THE BEAUTIES OF ENGLISH POESY. SELECTED BY OLIVER GOLDSMITH. IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON: Printed for WILLIAM GRIFFIN, in Catharine Street in the Strand. 1767. [P. 6s. B.]
PREFACE.
MY Bookseller having informed me that there was no collection of English Poetry among us, of any estimation, I thought a few Hours spent in making a proper selection would not be ill bestowed. Compilations of this kind are chiefly designed for such as either want leisure, skill, or fortune, to choose for themselves; for persons whose professions turn them to different pursuits, or who, not yet arrived at sufficient maturity, require a guide to direct their application. To our youth, particularly, a publication of this sort may be useful; since, if compiled with any share of judgement, it may at once unite precept and example, shew them what is beautiful, and inform them why it is so: I therefore offer this, to the best of my judgement, as the best collection that has yet appeared: though, as tastes are various, numbers will be of a very different opinion. Many perhaps may wish to see in it the poems of their favourite Authors, others may wish that I had selected from works less generally read, and others still may wish, that I had selected from their own. But my design was to give a useful, unaffected compilation; one that might tend to advance the reader's taste, and not impress him with exalted ideas of mine. Nothing so common, and yet so absurd, as affectation in criticism. The desire of being thought to have a more discerning taste than others, has often led writers to labour after error, and to be foremost in promoting deformity. In this compilation I run but few risques of that kind; every poem here is well known, and possessed, or the public has been long mistaken, of peculiar merit: every poem has, as Aristotle expresses it, a beginning, a middle, and an end, in which, however trifling the rule may seem, most of the poetry in our language is deficient: I claim no merit in the choice, as it was obvious, for in all languages the best productions are most easily found. As to the short introductory criticisms to each poem, they are rather designed for boys than men; for it will be seen that I declined all refinement, satisfied with being obvious and sincere. In short, if this work be useful in schools, or amusing in the closet, the merit all belongs to others; I have nothing to boast, and, at best, can expect, not applause, but pardon.
OLIVER GOLDSMITH.
CONTENTS OF VOLUME I.
THE Rape of the Lock
Page 1
The Hermit
Page 29
Il Penseroso
Page 39
L'Allegro
Page 46
An Elegy written in a Country Church-yard
Page 53
London; in imitation of the Third Satire of Juvenal
Page 59
The School-mistress
Page 69
Cooper's Hill
Page 81
Eloisa to Abelard
Page 95
An Epistle from Mr. Philips to the Earl of Dorset
Page 108
A Letter from Italy to the Right Honourable Charles Lord Hallifax
Page 111
Alexander's Feast, or the Power of Music; an Ode
Page 119
An Ode for Music on St. Cecilia's Day
Page 127
The Shepherd's Week
Page 133
Mac Flecknoe
Page 167
Poetry; a Rhapsody
Page 175
The use of Riches
Page 193
From the Dispensary
Page 225
Selim, or the Shepherd's Moral, an Eclogue
Page 239
Hassan; or the Camel-driver
Page 242
Agib and Secander
Page 250
Abra, or the Georgian Sultana
Page 247
The Splendid Shilling
Page 255
A Pipe of Tobacco; in Imitation of Six several Authors
Page 261
THE BEAUTIES OF ENGLISH POESY.
The Rape of the Lock.
This seems to be Mr. Pope's most finished production, and is, perhaps, the most perfect in our language. It exhibits stronger powers of imagination, more harmony of numbers, and a greater knowledge of the world, than any other of this poet's works: and it is probable, if our country were called upon to shew a specimen of their genius to foreigners, this would be the work here fixed upon.
WHAT dire offence from am'rous causes springs,
What mighty contests rise from trivial things,
I sing—This verse to CARYL, Muse! is due:
This, ev'n Belinda may vouchsafe to view:
Slight is the subject, but not so the praise,
If She inspire, and He approve my lays.
Say what strange motive, Goddess! could compel
A well-bred Lord t'assault a gentle Belle?
O say what stranger cause, yet unexplor'd,
Could make a gentle Belle reject a Lord?
In tasks so bold, can little men engage,
And in soft bosoms dwells such mighty rage?
Sol thro' white curtains shot a tim'rous ray,
And ope'd those eyes that must eclipse the day:
Now lap-dogs gave themselves the rouzing shake,
And sleepless lovers, just at twelve, awake:
Thrice rung the bell, the slipper knock'd the ground,
And the press'd watch return'd a silver sound.
Belinda still her downy pillow prest;
Her guardian SYLPH prolong'd the balmy rest:
'Twas He had summon'd to her silent bed
The morning dream that hover'd o'er her head.
A youth more glitt'ring than a birth-night beau,
(That ev'n in slumber caus'd her cheek to glow)
Seem'd to her ear his winning lips to lay,
And thus in whispers said, or seem'd to say.
Fairest of mortals, thou distinguish'd care
Of thousand bright inhabitants of air!
If e'er one Vision touch thy infant thought,
Of all the Nurse and all the Priest have taught;
Of airy Elves by moonlight shadows seen,
The silver token, and the circled green,
Or virgins visited by Angel-pow'rs,
With golden crowns and wreaths of heav'nly flow'rs;
Hear and believe! thy own importance know,
Nor bound thy narrow views to things below.
Some secret truths, from learned pride conceal'd,
To Maids alone and children are reveal'd:
What tho' no credit doubting Wits may give,
The Fair and Innocent shall still believe.
Know, then, unnumbered Spirits round thee fly,
The light Militia of the lower sky:
These, tho' unseen, are ever on the wing,
Hang o'er the Box, and hover round the Ring.
Think what an equipage thou hast in air,
And view with scorn two Pages and a Chair.
As now your own, our beings were of old,
And once inclos'd in Woman's beauteous mould;
Thence, by a soft transition, we repair
From earthly vehicles to these of air.
Think not, when Woman's transient breath is fled,
That all her vanities at once are dead;
Succeeding vanities she still regards,
And, tho' she plays no more, o'erlooks the cards.
Her joy in gilded Chariots, when alive,
And love of Ombre, after death survive.
For when the Fair in all their pride expire,
To their first Elements their Souls retire:
The sprites of fiery Termagants in Flame
Mount up, and take a Salamander's name.
Soft yielding minds to Water glide away,
And sip, with nymphs, their elemental tea.
The graver Prude sinks downward to a Gnome,
In search of mischief still on Earth to roam.
The light Coquettes in Sylphs aloft repair,
And sport and flutter in the fields of air.
Know farther yet; whoever, fair and chaste,
Rejects mankind, is by some Sylph embrac'd:
For Spirits, freed from mortal laws, with ease
Assume what sexes and what shapes they please.
What guards the purity of melting maids,
In courtly balls, and midnight masquerades,
Safe from the treach'rous friend, the daring spark,
The glance by day, the whisper in the dark,
When kind occasion prompts their warm desires,
Whe music softens, and when dancing fires?
'Tis but their Sylph, the wise Celestials know,
Tho' Honour is the word with Men below.
Some nymphs there are, too conscious of their face,
For life predestin'd to the Gnomes embrace.
These swell their prospects and exalt their pride,
When offers are disdain'd, and love deny'd:
Then gay ideas croud the vacant brain,
While Peers, and Dukes, and all their sweeping train,
And Garters, Stars, and Coronets appear,
And, in soft sounds, Your Grace salutes their ear.
'Tis these that early taint the female soul,
Instruct the eyes of young Coquettes to roll,
Teach infant cheeks a bidden blush to know,
And little hearts to flutter at a Beau.
Oft, when the world imagine women stray,
The Sylphs thro' mystic mazes guide their way,
Thro' all the giddy circle they pursue,
And old impertinence expel by new.
What tender maid but must a victim fall
To one man's treat, but for another's ball?
When Florio speaks, what virgin could withstand,
If gentle Damon did not squeeze her hand;
With varying vanities, from ev'ry part
They shift the moving Toy-shop of their heart;
Where wigs with wigs, with sword-knots sword-knots strive,
Beaux banish beaux, and coaches coaches drive.
This erring mortals Levity may call,
Oh blind to truth! the Sylphs contrive it all.
Of these am I, who thy protection claim;
A watchful sprite, and Ariel is my name.
Late, as I rang'd the crystal wilds of air,
In the clear Mirror of thy ruling star
I saw, alas, some dread event impend,
Ere to the main this morning sun descend;
But heav'n reveals not what, or how, or where:
Warn'd by the Sylph, oh pious maid, beware!
This to disclose is all thy guardian can:
Beware of all; but, most, beware of Man!
He said; when Shock, who thought she slept too long,
Leap'd up, and wak'd his mistress with his tongue.
'Twas then, Belinda, if report say true,
Thy eyes first open'd on a Billet-doux;
Wounds, Charms, and Ardors, were no sooner read,
But all the Vision vanish'd from thy head.
And now, unveil'd, the Toilet stands display'd,
Each silver vase in mystic order laid.
First, rob'd in white, the Nymph intent adores,
With head uncover'd, the Cosmetic pow'rs.
A heav'nly image in the glass appears,
To that she bends, to that her eyes she rears;
Th' inferior Priestess, at her altar's side,
Trembling, begins the sacred rites of Pride.
Unnumber'd treasures ope at once, and here
The various off'rings of the world appear;
From each she nicely culls, with curious toil,
And decks the Goddess with the glitt'ring spoil.
This casket, India's glowing gems unlocks,
And all Arabia breathes from yonder box.
The Tortoise here and Elephant unite,
Transform'd to combs, the speckled and the white.
Here files of pins extend their shining rows,
Puffs, Powders, Patches, Bibles, Billet-doux.
Now awful beauty puts on all its arms;
The fair each moment rises in her charms,
Repairs her smiles, awakens every grace,
And calls forth all the wonders of her face:
Sees by degrees a purer blush arise,
And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes.
The busy Sylphs surround their darling care,
These set the head, and those divide the hair;
Some fold the sleeve, whilst others plait the gown;
And Betty's prais'd for labours not her own.
Not with more glories, in th' etherial plain,
The sun first rises o'er the purpled main,
Than, issuing forth, the rival of his beams
Launch'd on the bosom of the silver'd Thames.
Fair Nymphs, and well-dress'd Youths, around her shone,
But ev'ry eye was fix'd on her alone.
On her white breast a sparkling Cross she wore,
Which Jews might kiss, and Infidels adore.
Her lively looks a sprightly mind disclose,
Quick as her eyes, and as unfix'd as those;
Favours to none, to all she smiles extends;
Oft she rejects, but never once offends.
Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers strike,
And, like the sun, they shine on all alike.
Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride,
Might hide her faults, if Belles had faults to hide:
If to her share some female errors fall,
Look on her face and you'll forget 'em all.
This nymph, to the destruction of mankind,
Nourish'd two Locks which graceful hung behind
In equal curls, and well conspir'd to deck,
With shining ringlets, the smooth iv'ry neck.
Love in these labyrinths his slaves detains,
And mighty hearts are held in slender chains.
With hairy springes we the birds betray,
Slight lines of hair surprize the finny prey,
Fair tresses men's imperial race insnare,
And beauty draws us with a single hair.
Th' advent'rous Baron the bright locks admir'd;
He saw, he wish'd, and to the prize aspir'd.
Resolv'd to win, he meditates the way,
By force to ravish, or by fraud betray;
For when success a lover's toil attends,
Few ask, if fraud or force attain'd his ends.
For this, 'ere Phoebus rose, he had implor'd
Propitious heav'n, and ev'ry pow'r ador'd;
But chiefly Love—to Love an Altar built,
Of twelve vast French Romances, neatly gilt.
There lay three garters, half a pair of gloves,
And all the trophies of his former loves.
With tender billet-doux he lights the pyre,
And breathes three am'rous sighs to raise the fire.
Then prostrate falls, and begs, with ardent eyes,
Soon to obtain, and long possess the prize:
The pow'rs gave ear, and granted half his pray'r,
The rest, the winds dispers'd in empty air.
But now secure the painted vessel glides,
The sun-beams trembling on the floating tides:
While melting music steals upon the sky,
And soften'd sounds along the waters die;
Smooth flow the waves, the Zephyrs gently play,
Belinda smil'd, and all the world was gay.
All but the Sylph—with careful thoughts opprest,
Th' impending woe sat heavy on his breast.
He summons strait his Denizens of air;
The lucid squadrons round the sails repair:
Soft o'er the shrouds aërial whispers breathe,
That seem'd but Zephyrs to the train beneath.
Some to the sun their insect-wings unfold,
Waft on the breeze, or sink in clouds of gold;
Transparent forms, too fine for mortal sight,
Their fluid bodies half dissolv'd in light.
Loose to the wind their airy garments flew,
Thin glitt'ring textures of the filmy dew,
Dip'd in the richest tincture of the skies,
Where light disports in ever-mingling dyes,
While ev'ry beam new transient colours slings,
Colours that change whene'er they wave their wings,
Amid the circle on the gilded mast,
Superior by the head, was Ariel plac'd;
His purple pinions op'ning to the sun,
He rais'd his azure wand, and thus begun.
Ye Sylphs and Sylphids, to your chief give ear,
Fay, Fairies, Genii, Elves, and Daemons hear!
Ye know the spheres, and various tasks assign'd
By laws eternal to the aërial kind.
Some in the fields of purest aether play,
And bask and whiten in the blaze of day;
Some guide the course of wand'ring orbs on high,
Or roll the planets thro' the boundless sky.
Some, less refin'd, beneath the moon's pale light
Pursue the stars that shoot athwart the night,
Or suck the mists in grosser air below,
Or dip their pinions in the painted bow,
Or brew fierce tempests on the wintry main,
Or o'er the glebe distil the kindly rain.
Others on earth o'er human race preside,
Watch all their ways, and all their actions guide:
Of these the chief the care of Nations own,
And guard with arms divine the British throne.
Our humbler province is to tend the Fair,
Not a less pleasing, tho' less glorious care;
To save the powder from too rude a gale,
Nor let th' imprison'd essences exhale;
To draw fresh colours from the vernal flow'rs;
To steal from rainbows ere they drop in show'rs,
A brighter wash; to curl their waving hairs,
Assist their blushes, and inspire their airs;
Nay oft, in dreams, invention we bestow,
To change a Flounce, or add a Furbelow.
This day, black Omens threat the brightest Fair
That e'er deserv'd a watchful spirit's care;
Some dire disaster, or by force, or slight;
But what, or where, the fates have wrap'd in night.
Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,
Or some frail China-jar receive a flaw;
Or stain her honour, or her new brocade;
Forget her pray'rs, or miss a masquerade;
Or lose her heart or necklace at a ball;
Or whether heav'n has doom'd that Shock must fall.
Haste then, ye spirits! to your charge repair:
The flutt'ring fan be Zephyretta's care;
The drops to thee, Brillante, we consign;
And, Momentilla, let the watch be thine;
Do thou, Crispissa, tend her fav'rite Lock;
Ariel himself shall be the guard of Shock.
To fifty chosen Sylphs, of special note,
We trust th' important charge, the Petticoat:
Oft have we known that seven-fold fence to fail,
Tho' stiff with hoops, and arm'd with ribs of whale;
Form a strong line about the silver bound,
And guard the wide circumference around.
Whatever spirit, careless of his charge,
His post neglects, or leaves the fair at large,
Shall feel sharp vengeance soon o'ertake his sins,
Be stop'd in vials, or transfix'd with pins;
Or plang'd in lakes of bitter washes lie,
Or wedg'd whole ages in a bodkin's eye:
Gums and Pomatums shall his flight restrain,
While, clog'd, he beats his silken wings in vain;
Or Alum styptics, with contracting pow'r,
Shrink his thin essence like a shrivel'd flow'r:
Or, as Ixion fix'd, the wretch shall feel
The giddy motion of the whirling mill,
In fumes of burning Chocolate shall glow,
And tremble at the sea that froths below!
He spoke; the spirits from the sails descend;
Some, orb in orb, around the nymph extend;
Some thrid the mazy ringlets of her hair;
Some hang upon the pendants of her ear;
With beating hearts the dire event they wait,
Anxious, and trembling for the birth of Fate.
Close by those meads, forever crown'd with flow'rs,
Where Thames with pride surveys his rising tow'rs,
There stands a structure of majestic frame,
Which from the neighb'ring Hampton takes its name.
Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoom
Of foreign Tyrants, and of Nymphs at home;
Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.
Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort,
To taste awhile the pleasures of a Court;
In various talk th' instructive hours they past,
Who gave the ball or paid the visit last:
One speaks the glory of the British Queen,
And one describes a charming Indian screen;
A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes;
At ev'ry word a reputation dies.
Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat,
With singing, laughing, ogling,
and all that.
Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day,
The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray;
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign,
And wretches hang that Jurymen may dine;
The merchant from th' Exchange returns in peace,
And the long labours of the toilet cease.
Belinda now, whom thirst of fame invites,
Burns to encounter two advent'rous Knights,
At Ombre singly to decide their doom,
And swells her breast with conquests yet to come.
Strait the three bands prepare in arms to join,
Each band the number of the sacred nine.
Soon as she spreads her hand, th' aërial guard
Descend, and sit on each important card:
First Ariel perch'd upon a Matadore,
Then each according to the rank he bore;
For Sylphs, yet mindful of their ancient race,
Are, as when women, wond'rous fond of place.
Behold, four Kings in majesty rever'd,
With hoary whiskers and a forky beard;
And four fair Queens, whose hands sustain a flow'r,
Th' expressive emblem of their softer pow'r;
Four knaves in garbs succinct, a trusty band;
Caps on their heads, and halberts in their hand;
And party-colour'd troops, a shining train,
Drawn forth to combat on the velvet plain.
The skilful nymph reviews her force with care:
Let Spades be trumps! she said, and trumps they were.
Now move to war her sable Matadores,
In show like leaders of the swarthy Moors.
Spadillio first, unconquerable Lord!
Led off two captive trumps, and swept the board.
As many more Manillio forc'd to yield,
And march'd a victor from the verdant field.
Him Basto follow'd; but his fate, more hard,
Gain'd but one trump, and one Plebeian card.
With his broad sabre next, a chief in years,
The hoary Majesty of Spades appears,
Puts forth one manly leg, to sight reveal'd,
The rest, his many-colour'd robe conceal'd▪
The rebel Knave, who dares his prince engage,
Proves the just victim of his royal rage.
Ev'n mighty Pam, that Kings and Queens o'erthrew,
And mow'd down armies in the fights of Lu,
Sad chance of war! now, destitute of aid,
Falls undistinguish'd by the victor Spade!
Thus far both armies to Belinda yield;
Now to the Baron fate inclines the field.
His warlike Amazon her host invades,
Th' imperial consort of the crown of Spades.
The Club's black tyrant first her victim dy'd,
Spite of his haughty mien, and barb'rous pride:
What boots the regal circle on his head,
His giant limbs in state unwieldy spread;
That long behind he trails his pompous robe,
And, of all monarchs, only grasps the globe?
The Baron now his Diamonds pours apace;
Th' embroider'd King who shews but half his face,
And his refulgent Queen, with pow'rs combin'd,
Of broken troops an easy conquest find.
Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts, in wild disorder seen,
With throngs promiscuous strow the level green.
Thus, when dispers'd, a routed army runs,
Of Asia's troops, and Afric's sable sons,
With like confusion diff'rent nations fly,
Of various habits, and of various dye,
The pierc'd battalions, disunited, fall,
In heaps on heaps; one fate o'erwhelms them all.
The Knave of Diamonds tries his wily arts,
And wins (oh shameful chance!) the Queen of Hearts.
At this, the blood the virgin's cheek forsook,
A livid paleness spreads o'er all her look;
She sees, and trembles at th' approaching ill,
Just in the jaws of ruin, and Codille.
And now (as oft in some distemper'd state)
On one nice trick depends the gen'ral fate.
An Ace of Hearts steps forth: the King, unseen,
Lurk'd in her hand, and mourn'd his captive Queen:
He springs to vengeance with an eager pace,
And falls like thunder on the prostrate Ace.
The nymph exulting fills with shouts the sky;
The walls, the woods, and long canals reply.
O thoughtless mortals! ever blind to fate,
Too soon dejected, and too soon elate.
Sudden, these honours shall be snatch'd away,
And curs'd for ever this victorious day.
For lo! the board with cups and spoons is crown'd,
The berries crackle, and the mill turns round;
On shining Altars of Japan they raise
The silver lamp; the fiery spirits blaze:
From silver spouts the grateful liquors glide,
While China's earth receives the smoaking tide:
At once they gratify their scent and taste,
And frequent cups prolong the rich repast.
Strait hover round the fair her airy band;
Some, as she sipp'd, the fuming liquor fann'd,
Some o'er her lap their careful plumes display'd,
Trembling, and conscious of the rich brocade.
Coffee (which makes the politician wise,
And see thro' all things with his half shut eyes)
Sent up in vapours to the Baron's brain
New stratagems, the radiant Lock to gain.
Ah cease, rash youth! desist ere 'tis too late,
Fear the just Gods, and think of Scylla's fate!
Chang'd to a bird, and sent to flit in air,
She dearly pays for Nisus' injur'd hair!
But, when to mischief mortals bend their will,
How soon they find fit instruments of ill?
Just then, Clarissa drew, with tempting grace,
A two-edg'd weapon from her shining case:
So ladies, in Romance, assist their knight,
Present the spear, and arm him for the fight.
He takes the gift with rev'rence, and extends
The little engine on his fingers ends;
This just behind Belinda's neck he spread,
As o'er the fragrant steams she bends her head.
Swift to the Lock a thousand Sprites repair,
A thousand wings, by turns, blow back the hair;
And thrice they twitch'd the diamond in her ear;
Thrice she look'd back, and thrice the foe drew near.
Just in that instant anxious Ariel sought
The close recesses of the Virgin's thought;
As on the nosegay in her breast reclin'd,
He watch'd th' ideas rising in her mind,
Sudden he view'd, in spite of all her art,
An earthly lover lurking at her heart.
Amaz'd, confus'd, he found his pow'r expir'd,
Resign'd to fate, and with a sigh retir'd.
The Peer now spreads the glitt'ring forfex wide,
T' inclose the Lock; now joins it, to divide.
Ev'n then, before the fatal engine clos'd,
A wretched Sylph too fondly interpos'd;
Fate urg'd the sheers, and cut the Sylph in twain,
(But airy substance soon unites again)
The meeting points the sacred hair dissever
From the fair head, for ever, and for ever!
Then slash'd the living light'ning from her eyes,
And skreams of horror rend th' affrighted skies.
Not louder shrieks to pitying heav'n are cast,
When husbands, or when lap-dogs breathe their last;
Or when rich China vessels, fall'n from high,
In glitt'ring dust, and painted fragments lie!
Let wreathes of triumph now my temples, twine,
(The victor cry'd) the glorious prize is mine!
While fish in streams, or birds delight in air,
Or in a coach and six the British fair,
As long as Atalantis shall be read,
Or the small pillow grace a Lady's bed,
While visits shall be paid on solemn days,
When num'rous wax-lights in bright order blaze,
While nymphs take treats, or assignations give,
So long my honour, name, and praise shall live!
What Time would spare, from Steel receives its date,
And monuments, like men, submit to fate!
Steel could the labour of the Gods destroy,
And strike to dust th' imperial tow'rs of Troy;
Steel could the works of mortal pride confound,
And hew triumphal arches to the ground.
What wonder, then, fair Nymph! thy hairs should feel
The conqu'ring force of unresisted steel?
But anxious cares the pensive Nymph oppress'd,
And secret passions labour'd in her breast.
Not youthful kings in Battle seiz'd alive,
Not scornful virgins who their charms survive,
Not ardent lovers robb'd of all their bliss,
Not ancient ladies when refus'd a kiss,
Not tyrants fierce that unrepenting die,
Not Cynthia when her manteau's pinn'd awry,
E'er felt such rage, resentment, and despair,
As thou, sad Virgin! for thy ravish'd Hair.
For, that sad moment when the Sylphs withdrew,
And Ariel, weeping, from Belinda flew,
Umbriel, a dusky, melancholy sprite,
As ever sully'd the fair face of light,
Down to the central earth, his proper scene,
Repair'd, to search the gloomy Cave of Spleen.
Swift on his sooty pinions flits the Gnome,
And in a vapour reach'd the dismal dome.
No chearful breeze this sullen region knows,
The dreaded East is all the wind that blows.
Here, in a grotto shelter'd close from air,
And screen'd in shades from day's detested glare,
She sighs for ever on her pensive bed,
Pain at her side, and Megrim at her head.
Two handmaids wait the throne: alike in place,
But diff'ring far in figure and in face.
Here stood Ill-nature like an ancient maid,
Her wrinkled form in black and white array'd;
With store of pray'rs, for mornings, nights, and noons,
Her hand is fill'd! her bosom with lampoons.
There Affectation, with a sickly mien,
Shows in her cheek the roses of eighteen,
Practis'd to lisp, and hang the head aside,
Faints into airs, and languishes with pride,
On the rich quilt sinks with becoming woe,
Wrapt in a gown, for sickness, and for show.
The fair-ones feel such maladies as these,
When each new night-dress gives a new disease.
A constant Vapour o'er the palace flies;
Strange phantoms rising as the mists arise;
Dreadful, as hermits dreams in haunted shades,
Or bright, as visions of expiring maids.
Now glaring siends, and snakes on rolling spires,
Pale spectres, gaping tombs, and purple fires:
Now lakes of liquid gold, Elysian scenes,
And crystal domes, and Angels in machines.
Unnumber'd throngs on ev'ry side are seen,
Of bodies chang'd to various forms by Spleen.
Here living tea-pots stand, one arm held out,
One bent; the handle this, and that the spout:
A pipkin here, like Homer's Tripod, walks;
Here sighs a jar, and there a goose-pye talks;
Men prove with child, as pow'rful fancy works,
And maids, turn'd bottles, call aloud for corks.
Safe pass'd the Gnome thro' this fantastic band,
A branch of healing Spleen-wort in his hand.
Then thus address'd the Pow'r—Hail wayward Queen!
Who rule the sex to fifty from fifteen:
Parent of vapours, and of female wit,
Who give th' hysteric, or poetic fit,
On various tempers act by various ways,
Make some take physic, others scribble plays;
Who cause the proud their visits to delay,
And send the godly in a pet to pray.
A Nymph there is, that all thy pow'r disdains,
And thousands more in equal mirth maintains.
But oh! if e'er thy Gnome could spoil a grace,
Or raise a pimple on a beauteous face,
Like Citron-waters matrons cheeks inflame,
Or change complexions at a losing game;
If e'er with airy horns I planted heads,
Or rumpled petticoats, or tumbled beds;
Or caus'd suspicion when no soul was rude,
Or discompos'd the head-dress of a Prude;
Or e'er to costive lap-dog gave disease,
Which not the tears of brightest eyes could ease:
Hear me, and touch Belinda with chagrin;
That single act gives half the world the spleen.
The Goddess, with a discontented air,
Seems to reject him, tho' she grants his pray'r.
A wond'rous Bag with both her hands she binds,
Like that where once Ulysses held the winds;
There she collects the force of female lungs,
Sighs, sobs, and passions, and the war of tongues.
A Vial next she fills with sainting fears,
Soft sorrows, melting griefs, and flowing tears.
The Gnome rejoicing bears her gifts away,
Spreads his black wings, and slowly mounts to day.
Sunk in Thalestris' arms the Nymph he found,
Her eyes dejected, and her hair unbound.
Full o'er their heads the swelling bag he rent,
And all the Furies issu'd at the vent.
Belinda burns with more than mortal ire,
And fierce Thalestris fans the rising fire.
O wretched maid! she spread her hands and cry'd,
(While Hampton's echoes, Wretched maid! reply'd)
Was it for this you took such constant care
The bodkin, comb, and essence to prepare?
For this your locks in paper durance bound,
For this with tort'ring irons writh'd around?
For this with fillets strain'd your tender head,
And bravely bore the double loads of lead?
Gods! shall the ravisher display your hair,
While the Eops envy, and the Ladies stare!
Honour forbid! at whose unrival'd shrine,
Ease, pleasure, virtue, all our sex resign.
Methinks already I your tears survey,
Already hear the horrid things they say,
Already see you a degraded toast,
And all your honour in a whisper lost!
How shall I, then, your helpless fame defend?
'Twill, then, be infamy to seem your friend!
And shall this prize, th' inestimable prize,
Expos'd thro' crystal to the gazing eyes,
And, heighten'd by the diamond's circling rays,
On that rapacious hand for ever blaze!
Sooner shall grass in Hyde-park Circus grow,
And wits take lodgings in the sound of Bow;
Sooner let earth, air, sea, to Chaos fall,
Men, monkeys, lap-dogs, parrots, perish all!
She said! then raging to Sir Plume repairs,
And bids her beau demand the precious hairs:
Sir Plume (of amber snuff-box justly vain,
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane)
With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face,
He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case,
And thus broke out—"My Lord, why, what the "devil?
"Z—ds! damn the Lock! 'fore Gad, you must be "civil!
"Plague on't! 'tis past a jest—nay, pr'ythee, pox,
"Give her the hair"—he spoke, and rapp'd his box.
It grieves me much (reply'd the Peer again)
Who speaks so well should ever speak in vain.
But by this Lock, this sacred Lock I swear,
(Which never more shall join its parted hair;
Which never more its honours shall renew,
Clipp'd from the lovely head where late it grew)
That while my nostrils draw the vital air,
This hand, which won it, shall for ever wear.
He spoke, and speaking, in proud triumph spread
The long-contended honours of her head.
But Umbriel, hateful Gnome! forbears not so;
He breaks the Vial, whence the sorrows flow.
Then see! the Nymph in beauteous grief appears,
Her eyes half-languishing, half-drown'd in tears;
On her heav'd bosom hung her drooping head,
Which, with a sigh, she rais'd; and thus she said:
For ever curs'd be this detested day,
Which snatch'd my best, my fav'rite curl away!
Happy! ah ten times happy had I been,
If Hampton-Court these eyes had never seen!
Yet am not I the first mistaken maid
By love of courts to num'rous ills betray'd.
Oh had I rather unadmir'd remain'd
In some lone isle, or distant northern land;
Where the gilt chariot never marks the way,
Where none learn Ombre, none e'er taste Bohea!
There kept my charms conceal'd from mortal eye,
Like roses, that in deserts bloom and die.
What mov'd my mind with youthful Lords to roam?
O had I stay'd, and said my pray'rs at home!
'Twas this the morning Omens seem'd to tell;
Thrice from my trembling hand the patch-box fell;
The tott'ring China shook without a wind;
Nay, Poll sat mute, and Shock was most unkind!
A Sylph, too, warn'd me of the threats of Fate,
In mystic visions, now believ'd too late!
See the poor remnants of these slighted hairs!
My hands shall rend what ev'n thy rapine spares:
These in two sable ringlets taught to break,
Once gave new beauties to the snowy neck;
The sister-lock now fits uncouth, alone,
And in its fellow's fate foresees its own;
Uncurl'd it hangs, the fatal sheers demands,
And tempts, once more, thy sacrilegious hands.
Oh hadst thou, cruel! been content to seize
Hairs less in sight, or any hairs but these!
She said: the pitying audience melt in tears.
But Fate and Jove had stopp'd the Baron's ears.
In vain Thalestris with reproach assails!
For who can move when fair Belinda fails?
Not half so fix'd the Trojan could remain,
While Anna begg'd, and Dido rag'd in vain.
Then grave Clarissa graceful wav'd her fan;
Silence ensu'd, and thus the Nymph began.
Say, why are Beauties prais'd and honour'd most,
The wise man's passion, and the vain man's toast?
Why deck'd with all that land and sea afford,
Why Angels call'd, and Angel-like ador'd;
Why round our coaches crowd the white-glov'd Beaux,
Why bows the side-box from its inmost rows?
How vain are all these glories, all our pains,
Unless good sense preserve what beauty gains:
That men may say, when we the front-box grace,
Behold the first in virtue, as in face!
Oh! if to dance all night, and dress all day,
Charm'd the small-pox, or chas'd old-age away;
Who would not scorn what housewife's cares produce,
Or who would learn one earthly thing of use?
To patch, nay ogle, might become a Saint;
Nor could it, sure, be such a sin to paint.
But since, alas! frail beauty must decay,
Curl'd or uncurl'd, since Locks will turn to gray;
Since painted, or not painted, all shall fade,
And she who scorns a man must die a maid;
What, then, remains, but well our pow'r to use,
And keep good-humour still, whate'er we lose?
And trust me, Dear, good-humour can prevail,
When airs, and flights, and screams, and scolding fail.
Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll;
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
So spoke the Dame, but no applause ensu'd;
Belinda frown'd; Thalestris call'd her Prude.
To arms, to arms! the fierce Virago cries,
And, swift as lightning, to the combat flies.
All side in parties, and begin th' attack;
Fans clap, silks rustle, and tough whalebones crack;
Heroes and Heroines shouts confus'dly rise,
And base and treble voices strike the skies.
No common weapon in their hands are found;
Like Gods they fight, nor dread a mortal wound.
So, when bold Homer makes the Gods engage,
And heav'nly breasts with human passions rage;
'Gainst Pallas, Mars; Latona, Hermes arms;
And all Olympus rings with loud alarms:
Jove's thunder roars, heav'n trembles all around,
Blue Neptune storms, the bellowing deeps resound:
Earth shakes her nodding tow'rs, the ground gives way,
And the pale ghosts start at the flash of day!
Triumphant Umbriel, on a sconce's height,
Clapp'd his glad wings, and sate to view the fight:
Propp'd on their bodkin spears, the sprites survey
The growing combat, or assist the fray.
While thro' the press enrag'd Thalestris flies,
And scatters death around from both her eyes,
A Beau and Witling perish'd in the throng,
One dy'd in metaphor, and one in song.
"O cruel Nymph! a living death I bear,"
Cry'd Dapperwit, and sunk beside his chair.
A mournful glance Sir Fopling upwards cast,
"Those eyes are made so killing"—was his last.
Thus on Maeander's flow'ry margin lies
Th' expiring Swan, and, as he sings, he dies.
When bold Sir Plume had drawn Clarissa down,
Chloe stepp'd in, and kill'd him with a frown;
She smil'd to see the doughty hero slain,
But, at her smile, the Beau reviv'd again.
Now Jove suspends his golden scales in air,
Weighs the men's wits against the Lady's hair;
The doubtful beam long nods from side to side;
At length the wits mount up, the hairs subside.
See fierce Belinda on the Baron flies,
With more than usual lightning in her eyes:
Nor fear'd the Chief th' unequal fight to try,
Who sought no more than on his foe to die.
But this bold Lord, with manly strength endu'd,
She with one finger and a thumb subdu'd:
Just where the breath of life his nostrils drew,
A charge of Snuff the wily virgin threw;
The Gnomes direct, to ev'ry atom just,
The pungent grains of titillating dust.
Sudden, with starting tears each eye o'erflows,
And the high dome re-echoes to his nose.
Now meet thy fate, incens'd Belinda cry'd,
And drew a deadly bodkin from her side.
(The same, his ancient personage to deck,
Her great-great-grandsire wore about his neck,
In three scal-rings; which, after melted down,
Form'd a vast buckle for his widow's gown:
Her infant grandame's whistle next it grew;
The bells she gingled, and the whistle blew;
Then in a bodkin grac'd her mother's hairs,
Which long she wore, and now Belinda wears.)
Boast not my fall (he cry'd) insulting foe!
Thou by some other shalt be laid as low.
Nor think, to die dejects my lofty mind:
All that I dread is leaving you behind!
Rather than so, ah let me still survive
And burn in Cupid's flames—but burn alive.
Restore the Lock! she cries; and all around
Restore the Lock! the vaulted roofs rebound.
Not fierce Othello in so loud a strain
Roar'd for the handkerchief that caus'd his pain.
But see how oft ambitious aims are cross'd,
And chiefs contend till all the prize is lost!
The Lock, obtain'd with guilt, and kept with pain,
In ev'ry place is sought, but sought in vain:
With such a prize no mortal must be blest;
So heav'n decrees! with heav'n who can contest?
Some thought it mounted to the Lunar sphere,
Since all things lost on earth are treasur'd there.
There hero's wits are kept in pond'rous vases,
And Beaux in snuff-boxes and tweezer-cases.
There broken vows, and death-bed alms are found,
And lovers hearts with ends of ribband bound,
The courtier's promises, and sick man's pray'rs,
The smiles of harlots, and the tears of heirs,
Cages for knats, and chains to yoak a flea,
Dry'd butterflies, and tomes of casuistry.
But trust the Muse—she saw it upward rise,
Tho' mark'd by none but quick, poetic eyes:
(So Rome's great founder to the heav'ns withdrew,
To Proculus alone confess'd in view)
A sudden Star, it shot thro' liquid air,
And drew behind a radiant tail of hair.
Not Berenice's Locks first rose so bright,
The heav'ns bespangling with dishevel'd light.
The Sylphs behold it kindling as it flies,
And, pleas'd, pursue its progress thro' the skies.
This the Beau-monde shall from the Mall survey,
And hail with music its propitious ray.
This the blest Lover shall for Venus take,
And send up vows from Rosamonda's lake.
This Partridge soon shall view in cloudless skies,
When next he looks thro' Galilaeo's eyes;
And hence th' egregious wizard shall foredoom
The fate of Louis and the fall of Rome.
Then cease, bright Nymph! to mourn thy ravish'd hair,
Which adds new glory to the shining sphere!
Not all the tresses that fair head can boast,
Shall draw such envy as the Lock you lost.
For, after all the murders of your eye,
When, after millions slain, yourself shall die;
When those fair suns shall set, as set they must,
And all those tresses shall be laid in dust,
This Lock, the Muse shall consecrate to fame,
And 'midst the stars inscribe Belinda's name.
THE HERMIT.
This poem is held in just esteem, the versification being chaste, and tolerably harmonious, and the story told with perspicuity and conciseness. It seems to have cost great labour, both to Mr. Pope, and Parnell himself, to bring it to this perfection. It may not be amiss to observe, that the fable is taken from one of Dr. Henry Moore's Dialogues.
FAR in a wild, unknown to public view,
From youth to age a rev'rend Hermit grew;
The moss his bed, the cave his humble cell,
His food the fruits, his drink the crystal well:
Remote from man, with God he pass'd the days,
Pray'r all his bus'ness, all his pleasure, praise.
A life so sacred, such serene repose,
Seem'd heav'n itself, till one suggestion rose;
That vice should triumph, virtue vice obey;
This sprung some doubt of providence's sway:
His hopes no more a certain prospect boast,
And all the tenour of his soul is lost:
So when a smooth expanse receives, imprest,
Calm nature's image on its watry breast,
Down bend the banks, the trees depending grow,
And skies beneath with answ'ring colours glow:
But if a stone the gentle sea divide,
Swift ruffling circles curl on ev'ry side,
And glimmering fragments of a broken sun,
Banks, seas, and skies, in thick disorder run.
To clear this doubt, to know the world by sight,
To find if books, or swains, report it right;
(For yet by swains alone the world he knew,
Whose feet came wand'ring o'er the nightly dew)
He quits his cell; the Pilgrim-staff he bore,
And fix'd the Scallop in his hat before;
Then with the sun a rising journey went,
Sedate to think, and watching each event.
The morn was wasted in the pathless grass,
And long and lonesome was the wild to pass;
But when the southern sun had warm'd the day,
A youth came posting o'er a crossing way;
His rayment decent, his complexion fair,
And soft in graceful ringlets wav'd his hair.
Then, near approaching, Father, hail! he cry'd,
And hail, my Son, the rev'rend fire reply'd;
Words follow'd words, from question answer flow'd,
And talk of various kind deceiv'd the road;
'Till each with other pleas'd, and loth to part,
While in their rage they differ, join in heart:
Thus stands an aged elm in ivy bound;
Thus youthful ivy clasps an elm around.
Now sunk the sun; the closing hour of day
Came onward, mantled o'er with sober grey;
Nature in silence bid the world repose;
When, near the road, a stately palace rose:
There, by the moon, thro' ranks of trees they pass,
Whose verdure crown'd their sloping sides of grass.
It chanc'd the noble master of the dome,
Still made his house the wand'ring stranger's home:
Yet still the kindness, from a thirst of praise,
Prov'd the vain flourish of expensive ease.
The pair arrive: the livery'd servants wait;
Their lord receives them at the pompous gate,
The table groans with costly piles of food,
And all is more than hospitably good.
Then led to rest, the day's long toil they drown,
Deep sunk in sleep, and silk, and heaps of down.
At length 'tis morn, and, at the dawn of day,
Along the wide canals the Zephyrs play;
Fresh o'er the gay parterre the breezes creep,
And shake the neighb'ring wood to banish sleep.
Up rise the guests, obedient to the call:
An early banquet deck'd the splendid hall;
Rich, luscious wine a golden goblet grac'd,
Which the kind master forc'd the guests to taste.
Then, pleas'd and thankful, from the porch they go;
And, but the landlord, none had cause of woe;
His cup was vanish'd; for, in secret guise,
The younger guest purloin'd the glitt'ring prize.
As one who spies a serpent in his way,
Glist'ning and basking in the summer ray,
Disorder'd stops to shun the danger near,
Then walks with faintness on, and looks with fear:
So seem'd the sire, when, far upon the road,
The shining spoil his wily partner show'd.
He stopp'd with silence; walk'd with trembling heart,
And much he wish'd, but durst not ask to part:
Murm'ring he lifts his eyes, and thinks it hard,
That gen'rous actions meet a base reward.
While thus they pass, the sun his glory shrouds,
The changing skies hang out their sable clouds;
A sound in air presag'd approaching rain,
And beasts to covert scud across the plain.
Warn'd by the signs the wand'ring pair retreat,
To seek for shelter at a neighb'ring seat.
'Twas built with turrets, on a rising ground,
And strong, and large, and unimprov'd around;
Its owner's temper tim'rous and severe,
Unkind and griping, caus'd a desart there.
As near the miser's heavy doors they drew,
Fierce rising gusts with sudden fury blew;
The nimble lightning, mix'd with show'rs, began,
And o'er their heads loud rolling thunder ran.
Here long they knock, but knock or call in vain,
Driv'n by the wind, and batter'd by the rain.
At length some pity warm'd the master's breast,
('Twas then his threshold first receiv'd a guest)
Slow, creaking, turns the door, with jealous care,
And half he welcomes in the shiv'ring pair;
One frugal faggot lights the naked walls,
And nature's fervour thro' their limbs recalls:
Bread of the coarsest sort, with eager wine,
(Each hardly granted) serv'd them both to dine;
And, when the tempest first appear'd to cease,
A ready warning bid them part in peace.
With still remark the pond'ring Hermit view'd,
In one so rich, a life so poor and rude;
And why should such, within himself he cry'd,
Lock the lost wealth a thousand want beside?
But what new marks of wonder soon took place
In ev'ry settling feature of his face;
When from his vest the young companion bore
That cup, the gen'rous landlord own'd before,
And paid, profusely, with the precious bowl,
The stinted kindness of his churlish soul.
But now the clouds in airy tumult fly,
The sun emerging opes an azure sky;
A fresher green the smelling leaves display,
And, glitt'ring as they tremble, chear the day:
The weather courts them from the poor retreat,
And the glad master bolts the wary gate.
While hence they walk, the pilgrim's bosom wrought
With all the travail of uncertain thought;
His partner's acts without their cause appear;
'Twas there a vice, and seem'd a madness here:
Detesting that, and pitying this, he goes,
Lost and confounded with the various shows.
Now night's dim shades again involve the sky,
Again the wand'rers want a place to lie,
Again they search, and find a lodging nigh.
The soil improv'd around, the mansion neat,
And neither poorly low, nor idly great:
It seem'd to speak its master's turn of mind,
Content, and, not for praise, but virtue, kind.
Hither the walkers turn, with weary feet,
Then bless the mansion, and the master greet:
Their greeting fair, bestow'd with modest guise,
The courteous master hears, and thus replies:
Without a vain, without a grudging heart,
To him who gives us all, I yield a part;
From him you come, for him accept it here,
A frank and sober, more than costly cheer.
He spoke, and bid the welcome table spread,
Then talk'd of virtue till the time of bed,
When the grave houshold round his hall repair,
Warn'd by a bell, and close the hours with pray'r.
At length the world, renew'd by calm repose,
Was strong for toil, the dappled morn arose;
Before the pilgrims part, the younger crept
Near the clos'd cradle, where an infant slept,
And writh'd his neck; the landlord's little pride,
O strange return! grew black, and gasp'd, and dy'd.
Horror of horrors! what! his only son!
How look'd our hermit when the fact was done;
Not hell, tho' hell's black jaws in sunder part,
And breathe blue fire, could more assault his heart.
Confus'd, and struck with silence at the deed,
He flies, but, trembling, fails to fly with speed.
His steps the youth pursues: the country lay
Perplex'd with roads, a servant show'd the way;
A river cross'd the path; the passage o'er
Was nice to find; the servant rode before;
Long arms of oaks an open bridge supply'd,
And deep the waves beneath the bending glide.
The youth, who seem'd to watch a time to sin,
Approach'd the careless guide, and thrust him in;
Plunging, he falls, and, rising, lifts his head,
Then, flashing, turns, and sinks among the dead.
Wild, sparkling rage, inflames the father's eyes,
He bursts the bands of fear, and madly cries,
Detested wretch—But scarce his speech began,
When the strange partner seem'd no longer man:
His youthful face grew more serenely sweet;
His robe turn'd white, and flow'd upon his feet;
Fair rounds of radiant points invest his hair;
Celestial odours breathe thro' purpled air;
And wings, whose colours glitter'd on the day,
Wide at his back the gradual plumes display.
The form etherial bursts upon his sight,
And moves in all the majesty of light.
Tho' loud, at first, the pilgrim's passion grew,
Sudden he gaz'd, and wist not what to do;
Surprize in secret chains his words suspends,
And in a calm his settling temper ends.
But silence here the beauteous angel broke,
(The voice of music ravish'd as he spoke.)
Thy pray'r, thy praise, thy life, to vice unknown,
In sweet memorial rise before the throne:
These charms success in our bright region find,
And force an Angel down, to calm thy mind!
For this commission'd, I forsook the sky;
Nay, cease to kneel—thy fellow-servant I.
Then know the truth of government divine,
And let these scruples be no longer thine.
The maker justly claims that world he made;
In this the right of providence is laid;
Its sacred majesty thro' all depends
On using second means to work his ends:
'Tis thus, withdrawn in state from human eye,
The Pow'r exerts his Attributes on high,
Your actions uses, nor controuls your will,
And bids the doubting sons of men be still.
What strange events can strike with more surprize,
Than those which lately struck thy wond'ring eyes?
Yet, taught by these, confess th' Almighty just,
And, where you can't unriddle, learn to trust!
The great, vain man, who far'd on costly food,
Whose life was too luxurious to be good;
Who made his ivory stands with goblets shine,
And forc'd his guests to morning draughts of wine,
Has, with the cup, the graceless custom lost;
And still he welcomes, but with less of cost.
The mean, suspicious wretch, whose bolted door
Ne'er mov'd in duty to the wand'ring poor;
With him I left the cup, to teach his mind,
That heav'n can bless, if mortals will be kind.
Conscious of wanting worth, he views the bowl,
And feels compassion touch his grateful soul.
Thus artists melt the sullen oar of lead,
With heaping coals of fire upon its head;
In the kind warmth the metal learns to glow,
And, loose from dross, the silver runs below.
Long had our pious friend in virtue trod,
But now the child half-wean'd his heart from God;
(Child of his age) for him he liv'd in pain,
And measur'd back his steps to earth again.
To what excesses had his dotage run?
But God, to save the father, took the son.
To all but thee, in fits he seem'd to go,
(And 'twas my ministry to deal the blow)
The poor fond parent, humbled in the dust,
Now owns, in tears, the punishment was just.
But now had all his fortune felt a wreck,
Had that false servant sped in safety back?
This night his treasur'd heaps he meant to steal;
And what a fund of charity would fail!
Thus heav'n instructs thy mind: this trial o'er,
Depart in peace, resign, and sin no more.
On sounding pinions here the youth withdrew,
The sage stood wond'ring as the seraph flew.
Thus look'd Elisha, when, to mount on high,
His master took the chariot of the sky;
The fiery pomp ascending, left the view;
The prophet gaz'd, and wish'd to follow too.
The bending hermit here a pray'r begun,
"Lord! as in Heav'n, on earth thy will be done."
Then, gladly turning, sought his ancient place,
And pass'd a life of piety and peace.
IL PENSEROSO.
I have heard a very judicious critic say, that he had an higher idea of Milton's stile in poetry, from the two following poems, than from his Paradise Lost. It is certain the imagination shewn in them is correct and strong. The introduction to both in irregular measure is borrowed from the Italians, and hurts an English ear.
HENCE vain deluding joys,
The brood of folly without father bred,
How little you bested,
Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys?
Dwell in some idle brain,
And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess,
As thick and numberless
As the gay motes that people the sun-beams,
Or likest hovering dreams,
The fickle pensioners of Morpheus train.
But hail thou Goddess, sage and holy,
Hail divinest Melancholy,
Whose saintly visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human sight,
And, therefore, to our weaker view,
O'er-laid with black, staid wisdom's hue;
Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might beseem,
Or that starred Ethiop queen that strove
To set her beauties praise above
The Sea-Nymphs, and their pow'rs offended:
Yet thou art higher far descended,
Thee bright-hair'd Vesta long of yore
To solitary Saturn bore;
His daughter she (in Saturn's reign,
Such mixture was not held a stain)
Oft, in glimmering bow'rs and glades
He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida's inmost grove,
While yet there was no fear of Jove.
Come pensive Nun, devout and pure,
Sober, stedfast, and demure,
All in a robe of darkest grain,
Flowing with majestic train,
And sable stole of Cyprus lawn,
Over thy decent shoulders drawn.
Come, but keep thy wanted state,
With even step and musing gait,
And looks commercing with the skies,
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes:
There held in holy passion still,
Forget thyself to marble, till
With a sad leaden downward cast
Thou fix them on the earth as fast:
And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet,
Spare Fast, that oft with Gods doth diet,
And hears the Muses in a ring,
Ay round about Jove's altar sing:
And add to these retired Leisure,
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure;
But first, and chiefest, with thee bring,
Him that yon soars on golden wing,
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne,
The cherab Contemplation;
And the mute silence hist along,
'Less Philomel will deign a song,
In her sweetest, saddest plight,
Smoothing the rugged brow of night,
While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke
Gently o'er th' accustom'd oak;
Sweet bird, that shunn'st the noise of folly,
Most musical, most melancholy!
Thee, chauntress, oft, the woods among,
I woo, to hear thy even-song;
And, missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry smooth-shaven green,
To behold the wand'ring moon,
Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that had been led astray
Through the Heav'n's wide pathless way,
And oft, as if her head she bow'd,
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft, on a plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off Curfew sound,
Over some wide-water'd shore,
Swinging slow with sullen roar;
Or, if the air will not permit,
Some still removed place will fit,
Where glowing embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom,
Far from all resort of mirth,
Save the cricket on the hearth,
Or the bellman's drowsy charm,
To bless the doors from nightly harm:
Or let my lamp, at midnight hour,
Be seen in some high lonely tow'r,
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear,
With thrice great Hermes, or unsphere
The spirit of Plato, to unfold
What worlds, or what vast regions, hold
The immortal mind, that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook:
And of those demons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under-ground,
Whose power hath a true consent
With planet, or with element.
Sometime let gorgeous tragedy,
In scepter'd pall, come sweeping by,
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops line,
Or the Tale of Troy divine,
Or what (though rare) of later age
Ennobled hath thy buskin'd stage.
But, O sad Virgin, that thy pow'r
Might raise Musaeus from his bower,
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes, as, warbled to the string,
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek,
And made Hell grant what love did seek.
Or call up him that left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold,
Of Camball, and of Algarsife,
And who had Canace to wife,
That own'd the virtuous ring and glass,
And of the wond'rous horse of brass,
On which the Tartar king did ride;
And if ought else great bards beside
In sage and solemn tunes have sung,
Of tourneys and of trophies hung,
Of forests, and inchantments drear,
Where more is meant than meets the ear,
Thus, night, oft see me in thy pale career,
Till civil-suited morn appear,
Not trickt and frounct as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt,
But, kercheft in a comely cloud,
While rocking winds are piping loud,
Or, usher'd with a shower still,
When the gust hath blown its fill,
Ending on the rustling leaves,
With minute drops from off the eaves.
And, when the sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me, Goddess, bring
To arched walks of twilight groves,
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves,
Of pine, or monumental oak,
Where the rude ax, with heaved stroke,
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt,
Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt.
There, in close covert, by some brook,
Where no profaner eye may look,
Hide me from day's garish eye,
While the bee, with honey'd thigh,
That at her flow'ry work doth sing,
And the waters murmuring,
With such consort as they keep,
Entice the dewy feather'd sleep;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings, in aery stream
Of lively portraiture display'd,
Softly on my eye-lids laid:
And, as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath,
Sent by some Spirit to mortals good,
Or th' unseen Genius of the wood.
But let my due feet never fail
To walk the studious cloysters pale,
And love the high embowed roof,
With antic pillars massy proof,
And storied windows richly dight,
Casting a dim religious light.
There let the pealing organ blow,
To the full voic'd quire below,
In service high, and anthems clear,
As may, with sweetness, through mine ear,
Dissolve me into extasies,
And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes.
And may, at last, my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage,
The hairy grown and mossy cell,
Where I may sit, and rightly spell
Of every star that Heaven doth shew,
And every herb that sips the dew;
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.
These pleasures, Melancholy give,
And I with thee will choose to live.
L'ALLEGRO.
HENCE, loathed Melancholy,
Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight born,
In Stygian cave forlorn,
'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights unholy,
Find out some uncouth cell,
Where brooding darkness spreads his jealous wings,
And the night raven sings;
There, under ebon shades, and low-brow'd rocks,
As ragged as thy locks,
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come, thou goddess fair and free,
In Heav'n yclep'd Euphrosine,
And, by men, heart-easing Mirth,
Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,
With two sister graces more,
To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore;
Or whether (as some sages sing)
The frolic wind that breathes the spring,
Zephyr with Aurora playing,
As he met her once a maying;
There, on beds of violets blue,
And fresh blown roses wash'd in dew,
Fill'd her with thee, a daughter fair,
So buxom, blithe, and debonair.
Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee
Jest, and youthful Jollity,
Quips, and Cranks, and wanton Wiles,
Nods, and Becks, and wreathed Smiles,
Such as hang on Hebe's cheek,
And love to live in dimple sleek;
Sport, that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter, holding both his sides.
Come, and trip it as you go,
On the light fantastic toe;
And, in thy right hand, lead with thee
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty;
And, if I give thee honour due,
Mirth, admit me of thy crew,
To live with her, and live with thee,
In unreproved pleasures free;
To hear the lark begin his flight,
And, singing, startle the dull night
From his watch-tow'r in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise;
Then to come, in spite of sorrow,
And, at my window, bid good morrow,
Through the sweet-briar, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine:
While the cock, with lively din,
Scatters the rear of darkness thin,
And to the stack, or barn-door,
Stoutly struts his dames before:
Oft list'ning how the hounds and horn
Chearly rouse the slumb'ring morn,
From the side of some hoar hill,
Through the high wood echoing shrill:
Some time walking, not unseen,
By hedge row elms, on hillocks green,
Right against the eastern gate,
Where the great sun begins his state,
Rob'd in flames and amber light,
The clouds in thousand liveries dight,
While the plowman, near at hand,
Whistles o'er the furrow'd land,
And the milk-maid singeth blithe,
And the mower whets his scythe,
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Strait mine eye hath caught new pleasures
Whilst the landskip round it measures,
Russet lawns, and fallows gray,
Where the nibbling flocks do stray.
Mountains, on whose barren breast
The lab'ring clouds do often rest;
Meadows, trim with daisies pied,
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide.
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosom'd high in tufted trees,
Where, perhaps, some beauty lies,
The Cynosure of neighb'ring eyes.
Hard by a cottage chimney smokes,
From betwixt two aged oaks,
Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met,
Are at their savory dinner set,
Of herbs, and other country messes,
Which the neat handed Phillis dresses;
And then, in haste, her bow'r she leaves,
With Thestylis to bind the sheaves;
Or, if the earlier season lead,
To the tann'd haycock in the mead.
Sometimes, with secure delight,
The upland hamlets will invite,
When the merry bells ring round,
And the jocund rebecs sound
To many a youth, and many a maid,
Dancing in the chequer'd shade;
And young and old come forth to play
On a sun-shine holy-day,
Till the live-long day-light fail;
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat,
How fairy Mab the junkets eat,
She was pincht and pull'd, she said,
And he by fryar's lanthorn led;
Tells how the drudging goblin swet
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn,
His shadowy flale had thrash'd the corn
That ten day-lab'rers could not end;
Then lies him down the lubbard fiend,
And stretch'd out all the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy strength,
And, crop-full, out of doors he flings,
Ere the first cock his matin lings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whisp'ring winds soon lull'd asleep.
Towered cities please us then,
And the busy hum of men,
Where throngs of knights and barons bold,
In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold,
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes,
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit, or arms, while both contend
To win her grace, whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with taper clear,
And pomp, and feast, and revelry,
With mask, and antique pageantry,
Such fights as youthful poets dream
On summer eves, by haunted stream.
Then to the well-trod stage anon,
If Johnson's learned sock be on,
Or sweetest Shakespear, Fancy's child,
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
And ever, against eating cares,
Lap me in soft Lydian airs,
Married to immortal verse,
Such as the meeting soul may pierce,
In notes with many a winding bout
Of linked sweetness, long drawn out,
With wanton heed, and giddy cunning,
The melting voice through mazes running,
Untwisting all the chains that tye
The hidden soul of harmony;
That Orpheus self may heave his head
From golden slumber on a bed
Of heapt Elysian flow'r, and hear
Such strains as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free
His half regain'd Eurydice.
These delights if thou can'st give,
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
AN ELEGY, Written in a Country Church Yard.
This is a very fine poem, but overloaded with epithet. The heroic measure with alternate rhime is very properly adapted to the solemnity of the subject, as it is the slowest movement that our language admits of. The latter part of the poem is pathetic and interesting.
THE Curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his drony flight,
And drousy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r,
The moping owl does to the Moon complain
Of such, as, wand'ring near her secret bow'r,
Molest her ancient, solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-trees shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow, twitt'ring from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
Nor children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.
Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their surrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!
Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await, alike th' inevitable hour:
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where, thro' the long-drawn isle and fretted vault,
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
Can storied urn, or animated bust,
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of death?
Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire:
Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,
Or wak'd to extasy the living lyre.
But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of Time, did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.
Full many a gem, of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Some village-Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little tyrant of his fields withstood;
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest;
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.
Th' applause of list'ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation's eyes,
Their lot forbad: nor circumscrib'd alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd;
Forbad to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind;
The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
With incense, kindled at the muse's flame.
Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray;
Along the cool, sequester'd vale of life,
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.
Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect,
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhimes and shapeless sculpture deck'd,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.
Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to dye.
For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,
Left the warm precincts of the chearful day,
Nor cast one longing, ling'ring, look behind?
On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires:
Ev'n from the tomb the voice of nature cries,
Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.
For thee, who, mindful of th' unhonour'd dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
If, chance, by lonely Contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,
Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him, at the peep of dawn,
Brushing, with hasty steps, the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
There, at the foot of yonder nodding beech,
That wriths its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noon-tide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
Hard by yon wood, now smiling, as in scorn,
Mutt'ring his wayward fancies, he wou'd rove;
Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,
Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love.
One morn I miss'd him on the 'custom'd hill,
Along the heath, and near his fav'rite tree:
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he.
The next, with dirges due, in sad array,
Slow thro' the church-yard path we saw him borne.
Approach and read (for thou can'st read) the lay,
Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."
THE EPITAPH.
Here rests his head upon the lap of earth,
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown;
Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy mark'd him for her own.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heav'n did a recompence as largely send:
He gave to mis'ry all he had, a tear;
He gain'd from Heav'n ('twas all he wish'd) a friend.
No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope repose)
The bosom of his Father and his God.
LONDON. In Imitation of the Third Satire of JUVENAL.
This poem of Mr. Johnson's is the best imitation of the original that has appeared in our language, being possessed of all the force and satyrical resentment of Juvenal. Imitation gives us a much truer idea of the ancients than even translation could do.
THO' grief and fondness in my breast rebel,
When injur'd Thales bids the town farewel,
Yet still my calmer thoughts his choice commend,
I praise the hermit, but regret the friend;
Who now resolves, from vice and London far,
To breathe in distant fields a purer air,
And, fix'd on Cambria's solitary shore,
Give to St. David one true Briton more.
For who wou'd leave, unbrib'd, Hibernia's land,
Or change the rocks of Scotland for the Strand?
There none are swept by sudden fate away,
But all, whom hunger spares, with age decay:
Here malice, rapine, accident, conspire;
And now a rabble rages, now a fire:
Their ambush here relentless ruffians lay,
And here the fell attorney prowls for prey:
Here falling houses thunder on your head,
And here a female atheist talks you dead.
While Thales waits the wherry that contains
Of dissipated wealth the small remains,
On Thames's bank in silent thought we stood,
Where Greenwich smiles upon the silver flood.
Struck with the seat that gave Eliza birth,
We kneel, and kiss the consecrated earth;
In pleasing dreams the blissful age renew,
And call Britannia's glories back to view;
Behold her cross triumphant on the main,
The guard of commerce and the dread of Spain.
Ere masquerades debauch'd, excise oppress'd,
Or English honour grew a standing jest.
A transient calm the happy scenes bestow,
And, for a moment, lull the sense of woe.
At length awaking with contemptuous frown,
Indignant Thales eyes the neighb'ring town.
Since worth, he cries, in these degen'rate days,
Wants e'en the cheap reward of empty praise;
In those curst walls, devote to vice and gain,
Since unrewarded science toils in vain;
Since hope but sooths to double my distress,
And ev'ry moment leaves my little less;
While yet my steady steps no staff sustains,
And life still vig'rous revels in my veins;
Grant me, kind heaven, to find some happier place,
Where honesty and sense are no disgrace;
Some pleasing bank, where verdant osiers play,
Some peaceful vale, with nature's painting gay;
Where once the harrass'd Briton found repose,
And safe, in poverty, defy'd his foes:
Some secret cell, ye pow'rs indulgent, give:
Let — live here; for — has learn'd to live.
Here let those reign, whom pensions can incite
To vote a patriot black, a courtier white;
Explain their country's dear-bought rights away,
And plead for pirates in the face of day;
With slavish tenets taint our poinson'd youth,
And lend a lye the confidence of truth.
Let such raise palaces, and manors buy,
Collect a tax, or farm a lottery,
With warbling eunuchs fill a licens'd stage,
And lull to servitude a thoughtless age.
Heroes proceed! what bounds your pride shall hold?
What check restrain your thirst of pow'r and gold?
Behold rebellious virtue quite o'erthrown,
Behold our fame, our wealth, our lives your own.
To such, a groaning nation's spoils are giv'n,
When public crimes inflame the wrath of heav'n:
But what, my friend, what hope remains for me,
Who start at theft, and blush at perjury?
Who scarce forbear, tho' Britain's court he sing,
To pluck a titled poet's borrow'd wing;
A statesman's logic unconvinc'd can hear,
And dare to slumber o'er the Gazetteer;
Despise a fool in half his pension dress'd,
And strive in vain to laugh at H—y's jest.
Others with softer smiles, and subtler art,
Can sap the principles, or taint the heart;
With more address a lover's note convey,
Or bribe a virgin's innocence away.
Well may they rise, while I, whose rustic tongue
Ne'er knew to puzzle right, or varnish wrong,
Spurn'd as a beggar, dreaded as a spy,
Live unregarded, unlamented die.
For what but social guilt the friend endears?
Who shares Orgilio's crimes, his fortune shares:
But thou, should tempting villainy present,
All Marlb'rough hoarded, or all Villiers spent,
Turn from the glitt'ring bribe thy scornful eye,
Nor sell for gold, what gold could never buy,
The peaceful slumber, self-approving day,
Unsullied fame, and conscience ever gay.
The cheated nation's happy fav'rites see;
Mark whom the great caress, who frown on me.
London! the needy villain's gen'ral home,
The common sewer of Paris and of Rome,
With eager thirst, by folly or by fate,
Sucks in the dregs of each corrupted state;
Forgive my transports on a theme like this;
I cannot bear a French metropolis.
Illustrious Edward! from the realms of day
The land of heroes and of saints survey;
Nor hope the British lineaments to trace,
The rustic grandeur, or the surly grace,
But, lost in thoughtless ease, and empty show,
Behold the warrior dwindled to a beau;
Sense, freedom, piety, refin'd away,
Of France the mimic, and of Spain the prey.
All that at home no more can beg or steal,
Or like a gibbet better than a wheel;
Hiss'd from the stage, or hooted from the court,
Their air, their dress, their politics import;
Obsequious, artful, voluble, and gay,
On Britain's fond credulity they prey.
No gainful trade their industry can 'scape,
They sing, they dance, clean shoes, or cure a clap;
All sciences a fasting Monsieur knows,
And bid him go to hell, to hell he goes.
Ah! what avails it, that, from slav'ry far,
I drew the breath of life in English air;
Was early taught a Briton's right to prize,
And lisp the tales of Henry's victories;
If the gull'd conqueror receives the chain,
And flattery subdues when arms are vain?
Studious to please, and ready to submit,
The supple Gaul was born a parasite:
Still to his int'rest true, where-e'er he goes,
Wit, bravery, worth, his lavish tongue bestows;
In ev'ry face a thousand graces shine,
From ev'ry tongue flows harmony divine.
These arts in vain our rugged natives try,
Strain out with fault'ring dissidence a lye,
And gain a kick for aukward flattery.
Besides, with justice this discerning age
Admires their wond'rous talents for the stage:
Well may they venture on the mimic's art,
Who play from morn to night a borrow'd part;
Practis'd their master's notions to embrace,
Repeat his maxims, and reflect his face;
With ev'ry wild absurdity comply,
And view each object with another's eye;
To shake with laughter ere the jest they hear,
To pour, at will, the counterfeited tear,
And, as their patron hints the cold or heat,
To shake in Dog-days, in December sweat.
How, when competitors like these contend,
Can surly virtue hope to fix a friend?
Slaves, that with serious impudence beguile,
And lye without a blush, without a smile;
Exalt each trifle, ev'ry vice adore,
Your taste in snuff, your judgment in a whore;
Can Balbo's eloquence applaud, and swear
He gropes his breeches with a monarch's air.
For arts like these preferr'd, admir'd, caress'd,
They first invade your table, then your breast;
Explore your secrets with insidious art,
Watch the weak hour, and ransack all the heart;
Then soon your ill-plac'd confidence repay,
Commence your lords, and govern or betray.
By numbers, here, from shame or censure free,
All crimes are safe, but hated poverty.
This, only this, the rigid law pursues;
This, only this, provokes the snarling muse.
The sober trader, at a tatter'd cloak,
Wakes from his dream, and labours for a joke;
With brisker air the silken courtiers gaze,
And turn the varied taunt a thousand ways.
Of all the griefs that harrass the distress'd,
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest;
Fate never wounds more deep the gen'rous heart,
Than when a blockhead's insult points the dart.
Has Heaven reserv'd, in pity to the poor,
No pathless waste or undiscover'd shore?
No secret island in the boundless main?
No peaceful desart yet unclaim'd by Spain?
Quick let us rise, the happy seats explore,
And bear oppression's insolence no more.
This mournful truth is ev'ry where confess'd,
SLOW RISES WORTH, BY POVERTY DEPRESS'D:
But here more slow, where all are slaves to gold,
Where looks are merchandise, and smiles are sold;
Where, won by bribes, by flatteries implor'd,
The groom retails the favours of his lord.
But hark, th' affrighted crowd's tumultuous cries
Roll through the streets and thunder to the skies;
Rais'd from some pleasing dream of wealth and power,
Some pompous palace or some blissful bow'r,
Aghast you start, and scarce with aching sight
Sustain th' approaching fire's tremendous light;
Swift from pursuing honors take your way,
And leave your little All to flames a prey;
Then thro' the world a wretched vagrant roam;
For where can starving merit find a home?
In vain your mournful narrative disclose,
While all neglect, and most insult your woes.
Should Heaven's just bolts Orgilio's wealth confound,
And spread his flaming palace on the ground,
Swift o'er the land the dismal rumour flies,
And public mournings pacify the skies;
The laureate tribe in servile verse relate,
How virtue wars with persecuting fate;
With well-feign'd gratitude the pension'd band
Refund the plunder of the beggar'd land.
See! while he builds, the gaudy vassals come,
And crowd with sudden wealth the rising dome;
The price of boroughs and of souls restore;
And raise his treasures higher than before.
Now bless'd with all the baubles of the great,
The polish'd marble, and the shining plate,
Orgilio sees the golden pile aspire,
And hopes from angry Heav'n another fire.
Could'st thou resign the park and play, content,
For the fair banks of Severn or of Trent;
There might'st thou find some elegant retreat,
Some hireling senator's deserted seat!
And stretch thy prospects o'er the smiling land,
For less than rent the dungeons of the Strand;
There prune thy walks, support thy drooping flow'rs,
Direct thy rivulets, and twine thy bow'rs;
And, while thy beds a cheap repast afford,
Despise the dainties of a venal lord.
There ev'ry bush with nature's music rings,
There ev'ry breeze bears health upon its wings;
On all thy hours security shall smile,
And bless thy evening walk and morning toil.
Prepare for death if here at night you roam,
And sign your will before you sup from home.
Some fiery fop, with new commission vain,
Who sleeps on brambles till he kills his man;
Some frolic drunkard, reeling from a feast,
Provokes a broil, and stabs you for a jest.
Yet e'en these heroes, mischievously gay,
Lords of the street, and terrors of the way;
Flush'd as they are with folly, youth and wine,
Their prudent insults to the poor confine;
Afar they mark the flambeau's bright approach,
And shun the shining train, and golden coach.
In vain these dangers past, your doors you close,
And hope the balmy blessings of repose:
Cruel with guilt, and daring with despair,
The midnight murd'rer bursts the faithless bar;
Invades the sacred hour of silent rest,
And plants, unseen, a dagger in your breast.
Scarce can our fields, such crowds at Tyburn die,
With hemp the gallows and the fleet supply.
Propose your schemes, ye senatorian band,
Whose ways and means support the sinking land;
Lest ropes be wanting in the tempting spring,
To rig another convoy for the k—g.
A single jail, in Alfred's golden reign,
Could half the nation's criminals contain;
Fair justice, then, without constraint ador'd,
Held high the steady scale, but deep'd the sword;
No spies were paid, no special juries known;
Blest age! but ah! how diff'rent from our own!
Much could I add, but see the boat at hand,
The tide, retiring, calls me from the land:
Farewel!—When youth, and health, and fortune spent,
Thou fly'st for refuge to the Wilds of Kent;
And tir'd, like me, with follies and with crimes,
In angry numbers warn'st succeeding times;
Then shall thy friend; nor thou refuse his aid,
Still foe to vice, forsake his Cambrian shade;
In virtue's cause once more exert his rage,
Thy satire point, and animate thy page.
THE SCHOOL-MISTRESS. In Imitation of SPENCER.
This poem is one of those happinesses in which a poet excels himself, as there is nothing in all Shenstone which any way approaches it in merit; and, though I dislike the imitations of our old English poets in general, yet, on this minute subject, the antiquity of the style produces a very ludicrous solemnity.
AH me! full sorely is my heart forlorn,
To think how modest worth neglected lies;
While partial Fame doth with her blasts adorn
Such deeds alone as pride and pomp disguise;
Deeds of ill sort, and mischievous emprize:
Lend me thy clarion, goddess! let me try
To sound the praise of merit, ere it dies!
Such as I oft have chaunced to espy,
Lost in the dreary shades of dull obscurity.
In ev'ry village mark'd with little spire,
Embower'd in trees, and hardly known to fame,
There dwells, in lowly shed, and mean attire,
A matron old, whom we school-mistress name;
Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame;
They grieven sore, in piteous durance pent,
Aw'd by the pow'r of this relentless dame;
And oft-times on vagaries idly bent,
For unkempt hair, or task unconn'd, are sorely shent.
And all in sight doth rise a birchen tree,
Which Learning near her little dome did stowe;
Whilom a twig of small regard to see,
Tho' now so wide its waving branches flow;
And work the simple vassals mickle woe;
For not a wind might curl the leaves that blew,
But their limbs shudder'd, and their pulse beat low;
And, as they look'd, they found their horror grew,
And shap'd it into rods, and tingled at the view.
So have I seen (who has not, may conceive)
A lifeless phantom near a garden plac'd;
So doth it wanton birds of peace bereave,
Of sport, of song, of pleasure, of repast;
They start, they stare, they wheel, they look aghast;
Sad servitude! such comfortless annoy
May no bold Briton's riper age e'er taste!
Ne superstition clog his dance of joy,
Ne vision empty, vain, his native bliss destroy.
Near to this dome is found a patch so green,
On which the tribe their gambols do display;
And at the door impris'ning board is seen,
Lest weakly wights of smaller size should stray;
Eager, perdie, to bask of sunny day!
The noises intermix'd, which hence resound,
Do learning's little tenement betray:
Where sits the dame, disguis'd in look profound,
And eyes her fairy throng, and turns her wheel around.
Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow,
Emblem right meet of decency does yield:
Her apron dy'd in grain, as blue, I trowe,
As is the hare-bell that adorns the field:
And in her hand, for sceptre, she does wield
Tway birchen sprays; with anxious fear entwin'd,
With dark distrust, and sad repentance fill'd;
And stedfast hate, and sharp affliction join'd,
And fury uncontroul'd, and chastisement unkind.
Few but have ken'd, in semblance meet pourtray'd,
The childish faces of old Eol's train;
Libs, Notus, Auster: these in frowns array'd,
How then would fare or earth, or sky, or main,
Were the stern god to give his slaves the rein?
And were not she rebellious breasts to quell,
And were not she her statutes to maintain,
The cot no more, I ween, were deem'd the cell,
Where comely peace of mind, and decent order dwell.
A russet stole was o'er her shoulders thrown;
A russet kirtle fenc'd the nipping air;
'Twas simple russet, but it was her own;
'Twas her own country bred the flock so fair;
'Twas her own labour did the fleece prepare;
And, sooth to say, her pupils, rang'd around,
Thro' pious awe, did term it passing rare;
For they in gaping wonderment abound,
And think, no doubt, she been the greatest wight on ground.
Albeit ne flatt'ry did corrupt her truth,
Ne pompous title did debauch her ear;
Goody, good-woman, gossip, n'aunt, forsooth,
Or dame, the sole additions she did hear;
Yet these she challeng'd, these she held right dear:
Ne wou'd esteem him act as mought behove,
Who should not honour'd eld with these revere:
For never title yet so mean could prove,
But there was eke a mind which did that title love.
One ancient hen she took delight to feed,
The plodding pattern of the busy dame;
Which, ever and anon, impell'd by need,
Into her school, begirt with chickens, came;
Such favour did her past deportment claim;
And, if neglect had lavish'd on the ground
Fragment of bread, she would collect the same;
For well she knew, and quaintly cou'd expound,
What sin it were to waste the smallest crumb she found.
Herbs too she knew, and well of each could speak
That in her garden sipp'd the silv'ry dew;
Where no vain flow'r disclos'd a gaudy streak;
But herbs for use, and physic, not a few,
Of grey renown, within those borders grew:
The tufted basil, pun-provoking thyme,
Fresh baum, and mary-gold of chearful hue;
The lowly gill, that never dares to climb;
And more I fain would sing, disdaining here to rhime.
Yet euphrasy may not be left unsung,
That gives dim eyes to wander leagues around;
And pungent radish, biting infant's tongue;
And plantain ribb'd, that heals the reaper's wound;
And marj'ram sweet, in shepherd's posie found;
And lavender, whose spikes, of azure bloom,
Shall be, ere-while, in arid bundles bound,
To lurk amidst the labours of her loom,
And crown her kerchiefs clean, with mickle rare perfume.
And here trim rosmarine, that whilom crown'd
The daintiest garden of the proudest peer;
Ere, driven from its envied site, it found
A sacred shelter for its branches here;
Where, edg'd with gold, its glitt'ring skirts appear.
O wassel days! O customs meet and well!
Ere this was banish'd from its lofty spere:
Simplicity then sought this humble cell,
Nor ever would she more with Thane and lordling dwell.
Here oft the dame, on sabbath's decent eve,
Hymned such psalms as Sternhold forth did mete;
If winter 'twere, she to her hearth did cleave;
But in her garden found a summer seat:
Sweet melody! to hear her then repeat
How Israel's sons, beneath a foreign king,
While taunting foe-men did a song intreat,
All, for the nonce, untuning ev'ry string,
Up hung their useless lyres—small heart had they to sing.
For she was just, and friend to virtuous lore,
And pass'd much time in truly virtuous deed;
And, in those elfins' ears, would oft deplore
The times, when truth by popish rage did bleed;
And tortious death was true devotion's meed;
And simple faith in iron chains did mourn,
That nould on wooden image place her creed;
And lawny saints in smould'ring flames did burn:
Ah! dearest Lord, forefend, thilk days should e'er return.
In elbow chair, like that of Scottish stem
By the sharp tooth of cank'ring eld defac'd,
In which, when he receives his diadem,
Our sovereign prince and liefest liege is plac'd,
The matron sate; and some with rank she grac'd,
(The source of children's and of courtier's pride!)
Redress'd affronts, for vile affronts there pass'd;
And warn'd them not the fretful to deride,
But love each other dear, whatever them betide.
Right well she knew each temper to descry;
To thwart the proud, and the submiss to raise;
Some with vile copper prize exalt on high,
And some entice with pittance small of praise;
And other some with baleful sprig she 'frays:
Ev'n absent, she the reins of pow'r doth hold,
While with quaint arts the giddy crowd she sways;
Forewarn'd, if little bird their pranks behold,
'Twill whisper in her ear, and all the scene unfold.
Lo now with state she utters the command!
Eftsoons the urchins to their tasks repair;
Their books, of stature small, they take in hand,
Which with pellucid horn secured are;
To save, from finger wet, the letters fair:
The work so gay, that on their back is seen,
St. George's high atchievements does declare;
On which thilk wight that has y-gazing been,
Kens the forth-coming rod, unpleasing sight, I ween!
Ah luckless he, and born beneath the beam
Of evil star! it irks me whilst I write!
As erst the bard by Mulla's silver stream,
Oft, as he told of deadly dolorous plight,
Sigh'd as he sung, and did in tears indite.
For, brandishing the rod, she doth begin
To loose the brogues, the stripling's late delight!
And down they drop; appears his dainty skin,
Fair as the furry coat of whitest ermilin.
O ruthful scene! when, from a nook obscure,
His little sister doth his peril see:
All playful as she sate, she grows demure;
She finds full soon her wonted spirits flee;
She meditates a pray'r to set him free:
Nor gentle pardon could this dame deny,
(If gentle pardon could with dames agree)
To her sad grief that swells in either eye,
And wrings her so that all for pity she could die.
Nor longer can she now her shrieks command;
And hardly she forbears, thro' aweful fear,
To rushen forth, and, with presumptuous hand,
To stay harsh justice in its mid career.
On thee she calls, on thee her parent dear!
(Ah! too remote to ward the shameful blow!)
She sees no kind domestic visage near,
And soon a flood of tears begins to flow;
And gives a loose, at last, to unavailing woe.
But ah! what pen his piteous plight may trace?
Or what device his loud laments explain?
The form uncouth of his disguised face?
The pallid hue that dyes his looks amain?
The plenteous show'r that does his cheek distain?
When he, in abject wise, implores the dame,
Ne hopeth aught of sweet reprieve to gain;
Or when from high she levels well her aim,
And, thro' the thatch, his cries each falling stroke proclaim.
The other tribe, aghast, with sore dismay,
Attend, and conn their tasks with mickle care:
By turns, astony'd, every twig survey,
And, from their fellow's hateful wounds, beware;
Knowing, I wist, how each the same may share;
'Till fear has taught them a performance meet,
And to the well-known chest the dame repair;
Whence oft with sugar'd cates she doth 'em greet,
And gingerbread y-rare; now, certe, doubly sweet!
See to their seats they hye with merry glee,
And in beseemly order sitten there;
All but the wight of bum y-galled, he
Abhorreth bench, and stool, and fourm, and chair;
(This hand in mouth y-fix'd, that rends his hair;)
And eke with snubs profound, and heaving breast.
Convulsions intermitting! does declare
His grievous wrong; his dame's unjust behest;
And scorns her offer'd love, and shuns to be caress'd.
His face besprent with liquid crystal shines,
His blooming face, that seems a purple flow'r,
Which low to earth its drooping head declines,
All smear'd and sully'd by a vernal show'r.
O the hard bosoms of despotic pow'r!
All, all, but she, the author of his shame,
All, all, but she, regret this mournful hour:
Yet hence the youth, and hence the flow'r, shall claim,
If so I deem aright, transcending worth and fame.
Behind some door, in melancholy thought,
Mindless of food, he, dreary caitif, pines;
Ne for his fellow's joyaunce careth aught,
But to the wind all merriment resigns,
And deems it shame, if he to peace inclines;
And many a sullen look ascance is sent,
Which for his dame's annoyance he designs;
And still the more to pleasure him she's bent,
The more doth he, perverse, her haviour past resent.
Ah me! how much I fear lest pride it be!
But if that pride it be, which thus inspires,
Beware ye dames, with nice discernment see
Ye quench not too the sparks of nobler fires:
Ah! better far than all the muses' lyres,
All coward arts, is valour's gen'rous heat;
The firm fixt breast which fit and right requires,
Like Vernon's patriot soul, more justly great
Than craft that pimps for ill, or flow'ry false deceit.
Yet nurs'd with skill, what dazling fruits appear!
Ev'n now sagacious foresight points to show
A little bench of heedless bishops here,
And there a chancellor in embryo,
Or bard sublime, if bard may e'er be so,
As Milton, Shakespear, names that ne'er shall die!
Tho' now he crawl along the ground so low,
Nor weeting how the muse shou'd soar on high,
Wisheth, poor starv'ling elf! his paper-kite may fly.
And this, perhaps, who, cens'ring the design,
Low lays the house which that of cards doth build,
Shall Dennis be! if rigid fates incline,
And many an epic to his rage shall yield;
And many a poet quit th' Aonian field;
And, sour'd by age, profound he shall appear,
As he who now with 'sdainful fury thrill'd
Surveys mine work; and levels many a sneer,
And furls his wrinkly front, and cries, " What stuff is here?"
But now Dan Phoebus gains the middle skie,
And liberty unbars her prison-door,
And, like a rushing torrent, out they fly;
And now the grassy cirque han cover'd o'er
With boist'rous revel-rout and wild uproar;
A thousand ways in wanton rings they run,
Heav'n shield their short-liv'd pastimes, I implore!
For well may freedom, erst so dearly won,
Appear to British elf more gladsome than the sun.
Enjoy, poor imps! enjoy your sportive trade;
And chase gay flies, and cull the fairest flow'rs,
For, when my bones in grass-green sods are laid;
For never may ye taste more careless hours
In nightly castles, or in ladies bow'rs.
O vain to seek delight in earthly thing!
But most in courts, where proud ambition tow'rs!
Deluded wight! who weens fair peace can spring
Beneath the pompous dome of kesar or of king.
See in each sprite some various bent appear!
These rudely carol most incondite lay;
Those sauntering on the green, with jocund leer
Salute the stranger passing on his way;
Some builden fragile tenements of clay;
Some to the standing lake their courses bend,
With pebbles smooth at duck and drake to play;
Thilk to the huxter's sav'ry cottage tend,
In pastry kings and queens th' allotted mite to spend.
Here, as each season yields a diff'rent store,
Each season's stores in order ranged been;
Apples with cabbage-net y-cover'd o'er,
Galling full sore th' unmoney'd wight, are seen;
And goose-b'rie clad in liv'ry red or green;
And here, of lovely dye, the cath'rine pear,
Fine pear! as lovely for thy juice, I ween:
O may no wight e'er pennyless come there,
Lest, smit with ardent love, he pine with hopeless care!
See! cherries here, ere cherries yet abound,
With thread so white in tempting posies ty'd,
Scatt'ring like blooming maid their glances round,
With pamper'd look draw little eyes aside;
And must be bought, though penury betide.
The plumb all azure, and the nut all brown,
And here, each season, do those cakes abide,
Whose honour'd names th' inventive city own,
Rend'ring thro' Britain's isle Salopia's praises known.
Admir'd Salopia! that, with venial pride,
Eyes her bright form in Severn's ambiant wave,
Fam'd for her loyal cares in perils try'd,
Her daughters lovely, and her striplings brave:
Ah! midst the rest, may flow'rs adorn his grave,
Whose art did first these dulcet cates display!
A motive fair to learning's imps he gave,
Who chearless o'er her darkling region stray;
'Till reason's morn arise and light them on their way.
COOPER's HILL.
This poem, by Denham, though it may have been exceeded by later attempts in description, yet deserves the highest applause, as it far surpasses all that went before it: the concluding part, though a little too much crowded, is very masterly.
SURE there are poets which did never dream
Upon Parnassus, nor did taste the stream
Of Helicon; we, therefore, may suppose
Those made not poets, but the poets those.
And, as courts make not kings, but kings the court,
So, where the muses and their train resort,
Parnassus stands; if I can be to thee
A poet, thou Parnassus art to me.
Nor wonder, if (advantag'd in my flight,
By taking wing from thy auspicious height)
Through untrac'd ways and airy paths I fly,
More boundless in my fancy than my eye;
My eye, which, swift as thought, contracts the space
That lies between, and first salutes the place
Crown'd with that sacred pile, so vast, so high,
That, whether 'tis a part of earth, or sky,
Uncertain seems, and may be thought a proud
Aspiring mountain, or descending cloud;
Paul's, the late theme of such a
Mr. Waller.
muse, whose flight
Has bravely reach'd and soar'd above thy height:
Now shalt thou stand, tho' sword, or time, or fire,
Or zeal, more fierce than they, thy fall conspire;
Secure, whilst thee the best of poets sings,
Preserv'd from ruin by the best of kings.
Under his proud survey the city lies,
And, like a mist, beneath a hill doth rise;
Whose state and wealth, the business and the crowd,
Seems, at this distance, but a darker cloud:
And is, to him who rightly things esteems,
No other in effect than what it seems;
Where, with like haste, tho' sev'ral ways they run,
Some to undo, and some to be undone;
While luxury and wealth, like war and peace,
Are each the other's ruin, and increase;
As rivers lost in seas, some secret vein
Thence reconveys, there to be lost again.
Oh happiness of sweet retir'd content!
To be at once secure, and innocent.
Windsor the next (where Mars with Venus dwells,
Beauty with strength) above the valley swells
Into my eye, and doth itself present
With such an easy and unforc'd ascent,
That no stupendious precipice denies
Access, no horror turns away our eyes;
But such a rise, as doth at once invite
A pleasure, and a rev'rence from the sight.
Thy mighty master's emblem, in whose face
Sate meekness, heighten'd with majestic grace;
Such seems thy gentle height, made only proud
To be the basis of that pompous load,
Than which, a nobler weight no mountain bears,
But Atlas only, which supports the spheres.
When nature's hand this ground did thus advance,
'Twas guided by a wiser power than Chance;
Mark'd out for such an use, as if 'twere meant
T' invite the builder, and his choice prevent.
Nor can we call it choice, when, what we chuse,
Folly or blindness only cou'd refuse.
A crown of such majestic tow'rs does grace
The gods great mother, when her heav'nly race
Do homage to her; yet she cannot boast,
Among that num'rous and celestial host,
More heroes than can Windsor; nor doth Fame's
Immortal book record more noble names.
Not to look back so far, to whom this isle
Owes the first glory of so brave a pile,
Whether to Caesar, Albanact, or Brute,
The British Arthur, or the Danish Knute,
(Tho' this, of old, no less contest did move,
Than when, for Homer's birth, sev'n cities strove)
(Like him in birth, thou should'st be like in fame,
As thine his fate, if mine had been his flame)
But whosoe'er it was, nature design'd
First a brave place, and then as brave a mind.
Not to recount those sev'ral kings, to whom
It gave a cradle, or to whom a tomb,
But thee (great
Edward III. and the Black Prince.
Edward) and thy greater son,
(The lillies which his father wore he won)
And thy
Queen Philip.
Bellona, who the consort came
Not only to thy bed, but to thy fame,
She to thy triumph led one captive
The kings of France and Scotland.
king,
And brought that son, which did the second bring.
Then didst thou found that order (whether love
Or victory thy royal thoughts did move)
Each was a noble cause, and nothing less
Than the design, has been the great success:
Which foreign kings, and emperors esteem
The second honour to their diadem.
Had thy great destiny but giv'n thee skill
To know, as well as pow'r to act, her will,
That, from those kings who then thy captives were,
In after-times should spring a royal pair,
Who should possess all that thy mighty pow'r,
Or thy desires, more mighty, did devour;
To whom their better fate reserves whate'er
The victor hopes for, or the vanquish'd fear;
That blood, which thou and thy great grandsire shed,
And all that since these sister nations bled,
Had been unspilt, had happy Edward known
That all the blood he spilt had been his own.
When he that patron chose, in whom are join'd
Soldier and martyr, and his arms confin'd
Within the azure circle, he did seem
But to foretel, and prophesy of him,
Who to his realms that azure round hath join'd,
Which nature for their bound at first design'd:
That bound, which, to the world's extremest ends,
Endless itself, its liquid arms extends:
Nor doth he need those emblems which we paint,
But is himself the soldier and the saint.
Here should my wonder dwell, and here my praise,
But my fix'd thoughts my wond'ring eye betrays
Viewing a neighb'ring hill, whose top of late
A chapel crown'd, 'till, in the common fate,
Th' adjoining abbey fell: (may no such storm
Fall on our times, where ruin must reform.)
Tell me, my muse, what monstrous dire offence,
What crime, could any Christian king incense
To such a rage? Was't luxury, or lust?
Was he so temperate, so chaste, to just?
Were these their crimes? They were his own much more:
But wealth is crime enough to him that's poor;
Who, having spent the treasures of his crown,
Condemns their luxury to feed his own.
And yet this act, to varnish o'er the shame
Of sacrilege, must bear Devotion's name.
No crime so bold, but would be understood
A real, or, at least, a seeming good.
Who fears not to do ill, yet fears the name,
And free from conscience, is a slave to fame.
Thus, he the church at once protects, and spoils:
But princes' swords are sharper than their stiles.
And thus to th' ages past he makes amends,
Their charity destroys, their faith defends.
Then did religion, in a lazy cell,
In empty, airy contemplations dwell;
And, like the block, unmoved lay: but ours,
As much too active, like the stork devours.
Is there no temp'rate region can be known,
Betwixt their frigid, and our torrid, zone?
Cou'd we not wake from that lethargic dream,
But to be restless in a worse extreme?
And, for that lethargy, was there no cure,
But to be cast into a calenture?
Can knowledge have no bound, but must advance
So far, to make us wish for ignorance;
And rather in the dark to grope our way,
Than, led by a false guide, to err by day?
Who sees these dismal heaps, but would demand
What barbarous invader sack'd the land?
But when he hears, no Goth, no Turk, did bring
This desolation, but a Christian king;
When nothing but the name of Zeal appears,
'Twixt our best actions, and the worst of theirs,
What does he think our sacrilege wou'd spare,
When such the effects of our devotions are?
Parting from thence, 'twixt anger, shame, and fear,
Those for what's past, and this for what's too near;
My eye, descending from the hill, surveys
Where Thames among the wanton vallies strays.
Thames, the most lov'd of all the ocean's sons
By his old sire, to his embraces runs,
Hasting to pay his tribute to the sea,
Like mortal life to meet eternity.
Tho' with those streams he no resemblance hold,
Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold;
His genuine and less guilty wealth t'explore,
Search not his bottom, but survey his shore;
O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing,
And hatches plenty for th'ensuing spring:
Nor then destroys it with too fond a stay,
Like mothers which their infants overlay;
Nor, with a sudden and impetuous wave,
Like profuse kings, resumes the wealth he gave.
No unexpected inundations spoil
The mower's hopes, or mock the ploughman's toil:
But, godlike, his unwearied bounty flows;
First loves to do, then loves the good he does.
Nor are his blessings to his banks confin'd,
But free and common as the sea, or wind;
When he to boast, or to disperse his stores,
Full of the tributes of his grateful shores,
Visits the world, and, in his flying towers,
Brings home to us, and makes both Indies ours;
Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants,
Cities in desarts, woods in cities plants.
So that to us no things, no place is strange,
While his fair bosom is the world's exchange.
O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme!
Tho' deep, yet clear, tho' gentle, not yet dull;
Strong, without rage, without o'erflowing, full.
Heav'n her Eridanus no more shall boast,
Whose fame in thine, like lesser currents, lost,
Thy nobler streams shall visit Jove's abodes,
To shine among the stars, and bathe the gods:
Here nature, whether more intent to please
Us or herself, with strange varieties,
(For things of wonder give no less delight
To the wise maker's, than beholder's sight:
Tho' these delights from several causes move;
For so our children, thus our friends we love)
Wisely she knew the harmony of things,
As well as that of sounds, from discord springs.
Such was the discord, which did first disperse
Form, order, beauty, through the universe;
While dryness, moisture, coldness heat resists,
All that we have, and that we are, subsists.
While the steep horrid roughness of the wood,
Strives with the gentle calmness of the flood,
Such huge extremes when nature doth unite,
Wonder from thence results, from thence delight.
The stream is to transparent, pure, and clear,
That, had the self-enamour'd youth gaz'd here,
So fatally deceiv'd he had not been,
While he the bottom, not his face, had seen.
But his proud head the airy mountain hides
Among the clouds; his shoulders, and his sides,
A shady mantle cloathes; his curled brows
Frown on the gentle stream, which calmly flows,
While winds and storms his lofty forehead beat:
The common fate of all that's high or great.
Low at his foot a spacious plain is plac'd,
Between the mountain and the stream embrac'd:
Which shade and shelter from the hill derives,
While the kind river wealth and beauty gives;
And in the mixture of all these appears
Variety, which all the rest indears.
This scene had some bold Greek, or British bard,
Beheld of old, what stories had we heard,
Of fairies, satyrs, and the nymphs their dames,
Their feasts, their revels, and their am'rous flames?
'Tis still the same, altho' their airy shape
All but a quick poetic sight escape.
There Faunus and Sylvanus keep their courts,
And thither all the horned host resorts,
To graze the ranker mead; that noble herd,
On whose sublime and shady fronts is rear'd
Nature's great master-piece, to shew how soon
Great things are made, but sooner are undone.
Here have I seen the king, when great affairs
Gave leave to slacken and unbend his cares,
Attended to the chase by all the flow'r
Of youth, whose hopes a noble prey devour:
Pleasure with praise, and danger they would buy,
And wish a foe that would not only fly.
The stag, now conscious of his fatal growth,
At once indulgent to his fear and sloth,
To some dark covert his retreat had made,
Where nor man's eye, nor Heaven's should invade
His soft repose; when th' unexpected sound
Of dogs, and men, his wakeful ear does wound:
Rouz'd with the noise, he scarce believes his ear,
Willing to think th'illusions of his fear
Had giv'n this false alarm, but straight his view
Confirms, that more than all he fears is true.
Betray'd in all his strengths, the wood beset,
All instruments, all arts of ruin met;
He calls to mind his strength, and then his speed,
His winged heels, and then his armed head;
With these t'avoid, with that his fate to meet:
But fear prevails, and bids him trust his feet.
So fast he flies, that his reviewing eye
Has lost the chasers, and his ear the cry;
Exulting, 'till he finds, their nobler sense
Their disproportion'd speed does recompense;
Then curses his conspiring feet, whose scent
Betrays that safety which their swiftness lent.
Then tries his friends among the baser herd,
Where he so lately was obey'd and fear'd,
His safety seeks: the herd, unkindly wise,
Or chases him from thence, or from him flies;
Like a declining statesman, left forlorn,
To his friends pity, and pursuers scorn,
With shame remembers, while himself was one
Of the same herd, himself the same had done.
Thence to the coverts, and the conscious groves,
The scenes of his past triumphs, and his loves;
Sadly surveying where he rang'd alone
Prince of the soil, and all the herd his own;
And, like a bold knight-errant, did proclaim
Combat to all, and bore away the dame;
And taught the woods to echo to the stream
His dreadful challenge, and his clashing beam.
Yet faintly now declines the fatal strife;
So much his love was dearer than his life.
Now ev'ry leaf, and every moving breath,
Presents a foe, and ev'ry foe a death.
Weary'd, forsaken, and pursu'd, at last,
All safety in despair of safety plac'd;
Courage he thence resumes, resolv'd to bear
All their assaults, since 'tis in vain to fear.
And now, too late, he wishes, for the fight,
That strength he wasted in ignoble flight:
But, when he sees the eager chace renew'd,
Himself by dogs, the dogs by men pursu'd,
He strait revokes his bold resolve, and more
Repents his courage, than his fear before;
Finds that uncertain ways unsafest are,
And doubt a greater mischief than despair.
Then to the stream, when neither friends, nor force,
Nor speed, nor art avail, he shapes his course;
Thinks not their rage so desp'rate, to assay
An element more merciless than they.
But, fearless, they pursue, nor can the flood
Quench their dire thirst; alas, they thirst for blood.
So tow'rds a ship the oar-finn'd gallies ply,
Which wanting sea to ride, or wind to fly,
Stands but to fall reveng'd on those that dare
Tempt the last fury of extreme despair.
So fares the stag among th' enraged hounds,
Repels their force, and wounds returns for wounds.
And as a hero, whom his baser foes
In troops surround, now these assail, now those,
Though prodigal of life, disdains to die
By common hands; but, if he can descry
Some nobler foe approach, to him he calls,
And begs his fate, and then contented falls.
So when the king a mortal shaft lets fly
From his unerring hand, then, glad to die,
Proud of the wound, to it resigns his blood,
And stains the crystal with a purple flood.
This a more innocent, and happy chase
Than when of old, but in the self-same place,
Fair Liberty, pursu'd, and meant a prey
To lawless power,
Runnimede; where that great charter was first sealed.
here turn'd, and stood at bay.
When in that remedy all hope was plac'd,
Which was, or should have been at least, the last.
Here was that charter seal'd, wherein the crown
All marks of arbitrary pow'r lays down:
Tyrant and slave, those names of hate and fear,
The happier stile of king and subject bear:
Happy, when both to the same center move,
When kings give liberty, and subjects love.
Therefore not long in force this charter stood;
Wanting that seal, it must be seal'd in blood.
The subjects arm'd, the more their princes gave,
Th' advantage only took, the more to crave:
'Till kings, by giving, give themselves away,
And ev'n that pow'r, that should deny, betray.
"Who gives constrain'd, but his own fear reviles,
Not thank't, but scorn'd; nor are they gifts, but spoils."
Thus kings, by grasping more than they could hold,
First made their subjects, by oppression, bold:
And popular sway, by forcing kings to give
More than was fit for subjects to receive,
Ran to the same extremes; and one excess
Made both, by striving to be greater, l
ss.
When a calm river, rais'd with sudden rains,
Or snows dissolv'd, o'erflows th' adjoining plains,
The husbandmen with high-rais'd banks secure
Their greedy hopes, and this he can endure.
But if with bays and dams they strive to force
His channel to a new, or narrow, course;
No longer, then, within his banks he dwells,
First to a torrent, then a deluge, swells:
Stronger and fiercer by restraint he roars,
And knows no bound, but makes his pow'r his shores,
ELOISA TO ABELARD.
The harmony of numbers in this poem is very fine. It is rather drawn out to too tedious a length, altho' the passions vary with great judgement. It may be considered as superior to any thing in the epistolary way; and the many translations which have been made of it into the modern languages, are, in some measure, a proof of this.
IN these deep solitudes and awful cells,
Where heav'nly-pensive contemplation dwells,
And ever-musing melancholy reigns;
What means this tumult in a vestal's veins?
Why rove my thoughts beyond this last retreat?
Why feels my heart its long-forgotten heat?
Yet, yet I love!—From Abelard it came,
And Eloïsa yet must kiss the name.
Dear, fatal name! rest ever unreveal'd,
Nor pass these lips in holy silence seal'd:
Hide it, my heart, within that close disguise,
Where, mix'd with God's, his lov'd idea lies:
O write it not, my hand—the name appears
Already written—wash it out, my tears!
In vain lost Eloïsa weeps and prays,
Her heart still dictates, and her hand obeys.
Relentless walls! whose darksome round contains
Repentant sighs, and voluntary pains:
Ye rugged rocks! which holy knees have worn;
Ye grots and caverns, shagg'd with horrid thorn!
Shrines! where their vigils pale-ey'd virgins keep,
And pitying saints, whose statues learn to weep!
Tho' cold like you, unmov'd and silent grown,
I have not yet forgot myself to stone.
All is not Heav'n's, while Abelard has part,
Still rebel Nature holds out half my heart;
Nor pray'rs, nor fasts, its stubborn pulse restrain,
Nor tears, for ages taught to flow in vain.
Soon as thy letters, trembling, I unclose,
That well-known name awakens all my woes.
Oh name for ever sad! for ever dear!
Still breath'd in sighs, still usher'd with a tear.
I tremble, too, where-e'er my own I find,
Some dire misfortune follows close behind.
Line after line my gushing eyes o'erflow,
Led thro' a sad variety of woe;
Now warm in love, now with'ring in my bloom,
Lost in a convent's solitary gloom!
There stern Religion quench'd th' unwilling flame,
There dy'd the best of passions, Love and Fame.
Yet write, oh write me all, that I may join
Griefs to thy griefs, and echo sighs to thine.
Nor foes nor fortune take this pow'r away;
And is my Abelard less kind than they?
Tears still are mine, and those I need not spare,
Love but demands what else were shed in pray'r;
No happier task these faded eyes pursue;
To read and weep is all they now can do.
Then share thy pain, allow that sad relief;
Ah, more than share it, give me all thy grief.
Heav'n first taught letters for some wretch's aid,
Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid;
They live, they speak, they breathe what love inspires,
Warm from the soul, and faithful to its fires,
The virgin's wish without her fears impart,
Excuse the blush, and pour out all the heart,
Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the Pole.
Thou know'st how guiltless first I met thy flame,
When Love approach'd me under Friendship's name;
My fancy form'd thee of angelic kind,
Some emanation of th' All-beauteous Mind.
Those smiling eyes, attemp'ring ev'ry ray,
Shone sweetly lambent with celestial day.
Guiltless I gaz'd; Heav'n listen'd while you sung;
And truths divine came mended from that tongue.
From lips like those what precept fail'd to move?
Too soon they taught me 'twas no sin to love:
Back thro' the paths of pleasing sense I ran,
Nor wish'd an Angel, whom I lov'd a Man.
Dim and remote the joys of saints I see;
Nor envy them that Heav'n I lose for thee.
How oft, when press'd to marriage, have I said,
Curse on all laws but those which love has made!
Love, free as air, at sight of human ties,
Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.
Let wealth, let honour, wait the wedded dame,
August her deed, and sacred be her fame;
Before true passion all those views remove,
Fame, wealth, and honour! what are you to love?
The jealous god, when we prophane his fires,
Those restless passions in revenge inspires,
And bids them make mistaken mortals groan,
Who seek in love for aught but love alone.
Should at my feet the world's great master fall,
Himself, his throne, his world, I'd scorn 'em all;
Not Caesar's empress would I deign to prove;
No, make me mistress to the man I love.
If there be yet another name more free,
More fond than mistress, make me that to thee!
Oh! happy state, when souls each other draw,
When love is liberty, and nature law;
All then is full, possessing, and possess'd,
No craving void left aching in the breast:
Ev'n thought meets thought, ere from the lips it part,
And each warm wish springs mutual from the heart.
This sure is bliss (if bliss on earth there be)
And once the lot of Abelard and me.
Alas how chang'd! what sudden horrors rise!
A naked lover bound and bleeding lies!
Where, where was Eloïse? her voice, her hand,
Her ponyard had oppos'd the dire command.
Barbarian, stay! that bloody stroke restrain;
The crime was common, common be the pain.
I can no more; by shame, by rage suppress'd,
Let tears and burning blushes speak the rest.
Canst thou forget that sad, that solemn day,
When victims at yon altar's foot we lay?
Canst thou forget what tears that moment fell,
When, warm in youth, I bade the world farewell?
As, with cold lips, I kiss'd the sacred veil,
The shrines all trembled, and the lamps grew pale:
Heav'n scarce believ'd the conquest it survey'd,
And saints with wonder heard the vows I made.
Yet then, to those dread altars as I drew,
Not on the cross my eyes were fix'd, but you:
Not grace, or zeal, love only was my call;
And if I lose thy love, I lose my all.
Come, with thy looks, thy words, relieve my woe;
Those, still, at least, are left thee to bestow.
Still on that breast enamour'd let me lie,
Still drink delicious poison from thy eye,
Pant on thy lip, and to thy heart be press'd;
Give all thou canst—and let me dream the rest.
Ah no! instruct me other joys to prize,
With other beauties charm my partial eyes,
Full in my view set all the bright abode,
And make my soul quit Abelard for God.
Ah think, at least, thy flock deserves thy care,
Plants of thy hand, and children of thy pray'r.
From the false world in early youth they fled,
By thee to mountains, wilds, and deserts led.
You rais'd these hallow'd walls; the desert smil'd,
And paradise was open'd in the wild.
No weeping orphan saw his father's stores
Our shrines irradiate, or emblaze the floors;
No silver saints, by dying misers giv'n,
Here brib'd the rage of ill-requited Heav'n;
But such plain roofs as piety could raise,
And only vocal with the Maker's praise.
In these lone walls (their day's eternal bound)
These moss-grown domes with spiry turrets crown'd,
Where awful arches make a noon-day night,
And the dim windows shed a solemn light;
Thy eyes diffus'd a reconciling ray,
And gleams of glory brighten'd all the day.
But now no face divine contentment wears,
'Tis all blank sadness, or continual tears.
See how the force of others pray'rs I try,
(O pious fraud of am'rous charity!)
But why should I on other's pray'rs depend?
Come thou, my father, brother, husband, friend!
Ah let thy handmaid, sister, daughter, move,
And all those tender names in one, thy love!
The darksome pines that o'er yon rocks reclin'd,
Wave high, and murmur to the hollow wind,
The wand'ring streams that shine between the hills,
The grots that echo to the tinkling rills,
The dying gales that pant upon the trees,
The lakes that quiver to the curling breeze;
No more these scenes my meditation aid,
Or lull to rest the visionary maid.
But, o'er the twilight groves and dusky caves,
Long-sounding isles, and intermingled graves,
Black Melancholy sits, and round her throws
A death-like silence, and a dread repose;
Her gloomy presence saddens all the scene,
Shades ev'ry flow'r, and darkens ev'ry green,
Deepens the murmur of the falling floods,
And breathes a browner horror on the woods.
Yet here for ever, ever must I stay;
Sad proof how well a lover can obey!
Death, only death, can break the lasting chain;
And here, e'en then, shall my cold dust remain;
Here all its frailties, all its flames resign,
And wait 'till 'tis no sin to mix with thine.
Ah wretch! believ'd the spouse of God in vain,
Confess'd, within, the slave of love and man.
Assist me, Heav'n! but whence arose that pray'r?
Sprung it from piety, or from despair?
Ev'n here, where frozen chastity retires,
Love finds an altar for forbidden sires.
I ought to grieve, but cannot what I ought;
I mourn the lover, not lament the fault;
I view my crime, but kindle at the view,
Repent old pleasures, and solicit new;
Now, turn'd to Heav'n, I weep my past offence;
Now think of thee, and curse my innocence.
Of all affliction taught a lover yet,
'Tis, sure, the hardest science to forget!
How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense,
And love th'offender, yet detest th' offence?
How the dear object from the crime remove,
Or how distinguish penitence from love?
Unequal task! a passion to resign,
For hearts so touch'd, so pierc'd, so lost as mine!
Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state,
How often must it love, how often hate!
How often hope, despair, resent, regret,
Conceal, disdain,—do all things but forget?
But let Heav'n seize it, all at once 'tis fir'd;
Not touch'd, but rapt; not waken'd, but inspir'd!
Oh come! oh teach me nature to subdue,
Renounce my love, my life, myself—and you.
Fill my fond heart with God alone, for he
Alone can rival, can succeed to thee.
How happy is the blameless vestal's lot?
The world forgetting, by the world forgot:
Eternal sun-shine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd;
Labour and rest, that equal periods keep;
"Obedient slumbers, that can wake and weep;"
Desires compos'd, affections ever ev'n;
Tears that delight, and sighs that waft to heav'n.
Grace shines around her with serenest beams,
And whisp'ring angels prompt her golden dreams.
For her th' unfading rose of Eden blooms,
And wings of seraphs shed divine perfumes,
For her the spouse prepares the bridal ring,
For her white virgins hymenaeals sing,
To sounds of heav'nly harps she dies away,
And melts in visions of eternal day.
Far other dreams my erring soul employ,
Far other raptures, of unholy joy:
When, at the close of each sad, sorrowing day,
Fancy restores what vengeance snatch'd away,
Then conscience sleeps, and leaving nature free,
All my loose soul unbounded springs to thee.
O curst, dear horrors of all-conscious night!
How glowing guilt exalts the keen delight!
Provoking daemons all restraint remove,
And stir within me ev'ry source of love.
I hear thee, view thee, gaze o'er all thy charms,
And round thy phantom glue my clasping arms.
I wake:—no more I hear, no more I view,
The phantom flies me, as unkind as you.
I call aloud; it hears not what I say:
I stretch my empty arms; it glides away.
To dream once more I close my willing eyes;
Ye soft illusions, dear deceits, arise!
Alas, no more! methinks we wand'ring go
Thro' dreary wastes, and weep each other's woe,
Where, round some mould'ring tow'r, pale ivy creeps,
And low-brow'd rocks hang nodding o'er the deeps.
Sudden you mount, you beckon from the skies;
Clouds interpose, waves roar, and winds arise.
I shriek, start up, the same sad prospect find,
And wake to all the griefs I left behind.
For thee the fates, severely kind, ordain
A cool suspence from pleasure and from pain;
Thy life a long dead calm of fix'd repose;
No pulse that riots, and no blood that glows.
Still as the sea, ere winds were taught to blow,
Or moving spirit bade the waters flow;
Soft as the slumbers of a saint forgiv'n,
And mild as op'ning gleams of promis'd heav'n.
Come, Abelard! for what hast thou to dread?
The torch of Venus burns not for the dead.
Nature stands check'd; Religion disapproves;
Ev'n thou art cold—yet Eloïsa loves.
Ah hopeless, lasting flames! like those that burn
To light the dead, and warm th' unfruitful urn.
What scenes appear where'er I turn my view?
The dear ideas, where I fly, pursue,
Rise in the grove, before the altar rise,
Stain all my soul, and wanton in my eyes.
I waste the Matin lamp in sighs for thee,
Thy image steals between my God and me,
Thy voice I seem in ev'ry hymn to hear,
With ev'ry bead I drop too soft a tear.
When from the censer clouds of fragrance roll,
And swelling organs lift the rising soul,
One thought of thee puts all the pomp to flight,
Priests, tapers, temples, swim before my sight:
In seas of flame my plunging soul is drown'd,
While Altars blaze, and Angels tremble round.
While prostrate here in humble grief I lie,
Kind, virtuous drops just gath'ring in my eye,
While praying, trembling, in the dust I roll,
And dawning grace is op'ning on my soul:
Come, if thou dar'st, all charming as thou art!
Oppose thyself to Heav'n; dispute my heart;
Come, with one glance of those deluding eyes
Blot out each bright idea of the skies;
Take back that grace, those sorrows, and those tears;
Take back my fruitless penitence and pray'rs;
Snatch me, just mounting, from the blest abode;
Assist the fiends, and tear me from my God!
No, fly me, fly me, far as Pole from Pole;
Rise Alps between us! and whole oceans roll!
Ah, come not, write not, think not once of me,
Nor share one pang of all I felt for thee.
Thy oaths I quit, thy memory resign;
Forget, renounce me, hate whate'er was mine.
Fair eyes, and tempting looks (which yet I view!)
Long lov'd, ador'd ideas, all adieu!
O Grace serene! oh Virtue heav'nly fair!
Divine oblivion of low-thoughted care!
Fresh blooming Hope, gay daughter of the sky!
And Faith, our early immortality!
Enter each mild, each amicable guest;
Receive and wrap me in eternal rest!
See in her cell sad Eloïsa spread,
Propt on some tomb, a neighbour of the dead.
In each low wind methinks a Spirit calls,
And more than Echoes talk along the walls.
Here, as I watch'd the dying lamps around,
From yonder shrine I heard a hollow sound.
"Come, sister, come!" (it said, or seem'd to say)
"Thy place is here, sad sister, come away!
Once, like thyself, I trembled, wept, and pray'd,
Love's victim then, tho' now a sainted maid:
But all is calm in this eternal sleep;
Here grief forgets to groan, and love to weep,
Ev'n superstition loses ev'ry fear:
For God, not man, absolves our frailties here."
I come, I come! prepare your roseate bow'rs,
Celestial palms, and ever-blooming flow'rs.
Thither, where sinners may have rest, I go,
Where flames refin'd in breasts seraphic glow:
Thou, Abelard! the last sad office pay,
And smooth my passage to the realms of day;
See my lips tremble, and my eye-balls roll,
Suck my last breath, and catch my flying soul!
Ah no—in sacred vestments may'st thou stand,
The hallow'd taper trembling in thy hand,
Present the Cross before my lifted eye,
Teach me, at once, and learn of me, to die.
Ah then, thy once-lov'd Eloïsa see;
It will be, then, no crime to gaze on me.
See from my cheek the transient roses fly!
See the last sparkle languish in my eye!
'Till ev'ry motion, pulse, and breath be o'er;
And e'en my Abelard be lov'd no more.
O Death all-eloquent! you only prove
What dust we doat on, when 'tis man we love.
Then, too, when fate shall thy fair frame destroy,
(That cause of all my guilt, and all my joy)
In trance extatic may thy pangs be drown'd,
Bright clouds descend, and Angels watch thee round,
From op'ning skies may streaming glories shine,
And Saints embrace thee with a love like mine.
May one kind grave unite each hapless name,
And graft my love immortal on thy fame!
Then, ages hence, when all my woes are o'er,
When this rebellious heart shall beat no more;
If ever chance two wand'ring lovers brings
To Paraclete's white walls and silver springs,
O'er the pale marble shall they join their heads,
And drink the falling tears each other sheds;
Then sadly say, with mutual pity mov'd,
"O may we never love as these have lov'd!"
From the full choir, when loud Hosannas rise,
And swell the pomp of dreadful sacrifice,
Amid that scene if some relenting eye
Glance on the stone where our cold relics lie,
Devotion's self shall steal a thought from Heav'n,
One human tear shall drop, and be forgiv'n.
And sure, if fate some future bard shall join
In sad similitude of griefs to mine,
Condemn'd whole years in absence to deplore,
And image charms he must behold no more;
Such if there be, who loves so long, so well;
Let him our sad, our tender story tell!
The well-sung woes will sooth my pensive ghost;
He best can paint 'em who shall feel 'em most.
AN EPISTLE, FROM Mr. PHILIPS to the Earl of DORSET.
The opening of this poem is incomparably fine.
The latter part is tedious and trifling.
Copenhagen,
March 9, 1709.
FROM frozen climes, and endless tracts of snow,
From streams that northern winds forbid to flow;
What present shall the Muse to Dorset bring,
Or how, so near the Pole, attempt to sing?
The hoary winter here conceals from sight
All pleasing objects that to verse invite.
The hills and dales, and the delightful woods,
The flow'ry plains, and silver streaming floods,
By snow disguis'd, in bright confusion lie,
And, with one dazzling waste, fatigue the eye.
No gentle breathing breeze prepares the spring,
No birds within the desart region sing.
The ships, unmov'd, the boist'rous winds defy,
While rattling chariots o'er the ocean fly.
The vast Leviathan wants room to play,
And spout his waters in the face of day,
The starving wolves along the main sea prowl,
And to the moon in icy vallies howl.
For many a shining league the level main
Here spreads itself into a glassy plain:
There solid billows, of enormous size,
Alps of green ice, in wild disorder rise.
And yet but lately have I seen, e'en here,
The winter in a lovely dress appear.
Ere yet the clouds let fall the treasur'd snow,
Or winds begun thro' hazy skies to blow,
At ev'ning a keen eastern breeze arose;
And the descending rain unsullied froze.
Soon as the silent shades of night withdrew,
The ruddy morn disclos'd at once to view
The face of nature in a rich disguise,
And brighten'd ev'ry object to my eyes:
For ev'ry shrub, and every blade of grass,
And ev'ry pointed thorn, seem'd wrought in glass,
In pearls and rubies rich the hawthorns show,
While thro' the ice the crimson berries glow.
The thick-sprung reeds the wat'ry marshes yield,
Seem polish'd lances in a hostile field.
The stag, in limpid currents, with surprize,
Sees crystal branches on his forehead rise.
The spreading oak, the beech, and tow'ring pine,
Glaz'd over, in the freezing aether shine.
The frighted birds the rattling branches shun,
That wave and glitter in the distant sun.
When, if a sudden gust of wind arise,
The brittle forest into atoms flies:
The crackling wood beneath the tempest bends,
And in a spangled show'r the prospect ends;
Or, if a southern gale the region warm,
And, by degrees, unbind the wintry charm,
The traveller a miry country sees,
And journies sad beneath the dropping trees.
Like some deluded peasant Merlin leads
Thro' fragrant bow'rs, and thro' delicious meads;
While here enchanted gardens to him rise,
And airy fabrics there attract his eyes,
His wondring feet the magic paths pursue;
And, while he thinks the fair illusion true,
The trackless scenes disperse in fluid air,
And woods, and wilds, and thorny ways appear:
A tedious road the weary wretch returns,
And, as he goes, the transient vision mourns.
A LETTER FROM ITALY, To the Right Honourable CHARLES LORD HALIFAX. In the Year MDCCI.
Few poems have done more honour to English genius than this. There is in it a strain of political thinking that was, at that time, new in our poetry. Had the harmony of this been equal to that of Pope's versification, it would be incontestibly the finest poem in our language; but there is a dryness in the numbers which greatly lessens the pleasure excited both by the poet's judgement and imagination.
WHILE you, my lord, the rural shades admire,
And from Britannia's public posts retire,
Nor longer, her ungrateful sons to please,
For their advantage sacrifice your ease;
Me into foreign realms my fate conveys,
Through nations fruitful of immortal lays,
Where the soft season and inviting clime
Conspire to trouble your repose with rhime.
For wheresoe'er I turn my ravish'd eyes,
Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise,
Poetic fields incompass me around,
And still I seem to tread on Classic ground;
For here the Muse so oft her harp has strung,
That not a mountain rears its head unsung,
Renown'd in verse each shady thicket grows,
And ev'ry stream in heav'nly numbers flows.
How am I pleas'd to search the hills and woods
For rising springs and celebrated floods!
To view the Nar, tumultuous in his course,
And trace the smooth Clitumnus to his source;
To see the Mincio draw his watry store
Through the long windings of a fruitful shore,
And hoary Albula's infected tide
O'er the warm bed of smoking sulphur glide.
Fir'd with a thousand raptures I survey
Eridanus through flow'ry meadows stray,
The king of floods! that rolling o'er the plains
The tow'ring Alps of half their moisture drains,
And proudly swoln with a whole winter's snows,
Distributes wealth and plenty where he flows.
Sometimes, misguided by the tuneful throng,
I look for streams immortaliz'd in song,
That lost in silence and oblivion lie,
(Dumb are their fountains and their channels dry)
Yet run for ever by the Muse's skill,
And in the smooth description murmur still.
Sometimes to gentle Tiber I retire,
And the fam'd river's empty shores admire,
That, destitute of strength, derives its course
From thrifty urns and an unfruitful source;
Yet sung so often in poetic lays,
With scorn the Danube and the Nile surveys;
So high the deathless muse exalts her theme!
Such was the Boyne, a poor inglorious stream,
That in Hibernian vales obscurely stray'd,
And, unobserv'd, in wild meanders play'd;
'Till by your lines and Nassau's sword renown'd;
Its rising billows through the world resound,
Where'er the Hero's godlike acts can pierce,
Or where the fame of an immortal verse.
Oh cou'd the Muse my ravish'd breast inspire
With warmth like yours, and raise an equal fire,
Unnumber'd beauties in my verse should shine,
And Virgil's Italy shou'd yield to mine!
See how the golden groves around me smile,
That shun the coast of Britain's stormy isle,
Or, when transplanted and preserv'd with care,
Curse the cold clime, and starve in northern air.
Here kindly warmth their mounting juice ferments
To nobler tastes, and more exalted scents:
E'en the rough rocks with tender myrtle bloom,
And trodden weeds send out a rich perfume.
Bear me, some God, to Baia's gentle seats,
Or cover me in Umbria's green retreats;
Where western gales eternally reside,
And all the seasons lavish all their pride:
Blossoms, and fruits, and flow'rs together rise,
And the whole year in gay confusion lies.
Immortal glories in my mind revive,
And in my soul a thousand passions strive,
When Rome's exalted beauties I descry,
Magnificent in piles of ruin lie.
An amphitheatre's amazing height
Here sills my eye with terror and delight,
That on its public shews Unpeopled Rome,
And held Uncrowded nations in its womb:
Here pillars rough with sculpture pierce the skies:
And here the proud triumphal arches rise,
Where the old Romans deathless acts display'd,
Their base degenerate progeny upbraid:
Whole rivers here forsake the fields below,
And, wond'ring at their height, through airy channels flow.
Still to new scenes my wand'ring Muse retires;
And the dumb show of breathing rocks admires;
Where the smooth chisel all its force has shown,
And soften'd into flesh the rugged stone.
In solemn silence, a majestic band,
Heroes, and Gods, and Roman Consuls, stand,
Stern tyrants, whom their cruelties renown,
And emperors, in Parian marble frown;
While the bright dames, to whom they humbly su'd,
Still show the charms that their proud hearts subdu'd.
Fain would I Raphael's godlike art rehearse,
And show th' immortal labours in my verse,
Where, from the mingled strength of shade and light,
A new creation rises to my sight,
Such heav'nly figures from his pencil flow,
So warm with life his blended colours glow,
From theme to theme with secret pleasure tost,
Amidst the soft variety I'm lost:
Here pleasing airs my ravish'd soul confound
With circling notes and labyrinths of sound:
Here domes and temples rise in distant views,
And opening palaces invite my Muse.
How has kind Heav'n adorn'd the happy land,
And scatter'd blessings with a wasteful hand!
But what avail her unexhausted stores,
Her blooming mountains, and her sunny shores,
With all the gifts that Heav'n and earth impart,
The smiles of nature, and the charms of art,
While proud Oppression in her valleys reigns,
And Tyranny usurps her happy plains?
The poor inhabitant beholds in vain
The redd'ning Orange and the swelling grain:
Joyless he sees the growing oils and wines,
And in the Myrtle's fragrant shade repines:
Starves, in the midst of nature's bounty curst,
And in the loaden vineyard dies for thirst.
Oh Liberty, thou goddess heav'nly bright,
Profuse of bliss, and pregnant with delight!
Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign,
And smiling Plenty leads thy wanton train;
Eas'd of her load Subjection grows more light,
And Poverty looks chearful in thy sight;
Thou mak'st the gloomy face of Nature gay,
Giv'st beauty to the Sun, and pleasure to the Day.
Thee, goddess, thee Britannia's isle adores;
How has she oft exhausted all her stores,
How oft, in fields of death, thy presence sought,
Nor thinks the mighty prize too dearly bought!
On foreign mountains may the Sun refine
The grape's soft juice, and mellow it to wine,
With Citron groves adorn a distant soil,
And the fat Olive swell with floods of oil:
We envy not the warmer clime, that lies
In ten degrees of more indulgent skies,
Nor at the coarseness of our Heav'n repine,
Tho' o'er our heads the frozen Pleiads shine:
'Tis Liberty that crowns Britannia's isle,
And makes her barren rocks and her bleak mountains smile.
Others with tow'ring piles may please the sight,
And in their proud aspiring domes delight;
A nicer touch to the stretch'd canvass give,
Or teach their animated rocks to live:
'Tis Britain's care to watch o'er Europe's fate,
And hold in balance each contending state;
To threaten bold presumptuous kings with war,
And answer her afflicted neighbour's pray'r.
The Dane and Swede, rous'd up by fierce alarms,
Bless the wise conduct of her pious arms:
Soon as her fleets appear, their terrors cease,
And all the northern world lies hush'd in peace.
Th' ambitious Gaul beholds with secret dread
Her thunder aim'd at his aspiring head,
And fain her godlike sons wou'd disunite
By foreign gold, or by domestic spite:
But strives in vain to conquer or divide,
Whom Nassau's arms defend and counsels guide.
Fir'd with the name, which I so oft have found
The distant climes and diff'rent tongues resound,
I bridle in my struggling Muse with pain,
That longs to launch into a bolder strain.
But I've already troubled you too long,
Nor dare attempt a more advent'rous song.
My humble verse demands a softer theme,
A painted meadow, or a purling stream;
Unfit for Heroes; whom immortal lays,
And lines like Virgil's, or like your's, shou'd praise.
ALEXANDER's FEAST; OR, THE POWER OF MUSIC. AN ODE, In Honour of St. CECILIA's Day.
This ode has been more applauded, perhaps, than it has been felt; however, it is a very fine one, and gives its beauties rather at a third, or fourth, than at a first, perusal.
I.
'TWAS at the royal feast, for Persia won,
By Philip's warlike son:
Aloft, in awful state,
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne:
His valiant peers were plac'd around;
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound.
(So shou'd desert in arms be crown'd:)
The lovely Thais by his side,
Sate like a blooming eastern bride,
In flower of youth and beauty's pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserve the fair.
CHORUS.
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
II.
Timotheus plac'd on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touch'd the lyre:
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heav'nly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove;
Who left his blissful seats above,
(Such is the pow'r of mighty love.)
A dragon's fiery form bely'd the god:
Sublime on radiant spires he rode,
When he to fair Olympia press'd:
And while he sought her snowy breast:
Then, round her slender waist he curl'd,
And stamp'd an image of himself, a sov'reign of the world.
The list'ning crowd admire the lofty sound.
A present Deity they shout around:
A present Deity the vaulted roofs rebound:
With ravish'd ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
CHORUS.
With ravish'd ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the god,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
III.
The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musician sung;
Of Bacchus, ever fair, and ever young:
The jolly god in triumph comes;
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums;
Flush'd with a purple grace,
He shews his honest face;
Now gives the hautboys breath; he comes, he comes.
Bacchus, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain:
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure,
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure;
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
CHORUS.
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure;
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure;
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
IV.
Sooth'd with the sound the king grew vain;
Fought all his battles o'er again;
And thrice he routed all his foes; and thrice he slew the slain.
The master saw the madness rise;
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And, while he Heav'n and earth defy'd,
Chang'd his hand, and check'd his pride.
He chose a mournful muse,
Soft pity to infuse:
He sung Darius, great and good,
By too severe a fate,
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen,
Fallen from his high estate,
And welt'ring in his blood:
Deserted at his utmost need,
By those his former bounty fed:
On the bare earth expos'd he lies,
With not a friend to close his eyes.
With down-cast looks the joyless victor sate,
Revolving in his alter'd soul
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole;
And tears began to flow.
CHORUS.
Revolving in his alter'd soul
The various turns of chance below;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole;
And tears began to flow.
V.
The mighty master smil'd, to see
That love was in the next degree:
'Twas but a kindred sound to move;
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures,
Soon he sooth'd his soul to pleasures.
War, he sung, his toil and trouble;
Honour, but an empty bubble:
Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying:
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, O think it worth enjoying.
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,
Take the good the gods provide thee.
The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crown'd, but Mu
ic won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gaz'd on the fair
Who caus'd his care,
And sigh'd and look'd, sigh'd and look'd,
Sigh'd and look'd, and sigh'd again:
At length, with love and wine at once oppress'd,
The vanquish'd victor sunk upon her breast.
CHORUS.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gaz'd on the fair
Who caus'd his care,
And sigh'd and look'd, sigh'd and look'd,
Sigh'd and look'd, and sigh'd again:
At length, with love and wine at once oppress'd,
The vanquish'd victor sunk upon her breast.
VI.
Now strike the golden lyre again:
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleep asunder,
And rouze him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark! hark! the horrid sound
Has rais'd up his head,
As awak'd from the dead,
And, amaz'd, he stares around.
Revenge, Revenge, Timotheus cries,
See the furies arise:
See the snakes that they rear,
How they hiss in their hair,
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a ghastly band,
Each a torch in his hand!
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain,
And unbury'd remain
Inglorious on the plain.
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.
Behold how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes,
And glitt'ring temples of their hostile gods!
The princes applaud, with a furious joy;
And the king seiz'd a flambeau, with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fir'd another Troy.
CHORUS.
And the king seiz'd a flambeau, with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey,
And, like another Helen, fir'd another Troy.
VII.
Thus, long ago,
Ere heaving bellows learn'd to blow,
While organs yet were mute;
Timotheus, to his breathing flute
And sounding lyre,
Cou'd swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarg'd the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before,
Let old Timotheus yield the prize;
Or both divide the crown;
He rais'd a mortal to the skies;
She drew an angel down.
GRAND CHORUS.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarg'd the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown;
He rais'd a mortal to the skies;
She drew an angel down.
ODE FOR MUSIC ON ST. CECILIA's DAY.
This ode has by many been thought equal to the former. As it is a repetition of Dryden's manner, it is so far inferior to him. The whole hint of Orpheus, with many of the lines, have been taken from an obscure Ode upon Music, published in Tate's Miscellanies.
I.
DESCEND, ye Nine! descend and sing;
The breathing instruments inspire;
Wake into voice each silent string,
And sweep the sounding lyre!
In a sadly-pleasing strain
Let the warbling lute complain:
Let the loud trumpet sound,
'Till the roofs all around
The shrill echoes rebound:
While, in more lengthen'd notes, and slow,
The deep, majestic, solemn organs, blow.
Hark! the numbers, soft and clear,
Gently steal upon the ear;
Now louder, and yet louder rise,
And fill with spreading sounds the skies;
Exulting in triumph now swell the bold notes,
In broken air, trembling, the wild music floats;
'Till, by degrees, remote and small,
The strains decay,
And melt away,
In a dying, dying fall.
II.
By Music, minds an equal temper know,
Nor swell too high, nor sink too low.
If in the breast tumultuous joys arise,
Music her soft, assuasive voice applies;
Or, when the soul is press'd with cares,
Exalts her in enlivening airs.
Warriors she fires with animated sounds;
Pours balm into the bleeding lover's wounds;
Melancholy lifts her head,
Morpheus rouzes from his bed,
Sloth unfolds her arms and wakes,
List'ning Envy drops her snakes;
Intestine war no more our passions wage,
And giddy factions hear away their rage.
III.
But, when our country's cause provokes to arms,
How martial music ev'ry bosom warms!
So, when the first bold vessel dar'd the seas,
High on the stern the Thracian rais'd his strain,
While Argo saw her kindred trees
Descend from Pelion to the main.
Transported demi-gods stood round,
And men grew heroes at the sound,
Enflam'd with glory's charms:
Each chief his sev'n-fold shield display'd,
And half unsheath'd the shining blade:
And seas, and rocks, and skies rebound
To arms, to arms, to arms!
IV.
But when thro' all th' infernal bounds,
Which flaming Phlegeton surrounds,
Love, strong as Death, the Poet led
To the pale nations of the dead,
What sounds were heard,
What scenes appear'd,
O'er all the dreary coasts!
Dreadful gleams,
Dismal screams,
Fires that glow,
Shrieks of woe,
Sullen moans,
Hollow groans,
And cries of tortur'd ghosts!
But hark! he strikes the golden lyre;
And see! the tortur'd ghosts respire!
See, shady forms advance!
Thy stone, O Sisyphus, stands still,
Ixion rests upon his wheel,
And the pale spectres dance!
The furies sink upon their iron beds,
And snakes, uncurl'd, hang list'ning round their heads.
V.
By the streams that ever flow,
By the fragrant winds that blow
O'er th' Elysian flow'rs;
By those happy souls who dwell
In yellow meads of Asphodel,
Or Amaranthine bowers;
By the heros' armed shades,
Glitt'ring thro' the gloomy glades;
By the youths that dy'd for love,
Wand'ring in the myrtle grove,
Restore, restore Eurydice to life:
Oh take the husband, or return the wife!
He sung, and Hell consented
To hear the Poet's prayer;
Stern Proserpine relented,
And gave him back the fair.
Thus song could prevail
O'er death, and o'er hell,
A conquest how hard and how glorious?
Tho' fate had fast bound her
With Styx nine times round her,
Yet music and love were victorious.
VI.
But soon, too soon, the lover turns his eyes:
Again she falls, again she dies, she dies!
How wilt thou now the fatal sisters move?
No crime was thine, if 'tis no crime to love.
Now under hanging mountains,
Beside the falls of fountains,
Or where Hebrus wanders,
Rolling in meanders,
All alone,
Unheard, unknown,
He makes his moan;
And calls her ghost,
For ever, ever, ever lost!
Now with furies surrounded,
Despairing, confounded,
He trembles, he glows,
Amidst Rhodope's snows:
See, wild as the winds, o'er the desert he flies;
Hark! Haemus resounds with the Bacchanals cries—
Ah see, he dies!
Yet ev'n in death Eurydice he sung,
Eurydice still trembled on his tongue,
Eurydice the woods,
Eurydice the floods,
Eurydice the rocks and hollow mountains rung.
VII.
Music the fiercest grief can charm,
And fate's severest rage disarm:
Music can soften pain to ease,
And make despair and madness please:
Our joys below it can improve,
And antedate the bliss above.
This the divine Cecilia found,
And to her Maker's praise confin'd the sound.
When the full organ joins the tuneful quire,
Th' immortal pow'rs incline their ear;
Borne on the swelling notes our souls aspire,
While solemn airs improve the sacred fire;
And Angels lean from heav'n to hear.
Of Orpheus now no more let Poets tell,
To bright Cecilia greater pow'r is given;
His numbers rais'd a shade from hell,
Her's lift the soul to Heav'n.
THE SHEPHERD's WEEK. IN SIX PASTORALS.
These are Mr. Gay's principal performance. They were originally intended, I suppose, as a burlesque on those of Philips; but, perhaps without designing it, he has hit the true spirit of pastoral poetry. In fact, he more resembles Theocritus than any other English pastoral writer whatsoever. There runs through the whole a strain of rustic pleasantry which should ever distinguish this species of composition; but how far the antiquated expressions used here may contribute to the humour, I will not determine; for my own part, I could wish the simplicity were preserved, without recurring to such obsolete antiquity for the manner of expressing it.
MONDAY; OR, THE SQUABBLE.
LOBBIN CLOUT, CUDDY, CLODDIPOLE.
THY younglings, Cuddy, are but just awake,
No thrustles shrill the bramble bush forsake,
No chirping lark the welkin sheen invokes,
No damsel yet the swelling udder strokes;
O'er yonder hill does scant the dawn appear,
Then why does Cuddy leave his cott so rear?
Ah Lobbin Clout! I ween, my plight is guest,
For, he that loves, a stranger is to rest;
If swains belye not, thou hast prov'd the smart,
And Blouzelinda's mistress of thy heart.
This rising rear betokeneth well thy mind,
Those arms are folded for thy Blouzelind.
And well, I trow, our piteous plights agree,
Thee Blouzelinda smites, Buxoma me.
Ah Blouzelind! I love thee more by half,
Than does their fawns, or cows the new-fall'n calf:
Woe worth the tongue! may blisters sore it gall,
That names Buxoma Blouzelind withal.
Hold, witless Lobbin Clout, I thee advise,
Lest blisters sore on thy own tongue arise.
Lo yonder Cloddipole, the blithsome swain,
The wisest lout of all the neighb'ring plain!
From Cloddipole we learnt to read the skies,
To know when hail will fall, or winds arise.
He taught us erst the heifer's tale to view;
When stuck aloft, that show'rs would strait ensue:
He first that useful secret did explain,
That pricking corns foretold the gath'ring rain.
When swallows fleet soar high, and sport in air,
He told us that the welkin would be clear:
Let Cloddipole, then, hear us twain rehearse,
And praise his sweetheart in alternate verse.
I'll wager this same oaken staff with thee,
That Cloddipole shall give the prize to me.
See this tobacco-pouch, that's lin'd with hair,
Made of the skin of sleekest fallow-deer.
This pouch, that's ty'd with tape of reddest hue,
I'll wager, that the prize shall be my due.
Begin thy carrols, then, thou vaunting slouch;
Be thine the oaken staff, or mine the pouch.
My Blouzelinda is the blithest lass,
Than primrose sweeter, or the clover-grass.
Fair is the king-cup that in meadow blows,
Fair is the daisie that beside her grows;
Fair is the gilliflower, of gardens sweet,
Fair is the mary-gold, for pottage meet.
But Blouzelind's than gilliflow'r more fair,
Than daisie, mary-gold, or king-cup rare.
My brown Buxoma is the featest maid,
That e'er at wake delightsome gambol play'd.
Clean as young lambkins, or the goose's down,
And like the goldfinch in her Sunday gown.
The witless lamb may sport upon the plain,
The frisking kid delight the gaping swain,
The wanton calf may skip with many a bound,
And my cur Tray play deftest feats around;
But neither lamb, nor kid, nor calf, nor Tray,
Dance like Buxoma on the first of May.
Sweet is my toil when Blouzelind is near;
Of her bereft 'tis winter all the year.
With her, no sultry summer's heat I know;
In winter, when she's nigh, with love I glow.
Come, Blouzelinda, ease thy swain's desire,
My summer's shadow, and my winter's fire!
As with Buxoma, once, I work'd at hay,
Ev'n noon-tide labour seem'd an holiday;
And holidays, if haply, she were gone,
Like worky-days, I wish'd would soon be done.
Eftsoons, O sweet-heart kind, my love repay,
And all the year shall then be holiday.
As Blouzelinda, in a gamesome mood,
Behind a haycock loudly laughing stood,
I slily ran, and snatch'd a hasty kiss,
She wip'd her lips, nor took it much amiss.
Believe me, Cuddy, while I'm bold to say,
Her breath was sweeter than the ripen'd hay.
As my Buxoma, in a morning fair,
With gentle finger strok'd her milky care,
I queintly stole a kiss; at first, 'tis true,
She frown'd, yet, after, granted one or two.
Lobbin, I swear, believe who will my vows,
Her breath by far excell'd the breathing cows.
Leek to the Welch, to Dutchmen butter's dear,
Of Irish swains potatoe is the chear;
Oats, for their feasts, the Scottish shepherds grind,
Sweet turnips are the food of Blouzelind.
While she loves turnips, butter I'll despise,
Nor leeks, nor oatmeal, nor potatoe prize.
In good roast-beef my landlord sticks his knife,
The capon fat delights his dainty wife,
Pudding our parson eats, the 'squire loves hare,
But white-pot thick is my Buxoma's fare.
While she loves white-pot, capon ne'er shall be,
Nor hare, nor beef, nor pudding, food for me.
As once I play'd at Blindman's-buff, it hapt
About my eyes the towel thick was wrapt.
I miss'd the swains and seiz'd on Blouzelind.
True speaks that ancient proverb, 'Love is blind.'
As at Hot-cockles once I laid me down,
And felt the weighty hand of many a clown;
Buxoma gave a gentle tap, and I
Quick rose, and read soft mischief in her eye.
On two near elms the slacken'd cord I hung,
Now high, now low, my Blouzelinda swung.
With the rude wind her rumpled garment rose,
And show'd her taper leg, and scarlet hose.
Across the fallen oak the plank I laid,
And myself pois'd against the tott'ring maid.
High leapt the plank; adown Buxoma fell;
I spy'd—but faithful sweethearts never tell.
This riddle, Cuddy, if thou can'st explain;
This wily riddle puzzles every swain:
What
Marygold.
flower is that which bears the virgin's name,
The richest metal joined with the same?
Answer, thou carle, and judge this riddle right,
I'll frankly own thee for a cunning wight.
What
Rosemary.
flower is that which royal honour craves,
Adjoin the virgin, and 'tis strown on graves?
Forbear, contending louts, give o'er your strains,
An oaken staff each merits for his pains.
But see the sun-beams bright to labour warn,
And gild the thatch of goodman Hodge's barn.
Your herds for want of water stand adry;
They're weary of your songs—and so am I.
TUESDAY; OR, THE DITTY.
YOUNG Collin Clout, a lad of peerless meed,
Full well could dance, and deftly tune the reed;
In ev'ry wood his carols sweet were known,
At ev'ry wake his nimble feats were shown.
When in the ring the rustic routs he threw,
The damsels pleasures with his conquests grew;
Or when, aslant, the cudgel threats his head,
His danger smites the breast of every maid;
But chief of Marian: Marian lov'd the swain,
The parson's maid, and neatest of the plain.
Marian, that soft could stroke the udder'd cow,
Or lessen with her sieve the barley mow;
Marbled with sage the harden'd cheese she press'd,
And yellow butter Marian's skill confess'd;
But Marian now, devoid of country cares,
Nor yellow butter, nor sage cheese, prepares:
For yearning love the witless maid employs,
And love, say swains, all busie heed destroys.
Collin makes mock at all her piteous smart,
A las, that Cic'ly hight, had won his heart;
Cic'ly, the western lass, that tends the kee,
The rival of the parson's maid was she.
In dreary shade now Marian lies along,
And, mix'd with sighs, thus wails in plaining song.
Ah woful day! ah woful noon and morn!
When first by thee my younglings white were shorn,
Then, first, I ween, I cast a lover's eye;
My sheep were silly, but more silly I;
Beneath the shears they felt no lasting smart;
They lost but fleeces, while I lost a heart.
Ah Collin! canst thou leave thy sweetheart true?
What I have done for thee will Cic'ly do?
Will she thy linen wash, or hosen darn,
And knit thee gloves made of her own-spun yarn?
Will she with huswife's hand provide thy meat,
And ev'ry Sunday morn thy neckcloth plait?
Which o'er thy kersey doublet spreading wide,
In service time drew Cic'ly's eyes aside.
Where-e'er I gad I cannot hide my care,
My new disasters in my look appear.
White as the curd my ruddy cheek is grown,
So thin my features that I'm hardly known;
Our neighbours tell me oft, in joking talk,
Of ashes, leather, oatmeal, bran, and chalk;
Unwittingly of Marian they divine,
And wist not that with thoughtful love I pine.
Yet Collin Clout, untoward shepherd swain,
Walks whistling blithe, while pitiful I plain.
Whilom with thee 'twas Marian's dear delight
To moil all day, and merry-make at night;
If in the soil you guide the crooked share,
Your early breakfast is my constant care.
And when, with even hand, you strow the grain,
I fright the thievish rooks from off the plain.
In misling days when I my thresher heard,
With nappy beer I to the barn repair'd;
Lost in the music of the whirling flail,
To gaze on thee I left the smoaking pail:
In harvest, when the sun was mounted high,
My leathern bottle did thy drought supply;
When-e'er you mow'd I follow'd with the rake,
And have, full oft, been sun-burnt for thy sake;
When in the welkin gathering show'rs were seen,
I lagg'd the last with Collin on the green;
And when, at eve, returning with thy carr,
Awaiting heard the gingling bells from far,
Strait on the fire the sooty pot I plac'd;
To warm thy broth I burnt my hands for haste.
When, hungry, thou stood'st staring, like an oaf,
I slic'd the lunceon from the barley loaf,
With crumbled bread I thicken'd well thy mess:
Ah, love me more, or love thy pottage less!
Last Friday's eve, when, as the sun was set,
I, near yon stile, three sallow gypsies met.
Upon my hand they cast a poring look,
Bid me beware, and thrice their heads they shook;
They said, that many crosses I must prove,
Some in my wordly gain, but most in love.
Next morn I miss'd three hens and our old cock,
And off the hedge two pinners and a smock.
I bore these losses with a christian mind,
And no mishaps could feel, while thou wert kind.
But since, alas! I grew my Collin's scorn,
I've known no pleasure, night, or noon, or morn.
Help me, ye gypsies, bring him home again,
And, to a constant lass, give back her swain.
Have I not sat with thee full many a night,
When dying embers were our only light,
When ev'ry creature did in slumbers lie,
Besides our cat, my Collin Clout, and I?
No troublous thoughts the cat or Collin move,
While I alone am kept awake by love.
Remember, Collin, when at last year's wake,
I bought the costly present for thy sake;
Couldst thou spell o'er the posie on thy knife,
And with another change thy state of life?
If thou forget'st, I wot, I can repeat;
My memory can tell the verse so sweet.
"As this is grav'd upon this knife of thine,
"So is thy image on this heart of mine."
But woe is me! Such presents luckless prove;
For knives, they tell me, always sever love.
Thus Marian wail'd, her eyes with tears brimfull,
When goody Debbins brought her cow to bull.
With apron blue to dry her tears she sought,
Then saw the cow well serv'd, and took a groat.
WEDNESDAY; OR, THE DUMPS.
THE wailings of a maiden I recite,
A maiden fair, that Sparabella hight.
Such strains ne'er warble in the linnet's throat,
Nor the gay goldfinch chaunts so sweet a note.
No magpye chatter'd, nor the painted jay,
No ox was heard to low, nor ass to bray;
No rusling breezes play'd the leaves among,
While thus her madrigal the damsel sung.
Awhile, O D'Urfey, lend an ear or twain,
Nor, though in homely guise, my verse disdain;
Whether thou seek'st new kingdoms in the sun,
Whether thy muse does at Newmarket run,
Or does with gossips at a feast regale,
And heighten her conceits with sack and ale;
Or else, at wakes, with Joan and Hodge rejoice,
Where D'Urfey's lyrics swell in ev'ry voice;
Yet suffer me, thou bard of wond'rous meed,
Amid thy bays to weave this rural weed.
Now the sun drove adown the western road,
And oxen laid at rest forget the goad;
The clown fatigu'd trudg'd homeward with his spade,
Across the meadows stretch'd the lengthen'd shade:
When Sparabella, pensive and forlorn,
Alike with yearning love and labour worn,
Lean'd on her rake, and, strait, with doleful guise,
Did this sad plaint in mournful notes devise.
Come night, as dark as pitch, surround my head,
From Sparabella Bumkinet is fled;
The ribbon that his val'rous cudgel won,
Last Sunday happier Clumsilis put on.
Sure, if he'd eyes (but love, they say, has none)
I whilom by that ribbon had been known.
Ah, well a-day, I'm shent with baneful smart,
For with that ribbon he bestow'd his heart.
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
Shall heavy Clumsilis with me compare?
View this, ye lovers, and like me despair.
Her blubber'd lip by smutty pipes is worn,
And in her breath tobacco whiffs are born;
The cleanly cheese-press she could never turn,
Her aukward fist did ne'er employ the churn;
If e'er she brew'd, the drink wou'd strait go sour,
Before it ever felt the thunder's power:
No huswifry the dowdy creature knew;
To sum up all, her tongue confess'd the shrew.
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
I've often seen my visage in yon lake.
Nor are my features of the homeliest make.
Though Clumsilis may boast a whiter dye,
Yet the black sloe turns in my rolling eye;
And fairest blossoms drop with ev'ry blast;
But the brown beauty will like hollies last.
Her wan complexion's like the wither'd leek,
While Katherine pears adorn my ruddy cheek.
Yet she, alas! the witless lout hath won;
And, by her gain, poor Sparabell's undone!
Let hares and hounds in coupling straps unite,
The clocking hen make friendship with the kite;
Let the fox simply wear the nuptial noose,
And join in wedlock with the waddling goose;
For love hath brought a stranger thing to pass,
The fairest shepherd weds the foulest lass.
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
Sooner shall cats disport in waters clear,
And speckled mackrels graze the meadows fair,
Sooner shall screech-owls bask in sunny day,
And the slow ass on trees, like squirrels, play;
Sooner shall snails on insect pinions rove,
Than I forget my shepherd's wonted love.
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
Ah! didst thou know what proffers I withstood,
When late I met the squire in yonder wood!
To me he sped, regardless of his game,
While all my cheek was glowing red with shame;
My lip he kiss'd, and prais'd my healthful look,
Then from his purse of silk a guinea took,
Into my hand he forc'd the tempting gold,
While I with modest struggling broke his hold.
He swore that Dick, in liv'ry strip'd with lace,
Should wed me soon, to keep me from disgrace;
But I nor footman priz'd, nor golden fee;
For what is lace, or gold, compar'd to thee?
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
Now plain I ken whence Love his rise begun.
Sure he was born some bloody butcher's son,
Bred up in shambles, where our younglings slain,
Erst taught him mischief, and to sport with pain.
The father only silly sheep annoys,
The son the sillier shepherdess destroys.
Does son or father greater mischief do?
The fire is cruel, so the son is too.
My plaint, ye lasses, with this burthen aid,
'Tis hard so true a damsel dies a maid.
Farewel, ye woods, ye meads, ye streams that flow;
A sudden death shall rid me of my woe.
This penknife, keen, my windpipe shall divide.
What, shall I fall as squeaking pigs have dy'd!
No—To some tree this carcase I'll suspend.
But worrying curs find such untimely end!
I'll speed me to the pond, where the high stool
On the long plank hangs o'er the muddy pool,
That stool, the dread of every scolding quean;
Yet, sure a lover should not dye so mean?
There plac'd aloft, I'll rave and rail by fits,
Though all the parish say I've lost my wits;
And thence, if courage holds, myself I'll throw,
And quench my passion in the lake below.
Ye lasses, ease your burthen, cease to moan,
And, by my case forewarn'd, go mind your own.
The sun was set; the night came on a-pace,
And falling dews bewet around the place;
The bat takes airy rounds on leathern wings,
And the hoarse owl his woeful dirges sings;
The prudent maiden deems it now too late,
And, till to-morrow comes, defers her fate.
THURSDAY; OR, THE SPELL.
HOBNELIA, seated in a dreary vale,
In pensive mood rehears'd her piteous tale;
Her piteous tale the winds in sighs bemoan,
And pining eccho answers groan for groan.
I rue the day, a rueful day I trow;
The woful day; a day, indeed, of woe!
When Lubberkin to town his cattle drove,
A maiden fine bedight he happ'd to love;
The maiden fine bedight his love retains,
And for the village he forsakes the plains.
Return, my Lubberkin, these ditties hear;
Spells will I try, and spells shall ease my care.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
When first the year, I heard the cuckow sing,
And call with welcome note the budding spring,
I straitway set a running with such haste,
Deb'rah, that won the smock, scarce ran so fast.
'Till spent for lack of breath, quite weary grown,
Upon a rising bank I sat adown,
Then doff'd my shoe, and, by my troth, I swear,
Therein I spy'd this yellow frizled hair,
As like to Lubberkin's in curl and hue,
As if upon his comely pate it grew.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
At eve last midsummer no sleep I sought,
But to the field a bag of hemp-seed brought,
I scattered round the seed on every side,
And three times, in a trembling accent, cry'd,
"This hemp-seed with my virgin hand I sow,
"Who shall my true-love be, the crop shall mow."
I strait look'd back, and, if my eyes speak truth,
With his keen scythe behind me came the youth.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
Last Valentine, the day when birds of kind
Their paramours with mutual chirpings find;
I rearly rose, just at the break of day,
Before the sun had chas'd the stars away;
A-field I went, amid the morning dew,
To milk my kine (for so should huswives do)
Thee first I spy'd; and the first swain we see,
In spite of fortune, shall our true-love be;
See, Lubberkin, each bird his partner take;
And canst thou, then, thy sweetheart dear forsake?
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
Last May-day fair I search'd to find a snail
That might my secret lover's name reveal;
Upon a gooseberry bush a snail I found,
For, always, snails near sweetest fruit abound.
I seiz'd the vermin, home I quickly sped,
And on the hearth the milk-white embers spread.
Slow crawl'd the snail, and, if I right can spell,
In the soft ashes mark'd a curious L:
Oh, may this wond'rous omen lucky prove!
For L is found in Lubberkin and Love.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
Two hazle nuts I threw into the flame,
And to each nut I gave a sweet-heart's name.
This with the loudest bounce me sore amaz'd,
That in a flame of brightest colour blaz'd.
As blaz'd the nut so may thy passion grow;
For 'twas thy nut that did so brightly glow.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
As peascods once I pluck'd, I chanc'd to see
One that was closely fill'd with three times three,
Which when I cropp'd I safely home convey'd,
And o'er the door the spell in secret laid;
My wheel I turn'd, and sung a ballad new,
While from the spindle I the fleeces drew;
The latch mov'd up, when who should first come in,
But, in his proper person,—Lubberkin.
I broke my yarn, surpris'd the sight to see;
Sure sign that he would break his word with me.
Eftsoons I join'd it with my wonted slight;
So may again his love with mine unite!
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
This Lady-fly I take from off the grass,
Whose spotted back might scarlet red surpass.
"Fly, Lady-bird, north, south, or east or west,
"Fly where the man is found that I love best."
He leaves my hand! see, to the west he's flown,
To call my true-love from the faithless town.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
I pare this pippin round and round again,
My shepherd's name to flourish on the plain.
I fling th' unbroken paring o'er my head,
Upon the grass a perfect L is read;
Yet on my heart a fairer L is seen
Than what the paring marks upon the green.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
This pippin shall another tryal make;
See from the core two kernels brown I take;
This on my cheek for Lubberkin is worn,
And Boobyclod on t'other side is born.
But Boobyclod soon drops upon the ground,
A certain token that his love's unsound,
While Lubberkin sticks firmly to the last;
Oh were his lips to mine but join'd so fast!
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
As Lubberkin once slept beneath a tree,
I twitch'd his dangling garter from his knee;
He wist not when the hempen string I drew.
Now mine I quickly doff, of inkle blue;
Together fast I tye the garters twain,
And, while I knit the knot, repeat the strain:
"Three times a true-love's knot I tye secure;
"Firm be the knot, firm may his love endure."
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
As I was wont, I trudg'd last market-day
To town, with new-laid eggs preserv'd in hay.
I made my market long before 'twas night;
My purse grew heavy and my basket light.
Strait to the 'pothecary's shop I went,
And in love-powder all my money spent;
Behap what will, next Sunday, after prayers,
When to the alehouse Lubberkin repairs,
These golden flies into his mug I'll throw,
And soon the swain with fervent love shall glow.
With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.
But hold, our Lightfoot barks, and cocks his ears,
O'er yonder stile see Lubberkin appears.
He comes, he comes, Hobnelia's not bewray'd,
Nor shall she, crown'd with willow, die a maid.
He vows, he swears, he'll give me a green gown;
Oh dear! I fall adown, adown, adown;
FRIDAY; OR, THE DIRGE.
BUMKINET, GRUBBINOL.
WHY, Grubbinol, dost thou so wistful seem?
There's sorrow in thy look, if right I deem.
'Tis true, yon oaks with yellow tops appear,
And chilly blasts begin to nip the year;
From the tall elm a shower of leaves is born,
And their lost beauty riven beeches mourn.
Yet ev'n this season pleasance blith affords,
Now the squeez'd press foams with our apple hoards.
Come, let us hye, and quaff a cheary bowl,
Let cyder now wash sorrow from thy soul.
Ah Bumkinet! since thou from hence wert gone,
From these sad plains all merriment is flown;
Should I reveal my grief 'twould spoil thy chear,
And make thine eye o'erflow with many a tear.
Hang sorrow! Let's to yonder hut repair,
And, with trim sonnets, cast away our care.
Gillian of Croydon well thy pipe can play;
Thou sing'st, most sweet, O'er hills and far away.
Of Patient Grissel I devise to sing,
And catches quaint shall make the vallies ring.
Come, Grubbinol, beneath this shelter, come,
From hence we view our flocks securely roam.
Yes, blithesome lad, a tale I mean to sing,
But with my woe shall distant vallies ring,
The tale shall make our kidlings droop their head;
For, woe is me!—our Blouzelind is dead.
Is Blouzelinda dead? farewel my glee!
No happiness is now reserv'd for me.
As the wood pigeon cooes without his mate,
So shall my doleful dirge bewail her fate.
Of Blouzelinda fair I mean to tell,
The peerless maid that did all maids excel.
Henceforth, the morn shall dewy sorrow shed,
And ev'ning tears upon the grass be spread;
The rolling streams with wat'ry grief shall flow,
And winds shall moan aloud—when loud they blow.
Henceforth, as oft as autumn shall return,
The dropping trees, whene'er it rains, shall mourn;
This season quite shall strip the country's pride;
For 'twas in Autumn Blouzelinda dy'd
Where'er I gad, I Blouzelind shall view,
Woods, dairy, barn, and mows, our passion knew.
When I direct my eyes to yonder wood,
Fresh rising sorrow curdles in my blood.
Thither I've often been the damsel's guide.
When rotten sticks our fuel have supply'd;
There I remember how her faggots large,
Were frequently these happy shoulders charge.
Sometimes this crook drew hazel boughs adown,
And stuff'd her apron wide with nuts so brown;
Or, when her feeding hogs had miss'd their way,
Or wallowing 'mid a feast of acorns lay;
Th' untoward creatures to the stye I drove,
And whistled all the way—or told my love.
If by the dairy's hatch I chance to hie,
I shall her goodly countenance espy;
For there her goodly countenance I've seen,
Set off with kerchief starch'd and pinners clean.
Sometimes, like wax, she rolls the butter round,
Or with the wooden lilly prints the pound.
Whilom I've seen her skim the clouted cream,
And press from spongy curds the milky stream.
But now, alas! these ears shall hear no more
The whining swine surround the dairy door,
No more her care shall fill the hollow tray,
To fat the guzzling hogs with floods of whey.
Lament, ye swine, in gruntings spend your grief,
For you, like me, have lost your sole relief.
When in the barn the sounding flail I ply,
Where, from her sieve, the chaff was wont to fly,
The poultry there will seem around to stand,
Waiting upon her charitable hand.
No succour meet the poultry now can find,
For they, like me, have lost their Blouzelind.
Whenever by yon barley mow I pass
Before my eyes will trip the tidy lass.
I pitch'd the sheaves (oh could I do so now)
Which she in rows pil'd on the growing mow.
There every deale my heart by love was gain'd,
There the sweet kiss my courtship has explain'd,
Ah, Blouzelind! that mow I ne'er shall see,
But thy memorial will revive in me.
Lament, ye fields, and rueful symptoms show;
Henceforth, let not the smelling primrose grow;
Let weeds, instead of butter-flowers, appear,
And meads, instead of daisies, hemlock bear;
For cowslips sweet let dandelion spread,
For Blouzelinda, blithsome maid, is dead!
Lament, ye swains, and o'er her grave bemoan,
And spell ye right this verse upon her stone:
"Here Blouzelinda lies—Alas, alas!
"Weep, shepherds,—and remember flesh is grass.
Albeit thy songs are sweeter to mine ear,
Than, to the thirsty cattle, rivers clear;
Or winter porridge to the lab'ring youth,
Or buns and sugar to the damsel's tooth;
Yet Blouzelinda's name shall tune my lay;
Of her I'll sing for ever and for aye.
When Blouzelind expir'd, the weather's bell
Before the drooping flock toll'd forth her knell!
The solemn death-watch click'd the hour she dy'd,
And chilling crickets in the chimney cry'd;
The boding raven on her cottage sate,
And, with hoarse croaking, warn'd us of her fate;
The lambkin, which her wonted tendance bred,
Dropp'd on the plains, that fatal instant, dead;
Swarm'd on a rotten stick the bees I spy'd,
Which erst I saw when goody Dobson dy'd,
How shall I, void of tears, her death relate,
While on her darling's bed her mother sate;
These words the dying Blouzelinda spoke;
And of the dead let none the will revoke.
"Mother," quoth she, "let not the poultry need,
And give the goose wherewith to raise her breed;
Be these my sister's care—and, ev'ry morn,
Amid the ducklings let her scatter corn;
The sickly calf, that's hous'd, be sure to tend,
Feed him with milk, and from bleak colds defend.
Yet, e're I die—See, mother, yonder shelf,
There secretly I've hid my worldly pelf.
Twenty good shillings in a rag I laid;
Be ten the parson's, for my sermon, paid.
The rest is your's—my spinning-wheel and rake,
Let Susan keep for her dear sister's sake;
My new straw hat, that's trimly lin'd with green,
Let Peggy wear; for she's a damsel clean.
My leathern bottle, long in harvests try'd,
Be Grubbinol's—this silver ring beside:
Three silver pennies, and a nine-pence bent,
A token kind, to Bumkinet is sent."
Thus spoke the maiden, while her mother cry'd,
And peaceful, like the harmless lamb, she dy'd.
To show their love, the neibours, far and near,
Follow'd, with wistful look, the damsel's bier.
Sprigg'd rosemary the lads and lasses bore,
While, dismally, the parson walk'd before.
Upon her grave the rosemary they threw,
The daisie, butter-flower, and endive blue.
After the good man warn'd us from his text,
That none could tell whose turn would be the next;
He said, that Heaven would take her soul, no doubt,
And spoke the hour-glass, in her praise—quite out.
To her sweet mem'ry flow'ry garlands strung,
O'er her now empty seat aloft were hung.
With wicker rods we fenc'd her tomb around,
To ward, from man and beast, the hallow'd ground,
Lest her new grave the parson's cattle raze;
For both his horse and cow the church-yard graze.
Now we trudg'd homeward to her mother's farm,
To drink new cyder mull'd, with ginger warm:
For gaffer Tread-well told us, by the by,
Excessive sorrow is exceeding dry.
While bulls bear horns upon their curled brow,
Or lasses with soft stroakings milk the cow;
While paddling ducks the standing lake desire,
Or batt'ning hogs roll in the sinking mire;
While moles the crumbled earth in hillocks raise,
So long shall swains tell Blouzelinda's praise.
Thus wail'd the louts in melancholy strain,
'Till bonny Susan sped a-cross the plain;
They seiz'd the lass, in apron clean array'd,
And to the ale-house forc'd the willing maid:
In ale and kisses they forget their cares,
And Susan Blouzelinda's loss repairs.
SATURDAY; OR, THE FLIGHTS.
SUBLIMER strains, O rustic muse, prepare;
Forget, a-while, the barn and dairy's care;
Thy homely voice to loftier numbers raise;
The drunkard's flights require sonorous lays,
With Bowzybeus songs exalt thy verse,
While rocks and woods the various notes rehearse.
'Twas in the season when the reapers toil
Of the ripe harvest 'gan to rid the soil;
Wide through the field was seen a goodly rout,
Clean damsels bound the gather'd sheafs about;
The lads, with sharpen'd hook and sweating brow,
Cut down the labours of the winter plow.
To the near hedge young Susan steps aside,
She feign'd her coat or garter was unty'd,
Whate'er she did, she stoop'd adown unseen,
And merry reapers, what they list, will ween.
Soon she rose up, and cry'd with voice so shrill,
That echo answer'd from the distant hill;
The youths and damsels ran to Susan's aid,
Who thought some adder had the lass dismay'd.
When fast asleep they Bowzybeus spy'd,
His hat and oaken staff lay close beside.
That Bowzybeus who could sweetly sing,
Or, with the rosin'd bow, torment the string:
That Bowzybeus who, with finger's speed,
Could call soft warblings from the breathing reed;
That Bowzybeus who, with jocund tongue,
Ballads, and roundelays, and catches sung.
They loudly laugh to see the damsel's fright,
And in disport surround the drunken wight.
Ah, Bowzybee, why didst thou stay so long?
The mugs were large, the drink was wond'rous strong!
Thou should'st have left the fair before 'twas night,
But thou sat'st toping till the morning light.
Cic'ly, brisk maid, steps forth before the rout,
And kiss'd with smacking lip, the snoring lout;
For custom says, "Whoe'er this venture proves,
For such a kiss demands a pair of gloves."
By her example Dorcas bolder grows,
And plays a tickling straw within his nose.
He rubs his nostril, and, in wonted joke,
The sneering swains with stamm'ring speech bespoke.
"To you, my lads, I'll sing my carrols o'er;
As for the maids—I've something else in store.
No sooner 'gan he raise his tuneful song,
But lads and lasses round about him throng.
Not ballad-singer, plac'd above the crowd,
Sings with a note so shrilling sweet and loud,
Nor parish-clerk, who calls the psalm so clear,
Like Bowzybeus sooths th' attentive ear.
Of nature's laws his carols first begun,
Why the grave owl can never face the sun.
For owls, as swains observe, detest the light,
And only sing and seek their prey by night.
How turnips hide their swelling heads below,
And how the closing colworts upwards grow;
How Will-a-Wisp misleads night-faring clowns,
O'er hills, and sinking bogs, and pathless downs.
Of stars he told, that shoot with shining trail,
And of the glow-worms light that gilds his tail.
He sung, where wood-cocks in the summer feed,
And in what climates they renew their breed;
Some think to northern coasts their flight they tend,
Or to the moon, in midnight hours, ascend.
Where swallows in the winter's season keep.
And how the drowsy bat and dormouse sleep.
How nature does the puppy's eyelid close,
Till the bright sun has nine times set and rose;
For huntsmen, by their long experience find,
That puppies, still, nine rolling suns are blind.
Now he goes on, and sings of fairs and shows;
For still new fairs before his eyes arose.
How pedlars stalls with glitt'ring toys are laid,
The various fairings of the country-maid.
Long silken laces hang upon the twine,
And rows of pins and amber bracelets shine;
How the tight lass knives, combs, and scissars spies,
And looks on thimbles with desiring eyes.
Of lott'ries, next, with tuneful note, he told,
Where silver spoons are won, and rings of gold.
The lads and lasses trudge the street along,
And all the fair is crouded in his song.
The mountebank now treads the stage, and sells
His pills, his balsams and his ague-spells;
Now o'er and o'er the nimble tumbler springs,
And on the rope the vent'rous maiden swings;
Jack Pudding, in his party-colour'd jacket,
Tosses the glove, and jokes at every packet.
Of Raree-shows he sung, and Punch's feats,
Of pockets pick'd in crowds, and various cheats.
Then sad he sung, The Children in the Wood.
Ah barb'rous uncle, stain'd with infant blood;
How blackberries they pluck'd in desarts wild,
And, fearless, at the glittering fauchion smil'd;
Their little corps the robin-red-breasts found,
And strew'd, with pious bill, the leaves around.
Ah gentle birds! if this verse lasts so long,
Your names shall live for ever in my song.
For buxom Joan he sung the doubtful strife,
How the sly sailor made the maid a wife.
To louder strains he rais'd his voice, to tell
What woeful wars in Chevy-chace befel,
When "Piercy drove the deer with hound and horn,
Wars to be wept by children yet unborn!"
Ah With'rington, more years thy life had crown'd,
If thou hadst never heard the horn or hound!
Yet shall the 'squire who fought on bloody stumps,
By future bards be wail'd in doleful dumps.
All in the land of Essex next he chaunts,
How to sleek mares starch Quakers turn gallants:
How the grave brother stood on bank so green.
Happy for him if mares had never been!
Then he was seiz'd with a religious qualm,
And, on a sudden, sung the hundredth psalm.
He sung of Taffey Welch, and Sawney Scot,
Lilly-bullero, and the Irish Trot.
Why should I tell of Bateman or of Shore,
Or Wantley's dragon slain by valiant Moore,
The bower of Rosamond, or Robin Hood,
And how the grass now grows where Troy town stood?
His carrols ceas'd: the list'ning maids and swains
Seem still to hear some soft imperfect strains.
Sudden he rose; and, as he reels along,
Swears kisses sweet should well reward his song.
The damsels laughing fly: the giddy clown
Again upon a wheatsheaf drops adown;
The pow'r that guards the drunk his sleep attends,
Till, ruddy, like his face, the sun descends.
MAC FLECKNOE.
The severity of this satire, and the excellence of its versification, give it a distinguished rank in this species of composition. At present, an ordinary reader would scarce suppose that Shadwell, who is here meant by Mac Flecknoe, was worth being chastised, and that Dryden's descending to such game was like an eagle's stooping to catch flies. The truth, however, is, Shadwell, at one time, held divided reputation with this great poet. Every age produces its fashionable dunces, who, by following the transient topic, or humour, of the day, supply talkative ignorance with materials for conversation.
ALL human things are subject to decay,
And, when Fate summons, monarchs must obey.
This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young
Was call'd to empire, and had govern'd long;
In prose and verse was own'd, without dispute,
Through all the realms of Nonsense, absolute.
This aged prince, now flourishing in peace,
And bless'd with issue of a large increase;
Worn out with business, did, at length debate
To settle the succession of the state:
And pond'ring which, of all his sons, was fit
To reign, and wage immortal war with Wit,
Cry'd, 'Tis resolv'd; for Nature pleads, that he
Should only rule, who most resembles me.
Sh—, alone, my perfect image bears,
Mature in dulness from his tender years:
Sh—, alone, of all my sons, was he,
Who stands confirm'd in full stupidity.
The rest, to some faint meaning make pretence;
But Sh— never deviates into sense.
Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through, and make a lucid interval;
But Sh—'s genuine night admits no ray;
His rising fogs prevail upon the day.
Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye,
And seems design'd for thoughtless majesty:
Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain,
And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.
Heywood and Shirley were but types of thee,
Thou last great prophet of Tautology.
Ev'n I, a dunce of more renown than they,
Was sent before but to prepare thy way;
And, coarsely clad in Norwich drugget, came
To teach the nations in thy greater name.
My warbling lute, the lute I whilom strung,
When to king John of Portugal I sung,
Was but the prelude to that glorious day,
When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way,
With well-tim'd oars, before the royal barge,
Swell'd with the pride of thy celestial charge;
And, big with hymn, commander of an host,
The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost.
Methinks I see the new Arion sail,
The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.
At thy well-sharpen'd thumb, from shore to shore
The trebles squeak for fear, the bases roar:
Echoes from Pissing-Alley Sh— call,
And Sh— they resound from Aston-Hall.
About thy boat the little fishes throng,
As at the morning toast that floats along.
Sometimes, as prince of thy harmonious band,
Thou wield'st thy papers in thy threshing hand.
St. Andre's feet ne'er kept more equal time,
Not ev'n the feet of thy own Psyche's rhime:
Though they in number as in sense excel;
So just, so like Tautology they fell,
That, pale with envy, Singleton forswore
The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore,
And vow'd he ne'er wou'd act Villerius more.
Here stopt the good old sire, and wept for joy,
In silent raptures of the hopeful boy.
All arguments, but most his plays, persuade,
That for anointed dulness he was made.
Close to the walls which fair Augusta bind,
(The fair Augusta, much to fears inclin'd)
An antient fabric, rais'd t' inform the sight,
There stood of yore, and Barbican it hight;
A watch-tow'r once; but now, so fate ordains,
Of all the pile an empty name remains:
From its old ruins brothel-houses rise,
Scenes of lewd loves, and of polluted joys,
Where their vast courts the mother-strumpets keep,
And, undisturb'd by watch, in silence sleep.
Near these a nursery erects its head,
Where queens are form'd, and future heroes bred;
Where unfledg'd actors learn to laugh and cry,
Where infant punks their tender voices try,
And little Maximins the Gods defy.
Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,
Nor greater Johnson dares in socks appear;
But gentle Simkin just reception finds
Amidst this monument of vanish'd minds:
Pure clinches the suburbian muse affords,
And Panton waging harmless war with words.
Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,
Ambitiously design'd his Sh—'s throne:
For ancient Decker prophesy'd, long since,
That in this pile should reign a mighty prince,
Born for a scourge of Wit, and flail of sense:
To whom true dulness should some Psyche's owe,
But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;
Humourists and Hypocrites it should produce,
Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.
Now empress Fame had publish'd the renown
Of Sh—'s coronation through the town.
Rouz'd by report of Fame, the nations meet,
From near Bun-hill, and distant Watling-street.
No Persian carpets spread th' imperial way,
But scatter'd limbs of mangled poets lay:
From dusty shops neglected authors come,
Martyrs of pies, and reliques of the bum.
Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby, there lay;
But loads of Sh— almost choak'd the way.
Bilk'd Stationers for yeomen stood prepar'd,
And H—n was captain of the guard.
The hoary prince in majesty appear'd,
High on a throne of his own labours rear'd.
At his right hand our young Ascanius sate,
Rome's other hope, and pillar of the state.
His brows thick fogs, instead of glories, grace,
And lambent Dulness play'd around his face.
As Hannibal did to the altars come,
Swore by his sire a mortal foe to Rome;
So Sh— swore, nor should his vow be vain,
That he, till death, true dulness would maintain;
And, in his father's right, and realm's defence,
Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense.
The king himself the sacred unction made,
As king by office, and as priest by trade.
In his sinister hand, instead of ball,
He plac'd a mighty mug of potent ale;
Love's kingdom to his right he did convey,
At once his sceptre, and his rule of sway;
Whose righteous lore the prince had practis'd young,
And from whose loins recorded Psyche sprung.
His temples, last, with poppies were o'erspread,
That, nodding, seem'd to consecrate his head.
Just at the point of time, if fame not lye,
On his left hand twelve rev'rend owls did fly.
So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tyber's brook,
Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.
Th' admiring throng loud acclamations make,
And omens of his future empire take.
The sire then shook the honours of his head,
And from his brows damps of oblivion shed
Full on the filial dullness: long he stood,
Repelling from his breast the raging god;
At length burst out in this prophetic mood:
"Heav'ns bless my son, from Ireland let him reign
To far Barbadoes on the western main;
Of his dominion may no end be known,
And greater than his father's be his throne;
Beyond Love's kingdom let him stretch his pen!"—
He paus'd, and all the people cry'd, Amen.
Then thus continu'd he: "My son, advance
Still in new impudence, new ignorance.
Success let others teach, learn thou, from me,
Pangs without birth, and fruitless industry.
Let Virtuoso's in five years be writ;
Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit.
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,
And, in their folly, shew the writer's wit.
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their author's want of sense.
Let 'em be all by thy own model made
Of dulness, and desire no foreign aid;
That they to future ages may be known,
Not copies drawn, but issue of thy own.
Nay, let thy men of wit too be the same,
All full of thee, and diff'ring but in name.
But let no alien S—dl—y interpose,
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.
And, when false flowers of Rhetoric thou wouldst cull,
Trust Nature, do not labour to be dull;
But write thy best, and top; and, in each line,
Sir Formal's oratory will be thine:
Sir Formal, tho' unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy Northern Dedications fill.
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Johnson's hostile name.
Let father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise,
And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.
Thou art my blood, where Johnson has no part:
What share have we in nature or in art?
Where did his wit on Learning fix a brand,
And rail at arts he did not understand?
Where made he love in prince Nicander's vein,
Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?
Where sold he bargains, whip-stitch, kiss my arse,
Promis'd a play, and dwindled to a farce?
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whole Eth'ridge dost transfuse to thine?
But so transfus'd, as oil and waters flow;
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
This is thy province, this thy wondrous way,
New humours to invent for each new play:
This is that boasted bias of thy mind,
By which, one way, to dulness 'tis inclin'd:
Which makes thy writings lean on one side still,
And, in all changes, that way bends thy will.
Nor let thy mountain-belly make pretence
Of likeness; thine's a tympany of sense.
A tun of man in thy large bulk is writ;
But sure thou'rt but a kilderkin of wit.
Like mine, thy gentle numbers feebly creep:
Thy tragic muse gives smiles, thy comic, sleep.
With whate'er gall thou set'st thyself to write,
Thy inoffensive satires never bite.
In thy felonious heart though venom lies,
It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies.
Thy genius calls thee not to purchase fame
In keen Iambics, but mild Anagram.
Leave writing plays, and chuse for thy command
Some peaceful province in Acrostic land.
There thou may'st Wings display, and Altars raise,
And torture one poor word ten thousand ways.
Or, if thou woud'st thy different talents suit,
Set thy own songs, and sing them to thy lute."
He said; but his last words were scarcely heard:
For Bruce and Longvil had a trap prepar'd,
And down they sent the yet declaiming bard.
Sinking, he left his drugget robe behind,
Borne upwards by a subterranean wind.
The mantle sell to the young prophet's part,
With double portion of his father's art.
ON POETRY. A RHAPSODY.
Here follows one of the best versified poems in our language, and the most masterly production of its author. The severity with which Walpole is here treated, was in consequence of that minister's having refused to provide for Swift in England, when applied to for that purpose in the year 1725 (if I remember right). The severity of a poet, however, gave Walpole very little uneasiness. A man whose schemes, like this minister's, seldom extended beyond the exigency of the year, but little regarded the contempt of posterity.
ALL human race would fain be wits,
And millions miss for one that hits.
Young's universal passion, pride,
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 ev'ry fool his claim alledges,
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 heav'nly influence require,
As how to strike the Muse's lyre.
Not beggar's brat, on bulk begot;
Not bastard of a pedlar Scot;
Not boy brought up to cleaning shoes,
The spawn of Bridewell, or the stews;
Not infants dropt, the spurious pledges
Of gipsies litt'ring under hedges,
Are so disqualify'd by fate
To rise in church, or law, or state,
As he whom Phoebus, in his ire,
Hath 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 aukward, 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 brought in an attainder;
For ever fix'd by right divine
(A monarch's right) on Grub-street line.
Poor starvling 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 diff'rent spirits to discern,
And how distinguish which is which,
The poet's vein, or scribbling itch?
Then hear an old experienc'd 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 satyre, praise, or hum'rous lines;
To elegies in mournful tone,
Or prologue, sent from hand unknown.
Then, rising with Aurora's light,
The muse invok'd, 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 num'rous 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 exprest,
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,
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 surpriz'd
Are you to see it advertiz'd!
The hawker shews 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 Wills, the following day,
Lie snug, and hear what critics say.
And, if you find the gen'ral 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 judgement 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 provok'd their spight,
Depend upon't their judgement'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 doggrel Grub-street sends
Will pass for your's 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 dispos'd to rhime,
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 similies, that nothing fit;
The cant which ev'ry fool repeats,
Town jests, and coffee-house conceits;
Descriptions tedious, flat, and dry,
And introduc'd 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 pick-purse 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 diff'rent parish.
So have I seen ill-coupled hounds
Drag diff'rent 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.
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.
A prince, the moment he is crown'd,
Inherits every virtue round,
As emblems of the sov'reign pow'r,
Like other bawbles in the Tow'r:
Is gen'rous, 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:
As soon as you can hear his knell,
This God on earth turns d—l 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 fop,
His tripple-barking mouth to stop;
Or, in the iv'ry gate of dreams,
Project Excise and South-sea 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 'em 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 us'd, may serve awhile.
Proceed no further in your part,
Before you learn the terms of art;
For you can ne'er 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 oft review,
Wise Dennis, and profound Bossu.
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 out-shine us.
Then, lest with Greek he over-run ye,
Procure the book for love or money,
Translated from Boileau's translation,
And quote quotation on quotation.
At Will's you hear a poem read,
Where Battus, from the table-head,
Reclining on his elbow-chair,
Gives judgement 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 learnt, 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
The ancient name of London.
Augusta Trinobantum,
Computing by their pecks of coals,
Amount to just nine thousand souls:
These o'er their proper districts govern,
Of wit and humour judges sov'reign.
In ev'ry street a city-bard
Rules, like an alderman, his ward;
His indisputed rights extend
Through all the lane, from end to end;
The neighbours round admire his shrewdness
For songs of loyalty and lewdness;
Out-done by none in rhiming well,
Although he never learnt 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 fam'd 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 in Wapping gains renown,
And Maevius reigns o'er Kentish-town:
Tigellius, plac'd in Phoebus' car,
From Ludgate shines to Temple-bar:
Harmonious Cibber entertains
The court, with annual birth-day strains;
Whence Gay was banish'd in disgrace,
Where Pope will never show his face;
Where Y—g must torture his invention
To flatter knaves, or lose his pension.
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 ev'ry 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 ev'ry creature
Lives in a state of war, by nature.
The greater for the smallest watch,
But meddle seldom with their match.
A whale, of mod'rate 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 rhiming 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, nat'ralists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey,
And these have smaller still to bite 'em,
And so proceed
ad infinitum.
Thus ev'ry poet, in his kind,
Is bit by him that comes behind;
Who, though too little to be seen,
Can tease, 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 out-sung us;
Can personate an aukward scorn
For those who are not poets born;
And all their brother dunces lash,
Who croud the press with hourly trash.
Oh 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
Asham'd 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 down to Howard's time,
How few have reach'd the low sublime?
For, when our high-born Howard died,
Blackmore, alone, his place supplied:
And lest a chasm should intervene,
When death had finish'd Blackmore's reign,
The leaden crown devolv'd to thee,
Great
Lord Grimstone, author of a play called Love in an Hollow Tree.
poet of the Hollow-tree.
But ah! how unsecure thy throne!
A thousand bards thy right disown:
They plot to turn, in factious zeal,
Duncinea to a common-weal;
And, with rebellious arms, pretend,
An equal priv'lege 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 rhiming 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 rhimer can like Welsted sink,
His merits ballanc'd, you shall find,
The laureate leaves him far behind.
Concannen, more aspiring bard,
Soars downwards deeper by a yard.
Smart Jemmy Moor with vigour drops,
The rest pursue as thick as hops.
With heads to points the gulph they enter,
Link'd perpendicular to the center;
And, as their heels elated rise,
Their heads attempt the nether skies.
O, what indignity and shame,
To prostitute the Muse's name!
By flatt'ring —, whom Heav'n design'd
The plagues and scourges of mankind;
Bred up in ignorance and sloth,
And ev'ry vice that nurses both.
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 bind his hands,
Confest the conq'ring hero stands.
Hydaspes, Indus, and the Ganges,
Dread from his hand impending changes.
From him the Tartar, and Chinese,
Short by the knees, intreat for peace.
The consort of his throne and bed
A perfect goddess born and bred,
Appointed sov'reign judge to sit
On learning, eloquence, and wit.
Our eldest hope, divine Iülus,
(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, by delay.
Thou great vicegerent of the king,
Thy praises ev'ry 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 chuse 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 fixt 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 strow 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 mortify'd his pride,
And swore the fawning rascals ly'd.
Yet what the world refus'd 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 pow'r in Heav'n divide,
And do no wrong to either side:
They teach you how to split a hair,
Give — and Jove an equal share.
Yet, why should we be lac'd so strait?
I'll give my — 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. * * * * *
OF THE USE OF RICHES.
This poem, as Mr. Pope tells us himself, cost much attention and labour; and, from the easiness that appears in it, one would be apt to think as much.
P. WHO shall decide, when Doctors disagree,
And soundest Casuists doubt, like you and me?
You hold the word, from Jove to Momus giv'n,
That man was made the standing jest of Heav'n;
And gold but sent to keep the fools in play,
For some to heap, and some to throw away.
But I, who think more highly of our kind,
(And, surely, Heav'n and I are of a mind)
Opine, that Nature, as in duty bound,
Deep hid the shining mischief under ground:
But when, by man's audacious labour, won,
Flam'd forth this rival to its Sire, the Sun,
Then careful Heav'n supply'd two sorts of Men;
To squander These, and Those, to hide agen.
Like doctors, thus, when much dispute has pass'd,
We find our tenets just the same at last.
Both fairly owning, Riches, in effect,
No grace of Heav'n, or token of th' Elect;
Giv'n to the Fool, the Mad, the Vain, the Evil,
To Ward
John Ward, of Hackney, Esq. member of parliament, being prosecuted by the dutchess of Buckingham, and convicted of forgery, was first expelled the house, and then stood in the pillory on the 17th of March 1727. He was suspected of joining in a conveyance with Sir John Blunt, to secrete 50,000l. of that director's estate, forfeited to the South-Sea company by act of parliament. The company recovered the 50,000 l. against Ward; but he set up prior conveyances of his real estate to his brother and son, and concealed all his personal, which was computed to be 150,000 l. These conveyances being also set aside by a bill in Chancery, Ward was imprisoned, and hazarded the forfeiture of his life by not giving in his effects till the last day, which was that of his examination. During his confinement, his amusement was to give poison to dogs and cats, and see them expire by flower or quicker torments. To sum up the worth of this gentleman at the several aera's of his life; at his standing in the pillory he was worth above 200,000 l. at his commitment to prison he was worth 150,000 l. but has since been so far diminished in his reputation, as to be thought a worse man by 50 or 60,000 l.
Fr. Chartres, a man infamous for all manner of vice. When he was an ensign in the army, he was drummed out of the regiment for a cheat: he was next banished Brussels, and drummed out of Ghent on the same account. After a hundred tricks at the gaming tables, he took to lending of money at exorbitant interest, and on great penalties, accumulating praemium, interest, and capital, into a new capital, and seizing, to a minute, when the payments became due. In a word, by a constant attention to the vices, wants, and follies of mankind, he acquired an immense fortune. His house was a perpetual bawdy-house. He was twice condemned for rapes, and pardoned; but, the last time, not without imprisonment in Newgate, and large confiscations. He died in Scotland in 1731, aged 62. The populace, at his funeral, raised a great riot, almost tore the body out of the coffin, and cast dead dogs, &c. into the grave along with it. The following epitaph contains his character, very justly drawn, by Dr. Arbuthnot.
HERE continueth to rot
The body of FRANCIS CHARTRES,
Who, with an INFLEXIBLE CONSTANCY, and
INIMITABLE UNIFORMITY of life,
PERSISTED,
In spite of AGE and INFIRMITIES,
In the practice of EVERY HUMAN VICE;
Excepting PRODIGALITY and HYPOCRISY:
His insatiable AVARICE exempted him from the first,
His matchless IMPUDENCE from the last.
Nor was he more singular in the undeviating pravity
Of his manners, than successful in
Accumulating WEALTH;
For, without TRADE or PROFESSION,
Without TRUST of PUBLIC MONEY,
And without BRIBE WORTHY service,
He acquired, or, more properly, created
A MINISTERIAL ESTATE.
He was the only person of his time,
Who could CHEAT without the mask of HONESTY,
Retain his primaeval MEANNESS when possess'd of
TEN THOUSAND a year,
And having daily deserv'd the GIBBET for what he did,
Was at last condemned to it for what he could not do.
Oh indignant reader!
Think not his life useless to mankind!
PROVIDENCE conniv'd at his execrable designs,
To give to after-ages a conspicuous
PROOF, and EXAMPLE,
Of how small estimation is EXORBITANT WEALTH
In the sight of GOD, by his bestowing it on
The most UNWORTHY of ALL MORTALS.
This gentleman was worth 7000 l. a year estate in land, and about 100,000 l. in money.
Mr. Waters, the third of these worthies, was a man no way resembling the former in his military, but extremely so in his civil capacity; his great fortune having been raised by the like diligent attendance on the necessities of others. But this gentleman's history must be deferred till his death, when his worth may be known more certainly.
, to Waters, Chartres, and the Devil.
B. What Nature wants commodious Gold bestows;
'Tis thus we eat the bread another sows.
P. But how unequal it bestows, observe;
'Tis thus we riot, while, who sow it, starve:
What Nature wants (a phrase I much distrust)
Extends to Luxury, extends to Lust:
Useful, I grant, it serves what life requires,
But dreadful, too, the dark assassin hires.
B. Trade it may help, society extend:
P. But lures the Pyrate, and corrupts the Friend.
B. It raises armies in a Nation's aid:
P. But bribes a Senate, and the Land's betray'd.
In vain may Heroes fight, and Patriots rave;
If secret gold sap on from knave to knave.
Once, we confess, beneath the Patriot's cloak,
From the crack'd bag the dropping Guinea spoke
This is a true story, which happened in the reign of king William III. to an unsuspected old patriot, who coming out at the back-door from having been closeted by the king, where he had received a large bag of guineas, the bursting of the bag discovered his business there.
,
And jingling down the back-stairs, told the crew,
"Old Cato is as great a rogue as you."
Blest paper-credit! last and best supply!
That lends Corruption lighter wings to fly!
Gold, imp'd by thee, can compass hardest things,
Can pocket States, can fetch or carry Kings
In our author's time, many princes had been sent about the world, and great changes of kings projected in Europe. The Partition-treaty had disposed of Spain; France had set up a king for England, who was sent to Scotland, and back again; king Stanislaus was sent to Poland and back again; the duke of Anjou was sent to Spain, and don Carlos to Italy.
;
A single leaf shall waft an army o'er,
Or ship off Senates to some distant shore
This alludes to several ministers, counsellors, and patriots banished in our times to Siberia, and to that more glorious fate of the Parliament of Paris, banished to Pontoise in the year 1720.
;
A leaf, like Sibyl's, scatter to and fro
Our fates and fortunes, as the wind shall blow:
Pregnant with thousands flits the scrap unseen,
And, silent, sells a King, or buys a Queen.
Oh! that such bulky bribes as all might see,
Still, as of old, incumber'd Villainy!
Could France or Rome divert our brave designs,
With all their brandies, or with all their wines?
What could they more than Knights and 'Squires confound,
Or water all the Quorum ten miles round?
A statesman's slumbers how this speech would spoil!
"Sir, Spain has sent a thousand jars of oil;
"Huge bales of British cloth blockade the door;
"A hundred oxen at your levee roar."
Poor Avarice one torment more would find;
Nor could Profusion squander all in kind.
Astride his cheese Sir Morgan might we meet;
And Worldly
Some misers of great wealth, proprietors of the coal-mines, had entered, at this time, into an association to keep up coals to an extravagant price, whereby the poor were reduced almost to starve; till one of them taking the advantage of underselling the rest, defeated the design. One of these misers was worth 10,000 l. another 7000 l. a year.
crying coals from street to street,
Whom with a wig so wild, and mien so maz'd,
Pity mistakes for some poor tradesman craz'd.
Had
Sir William Colepeper, Bart. a person of an ancient family and ample fortune, without any other quality of a gentleman; who, after ruining himself at the gaming-table, passed the rest of his days in sitting there to see the ruin of others; preferring to subsist upon borrowing and begging, rather than to enter into any reputable method of life, and refusing a post in the army which was offered him.
Colepeper's whole wealth been hops and hogs,
Could he himself have sent it to the dogs?
His Grace will game: to White's a Bull be led,
With spurning heels, and with a butting head.
To White's be carry'd, as to ancient games,
Fair Coursers, Vases, and alluring Dames.
Shall, then, Uxorio, if the stakes he sweep,
Bear home six Whores, and make his Lady weep?
Or soft Adonis, so perfum'd and fine,
Drive to St. James's a whole herd of swine?
Oh filthy check on all industrious skill,
To spoil the nation's last great trade, Quadrille!
Since, then, my Lord, on such a World we fall,
What say you? B. Say? Why take it, Gold and all.
P. What Riches give us, let us, then, enquire:
Meat, Fire, and Cloaths. B. What more? P. Meat, Cloaths, and Fire.
Is this too little? would you more than live?
Alas! 'tis more than
One who, being possessed of 300,000 l. laid down his coach because interest was reduced from 5 to 4 per cent. and then put 70,000 l. into the Charitable Corporation, for better interest: which sum having lost, he took it so much to heart, that he kept his chamber ever after. It is thought he would not have out-lived it, but that he was heir to another considerable estate, which he daily expected; and that, by this course of life, he saved both clothes and all other expences.
Turner finds they give.
Alas! 'tis more than (all his visions past)
Unhappy
A nobleman of great qualities; but as unfortunate in the application of them, as if they had been vices and follies.
Wharton, waking, found at last!
What can they give? to dying
A citizen whose rapacity obtained him the name of Vulture Hopkins. He lived worthless, but died worth 300,000 l. which he would give to no person living, but left it so as not to be inherited till after the second generation. His council representing to him how many years it must be before this could take effect, and that his money could only lie at interest all that time, he expressed great joy thereat, and said, "They would then be as long in spending, as he had been in getting it." But the Chancery afterwards set aside the will, and gave it to the heir at law.
Hopkins, Heirs;
To Chartres, Vigour;
Japhet Crook, alias Sir Peter Stranger, was punished with the loss of those parts, for having forged a conveyance of an estate to himself, upon which he took up several thousand pounds. He was at the same time sued in Chancery, for having fraudulently obtained a will, by which he possessed ano
her considerable estate, in wrong of the brother of the deceased. By these means he was worth a great sum, which (in reward for the small loss of his ears) he enjoyed in prison till his death, and quietly left to his executor.
Japhet, Nose and Ears?
Can they, in gems, bid pallid Hippia glow;
In Fulvia's buckle ease the throbs below:
Or heal, old Narses, thy obscener ail,
With all th' imbroid'ry plaister'd at thy tail?
They might (were Harpax not too wise to spend)
Give Harpax self the blessing of a friend;
Or find some Doctor that would save the life
Of wretched Shylock, spite of Shylock's Wife:
But thousands die, without or this or that,
Die, and endow a College, or a Cat
A famous dutchess of Richmond, in her last will, left considerable legacies and annuities to her cats.
.
To some, indeed, Heav'n grants the happier fate,
T' enrich a bastard, or a son they hate.
Perhaps you think the poor might have their part.
Bond damns the poor
In the year 1730, a corporation was established to lend money to the poor upon pledges, by the name of the Charitable Corporation. It was under the direction of the Right Honourable Sir R. S. Sir Arch. Grant, Mr. Dennis Bond, Mr. Burroughs, &c. But the whole was turned only to an iniquitous method of enriching particular people, to the ruin of such numbers, that it became a parliamentary concern to endeavour the relief of those unhappy sufferers; and three of the managers, who were members of the house, were expelled. That "God hates the poor," and, "That every man in want is knave or fool, &c." were the genuine apothegms of some of the persons here mentioned.
, and hates them from his heart:
The grave Sir Gilbert holds it for a rule,
That every man in want is knave or fool:
"God cannot love (says Blunt, with tearless eyes)
"The wretch he starves"—and piously denies:
But the good Bishop, with a meeker air,
Admits, and leaves them, Providence's care.
Yet, to be just to these poor men of pelf,
Each does but hate his neighbour as himself:
Damn'd to the mines, an equal fate betides
The Slave that digs it, and the Slave that hides.
B. Who suffer thus, mere Charity should own,
Must act on motives powerful, tho' unknown.
P. Some War, some Plague, or Famine they foresee,
Some Revelation hid from you and me.
Why Shylock wants a meal the cause is found,
He thinks a loaf will rise to fifty pound.
What made Directors cheat in South-sea year?
To live on
In the extravagance and luxury of the South-Sea year, the price of a haunch of venison was from three to five pounds.
Ven'son when it sold so dear.
Ask you why
Many people, about the year 1733, had a conceit that such a thing was intended; of which, 'tis not improbable, this lady might have some intimation.
Phryne the whole Auction buys?
Phryne foresees a general Excise.
Why she and Sappho raise that monstrous sum?
Alas! they fear a man will cost a plum.
Wise
Peter Walter, a person not only eminent in the wisdom of his profession, as a dextrous attorney, but allowed to be a good, if not a safe conveyancer; extremely respected by the nobility of this land, though free from all manner of luxury and ostentation: his wealth was never seen, and his bounty never heard of; except to his own son, for whom he procured an employment of considerable profit, of which he gave him as much as was NECESSARY. Therefore, the taxing this gentleman with any Ambition, is, certainly, a great wrong to him.
Peter sees the world's respect for Gold,
And, therefore, hopes this nation may be sold:
Glorious Ambition! Peter, swell thy store,
And be what Rome's great
A Roman lawyer, so rich as to purchase the empire, when it was set to sale upon the death of Pertinax.
Didius was before.
The crown of Poland, venal twice an age,
To just three millions stinted modest
The two persons here mentioned were of quality, each of whom, in the time of the Missisippi, despised to realize above 300,000l. The gentleman, with a view to the purchase of the crown of Poland; the lady, on a vision of the like royal nature. They since retired into Spain, where they are still in search of gold in the mines of the Asturies.
Gage.
But nobler scenes Maria's dreams unfold,
Hereditary Realms, and worlds of Gold.
Congenial souls! whose life one Av'rice joins,
And one fate buries in th' Asturian Mines.
Much injur'd
Sir John Blunt, originally a scrivener, was one of the first projectors of the South-Sea company, and afterwards one of the directors and chief managers of the famous scheme in 1720. H
was also one of those who suffered most severely by the bill of pains and penalties on the said directors. He was a dissenter of a most religious deportment, and professed to be a great believer. Whether he did really credit the prophecy here mentioned, is not certain; but it was constantly in this very style he declaimed against the corruption and luxury of the age, the partiality of parliaments, and the misery of party-spirit. He was particularly eloquent against avarice in great and noble persons, of which he had, indeed, lived to see many miserable examples. He died in the year 1732.
Blunt! why bears he Britain's hate?
A wizard told him in these words our fate:
"At length, Corruption, like a gen'ral flood,
(So long by watchful ministers withstood)
Shall deluge all; and Av'rice creeping on,
Spread like a low-born mist, and blot the Sun;
Statesman and Patriot ply alike the Stocks,
Peeress and Butler share alike the Box,
And Judges job, and Bishops bite the town,
And mighty Dukes pack cards for half a crown.
See Britain sunk in lucre's sordid charms,
And France reveng'd of Anne's and Edward's arms!"
'Twas no court-badge, great Scriv'ner, fir'd thy brain,
Nor lordly Luxury, nor City Gain:
No, 'twas thy righteous end, asham'd to see
Senates degen'rate, Patriots disagree,
And nobly wishing Party-rage to cease,
To buy both sides, and give thy country peace.
"All this is madness," cries a sober sage:
But who, my friend, has reason in his rage?
"The ruling passion, be it what it will,
The ruling passion conquers Reason still."
Less mad, the wildest whimsey we can frame,
Than ev'n that passion, if it has no Aim;
For tho' such motives Folly you may call,
The Folly's greater to have none at all.
Hear, then, the truth: "'Tis Heav'n each passion sends,
And diff'rent men directs to diff'rent ends.
Extremes in Nature equal good produce,
Extremes in Man concur to gen'ral use."
Ask we what makes one keep, and one bestow?
That Pow'r who bids the ocean ebb and flow;
Bids seed-time, harvest, equal course maintain,
Thro' reconcil'd extremes of drought and rain,
Builds Life on Death, on Change Duration founds,
And gives th' eternal wheels to know their rounds.
Riches, like insects, when conceal'd they lie,
Wait but for wings, and, in their season, fly.
Who sees pale Mammon pine amidst his store,
Sees but a backward steward for the Poor;
This year a Reservoir, to keep and spare;
The next, a Fountain, spouting thro' his Heir,
In lavish streams to quench a Country's thirst,
And men and dogs shall drink him till they burst.
Old Cotta sham'd his fortune and his birth,
Yet was not Cotta void of wit or worth:
What tho' (the use of barb'rous spits forgot)
His kitchen vy'd, in coolness, with his grot?
His court with nettles, moats with cresses stor'd,
With soups unbought, and sallads, bless'd his board?
If Cotta liv'd on pulse, it was no more
Than Bramins, Saints, and Sages did before;
To cram the Rich was prodigal expence;
And who would take the Poor from Providence?
Like some lone Chartreux stands the good old Hall,
Silence without, and fasts within the wall;
No rafter'd roofs with dance and tabor sound,
No noontide bell invites the country round;
Tenants with sighs the smoakless tow'rs survey,
And turn th' unwilling steeds another way:
Benighted wanderers, the forest o'er,
Curse the sav'd candle, and unop'ning door;
While the gaunt mastiff growling at the gate,
Affrights the beggar whom he longs to eat.
Not so his Son; he mark'd this oversight,
And then mistook reverse of wrong for right.
(For what to shun will no great knowledge need,
But what to follow, is a task indeed.)
Yet sure, of qualities deserving praise,
More go to ruin Fortunes, than to raise.
What slaughter'd hecatombs, what floods of wine,
Fill the capacious 'Squire, and deep Divine!
Yet no mean motives this profusion draws,
His oxen perish in his country's cause;
'Tis George and Liberty that crowns the cup,
And zeal for that great House which eats him up.
The woods recede around the naked seat;
The Sylvans groan—no matter—for the Fleet:
Next goes his wool—to clothe our valiant bands;
Last, for his Country's Love, he sells his Lands.
To town he comes, completes the nation's hope,
And heads the bold Train-bands, and burns a Pope.
And shall not Britain now reward his toils,
Britain, that pays her Patriots with her Spoils?
In vain at Court the Bankrupt pleads his cause,
His thankless Country leaves him to her laws.
The Sense to value Riches, with the Art
T' enjoy them, and the Virtue to impart,
Not meanly, nor ambitiously pursu'd,
Not sunk by sloth, not rais'd by servitude;
To balance Fortune by a just expence,
Join with Oeconomy, Magnificence;
With Splendor, Charity; with Plenty, Health;
Oh teach us, Bathurst! yet unspoil'd by wealth!
That secret rare, between th' extremes to move
Of mad Good-nature, and of mean Self-love.
B. To Worth or Want well weigh'd, be Bounty giv'n,
And ease, or emulate, the care of Heav'n;
(Whose measure full o'erflows on human race)
Mend Fortune's fault, and justify her grace.
Wealth in the gross is death; but life diffus'd;
As poison heals, in just proportion us'd:
In heaps, like Ambergrise, a stink it lies,
But well dispers'd, is incense to the Skies.
P. Who starves by Nobles, or with Nobles eats?
The Wretch that trusts them, and the Rogue that cheats.
Is there a Lord, who knows a chearful noon
Without a Fiddler, Flatt'rer, or Buffoon?
Whose table, Wit, or modest Merit share,
Un-elbow'd by a Gamester, Pimp, or Play'r?
Who copies Your's, or
Edward Harley earl of Oxford, the son of Robert, created earl of Oxford, and earl Mortimer, by queen Anne.
Oxford's better part,
To ease th' oppress'd, and raise the sinking heart?
Where-e'er he shines, oh Fortune, gild the scene,
And Angels guard him in the golden Mean!
There, English bounty yet a-while may stand,
And Honour linger ere it leaves the land.
But all our praises why should Lords engross?
Rise, honest Muse! and sing
The person here celebrated, who, with a small estate, actually performed all these good works, and whose true name was almost lost (partly by the title of The Man of Ross, given him by way of eminence, and partly by being buried without so much as an inscription) was called Mr. John Kyrle. He died in the year 1724, aged 90, and lies interred in the chancel of the church of Ross in Herefordshire.
The Man of Ross:
Pleas'd Vaga echoes thro' her winding bounds,
And rapid Severn hoarse applause resounds.
Who hung with woods yon mountain's sultry brow?
From the dry rock who bad the waters flow?
Not to the skies in useless columns tost,
Or in proud falls magnificently lost;
But, clear and artless, pouring thro' the plain
Health to the sick, and solace to the swain.
Whose Cause-way parts the vale with shady rows?
Whose Seats the weary Traveller repose?
Who taught that Heav'n-directed spire to rise?
"The Man of Ross," each lisping babe replies.
Behold the Market-place with poor o'er-spread!
The Man of Ross divides the weekly bread:
He feeds yon Alms-house, neat, but void of state,
Where Age and Want sit smiling at the gate;
Him portion'd Maids, apprentic'd Orphans blest,
The young who labour, and the old who rest.
Is any sick? The Man of Ross relieves,
Prescribes, attends, the med'cine makes, and gives.
Is there a variance? enter but his door,
Baulk'd are the Courts, and contest is no more.
Despairing Quacks with curses fled the place,
And vile Attorneys, now an useless race.
B. Thrice happy man! enabled to pursue
What all so wish, but want the pow'r to do!
Oh say, what sums that gen'rous hand supply?
What mines to swell that boundless charity?
P. Of Debts and Taxes, Wife and Children, clear,
This man possess'd—five hundred pounds a year.
Blush, Grandeur, blush! proud Courts, withdraw your blaze!
Ye little Stars! hide your diminish'd rays.
B. And what? no monument, inscription, stone?
His race, his form, his name almost unknown?
P. Who builds a Church to God, and not to Fame,
Will never mark the marble with his name:
Go, search it there
The parish register.
, where to be born and die,
Of rich and poor makes all the history;
Enough, that Virtue fill'd the space between;
Prov'd, by the ends of being, to have been.
When Hopkins dies, a thousand lights attend
The wretch, who, living, sav'd a candle's end;
Should'ring God's altar a vile image stands,
Belies his features, nay, extends his hands;
That live-long wig which Gorgon's self might own,
Eternal buckle takes in Parian stone
Ridicules the wretched taste of carving large perriwigs on busto's; of which there are several vile examples among the tombs at Westminster, and elsewhere.
.
Behold what blessings Wealth to life can lend!
And see, what comfort it affords our end.
In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half-hung,
The floors of plaister, and the walls of dung,
On once a flock-bed, but repair'd with straw,
With tape-ty'd curtains, never meant to draw,
The George and Garter dangling from that bed
Where tawdry yellow strove with dirty red,
Great Villers lies
George Villers, duke of Buckingham, who died in this manner.
—alas! how chang'd from him,
That life of pleasure, and that soul of whim!
Gallant and gay, in Cliveden's proud alcove,
The bow'r of wanton Shrewsbury and love;
Or just as gay, at Council, in a ring
Of mimick'd Statesmen, and their merry King.
No Wit to flatter, left of all his store!
No fool to laugh at, which he valu'd more.
There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends,
And fame; this lord of useless thousands ends.
His Grace's fate sage Cutler could foresee,
And well (he thought) advis'd him, "Live like me."
As well his Grace reply'd, "Like you, Sir John?
That I can do when all I have is gone."
Resolve me, Reason, which of these is worse,
Want with a full, or with an empty purse?
Thy life more wretched, Cutler, was confess'd,
Arise, and tell me, was thy death more bless'd?
Cutler saw tenants break, and houses fall,
For very want; he could not build a wall.
His only daughter in a stranger's pow'r,
For very want; he could not pay a dow'r.
A few grey hairs his rev'rend temples crown'd,
'Twas very want that sold them for two pound.
What ev'n deny'd a cordial at his end,
Banish'd the doctor, and expell'd the friend?
What but a want, which you, perhaps, think mad,
Yet numbers feel, the want of what he had!
Cutler and Brutus, dying, both exclaim,
"Virtue, and Wealth, what are ye, but a name!"
Say, for such worth are other worlds prepar'd?
Or are they both, in this, their own reward?
A knotty point! to which we now proceed.
But you are tir'd—I'll tell a tale—B. Agreed.
P. Where London's column
The Monument, built in memory of the fire of London, with an inscription importing that city to have been burnt by the papists.
, pointing at the skies,
Like a tall bully, lifts the head, and lies;
There dwelt a Citizen of sober fame,
A plain, good man, and Balaam was his name;
Religious, punctual, frugal, and so forth;
His word would pass for more than he was worth.
One solid dish his week-day meal affords,
An added pudding solemniz'd the Lord's:
Constant at Church, and Change; his gains were sure,
His givings rare, save farthings to the poor.
The Dev'l was piqu'd such saintship to behold,
And long'd to tempt him, like good Job of old:
But Satan, now, is wiser than of yore,
And tempts by making rich, not making poor.
Rouz'd by the Prince of Air, the whirlwinds sweep
The surge, and plunge his father in the deep;
Then full against his Cornish lands they roar,
And two rich shipwrecks bless the lucky shore.
Sir Balaam, now, he lives like other folks;
He takes his chirping pint, and cracks his jokes:
"Live like yourself," was soon my Lady's word;
And lo! two puddings smoak'd upon the board.
Asleep and naked as an Indian lay,
An honest factor stole a Gem away:
He pledg'd it to the knight; the knight had wit,
So kept the Di'mond, and the rogue was bit.
Some scruple rose, but thus he eas'd his thought,
"I'll now give sixpence where I gave a groat;
Where once I went to church, I'll now go twice—
"And am so clear too of all other vice."
The Tempter saw his time; the work he ply'd;
Stocks and Subscriptions pour on ev'ry side,
'Till all the Daemon makes his full descent
In one abundant show'r of Cent. per Cent.
Sinks deep within him, and possesses whole,
Then dubs Director, and secures his soul.
Behold Sir Balaam now a man of spirit,
Ascribes his gettings to his parts and merit;
What late he call'd a blessing, now was Wit,
And God's good Prov
dence, a lucky Hit.
Things change their titles, as our manners turn:
His Compting-house employ'd the Sunday-morn:
Seldom at Church ('twas such a busy life)
But duly sent his family and wife.
There (so the Dev'l ordain'd) one Christmas-tide,
My good old lady catch'd a cold, and dy'd.
A Nymph of Quality admires our Knight;
He marries, bows at Court, and grows polite:
Leaves the dull Cits, and joins (to please the Fair)
The well-bred cuckolds in St. James's air:
First, for his Son a gay Commission buys,
Who drinks, whores, fights, and in a duel dies:
His daughter flaunts a Viscount's tawdry wife;
She bears a Coronet and P—x for life.
In Britain's Senate he a seat obtains,
And one more Pensioner St. Stephen gains
—atque unum civem donare Sybillae.
JUV.
.
My lady falls to play; so bad her chance,
He must repair it; takes a bribe from France;
The House impeach him; Coningsby harangues;
The Court forsake him, and Sir Balaam hangs:
Wife, son, and daughter, Satan! are thy own,
His wealth, yet dearer, forfeit to the Crown;
The Devil and the King divide the prize,
And sad Sir Balaam curses God and dies.
'Tis strange the Miser should his Cares employ
To gain those riches he can ne'er enjoy:
Is it less strange, the Prodigal should waste
His wealth, to purchase what he ne'er can taste?
Not for himself he sees, or hears, or eats;
Artists must chuse his Pictures, Music, Meats;
He buys, for
A gentleman famous for a judicious collection of drawings.
Topham, Drawings and Designs;
For Pembroke Statues, dirty Gods, and Coins;
Rare monkish Manuscripts for Hearne alone,
And Books for
Two eminent physicians; the one had an excellent library; the other the finest collection, in Europe, of natural curiosities: both men of great learning and humanity.
Mead, and Butterflies for Sloane.
Think we all these are for himself? no more
Than his fine Wife, alas! or finer Whore.
For what has Virro painted, built, and planted?
Only to shew, how many tastes he wanted.
What brought Sir Visto's ill-got wealth to waste?
Some Daemon whisper'd, "Visto! have a Taste."
Heav'n visits with a Taste the wealthy fool,
And needs no Rod but Ripley with a Rule.
See! sportive Fate, to punish aukward pride,
Bids Bubo build, and sends him such a Guide:
A standing sermon, at each year's expence,
That never Coxcomb reach'd Magnificence!
You show us,
The earl of Burlington was then publishing designs of Inigo Jones; and the antiquities of Rome, by Palladio.
Rome was glorious, not profuse,
And pompous buildings once were things of Use.
Yet shall, my Lord, your just, your noble rules,
Fill half the land with Imitating-Fools?
Who random drawings from your sheets shall take,
And of one beauty many blunders make;
Load some vain Church with old Theatric state,
Turn Arcs of Triumph to a Garden-gate;
Reverse your ornaments, and hang them all
On some patch'd dog-hole ek'd with ends of wall;
Then clap four slices of pilaster on't.
That, lac'd with bits of rustic, makes a Front.
Shall call the wind thro' long arcades to roar,
Proud to catch cold at a Venetian door
A door, or window, so called from being much practised at Venice, by Palladio and others.
;
Conscious they act a true Palladian part,
And, if they starve, they starve by rules of art.
Oft have you hinted to your brother Peer
A certain truth, which many buy too dear:
Something there is more needful than Expence,
And something previous e'en to Taste—'tis Sense:
Good Sense, which only is the gift of Heav'n,
And, tho' no Science, fairly worth the seven:
A Light, which in yourself you must perceive;
Jones and Le Nôtre have it not to give
Inigo Jones, the celebrated architect; and M. Le Nôtre, the designer of the best gardens of France.
.
To build, to plant, whatever you intend,
To rear the Column, or the Arch to bend,
To swell the Terras, or to sink the Grot;
In all, let Nature never be forgot.
But treat the Goddess like a modest fair,
Nor over-dress, nor leave her wholly bare;
Let not each beauty ev'ry where be spy'd,
Where half the skill is decently to hide.
He gains all points, who pleasingly confounds,
Surprizes, varies, and conceals the Bounds.
Consult the Genius of the Place in all;
That tells the Waters or to rise, or fall;
Or helps th' ambitious Hill the Heav'ns to scale,
Or scoops in circling theatres the Vale;
Calls in the country, catches op'ning glades,
Joins willing woods, and varies shades from shades;
Now breaks, or now directs, th' intending lines;
Paints as you plant, and, as you work, designs.
Still follow Sense, of ev'ry Art the Soul,
Parts answering parts shall slide into a whole,
Spontaneous beauties all around advance,
Start ev'n from Difficulty, strike from Chance;
Nature shall join you; Time shall make it grow
A Work to wonder at—perhaps a STOW
The seat and gardens of the lord viscount Cobham, in Buckinghamshire.
.
Without it, proud Versailles! thy glory falls;
And Nero's Terraces desert their walls:
The vast Parterres a thousand hands shall make,
Lo! Cobham comes, and floats them with a Lake:
Or cut wide views through mountains to the Plain
This was done in Hertfordshire by a wealthy citizen, at the expence of above 5000 l. by which means, (merely to overlook a dead plain) he let in the North wind upon his house and parterre, which were, before, adorned and defended with beautiful woods.
,
You'll wish your hill or shelter'd seat again.
Ev'n in an ornament its place remark,
Nor in an Hermitage set Dr. Clarke.
Behold Villario's ten years toil complete;
His Quincunx darkens, his Espaliers meet;
The Wood supports the Plain, the parts unite,
And strength of Shade contends with strength of Light;
A waving Glow the bloomy beds display,
Blushing in bright diversities of day,
With silver quiv'ring rills maeander'd o'er—
Enjoy them, you; Villario can no more;
Tir'd of the scene Parterres and Fountains yield,
He finds, at last, he better likes a field.
Thro' his young Woods how pleas'd Sabinus stray'd,
Or sat delighted in the thick'ning shade,
With annual joy the red'ning shoots to greet,
Or see the stretching branches long to meet!
His son's fine Taste an op'ner Vista loves,
Foe to the Dryads of his Father's groves;
One boundless green
The two extremes in parterre, which are equally faulty; a boundless green, large and naked as a field; or as a flourished carpet, where the greatness and nobleness of the piece is lessened by being divided into too many parts, with scrolled works and beds; of which the examples are frequent.
, or flourish'd carpet views,
With all the mournful family of Yews
Touches upon the ill taste of those who are so fond of evergreens, (particularly yews, which are the most tonsile) as to destroy the nobler forest trees, to make way for such little ornaments as pyramids of dark green, continually repeated; not unlike a funeral procession.
;
The thriving plants ignoble broomsticks made,
Now sweep those Alleys they were born to shade.
At Timon's Villa let us pass a day,
Where all cry out, "What sums are thrown away!"
So proud, so grand; of that stupendous air,
Soft and Agreeable come never there.
Greatness, with Timon, dwells in such a draught
As brings all Brobdignag before your thought.
To compass this, his Building is a Town,
His Pond an Ocean, his Parterre a Down:
Who but must laugh the master when he sees,
A puny insect, shiv'ring at a breeze!
Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around!
The whole, a labour'd Quarry above ground.
Two Cupids squirt before: a Lake behind
Improves the keenness of the Northern wind.
His Gardens next your admiration call,
On ev'ry side you look, behold the Wall!
No pleasing Intricacies intervene,
No artful wildness to perplex the scene;
Grove nods at grove, each Alley has a brother,
And half the platform just reflects the other.
The suffering eye inverted Nature sees,
Trees cut to Statues, Statues thick as trees;
With here a Fountain, never to be play'd;
And there a Summer-house, that knows no shade;
Here Amphitrite sails thro' myrtle bow'rs;
There
The two statues of the Gladiator Pugnans, and Gladiator Moriens.
Gladiators fight, or die in flow'rs;
Unwater'd, see the drooping sea-horse mourn,
And swallows roost in Nilus' dusty Urn.
My Lord advances with majestic mien,
Smit with the mighty pleasure to be seen;
But soft—by regular approach—not yet—
First thro' the length of yon hot terrace sweat;
And when up ten steep slopes you've dragg'd your thighs,
Just at his Study-door he'll bless your eyes.
His Study! with what Authors is it stor'd?
In Books, not Authors, curious is my Lord:
To all their dated backs he turns you round;
These Aldus printed, those Du Sueïl has bound.
Lo some are Vellom, and the rest as good
For all his Lordship knows, but they are Wood.
For Locke or Milton 'tis in vain to look,
These Shelves admit not any modern book.
And now the Chapel's silver bell you hear,
That summons you to all the Pride of Pray'r:
Light quirks of Music, broken and uneven,
Make the soul dance upon a Jig to Heav'n.
On painted Ceilings you devoutly stare,
Where sprawl the Saints of
Verrio (Antonio) painted many cielings, &c. at Windsor, Hampton-court, &c. and Laguerre, at Blenheim-castle, and other places.
Verrio or Laguerre,
Or gilded clouds in fair expansion lie,
And bring all Paradise before your eye.
To rest, the Cushion and soft Dean invite,
Who never mentions
This is a fact; a reverend dean preaching at court, threatened the sinner with punishment, "in a place which he thought it not decent to name before so polite an assembly."
Hell to ears polite.
But hark! the chiming Clocks to dinner call;
A hundred footsteps scrape the marble Hall:
The rich Buffet well-colour'd Serpents grace,
And gaping Tritons spew to wash your face.
Is this a dinner? this a genial room
The proud festivals of some men are here set forth to ridicule, where the pride destroys the ease, and the formal regularity all the pleasurable enjoyment of the entertainment.
?
No, 'tis a Temple, and a Hecatomb.
A solemn Sacrifice, perform'd in state,
You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.
So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear
Sancho's
See Don Quixote, vol. iv. chap. 6.
dread Doctor and his Wand were there.
Between each Act the trembling salvers ring,
From soup to sweet-wine, and God bless the King.
In plenty starving, tantaliz'd in state,
And complaisantly help'd to all I hate,
Treated, caress'd, and tir'd, I take my leave,
Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve;
I curse such lavish cost, and little skill,
And swear no day was ever past so ill.
Yet hence the poor are cloath'd, the hungry fed;
Health to himself, and to his infants bread
The Lab'rer bears: what his hard heart denies,
His charitable Vanity supplies.
Another age shall see the golden Ear
Imbrown the slope, and nod on the Parterre,
Deep harvests bury all his pride has plann'd,
And laughing Ceres re-assume the land.
Who, then, shall grace, or who improve the Soil?
Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle?
'Tis use, alone, that sanctifies Expence,
And Splendor borrows all her rays from Sense.
His Father's Acres who enjoys in peace,
Or makes his Neighbours glad, if he encrease:
Whose chearful Tenants bless their yearly toil,
Yet to their Lord owe more than to the soil;
Whose ample lawns are not asham'd to feed
The milky heifer and deserving steed;
Whose rising forests, nor for pride or show,
But future Building, future Navies, grow:
Let his plantations stretch from down to down,
First shade a Country, and then raise a Town.
You too proceed! make falling Arts your care,
Erect new wonders, and the old repair;
Jones and Palladio to themselves restore,
And be whate'er Vitruvius was before:
Till Kings call forth th' ideas of your mind
The poet, after having touched upon the proper objects of magnificence and expence in the private works of great men, comes to those great and public works which become a prince. This poem was published at the time when some of the new churches, built by the act of queen Anne, were ready to fall, being founded on boggy land; and others vilely executed, through fraudulent cabals between undertakers, officers, &c. when Dagenham-breach had done very great mischiefs; when the proposal of building a bridge at Westminster had been petitioned against, and rejected; when many of the highways throughout England were hardly passable, and most of those which were repaired by turnpikes made jobbs for private lucre, and infamously executed, even to the entrances of London itself. At this time there had been an uninterrupted peace in Europe for above twenty years.
,
(Proud to accomplish what such hands design'd)
Bid Harbours open, public Ways extend,
Bid Temples, worthier of the God, ascend;
Bid the broad Arch the dang'rous Flood contain,
The Mole projected break the roaring Main;
Back to his bounds their subject sea command,
And roll obedient Rivers thro' the Land:
These Honours, Peace to happy Britain brings,
These are Imperial Works, and worthy Kings.
FROM THE DISPENSARY. CANTO VI.
This sixth canto of the Dispensary, by Dr. Garth, has more merit than the whole preceding part of the poem, and, as I am told, in the first edition of this work it is more correct than as here exhibited; but that edition I have not been able to find. The praises bestowed, on this poem are more than have been given to any other; but our approbation, at present, is cooler, for it owed part of its fame to party.
AND now the Delegate prepares to go
And view the wonders of the realms below.
Thrice did the goddess, with her sacred wand,
The pavement strike; and strait, at her command,
The willing surface opens, and descries
A deep descent, that leads to nether skies.
Hygeia to the silent region tends;
And, with his heav'nly guide; the Charge descends.
Thus Numa, when to hallow'd caves retir'd,
Was by Aegeria guarded and inspir'd.
Within the chambers of the globe they spy
The beds where sleeping vegetables lie,
Till the glad summons of a genial ray
Unbinds the glebe, and calls them out to day.
Hence Pancies trick themselves in various hue,
And hence Junquils derive their fragrant dew;
Hence the Carnation, and the bashful Rose,
Their virgin blushes to the morn disclose.
Hence the chaste Lilly rises to the light,
Unveils her snowy breasts and charms the sight.
Hence arbours are with twining greens array'd,
T'oblige complaining lovers with their shade:
And hence on Daphne's laurel'd forehead grow
Immortal wreaths for Phoebus and Nassau.
The insects here their ling'ring trance survive:
Benumb'd they seem, and doubtful if alive.
From Winter's fury hither they repair,
And stay for milder skies and softer air.
Down to these cells obscener reptiles creep;
Where hateful Nutes and painted Lizzards sleep.
Where shiv'ring Snakes the summer Solstice wait,
Unfurl their painted folds, and slide in state.
Here their new form the numb'd Erucae hide,
Their num'rous feet in slender bandage ty'd;
Soon as the kindling year begins to rise,
This upstart race their native clod despise,
And, proud of painted wings, attempt the skies.
Now those profounder regions they explore,
Where metals ripen in vast cakes of oar.
Here, sullen to the sight, at large is spread,
The dull unwieldy mass of lumpish Lead.
There, glimm'ring in their dawning beds, are seen
The aspiring seeds of sprightly Tin.
The Copper sparkles next in ruddy streaks;
And in the gloom betrays its glowing cheeks,
The Silver, then, with bright and burnish'd grace,
Youth, and a blooming lustre in its face,
To th' arms of those more yielding metals flies,
And in the folds of their embraces lies:
So close they cling, so stubbornly retire,
Their love's more vi'lent than the chymist's fire.
Near these the Delegate, with wonder, spies
Where floods of living silver serpentize:
Where richest metals their bright looks put on,
And golden streams through amber channels run.
Where Light's gay God descends to ripen gems,
And lend a lustre brighter than his beams.
Here he observes the subterranean cells,
Where wanton nature sports in idle shells.
Some helicoeids, some conical appear;
These mitres emulate, those turbans are.
Here marcasites in various figure wait,
To ripen to a true metallic state:
Till drops, that from impending rocks descend,
Their substance petrify, and progress end.
Nigh, livid seas of kindled sulphur flow,
And whilst, enraged, their fiery surges glow,
Convulsions in the lab'ring mountains rise,
And hurl their melted vitals to the skies.
He views, with horror, next, the noisy cave,
Where, with hoarse dinns, imprison'd tempests rave;
Where clam'rous hurricanes attempt their, flight,
Or, whirling in tumultuous eddies, fight.
The warring winds, unmov'd, Hygeia heard,
Brav'd their loud jars, but much for Celsus fear'd.
Andromeda, so, whilst her hero fought,
Shook for his danger, but her own forgot.
And now the goddess, with her charge, descends
Where scarce one chearful glimpse their steps be-friends.
Here his forsaken seat old Chaos keeps,
And, undisturb'd by Form, in silence sleeps.
A grisly wight, and hideous to the eye;
An aukward lump of shapeless anarchy.
With sordid age his features are defac'd;
His lands unpeopled, and his countries waste.
To these dark realms much learned lumber creeps;
There copious M— safe in silence sleeps.
Where mushroom libels in oblivion lie,
And, soon as born, like other monsters, die.
Upon a couch of jett, in these abodes,
Dull Night, his melancholy consort, nods.
No ways and means their cabinet employ;
But their dark hours they waste in barren joy.
Nigh this recess, with terror, they survey
Where Death maintains his dread tyrannic sway:
In the close covert of a cypress grove,
Where goblins frisk and airy spectres rove,
Yawns a dark cave, with awful horror, wide;
And there the monarch's triumphs are descry'd.
Confus'd, and wildly huddled, to the eye,
The beggar's pouch and prince's purple lie.
Dim lamps with sickly rays scarce seem to glow;
Sighs heave in mournful moans, and tears o'erflow.
Restless Anxiety, forlorn Despair,
And all the faded family of Care;
Old mould'ring urns, racks, daggers, and distress,
Make up the frightful horror o' the place.
Within its dreadful jaws those furies wait,
Which execute the harsh decrees of Fate.
Febris is first: the hag relentless hears
The virgin's sighs, and sees the infant's tears;
In her parch'd eye-balls fiery meteors reign;
And restless ferments revel in each vein.
Then hydrops next appears amongst the throng;
Bloated, and big, she slowly sails along.
But, like a miser, in excess she's poor,
And pines for thirst amidst her watry store.
Now loathsome Lepra, that offensive spright,
With foul eruptions stain'd, offends the sight;
Still deaf to beauty's soft persuading pow'r:
Nor can bright Hebe's charms her bloom secure.
Whilst meager Pthisis gives a silent blow;
Her strokes are sure, but her advances slow.
No loud alarms, or fierce assaults, are shown:
She starves the fortress first, then takes the town.
Behind stood crowds of much inferior name;
Too numerous to repeat, too foul to name;
The vassals of their monarch's tyranny,
Who, at his nod, on fatal errands fly.
Now Celsus, with his glorious guide, invades
The silent region of the fleeting shades:
Where rocks and ruful desarts are descry'd;
And sullen Styx rolls down his lazy tide.
Then shews the ferry-man the plant he bore,
And claims his passage to the further shore.
To whom the Stygian pilot, smiling, said,
You need no passport to demand our aid.
Physicians never linger on this strand:
Old Charon's present still at their command.
Our awful monarch, and his consort, owe
To them the peopling of their realms below.
Then in his swarthy hand he grasp'd the oar,
Receiv'd his guests aboard, and shov'd from shore,
Now, as the goddess and her charge prepare
To breathe the sweets of soft Elysian air,
Upon the left they spy a pensive shade,
Who on his bended arm had rais'd his head;
Pale Grief sate heavy on his mournful look:
To whom, not unconcern'd, thus Celsus spoke:
Tell me, thou much afflicted shade, why sighs
Burst from your breast, and torrents from your eyes;
And who those mangled manes are, which show
A sullen satisfaction at your woe?
Since, said the ghost, with pity you'll attend,
Know, I'm Guâicum, once your firmest friend.
And on this barren beach, in discontent,
Am doom'd to stay, 'till th' angry powers relent.
Those spectres, seam'd with scars, that threaten there,
The victims of my late ill conduct are.
They vex, with endless clamours, my repose:
This wants his palate, that demands his nose:
And here they execute stern Pluto's will,
And ply me ev'ry moment with a pill.
Then Celsus thus, O much-lamented state!
How rigid is the sentence you relate?
Methinks I recollect your former air;
But ah, how much you're chang'd from what you were!
Insipid as your late ptisans you lie,
That, once, were sprightlier far than Mercury.
At the sad tale you tell the poppies weep,
And mourn their vegetable souls asleep.
The unctuous Larix, and the healing Pine,
Lament your fate in tears of Turpentine;
But still the offspring of your brain shall prove
The grocer's care, and brave the rage of Jove.
When bonfires blaze your vagrant works shall rise
In rockets, till they reach the wond'ring skies.
If mortals e'er the Stygian pow'rs could bend,
Entreaties to their awful seats I'd send:
But, since no human arts the Fates dissuade,
Direct me how to find bless'd Hervey's shade.
In vain th' unhappy ghost still urg'd his stay:
Then, rising from the ground, he shew'd the way.
Nigh the dull shore a shapeless mountain stood,
That, with a dreadful frown, survey'd the flood
Its fearful brow no lively greens put on;
No frisking goats bound o'er the ridgy stone.
To gain the summit the bright goddess try'd,
And Celsus, follow'd, by degrees, his guide.
Th' ascent thus conquer'd, now they towre on high,
And taste th' indulgence of a milder sky.
Loose breezes on their airy pinions play,
Soft infant blossoms their chaste odours pay,
And roses blush their fragrant lives away.
Cool streams thro' flow'ry meadows gently glide;
And, as they pass, their painted banks they chide.
These blissful plains no blights, nor mildews fear,
The flow'rs ne'er fade, and shrubs are myrtles here.
The morn awakes the tulip from her bed;
E'er noon, in painted pride she decks her head:
Rob'd in rich dye, she triumphs on the green,
And ev'ry flow'r does homage to their queen.
So, when bright Venus rises from the flood,
Around, in throngs, the wond'ring Nereids crowd;
The Tritons gaze, and tune each vocal shell,
And ev'ry grace unsung the waves conceal.
The Delegate observes, with wond'ring eyes,
Ambrosial dews descend, and incense rise.
Then hastens onward to the pensive grove,
The silent mansion of disastrous love.
Here Jealousy with jaundice looks appears,
And broken slumbers, and fantastic fears.
The widow'd Turtle hangs her moulting wings,
And to the woods, in mournful murmurs, sings.
No winds but sighs there are, no floods but tears.
Each conscious tree a tragic signal bears.
Their wounded bark records some broken vow,
And willow garlands hang on ev'ry bough.
Olivia, here, in solitude he found,
Her downcast eyes fix'd on the silent ground:
Her dress neglected, and unbound her hair,
She seem'd the dying image of despair.
How lately did this celebrated thing
Blaze in the box, and sparkle in the ring!
Till the Green-sickness, and Love's force, betray'd
To Death's remorseless arms th' unhappy maid.
All o'er confus'd the guilty lover stood,
The light forsook his eyes, his cheeks the blood;
An icy horror shiver'd in his look,
As to the cold-complexion'd nymph he spoke:
"Tell me, dear shade, from whence such anxious care;
Your looks disorder'd, and your bosom bare?
Why thus you languish, like a drooping flow'r,
Crush'd by the weight of some relentless show'r?
Your languid looks your late ill-conduct tell;
O that, instead of trash, you'd taken steel!"
Stabb'd with th' unkind reproach, the conscious maid
Thus, to her late insulting lover said:
"When ladies listen not to loose desire,
You stile our modesty our want of fire.
Smile or forbid, encourage or reprove,
You still find reasons to believe we love:
Vainly you think a liking we betray,
And never mean the peevish things we say.
Few are the fair ones of Rufilla's make;
Unask'd she grants, uninjur'd she'll forsake:
But sev'ral Caelia's sev'ral ages boast,
That like where Reason recommends the most.
Where heav'nly truth and tenderness conspire,
Chaste passion may perswade us to desire."
"Your sex (he cry'd) as custom bids, behaves;
In forms the tyrant tyes such haughty slaves.
To do nice Conduct right, you Nature wrong;
Impulses are but weak, where Reason's strong.
Some want the courage; but how few the flame!
They like the thing, that startle at the name.
The lonely Phoenix, tho' profess'd a nun,
Warms into love, and kindles at the sun.
Those tales of spicy urns, and fragrant fires,
Are but the emblems of her scorch'd desires."
Then, as he strove to clasp the fleeting fair,
His empty arms confess'd th' impassive air.
From his embrace th'unbody'd spectre flies;
And, as she mov'd, she chid him with her eyes.
They hasten now to that delightful plain,
Where the glad manes of the bless'd remain:
Where Hervey gathers simples, to bestow
Immortal youth on heroes shades below.
Soon as the bright Hygeia was in view,
The venerable sage her presence knew:
Thus he—
Hail, blooming goddess! thou propitious pow'r,
Whose blessings mortals more than life implore,
With so much lustre your bright looks endear,
That cottages are courts where those appear.
Mankind, as you vouchsafe to smile or frown,
Finds ease in chains, or anguish in a crown.
With just resentments and contempt you see
The foul dissentions of the Faculty;
How your sad sick'ning art now hangs her head;
And, once a science, is become a trade.
Her sons ne'er rifle her mysterious store,
But study Nature less, and lucre more.
Not so, when Rome to th' Epidaurian rais'd
A temple, where devoted incense blaz'd.
Oft father Tyber views the lofty fire,
As the learn'd son is worshipp'd like the fire;
The sage with Romulus like honours claim;
The gift of life and laws were then the same.
I show'd, of old, how vital currents glide,
And the meanders of their refluent tide.
Then, Willis, why spontaneous actions here,
And whence involuntary motions there:
And how the spirits, by mechanic laws,
In wild careers tumultuous riots cause.
Nor wou'd our Wharton, Bates, and Glisson lie
In the abyss of blind Obscurity.
But, now, such wond'rous searches are forborne,
And Paean's art is by divisions torn.
Then let your Charge attend, and I'll explain
How her lost health your science may regain.
Haste, and the matchless Atticus address;
From Heav'n and great Nassau he has the mace.
Th' oppress'd to his asylum still repair;
Arts he supports, and Learning is his care.
He softens the harsh rigour of the laws,
Blunts their keen edge, and grinds their harpy claws;
And, graciously, he casts a pitying eye
On the sad state of virtuous poverty.
When e'er he speaks, Heav'ns! how the list'ning throng
Dwells on the melting music of his tongue!
His arguments are emblems of his mien,
Mild, but not faint; and forcing, tho' serene;
And, when the pow'r of eloquence he'd try,
Here, light'ning strikes you; there, soft breezes sigh.
To him you must your sickly state refer;
Your charter claims him as your Visiter.
Your wounds he'll close, and sov'reignly restore
Your science to the height it had before.
Then Nassau's health shall be your glorious aim,
His life should be as lasting as his fame.
Some princes claims from devastations spring,
He condescends, in pity, to be king:
And when, amidst his olives plac'd, he stands,
And governs more by candour than commands,
Ev'n then not less a hero he appears,
Than when a Laurel diadem he wears.
Wou'd Phoebus, or his G—le, but inspire
Their sacred veh'mence of poetic sire;
To celebrate in song that godlike pow'r,
Which did the lab'ring universe restore:
Fair Albion's cliffs would echo to the strain,
And praise the arm that conquer'd, to regain
The earth's repose, and empire o'er the main.
Still may th' immortal man his cares repeat,
To make his blessings endless as they're great:
Whilst Malice and Ingratitude confess
They've strove for ruin long, without success.
When, late, Jove's eagle from the pyle shall rise,
To bear the victor to the boundless skies,
Awhile the God puts off paternal care,
Neglects the earth to give the Heav'ns a star.
Near thee, Alcides, shall the hero shine;
His rays resembling, as his labours, thine.
Had some fam'd patriot, of the Latin blood,
Like Julius great, and like Octavius good,
But thus preserv'd the Latin liberties,
Aspiring columns soon had reach'd the skies:
Loud Io's the proud capitol had shook,
And all the statues of the gods had spoke.
No more the sage his raptures could pursue:
He paus'd; and Celsus, with his guide, withdrew.
ECLOGUE I. SELIM: OR THE SHEPHERD'S MORAL. SCENE, A VALLEY NEAR BAGDAT. TIME, THE MORNING.
The following eclogues, written by Mr. Collins, are very pretty: the images, it must be owned, are not very local; for the pastoral subject could not well admit of it. The description of Asiatic magnificence, and manners, is a subject as yet unattempted amongst us, and, I believe, capable of furnishing a great variety of poetical imagery.
YE Persian maids, attend your poet's lays,
And hear how shepherds pass their golden days.
Not all are blest, whom Fortune's hand sustains
With wealth, in courts, nor all that haunt the plains:
Well may your hearts believe the truths I tell;
'Tis virtue makes the bliss, where'er we dwell.
Thus Selim sung, by sacred Truth inspir'd;
Nor praise, but such as Truth bestow'd, desir'd:
Wise in himself, his meaning songs convey'd
Informing morals to the shepherd maid;
Or taught the swains that surest bliss to find,
What groves nor streams bestow, a virtuous mind.
When, sweet, and blushing like a virgin bride,
The radiant morn resum'd her orient pride;
When wanton gales along the valleys play,
Breathe on each flower, and bear their sweets away;
By Tigris' wandering waves he sat, and sung
This useful lesson for the fair and young.
Ye Persian dames, he said, to you belong,
Well may they please, the morals of my song:
No fairer maids, I trust, than you are found,
Grac'd with soft arts, the peopled world around!
The morn that lights you, to your loves supplies
Each gentler ray delicious to your eyes:
For you those flowers her fragrant hands bestow,
And yours the love that kings delight to know.
Yet think not these, all-beauteous as they are,
The best kind blessings Heaven can grant the fair!
Who trust alone in beauty's feeble ray,
Boast but the worth Bassora's pearls display;
Drawn from the deep we own their surface bright,
But, dark within, they drink no lustrous light:
Such are the maids, and such the charms they boast,
By sense unaided, or to virtue lost.
Self-flattering sex! your hearts believe in vain
That love shall blind, whence once he fires the swain;
Or hope a lover by your faults to win,
As spots on ermin beautify the skin:
Who seeks secure to rule, be first her care
Each softer virtue that adorns the fair;
Each tender passion man delights to find,
The lov'd perfections of a female mind!
Blest were the days, when Wisdom held her reign,
And shepherds sought her on the silent plain;
With Truth she wedded in the secret grove,
Immortal Truth; and daughters bless'd their love.
O haste, fair maids! ye Virtues come away;
Sweet Seace and Plenty lead you on your way!
The balmy shrub for you shall love our shore,
By Ind excell'd, or Araby, no more.
Lost to our fields, for so the fates ordain,
The dear deserters shall return again.
Come thou, whose thoughts as limpid springs are clear,
To lead the train, sweet Modesty, appear:
Here make thy court, amidst our rural scene,
And shepherd-girls shall own thee for their queen.
With thee be Chastity, of all afraid,
Distrusting all; a wise, suspicious maid:
But man the most—not more the mountain doe
Holds the swift falcon for her deadly foe.
Cold is her breast, like flowers that drink the dew;
A silken veil conceals her from the view.
No wild desires amidst thy train be known,
But Faith, whose heart is fix'd on one alone;
Desponding Meekness, with her downcast eyes,
And friendly Pity, full of tender sighs;
And Love the last: by these your hearts approve;
These are the virtues that must lead to love.
Thus sung the swain; and antient legends say,
The maids of Bagdat verified the lay:
Dear to the plains, the Virtues came along;
The shepherds lov'd, and Selim bless'd his song.
ECLOGUE II. HASSAN: OR THE CAMEL-DRIVER. SCENE, THE DESERT. TIME, MID-DAY.
IN silent horror, o'er the boundless waste
The driver, Hassan, with his camels past;
One cruise of water on his back he bore,
And his light scrip contain'd a scanty store;
A fan of painted feathers in his hand,
To guard his shaded face from scorching sand.
The sultry sun had gain'd the middle sky,
And not a tree, and not an herb was nigh;
The beasts, with pain, their dusty way pursue,
Shrill roar'd the winds, and dreary was the view!
With desperate sorrow wild, th' affrighted man
Thrice sigh'd, thrice struck his breast, and thus began:
"Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day,
When first from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!"
Ah! little thought I of the blasting wind,
The thirst, or pinching hunger that I find!
Bethink thee, Hassan, where shall Thirst asswage,
When fails this cruise, his unrelenting rage?
Soon shall this scrip its precious load resign;
Then what but tears and hunger shall be thine?
Ye mute companions of my toils, that bear,
In all my griefs, a more than equal share!
Here, where no springs in murmurs break away,
Or moss-crown'd fountains mitigate the day,
In vain ye hope the green delights to know,
Which plains more blest, or verdant vales, bestow:
Here rocks alone, and tasteless sands, are found,
And faint and sickly winds for ever howl around.
"Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day,
When first from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!"
Curst be the gold and silver, which persuade
Weak men to follow far-fatiguing trade!
The lilly peace outshines the silver store,
And life is dearer than the golden ore:
Yet money tempts us o'er the desert brown,
To every distant mart and wealthy town.
Full oft we tempt the land, and oft the sea:
And are we only yet repair'd by thee?
Ah! why was ruin so attractive made,
Or why fond man so easily betray'd?
Why heed we not, while, mad, we haste along,
The gentle voice of Peace, or Pleasure's song?
Or wherefore think the flowery mountain's side,
The fountain's murmurs, and the valley's pride;
Why think we these less pleasing to behold,
Than dreary deserts, if they lead to gold?
"Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day,
When first from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!"
O cease, my fears!—all frantic as I go,
When thought creates unnumber'd scenes of woe:
What if the lion in his rage I meet!—
Oft, in the dust, I view his printed feet:
And, fearful! oft, when day's declining light
Yields her pale empire to the mourner night,
By hunger rous'd, he scours the groaning plain,
Gaunt wolves and sullen tygers in his train:
Before them death with shrieks directs their way,
Fills the wild yell, and leads them to their prey.
"Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day,
When first from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!"
At that dead hour the silent asp shall creep,
If aught of rest I find, upon my sleep:
Or some swol'n serpent twist his scales around,
And wake to anguish with a burning wound.
Thrice happy they, the wise, contented poor,
From lust of wealth, and dread of death, secure!
They tempt no deserts, and no griefs they find;
Peace rules the day, where Reason rules the mind.
"Sad was the hour, and luckless was the day,
When first from Schiraz' walls I bent my way!"
O hapless youth! for she thy love hath won,
The tender Zara, will be most undone;
Big swell'd my heart, and own'd the powerful maid,
When fast she dropt her tears, as thus she said:
"Farewell the youth whom sighs could not detain,
Whom Zara's breaking heart implor'd in vain!
Yet, as thou go'st, may ev'ry blast arise
Weak and unfelt as these rejected sighs!
Safe o'er the wild, no perils may'st thou see,
No griefs endure, nor weep, false youth, like me."
O let me safely to the fair return,
Say, with a kiss, she must not, shall not mourn;
O! let me teach my heart to lose its fears,
Recall'd by Wisdom's voice, and Zara's tears.
He said, and call'd on Heav'n to bless the day,
When back to Schiraz' walls he bent his way.
ECLOGUE III. ABRA: OR THE GEORGIAN SULTANA. SCENE, A FOREST. TIME, THE EVENING.
IN Georgia's land, where Tefflis' towers are seen,
In distant view along the level green,
While evening dews enrich the glittering glade,
And the tall forests cast a longer shade,
What time 'tis sweet o'er fields of rice to stray,
Or scent the breathing maize at setting day;
Amidst the maids of Zagen's peaceful grove,
Emyra sung the pleasing cares of love.
Of Abra, first, began the tender strain,
Who led her youth with flocks upon the plain:
At morn she came those willing flocks to lead,
Where lillies rear them in the watery mead;
From early dawn the live-long hours she told,
Till, late at silent eve, she penn'd the fold.
Deep in the grove, beneath the secret shade,
A various wreath of odorous flowers she made:
That these flowers are found in very great abundance in some of the provinces of Persia; see the Modern History of Mr. Salmon.
Gay-motley'd pinks, and sweet jonquils, she chose,
The violet blue that on the moss-bank grows:
All sweet to sense, the flaunting rose was there:
The finish'd chaplet well adorn'd her hair.
Great Abbas chanc'd that fated morn to stray,
By love conducted from the chace away;
Among the vocal vales he heard her song,
And sought the vales and echoing groves among:
At length he found, and woo'd the rural maid;
She knew the monarch, and, with fear, obey'd.
"Be every youth like royal Abbas mov'd,
And every Georgian maid like Abra lov'd!
The royal lover bore her from the plain;
Yet still her crook and bleating flock remain:
Oft, as she went, she backward turn'd her view,
And bad that crook and bleating flock adieu.
Fair happy maid! to other scenes remove,
To richer scenes of golden power and love!
Go, leave the simple pipe, and shepherd's strain:
With love delight thee, and with Abbas reign.
"Be every youth like royal Abbas mov'd,
And ev'ry Georgian maid like Abra lov'd!"
Yet, midst the blaze of courts, she fix'd her love
On the cool fountain, or the shady grove;
Still, with the shepherd's innocence, her mind
To the sweet vale, and flowery mead, inclin'd:
And, oft as spring renew'd the plains with flowers,
Breath'd his soft gales, and led the fragrant hours,
With sure return she sought the sylvan scene,
The breezy mountains, and the forests green.
Her maids around her mov'd, a duteous band!
Each bore a crook, all-rural, in her hand:
Some simple lay, of flocks and herds, they sung;
With joy the mountain and the forest rung.
"Be ev'ry youth like royal Abbas mov'd,
And every Georgian maid like Abra lov'd!"
And oft the royal lover left the care
And thorns of state, attendant on the fair;
Oft to the shades and low-roof'd cots retir'd,
Or sought the vale where first his heart was fir'd;
A russet mantle, like a swain, he wore,
And thought of crowns and busy courts no more.
"Be every youth like royal Abbas mov'd,
And every Georgian maid like Abra lov'd!"
Blest was the life that royal Abbas led:
Sweet was his love, and innocent his bed.
What if in wealth the noble maid excel;
The simple shepherd girl can love as well.
Let those who rule on Persia's jewell'd throne
Be fam'd for love, and gentlest love alone;
Or wreathe, like Abbas, full of fair renown,
The lover's myrtle with the warrior's crown.
O happy days! the maids around her say;
O haste, profuse of blessings, haste away!
"Be ev'ry youth, like royal Abbas, mov'd;
And every Georgian maid, like Abra, lov'd!"
ECLOGUE IV. AGIB AND SECANDER: OR, THE FUGITIVES. SCENE, A MOUNTAIN IN CIRCASSIA. TIME, MIDNIGHT.
IN fair Circassia, where, to love inclin'd,
Each swain was bless'd, for ev'ry maid was kind;
At that still hour when awful midnight reigns,
And none, but wretches, haunt the twilight plains;
What time the moon had hung her lamp on high,
And past, in radiance, thro' the cloudless sky;
Sad o'er the dews two brother shepherds fled,
Where wildering fear and desperate sorrow led:
Fast as they press'd their flight, behind them lay
Wide ravag'd plains, and vallies stole away.
Along the mountain's bending sides they ran,
Till faint and weak Secander thus began:
O stay thee, Agib, for my feet deny,
No longer friendly to my life, to fly.
Friend of my heart, O turn thee, and survey,
Trace our sad slight, thro' all its length of way!
And, first, review that long-extended plain,
And yon wide groves, already past with pain!
Yon ragged cliff, whose dangerous path we try'd!
And, last, this lofty mountain's weary side!
Weak as thou art, yet, hapless, must thou know
The toils of flight, or some severer woe!
Still as I haste the Tartar shouts behind,
And shrieks and sorrows load the saddening wind:
In rage of heart, with ruin in his hand,
He blasts our harvests, and deforms our land.
Yon citron grove, whence first in fear we came,
Droops its fair honours to the conquering flame:
Far fly the swains, like us, in deep despair,
And leave to ruffian bands their fleecy care.
Unhappy land, whose blessings tempt the sword.
In vain, unheard, thou call'st thy Persian lord!
In vain thou court'st him, helpless, to thine aid,
To shield the shepherd, and protect the maid!
Far off, in thoughtless indolence resign'd,
Soft dreams of love and pleasure soothe his mind:
'Midst fair sultanas lost in idle joy;
No wars alarm him, and no fears annoy.
Yet these green hills, in summer's sultry heat,
Have lent the monarch, oft, a cool retreat.
Sweet to the sight is Zabran's flowery plain,
And once by maids and shepherds lov'd in vain!
No more the virgins shall delight to rove
By Sargis' banks, or Irwan's shady grove;
On Tarkie's mountain catch the cooling gale,
Or breathe the sweets of Aly's flowery vale:
Fair scenes! but, ah! no more with peace possest,
With ease alluring, and with plenty blest.
No more the shepherds' whitening tents appear,
Nor the kind produces of a bounteous year;
No more the date with snowy blossoms crown'd!
But Ruin spreads her baleful fires around.
In vain Circassia boasts her spicy groves,
For ever fam'd for pure and happy loves:
In vain she boasts her fairest of the fair,
Their eye's blue languish, and their golden hair!
Those eyes in tears their fruitless grief must send;
Those hairs the Tartar's cruel hand shall rend.
Ye Georgian swains, that, piteous, learn from far
Circassia's ruin, and the waste of war;
Some weightier arms than crooks and staffs prepare,
To shield your harvests, and defend your fair;
The Turk and Tartar like designs pursue,
Fix'd to destroy, and stedfast to undo.
Wild as his land, in native deserts bred,
By lust incited, or by malice led,
The villain Arab, as he prowls for prey,
Oft marks with blood and wasting flames the way;
Yet none so cruel as the Tartar foe,
To death inur'd, and nurst in scenes of woe.
He said, when loud along the vale was heard
A shriller shriek, and nearer fires appear'd:
The frighted shepherds, thro' the dews of night,
Wide o'er the moonlight hills renew'd their flight.
THE SPLENDID SHILLING. BY MR. J. PHILIPS.
This is reckoned the best parody of Milton in our language: it has been an hundred times imitated, without success. The truth is, the first thing in this way must preclude all future attempts; for nothing is so easy as to burlesque any man's manner, when we are once shewed the way.
HAPPY the man, who, void of cares and strife,
In silken, or in leathern, purse, retains
A Splendid Shilling: he nor hears with pain
New oysters cry'd, nor sighs for chearful ale;
But, with his friends, when nightly mists arise,
To Juniper's Magpye, or Town-Hall
Two noted alehouses in Oxford, 1700.
repairs:
Where, mindful of the nymph whose wanton eye
Transfix'd his soul, and kindled amorous flames,
Cloe, or Philips; he each circling glass
Wisheth her health, and joy, and equal love.
Mean while, he smokes, and laughs at merry tale,
Or Pun ambiguous, or Conundrum quaint.
But I, whom griping penury surrounds,
And hunger, sure attendant upon want,
With scanty offals, and small acid tiff,
(Wretched repast!) my meagre corps sustain:
Then solitary walk, or doze at home
In garret vile, and with a warming puff
Regale chill'd fingers; or from tube as black
As winter chimney, or well-polish'd jet,
Exhale Mundungus, ill-perfuming scent:
Not blacker tube, nor of a shorter size
Smokes Cambro-Briton (vers'd in pedigree,
Sprung from Cadwalador and Arthur, kings
Full famous in romantic tale) when he
O'er many a craggy hill and barren cliff,
Upon a cargo of fam'd Cestrian cheese,
High over-shadowing rides, with a design
To vend his wares, or at th' Arvonian mart,
Or Maridunum, or the antient town
Yclip'd Brechinia; or where Vaga's stream
Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil!
Whence flow nectareous wines, that well may vie
With Massic, Setin, or renown'd Falern.
Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow,
With looks demure, and silent pace, a Dun,
Horrible monster! hated by gods and men,
To my aërial citadel ascends,
With vocal heel thrice thundering at my gate,
With hideous accent thrice he calls; I know
The voice ill-boding, and the solemn sound.
What should I do? or whither turn? amaz'd,
Confounded, to the dark recess I fly
Of woodhole; strait my bristling hairs erect
Thro' sudden fear; a chilly sweat bedews
My shudd'ring limbs, and (wonderful to tell!)
My tongue forgets her faculty of speech;
So horrible he seems! his faded brow
Entrench'd with many a frown, and conic beard,
And spreading band, admir'd by modern saints,
Disastrous acts forebode; in his right hand
Long scrolls of paper solemnly he waves,
With characters and figures dire inscrib'd,
Grievous to mortal eyes; (ye gods, avert
Such plagues from righteous men) behind him stalks
Another monster not unlike himself,
Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar call'd
A Catchpole; whose polluted hands the Gods
With force incredible, and magic charms,
First have endu'd, if he his ample palm
Should, haply, on ill-fated shoulder lay
Of debtor, strait his body, to the touch
Obsequious, (as whilom knights were wont)
To some inchanted castle is convey'd,
Where gates impregnable, and coercive chains
In durance strict detain him, till, in form
Of money, Pallas sets the captive free.
Beware, ye debtors, when ye walk, beware,
Be circumspect; oft, with insiduous ken,
This caitiff eyes your steps aloof, and oft
Lies perdue in a nook or gloomy cave,
Prompt to inchant some inadvertent wretch
With his unhallow'd touch. So (poets sing)
Grimalkin, to domestic vermin sworn
An everlasting foe, with watchful eye
Lies nightly brooding o'er a chinky gap,
Protending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice
Sure ruin. So, her disembowell'd web,
Arachne, in a hall, or kitchen, spreads,
Obvious to vagrant flies: she secret stands
Within her woven cell; the humming prey,
Regardless of their fate, rush on the toils
Inextricable, nor will aught avail
Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue;
The wasp insiduous, and the buzzing drone,
And butterfly, proud of expanded wings
Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares,
Useless resistance make: with eager strides,
She tow'ring flies to her expected spoils;
Then, with envenom'd jaws, the vital blood
Drinks of reluctant foes, and to her cave
Their bulky carcases triumphant drags.
So pass my days. But when nocturnal shades
This world invelop, and th' inclement air
Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts
With pleasant wines, and crackling blaze of wood;
Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light
Of makeweight candle, nor the joyous talk
Of loving friend delights; distress'd, forlorn,
Amidst the horrors of the tedious night,
Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts
My anxious mind, or, sometimes, mournful verse
Indite, and sing of groves and myrtle shades,
Or desp'rate lady near a purling stream,
Or lover pendent on a willow-tree.
Mean while I labour with eternal drought,
And, restless, wish, and rave, my parched throat
Finds no relief, nor heavy eyes repose:
But if a slumber haply does invade
My weary limbs, my fancy's still awake,
Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream,
Tipples imaginary pots of ale,
In vain; awake I find the settled thirst
Still gnawing, and the pleasant fantom curse.
Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debarr'd.
Nor taste the fruits that the sun's genial rays
Mature, John-Apple, nor the downy Peach,
Nor Walnut in rough-furrow'd coat secure;
Nor Medlar fruit, delicious in decay:
Afflictions great! yet greater still remain:
My Galligaskins, that have long withstood
The winter's fury, and encroaching frosts,
By Time subdu'd (what will not Time subdue!)
An horrid chasm disclos'd with orifice
Wide, discontinuous; at which the winds
Eurus and Auster, and the dreadful force
Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronean waves,
Tumultuous enter with dire chilling blasts,
Portending agues. Thus, a well fraught ship
Long sail'd secure, or thro' th' Aegean deep,
Or th' Ionean, till cruising near
The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush,
On Scylla, or Charybdis (dang'rous rocks!)
She strikes rebounding, whence the shatter'd oak,
So fierce a shock unable to withstand,
Admits the sea; in at the gaping side
The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage,
Resistless, overwhelming; horrors seize
The mariners, death in their eyes appear,
They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, they pray:
(Vain efforts!) Still the batt'ring waves rush in,
Implacable, till, delug'd by the foam,
The ship sinks found'ring in the vast abyss.
A PIPE OF TOBACCO: IN IMITATION OF SIX SEVERAL AUTHORS.
Mr. Hawkins Browne, the author of these, as I am told, had no good original manner of his own, yet we see how well he succeeds when he turns an imitator; for the following are rather imitations, than ridiculous parodies.
IMITATION I. A NEW-YEAR's ODE.
RECITATIVE.
OLD battle-array, big with horror, is fled,
And olive rob'd Peace again lifts up her head.
Sing, ye Muses, Tobacco, the blessing of peace;
Was ever a nation so blessed as this?
AIR.
When summer suns grow red with heat,
Tobacco tempers Phoebus' ire;
When wintry storms around us beat,
Tobacco chears with gentle fire.
Yellow Autumn, youthful Spring,
In thy praises jointly sing.
RECITATIVE.
Like Neptune, Caesar guards Virginian fleets,
Fraught with Tobacco's balmy sweets;
Old Ocean trembles at Britannia's pow'r,
And Boreas is afraid to roar.
AIR.
Happy mortal, he! who knows
Pleasure which a Pipe bestows;
Curling eddies climb the room,
Wafting round a mild perfume.
RECITATIVE.
Let foreign climes the vine and orange boast,
While wastes of war deform the teeming coast;
Britannia, distant from each hostile sound,
Enjoys a Pipe, with case and freedom crown'd:
E'en restless Faction finds itself most free;
Or, if a slave, a slave to Liberty.
AIR.
Smiling years, that gayly run
Round the zodiac, with the sun,
Tell, if ever you have seen
Realms so quiet and serene.
British sons no longer, now,
Hurl the bar, or twang the bow;
Nor of crimson combat think,
But securely smoke and drink.
CHORUS.
Smiling years, that gayly run
Round the zodiac, with the sun,
Tell, if ever you have seen
Realms so quiet and serene.
IMITATION II.
LITTLE tube, of mighty power,
Charmer of an idle hour,
Object of my warm desire,
Lip of wax, and eye of fire:
And thy snowy, taper waist,
With my finger gently brac'd;
And thy pretty swelling crest,
With my little stopper prest,
And the sweetest bliss of blisses
Breathing from thy balmy kisses.
Happy thrice and thrice agen,
Happiest he of happy men,
Who, when again the night returns,
When again the taper burns;
When again the cricket's gay,
(Little cricket, full of play)
Can afford his tube to feed
With the fragrant Indian weed:
Pleasure for a nose divine,
Incense of the god of wine.
Happy thrice and thrice agen,
Happiest he of happy men.
IMITATION III.
O THOU, matur'd by glad Hesperian suns,
Tobacco! fountain pure of limpid truth,
That looks the very soul; whence pouring thought
Swarms all the mind; absorpt is yellow care;
And at each puff imagination burns.
Flash on thy bard, and, with exalting fires,
Touch the mysterious lip that chaunts thy praise,
In strains to mortal sons of earth unknown.
Behold an engine, wrought from tauny mines
Of ductile clay, with plastic virtue form'd,
And glaz'd magnific o'er, I grasp, I fill.
From Paetotheke with pungent pow'rs perfum'd,
Itself one tortoise all, where shines imbib'd
Each parent ray; then rudely ram'd illume,
With the red touch of zeal-enkindling sheet,
Mark'd with Gibsonian lore; forth issue clouds,
Thought-thrilling, thirst-inciting clouds around,
And many-mining fires: I all the while,
Lolling at ease, inhale the breezy balm.
But chief, when Bacchus wont with thee to join,
In genial strife and orthodoxal ale,
Stream life and
into the Muses' bowl.
O be thou still my
eat inspirer, thou
My Muse; oh fan me with thy zephyrs boon,
While I, in clouded tabernacle shrin'd,
Burst forth all oracle and mystic song.
IMITATION IV.
CRITICS avaunt; Tobacco is my theme;
Tremble like hornets at the blasting steam.
And you, court-insects, flutter not too near
Its light, nor buzz within the scorching sphere.
Pollio, with flame like thine my verse inspire,
So shall the Muse from smoke elicit sire.
Coxcombs prefer the tickling sting of snuff;
Yet all their claim to wisdom is—a puff:
Lord
oplin smokes not—for his teeth afraid:
Sir Tawdry smokes not—for he wears brocade.
Ladies, when pipes are brought, affect to swoon;
They love no smoke, except the smoke of town:
But courtiers hate the puffing tribe—no matter,
Strange, if they love the breath that cannot flatter!
Its foes but shew their ignorance; can he
Who scorns the leaf of knowledge, love the tree?
The tainted Templar (more prodigious yet)
Rails at Tobacco, tho' it makes him—spit.
Citronia vows it has an odious stink;
She will not smoke (ye gods!)—but she will drink.
And chaste Prudella (blame her if you can)
Says, Pipes are us'd by that vile creature Man:
Yet crowds remain, who still its worth proclaim,
While some for pleasure smoke, and some for fame:
Fame, of our actions universal spring,
For which we drink, eat, sleep, smoke,—ev'ry thing.
IMITATION V.
BLEST leaf! whose aromatic gales dispense
To Templars modesty, to Parsons sense:
So raptur'd priests, at fam'd Dodona's shrine,
Drank inspiration from the steam divine.
Poison that cures, a vapour that affords
Content more solid than the smile of lords:
Rest to the weary, to the hungry food,
The last kind refuge of the wise and good:
Inspir'd by thee, dull cits adjust the scale
Of Europe's peace, when other statesmen fail.
By thee protected, and thy sister, Beer,
Poets rejoice, nor think the bailiff near.
Nor less the critic owns thy genial aid,
While supperless he plies the piddling trade.
What tho' to love and soft delights a foe,
By ladies hated, hated by the beau,
Yet social freedom, long to courts unknown,
Fair health, fair truth, and virtue are thy own.
Come to thy poet, come with healing wings,
And let me taste thee unexcis'd by kings.
IMITATION VI.
BOY! bring an ounce of Freeman's best,
And bid the vicar be my guest:
Let all be plac'd in manner due;
A pot wherein to spit, or spue,
And London Journal, and Free-Briton,
Of use to light a pipe, or * *
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
This village, unmolested yet
By troopers, shall be my retreat:
Who cannot flatter, bribe, betray;
Who cannot write, or vote for *.
Far from the vermin of the town,
Here let me rather live, my own,
Doze o'er a pipe, whose vapour bland
In sweet oblivion lulls the land;
Of all, which at Vienna passes,
As ignorant as * * Brass is:
And scorning rascals to caress,
Extol the days of good queen Bess,
When first Tobacco blest our isle,
Then think of other queens—and smile.
Come jovial pipe, and bring along
Midnight revelry, and song;
The merry catch, the madrigal,
That echoes sweet in City hall;
The parson's pun, the smutty tale
Of country justice o'er his ale.
I ask not what the French are doing,
Or Spain to compass Britain's ruin:
Britons, if undone, can go,
Where Tobacco loves to grow.
END OF VOL. I.