Chapter 2

"Sunt quibus in Satirâ," etc.

WRITTEN BY MR. LINDSAY, IN 1729

DR. SWIFT

Since there are persons who complain There's too much satire in my vein; That I am often found exceeding The rules of raillery and breeding; With too much freedom treat my betters, Not sparing even men of letters: You, who are skill'd in lawyers' lore, What's your advice? Shall I give o'er? Nor ever fools or knaves expose, Either in verse or humorous prose: And to avoid all future ill, In my scrutoire lock up my quill?

LAWYER

Since you are pleased to condescend To ask the judgment of a friend, Your case consider'd, I must think You should withdraw from pen and ink, Forbear your poetry and jokes, And live like other Christian folks; Or if the Muses must inspire Your fancy with their pleasing fire, Take subjects safer for your wit Than those on which you lately writ. Commend the times, your thoughts correct, And follow the prevailing sect; Assert that Hyde,[2] in writing story, Shows all the malice of a Tory; While Burnet,[3] in his deathless page, Discovers freedom without rage. To Woolston[4] recommend our youth, For learning, probity, and truth; That noble genius, who unbinds The chains which fetter freeborn minds; Redeems us from the slavish fears Which lasted near two thousand years; He can alone the priesthood humble, Make gilded spires and altars tumble.

DR. SWIFT

Must I commend against my conscience, Such stupid blasphemy and nonsense; To such a subject tune my lyre, And sing like one of Milton's choir, Where devils to a vale retreat, And call the laws of Wisdom, Fate; Lament upon their hapless fall, That Force free Virtue should enthrall? Or shall the charms of Wealth and Power Make me pollute the Muses' bower?

LAWYER

As from the tripod of Apollo, Hear from my desk the words that follow: "Some, by philosophers misled, Must honour you alive and dead; And such as know what Greece has writ, Must taste your irony and wit; While most that are, or would be great, Must dread your pen, your person hate; And you on Drapier's hill[5] must lie, And there without a mitre die."

[Footnote 1: Mr. Lindsay.--_F_.]

[Footnote 2: See Clarendon's "History of the Rebellion."]

[Footnote 3: In his "History of his own Time," and "History of the Reformation."]

[Footnote 4: An enthusiast and a freethinker. For a full account of him, see "Dictionary of National Biography." His later works on the Miracles caused him to be prosecuted, fined, and imprisoned. He died in 1733.--_W.E.B._]

[Footnote 5: In the county of Armagh.--_F_.]

ON BURNING A DULL POEM

1729

An ass's hoof alone can hold That poisonous juice, which kills by cold. Methought, when I this poem read, No vessel but an ass's head Such frigid fustian could contain; I mean, the head without the brain. The cold conceits, the chilling thoughts, Went down like stupifying draughts; I found my head begin to swim, A numbness crept through every limb. In haste, with imprecations dire, I threw the volume in the fire; When, (who could think?) though cold as ice, It burnt to ashes in a trice. How could I more enhance its fame? Though born in snow, it died in flame.

AN EXCELLENT NEW BALLAD OR, THE TRUE ENGLISH DEAN[1] TO BE HANGED FOR A RAPE. 1730

Our brethren of England, who love us so dear, And in all they do for us so kindly do mean, (A blessing upon them!) have sent us this year, For the good of our church, a true English dean. A holier priest ne'er was wrapt up in crape, The worst you can say, he committed a rape.

In his journey to Dublin, he lighted at Chester, And there he grew fond of another man's wife; Burst into her chamber and would have caress'd her; But she valued her honour much more than her life. She bustled, and struggled, and made her escape To a room full of guests, for fear of a rape.

The dean he pursued, to recover his game; And now to attack her again he prepares: But the company stood in defence of the dame, They cudgell'd, and cuff'd him, and kick'd him down stairs. His deanship was now in a damnable scrape, And this was no time for committing a rape.

To Dublin he comes, to the bagnio he goes, And orders the landlord to bring him a whore; No scruple came on him his gown to expose, 'Twas what all his life he had practised before. He made himself drunk with the juice of the grape, And got a good clap, but committed no rape.

The dean, and his landlord, a jolly comrade, Resolved for a fortnight to swim in delight; For why, they had both been brought up to the trade Of drinking all day, and of whoring all night. His landlord was ready his deanship to ape In every debauch but committing a rape.

This Protestant zealot, this English divine, In church and in state was of principles sound; Was truer than Steele to the Hanover line, And grieved that a Tory should live above ground. Shall a subject so loyal be hang'd by the nape, For no other crime but committing a rape?

By old Popish canons, as wise men have penn'd 'em, Each priest had a concubine _jure ecclesiae_; Who'd be Dean of Fernes without a _commendam_? And precedents we can produce, if it please ye: Then why should the dean, when whores are so cheap, Be put to the peril and toil of a rape?

If fortune should please but to take such a crotchet, (To thee I apply, great Smedley's successor,) To give thee lawn sleeves, a mitre, and rochet, Whom wouldst thou resemble? I leave thee a guesser. But I only behold thee in Atherton's[2] shape, For sodomy hang'd; as thou for a rape.

Ah! dost thou not envy the brave Colonel Chartres, Condemn'd for thy crime at threescore and ten? To hang him, all England would lend him their garters, Yet he lives, and is ready to ravish again.[3] Then throttle thyself with an ell of strong tape, For thou hast not a groat to atone for a rape.

The dean he was vex'd that his whores were so willing; He long'd for a girl that would struggle and squall; He ravish'd her fairly, and saved a good shilling; But here was to pay the devil and all. His troubles and sorrows now come in a heap, And hang'd he must be for committing a rape.

If maidens are ravish'd, it is their own choice: Why are they so wilful to struggle with men? If they would but lie quiet, and stifle their voice, No devil nor dean could ravish them then. Nor would there be need of a strong hempen cape Tied round the dean's neck for committing a rape.

Our church and our state dear England maintains, For which all true Protestant hearts should be glad: She sends us our bishops, our judges, and deans, And better would give us, if better she had. But, lord! how the rabble will stare and will gape, When the good English dean is hang'd up for a rape!

[Footnote 1: "DUBLIN, June 6. The Rev. Dean Sawbridge, having surrendered himself on his indictment for a rape, was arraigned at the bar of the Court of King's Bench, and is to be tried next Monday."--_London Evening Post_, June 16, 1730. "DUBLIN, June 13. The Rev. Thomas Sawbridge, Dean of Fernes, who was indicted for ravishing Susanna Runkard, and whose trial was put off for some time past, on motion of the king's counsel on behalf of the said Susanna, was yesterday tried in the Court of King's Bench, and acquitted. It is reported, that the Dean intends to indict her for perjury, he being in the county of Wexford when she swore the rape was committed against her in the city of Dublin."--_Daily Post-Boy_, June 23, 1730.--_Nichols_.]

[Footnote 2: A Bishop of Waterford, sent from England a hundred years ago, was hanged at Arbor-hill, near Dublin.--See "The penitent death of a woful sinner, or the penitent death of John Atherton, executed at Dublin the 5th of December, 1640. With some annotations upon several passages in it". As also the sermon, with some further enlargements, preached at his burial. By Nicholas Barnard, Dean of Ardagh, in Ireland.

"_Quis in seculo peccavit enormius Paulo? Quis in religione gravius Petro? illi tamen poenitentiam assequuti sunt non solum ministerium sed magisterium sanctitatis. Nolite ergo ante tempus judicare, quia fortasse quos vos laudatis, Deus reprehendit, et quos vos reprehenditis, ille laudabit, priminovissimi, et novissimi primi_. Petr. Chrysolog. Dublin, Printed by the Society of Stationers, 1641."]

[Footnote 3: This trial took place in 1723; but being only found guilty of an assault, with intent to commit the crime, the worthy colonel was fined £300 to the private party prosecuting. See a full account of Chartres in the notes to Pope's "Moral Essays," Epistle III, and the Satirical Epitaph by Arbuthnot. Carruthers' Edition.--_W. E. B._]

ON STEPHEN DUCK THE THRESHER, AND FAVOURITE POET

A QUIBBLING EPIGRAM. 1730

The thresher Duck[1] could o'er the queen prevail, The proverb says, "no fence against a flail." From threshing corn he turns to thresh his brains; For which her majesty allows him grains: Though 'tis confest, that those, who ever saw His poems, think them all not worth a straw! Thrice happy Duck, employ'd in threshing stubble, Thy toil is lessen'd, and thy profits double.

[Footnote 1: Who was appointed by Queen Caroline librarian to a small collection of books in a building called Merlin's Cave, in the Royal Gardens of Richmond. "How shall we fill a library with wit, When Merlin's cave is half unfurnish'd yet?" POPE, _Imitations of Horace_, ii, Ep. 1.--_W. E. B._]

THE LADY'S DRESSING-ROOM. 1730

Five hours (and who can do it less in?) By haughty Celia spent in dressing; The goddess from her chamber issues, Array'd in lace, brocades, and tissues. Strephon, who found the room was void, And Betty otherwise employ'd, Stole in, and took a strict survey Of all the litter as it lay: Whereof, to make the matter clear, An inventory follows here. And, first, a dirty smock appear'd, Beneath the arm-pits well besmear'd; Strephon, the rogue, display'd it wide, And turn'd it round on ev'ry side: On such a point, few words are best, And Strephon bids us guess the rest; But swears, how damnably the men lie In calling Celia sweet and cleanly. Now listen, while he next produces The various combs for various uses; Fill'd up with dirt so closely fixt, No brush could force a way betwixt; A paste of composition rare, Sweat, dandriff, powder, lead, and hair: A fore-head cloth with oil upon't, To smooth the wrinkles on her front: Here alum-flour, to stop the steams Exhaled from sour unsavoury streams: There night-gloves made of Tripsey's hide, [1]Bequeath'd by Tripsey when she died; With puppy-water, beauty's help, Distil'd from Tripsey's darling whelp. Here gallipots and vials placed, Some fill'd with washes, some with paste; Some with pomatums, paints, and slops, And ointments good for scabby chops. Hard by a filthy bason stands, Foul'd with the scouring of her hands: The bason takes whatever comes, The scrapings from her teeth and gums, A nasty compound of all hues, For here she spits, and here she spues. But, oh! it turn'd poor Strephon's bowels When he beheld and smelt the towels, Begumm'd, bematter'd, and beslim'd, With dirt, and sweat, and ear-wax grim'd; No object Strephon's eye escapes; Here petticoats in frouzy heaps; Nor be the handkerchiefs forgot, All varnish'd o'er with snuff and snot. The stockings why should I expose, Stain'd with the moisture of her toes,[2] Or greasy coifs, and pinners reeking, Which Celia slept at least a week in? A pair of tweezers next he found, To pluck her brows in arches round; Or hairs that sink the forehead low, Or on her chin like bristles grow. The virtues we must not let pass Of Celia's magnifying glass; When frighted Strephon cast his eye on't, It shew'd the visage of a giant: A glass that can to sight disclose The smallest worm in Celia's nose, And faithfully direct her nail To squeeze it out from head to tail; For, catch it nicely by the head, It must come out, alive or dead. Why, Strephon, will you tell the rest? And must you needs describe the chest? That careless wench! no creature warn her To move it out from yonder corner! But leave it standing full in sight, For you to exercise your spight? In vain the workman shew'd his wit, With rings and hinges counterfeit, To make it seem in this disguise A cabinet to vulgar eyes: Which Strephon ventur'd to look in, Resolved to go thro' thick and thin. He lifts the lid: there needs no more, He smelt it all the time before. As, from within Pandora's box, When Epimetheus op'd the locks, A sudden universal crew Of human evils upward flew; He still was comforted to find That hope at last remain'd behind: So Strephon, lifting up the lid, To view what in the chest was hid, The vapours flew from up the vent; But Strephon, cautious, never meant The bottom of the pan to grope, And foul his hands in search of hope. O! ne'er may such a vile machine Be once in Celia's chamber seen! O! may she better learn to keep Those "secrets of the hoary deep." [3] As mutton-cutlets, prime of meat, Which, tho' with art you salt and beat, As laws of cookery require, And toast them at the clearest fire; If from upon the hopeful chops The fat upon a cinder drops, To stinking smoke it turns the flame, Pois'ning the flesh from whence it came, And up exhales a greasy stench, For which you curse the careless wench: So things which must not be exprest, When drop'd into the reeking chest, Send up an excremental smell To taint the part from whence they fell: The petticoats and gown perfume, And waft a stink round ev'ry room. Thus finishing his grand survey, Disgusted Strephon slunk away; Repeating in his amorous fits, "Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia sh--!" But Vengeance, goddess never sleeping, Soon punish'd Strephon for his peeping: His foul imagination links Each dame he sees with all her stinks; And, if unsavoury odours fly, Conceives a lady standing by. All women his description fits, And both ideas jump like wits; By vicious fancy coupled fast, And still appearing in contrast. I pity wretched Strephon, blind To all the charms of woman kind. Should I the Queen of Love refuse, Because she rose from stinking ooze? To him that looks behind the scene, Statira's but some pocky quean. When Celia in her glory shews, If Strephon would but stop his nose, (Who now so impiously blasphemes Her ointments, daubs, and paints, and creams, Her washes, slops, and every clout, With which he makes so foul a rout;) He soon would learn to think like me, And bless his ravish'd sight to see Such order from confusion sprung, Such gaudy tulips raised from dung.

[Footnote 1: Var. "The bitch bequeath'd her when she died."--1732.]

[Footnote 2: Var. "marks of stinking toes."--1732.]

[Footnote 3: Milton, "Paradise Lost," ii, 890-1: "Before their eyes in sudden view appear The secrets of the hoary deep."--_W. E. B._]

THE POWER OF TIME. 1730

If neither brass nor marble can withstand The mortal force of Time's destructive hand; If mountains sink to vales, if cities die, And lessening rivers mourn their fountains dry; When my old cassock (said a Welsh divine) Is out at elbows, why should I repine?

CASSINUS AND PETER

A TRAGICAL ELEGY

1731

Two college sophs of Cambridge growth, Both special wits and lovers both, Conferring, as they used to meet, On love, and books, in rapture sweet; (Muse, find me names to fit my metre, Cassinus this, and t'other Peter.) Friend Peter to Cassinus goes, To chat a while, and warm his nose: But such a sight was never seen, The lad lay swallow'd up in spleen. He seem'd as just crept out of bed; One greasy stocking round his head, The other he sat down to darn, With threads of different colour'd yarn; His breeches torn, exposing wide A ragged shirt and tawny hide. Scorch'd were his shins, his legs were bare, But well embrown'd with dirt and hair A rug was o'er his shoulders thrown, (A rug, for nightgown he had none,) His jordan stood in manner fitting Between his legs, to spew or spit in; His ancient pipe, in sable dyed, And half unsmoked, lay by his side. Him thus accoutred Peter found, With eyes in smoke and weeping drown'd; The leavings of his last night's pot On embers placed, to drink it hot. Why, Cassy, thou wilt dose thy pate: What makes thee lie a-bed so late? The finch, the linnet, and the thrush, Their matins chant in every bush; And I have heard thee oft salute Aurora with thy early flute. Heaven send thou hast not got the hyps! How! not a word come from thy lips? Then gave him some familiar thumps, A college joke to cure the dumps. The swain at last, with grief opprest, Cried, Celia! thrice, and sigh'd the rest. Dear Cassy, though to ask I dread, Yet ask I must--is Celia dead? How happy I, were that the worst! But I was fated to be curst! Come, tell us, has she play'd the whore? O Peter, would it were no more! Why, plague confound her sandy locks! Say, has the small or greater pox Sunk down her nose, or seam'd her face? Be easy, 'tis a common case. O Peter! beauty's but a varnish, Which time and accidents will tarnish: But Celia has contrived to blast Those beauties that might ever last. Nor can imagination guess, Nor eloquence divine express, How that ungrateful charming maid My purest passion has betray'd: Conceive the most envenom'd dart To pierce an injured lover's heart. Why, hang her; though she seem'd so coy, I know she loves the barber's boy. Friend Peter, this I could excuse, For every nymph has leave to choose; Nor have I reason to complain, She loves a more deserving swain. But, oh! how ill hast thou divined A crime, that shocks all human kind; A deed unknown to female race, At which the sun should hide his face: Advice in vain you would apply-- Then leave me to despair and die. Ye kind Arcadians, on my urn These elegies and sonnets burn; And on the marble grave these rhymes, A monument to after-times-- "Here Cassy lies, by Celia slain, And dying, never told his pain." Vain empty world, farewell. But hark, The loud Cerberian triple bark; And there--behold Alecto stand, A whip of scorpions in her hand: Lo, Charon from his leaky wherry Beckoning to waft me o'er the ferry: I come! I come! Medusa see, Her serpents hiss direct at me. Begone; unhand me, hellish fry: "Avaunt--ye cannot say 'twas I."[1] Dear Cassy, thou must purge and bleed; I fear thou wilt be mad indeed. But now, by friendship's sacred laws, I here conjure thee, tell the cause; And Celia's horrid fact relate: Thy friend would gladly share thy fate. To force it out, my heart must rend; Yet when conjured by such a friend-- Think, Peter, how my soul is rack'd! These eyes, these eyes, beheld the fact. Now bend thine ear, since out it must; But, when thou seest me laid in dust, The secret thou shalt ne'er impart, Not to the nymph that keeps thy heart; (How would her virgin soul bemoan A crime to all her sex unknown!) Nor whisper to the tattling reeds The blackest of all female deeds; Nor blab it on the lonely rocks, Where Echo sits, and listening mocks; Nor let the Zephyr's treacherous gale Through Cambridge waft the direful tale; Nor to the chattering feather'd race Discover Celia's foul disgrace. But, if you fail, my spectre dread, Attending nightly round your bed-- And yet I dare confide in you; So take my secret, and adieu: Nor wonder how I lost my wits: Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia sh--!

[Footnote 1: From "Macbeth," in Act III, Sc. iv: "Thou canst not say, I did it:" etc. "Avaunt, and quit my sight."]

A BEAUTIFUL YOUNG NYMPH GOING TO BED.

WRITTEN FOR THE HONOUR OF THE FAIR SEX. 1731

Corinna, pride of Drury-Lane, For whom no shepherd sighs in vain; Never did Covent-Garden boast So bright a batter'd strolling toast! No drunken rake to pick her up, No cellar where on tick to sup; Returning at the midnight hour, Four stories climbing to her bower; Then, seated on a three-legg'd chair, Takes off her artificial hair; Now picking out a crystal eye, She wipes it clean, and lays it by. Her eyebrows from a mouse's hide Stuck on with art on either side, Pulls off with care, and first displays 'em, Then in a play-book smoothly lays 'em. Now dext'rously her plumpers draws, That serve to fill her hollow jaws, Untwists a wire, and from her gums A set of teeth completely comes; Pulls out the rags contrived to prop Her flabby dugs, and down they drop. Proceeding on, the lovely goddess Unlaces next her steel-ribb'd bodice, Which, by the operator's skill, Press down the lumps, the hollows fill. Up goes her hand, and off she slips The bolsters that supply her hips; With gentlest touch she next explores Her chancres, issues, running sores; Effects of many a sad disaster, And then to each applies a plaster: But must, before she goes to bed, Rub off the daubs of white and red, And smooth the furrows in her front With greasy paper stuck upon't. She takes a bolus ere she sleeps; And then between two blankets creeps. With pains of love tormented lies; Or, if she chance to close her eyes, Of Bridewell[1] and the Compter[1] dreams, And feels the lash, and faintly screams; Or, by a faithless bully drawn, At some hedge-tavern lies in pawn; Or to Jamaica[2] seems transported Alone, and by no planter courted; Or, near Fleet-ditch's[3] oozy brinks, Surrounded with a hundred stinks, Belated, seems on watch to lie, And snap some cully passing by; Or, struck with fear, her fancy runs On watchmen, constables, and duns, From whom she meets with frequent rubs; But never from religious clubs; Whose favour she is sure to find, Because she pays them all in kind. Corinna wakes. A dreadful sight! Behold the ruins of the night! A wicked rat her plaster stole, Half eat, and dragg'd it to his hole. The crystal eye, alas! was miss'd; And puss had on her plumpers p--st, A pigeon pick'd her issue-pease: And Shock her tresses fill'd with fleas. The nymph, though in this mangled plight Must ev'ry morn her limbs unite. But how shall I describe her arts To re-collect the scatter'd parts? Or show the anguish, toil, and pain, Of gath'ring up herself again? The bashful Muse will never bear In such a scene to interfere. Corinna, in the morning dizen'd, Who sees, will spew; who smells, be poison'd.

[Footnote 1: See Cunningham's "Handbook of London." Bridewell was the Prison to which harlots were sent, and were made to beat hemp and pick oakum and were whipped if they did not perform their tasks. See the Plate in Hogarth's "Harlot's Progress." The Prison has, happily, been cleared away. The hall, court room, etc., remain at 14, New Bridge Street. The Compter, a similar Prison, was also abolished. For details of these abominations, see "London Past and Present," by Wheatley.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: Jamaica seems to have been regarded as a place of exile. See "A quiet life and a good name," _ante_, p. 152.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 3: See _ante_, p. 78, "Descripton of a City Shower."--_W. E. B_.]

STREPHON AND CHLOE 1731

Of Chloe all the town has rung, By ev'ry size of poets sung: So beautiful a nymph appears But once in twenty thousand years; By Nature form'd with nicest care, And faultless to a single hair. Her graceful mien, her shape, and face, Confess'd her of no mortal race: And then so nice, and so genteel; Such cleanliness from head to heel; No humours gross, or frouzy steams, No noisome whiffs, or sweaty streams, Before, behind, above, below, Could from her taintless body flow: Would so discreetly things dispose, None ever saw her pluck a rose.[1] Her dearest comrades never caught her Squat on her hams to make maid's water: You'd swear that so divine a creature Felt no necessities of nature. In summer had she walk'd the town, Her armpits would not stain her gown: At country dances, not a nose Could in the dog-days smell her toes. Her milk-white hands, both palms and backs, Like ivory dry, and soft as wax. Her hands, the softest ever felt, [2] Though cold would burn, though dry would melt. Dear Venus, hide this wond'rous maid, Nor let her loose to spoil your trade. While she engrosses ev'ry swain, You but o'er half the world can reign. Think what a case all men are now in, What ogling, sighing, toasting, vowing! What powder'd wigs! what flames and darts! What hampers full of bleeding hearts! What sword-knots! what poetic strains! What billets-doux, and clouded canes! But Strephon sigh'd so loud and strong, He blew a settlement along; And bravely drove his rivals down, With coach and six, and house in town. The bashful nymph no more withstands, Because her dear papa commands. The charming couple now unites: Proceed we to the marriage rites. _Imprimis_, at the Temple porch Stood Hymen with a flaming torch: The smiling Cyprian Goddess brings Her infant loves with purple wings: And pigeons billing, sparrows treading, Fair emblems of a fruitful wedding. The Muses next in order follow, Conducted by their squire, Apollo: Then Mercury with silver tongue; And Hebe, goddess ever young. Behold, the bridegroom and his bride Walk hand in hand, and side by side; She, by the tender Graces drest, But he, by Mars, in scarlet vest. The nymph was cover'd with her _flammeum_[3], And Phoebus sung th'epithalamium[4]. And last, to make the matter sure, Dame Juno brought a priest demure. [5]Luna was absent, on pretence Her time was not till nine months hence. The rites perform'd, the parson paid, In state return'd the grand parade; With loud huzzas from all the boys, That now the pair must crown their joys. But still the hardest part remains: Strephon had long perplex'd his brains, How with so high a nymph he might Demean himself the wedding-night: For, as he view'd his person round, Mere mortal flesh was all he found: His hand, his neck, his mouth, and feet, Were duly wash'd, to keep them sweet; With other parts, that shall be nameless, The ladies else might think me shameless. The weather and his love were hot; And, should he struggle, I know what-- Why, let it go, if I must tell it-- He'll sweat, and then the nymph may smell it; While she, a goddess dyed in grain, Was unsusceptible of stain, And, Venus-like, her fragrant skin Exhaled ambrosia from within. Can such a deity endure A mortal human touch impure? How did the humbled swain detest His prickly beard, and hairy breast! His night-cap, border'd round with lace, Could give no softness to his face. Yet, if the goddess could be kind, What endless raptures must he find! And goddesses have now and then Come down to visit mortal men; To visit and to court them too: A certain goddess, God knows who, (As in a book he heard it read,) Took Col'nel Peleus[6] to her bed. But what if he should lose his life By vent'ring on his heavenly wife! (For Strephon could remember well, That once he heard a school-boy tell, How Semele,[7] of mortal race, By thunder died in Jove's embrace.) And what if daring Strephon dies By lightning shot from Chloe's eyes! While these reflections fill'd his head, The bride was put in form to bed: He follow'd, stript, and in he crept, But awfully his distance kept. Now, "ponder well, ye parents dear;" Forbid your daughters guzzling beer; And make them ev'ry afternoon Forbear their tea, or drink it soon; That, ere to bed they venture up, They may discharge it ev'ry sup; If not, they must in evil plight Be often forc'd to rise at night. Keep them to wholesome food confin'd, Nor let them taste what causes wind: 'Tis this the sage of Samos means, Forbidding his disciples beans.[8] O! think what evils must ensue; Miss Moll, the jade, will burn it blue; And, when she once has got the art, She cannot help it for her heart; But out it flies, even when she meets Her bridegroom in the wedding-sheets. _Carminative_ and _diuretic_[9] Will damp all passion sympathetic; And Love such nicety requires, One blast will put out all his fires. Since husbands get behind the scene, The wife should study to be clean; Nor give the smallest room to guess The time when wants of nature press; But after marriage practise more Decorum than she did before; To keep her spouse deluded still, And make him fancy what she will. In bed we left the married pair; 'Tis time to show how things went there. Strephon, who had been often told That fortune still assists the bold, Resolved to make the first attack; But Chloe drove him fiercely back. How could a nymph so chaste as Chloe, With constitution cold and snowy, Permit a brutish man to touch her? Ev'n lambs by instinct fly the butcher. Resistance on the wedding-night Is what our maidens claim by right; And Chloe, 'tis by all agreed, Was maid in thought, in word, and deed. Yet some assign a different reason; That Strephon chose no proper season. Say, fair ones, must I make a pause, Or freely tell the secret cause? Twelve cups of tea (with grief I speak) Had now constrain'd the nymph to leak. This point must needs be settled first: The bride must either void or burst. Then see the dire effects of pease; Think what can give the colic ease. The nymph oppress'd before, behind, As ships are toss'd by waves and wind, Steals out her hand, by nature led, And brings a vessel into bed; Fair utensil, as smooth and white As Chloe's skin, almost as bright. Strephon, who heard the fuming rill As from a mossy cliff distil, Cried out, Ye Gods! what sound is this? Can Chloe, heavenly Chloe,----? But when he smelt a noisome steam Which oft attends that lukewarm stream; (Salerno both together joins,[10] As sov'reign med'cines for the loins:) And though contriv'd, we may suppose, To slip his ears, yet struck his nose; He found her while the scent increast, As mortal as himself at least. But soon, with like occasions prest He boldly sent his hand in quest (Inspired with courage from his bride) To reach the pot on t'other side; And, as he fill'd the reeking vase; Let fly a rouser in her face. The little Cupids hov'ring round, (As pictures prove) with garlands crown'd, Abash'd at what they saw and heard, Flew off, nor ever more appear'd. Adieu to ravishing delights, High raptures, and romantic flights; To goddesses so heav'nly sweet, Expiring shepherds at their feet; To silver meads and shady bowers, Dress'd up with amaranthine flowers. How great a change! how quickly made! They learn to call a spade a spade. They soon from all constraint are freed; Can see each other do their need. On box of cedar sits the wife, And makes it warm for dearest life; And, by the beastly way of thinking, Find great society in stinking. Now Strephon daily entertains His Chloe in the homeliest strains; And Chloe, more experienc'd grown, With int'rest pays him back his own. No maid at court is less asham'd, Howe'er for selling bargains fam'd, Than she to name her parts behind, Or when a-bed to let out wind. Fair Decency, celestial maid! Descend from Heaven to Beauty's aid! Though Beauty may beget desire, 'Tis thou must fan the Lover's fire; For Beauty, like supreme dominion, Is best supported by Opinion: If Decency bring no supplies, Opinion falls, and Beauty dies. To see some radiant nymph appear In all her glitt'ring birth-day gear, You think some goddess from the sky Descended, ready cut and dry: But ere you sell yourself to laughter, Consider well what may come after; For fine ideas vanish fast, While all the gross and filthy last. O Strephon, ere that fatal day When Chloe stole your heart away, Had you but through a cranny spy'd On house of ease your future bride, In all the postures of her face, Which nature gives in such a case; Distortions, groanings, strainings, heavings, 'Twere better you had lick'd her leavings, Than from experience find too late Your goddess grown a filthy mate. Your fancy then had always dwelt On what you saw and what you smelt; Would still the same ideas give ye, As when you spy'd her on the privy; And, spite of Chloe's charms divine, Your heart had been as whole as mine. Authorities, both old and recent, Direct that women must be decent; And from the spouse each blemish hide, More than from all the world beside. Unjustly all our nymphs complain Their empire holds so short a reign; Is, after marriage, lost so soon, It hardly lasts the honey-moon: For, if they keep not what they caught, It is entirely their own fault. They take possession of the crown, And then throw all their weapons down: Though, by the politician's scheme, Whoe'er arrives at power supreme, Those arts, by which at first they gain it, They still must practise to maintain it. What various ways our females take To pass for wits before a rake! And in the fruitless search pursue All other methods but the true! Some try to learn polite behaviour By reading books against their Saviour; Some call it witty to reflect On ev'ry natural defect; Some shew they never want explaining To comprehend a double meaning. But sure a tell-tale out of school Is of all wits the greatest fool; Whose rank imagination fills Her heart, and from her lips distils; You'd think she utter'd from behind, Or at her mouth was breaking wind. Why is a handsome wife ador'd By every coxcomb but her lord? From yonder puppet-man inquire, Who wisely hides his wood and wire; Shows Sheba's queen completely drest, And Solomon in royal vest: But view them litter'd on the floor, Or strung on pegs behind the door; Punch is exactly of a piece With Lorrain's duke, and prince of Greece. A prudent builder should forecast How long the stuff is like to last; And carefully observe the ground, To build on some foundation sound. What house, when its materials crumble, Must not inevitably tumble? What edifice can long endure Raised on a basis unsecure? Rash mortals, ere you take a wife, Contrive your pile to last for life: Since beauty scarce endures a day, And youth so swiftly glides away; Why will you make yourself a bubble, To build on sand with hay and stubble? On sense and wit your passion found, By decency cemented round; Let prudence with good-nature strive, To keep esteem and love alive. Then come old age whene'er it will, Your friendship shall continue still: And thus a mutual gentle fire Shall never but with life expire.

[Footnote 1: A delicate way of speaking of a lady retiring behind a bush in a garden.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 2: "Though deep, yet clear, though gentle, yet not dull Strong without rage, without o'erflowing, full." DENHAM, _Cooper's Hill._]

[Footnote 3: A veil with which the Roman brides covered themselves when going to be married.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: Marriage song, sung at weddings.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 5: Diana.]

[Footnote 6: Who married Thetis, the Nereid, by whom he became the father of Achilles.--Ovid, "Metamorph.," lib. xi, 221, _seq.--W. E. B._]

[Footnote 7: See Ovid, "Metamorph.," lib. iii.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 8: A precept of Pythagoras. Hence, in French _argot_, beans, as causing wind, are called _musiciens.--W. E. B._]

[Footnote 9: Provocative of perspiration and urine.]

[Footnote 1: "Mingere cum bombis res est saluberrima lumbis." A precept to be found in the "Regimen Sanitatis," or "Schola Salernitana," a work in rhyming Latin verse composed at Salerno, the earliest school in Christian Europe where medicine was professed, taught, and practised. The original text, if anywhere, is in the edition published and commented upon by Arnaldus de Villa Nova, about 1480. Subsequently above one hundred and sixty editions of the "Schola Salernitana" were published, with many additions. A reprint of the first edition, edited by Sir Alexander Croke, with woodcuts from the editions of 1559, 1568, and 1573, was published at Oxford in 1830.--_W. E. B._]

APOLLO; OR, A PROBLEM SOLVED 1731

Apollo, god of light and wit, Could verse inspire, but seldom writ, Refined all metals with his looks, As well as chemists by their books; As handsome as my lady's page; Sweet five-and-twenty was his age. His wig was made of sunny rays, He crown'd his youthful head with bays; Not all the court of Heaven could show So nice and so complete a beau. No heir upon his first appearance, With twenty thousand pounds a-year rents, E'er drove, before he sold his land, So fine a coach along the Strand; The spokes, we are by Ovid told, Were silver, and the axle gold: I own, 'twas but a coach-and-four, For Jupiter allows no more. Yet, with his beauty, wealth, and parts, Enough to win ten thousand hearts, No vulgar deity above Was so unfortunate in love. Three weighty causes were assign'd, That moved the nymphs to be unkind. Nine Muses always waiting round him, He left them virgins as he found them. His singing was another fault; For he could reach to B in _alt_: And, by the sentiments of Pliny,[1] Such singers are like Nicolini. At last, the point was fully clear'd; In short, Apollo had no beard.

[Footnote 1: "Bubus tantum feminis vox gravior, in alio omni genere exilior quam maribus, in homine etiam castratis."--"Hist. Nat.," xi, 51. "A condicione castrati seminis quae spadonia appellant Belgae," _ib_. xv.--_W. E. B._]

THE PLACE OF THE DAMNED 1731

All folks who pretend to religion and grace, Allow there's a HELL, but dispute of the place: But, if HELL may by logical rules be defined The place of the damn'd--I'll tell you my mind. Wherever the damn'd do chiefly abound, Most certainly there is HELL to be found: Damn'd poets, damn'd critics, damn'd blockheads, damn'd knaves, Damn'd senators bribed, damn'd prostitute slaves; Damn'd lawyers and judges, damn'd lords and damn'd squires; Damn'd spies and informers, damn'd friends and damn'd liars; Damn'd villains, corrupted in every station; Damn'd time-serving priests all over the nation; And into the bargain I'll readily give you Damn'd ignorant prelates, and counsellors privy. Then let us no longer by parsons be flamm'd, For we know by these marks the place of the damn'd: And HELL to be sure is at Paris or Rome. How happy for us that it is not at home!

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT[1]

With a whirl of thought oppress'd, I sunk from reverie to rest. An horrid vision seized my head; I saw the graves give up their dead! Jove, arm'd with terrors, bursts the skies, And thunder roars and lightning flies! Amaz'd, confus'd, its fate unknown, The world stands trembling at his throne! While each pale sinner hung his head, Jove, nodding, shook the heavens, and said: "Offending race of human kind, By nature, reason, _learning_, blind; You who, through frailty, stepp'd aside; And you, who never fell--_through pride_: You who in different sects were shamm'd, And come to see each other damn'd; (So some folk told you, but they knew No more of Jove's designs than you;) --The world's mad business now is o'er, And I resent these pranks no more. --I to such blockheads set my wit! I damn such fools!--Go, go, you're _bit_."

[Footnote 1: This Poem was sent in a letter from Lord Chesterfield to Voltaire, dated 27th August, 1752, in which he says: "Je vous envoie ci-jointe une pièce par le feu Docteur Swift, laquelle je crois ne vous déplaira pas. Elle n'a jamais été imprimée, vous en dévinerez bien la raison, roais elle est authentique. J'en ai l'original, écrit de sa propre main."--_W. E. B._]

JUDAS. 1731

By the just vengeance of incensed skies, Poor Bishop Judas late repenting dies. The Jews engaged him with a paltry bribe, Amounting hardly to a crown a-tribe; Which though his conscience forced him to restore, (And parsons tell us, no man can do more,) Yet, through despair, of God and man accurst, He lost his bishopric, and hang'd or burst. Those former ages differ'd much from this; Judas betray'd his master with a kiss: But some have kiss'd the gospel fifty times, Whose perjury's the least of all their crimes; Some who can perjure through a two inch-board, Yet keep their bishoprics, and 'scape the cord: Like hemp, which, by a skilful spinster drawn To slender threads, may sometimes pass for lawn. As ancient Judas by transgression fell, And burst asunder ere he went to hell; So could we see a set of new Iscariots Come headlong tumbling from their mitred chariots; Each modern Judas perish like the first, Drop from the tree with all his bowels burst; Who could forbear, that view'd each guilty face, To cry, "Lo! Judas gone to his own place, His habitation let all men forsake, And let his bishopric another take!"

AN EPISTLE TO MR. GAY[1] 1731

How could you, Gay, disgrace the Muse's train, To serve a tasteless court twelve years in vain![2] Fain would I think our female friend [3] sincere, Till Bob,[4] the poet's foe, possess'd her ear. Did female virtue e'er so high ascend, To lose an inch of favour for a friend? Say, had the court no better place to choose For triee, than make a dry-nurse of thy Muse? How cheaply had thy liberty been sold, To squire a royal girl of two years old: In leading strings her infant steps to guide, Or with her go-cart amble side by side![5] But princely Douglas,[6] and his glorious dame, Advanced thy fortune, and preserved thy fame. Nor will your nobler gifts be misapplied, When o'er your patron's treasure you preside: The world shall own, his choice was wise and just, For sons of Phoebus never break their trust. Not love of beauty less the heart inflames Of guardian eunuchs to the sultan's dames, Their passions not more impotent and cold, Than those of poets to the lust of gold. With Pæan's purest fire his favourites glow, The dregs will serve to ripen ore below: His meanest work: for, had he thought it fit That wealth should be the appanage of wit, The god of light could ne'er have been so blind To deal it to the worst of human kind. But let me now, for I can do it well, Your conduct in this new employ foretell. And first: to make my observation right, I place a statesman full before my sight, A bloated minister in all his gear, With shameless visage and perfidious leer: Two rows of teeth arm each devouring jaw, And ostrich-like his all-digesting maw. My fancy drags this monster to my view, To shew the world his chief reverse in you. Of loud unmeaning sounds, a rapid flood Rolls from his mouth in plenteous streams of mud; With these the court and senate-house he plies, Made up of noise, and impudence, and lies. Now let me show how Bob and you agree: You serve a potent prince,[7] as well as he. The ducal coffers trusted to your charge, Your honest care may fill, perhaps enlarge: His vassals easy, and the owner blest; They pay a trifle, and enjoy the rest. Not so a nation's revenues are paid; The servant's faults are on the master laid. The people with a sigh their taxes bring, And, cursing Bob, forget to bless the king. Next hearken, Gay, to what thy charge requires, With servants, tenants, and the neighbouring squires, Let all domestics feel your gentle sway; Nor bribe, insult, nor flatter, nor betray. Let due reward to merit be allow'd; Nor with your kindred half the palace crowd; Nor think yourself secure in doing wrong, By telling noses [8] with a party strong. Be rich; but of your wealth make no parade; At least, before your master's debts are paid; Nor in a palace, built with charge immense, Presume to treat him at his own expense.[9] Each farmer in the neighbourhood can count To what your lawful perquisites amount. The tenants poor, the hardness of the times, Are ill excuses for a servant's crimes. With interest, and a premium paid beside, The master's pressing wants must be supplied; With hasty zeal behold the steward come By his own credit to advance the sum; Who, while th'unrighteous Mammon is his friend, May well conclude his power will never end. A faithful treasurer! what could he do more? He lends my lord what was my lord's before. The law so strictly guards the monarch's health, That no physician dares prescribe by stealth: The council sit; approve the doctor's skill; And give advice before he gives the pill. But the state empiric acts a safer part; And, while he poisons, wins the royal heart. But how can I describe the ravenous breed? Then let me now by negatives proceed. Suppose your lord a trusty servant send On weighty business to some neighbouring friend: Presume not, Gay, unless you serve a drone, To countermand his orders by your own. Should some imperious neighbour sink the boats, And drain the fish-ponds, while your master dotes; Shall he upon the ducal rights intrench, Because he bribed you with a brace of tench? Nor from your lord his bad condition hide, To feed his luxury, or soothe his pride. Nor at an under rate his timber sell, And with an oath assure him, all is well; Or swear it rotten, and with humble airs [10] Request it of him, to complete your stairs; Nor, when a mortgage lies on half his lands, Come with a purse of guineas in your hands. Have Peter Waters [11] always in your mind; That rogue, of genuine ministerial kind, Can half the peerage by his arts bewitch, Starve twenty lords to make one scoundrel rich: And, when he gravely has undone a score, Is humbly pray'd to ruin twenty more. A dext'rous steward, when his tricks are found, Hush-money sends to all the neighbours round; His master, unsuspicious of his pranks, Pays all the cost, and gives the villain thanks. And, should a friend attempt to set him right, His lordship would impute it all to spite; Would love his favourite better than before, And trust his honesty just so much more. Thus families, like realms, with equal fate, Are sunk by premier ministers of state. Some, when an heir succeeds, go bodily on, And, as they robb'd the father, rob the son. A knave, who deep embroils his lord's affairs, Will soon grow necessary to his heirs. His policy consists in setting traps, In finding ways and means, and stopping gaps; He knows a thousand tricks whene'er he please, Though not to cure, yet palliate each disease. In either case, an equal chance is run; For, keep or turn him out, my lord's undone. You want a hand to clear a filthy sink; No cleanly workman can endure the stink. A strong dilemma in a desperate case! To act with infamy, or quit the place. A bungler thus, who scarce the nail can hit, With driving wrong will make the panel split: Nor dares an abler workman undertake To drive a second, lest the whole should break. In every court the parallel will hold; And kings, like private folks, are bought and sold. The ruling rogue, who dreads to be cashler'd, Contrives, as he is hated, to be fear'd; Confounds accounts, perplexes all affairs: For vengeance more embroils, than skill repairs. So robbers, (and their ends are just the same,) To 'scape inquiries, leave the house in flame. I knew a brazen minister of state,[12] Who bore for twice ten years the public hate. In every mouth the question most in vogue Was, when will they turn out this odious rogue? A juncture happen'd in his highest pride: While he went robbing on, his master died.[13] We thought there now remain'd no room to doubt; The work is done, the minister must out. The court invited more than one or two: Will you, Sir Spencer?[14] or will you, or you? But not a soul his office durst accept; The subtle knave had all the plunder swept: And, such was then the temper of the times, He owed his preservation to his crimes. The candidates observed his dirty paws; Nor found it difficult to guess the cause: But, when they smelt such foul corruptions round him, Away they fled, and left him as they found him. Thus, when a greedy sloven once has thrown His snot into the mess, 'tis all his own.

[Footnote 1: The Dean having been told by an intimate friend that the Duke of Queensberry had employed Mr. Gay to inspect the accounts and management of his grace's receivers and stewards (which, however, proved to be a mistake), wrote this Epistle to his friend.--_H_. Through the whole piece, under the pretext of instructing Gay in his duty as the duke's auditor of accounts, he satirizes the conduct of Sir Robert Walpole, then Prime Minister.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 2: See the "Libel on Dr. Delany and Lord Carteret," _post_.]

[Footnote 3: The Countess of Suffolk.--_H._]

[Footnote 4: Sir Robert Walpole.--_Faulkner_.]

[Footnote 5: The post of gentleman-usher to the Princess Louisa was offered to Gay, which he and his friends considered as a great indignity, her royal highness being a mere infant.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 6: The Duke and Duchess of Queensberry.]

[Footnote 7: A title given to every duke by the heralds.--_Faulkner_.]

[Footnote 8: Counting the numbers of a division. A horse dealer's term.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 9: Alluding to the magnificence of Houghton, the seat of Sir Robert Walpole, by which he greatly impaired his fortune. "What brought Sir Visto's ill-got wealth to waste? Some Demon whispered, 'Visto! have a Taste.'" POPE, _Moral Essays_, Epist. iv.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 10: These lines are thought to allude to some story concerning a vast quantity of mahogany declared rotten, and then applied by somebody to wainscots, stairs, door-cases, etc.--_Dublin edition_.]

[Footnote 11: He hath practised this trade for many years, and still continues it with success; and after he hath ruined one lord, is earnestly solicited to take another.--_Dublin edition_. Properly Walter, a dexterous and unscrupulous attorney. "Wise Peter sees the world's respect for gold, And therefore hopes this nation may be sold." POPE, _Moral Essays_, Epist. iii. And see his character fully displayed in Sir Chas. Hanbury Williams' poem, "Peter and my Lord Quidam," Works, with notes, edit. 1822. Peter was the original of Peter Pounce in Fielding's "Joseph Andrews."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 12: Sir Robert Walpole, who was called Sir Robert Brass.]

[Footnote 13: King George I, who died on the 12th June, 1727.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 14: Sir Spencer Compton, Speaker of the House of Commons, afterwards created Earl of Wilmington. George II, on his accession to the throne, intended that Compton should be Prime Minister, but Walpole, through the influence of the queen, retained his place, Compton having confessed "his incapacity to undertake so arduous a task." As Lord Wilmington, he is constantly ridiculed by Sir Chas. Hanbury Williams. See his Works, with notes by Horace Walpole, edit. 1822.--_W. E. B._]

TO A LADY WHO DESIRED THE AUTHOR TO WRITE SOME VERSES UPON HER IN THE HEROIC STYLE

After venting all my spite, Tell me, what have I to write? Every error I could find Through the mazes of your mind, Have my busy Muse employ'd, Till the company was cloy'd. Are you positive and fretful, Heedless, ignorant, forgetful? Those, and twenty follies more, I have often told before. Hearken what my lady says: Have I nothing then to praise? Ill it fits you to be witty, Where a fault should move your pity. If you think me too conceited, Or to passion quickly heated; If my wandering head be less Set on reading than on dress; If I always seem too dull t'ye; I can solve the diffi--culty. You would teach me to be wise: Truth and honour how to prize; How to shine in conversation, And with credit fill my station; How to relish notions high; How to live, and how to die. But it was decreed by Fate-- Mr. Dean, you come too late. Well I know, you can discern, I am now too old to learn: Follies, from my youth instill'd, Have my soul entirely fill'd; In my head and heart they centre, Nor will let your lessons enter. Bred a fondling and an heiress; Drest like any lady mayoress: Cocker'd by the servants round, Was too good to touch the ground; Thought the life of every lady Should be one continued play-day-- Balls, and masquerades, and shows, Visits, plays, and powder'd beaux. Thus you have my case at large, And may now perform your charge. Those materials I have furnish'd, When by you refined and burnish'd, Must, that all the world may know 'em, Be reduced into a poem. But, I beg, suspend a while That same paltry, burlesque style; Drop for once your constant rule, Turning all to ridicule; Teaching others how to ape you; Court nor parliament can 'scape you; Treat the public and your friends Both alike, while neither mends. Sing my praise in strain sublime: Treat me not with dogg'rel rhyme. 'Tis but just, you should produce, With each fault, each fault's excuse; Not to publish every trifle, And my few perfections stifle. With some gifts at least endow me, Which my very foes allow me. Am I spiteful, proud, unjust? Did I ever break my trust? Which of all our modern dames Censures less, or less defames? In good manners am I faulty? Can you call me rude or haughty? Did I e'er my mite withhold From the impotent and old? When did ever I omit Due regard for men of wit? When have I esteem express'd For a coxcomb gaily dress'd? Do I, like the female tribe, Think it wit to fleer and gibe? Who with less designing ends Kindlier entertains her friends; With good words and countenance sprightly, Strives to treat them more politely? Think not cards my chief diversion: 'Tis a wrong, unjust aspersion: Never knew I any good in 'em, But to dose my head like laudanum. We, by play, as men, by drinking, Pass our nights to drive out thinking. From my ailments give me leisure, I shall read and think with pleasure; Conversation learn to relish, And with books my mind embellish. Now, methinks, I hear you cry, Mr. Dean, you must reply. Madam, I allow 'tis true: All these praises are your due. You, like some acute philosopher, Every fault have drawn a gloss over;[1] Placing in the strongest light All your virtues to my sight. Though you lead a blameless life, Are an humble prudent wife, Answer all domestic ends: What is this to us your friends? Though your children by a nod Stand in awe without a rod; Though, by your obliging sway, Servants love you, and obey; Though you treat us with a smile; Clear your looks, and smooth your style; Load our plates from every dish; This is not the thing we wish. Colonel ***** may be your debtor; We expect employment better. You must learn, if you would gain us, With good sense to entertain us. Scholars, when good sense describing, Call it tasting and imbibing; Metaphoric meat and drink Is to understand and think; We may carve for others thus; And let others carve for us; To discourse, and to attend, Is, to help yourself and friend. Conversation is but carving; Carve for all, yourself is starving: Give no more to every guest, Than he's able to digest; Give him always of the prime; And but little at a time. Carve to all but just enough: Let them neither starve nor stuff: And, that you may have your due, Let your neighbours carve for you. This comparison will hold, Could it well in rhyme be told, How conversing, listening, thinking, Justly may resemble drinking; For a friend a glass you fill, What is this but to instil? To conclude this long essay; Pardon if I disobey, Nor against my natural vein, Treat you in heroic strain. I, as all the parish knows, Hardly can be grave in prose: Still to lash, and lashing smile, Ill befits a lofty style. From the planet of my birth I encounter vice with mirth. Wicked ministers of state I can easier scorn than hate; And I find it answers right: Scorn torments them more than spight. All the vices of a court Do but serve to make me sport. Were I in some foreign realm, Which all vices overwhelm; Should a monkey wear a crown, Must I tremble at his frown? Could I not, through all his ermine, 'Spy the strutting chattering vermin; Safely write a smart lampoon, To expose the brisk baboon? When my Muse officious ventures On the nation's representers: Teaching by what golden rules Into knaves they turn their fools; How the helm is ruled by Walpole, At whose oars, like slaves, they all pull; Let the vessel split on shelves; With the freight enrich themselves: Safe within my little wherry, All their madness makes me merry: Like the waterman of Thames, I row by, and call them names; Like the ever-laughing sage,[2] In a jest I spend my rage: (Though it must be understood, I would hang them if I could;) If I can but fill my niche, I attempt no higher pitch; Leave to d'Anvers and his mate Maxims wise to rule the state. Pulteney deep, accomplish'd St. Johns, Scourge the villains with a vengeance; Let me, though the smell be noisome, Strip their bums; let Caleb[3] hoise 'em; Then apply Alecto's[4] whip Till they wriggle, howl, and skip. Deuce is in you, Mr. Dean: What can all this passion mean? Mention courts! you'll ne'er be quiet On corruptions running riot. End as it befits your station; Come to use and application; Nor with senates keep a fuss. I submit; and answer thus: If the machinations brewing, To complete the public ruin, Never once could have the power To affect me half an hour; Sooner would I write in buskins, Mournful elegies on Blueskins.[5] If I laugh at Whig and Tory; I conclude _à fortiori_, All your eloquence will scarce Drive me from my favourite farce. This I must insist on; for, as It is well observed by Horace,[6] Ridicule has greater power To reform the world than sour. Horses thus, let jockeys judge else, Switches better guide than cudgels. Bastings heavy, dry, obtuse, Only dulness can produce; While a little gentle jerking Sets the spirits all a-working. Thus, I find it by experiment, Scolding moves you less than merriment. I may storm and rage in vain; It but stupifies your brain. But with raillery to nettle, Sets your thoughts upon their mettle; Gives imagination scope; Never lets your mind elope; Drives out brangling and contention. Brings in reason and invention. For your sake as well as mine, I the lofty style decline. I should make a figure scurvy, And your head turn topsy-turvy. I who love to have a fling Both at senate-house and king: That they might some better way tread, To avoid the public hatred; Thought no method more commodious, Than to show their vices odious; Which I chose to make appear, Not by anger, but by sneer. As my method of reforming, Is by laughing, not by storming, (For my friends have always thought Tenderness my greatest fault,) Would you have me change my style? On your faults no longer smile; But, to patch up all our quarrels, Quote you texts from Plutarch's Morals, Or from Solomon produce Maxims teaching Wisdom's use? If I treat you like a crown'd head, You have cheap enough compounded; Can you put in higher claims, Than the owners of St. James? You are not so great a grievance, As the hirelings of St. Stephen's. You are of a lower class Than my friend Sir Robert Brass. None of these have mercy found: I have laugh'd, and lash'd them round. Have you seen a rocket fly? You would swear it pierced the sky: It but reach'd the middle air, Bursting into pieces there; Thousand sparkles falling down Light on many a coxcomb's crown. See what mirth the sport creates! Singes hair, but breaks no pates. Thus, should I attempt to climb, Treat you in a style sublime, Such a rocket is my Muse: Should I lofty numbers choose, Ere I reach'd Parnassus' top, I should burst, and bursting drop; All my fire would fall in scraps, Give your head some gentle raps; Only make it smart a while; Then could I forbear to smile, When I found the tingling pain Entering warm your frigid brain; Make you able upon sight To decide of wrong and right; Talk with sense whate'er you please on; Learn to relish truth and reason! Thus we both shall gain our prize; I to laugh, and you grow wise.

[Footnote 1: "Beside, he was a shrewd Philosopher, And had read ev'ry Text and Gloss over." _Hudibras_.]

[Footnote 2: Democritus, the Greek philosopher, one of the founders of the atomic theory.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 3: Caleb d'Anvers was the name assumed by Nicholas Amhurst, the ostensible editor of the celebrated journal, entitled "The Craftsman," written by Bolingbroke and Pulteney. See "Prose Works," vii, p. 219.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: One of the three Furies--Alecto, Tisiphone, and Megaera, the avenging deities.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 5: The famous thief, who, while on his trial at the Old Bailey, stabbed Jonathan Wild. See Fielding's "Life of Jonathan Wild," Book iv, ch. i.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 6: "Ridiculum acri Fortius et melius magnas plerumque secat res."--_Sat_. I, x, 14.]

EPIGRAM ON THE BUSTS[1] IN RICHMOND HERMITAGE. 1732

"Sic siti laetantur docti."

With honour thus by Carolina placed, How are these venerable bustoes graced! O queen, with more than regal title crown'd, For love of arts and piety renown'd! How do the friends of virtue joy to see Her darling sons exalted thus by thee! Nought to their fame can now be added more, Revered by her whom all mankind adore.[2]

[Footnote 1: Newton, Locke, Clarke, and Woolaston.]

[Footnote 2: Queen Caroline's regard for learned men was chiefly directed to those who had signalized themselves by philosophical research. Horace Walpole alludes to this her peculiar taste, in his fable called the "Funeral of the Lioness," where the royal shade is made to say: "... where Elysian waters glide, With Clarke and Newton by my side, Purrs o'er the metaphysic page, Or ponders the prophetic rage Of Merlin, who mysterious sings Of men and lions, beasts and kings." _Lord Orford's Works_, iv, 379.--_W. E. B._]

ANOTHER

Louis the living learned fed, And raised the scientific head; Our frugal queen, to save her meat, Exalts the heads that cannot eat.

A CONCLUSION

DRAWN FROM THE ABOVE EPIGRAMS, AND SENT TO THE DRAPIER

Since Anna, whose bounty thy merits had fed, Ere her own was laid low, had exalted thy head: And since our good queen to the wise is so just, To raise heads for such as are humbled in dust, I wonder, good man, that you are not envaulted; Prithee go, and be dead, and be doubly exalted.

DR. SWIFT'S ANSWER

Her majesty never shall be my exalter; And yet she would raise me, I know, by a halter!

TO THE REVEREND DR. SWIFT

WITH A PRESENT OF A PAPER-BOOK, FINELY BOUND, ON HIS BIRTH-DAY, NOV. 30, 1732.[1] BY JOHN, EARL OF ORRERY

To thee, dear Swift, these spotless leaves I send; Small is the present, but sincere the friend. Think not so poor a book below thy care; Who knows the price that thou canst make it bear? Tho' tawdry now, and, like Tyrilla's face, The specious front shines out with borrow'd grace; Tho' pasteboards, glitt'ring like a tinsell'd coat, A _rasa tabula_ within denote: Yet, if a venal and corrupted age, And modern vices should provoke thy rage; If, warn'd once more by their impending fate, A sinking country and an injur'd state, Thy great assistance should again demand, And call forth reason to defend the land; Then shall we view these sheets with glad surprise, Inspir'd with thought, and speaking to our eyes; Each vacant space shall then, enrich'd, dispense True force of eloquence, and nervous sense; Inform the judgment, animate the heart, And sacred rules of policy impart. The spangled cov'ring, bright with splendid ore, Shall cheat the sight with empty show no more; But lead us inward to those golden mines, Where all thy soul in native lustre shines. So when the eye surveys some lovely fair, With bloom of beauty graced, with shape and air; How is the rapture heighten'd, when we find Her form excell'd by her celestial mind!

[Footnote 1: It was occasioned by an annual custom, which I found pursued among his friends, of making him a present on his birth-day. Orrery's "Remarks," p. 202.--_W. E. B._]

VERSES LEFT WITH A SILVER STANDISH ON THE DEAN OF ST. PATRICK'S DESK, ON HIS BIRTH-DAY. BY DR. DELANY

Hither from Mexico I came, To serve a proud Iernian dame: Was long submitted to her will; At length she lost me at quadrille. Through various shapes I often pass'd, Still hoping to have rest at last; And still ambitious to obtain Admittance to the patriot Dean; And sometimes got within his door, But soon turn'd out to serve the poor:[1] Not strolling Idleness to aid, But honest Industry decay'd. At length an artist purchased me, And wrought me to the shape you see. This done, to Hermes I applied: "O Hermes! gratify my pride; Be it my fate to serve a sage, The greatest genius of his age; That matchless pen let me supply, Whose living lines will never die!" "I grant your suit," the God replied, And here he left me to reside.

[Footnote 1: Alluding to sums lent by the Dean, without interest, to assist poor tradesmen.--_W. E. B._]

VERSES OCCASIONED BY THE FOREGOING PRESENTS

A paper book is sent by Boyle, Too neatly gilt for me to soil. Delany sends a silver standish, When I no more a pen can brandish. Let both around my tomb be placed: As trophies of a Muse deceased; And let the friendly lines they writ, In praise of long-departed wit, Be graved on either side in columns, More to my praise than all my volumes, To burst with envy, spite, and rage, The Vandals of the present age.

VERSES SENT TO THE DEAN WITH AN EAGLE QUILL, ON HEARING OF THE PRESENTS BY THE EARL OF ORRERY AND DR. DELANY. BY MRS. PILKINGTON Shall then my kindred all my glory claim, And boldly rob me of eternal fame? To every art my gen'rous aid I lend, To music, painting, poetry, a friend. 'Tis I celestial harmony inspire, When fix'd to strike the sweetly warbling wire.[1] I to the faithful canvas have consign'd Each bright idea of the painter's mind; Behold from Raphael's sky-dipt pencils rise Such heavenly scenes as charm the gazer's eyes. O let me now aspire to higher praise! Ambitious to transcribe your deathless lays: Nor thou, immortal bard, my aid refuse, Accept me as the servant of your Muse; Then shall the world my wondrous worth declare, And all mankind your matchless pen revere.

[Footnote 1: Quills of the harpsichord.]

AN INVITATION, BY DR. DELANY, IN THE NAME OF DR. SWIFT

Mighty Thomas, a solemn senatus[1] I call, To consult for Sapphira;[2] so come one and all; Quit books, and quit business, your cure and your care, For a long winding walk, and a short bill of fare. I've mutton for you, sir; and as for the ladies, As friend Virgil has it, I've _aliud mercedis_; For Letty,[3] one filbert, whereon to regale; And a peach for pale Constance,[4] to make a full meal; And for your cruel part, who take pleasure in blood, I have that of the grape, which is ten times as good: Flow wit to her honour, flow wine to her health: High raised be her worth above titles or wealth.[5]

[Footnote 1: To correct Mrs. Barber's poems; which were published at London, in 4to, by subscription.]

[Footnote 2: The name by which Mrs, Barber was distinguished by her friends.--_N_.]

[Footnote 2: Mrs. Pilkington.--_N_.]

[Footnote 3: Mrs. Constantia Grierson, a very learned young lady, who died in 1733, at the age of 27.--_N_.]

[Footnote 4: Mrs. Van Lewen, Mrs. Pilkington's mother. Swift had ultimately good reason to regret his intimacy with the Pilkingtons, and the favours he showed them. See accounts of them in the "Dictionary of National Biography."--. _W. E. B_.]

THE BEASTS' CONFESSION TO THE PRIEST, ON OBSERVING HOW MOST MEN MISTAKE THEIR OWN TALENTS. 1732

PREFACE

I have been long of opinion, that there is not a more general and greater mistake, or of worse consequences through the commerce of mankind, than the wrong judgments they are apt to entertain of their own talents. I knew a stuttering alderman in London, a great frequenter of coffeehouses, who, when a fresh newspaper was brought in, constantly seized it first, and read it aloud to his brother citizens; but in a manner as little intelligible to the standers-by as to himself. How many pretenders to learning expose themselves, by choosing to discourse on those very parts of science wherewith they are least acquainted! It is the same case in every other qualification. By the multitude of those who deal in rhymes, from half a sheet to twenty, which come out every minute, there must be at least five hundred poets in the city and suburbs of London: half as many coffeehouse orators, exclusive of the clergy, forty thousand politicians, and four thousand five hundred profound scholars; not to mention the wits, the railers, the smart fellows, and critics; all as illiterate and impudent as a suburb whore. What are we to think of the fine-dressed sparks, proud of their own personal deformities, which appear the more hideous by the contrast of wearing scarlet and gold, with what they call toupees[1] on their heads, and all the frippery of a modern beau, to make a figure before women; some of them with hump-backs, others hardly five feet high, and every feature of their faces distorted: I have seen many of these insipid pretenders entering into conversation with persons of learning, constantly making the grossest blunders in every sentence, without conveying one single idea fit for a rational creature to spend a thought on; perpetually confounding all chronology, and geography, even of present times. I compute, that London hath eleven native fools of the beau and puppy kind, for one among us in Dublin; besides two-thirds of ours transplanted thither, who are now naturalized: whereby that overgrown capital exceeds ours in the articles of dunces by forty to one; and what is more to our farther mortification, there is no one distinguished fool of Irish birth or education, who makes any noise in that famous metropolis, unless the London prints be very partial or defective; whereas London is seldom without a dozen of their own educating, who engross the vogue for half a winter together, and are never heard of more, but give place to a new set. This has been the constant progress for at least thirty years past, only allowing for the change of breed and fashion.

The poem is grounded upon the universal folly in mankind of mistaking their talents; by which the author does a great honour to his own species, almost equalling them with certain brutes; wherein, indeed, he is too partial, as he freely confesses: and yet he has gone as low as he well could, by specifying four animals; the wolf, the ass, the swine, and the ape; all equally mischievous, except the last, who outdoes them in the article of cunning: so great is the pride of man!

When beasts could speak, (the learned say They still can do so every day,) It seems, they had religion then, As much as now we find in men. It happen'd, when a plague broke out, (Which therefore made them more devout,) The king of brutes (to make it plain, Of quadrupeds I only mean) By proclamation gave command, That every subject in the land Should to the priest confess their sins; And thus the pious Wolf begins: Good father, I must own with shame, That often I have been to blame: I must confess, on Friday last, Wretch that I was! I broke my fast: But I defy the basest tongue To prove I did my neighbour wrong; Or ever went to seek my food, By rapine, theft, or thirst of blood. The Ass approaching next, confess'd, That in his heart he loved a jest: A wag he was, he needs must own, And could not let a dunce alone: Sometimes his friend he would not spare, And might perhaps be too severe: But yet the worst that could be said, He was a wit both born and bred; And, if it be a sin and shame, Nature alone must bear the blame: One fault he has, is sorry for't, His ears are half a foot too short; Which could he to the standard bring, He'd show his face before the king: Then for his voice, there's none disputes That he's the nightingale of brutes. The Swine with contrite heart allow'd, His shape and beauty made him proud: In diet was perhaps too nice, But gluttony was ne'er his vice: In every turn of life content, And meekly took what fortune sent: Inquire through all the parish round, A better neighbour ne'er was found; His vigilance might some displease; 'Tis true, he hated sloth like pease. The mimic Ape began his chatter, How evil tongues his life bespatter; Much of the censuring world complain'd, Who said, his gravity was feign'd: Indeed, the strictness of his morals Engaged him in a hundred quarrels: He saw, and he was grieved to see't, His zeal was sometimes indiscreet: He found his virtues too severe For our corrupted times to bear; Yet such a lewd licentious age Might well excuse a stoic's rage. The Goat advanced with decent pace, And first excused his youthful face; Forgiveness begg'd that he appear'd ('Twas Nature's fault) without a beard. 'Tis true, he was not much inclined To fondness for the female kind: Not, as his enemies object, From chance, or natural defect; Not by his frigid constitution; But through a pious resolution: For he had made a holy vow Of Chastity, as monks do now: Which he resolved to keep for ever hence And strictly too, as doth his reverence.[2] Apply the tale, and you shall find, How just it suits with human kind. Some faults we own; but can you guess? --Why, virtue's carried to excess, Wherewith our vanity endows us, Though neither foe nor friend allows us. The Lawyer swears (you may rely on't) He never squeezed a needy client; And this he makes his constant rule, For which his brethren call him fool; His conscience always was so nice, He freely gave the poor advice; By which he lost, he may affirm, A hundred fees last Easter term; While others of the learned robe, Would break the patience of a Job. No pleader at the bar could match His diligence and quick dispatch; Ne'er kept a cause, he well may boast, Above a term or two at most. The cringing knave, who seeks a place Without success, thus tells his case: Why should he longer mince the matter? He fail'd, because he could not flatter; He had not learn'd to turn his coat, Nor for a party give his vote: His crime he quickly understood; Too zealous for the nation's good: He found the ministers resent it, Yet could not for his heart repent it. The Chaplain vows, he cannot fawn, Though it would raise him to the lawn: He pass'd his hours among his books; You find it in his meagre looks: He might, if he were worldly wise, Preferment get, and spare his eyes; But owns he had a stubborn spirit. That made him trust alone to merit; Would rise by merit to promotion; Alas! a mere chimeric notion. The Doctor, if you will believe him, Confess'd a sin; (and God forgive him!) Call'd up at midnight, ran to save A blind old beggar from the grave: But see how Satan spreads his snares; He quite forgot to say his prayers. He cannot help it, for his heart, Sometimes to act the parson's part: Quotes from the Bible many a sentence, That moves his patients to repentance; And, when his medicines do no good, Supports their minds with heavenly food: At which, however well intended, He hears the clergy are offended; And grown so bold behind his back, To call him hypocrite and quack. In his own church he keeps a seat; Says grace before and after meat; And calls, without affecting airs, His household twice a-day to prayers. He shuns apothecaries' shops, And hates to cram the sick with slops: He scorns to make his art a trade; Nor bribes my lady's favourite maid. Old nurse-keepers would never hire, To recommend him to the squire; Which others, whom he will not name, Have often practised to their shame. The Statesman tells you, with a sneer, His fault is to be too sincere; And having no sinister ends, Is apt to disoblige his friends. The nation's good, his master's glory, Without regard to Whig or Tory, Were all the schemes he had in view, Yet he was seconded by few: Though some had spread a thousand lies, 'Twas he defeated the excise.[3] 'Twas known, though he had borne aspersion, That standing troops were his aversion: His practice was, in every station: To serve the king, and please the nation. Though hard to find in every case The fittest man to fill a place: His promises he ne'er forgot, But took memorials on the spot; His enemies, for want of charity, Said, he affected popularity: 'Tis true, the people understood, That all he did was for their good; Their kind affections he has tried; No love is lost on either side. He came to court with fortune clear, Which now he runs out every year; Must, at the rate that he goes on, Inevitably be undone: O! if his majesty would please To give him but a writ of ease, Would grant him license to retire, As it has long been his desire, By fair accounts it would be found, He's poorer by ten thousand pound. He owns, and hopes it is no sin, He ne'er was partial to his kin; He thought it base for men in stations, To crowd the court with their relations: His country was his dearest mother, And every virtuous man his brother; Through modesty or awkward shame, (For which he owns himself to blame,) He found the wisest man he could, Without respect to friends or blood; Nor ever acts on private views, When he has liberty to choose. The Sharper swore he hated play, Except to pass an hour away: And well he might; for, to his cost, By want of skill, he always lost; He heard there was a club of cheats, Who had contrived a thousand feats; Could change the stock, or cog a die, And thus deceive the sharpest eye: Nor wonder how his fortune sunk, His brothers fleece him when he's drunk. I own the moral not exact, Besides, the tale is false, in fact; And so absurd, that could I raise up, From fields Elysian, fabling Æsop, I would accuse him to his face, For libelling the four-foot race. Creatures of every kind but ours Well comprehend their natural powers, While we, whom reason ought to sway, Mistake our talents every day. The Ass was never known so stupid, To act the part of Tray or Cupid; Nor leaps upon his master's lap, There to be stroked, and fed with pap, As Æsop would the world persuade; He better understands his trade: Nor comes whene'er his lady whistles, But carries loads, and feeds on thistles. Our author's meaning, I presume, is A creature _bipes et implumis;_ Wherein the moralist design'd A compliment on human kind; For here he owns, that now and then Beasts may degenerate into men.[4]

[Footnote 1: Wigs with long black tails, at that time very much in fashion. It was very common also to call the wearers of them by the same name.--_F_.]

[Footnote 2: The priest, his confessor.--_F_.]

[Footnote 3: A bill was brought into the House of Commons of England, in March, 1733, for laying an excise on wines and tobacco, but so violent was the outcry against the measure, that when it came on for the second reading, 11th April, Walpole moved that it be postponed for two months, and thus it was dropped.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: See Gulliver's Travels; voyage to the country of the Houyhnhnms, "Prose Works," vol. viii.--_W. E. B._]

THE PARSON'S CASE

That you, friend Marcus, like a stoic, Can wish to die in strains heroic, No real fortitude implies: Yet, all must own, thy wish is wise. Thy curate's place, thy fruitful wife, Thy busy, drudging scene of life, Thy insolent, illiterate vicar, Thy want of all-consoling liquor, Thy threadbare gown, thy cassock rent, Thy credit sunk, thy money spent, Thy week made up of fasting-days, Thy grate unconscious of a blaze, And to complete thy other curses, The quarterly demands of nurses, Are ills you wisely wish to leave, And fly for refuge to the grave; And, O, what virtue you express, In wishing such afflictions less! But, now, should Fortune shift the scene, And make thy curateship a dean: Or some rich benefice provide, To pamper luxury and pride; With labour small, and income great; With chariot less for use than state; With swelling scarf, and glossy gown, And license to reside in town: To shine where all the gay resort, At concerts, coffee-house, or court: And weekly persecute his grace With visits, or to beg a place: With underlings thy flock to teach, With no desire to pray or preach; With haughty spouse in vesture fine, With plenteous meals and generous wine; Wouldst thou not wish, in so much ease, Thy years as numerous as thy days?

THE HARDSHIP UPON THE LADIES 1733

Poor ladies! though their business be to play, 'Tis hard they must be busy night and day: Why should they want the privilege of men, Nor take some small diversions now and then? Had women been the makers of our laws, (And why they were not, I can see no cause,) The men should slave at cards from morn to night And female pleasures be to read and write.

A LOVE SONG IN THE MODERN TASTE. 1733

Fluttering spread thy purple pinions, Gentle Cupid, o'er my heart: I a slave in thy dominions; Nature must give way to art.

Mild Arcadians, ever blooming Nightly nodding o'er your flocks, See my weary days consuming All beneath yon flowery rocks.

Thus the Cyprian goddess weeping Mourn'd Adonis, darling youth; Him the boar, in silence creeping, Gored with unrelenting tooth.

Cynthia, tune harmonious numbers; Fair Discretion, string the lyre; Sooth my ever-waking slumbers: Bright Apollo, lend thy choir.

Gloomy Pluto, king of terrors, Arm'd in adamantine chains, Lead me to the crystal mirrors, Watering soft Elysian plains.

Mournful cypress, verdant willow, Gilding my Aurelia's brows, Morpheus, hovering o'er my pillow, Hear me pay my dying vows.

Melancholy smooth Meander, Swiftly purling in a round, On thy margin lovers wander, With thy flowery chaplets crown'd.

Thus when Philomela drooping Softly seeks her silent mate, See the bird of Juno stooping; Melody resigns to fate.

THE STORM

MINERVA'S PETITION

Pallas, a goddess chaste and wise Descending lately from the skies, To Neptune went, and begg'd in form He'd give his orders for a storm; A storm, to drown that rascal Hort,[1] And she would kindly thank him for't: A wretch! whom English rogues, to spite her, Had lately honour'd with a mitre. The god, who favour'd her request, Assured her he would do his best: But Venus had been there before, Pleaded the bishop loved a whore, And had enlarged her empire wide; He own'd no deity beside. At sea or land, if e'er you found him Without a mistress, hang or drown him. Since Burnet's death, the bishops' bench, Till Hort arrived, ne'er kept a wench; If Hort must sink, she grieves to tell it, She'll not have left one single prelate: For, to say truth, she did intend him, Elect of Cyprus _in commendam._ And, since her birth the ocean gave her, She could not doubt her uncle's favour. Then Proteus urged the same request, But half in earnest, half in jest; Said he--"Great sovereign of the main, To drown him all attempts are vain. Hort can assume more forms than I, A rake, a bully, pimp, or spy; Can creep, or run, or fly, or swim; All motions are alike to him: Turn him adrift, and you shall find He knows to sail with every wind; Or, throw him overboard, he'll ride As well against as with the tide. But, Pallas, you've applied too late; For, 'tis decreed by Jove and Fate, That Ireland must be soon destroy'd, And who but Hort can be employ'd? You need not then have been so pert, In sending Bolton[2] to Clonfert. I found you did it, by your grinning; Your business is to mind your spinning. But how you came to interpose In making bishops, no one knows; Or who regarded your report; For never were you seen at court. And if you must have your petition, There's Berkeley[3] in the same condition; Look, there he stands, and 'tis but just, If one must drown, the other must; But, if you'll leave us Bishop Judas, We'll give you Berkeley for Bermudas.[4] Now, if 'twill gratify your spight, To put him in a plaguy fright, Although 'tis hardly worth the cost, You soon shall see him soundly tost. You'll find him swear, blaspheme, and damn (And every moment take a dram) His ghastly visage with an air Of reprobation and despair; Or else some hiding-hole he seeks, For fear the rest should say he squeaks; Or, as Fitzpatrick[5] did before, Resolve to perish with his whore; Or else he raves, and roars, and swears, And, but for shame, would say his prayers. Or, would you see his spirits sink? Relaxing downwards in a stink? If such a sight as this can please ye, Good madam Pallas, pray be easy. To Neptune speak, and he'll consent; But he'll come back the knave he went." The goddess, who conceived a hope That Hort was destined to a rope, Believed it best to condescend To spare a foe, to save a friend; But, fearing Berkeley might be scared, She left him virtue for a guard.

[Footnote 1: Josiah Hort was born about 1674, and educated in London as a Nonconformist Minister; but he soon conformed to the Church of England, and held in succession several benefices. In 1709 he went to Ireland as chaplain to Lord Wharton, when Lord Lieutenant; and afterwards became, in 1721, Bishop of Ferns and Leighlin, and ultimately Archbishop of Tuam. He died in 1751.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: Dr. Theophilus Bolton, afterwards Archbishop of Cashell.--_F_.]

[Footnote 3: Dr. George Berkeley, a senior fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, who became Dean of Derry, and afterwards Bishop of Cloyne.]

[Footnote 4: The Bishop had a project of a college at Bermuda for the propagation of the Gospel in 1722. See his Works, _ut supra.--W. E. B._]

[Footnote 5: Brigadier Fitzpatrick was drowned in one of the packet-boats in the Bay of Dublin, in a great storm.--_F_.]

ODE ON SCIENCE

O, heavenly born! in deepest dells If fairest science ever dwells Beneath the mossy cave; Indulge the verdure of the woods, With azure beauty gild the floods, And flowery carpets lave.

For, Melancholy ever reigns Delighted in the sylvan scenes With scientific light; While Dian, huntress of the vales, Seeks lulling sounds and fanning gales, Though wrapt from mortal sight.

Yet, goddess, yet the way explore With magic rites and heathen lore Obstructed and depress'd; Till Wisdom give the sacred Nine, Untaught, not uninspired, to shine, By Reason's power redress'd.

When Solon and Lycurgus taught To moralize the human thought Of mad opinion's maze, To erring zeal they gave new laws, Thy charms, O Liberty, the cause That blends congenial rays.

Bid bright Astræa gild the morn, Or bid a hundred suns be born, To hecatomb the year; Without thy aid, in vain the poles, In vain the zodiac system rolls, In vain the lunar sphere.

Come, fairest princess of the throng, Bring sweet philosophy along, In metaphysic dreams; While raptured bards no more behold A vernal age of purer gold, In Heliconian streams.

Drive Thraldom with malignant hand, To curse some other destined land, By Folly led astray: Iërne bear on azure wing; Energic let her soar, and sing Thy universal sway.

So when Amphion[1] bade the lyre To more majestic sound aspire, Behold the madding throng, In wonder and oblivion drown'd, To sculpture turn'd by magic sound And petrifying song.

[Footnote 1: King of Thebes, and husband of Niobe; famous for his magical power with the lyre by which the stones were collected for the building of the city.--Hor., "De Arte Poetica," 394.--_W. E. B._]

A YOUNG LADY'S COMPLAINT[1] FOR THE STAY OF THE DEAN IN ENGLAND

Blow, ye zephyrs, gentle gales; Gently fill the swelling sails. Neptune, with thy trident long, Trident three-fork'd, trident strong: And ye Nereids fair and gay, Fairer than the rose in May, Nereids living in deep caves, Gently wash'd with gentle waves; Nereids, Neptune, lull asleep Ruffling storms, and ruffled deep; All around, in pompous state, On this richer Argo wait: Argo, bring my golden fleece, Argo, bring him to his Greece. Will Cadenus longer stay? Come, Cadenus, come away; Come with all the haste of love, Come unto thy turtle-dove. The ripen'd cherry on the tree Hangs, and only hangs for thee, Luscious peaches, mellow pears, Ceres, with her yellow ears, And the grape, both red and white, Grape inspiring just delight; All are ripe, and courting sue, To be pluck'd and press'd by you. Pinks have lost their blooming red, Mourning hang their drooping head, Every flower languid seems, Wants the colour of thy beams, Beams of wondrous force and power, Beams reviving every flower. Come, Cadenus, bless once more, Bless again thy native shore, Bless again this drooping isle, Make its weeping beauties smile, Beauties that thine absence mourn, Beauties wishing thy return: Come, Cadenus, come with haste, Come before the winter's blast; Swifter than the lightning fly, Or I, like Vanessa, die.

[Footnote 1: These verses, like the "Love Song in the Modern Taste" and the preceding one, seem designed to ridicule the commonplaces of poetry.--_W. E. B._]

ON THE DEATH OF DR. SWIFT

WRITTEN IN NOVEMBER, 1731 [1]

Occasioned by reading the following maxim in Rochefoucauld, "Dans l'adversité de nos meilleurs amis, nous trouvons toujours quelque chose, qui ne nous déplait pas."

This maxim was No. 99 in the edition of 1665, and was one of those suppressed by the author in his later editions. In the edition published by Didot Freres, 1864, it is No. 15 in the first supplement. See it commented upon by Lord Chesterfield in a letter to his son, Sept. 5, 1748, where he takes a similar view to that expressed by Swift.--_W. E. B._

AS Rochefoucauld his maxims drew From nature, I believe 'em true: They argue no corrupted mind In him; the fault is in mankind. This maxim more than all the rest Is thought too base for human breast: "In all distresses of our friends, We first consult our private ends; While nature, kindly bent to ease us, Points out some circumstance to please us." If this perhaps your patience move, Let reason and experience prove. We all behold with envious eyes Our _equal_ raised above our _size._ Who would not at a crowded show Stand high himself, keep others low? I love my friend as well as you: [2]But why should he obstruct my view? Then let me have the higher post: [3]Suppose it but an inch at most. If in battle you should find One whom you love of all mankind, Had some heroic action done, A champion kill'd, or trophy won; Rather than thus be overtopt, Would you not wish his laurels cropt? Dear honest Ned is in the gout, Lies rackt with pain, and you without: How patiently you hear him groan! How glad the case is not your own! What poet would not grieve to see His breth'ren write as well as he? But rather than they should excel, He'd wish his rivals all in hell. Her end when Emulation misses, She turns to Envy, stings and hisses: The strongest friendship yields to pride, Unless the odds be on our side. Vain human kind! fantastic race! Thy various follies who can trace? Self-love, ambition, envy, pride, Their empire in our hearts divide. Give others riches, power, and station, 'Tis all on me an usurpation. I have no title to aspire; Yet, when you sink, I seem the higher. In Pope I cannot read a line, But with a sigh I wish it mine; When he can in one couplet fix More sense than I can do in six; It gives me such a jealous fit, I cry, "Pox take him and his wit!" [4]I grieve to be outdone by Gay In my own hum'rous biting way. Arbuthnot is no more my friend, Who dares to irony pretend, Which I was born to introduce, Refin'd it first, and shew'd its use. St. John, as well as Pultney, knows That I had some repute for prose; And, till they drove me out of date Could maul a minister of state. If they have mortify'd my pride, And made me throw my pen aside; If with such talents Heav'n has blest 'em, Have I not reason to detest 'em? To all my foes, dear Fortune, send Thy gifts; but never to my friend: I tamely can endure the first; But this with envy makes me burst. Thus much may serve by way of proem: Proceed we therefore to our poem. The time is not remote, when I Must by the course of nature die; When, I foresee, my special friends Will try to find their private ends: Tho' it is hardly understood Which way my death can do them good, Yet thus, methinks, I hear 'em speak: "See, how the Dean begins to break! Poor gentleman, he droops apace! You plainly find it in his face. That old vertigo in his head Will never leave him till he's dead. Besides, his memory decays: He recollects not what he says; He cannot call his friends to mind: Forgets the place where last he din'd; Plyes you with stories o'er and o'er; He told them fifty times before. How does he fancy we can sit To hear his out-of-fashion'd wit? But he takes up with younger folks, Who for his wine will bear his jokes. Faith! he must make his stories shorter, Or change his comrades once a quarter: In half the time he talks them round, There must another set be found. "For poetry he's past his prime: He takes an hour to find a rhyme; His fire is out, his wit decay'd, His fancy sunk, his Muse a jade. I'd have him throw away his pen;-- But there's no talking to some men!" And then their tenderness appears, By adding largely to my years; "He's older than he would be reckon'd, And well remembers Charles the Second. He hardly drinks a pint of wine; And that, I doubt, is no good sign. His stomach too begins to fail: Last year we thought him strong and hale; But now he's quite another thing: I wish he may hold out till spring!" Then hug themselves, and reason thus: "It is not yet so bad with us!" In such a case, they talk in tropes, And by their fears express their hopes: Some great misfortune to portend, No enemy can match a friend. With all the kindness they profess, The merit of a lucky guess (When daily how d'ye's come of course, And servants answer, "_Worse and worse!_") Wou'd please 'em better, than to tell, That, "God be prais'd, the Dean is well." Then he, who prophecy'd the best, Approves his foresight to the rest: "You know I always fear'd the worst, And often told you so at first." He'd rather chuse that I should die, Than his prediction prove a lie. Not one foretells I shall recover; But all agree to give me over. Yet, shou'd some neighbour feel a pain Just in the parts where I complain; How many a message would he send! What hearty prayers that I should mend! Inquire what regimen I kept; What gave me ease, and how I slept? And more lament when I was dead, Than all the sniv'llers round my bed. My good companions, never fear; For though you may mistake a year, Though your prognostics run too fast, They must be verify'd at last. Behold the fatal day arrive! "How is the Dean?"--"He's just alive." Now the departing prayer is read; "He hardly breathes."--"The Dean is dead." Before the Passing-bell begun, The news thro' half the town has run. "O! may we all for death prepare! What has he left? and who's his heir?"-- "I know no more than what the news is; 'Tis all bequeath'd to public uses."-- "To public use! a perfect whim! What had the public done for him? Mere envy, avarice, and pride: He gave it all--but first he died. And had the Dean, in all the nation, No worthy friend, no poor relation? So ready to do strangers good, Forgetting his own flesh and blood!" Now, Grub-Street wits are all employ'd; With elegies the town is cloy'd: Some paragraph in ev'ry paper To curse the Dean, or bless the Drapier.[5] The doctors, tender of their fame, Wisely on me lay all the blame: "We must confess, his case was nice; But he would never take advice. Had he been ruled, for aught appears, He might have lived these twenty years; For, when we open'd him, we found, That all his vital parts were sound." From Dublin soon to London spread, 'Tis told at court,[6] "the Dean is dead." Kind Lady Suffolk,[7] in the spleen, Runs laughing up to tell the queen. The queen, so gracious, mild, and good, Cries, "Is he gone! 'tis time he shou'd. He's dead, you say; why, let him rot: I'm glad the medals[8] were forgot. I promised him, I own; but when? I only was a princess then; But now, as consort of a king, You know, 'tis quite a different thing." Now Chartres,[9] at Sir Robert's levee, Tells with a sneer the tidings heavy: "Why, is he dead without his shoes," Cries Bob,[10] "I'm sorry for the news: O, were the wretch but living still, And in his place my good friend Will![11] Or had a mitre on his head, Provided Bolingbroke[12] were dead!" Now Curll[13] his shop from rubbish drains: Three genuine tomes of Swift's remains! And then, to make them pass the glibber, Revised by Tibbalds, Moore, and Cibber.[14] He'll treat me as he does my betters, Publish my will, my life, my letters:[15] Revive the libels born to die; Which Pope must bear, as well as I. Here shift the scene, to represent How those I love my death lament. Poor Pope will grieve a month, and Gay A week, and Arbuthnot a day. St. John himself will scarce forbear To bite his pen, and drop a tear. The rest will give a shrug, and cry, "I'm sorry--but we all must die!" Indifference, clad in Wisdom's guise, All fortitude of mind supplies: For how can stony bowels melt In those who never pity felt! When _we_ are lash'd, _they_ kiss the rod, Resigning to the will of God. The fools, my juniors by a year, Are tortur'd with suspense and fear; Who wisely thought my age a screen, When death approach'd, to stand between: The screen removed, their hearts are trembling; They mourn for me without dissembling. My female friends, whose tender hearts Have better learn'd to act their parts, Receive the news in doleful dumps: "The Dean is dead: (and what is trumps?) Then, Lord have mercy on his soul! (Ladies, I'll venture for the vole.)[16] Six deans, they say, must bear the pall: (I wish I knew what king to call.) Madam, your husband will attend The funeral of so good a friend. No, madam, 'tis a shocking sight: And he's engaged to-morrow night: My Lady Club wou'd take it ill, If he shou'd fail her at quadrille. He loved the Dean--(I lead a heart,) But dearest friends, they say, must part. His time was come: he ran his race; We hope he's in a better place." Why do we grieve that friends should die? No loss more easy to supply. One year is past; a different scene! No further mention of the Dean; Who now, alas! no more is miss'd, Than if he never did exist. Where's now this fav'rite of Apollo! Departed:--and his works must follow; Must undergo the common fate; His kind of wit is out of date. Some country squire to Lintot[17] goes, Inquires for "Swift in Verse and Prose." Says Lintot, "I have heard the name; He died a year ago."--"The same." He searches all the shop in vain. "Sir, you may find them in Duck-lane;[18] I sent them with a load of books, Last Monday to the pastry-cook's. To fancy they could live a year! I find you're but a stranger here. The Dean was famous in his time, And had a kind of knack at rhyme. His way of writing now is past; The town has got a better taste; I keep no antiquated stuff, But spick and span I have enough. Pray do but give me leave to show 'em; Here's Colley Cibber's birth-day poem. This ode you never yet have seen, By Stephen Duck,[19] upon the queen. Then here's a letter finely penned Against the Craftsman and his friend: It clearly shows that all reflection On ministers is disaffection. Next, here's Sir Robert's vindication,[20] And Mr. Henley's last oration.[21] The hawkers have not got them yet: Your honour please to buy a set? "Here's Woolston's[22] tracts, the twelfth edition; 'Tis read by every politician: The country members, when in town, To all their boroughs send them down; You never met a thing so smart; The courtiers have them all by heart: Those maids of honour (who can read), Are taught to use them for their creed.[23] The rev'rend author's good intention Has been rewarded with a pension. He does an honour to his gown, By bravely running priestcraft down: He shows, as sure as God's in Gloucester, That Moses was a grand impostor; That all his miracles were cheats, Perform'd as jugglers do their feats: The church had never such a writer; A shame he has not got a mitre!" Suppose me dead; and then suppose A club assembled at the Rose; Where, from discourse of this and that, I grow the subject of their chat. And while they toss my name about, With favour some, and some without, One, quite indiff'rent in the cause, My character impartial draws: The Dean, if we believe report, Was never ill receiv'd at court. As for his works in verse and prose I own myself no judge of those; Nor can I tell what critics thought 'em: But this I know, all people bought 'em. As with a moral view design'd To cure the vices of mankind: And, if he often miss'd his aim, The world must own it, to their shame, The praise is his, and theirs the blame. "Sir, I have heard another story: He was a most confounded Tory, And grew, or he is much belied, Extremely dull, before he died." Can we the Drapier then forget? Is not our nation in his debt? 'Twas he that writ the Drapier's letters!-- "He should have left them for his betters, We had a hundred abler men, Nor need depend upon his pen.-- Say what you will about his reading, You never can defend his breeding; Who in his satires running riot, Could never leave the world in quiet; Attacking, when he took the whim, Court, city, camp--all one to him.-- "But why should he, except he slobber't, Offend our patriot, great Sir Robert, Whose counsels aid the sov'reign power To save the nation every hour? What scenes of evil he unravels In satires, libels, lying travels! Not sparing his own clergy-cloth, But eats into it, like a moth!" His vein, ironically grave, Exposed the fool, and lash'd the knave. To steal a hint was never known, But what he writ was all his own.[24] "He never thought an honour done him, Because a duke was proud to own him, Would rather slip aside and chuse To talk with wits in dirty shoes; Despised the fools with stars and garters, So often seen caressing Chartres.[25] He never courted men in station, _Nor persons held in admiration;_ Of no man's greatness was afraid, Because he sought for no man's aid. Though trusted long in great affairs He gave himself no haughty airs: Without regarding private ends, Spent all his credit for his friends; And only chose the wise and good; No flatterers; no allies in blood: But succour'd virtue in distress, And seldom fail'd of good success; As numbers in their hearts must own, Who, but for him, had been unknown. "With princes kept a due decorum, But never stood in awe before 'em. He follow'd David's lesson just; _In princes never put thy trust:_ And would you make him truly sour, Provoke him with a slave in power. The Irish senate if you named, With what impatience he declaim'd! Fair LIBERTY was all his cry, For her he stood prepared to die; For her he boldly stood alone; For her he oft exposed his own. Two kingdoms,[26] just as faction led, Had set a price upon his head; But not a traitor could be found, To sell him for six hundred pound. "Had he but spared his tongue and pen He might have rose like other men: But power was never in his thought, And wealth he valued not a groat: Ingratitude he often found, And pitied those who meant the wound: But kept the tenor of his mind, To merit well of human kind: Nor made a sacrifice of those Who still were true, to please his foes. He labour'd many a fruitless hour, To reconcile his friends in power; Saw mischief by a faction brewing, While they pursued each other's ruin. But finding vain was all his care, He left the court in mere despair.[27] "And, oh! how short are human schemes! Here ended all our golden dreams. What St. John's skill in state affairs, What Ormond's valour, Oxford's cares, To save their sinking country lent, Was all destroy'd by one event. Too soon that precious life was ended, On which alone our weal depended.[28] When up a dangerous faction starts,[29] With wrath and vengeance in their hearts; _By solemn League and Cov'nant bound,_ To ruin, slaughter, and confound; To turn religion to a fable, And make the government a Babel; Pervert the laws, disgrace the gown, Corrupt the senate, rob the crown; To sacrifice old England's glory, And make her infamous in story: When such a tempest shook the land, How could unguarded Virtue stand! With horror, grief, despair, the Dean Beheld the dire destructive scene: His friends in exile, or the tower, Himself[30] within the frown of power, Pursued by base envenom'd pens, Far to the land of slaves and fens;[31] A servile race in folly nursed, Who truckle most, when treated worst. "By innocence and resolution, He bore continual persecution; While numbers to preferment rose, Whose merits were, to be his foes; When _ev'n his own familiar friends_, Intent upon their private ends, Like renegadoes now he feels, _Against him lifting up their heels._ "The Dean did, by his pen, defeat An infamous destructive cheat;[32] Taught fools their int'rest how to know, And gave them arms to ward the blow. Envy has own'd it was his doing, To save that hapless land from ruin; While they who at the steerage stood, And reap'd the profit, sought his blood. "To save them from their evil fate, In him was held a crime of state, A wicked monster on the bench,[33] Whose fury blood could never quench; As vile and profligate a villain, As modern Scroggs, or old Tresilian:[34] Who long all justice had discarded, _Nor fear'd he God, nor man regarded;_ Vow'd on the Dean his rage to vent, And make him of his zeal repent: But Heaven his innocence defends, The grateful people stand his friends; Not strains of law, nor judge's frown, Nor topics brought to please the crown, Nor witness hired, nor jury pick'd, Prevail to bring him in convict. "In exile,[35] with a steady heart, He spent his life's declining part; Where folly, pride, and faction sway, Remote from St. John, Pope, and Gay. Alas, poor Dean! his only scope Was to be held a misanthrope. This into gen'ral odium drew him, Which if he liked, much good may't do him. His zeal was not to lash our crimes, But discontent against the times: For had we made him timely offers To raise his post, or fill his coffers, Perhaps he might have truckled down, Like other brethren of his gown. For party he would scarce have bled: I say no more--because he's dead. What writings has he left behind? I hear, they're of a different kind; A few in verse; but most in prose-- Some high-flown pamphlets, I suppose;-- All scribbled in the worst of times, To palliate his friend Oxford's crimes, To praise Queen Anne, nay more, defend her, As never fav'ring the Pretender; Or libels yet conceal'd from sight, Against the court to show his spite; Perhaps his travels, part the third; A lie at every second word-- Offensive to a loyal ear: But not one sermon, you may swear." His friendships there, to few confined Were always of the middling kind;[36] No fools of rank, a mongrel breed, Who fain would pass for lords indeed: Where titles give no right or power,[37] And peerage is a wither'd flower; He would have held it a disgrace, If such a wretch had known his face. On rural squires, that kingdom's bane, He vented oft his wrath in vain; [Biennial[38]] squires to market brought; Who sell their souls and [votes] for nought; The [nation stripped,] go joyful back, To *** the church, their tenants rack, Go snacks with [rogues and rapparees,][39] And keep the peace to pick up fees; In every job to have a share, A gaol or barrack to repair; And turn the tax for public roads, Commodious to their own abodes.[40] "Perhaps I may allow the Dean, Had too much satire in his vein; And seem'd determined not to starve it, Because no age could more deserve it. Yet malice never was his aim; He lash'd the vice, but spared the name; No individual could resent, Where thousands equally were meant; His satire points at no defect, But what all mortals may correct; For he abhorr'd that senseless tribe Who call it humour when they gibe: He spared a hump, or crooked nose, Whose owners set not up for beaux. True genuine dulness moved his pity, Unless it offer'd to be witty. Those who their ignorance confest, He ne'er offended with a jest; But laugh'd to hear an idiot quote A verse from Horace learn'd by rote. "Vice, if it e'er can be abash'd, Must be or ridiculed or lash'd. If you resent it, who's to blame? He neither knew you nor your name. Should vice expect to 'scape rebuke, Because its owner is a duke? "He knew an hundred pleasant stories, With all the turns of Whigs and Tories: Was cheerful to his dying day; And friends would let him have his way. "He gave the little wealth he had To build a house for fools and mad; And show'd by one satiric touch, No nation wanted it so much. That kingdom he hath left his debtor, I wish it soon may have a better." And, since you dread no farther lashes Methinks you may forgive his ashes.

[Footnote 1: This poem was first written about 1731 but was not then intended to be published; and having been shown by Swift to all his "common acquaintance indifferently," some "friend," probably Pilkington, remembered enough of it to concoct the poem called "The Life and Character of Dr. Swift, written by himself," which was published in London in 1733, and reprinted in Dublin. In a letter to Pope, dated 1 May, that year, the Dean complained seriously about the imposture, saying, "it shall not provoke me to print the true one, which indeed is not proper to be seen till I can be seen no more." See Swift to Pope, in Pope's Works, edit. Elwin and Courthope, vii, 307. The poem was subsequently published by Faulkner with the Dean's permission. It is now printed from a copy of the original edition, with corrections in Swift's hand, which I found in the Forster collection.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: _Var_. "But would not have him stop my view."]

[Footnote 3: _Var_. "I ask but for an inch at most."]

[Footnote 4: _Var_. "Why must I be outdone by Gay."]

[Footnote 5: The author supposes that the scribblers of the prevailing party, which he always opposed, will libel him after his death; but that others will remember the service he had done to Ireland, under the name of M. B. Drapier, by utterly defeating the destructive project of Wood's halfpence, in five letters to the people of Ireland, at that time read universally, and convincing every reader.]

[Footnote 6: The Dean supposeth himself to die in Ireland.]

[Footnote 7: Mrs. Howard, afterwards Countess of Suffolk, then of the bedchamber to the queen, professed much favour for the Dean. The queen, then princess, sent a dozen times to the Dean (then in London), with her commands to attend her; which at last he did, by advice of all his friends. She often sent for him afterwards, and always treated him very graciously. He taxed her with a present worth £10, which she promised before he should return to Ireland; but on his taking leave the medals were not ready.

A letter from Swift to Lady Suffolk, 21st November, 1730, bears out this note.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 8: The medals were to be sent to the Dean in four months; but she forgot or thought them too dear. The Dean, being in Ireland, sent Mrs. Howard a piece of plaid made in that kingdom, which the queen seeing took it from her and wore it herself and sent to the Dean for as much as would clothe herself and children, desiring he would send the charge of it; he did the former, it cost £35, but he said he would have nothing except the medals; he went next summer to England, and was treated as usual, and she being then queen, the Dean was promised a settlement in England, but returned as he went, and instead of receiving of her intended favours or the medals, hath been ever since under Her Majesty's displeasure.]

[Footnote 9: Chartres is a most infamous vile scoundrel, grown from a footboy, or worse, to a prodigious fortune, both in England and Scotland. He had a way of insinuating himself into all ministers, under every change, either as pimp, flatterer, or informer. He was tried at seventy for a rape, and came off by sacrificing a great part of his fortune. He is since dead; but this poem still preserves the scene and time it was writ in.--_Dublin Edition,_ and see _ante_, p. 191.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 10: Sir Robert Walpole, chief minister of state, treated the Dean in 1726 with great distinction; invited him to dinner at Chelsea, with the Dean's friends chosen on purpose: appointed an hour to talk with him of Ireland, to which kingdom and people the Dean found him no great friend; for he defended Wood's project of halfpence, etc. The Dean would see him no more; and upon his next year's return to England, Sir Robert, on an accidental meeting, only made a civil compliment, and never invited him again.]

[Footnote 11: Mr. William Pultney, from being Sir Robert's intimate friend, detesting his administration, became his mortal enemy and joined with my Lord Bolingbroke, to expose him in an excellent paper called the Craftsman, which is still continued.]

[Footnote 12: Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, Secretary of State to Queen Anne, of blessed memory. He is reckoned the most universal genius in Europe. Walpole, dreading his abilities, treated him most injuriously working with King George I, who forgot his promise of restoring the said lord, upon the restless importunity of Sir Robert Walpole.]

[Footnote 13: Curll hath been the most infamous bookseller of any age or country. His character, in part, may be found in Mr. Pope's "Dunciad." He published three volumes, all charged on the Dean, who never writ three pages of them. He hath used many of the Dean's friends in almost as vile a manner.]

[Footnote 14: Three stupid verse-writers in London; the last, to the shame of the court, and the highest disgrace to wit and learning, was made laureate. Moore, commonly called Jemmy Moore, son of Arthur Moore, whose father was jailor of Monaghan, in Ireland. See the character of Jemmy Moore, and Tibbalds [Theobald], in the "Dunciad."]

[Footnote 15: Curll is notoriously infamous for publishing the lives, letters, and last wills and testaments of the nobility and ministers of state, as well as of all the rogues who are hanged at Tyburn. He hath been in custody of the House of Lords, for publishing or forging the letters of many peers, which made the Lords enter a resolution in their journal-book, that no life or writings of any lord should be published, without the consent of the next heir-at-law or license from their House.]

[Footnote 16: The play by which the dealer may win or lose all the tricks. See Hoyle on "Quadrille."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 17: See _post_, p. 267.]

[Footnote 18: A place in London, where old books are sold.]

[Footnote 19: See _ante_ "On Stephen Duck, the Thresher Poet," p. 192.]

[Footnote 20: Walpole hath a set of party scribblers, who do nothing but write in his defence.]

[Footnote 21: Henley is a clergyman, who, wanting both merit and luck to get preferment, or even to keep his curacy in the established church, formed a new conventicle, which he called an Oratory. There, at set times, he delivereth strange speeches, compiled by himself and his associates, who share the profit with him. Every hearer payeth a shilling each day for admittance. He is an absolute dunce, but generally reported crazy.]

[Footnote 22: See _ante_, p. 188.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 23: See _ante_, p. 188. There is some confusion here betwixt Woolston and Wollaston, whose book, the "Religion of Nature delineated," was much talked of and fashionable. See a letter from Pope to Bethell in Pope's correspondence, Pope's Works, edit. Elwin and Courthope, ix, p. 149.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 24: Denham's elegy on Cowley: "To him no author was unknown, Yet what he wrote was all his own."]

[Footnote 25: See _ante_, pp. 192 and 252.]

[Footnote 26: In the year 1713, the late queen was prevailed with, by an address of the House of Lords in England, to publish a proclamation, promising £300 to whatever person would discover the author of a pamphlet called "The Public Spirit of the Whigs"; and in Ireland, in the year 1724, Lord Carteret, at his first coming into the government, was prevailed on to issue a proclamation for promising the like reward of £300 to any person who would discover the author of a pamphlet, called "The Drapier's Fourth Letter," etc., writ against that destructive project of coining halfpence for Ireland; but in neither kingdom was the Dean discovered.]

[Footnote 27: Queen Anne's ministry fell to variance from the first year after their ministry began; Harcourt, the chancellor, and Lord Bolingbroke, the secretary, were discontented with the treasurer Oxford, for his too much mildness to the Whig party; this quarrel grew higher every day till the queen's death. The Dean, who was the only person that endeavoured to reconcile them, found it impossible, and thereupon retired to the country about ten weeks before that event: upon which he returned to his deanery in Dublin, where for many years he was worryed by the new people in power, and had hundreds of libels writ against him in England.]

[Footnote 28: In the height of the quarrel between the ministers, the queen died.]

[Footnote 29: Upon Queen Anne's death, the Whig faction was restored to power, which they exercised with the utmost rage and revenge; impeached and banished the chief leaders of the Church party, and stripped all their adherents of what employments they had; after which England was never known to make so mean a figure in Europe. The greatest preferments in the Church, in both kingdoms, were given to the most ignorant men. Fanaticks were publickly caressed, Ireland utterly ruined and enslaved, only great ministers heaping up millions; and so affairs continue, and are likely to remain so.]

[Footnote 30: Upon the queen's death, the Dean returned to live in Dublin at his Deanery House. Numberless libels were written against him in England as a Jacobite; he was insulted in the street, and at night he was forced to be attended by his servants armed.]

[Footnote 31: Ireland.]

[Footnote 32: One Wood, a hardware-man from England, had a patent for coining copper halfpence in Ireland, to the sum of £108,000, which, in the consequence, must leave that kingdom without gold or silver. See The Drapier's Letters, "Prose Works," vol. vi.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 33: Whitshed was then chief justice. He had some years before prosecuted a printer for a pamphlet writ by the Dean, to persuade the people of Ireland to wear their own manufactures. Whitshed sent the jury down eleven times, and kept them nine hours, until they were forced to bring in a special verdict. He sat afterwards on the trial of the printer of the Drapier's Fourth Letter; but the jury, against all he could say or swear, threw out the bill. All the kingdom took the Drapier's part, except the courtiers, or those who expected places. The Drapier was celebrated in many poems and pamphlets. His sign was set up in most streets of Dublin (where many of them still continue) and in several country towns. This note was written in 1734.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 34: Scroggs was chief justice under King Charles II. His judgement always varied in state trials according to directions from Court. Tresilian was a wicked judge hanged above three hundred years ago.]

[Footnote 35: In Ireland, which he had reason to call a place of exile; to which country nothing could have driven him but the queen's death, who had determined to fix him in England, in spite of the Duchess of Somerset.]

[Footnote 36: In Ireland the Dean was not acquainted with one single lord, spiritual or temporal. He only conversed with private gentlemen of the clergy or laity, and but a small number of either.]

[Footnote 37: The peers of Ireland lost their jurisdiction by one single act, and tamely submitted to this infamous mark of slavery without the least resentment or remonstrance.]

[Footnote 38: The Parliament, as they call it in Ireland, meet but once in two years, and after having given five times more than they can afford, return home to reimburse themselves by country jobs and oppressions of which some few are mentioned.]

[Footnote 39: The highwaymen in Ireland are, since the late wars there, usually called Rapparees, which was a name given to those Irish soldiers who, in small parties, used at that time to plunder Protestants.]

[Footnote 40: The army in Ireland are lodged in barracks, the building and repairing whereof and other charges, have cost a prodigious sum to that unhappy kingdom.]

ON POETRY A RHAPSODY. 1733

All human race would fain be wits, And millions miss for one that hits. Young's universal passion, pride,[1] Was never known to spread so wide. Say, Britain, could you ever boast Three poets in an age at most? Our chilling climate hardly bears A sprig of bays in fifty years; While every fool his claim alleges, As if it grew in common hedges. What reason can there be assign'd For this perverseness in the mind? Brutes find out where their talents lie: A bear will not attempt to fly; A founder'd horse will oft debate, Before he tries a five-barr'd gate; A dog by instinct turns aside, Who sees the ditch too deep and wide. But man we find the only creature Who, led by Folly, combats Nature; Who, when she loudly cries, Forbear, With obstinacy fixes there; And, where his genius least inclines, Absurdly bends his whole designs. Not empire to the rising sun By valour, conduct, fortune won; Not highest wisdom in debates, For framing laws to govern states; Not skill in sciences profound So large to grasp the circle round, Such heavenly influence require, As how to strike the Muse's lyre. Not beggar's brat on bulk begot; Not bastard of a pedler Scot; Not boy brought up to cleaning shoes, The spawn of Bridewell[2] or the stews; Not infants dropp'd, the spurious pledges Of gipsies litter'd under hedges; Are so disqualified by fate To rise in church, or law, or state, As he whom Phoebus in his ire Has blasted with poetic fire. What hope of custom in the fair, While not a soul demands your ware? Where you have nothing to produce For private life, or public use? Court, city, country, want you not; You cannot bribe, betray, or plot. For poets, law makes no provision; The wealthy have you in derision: Of state affairs you cannot smatter; Are awkward when you try to flatter; Your portion, taking Britain round, Was just one annual hundred pound; Now not so much as in remainder, Since Cibber[3] brought in an attainder; For ever fix'd by right divine (A monarch's right) on Grub Street line. Poor starv'ling bard, how small thy gains! How unproportion'd to thy pains! And here a simile comes pat in: Though chickens take a month to fatten, The guests in less than half an hour Will more than half a score devour. So, after toiling twenty days To earn a stock of pence and praise, Thy labours, grown the critic's prey, Are swallow'd o'er a dish of tea; Gone to be never heard of more, Gone where the chickens went before. How shall a new attempter learn Of different spirits to discern, And how distinguish which is which, The poet's vein, or scribbling itch? Then hear an old experienced sinner, Instructing thus a young beginner. Consult yourself; and if you find A powerful impulse urge your mind, Impartial judge within your breast What subject you can manage best; Whether your genius most inclines To satire, praise, or humorous lines, To elegies in mournful tone, Or prologue sent from hand unknown. Then, rising with Aurora's light, The Muse invoked, sit down to write; Blot out, correct, insert, refine, Enlarge, diminish, interline; Be mindful, when invention fails, To scratch your head, and bite your nails. Your poem finish'd, next your care Is needful to transcribe it fair. In modern wit all printed trash is Set off with numerous breaks and dashes. To statesmen would you give a wipe, You print it in _Italic_ type. When letters are in vulgar shapes, 'Tis ten to one the wit escapes: But, when in capitals express'd, The dullest reader smokes the jest: Or else perhaps he may invent A better than the poet meant; As learned commentators view In Homer more than Homer knew. Your poem in its modish dress, Correctly fitted for the press, Convey by penny-post to Lintot,[4] But let no friend alive look into't. If Lintot thinks 'twill quit the cost, You need not fear your labour lost: And how agreeably surprised Are you to see it advertised! The hawker shows you one in print, As fresh as farthings from the mint: The product of your toil and sweating; A bastard of your own begetting. Be sure at Will's,[5] the following day, Lie snug, and hear what critics say; And, if you find the general vogue Pronounces you a stupid rogue, Damns all your thoughts as low and little, Sit still, and swallow down your spittle; Be silent as a politician, For talking may beget suspicion; Or praise the judgment of the town, And help yourself to run it down. Give up your fond paternal pride, Nor argue on the weaker side: For, poems read without a name We justly praise, or justly blame; And critics have no partial views, Except they know whom they abuse: And since you ne'er provoke their spite, Depend upon't their judgment's right. But if you blab, you are undone: Consider what a risk you run: You lose your credit all at once; The town will mark you for a dunce; The vilest dogg'rel Grub Street sends, Will pass for yours with foes and friends; And you must bear the whole disgrace, Till some fresh blockhead takes your place. Your secret kept, your poem sunk, And sent in quires to line a trunk, If still you be disposed to rhyme, Go try your hand a second time. Again you fail: yet Safe's the word; Take courage and attempt a third. But first with care employ your thoughts Where critics mark'd your former faults; The trivial turns, the borrow'd wit, The similes that nothing fit; The cant which every fool repeats, Town jests and coffeehouse conceits, Descriptions tedious, flat, and dry, And introduced the Lord knows why: Or where we find your fury set Against the harmless alphabet; On A's and B's your malice vent, While readers wonder whom you meant: A public or a private robber, A statesman, or a South Sea jobber; A prelate, who no God believes; A parliament, or den of thieves; A pickpurse at the bar or bench, A duchess, or a suburb wench: Or oft, when epithets you link, In gaping lines to fill a chink; Like stepping-stones, to save a stride, In streets where kennels are too wide; Or like a heel-piece, to support A cripple with one foot too short; Or like a bridge, that joins a marish To moorlands of a different parish. So have I seen ill-coupled hounds Drag different ways in miry grounds. So geographers, in Afric maps, With savage pictures fill their gaps, And o'er unhabitable downs Place elephants for want of towns. But, though you miss your third essay, You need not throw your pen away. Lay now aside all thoughts of fame, To spring more profitable game. From party merit seek support; The vilest verse thrives best at court. And may you ever have the luck To rhyme almost as ill as Duck;[6] And, though you never learn'd to scan verse Come out with some lampoon on D'Anvers. A pamphlet in Sir Bob's defence Will never fail to bring in pence: Nor be concern'd about the sale, He pays his workmen on the nail.[7] Display the blessings of the nation, And praise the whole administration. Extol the bench of bishops round, Who at them rail, bid ---- confound; To bishop-haters answer thus: (The only logic used by us) What though they don't believe in ---- Deny them Protestants--thou lyest. A prince, the moment he is crown'd, Inherits every virtue round, As emblems of the sovereign power, Like other baubles in the Tower; Is generous, valiant, just, and wise, And so continues till he dies: His humble senate this professes, In all their speeches, votes, addresses. But once you fix him in a tomb, His virtues fade, his vices bloom; And each perfection, wrong imputed, Is fully at his death confuted. The loads of poems in his praise, Ascending, make one funeral blaze: His panegyrics then are ceased, He grows a tyrant, dunce, or beast. As soon as you can hear his knell, This god on earth turns devil in hell: And lo! his ministers of state, Transform'd to imps, his levee wait; Where in the scenes of endless woe, They ply their former arts below; And as they sail in Charon's boat, Contrive to bribe the judge's vote; To Cerberus they give a sop, His triple barking mouth to stop; Or, in the ivory gate of dreams,[8] Project excise and South-Sea[9] schemes; Or hire their party pamphleteers To set Elysium by the ears. Then, poet, if you mean to thrive, Employ your muse on kings alive; With prudence gathering up a cluster Of all the virtues you can muster, Which, form'd into a garland sweet, Lay humbly at your monarch's feet: Who, as the odours reach his throne, Will smile, and think them all his own; For law and gospel both determine All virtues lodge in royal ermine: I mean the oracles of both, Who shall depose it upon oath. Your garland, in the following reign, Change but the names, will do again. But, if you think this trade too base, (Which seldom is the dunce's case) Put on the critic's brow, and sit At Will's, the puny judge of wit. A nod, a shrug, a scornful smile, With caution used, may serve a while. Proceed no further in your part, Before you learn the terms of art; For you can never be too far gone In all our modern critics' jargon: Then talk with more authentic face Of unities, in time and place: Get scraps of Horace from your friends, And have them at your fingers' ends; Learn Aristotle's rules by rote, And at all hazards boldly quote; Judicious Rymer[10] oft review, Wise Dennis,[11] and profound Bossu.[12] Read all the prefaces of Dryden, For these our critics much confide in; Though merely writ at first for filling, To raise the volume's price a shilling. A forward critic often dupes us With sham quotations _peri hupsous_: And if we have not read Longinus, Will magisterially outshine us. Then, lest with Greek he overrun ye, Procure the book for love or money, Translated from Boileau's translation,[13] And quote quotation on quotation. At Will's you hear a poem read, Where Battus[14] from the table head, Reclining on his elbow-chair, Gives judgment with decisive air; To whom the tribe of circling wits As to an oracle submits. He gives directions to the town, To cry it up, or run it down; Like courtiers, when they send a note, Instructing members how to vote. He sets the stamp of bad and good, Though not a word be understood. Your lesson learn'd, you'll be secure To get the name of connoisseur: And, when your merits once are known, Procure disciples of your own. For poets (you can never want 'em) Spread through Augusta Trinobantum,[15] Computing by their pecks of coals, Amount to just nine thousand souls: These o'er their proper districts govern, Of wit and humour judges sovereign. In every street a city bard Rules, like an alderman, his ward; His undisputed rights extend Through all the lane, from end to end; The neighbours round admire his shrewdness For songs of loyalty and lewdness; Outdone by none in rhyming well, Although he never learn'd to spell. Two bordering wits contend for glory; And one is Whig, and one is Tory: And this, for epics claims the bays, And that, for elegiac lays: Some famed for numbers soft and smooth, By lovers spoke in Punch's booth; And some as justly fame extols For lofty lines in Smithfield drolls. Bavius[16] in Wapping gains renown, And Mævius[16] reigns o'er Kentish town: Tigellius[17] placed in Phooebus' car From Ludgate shines to Temple-bar: Harmonious Cibber entertains The court with annual birth-day strains; Whence Gay was banish'd in disgrace;[18] Where Pope will never show his face; Where Young must torture his invention To flatter knaves or lose his pension.[19] But these are not a thousandth part Of jobbers in the poet's art, Attending each his proper station, And all in due subordination, Through every alley to be found, In garrets high, or under ground; And when they join their pericranies, Out skips a book of miscellanies. Hobbes clearly proves, that every creature Lives in a state of war by nature.[20] The greater for the smaller watch, But meddle seldom with their match. A whale of moderate size will draw A shoal of herrings down his maw; A fox with geese his belly crams; A wolf destroys a thousand lambs; But search among the rhyming race, The brave are worried by the base. If on Parnassus' top you sit, You rarely bite, are always bit: Each poet of inferior size On you shall rail and criticise, And strive to tear you limb from limb; While others do as much for him. The vermin only teaze and pinch Their foes superior by an inch. So, naturalists observe, a flea Has smaller fleas that on him prey; And these have smaller still to bite 'em, And so proceed _ad infinitum_. Thus every poet, in his kind, Is bit by him that comes behind: Who, though too little to be seen, Can teaze, and gall, and give the spleen; Call dunces, fools, and sons of whores, Lay Grub Street at each other's doors; Extol the Greek and Roman masters, And curse our modern poetasters; Complain, as many an ancient bard did, How genius is no more rewarded; How wrong a taste prevails among us; How much our ancestors outsung us: Can personate an awkward scorn For those who are not poets born; And all their brother dunces lash, Who crowd the press with hourly trash. O Grub Street! how do I bemoan thee, Whose graceless children scorn to own thee! Their filial piety forgot, Deny their country, like a Scot; Though by their idiom and grimace, They soon betray their native place: Yet thou hast greater cause to be Ashamed of them, than they of thee, Degenerate from their ancient brood Since first the court allow'd them food. Remains a difficulty still, To purchase fame by writing ill. From Flecknoe[21] down to Howard's[22] time, How few have reach'd the low sublime! For when our high-born Howard died, Blackmore[23] alone his place supplied: And lest a chasm should intervene, When death had finish'd Blackmore's reign, The leaden crown devolved to thee, Great poet[24] of the "Hollow Tree." But ah! how unsecure thy throne! A thousand bards thy right disown: They plot to turn, in factious zeal, Duncenia to a common weal; And with rebellious arms pretend An equal privilege to descend. In bulk there are not more degrees From elephants to mites in cheese, Than what a curious eye may trace In creatures of the rhyming race. From bad to worse, and worse they fall; But who can reach the worst of all? For though, in nature, depth and height Are equally held infinite: In poetry, the height we know; 'Tis only infinite below. For instance: when you rashly think, No rhymer can like Welsted sink, His merits balanced, you shall find The Laureate leaves him far behind. Concanen,[25] more aspiring bard, Soars downward deeper by a yard. Smart Jemmy Moore[26] with vigour drops; The rest pursue as thick as hops: With heads to point the gulf they enter, Link'd perpendicular to the centre; And as their heels elated rise, Their heads attempt the nether skies. O, what indignity and shame, To prostitute the Muses' name! By flattering kings, whom Heaven design'd The plagues and scourges of mankind; Bred up in ignorance and sloth, And every vice that nurses both. Perhaps you say, Augustus shines, Immortal made in Virgil's lines, And Horace brought the tuneful quire, To sing his virtues on the lyre; Without reproach for flattery, true, Because their praises were his due. For in those ages kings, we find, Were animals of human kind. But now, go search all _Europe_ round Among the _savage monsters_ ---- With vice polluting every _throne_, (I mean all thrones except our own;) In vain you make the strictest view To find a ---- in all the crew, With whom a footman out of place Would not conceive a high disgrace, A burning shame, a crying sin, To take his morning's cup of gin. Thus all are destined to obey Some beast of burthen or of prey. 'Tis sung, Prometheus,[27] forming man, Through all the brutal species ran, Each proper quality to find Adapted to a human mind; A mingled mass of good and bad, The best and worst that could be had; Then from a clay of mixture base He shaped a ---- to rule the race, Endow'd with gifts from every brute That best the * * nature suit. Thus think on ----s: the name denotes Hogs, asses, wolves, baboons, and goats. To represent in figure just, Sloth, folly, rapine, mischief, lust; Oh! were they all but Neb-cadnezers, What herds of ----s would turn to grazers! Fair Britain, in thy monarch blest, Whose virtues bear the strictest test; Whom never faction could bespatter, Nor minister nor poet flatter; What justice in rewarding merit! What magnanimity of spirit! What lineaments divine we trace Through all his figure, mien, and face! Though peace with olive binds his hands, Confess'd the conquering hero stands. Hydaspes,[28] Indus, and the Ganges, Dread from his hand impending changes. From him the Tartar and Chinese, Short by the knees,[29] entreat for peace. The consort of his throne and bed, A perfect goddess born and bred, Appointed sovereign judge to sit On learning, eloquence, and wit. Our eldest hope, divine Iülus,[30] (Late, very late, O may he rule us!) What early manhood has he shown, Before his downy beard was grown, Then think, what wonders will be done By going on as he begun, An heir for Britain to secure As long as sun and moon endure. The remnant of the royal blood Comes pouring on me like a flood. Bright goddesses, in number five; Duke William, sweetest prince alive. Now sing the minister of state, Who shines alone without a mate. Observe with what majestic port This Atlas stands to prop the court: Intent the public debts to pay, Like prudent Fabius,[31] by delay. Thou great vicegerent of the king, Thy praises every Muse shall sing! In all affairs thou sole director; Of wit and learning chief protector, Though small the time thou hast to spare, The church is thy peculiar care. Of pious prelates what a stock You choose to rule the sable flock! You raise the honour of the peerage, Proud to attend you at the steerage. You dignify the noble race, Content yourself with humbler place. Now learning, valour, virtue, sense, To titles give the sole pretence. St. George beheld thee with delight, Vouchsafe to be an azure knight, When on thy breast and sides Herculean, He fix'd the star and string cerulean. Say, poet, in what other nation Shone ever such a constellation! Attend, ye Popes, and Youngs, and Gays, And tune your harps, and strew your bays: Your panegyrics here provide; You cannot err on flattery's side. Above the stars exalt your style, You still are low ten thousand mile. On Lewis all his bards bestow'd Of incense many a thousand load; But Europe mortified his pride, And swore the fawning rascals lied. Yet what the world refused to Lewis, Applied to George, exactly true is. Exactly true! invidious poet! 'Tis fifty thousand times below it. Translate me now some lines, if you can, From Virgil, Martial, Ovid, Lucan. They could all power in Heaven divide, And do no wrong on either side; They teach you how to split a hair, Give George and Jove an equal share.[32] Yet why should we be laced so strait? I'll give my monarch butter-weight. And reason good; for many a year Jove never intermeddled here: Nor, though his priests be duly paid, Did ever we desire his aid: We now can better do without him, Since Woolston gave us arms to rout him. _Caetera desiderantur_.

[Footnote 1: See Young's "Satires," and "Life" by Johnson.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: The prison or house of correction to which harlots were often consigned. See Hogarth's "Harlot's Progress," and "A beautiful young Nymph," _ante_, p. 201.--_W. R. B._]

[Footnote 3: Colley Cibber, born in 1671, died in 1757; famous as a comedian and dramatist, and immortalized by Pope as the hero of the "Dunciad"; appointed Laureate in December, 1730, in succession to Eusden, who died in September that year. See Cibber's "Apology for his Life"; Disraeli's "Quarrels of Authors," edit. 1859.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: Barnaby Bernard Lintot, publisher and bookseller, noted for adorning his shop with titles in red letters. In the Prologue to the "Satires" Pope says: "What though my name stood rubric on the walls"; and in the "Dunciad," book i, "Lintot's rubric post." He made a handsome fortune, and died High Sheriff of Sussex in 1736, aged sixty-one.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 5: The coffee-house most frequented by the wits and poets of that time.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 6: See _ante_, p. 192, "On Stephen Duck, the Thresher Poet."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 7: Allusion to the large sums paid by Walpole to scribblers in support of his party.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 8: "Sunt geminae Somni portae: quarum altera fertur Cornea; qua veris facilis datur exitus Vmbris: Altera candenti perfecta nitens elephanto; Sed falsa ad coelum mittunt insomnia Manes." VIRG., _Aen._, vi.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 9: See the "South Sea Project," _ante_, p. 120.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 10: Thomas Rymer, archaeologist and critic. The allusion is to his "Remarks on the Tragedies of the last Age," on which see Johnson's "Life of Dryden" and Spence's "Anecdotes," p. 173. Rymer is best known by his work entitled "Foedera," consisting of leagues, treaties, etc., made between England and other kingdoms.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 11: John Dennis, born 1657, died 1734. He is best remembered as "The Critic." See Swift's "Thoughts on various subjects," "Prose Works," i, 284; Disraeli, "Calamities of Authors: Influence of a bad Temper in Criticism"; Pope's Works, edit. Elwin and Courthope, _passim._--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 12: Highly esteemed as a French critic by Dryden and Pope.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 13: By Leonard Welsted, who, in 1712, published the work of "Longinus on the Sublime," stated to be "translated from the Greek." He is better known through his quarrel with Pope. See the "Prologue to the Satires."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 14: Dryden, whose armed chair at Will's was in the winter placed by the fire, and in the summer in the balcony. Malone's "Life of Dryden," p. 485. Why Battus? Battus was a herdsman who, because he Betrayed Mercury's theft of some cattle, was changed by the god into a Stone Index. Ovid, "Metam.," ii, 685.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 15: The ancient name of London, also called Troynovant. See Journal to Stella, "Prose Works," ii, 249; and Cunningham's "Handbook of London," introduction.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 16: The two bad Roman poets, hateful and inimical to Virgil and Horace: Virg., "Ecl." iii, 90; Horat., "Epod." x. The names have been well applied in our time by Gifford in his satire entitled "The Baviad and Maeviad."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 17: A musician, also a censurer of Horace. See "Satirae," lib. 1. iii, 4.--_--W. E. B._]

[Footnote 18: In consequence of "Polly," the supplement to the "Beggar's Opera," but which obtained him the friendship of the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 19: The grant of two hundred a year, which he obtained from the Crown, and retained till his death in 1765.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 20: See "Leviathan," Part I, chap, xiii.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 21: Richard Flecknoe, poet and dramatist, died 1678, of whom it has been written that "whatever may become of his own pieces, his name will continue, whilst Dryden's satire, called 'Mac Flecknoe,' shall remain in vogue." Dryden's Poetical Works, edit. Warton, ii, 169.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 22: Hon. Edward Howard, author of some indifferent plays and poems. See "Dict. Nat. Biog."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 23: Richard Blackmore, physician and very voluminous writer in prose and verse. In 1697 he was appointed physician to William III, when he was knighted. See Pope, "Imitations of Horace," book ii, epist. 1, 387.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 24: Lord Grimston, born 1683, died 1756. He is best known by his play, written in 1705, "The Lawyer's Fortune, or Love in a Hollow Tree," which the author withdrew from circulation; but, by some person's malice, it was reprinted in 1736. See "Dict. Nat. Biog.," Pope's Works, edit. Elwin and Courthope, iii, p. 314.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 25: Matthew Concanen, born in Ireland, 1701, a writer of miscellaneous works, dramatic and poetical. See the "Dunciad," ii, 299, 304, _ut supra.--W. E. B._]

[Footnote 26: James Moore Smythe, chiefly remarkable for his consummate assurance as a plagiarist. See the "Dunciad," ii, 50, and notes thereto, Pope's Works, edit. Elwin and Courthope, iv, 132.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 27: "Fertur Prometheus, addere principi Limo coactus particulam undique Desectam, et insani leonis Vim stomacho apposuisse nostro." HORAT., _Carm._ I, xvi.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 28: "---- super et Garamantas et Indos, Proferet imperium; ---- ---- jam nunc et Caspia regna Responsis horrent divom." Virg., _Aen._, vi.]

[Footnote 29: "---- genibus minor."]

[Footnote 30: Son of Aeneas, here representing Frederick, Prince of Wales, father of George III.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 31: "Unus qui nobis cunctando restituis rem." Virg., _Aen._, vi, 847.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 32: "Divisum imperium cum Jove Caesar habet."]

VERSES SENT TO THE DEAN ON HIS BIRTH-DAY, WITH PINE'S HORACE, FINELY BOUND. BY DR. J. SICAN[1]

(Horace speaking.)

You've read, sir, in poetic strain, How Varus and the Mantuan swain Have on my birth-day been invited, (But I was forced in verse to write it,) Upon a plain repast to dine, And taste my old Campanian wine; But I, who all punctilios hate, Though long familiar with the great, Nor glory in my reputation, Am come without an invitation; And, though I'm used to right Falernian, I'll deign for once to taste Iërnian; But fearing that you might dispute (Had I put on my common suit) My breeding and my politesse, I visit in my birth-day dress: My coat of purest Turkey red, With gold embroidery richly spread; To which I've sure as good pretensions, As Irish lords who starve on pensions. What though proud ministers of state Did at your antichamber wait; What though your Oxfords and your St. Johns, Have at your levee paid attendance, And Peterborough and great Ormond, With many chiefs who now are dormant, Have laid aside the general's staff, And public cares, with you to laugh; Yet I some friends as good can name, Nor less the darling sons of fame; For sure my Pollio and Mæcenas Were as good statesmen, Mr. Dean, as Either your Bolingbroke or Harley, Though they made Lewis beg a parley; And as for Mordaunt,[2] your loved hero, I'll match him with my Drusus Nero. You'll boast, perhaps, your favourite Pope; But Virgil is as good, I hope. I own indeed I can't get any To equal Helsham and Delany; Since Athens brought forth Socrates, A Grecian isle, Hippocrates; Since Tully lived before my time, And Galen bless'd another clime. You'll plead, perhaps, at my request, To be admitted as a guest, "Your hearing's bad!"--But why such fears? I speak to eyes, and not to ears; And for that reason wisely took The form you see me in, a book. Attack'd by slow devouring moths, By rage of barbarous Huns and Goths; By Bentley's notes, my deadliest foes, By Creech's[3] rhymes, and Dunster's[4] prose; I found my boasted wit and fire In their rude hands almost expire: Yet still they but in vain assail'd; For, had their violence prevail'd, And in a blast destroy'd my frame, They would have partly miss'd their aim; Since all my spirit in thy page Defies the Vandals of this age. 'Tis yours to save these small remains From future pedant's muddy brains, And fix my long uncertain fate, You best know how--"which way?"--TRANSLATE.

[Footnote 1: This ingenious young gentleman was unfortunately murdered in Italy.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 2: See verses to the Earl of Peterborough, _ante_, p. 48.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 3: The translator and editor of Lucretius and Horace.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 4: Who put forth, in 1710, the "Satyrs and Epistles of Horace, done into English," of which a second edition was published in 1717, with the addition of the "Art of Poetry." His versions were well satirized by the wits of the time, one of whom, Dr. T. Francklin, wrote: "O'er Tibur's swan the Muses wept in vain, And mourned their bard by cruel Dunster slain." _Dict. Nat. Biog.--W. E. B._]

EPIGRAM BY MR. BOWYER INTENDED TO BE PLACED UNDER THE HEAD OF GULLIVER. 1733

"Here learn from moral truth and wit refined, How vice and folly have debased mankind; Strong sense and humour arm in virtue's cause; Thus her great votary vindicates her laws: While bold and free the glowing colours strike; Blame not the picture, if the picture's like."

ON PSYCHE[1]

At two afternoon for our Psyche inquire, Her tea-kettle's on, and her smock at the fire: So loitering, so active; so busy, so idle; Which has she most need of, a spur or a bridle? Thus a greyhound outruns the whole pack in a race, Yet would rather be hang'd than he'd leave a warm place. She gives you such plenty, it puts you in pain; But ever with prudence takes care of the main. To please you, she knows how to choose a nice bit; For her taste is almost as refined as her wit. To oblige a good friend, she will trace every market, It would do your heart good, to see how she will cark it. Yet beware of her arts; for, it plainly appears, She saves half her victuals, by feeding your ears.

[Footnote 1: Mrs. Sican, a very ingenious lady, mother to the author of the "Verses" with Pine's Horace; and a favourite with Swift and Stella.--_W. E. B._]

THE DEAN AND DUKE 1734

James Brydges[1]and the Dean had long been friends; James is beduked; of course their friendship ends: But sure the Dean deserves a sharp rebuke, For knowing James, to boast he knows the duke. Yet, since just Heaven the duke's ambition mocks, Since all he got by fraud is lost by stocks,[2] His wings are clipp'd: he tries no more in vain With bands of fiddlers to extend his train. Since he no more can build, and plant, and revel, The duke and dean seem near upon a level. O! wert thou not a duke, my good Duke Humphry, From bailiffs claws thou scarce couldst keep thy bum free. A duke to know a dean! go, smooth thy crown: Thy brother[3](far thy better) wore a gown. Well, but a duke thou art; so please the king: O! would his majesty but add a string!

[Footnote 1: James Brydges, who was created Duke of Chandos in 1719, and built the magnificent house at Canons near Edgware, celebrated by Pope in his "Moral Essays," Epistles iii and iv. For a description of the building, see De Foe's "Tour through Great Britain," cited in Carruthers' edition of Pope, vol. i, p. 482. At the sale of the house by the second Duke in 1747, Lord Chesterfield purchased the hall pillars for the house he was then building in May Fair, where they still adorn the entrance hall of Chesterfield House. He used to call them his _Canonical_ pillars.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 2: In allusion to the Duke's difficulties caused by the failure of his speculative investments.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 3: The Hon. Henry Brydges, Archdeacon of Rochester.--_N_.]

WRITTEN BY DR. SWIFT ON HIS OWN DEAFNESS, IN SEPTEMBER, 1734

Vertiginosus, inops, surdus, male gratus amicis; Non campana sonans, tonitru non ab Jove missum, Quod mage mirandum, saltem si credere fas est, Non clamosa meas mulier jam percutit aures.

THE DEAN'S COMPLAINT, TRANSLATED AND ANSWERED

DOCTOR. Deaf, giddy, helpless, left alone. ANSWER. Except the first, the fault's your own. DOCTOR. To all my friends a burden grown. ANSWER. Because to few you will be shewn. Give them good wine, and meat to stuff, You may have company enough. DOCTOR. No more I hear my church's bell, Than if it rang out for my knell. ANSWER. Then write and read, 'twill do as well. DOCTOR. At thunder now no more I start, Than at the rumbling of a cart. ANSWER. Think then of thunder when you f--t. DOCTOR. Nay, what's incredible, alack! No more I hear a woman's clack. ANSWER. A woman's clack, if I have skill, Sounds somewhat like a throwster's mill; But louder than a bell, or thunder: That does, I own, increase my wonder.

THE DEAN'S MANNER OF LIVING

On rainy days alone I dine Upon a chick and pint of wine. On rainy days I dine alone, And pick my chicken to the bone; But this my servants much enrages, No scraps remain to save board-wages. In weather fine I nothing spend, But often spunge upon a friend; Yet, where he's not so rich as I, I pay my club, and so good b'ye.

EPIGRAM BY MR. BOWYER

"IN SYLLABAM LONGAM IN VOCE VERTIGINOSUS A. D. SWIFT CORREPTAM"

Musarum antistes, Phoebi numerosus alumnus, Vix omnes numeros Vertiginosus habet. Intentat charo capiti vertigo ruinam: Oh! servet cerebro nata Minerva caput. Vertigo nimium longa est, divina poeta; Dent tibi Pierides, donet Apollo, brevem.

VERSES MADE FOR FRUIT-WOMEN

APPLES

Come buy my fine wares, Plums, apples, and pears. A hundred a penny, In conscience too many: Come, will you have any? My children are seven, I wish them in Heaven; My husband a sot, With his pipe and his pot, Not a farthing will gain them, And I must maintain them.

ASPARAGUS

Ripe 'sparagrass Fit for lad or lass, To make their water pass: O, 'tis pretty picking With a tender chicken!

ONIONS

Come, follow me by the smell, Here are delicate onions to sell; I promise to use you well. They make the blood warmer, You'll feed like a farmer; For this is every cook's opinion, No savoury dish without an onion; But, lest your kissing should be spoil'd, Your onions must be thoroughly boil'd: Or else you may spare Your mistress a share, The secret will never be known: She cannot discover The breath of her lover, But think it as sweet as her own.

OYSTERS

Charming oysters I cry: My masters, come buy, So plump and so fresh, So sweet is their flesh, No Colchester oyster Is sweeter and moister: Your stomach they settle, And rouse up your mettle: They'll make you a dad Of a lass or a lad; And madam your wife They'll please to the life; Be she barren, be she old, Be she slut, or be she scold, Eat my oysters, and lie near her, She'll be fruitful, never fear her.

HERRINGS

Be not sparing, Leave off swearing. Buy my herring Fresh from Malahide,[1] Better never was tried. Come, eat them with pure fresh butter and mustard, Their bellies are soft, and as white as a custard. Come, sixpence a-dozen, to get me some bread, Or, like my own herrings, I soon shall be dead.

[Footnote 1: Malahide, a village five miles from Dublin, famous for oysters.--_F_.]

ORANGES

Come buy my fine oranges, sauce for your veal, And charming, when squeezed in a pot of brown ale; Well roasted, with sugar and wine in a cup, They'll make a sweet bishop when gentlefolks sup.

ON ROVER, A LADY'S SPANIEL

INSTRUCTIONS TO A PAINTER[1]

Happiest of the spaniel race, Painter, with thy colours grace: Draw his forehead large and high, Draw his blue and humid eye; Draw his neck so smooth and round, Little neck with ribbons bound! And the muscly swelling breast, Where the Loves and Graces rest; And the spreading even back, Soft, and sleek, and glossy black; And the tail that gently twines, Like the tendrils of the vines; And the silky twisted hair, Shadowing thick the velvet ear; Velvet ears, which, hanging low, O'er the veiny temples flow. With a proper light and shade, Let the winding hoop be laid; And within that arching bower, (Secret circle, mystic power,) In a downy slumber place Happiest of the spaniel race; While the soft respiring dame, Glowing with the softest flame, On the ravish'd favourite pours Balmy dews, ambrosial showers. With thy utmost skill express Nature in her richest dress, Limpid rivers smoothly flowing, Orchards by those rivers blowing; Curling woodbine, myrtle shade, And the gay enamell'd mead; Where the linnets sit and sing, Little sportlings of the spring; Where the breathing field and grove Soothe the heart and kindle love. Here for me, and for the Muse, Colours of resemblance choose, Make of lineaments divine, Daply female spaniels shine, Pretty fondlings of the fair, Gentle damsels' gentle care; But to one alone impart All the flattery of thy art. Crowd each feature, crowd each grace, Which complete the desperate face; Let the spotted wanton dame Feel a new resistless flame! Let the happiest of his race Win the fair to his embrace. But in shade the rest conceal, Nor to sight their joys reveal, Lest the pencil and the Muse Loose desires and thoughts infuse.

[Footnote 1: A parody of Ambrose Phillips's poem on Miss Carteret, daughter of the Lord Lieutenant. Phillips stood high in Archbishop Boulter's regard. Hence the parody. "Does not," says Pope, "still to one Bishop Phillips seem a wit?" It is to the infantine style of some of Phillips' verse that we owe the term, Namby Pamby.--_W. E. B_.]

EPIGRAMS ON WINDOWS

SEVERAL OF THEM WRITTEN IN 1726

I. ON A WINDOW AT AN INN

We fly from luxury and wealth, To hardships, in pursuit of health; From generous wines, and costly fare, And dozing in an easy-chair; Pursue the goddess Health in vain, To find her in a country scene, And every where her footsteps trace, And see her marks in every face; And still her favourites we meet, Crowding the roads with naked feet. But, oh! so faintly we pursue, We ne'er can have her full in view.

II. AT AN INN IN ENGLAND

The glass, by lovers' nonsense blurr'd, Dims and obscures our sight; So, when our passions Love has stirr'd, It darkens Reason's light.

III. ON A WINDOW AT THE FOUR CROSSES IN THE WATLING-STREET ROAD, WARWICKSHIRE

Fool, to put up four crosses at your door, Put up your wife, she's CROSSER than all four.

IV. ANOTHER, AT CHESTER

The church and clergy here, no doubt, Are very near a-kin; Both weather-beaten are without, And empty both within.

V. ANOTHER, AT CHESTER

My landlord is civil, But dear as the d--l: Your pockets grow empty With nothing to tempt ye; The wine is so sour, 'Twill give you a scour, The beer and the ale Are mingled with stale. The veal is such carrion, A dog would be weary on. All this I have felt, For I live on a smelt.

VI. ANOTHER, AT CHESTER

The walls of this town Are full of renown, And strangers delight to walk round 'em: But as for the dwellers, Both buyers and sellers, For me, you may hang 'em, or drown 'em.

VII. ANOTHER WRITTEN UPON A WINDOW WHERE THERE WAS NO WRITING BEFORE

Thanks to my stars, I once can see A window here from scribbling free! Here no conceited coxcombs pass, To scratch their paltry drabs on glass; Nor party fool is calling names, Or dealing crowns to George and James.

VIII. ON SEEING VERSES WRITTEN UPON WINDOWS AT INNS

The sage, who said he should be proud Of windows in his breast,[1] Because he ne'er a thought allow'd That might not be confest; His window scrawl'd by every rake, His breast again would cover, And fairly bid the devil take The diamond and the lover.

[Footnote 1: See on this "Notes and Queries," 10th S., xii, 497.--_W. E. B._]

IX. ANOTHER

By Satan taught, all conjurors know Your mistress in a glass to show, And you can do as much: In this the devil and you agree; None e'er made verses worse than he, And thine, I swear, are such.

X. ANOTHER

That love is the devil, I'll prove when required; Those rhymers abundantly show it: They swear that they all by love are inspired, And the devil's a damnable poet.

XI. ANOTHER, AT HOLYHEAD [1]

O Neptune! Neptune! must I still Be here detain'd against my will? Is this your justice, when I'm come Above two hundred miles from home; O'er mountains steep, o'er dusty plains, Half choked with dust, half drown'd with rains, Only your godship to implore, To let me kiss your other shore? A boon so small! but I may weep, While you're like Baal, fast asleep.

[Footnote 1: These verses were no doubt written during the Dean's enforced stay at Holyhead while waiting for fair weather. See Swift's Journal of 1727, in Craik's "Life of Swift," vol. ii, and "Prose Works," vol. xi.--_W. E. B_.]

TO JANUS, ON NEW YEAR'S DAY, 1726

Two-faced Janus,[1] god of Time! Be my Phoebus while I rhyme; To oblige your crony Swift, Bring our dame a new year's gift; She has got but half a face; Janus, since thou hast a brace, To my lady once be kind; Give her half thy face behind. God of Time, if you be wise, Look not with your future eyes; What imports thy forward sight? Well, if you could lose it quite. Can you take delight in viewing This poor Isle's[2] approaching ruin, When thy retrospection vast Sees the glorious ages past? Happy nation, were we blind, Or had only eyes behind! Drown your morals, madam cries, I'll have none but forward eyes; Prudes decay'd about may tack, Strain their necks with looking back. Give me time when coming on; Who regards him when he's gone? By the Dean though gravely told, New-years help to make me old; Yet I find a new-year's lace Burnishes an old-year's face. Give me velvet and quadrille, I'll have youth and beauty still.

[Footnote 1: "Matutine pater, seu Jane libentius audis Unde homines operum primos vitaeque labores Instituunt."--HOR., _Sat_., ii, vi, 20.]

[Footnote 2: Ireland.--_H_.]

A MOTTO FOR MR. JASON HASARD

WOOLLEN-DRAPER IN DUBLIN, WHOSE SIGN WAS THE GOLDEN FLEECE

Jason, the valiant prince of Greece, From Colchis brought the Golden Fleece; We comb the wool, refine the stuff, For modern Jasons, that's enough. Oh! could we tame yon watchful dragon,[1] Old Jason would have less to brag on.

[Footnote 1: England.--_H_.]

TO A FRIEND WHO HAD BEEN MUCH ABUSED IN MANY INVETERATE LIBELS

The greatest monarch may be stabb'd by night And fortune help the murderer in his flight; The vilest ruffian may commit a rape, Yet safe from injured innocence escape; And calumny, by working under ground, Can, unrevenged, the greatest merit wound. What's to be done? Shall wit and learning choose To live obscure, and have no fame to lose? By Censure[1] frighted out of Honour's road, Nor dare to use the gifts by Heaven bestow'd? Or fearless enter in through Virtue's gate, And buy distinction at the dearest rate.

[Footnote 1: See _ante_, p. 160, the poem entitled "On Censure."--_W. E. B._.]

CATULLUS DE LESBIA[1]

Lesbia for ever on me rails, To talk of me she never fails. Now, hang me, but for all her art, I find that I have gain'd her heart. My proof is this: I plainly see, The case is just the same with me; I curse her every hour sincerely, Yet, hang me but I love her dearly.

[Footnote 1: "Lesbia mi dicit semper mala nec tacet unquam De me: Lesbia me dispeream nisi amat. Quo signo? quia sunt totidem mea: deprecor illam Assidue; verum dispeream nisi amo." _Catulli Carmina, xcii.--W. E. B._]

ON A CURATE'S COMPLAINT OF HARD DUTY

I marched three miles through scorching sand, With zeal in heart, and notes in hand; I rode four more to Great St. Mary, Using four legs, when two were weary: To three fair virgins I did tie men, In the close bands of pleasing Hymen; I dipp'd two babes in holy water, And purified their mother after. Within an hour and eke a half, I preach'd three congregations deaf; Where, thundering out, with lungs long-winded, I chopp'd so fast, that few there minded. My emblem, the laborious sun, Saw all these mighty labours done Before one race of his was run. All this perform'd by Robert Hewit: What mortal else could e'er go through it!

TO BETTY, THE GRISETTE

Queen of wit and beauty, Betty, Never may the Muse forget ye, How thy face charms every shepherd, Spotted over like a leopard! And thy freckled neck, display'd, Envy breeds in every maid; Like a fly-blown cake of tallow, Or on parchment ink turn'd yellow; Or a tawny speckled pippin, Shrivell'd with a winter's keeping. And, thy beauty thus dispatch'd, Let me praise thy wit unmatch'd. Sets of phrases, cut and dry, Evermore thy tongue supply; And thy memory is loaded With old scraps from plays exploded; Stock'd with repartees and jokes, Suited to all Christian folks: Shreds of wit, and senseless rhymes, Blunder'd out a thousand times; Nor wilt thou of gifts be sparing, Which can ne'er be worse for wearing. Picking wit among collegians, In the playhouse upper regions; Where, in the eighteen-penny gallery, Irish nymphs learn Irish raillery. But thy merit is thy failing, And thy raillery is railing. Thus with talents well endued To be scurrilous and rude; When you pertly raise your snout, Fleer and gibe, and laugh and flout; This among Hibernian asses For sheer wit and humour passes. Thus indulgent Chloe, bit, Swears you have a world of wit.

EPIGRAM FROM THE FRENCH[1]

Who can believe with common sense, A bacon slice gives God offence; Or, how a herring has a charm Almighty vengeance to disarm? Wrapp'd up in majesty divine, Does he regard on what we dine?

[Footnote 1: A French gentleman dining with some company on a fast-day, called for some bacon and eggs. The rest were very angry, and reproved him for so heinous a sin; whereupon he wrote the following lines, which are translated above: "Peut-on croire avec bon sens Qu'un lardon le mil en colère, Ou, que manger un hareng, C'est un secret pour lui plaire? En sa gloire envelopé, Songe-t-il bien de nos soupés?"--_H_.]

EPIGRAM[1]

As Thomas was cudgell'd one day by his wife, He took to the street, and fled for his life: Tom's three dearest friends came by in the squabble, And saved him at once from the shrew and the rabble; Then ventured to give him some sober advice-- But Tom is a person of honour so nice, Too wise to take counsel, too proud to take warning, That he sent to all three a challenge next morning. Three duels he fought, thrice ventur'd his life; Went home, and was cudgell'd again by his wife.

[Footnote 1: Collated with copy transcribed by Stella.--_Forster_.]

EPIGRAM ADDED BY STELLA[1]

When Margery chastises Ned, She calls it combing of his head; A kinder wife was never born: She combs his head, and finds him horn.

[Footnote 1: From Stella's copy in the Duke of Bedford's volume.--_Forster._]

JOAN CUDGELS NED

Joan cudgels Ned, yet Ned's a bully; Will cudgels Bess, yet Will's a cully. Die Ned and Bess; give Will to Joan, She dares not say her life's her own. Die Joan and Will; give Bess to Ned, And every day she combs his head.

VERSES ON TWO CELEBRATED MODERN POETS

Behold, those monarch oaks, that rise With lofty branches to the skies, Have large proportion'd roots that grow With equal longitude below: Two bards that now in fashion reign, Most aptly this device explain: If this to clouds and stars will venture, That creeps as far to reach the centre; Or, more to show the thing I mean, Have you not o'er a saw-pit seen A skill'd mechanic, that has stood High on a length of prostrate wood, Who hired a subterraneous friend To take his iron by the end; But which excell'd was never found, The man above or under ground. The moral is so plain to hit, That, had I been the god of wit, Then, in a saw-pit and wet weather, Should Young and Philips drudge together.

EPITAPH ON GENERAL GORGES,[1] AND LADY MEATH[2]

Under this stone lies Dick and Dolly. Doll dying first, Dick grew melancholy; For Dick without Doll thought living a folly.

Dick lost in Doll a wife tender and dear: But Dick lost by Doll twelve hundred a-year; A loss that Dick thought no mortal could bear.

Dick sigh'd for his Doll, and his mournful arms cross'd; Thought much of his Doll, and the jointure he lost; The first vex'd him much, the other vex'd most.

Thus loaded with grief, Dick sigh'd and he cried: To live without both full three days he tried; But liked neither loss, and so quietly died.

Dick left a pattern few will copy after: Then, reader, pray shed some tears of salt water; For so sad a tale is no subject of laughter. Meath smiles for the jointure, though gotten so late; The son laughs, that got the hard-gotten estate; And Cuffe[3] grins, for getting the Alicant plate.

Here quiet they lie, in hopes to rise one day, Both solemnly put in this hole on a Sunday, And here rest----_sic transit gloria mundi_!

[Footnote 1: Of Kilbrue, in the county of Meath.--_F._]

[Footnote 2: Dorothy, dowager of Edward, Earl of Meath. She was married to the general in 1716, and died 10th April, 1728. Her husband survived her but two days.--_F_. The Dolly of this epitaph is the same lady whom Swift satirized in his "Conference between Sir Harry Pierce's Chariot and Mrs. Dorothy Stopford's Chair." See _ante_, p.85.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 3: John Cuffe, of Desart, Esq., married the general's eldest daughter.--_F._]

VERSES ON I KNOW NOT WHAT

My latest tribute here I send, With this let your collection end. Thus I consign you down to fame A character to praise or blame: And if the whole may pass for true, Contented rest, you have your due. Give future time the satisfaction, To leave one handle for detraction.

DR. SWIFT TO HIMSELF ON ST. CECILIA'S DAY

Grave Dean of St. Patrick's, how comes it to pass, That you, who know music no more than an ass, That you who so lately were writing of drapiers, Should lend your cathedral to players and scrapers? To act such an opera once in a year, So offensive to every true Protestant ear, With trumpets, and fiddles, and organs, and singing, Will sure the Pretender and Popery bring in, No Protestant Prelate, his lordship or grace, Durst there show his right, or most reverend face: How would it pollute their crosiers and rochets, To listen to minims, and quavers, and crochets!

[The rest is wanting.]

AN ANSWER TO A FRIEND'S QUESTION

The furniture that best doth please St. Patrick's Dean, good Sir, are these: The knife and fork with which I eat; And next the pot that boils the meat; The next to be preferr'd, I think, Is the glass in which I drink; The shelves on which my books I keep And the bed on which I sleep; An antique elbow-chair between, Big enough to hold the Dean; And the stove that gives delight In the cold bleak wintry night: To these we add a thing below, More for use reserved than show: These are what the Dean do please; All superfluous are but these.

EPITAPH INSCRIBED ON A MARBLE TABLET, IN BERKELEY CHURCH, GLOUCESTERSHIRE

H. S. E.

[*text centered] CAROLUS Comes de BERKELEY, Vicecomes DURSLEY, Baro BERKELEY, de Berkeley Cast., MOWBRAY, SEGRAVE, Et BRUCE, è nobilissimo Ordine Balnei Eques, Vir ad genus quod spectat et proavos usquequaque nobilis Et longo si quis alius procerum stemmate editus; Muniis etiam tarn illustri stirpi dignis insignitus. Siquidem a GULIELMO III° ad ordines foederati Belgii Ablegatus et Plenipotentiarius Extraordinarius Rebus, non Britanniae tantùm, sed totius fere Europae (Tunc temporis praesertim arduis) per annos V. incubuit, Quam felici diligentia, fide quam intemerata, Ex illo discas, Lector, quod, superstite patre, In magnatum ordinem adscisci meruerit. Fuit à sanctioribus consiliis et Regi GULIEL. et ANNAE Reginae E proregibus Hiberniae secundus, Comitatum civitatumque Glocest. et Brist. Dominus Locumtenens, Surriae et Glocest. Gustos Rot., Urbis Glocest. magnus Senescallus, Arcis sancti de Briavell Castellanus, Guardianus Forestae de Dean. Denique ad Turcarum primum, deinde ad Romam Imperatorem Cum Legatus Extraordinarius designatus esset, Quo minus has etiam ornaret provincias Obstitit adversa corporis valetudo. Sed restat adhuc, prae quo sordescunt caetera, Honos verus, stabilis, et vel morti cedere nescius Quòd veritatem evangelicam seriò amplexus; Erga Deum pius, erga pauperes munificus, Adversùs omnes aequus et benevolus, In Christo jam placidè obdormit Cum eodem olim regnaturus unà. Natus VIII° April. MDCXLIX. denatus XXIV° Septem. MDCCX. aetat. suae LXII.

EPITAPH

ON FREDERICK, DUKE OF SCHOMBERG[1]

[*text centered] Hic infra situm est corpus FREDERICI DUCIS DE SCHOMBERG. ad BUDINDAM occisi, A.D. 1690. DECANUS et CAPITULUM maximopere etiam atque etiam petierunt, UT HAEREDES DUCIS monumentum In memoriam PARENTIS erigendum curarent: Sed postquam per epistolas, per amicos, diu ac saepè orando nil profecêre; Hunc demum lapidem ipsi statuerunt, Saltem[2] ut scias, hospes, Ubinam terrarum SCONBERGENSIS cineres delitescunt "Plus potuit fama virtutis apud alienos, Quam sanguinis proximitas apud suos." A.D. 1731.

[Footnote 1: The Duke was unhappily killed in crossing the River Boyne, July, 1690, and was buried in St. Patrick's Cathedral, where the dean and chapter erected a small monument to his honour, at their own expense.--_N_.]

[Footnote 2: The words with which Dr. Swift first concluded the epitaph were, "Saltem ut sciat viator indignabundus, quali in cellulâ tanti ductoris cineres delitescunt."--_N._]

VERSES WRITTEN DURING LORD CARTERET'S ADMINISTRATION OF IRELAND

As Lord Carteret's residence in Ireland as Viceroy was a series of cabals against the authority of the Prime Minister, he failed not, as well from his love of literature as from his hatred to Walpole, to attach to himself as much as possible the distinguished author of the Drapier Letters. By the interest which Swift soon gained with the Lord-Lieutenant, he was enabled to recommend several friends, whose High Church or Tory principles had hitherto obstructed their preferment. The task of forwarding the views of Delany, in particular, led to several of Swift's liveliest poetical effusions, while, on the other hand, he was equally active in galling, by his satire, Smedley, and other Whig beaux esprits, who, during this amphibious administration, sought the favour of a literary Lord-Lieutenant, by literary offerings and poetical adulation. These pieces, with one or two connected with the same subject, are here thrown together, as they seem to reflect light upon each other.--_Scott._

AN APOLOGY TO LADY CARTERET

A lady, wise as well as fair, Whose conscience always was her care, Thoughtful upon a point of moment, Would have the text as well as comment: So hearing of a grave divine, She sent to bid him come to dine. But, you must know he was not quite So grave as to be unpolite: Thought human learning would not lessen The dignity of his profession: And if you'd heard the man discourse, Or preach, you'd like him scarce the worse. He long had bid the court farewell, Retreating silent to his cell; Suspected for the love he bore To one who sway'd some time before; Which made it more surprising how He should be sent for thither now. The message told, he gapes, and stares, And scarce believes his eyes or ears: Could not conceive what it should mean, And fain would hear it told again. But then the squire so trim and nice, 'Twere rude to make him tell it twice; So bow'd, was thankful for the honour; And would not fail to wait upon her. His beaver brush'd, his shoes, and gown, Away he trudges into town; Passes the lower castle yard, And now advancing to the guard, He trembles at the thoughts of state; For, conscious of his sheepish gait, His spirits of a sudden fail'd him; He stopp'd, and could not tell what ail'd him. What was the message I received? Why certainly the captain raved? To dine with her! and come at three! Impossible! it can't be me. Or maybe I mistook the word; My lady--it must be my lord. My lord 's abroad; my lady too: What must the unhappy doctor do? "Is Captain Cracherode[1] here, pray?"--"No." "Nay, then 'tis time for me to go." Am I awake, or do I dream? I'm sure he call'd me by my name; Named me as plain as he could speak; And yet there must be some mistake. Why, what a jest should I have been, Had now my lady been within! What could I've said? I'm mighty glad She went abroad--she'd thought me mad. The hour of dining now is past: Well then, I'll e'en go home and fast: And, since I 'scaped being made a scoff, I think I'm very fairly off. My lady now returning home, Calls "Cracherode, is the Doctor come?" He had not heard of him--"Pray see, 'Tis now a quarter after three." The captain walks about, and searches Through all the rooms, and courts, and arches; Examines all the servants round, In vain--no doctor's to be found. My lady could not choose but wonder; "Captain, I fear you've made some blunder; But, pray, to-morrow go at ten; I'll try his manners once again; If rudeness be th' effect of knowledge, My son shall never see a college." The captain was a man of reading, And much good sense, as well as breeding; Who, loath to blame, or to incense, Said little in his own defence. Next day another message brought; The Doctor, frighten'd at his fault, Is dress'd, and stealing through the crowd, Now pale as death, then blush'd and bow'd, Panting--and faltering--humm'd and ha'd, "Her ladyship was gone abroad: The captain too--he did not know Whether he ought to stay or go;" Begg'd she'd forgive him. In conclusion, My lady, pitying his confusion, Call'd her good nature to relieve him; Told him, she thought she might believe him; And would not only grant his suit, But visit him, and eat some fruit, Provided, at a proper time, He told the real truth in rhyme; 'Twas to no purpose to oppose, She'd hear of no excuse in prose. The Doctor stood not to debate, Glad to compound at any rate; So, bowing, seemingly complied; Though, if he durst, he had denied. But first, resolved to show his taste, Was too refined to give a feast; He'd treat with nothing that was rare, But winding walks and purer air; Would entertain without expense, Or pride or vain magnificence: For well he knew, to such a guest The plainest meals must be the best. To stomachs clogg'd with costly fare Simplicity alone is rare; While high, and nice, and curious meats Are really but vulgar treats. Instead of spoils of Persian looms, The costly boast of regal rooms, Thought it more courtly and discreet To scatter roses at her feet; Roses of richest dye, that shone With native lustre, like her own; Beauty that needs no aid of art Through every sense to reach the heart. The gracious dame, though well she knew All this was much beneath her due, Liked everything--at least thought fit To praise it _par manière d'acquit_. Yet she, though seeming pleased, can't bear The scorching sun, or chilling air; Disturb'd alike at both extremes, Whether he shows or hides his beams: Though seeming pleased at all she sees, Starts at the ruffling of the trees, And scarce can speak for want of breath, In half a walk fatigued to death. The Doctor takes his hint from hence, T' apologize his late offence: "Madam, the mighty power of use Now strangely pleads in my excuse; If you unused have scarcely strength To gain this walk's untoward length; If, frighten'd at a scene so rude, Through long disuse of solitude; If, long confined to fires and screens, You dread the waving of these greens; If you, who long have breathed the fumes Of city fogs and crowded rooms, Do now solicitously shun The cooler air and dazzling sun; If his majestic eye you flee, Learn hence t' excuse and pity me. Consider what it is to bear The powder'd courtier's witty sneer; To see th' important man of dress Scoffing my college awkwardness; To be the strutting cornet's sport, To run the gauntlet of the court, Winning my way by slow approaches, Through crowds of coxcombs and of coaches, From the first fierce cockaded sentry, Quite through the tribe of waiting gentry; To pass so many crowded stages, And stand the staring of your pages: And after all, to crown my spleen, Be told--'You are not to be seen:' Or, if you are, be forced to bear The awe of your majestic air. And can I then be faulty found, In dreading this vexatious round? Can it be strange, if I eschew A scene so glorious and so new? Or is he criminal that flies The living lustre of your eyes?"

[Footnote 1: The gentleman who brought the message.--_Scott._]

THE BIRTH OF MANLY VIRTUE

INSCRIBED TO LORD CARTERET[1] 1724

Gratior et pulcro veniens in corpore virtus.--VIRG., _Aen._, v, 344.

Once on a time, a righteous sage, Grieved with the vices of the age, Applied to Jove with fervent prayer-- "O Jove, if Virtue be so fair As it was deem'd in former days, By Plato and by Socrates, Whose beauties mortal eyes escape, Only for want of outward shape; Make then its real excellence, For once the theme of human sense; So shall the eye, by form confined, Direct and fix the wandering mind, And long-deluded mortals see, With rapture, what they used to flee!" Jove grants the prayer, gives Virtue birth, And bids him bless and mend the earth. Behold him blooming fresh and fair, Now made--ye gods--a son and heir; An heir: and, stranger yet to hear, An heir, an orphan of a peer;[2] But prodigies are wrought to prove Nothing impossible to Jove. Virtue was for this sex design'd, In mild reproof to womankind; In manly form to let them see The loveliness of modesty, The thousand decencies that shone With lessen'd lustre in their own; Which few had learn'd enough to prize, And some thought modish to despise. To make his merit more discern'd, He goes to school--he reads--is learn'd; Raised high above his birth, by knowledge, He shines distinguish'd in a college; Resolved nor honour, nor estate, Himself alone should make him great. Here soon for every art renown'd, His influence is diffused around; The inferior youth to learning led, Less to be famed than to be fed, Behold the glory he has won, And blush to see themselves outdone; And now, inflamed with rival rage, In scientific strife engage, Engage; and, in the glorious strife The arts new kindle into life. Here would our hero ever dwell, Fix'd in a lonely learned cell: Contented to be truly great, In Virtue's best beloved retreat; Contented he--but Fate ordains, He now shall shine in nobler scenes, Raised high, like some celestial fire, To shine the more, still rising higher; Completely form'd in every part, To win the soul, and glad the heart. The powerful voice, the graceful mien, Lovely alike, or heard, or seen; The outward form and inward vie, His soul bright beaming from his eye, Ennobling every act and air, With just, and generous, and sincere. Accomplish'd thus, his next resort Is to the council and the court, Where Virtue is in least repute, And interest the one pursuit; Where right and wrong are bought and sold, Barter'd for beauty, and for gold; Here Manly Virtue, even here, Pleased in the person of a peer, A peer; a scarcely bearded youth, Who talk'd of justice and of truth, Of innocence the surest guard, Tales here forgot, or yet unheard; That he alone deserved esteem, Who was the man he wish'd to seem; Call'd it unmanly and unwise, To lurk behind a mean disguise; (Give fraudful Vice the mask and screen, 'Tis Virtue's interest to be seen;) Call'd want of shame a want of sense, And found, in blushes, eloquence. Thus acting what he taught so well, He drew dumb merit from her cell, Led with amazing art along The bashful dame, and loosed her tongue; And, while he made her value known, Yet more display'd and raised his own. Thus young, thus proof to all temptations, He rises to the highest stations; For where high honour is the prize, True Virtue has a right to rise: Let courtly slaves low bend the knee To Wealth and Vice in high degree: Exalted Worth disdains to owe Its grandeur to its greatest foe. Now raised on high, see Virtue shows The godlike ends for which he rose; For him, let proud Ambition know The height of glory here below, Grandeur, by goodness made complete! To bless, is truly to be great! He taught how men to honour rise, Like gilded vapours to the skies, Which, howsoever they display Their glory from the god of day, Their noblest use is to abate His dangerous excess of heat, To shield the infant fruits and flowers, And bless the earth with genial showers. Now change the scene; a nobler care Demands him in a higher sphere:[3] Distress of nations calls him hence, Permitted so by Providence; For models, made to mend our kind, To no one clime should be confined; And Manly Virtue, like the sun, His course of glorious toils should run: Alike diffusing in his flight Congenial joy, and life, and light. Pale Envy sickens, Error flies, And Discord in his presence dies; Oppression hides with guilty dread, And Merit rears her drooping head; The arts revive, the valleys sing, And winter softens into spring: The wondering world, where'er he moves, With new delight looks up, and loves; One sex consenting to admire, Nor less the other to desire; While he, though seated on a throne, Confines his love to one alone; The rest condemn'd with rival voice Repining, do applaud his choice. Fame now reports, the Western isle Is made his mansion for a while, Whose anxious natives, night and day, (Happy beneath his righteous sway,) Weary the gods with ceaseless prayer, To bless him, and to keep him there; And claim it as a debt from Fate, Too lately found, to lose him late.

[Footnote 1: See Swift's "Vindication of Lord Carteret," "Prose Works," vii, 227; and his character as Lord Granville in my "Wit and Wisdom of Lord Chesterfield."--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: George, the first Lord Carteret, father of the Lord Lieutenant, died when his son was between four and five years of age.--_Scott_.]

[Footnote 3: Lord Carteret had the honour of mediating peace for Sweden, with Denmark, and with the Czar.--_H._]

ON PADDY'S CHARACTER OF THE "INTELLIGENCER."[1] 1729

As a thorn bush, or oaken bough, Stuck in an Irish cabin's brow, Above the door, at country fair, Betokens entertainment there; So bays on poets' brows have been Set, for a sign of wit within. And as ill neighbours in the night Pull down an alehouse bush for spite; The laurel so, by poets worn, Is by the teeth of Envy torn; Envy, a canker-worm, which tears Those sacred leaves that lightning spares. And now, t'exemplify this moral: Tom having earn'd a twig of laurel, (Which, measured on his head, was found Not long enough to reach half round, But, like a girl's cockade, was tied, A trophy, on his temple-side,) Paddy repined to see him wear This badge of honour in his hair; And, thinking this cockade of wit Would his own temples better fit, Forming his Muse by Smedley's model, Lets drive at Tom's devoted noddle, Pelts him by turns with verse and prose Hums like a hornet at his nose. At length presumes to vent his satire on The Dean, Tom's honour'd friend and patron. The eagle in the tale, ye know, Teazed by a buzzing wasp below, Took wing to Jove, and hoped to rest Securely in the thunderer's breast: In vain; even there, to spoil his nod, The spiteful insect stung the god.

[Footnote 1: For particulars of this publication, the work of two only, Swift and Sheridan, see "Prose Works," vol. ix, p. 311. The satire seems To have provoked retaliation from Tighe, Prendergast, Smedley, and even from Delany. Hence this poem.--_W. E. B._]

AN EPISTLE TO HIS EXCELLENCY JOHN, LORD CARTERET BY DR. DELANY. 1729[1]

Credis ob haec me, Pastor, opes fortasse rogare, Propter quae vulgus crassaque turba rogat. MART., _Epig._, lib. ix, 22.

Thou wise and learned ruler of our isle, Whose guardian care can all her griefs beguile; When next your generous soul shall condescend T' instruct or entertain your humble friend; Whether, retiring from your weighty charge, On some high theme you learnedly enlarge; Of all the ways of wisdom reason well, How Richelieu rose, and how Sejanus fell: Or, when your brow less thoughtfully unbends, Circled with Swift and some delighted friends; When, mixing mirth and wisdom with your wine, Like that your wit shall flow, your genius shine: Nor with less praise the conversation guide, Than in the public councils you decide: Or when the Dean, long privileged to rail, Asserts his friend with more impetuous zeal; You hear (whilst I sit by abash'd and mute) With soft concessions shortening the dispute; Then close with kind inquiries of my state, "How are your tithes, and have they rose of late? Why, Christ-Church is a pretty situation, There are not many better in the nation! This, with your other things, must yield you clear Some six--at least five hundred pounds a-year." Suppose, at such a time, I took the freedom To speak these truths as plainly as you read 'em; You shall rejoin, my lord, when I've replied, And, if you please, my lady shall decide. "My lord, I'm satisfied you meant me well, And that I'm thankful, all the world can tell; But you'll forgive me, if I own the event Is short, is very short, of your intent: At least, I feel some ills unfelt before, My income less, and my expenses more." "How, doctor! double vicar! double rector! A dignitary! with a city lecture! What glebes--what dues--what tithes--what fines--what rent! Why, doctor!--will you never be content?" "Would my good Lord but cast up the account, And see to what my revenues amount;[2] My titles ample; but my gain so small, That one good vicarage is worth them all: And very wretched, sure, is he that's double In nothing but his titles and his trouble. And to this crying grievance, if you please, My horses founder'd on Fermanagh ways; Ways of well-polish'd and well-pointed stone, Where every step endangers every bone; And, more to raise your pity and your wonder, Two churches--twelve Hibernian miles asunder: With complicated cures, I labour hard in, Beside whole summers absent from--my garden! But that the world would think I play'd the fool, I'd change with Charley Grattan for his school.[3] What fine cascades, what vistoes, might I make, Fixt in the centre of th' Iërnian lake! There might I sail delighted, smooth and safe, Beneath the conduct of my good Sir Ralph:[4] There's not a better steerer in the realm; I hope, my lord, you'll call him to the helm."-- "Doctor--a glorious scheme to ease your grief! When cures are cross, a school's a sure relief. You cannot fail of being happy there, The lake will be the Lethe of your care: The scheme is for your honour and your ease: And, doctor, I'll promote it when you please. Meanwhile, allowing things below your merit, Yet, doctor, you've a philosophic spirit; Your wants are few, and, like your income, small, And you've enough to gratify them all: You've trees, and fruits, and roots, enough in store: And what would a philosopher have more? You cannot wish for coaches, kitchens, cooks--" "My lord, I've not enough to buy me books-- Or pray, suppose my wants were all supplied, Are there no wants I should regard beside? Whose breast is so unmann'd, as not to grieve, Compass'd with miseries he can't relieve? Who can be happy--who should wish to live, And want the godlike happiness to give? That I'm a judge of this, you must allow: I had it once--and I'm debarr'd it now. Ask your own heart, my lord; if this be true, Then how unblest am I! how blest are you!" "'Tis true--but, doctor, let us wave all that-- Say, if you had your wish, what you'd be at?" "Excuse me, good my lord--I won't be sounded, Nor shall your favour by my wants be bounded. My lord, I challenge nothing as my due, Nor is it fit I should prescribe to you. Yet this might Symmachus himself avow, (Whose rigid rules[5] are antiquated now)-- My lord; I'd wish to pay the debts I owe-- I'd wish besides--to build and to bestow."

[Footnote 1: Delany, by the patronage of Carteret, and probably through the intercession of Swift, had obtained a small living in the north of Ireland, worth about one hundred pounds a-year, with the chancellorship of Christ-Church, and a prebend's stall in St. Patrick's, neither of which exceeded the same annual amount. Yet a clamour was raised among the Whigs, on account of the multiplication of his preferments; and a charge was founded against the Lord-Lieutenant of extravagant favour to a Tory divine, which Swift judged worthy of an admirable ironical confutation in his "Vindication of Lord Carteret." It appears, from the following verses, that Delany was far from being of the same opinion with those who thought he was too amply provided for.--_Scott._ See the "Vindication," "Prose Works," vii, p. 244.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 2: Which, according to Swift's calculation, in his "Vindication of Lord Carteret," amounted only to £300 a year. "Prose Works," vol. vii, p. 245.--_W. E. B._]

[Footnote 3: A free school at Inniskillen, founded by Erasmus Smith, Esq.--_Scott._]

[Footnote 4: Sir Ralph Gore, who had a villa in the lake of Erin.--_F._]

[Footnote 5: Symmachus, Bishop of Rome, 499, made a decree, that no man should solicit for ecclesiastical preferment before the death of the incumbent.--_H._]

AN EPISTLE UPON AN EPISTLE

FROM A CERTAIN DOCTOR TO A CERTAIN GREAT LORD. BEING A CHRISTMAS-BOX FOR DR. DELANY

As Jove will not attend on less, When things of more importance press: You can't, grave sir, believe it hard, That you, a low Hibernian bard, Should cool your heels a while, and wait Unanswer'd at your patron's gate; And would my lord vouchsafe to grant This one poor humble boon I want, Free leave to play his secretary, As Falstaff acted old king Harry;[1] I'd tell of yours in rhyme and print, Folks shrug, and cry, "There's nothing in't." And, after several readings over, It shines most in the marble cover. How could so fine a taste dispense With mean degrees of wit and sense? Nor will my lord so far beguile The wise and learned of our isle; To make it pass upon the nation, By dint of his sole approbation. The task is arduous, patrons find, To warp the sense of all mankind: Who think your Muse must first aspire, Ere he advance the doctor higher. You've cause to say he meant you well: That you are thankful, who can tell? For still you're short (which grieves your spirit) Of his intent: you mean your merit. Ah! _quanto rectius, tu adepte, Qui nil moliris tarn inepte_?[2] Smedley,[3] thou Jonathan of Clogher, "When thou thy humble lay dost offer To Grafton's grace, with grateful heart, Thy thanks and verse devoid of art: Content with what his bounty gave, No larger income dost thou crave." But you must have cascades, and all Iërne's lake, for your canal, Your vistoes, barges, and (a pox on All pride!) our speaker for your coxon:[4] It's pity that he can't bestow you Twelve commoners in caps to row you. Thus Edgar proud, in days of yore,[5] Held monarchs labouring at the oar; And, as he pass'd, so swell'd the Dee, Enraged, as Ern would do at thee. How different is this from Smedley! (His name is up, he may in bed lie) "Who only asks some pretty cure, In wholesome soil and ether pure: The garden stored with artless flowers, In either angle shady bowers: No gay parterre with costly green Must in the ambient hedge be seen; But Nature freely takes her course, Nor fears from him ungrateful force: No shears to check her sprouting vigour, Or shape the yews to antic figure." But you, forsooth, your all must squander On that poor spot, call'd Dell-ville, yonder; And when you've been at vast expenses In whims, parterres, canals, and fences, Your assets fail, and cash is wanting; Nor farther buildings, farther planting: No wonder, when you raise and level, Think this wall low, and that wall bevel. Here a convenient box you found, Which you demolish'd to the ground: Then built, then took up with your arbour, And set the house to Rupert Barber. You sprang an arch which, in a scurvy Humour, you tumbled topsy-turvy. You change a circle to a square, Then to a circle as you were: Who can imagine whence the fund is, That you _quadrata_ change _rotundis_? To Fame a temple you erect, A Flora does the dome protect; Mounts, walks, on high; and in a hollow You place the Muses and Apollo; There shining 'midst his train, to grace Your whimsical poetic place. These stories were of old design'd As fables: but you have refined The poets mythologic dreams, To real Muses, gods, and streams. Who would not swear, when you contrive thus, That you're Don Quixote redivivus? Beneath, a dry canal there lies, Which only Winter's rain supplies. O! couldst thou, by some magic spell, Hither convey St. Patrick's well![6] Here may it reassume its stream, And take a greater Patrick's name! If your expenses rise so high; What income can your wants supply? Yet still you fancy you inherit A fund of such superior merit, That you can't fail of more provision, All by my lady's kind decision. For, the more livings you can fish up, You think you'll sooner be a bishop: That could not be my lord's intent, Nor can it answer the event. Most think what has been heap'd on you To other sort of folk was due: Rewards too great for your flim-flams, Epistles, riddles, epigrams. Though now your depth must not be sounded, The time was, when you'd have compounded For less than Charley Grattan's school! Five hundred pound a-year's no fool! Take this advice then from your friend, To your ambition put an end, Be frugal, Pat: pay what you owe, Before you build and you bestow. Be modest, nor address your betters With begging, vain, familiar letters. A passage may be found,[7] I've heard, In some old Greek or Latian bard, Which says, "Would crows in silence eat Their offals, or their better meat, Their generous feeders not provoking By loud and inharmonious croaking, They might, unhurt by Envy's claws, Live on, and stuff to boot their maws."

[Footnote 1: "King Henry the Fourth," Part I, Act ii,