s: Estates have wings and hang in fortune's power


s: Loose on the point of every wavering hour,


s: By sale, at least by death, to change their lord.


s: Man? and for ever? wretch! what wouldst thou have?


s: Heir urges heir, like wave impelling wave.


s: All vast possessions (just the same the case


s: Whether you call them villa, park, or chase).


s: Alas, my Bathurst! what will they avail?


s: Join Cotswold hills to Saperton's fair dale,


s: There mingled farms and pyramids appear,


s: Link towns to towns with avenues of oak,


s: Enclose whole downs in walls, 'tis all a joke!


s: And trees, and stones, and farms, and farmer fall.


s: Gold, silver, ivory, vases sculptured high,


s: Paint, marble, gems, and robes of Persian dye,


s: There are who have not--and thank heaven there are,


s: Who, if they have not, think not worth their care,


s: Talk what you will of taste, my friend, you'll find,


s: Why, of two brothers, rich and restless one


s: Ploughs, burns, manures, and toils from sun to sun;


s: The other slights, for women, sports, and wines,


s: All Townshend's turnips, and all Grosvenor's mines;


s: Why one like Bu--with pay and scorn content,


s: Bows and votes on, in Court and Parliament;


s: One, driven by strong benevolence of soul,


s: Shall fly, like Oglethorpe, from pole to pole;


s: That God of Nature, who, within us still,


s: Inclines our action, not constrains our will:


s: Each individual: His great end the same.


s: My heir may sigh, and think it want of grace


s: A man so poor would live without a place;


s: How free, or frugal, I shall pass my days:


s: I, who at some times spend, at others spare,


s: 'Tis one thing madly to disperse my store;


s: Glad, like a boy, to snatch the first good day,


s: And pleased, if sordid want be far away.


s: The ship itself may make a better figure,


s: But I that sail, am neither less nor bigger,


s: I neither strut with every favouring breath,


s: Nor strive with all the tempest in my teeth.


s: In power, wit, figure, virtue, fortune, placed


s: Behind the foremost and before the last.


s: "But why all this of avarice? I have none."


s: Does neither rage inflame, nor fear appal?


s: Not the black fear of death, that saddens all?


s: With terrors round, can Reason hold her throne,


s: Despise the known, nor tremble at the unknown?


s: Survey both worlds, intrepid and entire,


s: In spite of witches, devils, dreams, and fire?


s: Pleased to look forward, pleased to look behind,


s: And count each birthday with a grateful mind?


s: Has life no sourness, drawn so near its end?


s: Canst thou endure a foe, forgive a friend?


s: Has age but melted the rough parts away,


s: As winter fruits grow mild ere they decay?


s: Or will you think, my friend, your business done,


s: When, of a hundred thorns, you pull out one?


s: Learn to live well, or fairly make your will;


s: You've played, and loved, and ate, and drank your fill:


s: Walk sober off; before a sprightlier age


s: Leave such to trifle with more grace and ease,


s: Where folly pleases, and whose follies please.


s: "Quid vetat et nosmet _Lucili_ scripta legentes


s: Quaerere, num illius, num rerum dura negarit


s: Versiculos natura magis factos, et euntes


s: This town, I had the sense to hate it too;


s: Yet here; as even in hell, there must be still


s: That all beside, one pities, not abhors;


s: It brought (no doubt) the excise and army in:


s: Catched like the plague, or love, the Lord knows how,


s: But that the cure is starving, all allow.


s: Yet like the Papist's, is the poet's state,


s: Poor and disarmed, and hardly worth your hate!


s: Here a lean bard, whose wit could never give


s: The thief condemned, in law already dead,


s: So prompts, and saves a rogue who cannot read.


s: Thus, as the pipes of some carved organ move,


s: The gilded puppets dance and mount above.


s: Heaved by the breath the inspiring bellows blow:


s: The inspiring bellows lie and pant below.


s: One sings the fair; but songs no longer move;


s: No rat is rhymed to death, nor maid to love:


s: In love's, in nature's spite, the siege they hold,


s: And scorn the flesh, the devil, and all but gold.


s: These write to lords, some mean reward to get,


s: As needy beggars sing at doors for meat.


s: Those write because all write, and so have still


s: Excuse for writing, and for writing ill.


s: Wretched, indeed! but far more wretched yet


s: Is he who makes his meal on others' wit:


s: 'Tis changed, no doubt, from what it was before;


s: His rank digestion makes it wit no more:


s: Sense, past through him, no longer is the same;


s: I pass o'er all those confessors and martyrs


s: Who live like S-tt-n, or who die like Chartres,


s: Out-cant old Esdras, or out-drink his heir,


s: Act sins which Prisca's confessor scarce hears.


s: Even those I pardon, for whose sinful sake


s: Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make;


s: Of whose strange crimes no canonist can tell


s: In what Commandment's large contents they dwell.


s: One, one man only breeds my just offence;


s: Whom crimes gave wealth, and wealth gave impudence:


s: More pert, more proud, more positive than he.


s: What further could I wish the fop to do,


s: But turn a wit, and scribble verses too;


s: Pierce the soft labyrinth of a lady's ear


s: With rhymes of this per cent. and that per year?


s: Or court a wife, spread out his wily parts,


s: Like nets or lime-twigs, for rich widows' hearts;


s: And woo in language of the pleas and bench?


s: Language, which Boreas might to Auster hold


s: More rough than forty Germans when they scold.


s: Cursed be the wretch, so venal and so vain:


s: Paltry and proud, as drabs in Drury Lane.


s: If Peter deigns to help you to your own:


s: What thanks, what praise, if Peter but supplies,


s: Grave, as when prisoners shake the head and swear


s: 'Twas only suretyship that brought 'em there.


s: His office keeps your parchment fates entire,


s: He starves with cold to save them from the fire;


s: For you he walks the streets through rain or dust,


s: For not in chariots Peter puts his trust;


s: For you he sweats and labours at the laws,


s: Takes God to witness he affects your cause,


s: Like a king's favourite--or like a king.


s: These are the talents that adorn them all,


s: In shillings and in pence at first they deal;


s: And steal so little, few perceive they steal;


s: Till, like the sea, they compass all the land,


s: From Scots to Wight, from mount to Dover strand:


s: And when rank widows purchase luscious nights,


s: Or when a duke to Jansen punts at White's,


s: Satan himself feels far less joy than they.


s: Piecemeal they win this acre first, then that,


s: Glean on, and gather up the whole estate.


s: Then strongly fencing ill-got wealth by law,


s: Indentures, covenants, articles thy draw,


s: Large as the fields themselves, and larger far


s: Than civil codes, with all their glosses, are;


s: So vast, our new divines, we must confess,


s: Are fathers of the Church for writing less.


s: But let them write for you, each rogue impairs


s: The deeds, and dexterously omits, ses heires;


s: Or, in quotation, shrewd divines leave out


s: Those words, that would against them clear the doubt.


s: When doomed to say his beads and even-song;


s: But having cast his cowl, and left those laws,


s: Adds to Christ's prayer, the Power and Glory clause.


s: The lands are bought; but where are to be found


s: Those ancient woods, that shaded all the ground?


s: Where are those troops of poor, that thronged of yore


s: The good old landlord's hospitable door?


s: Well, I could wish, that still in lordly domes


s: Some beasts were killed, though not whole hecatombs;


s: That both extremes were banished from their walls,


s: Carthusian fasts, and fulsome bacchanals;


s: And all mankind might that just mean observe,


s: In which none e'er could surfeit, none could starve.


s: These as good works, 'tis true, we all allow;


s: But oh! these works are not in fashion now:


s: Like rich old wardrobes, things extremely rare,


s: Extremely fine, but what no man will wear.


s: Thus much I've said, I trust, without offence;


s: Let no Court sycophant pervert my sense,


s: Nor sly informer watch these words to draw


s: Within the reach of treason, or the law.


s: Well, if it be my time to quit the stage,


s: Secure of peace at least beyond the grave.


s: And paid for all my satires, all my rhymes.


s: The poet's hell, its tortures, fiends, and flames,


s: To this were trifles, toys, and empty names.


s: With foolish pride my heart was never fired,


s: Nor the vain itch to admire, or be admired;


s: I hoped for no commission from his Grace;


s: I bought no benefice, I begged no place;


s: Had no new verses, nor new suit to show;


s: Yet went to Court!--the Devil would have it so.


s: Would go to Mass in jest (as story says)


s: Could not but think, to pay his fine was odd,


s: Since 'twas no formed design of serving God;


s: As deep in debt, without a thought to pay, }


s: As vain, as idle, and as false, as they }


s: Who live at Court, for going once that way! }


s: Scarce was I entered, when, behold! there came


s: A thing which Adam had been posed to name;


s: Where all the race of reptiles might embark:


s: Or Sloane or Woodward's wondrous shelves contain,


s: Nay, all that lying travellers can feign.


s: The watch would hardly let him pass at noon,


s: At night, would swear him dropped out of the moon.


s: One whom the mob, when next we find or make


s: And the wise Justice starting from his chair


s: Cry: "By your priesthood tell me what you are?"


s: Such was the wight; the apparel on his back


s: Though coarse, was reverend, and though bare, was black:


s: The suit, if by the fashion one might guess,


s: Was velvet in the youth of good Queen Bess,


s: But mere tuff-taffety what now remained;


s: So time, that changes all things, had ordained!


s: First turn plain rash, then vanish quite away.


s: This thing has travelled, speaks each language too,


s: And know what's fit for very state to do;


s: Of whose best phrase and courtly accent joined,


s: He forms one tongue, exotic and refined,


s: Talkers I've learned to bear; Motteux I knew,


s: Henley himself I've heard, and Budgel too.


s: The doctor's wormwood style, the hash of tongues


s: A pedant makes, the storm of Gonson's lungs,


s: The whole artillery of the terms of war,


s: And (all those plagues in one) the bawling bar:


s: These I could bear; but not a rogue so civil,


s: Whose tongue will compliment you to the devil.


s: A tongue that can cheat widows, cancel scores,


s: Make Scots speak treason, cozen subtlest w***es,


s: He spies me out, I whisper: "Gracious God!


s: What sin of mine could merit such a rod?


s: That all the shot of dulness now must be


s: From this thy blunderbuss discharged on me!"


s: "Permit" (he cries) "no stranger to your fame


s: To crave your sentiment, if ----'s your name.


s: What speech esteem you most?"  "The King's," said I


s: "But the best words?"--"O, sir, the dictionary."


s: And perfect speaker?"--"Onslow, past dispute."


s: "But, sir, of writers?"  "Swift, for closer style,


s: "Why, yes, 'tis granted, these indeed may pass:


s: Good common linguists, and so Panurge was;


s: Nay troth the Apostles (though perhaps too rough)


s: Had once a pretty gift of tongues enough:


s: Yet these were all poor gentlemen!  I dare


s: Affirm, 'twas travel made them what they were."


s: Thus others' talents having nicely shown,


s: Till I cried out: "You prove yourself so able,


s: For had they found a linguist half so good


s: I make no question but the tower had stood."


s: "Obliging sir! for courts you sure were made:


s: Spirits like you should see and should be seen,


s: The King would smile on you--at least the Queen."


s: "Ah, gentle sir! you courtiers so cajole us--


s: No lessons now are taught the Spartan way:


s: Though in his pictures lust be full displayed,


s: And though the Court show vice exceeding clear,


s: None should, by my advice, learn virtue there."


s: At this entranced, he lifts his hands and eyes,


s: Squeaks like a high-stretched lutestring, and replies:


s: "Oh, 'tis the sweetest of all earthly things


s: To gaze on princes, and to talk of kings!"


s: "Then, happy man who shows the tombs!" said I,


s: He every day, from king to king can walk,


s: Of all our Harries, all our Edwards talk,


s: And get by speaking truth of monarchs dead,


s: What few can of the living, ease and bread."


s: "Lord, sir, a mere mechanic! strangely low,


s: And coarse of phrase--your English all are so.


s: How elegant your Frenchmen?"  "Mine, d'ye mean?


s: I have but one, I hope the fellow's clean."


s: "Not, sir, my only, I have better still,


s: And this you see is but my dishabille--."


s: Wild to get loose, his patience I provoke,


s: Mistake, confound, object at all he spoke.


s: But as coarse iron, sharpened, mangles more,


s: And itch most hurts when angered to a sore;


s: So when you plague a fool, 'tis still the curse,


s: You only make the matter worse and worse.


s: At all my peevishness, and turns his style.


s: He asks, "What news?"  I tell him of new plays,


s: He hears, and as a still with simples in it


s: Between each drop it gives, stays half a minute,


s: Loth to enrich me with too quick replies,


s: Mere household trash! of birth-nights, balls, and shows,


s: More than ten Holinsheds, or Halls, or Stowes.


s: When the Queen frowned, or smiled, he knows; and what


s: Who sins with whom: who got his pension rug,


s: Whose place is quartered out, three parts in four,


s: Who having lost his credit, pawned his rent,


s: Who in the secret, deals in stocks secure,


s: And cheats the unknowing widow and the poor;


s: Why turnpikes rise, and now no cit nor clown


s: Can gratis see the country, or the town;


s: Shortly no lad shall chuck, or lady vole,


s: But some excising courtier will have toll.


s: He tells what strumpet places sells for life,


s: What 'squire his lands, what citizen his wife:


s: And last (which proves him wiser still than all)


s: As one of Woodward's patients, sick, and sore,


s: I puke, I nauseate--yet he thrusts in more:


s: Trims Europe's balance, tops the statesman's part,


s: And talks gazettes and post-boys o'er by heart.


s: Like a big wife at sight of loathsome meat


s: Ready to cast, I yawn, I sigh and sweat.


s: Then as a licensed spy, whom nothing can


s: Silence or hurt, he libels the great man;


s: Swears every place entailed for years to come,


s: He names the price for every office paid,


s: And says our wars thrive ill, because delayed;


s: Nay hints, 'tis by connivance of the Court,


s: That Spain robs on, and Dunkirk's still a port.


s: Not more amazement seized on Circe's guests,


s: To see themselves fall endlong into beasts,


s: Than mine, to find a subject staid and wise


s: Already half turned traitor by surprise.


s: I felt the infection slide from him to me,


s: As in the ---- some give it to get free;


s: And quick to swallow me, methought I saw


s: Stood just a-tilt, the minister came by.


s: To him he flies, and bows, and bows again,


s: Then, close as Umbra, joins the dirty train.


s: When half his nose is in his Prince's ear.


s: I quaked at heart; and still afraid, to see


s: All the Court filled with stranger things than he,


s: Ran out as fast as one that pays his bail


s: And dreads more actions, hurries from a jail.


s: Bear me, some god! oh, quickly bear me hence


s: To wholesome solitude, the nurse of sense:


s: Where Contemplation plumes her ruffled wings,


s: And the free soul looks down to pity kings!


s: There sober thought pursued the amusing theme,


s: Till fancy coloured it, and formed a dream.


s: And forced even me to see the damned at Court.


s: Not Dante dreaming all the infernal state,


s: Beheld such scenes of envy, sin, and hate.


s: Base fear becomes the guilty, not the free;


s: Suits tyrants, plunderers, but suits not me:


s: Shall I, the terror of this sinful town,


s: Care, if a liveried lord or smile or frown?


s: O, my fair mistress, Truth! shall I quit thee


s: Thou, who since yesterday hast rolled o'er all


s: Hast thou, oh, sun! beheld an emptier fort,