A WHIPPING FOR THE WELCH PARSON.
BEING A COMMENT ON THE REV. MR. EVAN LLOYD'S EPISTLE TO DAVID GARRICK, ESQ. BY SCRIBLERIUS FLAGELLARIUS.
TO WHICH IS SUPERADDED THE PARSON'S TEXT.
Vapula! Verbereum caput.
PLAUT.
Asin.
et
Per.
LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. EVANS, IN PATER-NOSTER-ROW.
M.DCC.LXXIII.
PREFACE.
IT is now full seven months since the following curious Epistle was advertised in the public papers, and its speedy publication promised. We were then told also, that the occasion of it was a late infamous attack on the character of the Gentleman to whom it is addressed.
See Morning Chronicle of July 25, 1772.
The length of time which has since elapsed, and that Gentleman's giving up his own cause, naturally gave room to imagine that the delivery of a mountain, so long in labor with a mouse, would be thought ridiculously superfluous. The ingenious author, however, of
"The Powers of the Pen—The Curate—Methodist and Conversation, Price Two and Sixpence each."
could not resist the powerful temptation of adding another
two-shilling
sprig to his former bays. Hence, after a truce declared, and the field of battle forsaken, steps forth this reverend champion, to renew the fight, and slay the slain. Unhappily for him, the disturbance he has thus given their ashes, seems to have provoked their ghosts to seek an avenger in the person of that learned commentator Scriblerius Flagellarius; who makes no other apology for the
insignificancy
of his
Comment,
than the
inanity
of the
Text;
taking refuge under the old adage:
Ex nihilo, nihil fit.
Some apology, indeed, may seem necessary for supperadding a copy of the Parson's text whole and entire; and would be really so, were it the property of the publisher. But, as we find the original is printed on the author's own account, and he might suffer more in his reputation, by our printing only mutilated extracts of his performance, than he would in his pocket from our printing the whole, we thought ourselves bound in justice to prefer his fame, as an author, to his profit, as a bookseller. At the same time we held it incumbent on us, in justice to the publick, to set a less price on the Text and Comment together, than he has done on the Text alone: because, admitting, as above, the inanity or nothingness of both, we know, as adepts in Algebra, that negative quantities added together produce a sum so much the less in
value
as the
co-efficients
encrease in
number.
Modesty, however, having induced us to value our Comment at but half the price of the Text, we have stated the value of both together at a fourth less; agreeable to calculation; for − 2
x
added to −
x
is = to − 3
x
= to eighteen-pence. Q. E. D
A WHIPPING FOR THE WELCH PARSON.
THE PARSON'S TEXT.
EPISTLE TO DAVID GARRICK, ESQ.
WHEN from his dewy throne, and pensile bowers,
To the green
p of earth in genial show'rs,
Prolific Jov
scends, all germens spring,
Blythe are the mountains, and the vallies sing;
Benignant N
e smiles, and breathes perfume,
And all around
Paradise in bloom!
But 'tis on gen
l laws the God proceeds,
And, flow'rs first cherish'd,
not forgets
the Weeds,
While Sharon's roses purple o'er the land,
The barren thistle feels his fost'ring hand.
In these enlighten'd days, not less benign
The Sun of Learning
deigns on all to shine;
With generous warmth it nourishes the root
Of Genius, ripening into classic fruit;
In wasteful bounty too its beams are spread
O'er the dry region of a dunce's head.
Those summer rays that nectar'd grapes produce,
Concoct the hemlock's deleterious juice;
So that bright sun, prime nourisher of wit,
Which burns in Burke, in Littelton and Pitt,
Obliquely glances on the leaden pate
Of ev'ry babbling blockhead of the state.
Many and great the evils which have slow'd
From b
essings thus promiscuously bestow'd!
Oft have we seen with grief the blushing rose
By pois'nous neighbours mildew'd as it blows;
As often genius in its vernal bloom,
From envy's blight receives untimely doom.
Among proverbial saws by wisdom seal'd,
Which by truth's oracles have been reveal'd,
Be this recorded—for 'tis nature's law—
Fairness will foulness ever to it draw;
While lust or envy urge, with equal joy,
The fiend to
ravish
beauty, or
destroy.
To find in this the depth of heaven's design,
For metaphysic heads be le
— not mine.
Essences, causes, substance, entity,
Be theirs—the beaten track of facts for me.
Let us,
my
ROSCIUS, freely let us rove
Thro' Flora's gay parterre, or thro' the grove
Where 'midst her mellow clusters brooding's seen,
Pomona, fruitful mother, Autumn's queen;
Where'er the garden's winding leads our feet,
Proofs of my text
on ev'ry plant we meet.
Or shou'd we range to city, court, or vale,
No spot we find, where new examples fail.
Upon the fairest fruit banditties throng
Of wasps, who sing and riot while they wrong,
The downy peach, the bloom-suffused plumb
Proclaim their wrongs with bleeding mouths tho' dumb;
The deep intrenchment on the luscious pear
Shews that some greedy spoiler has been there.
Attentive let us view this pearly rose
Its virgin beauties to the morn disclose;
Its clasping foilage open'd to the light,
Green coated gnats, almost too small for sight,
Swarm myriads-thick, like motes in solar ray,
On embrio buds, and infant leaves to prey.
The world of letters more prepost'rous still,
Is but one scene of good pursu'd by ill.
Dunces, like owls, can only bear the night,
No crime so great with them, as
being bright.
Genius and parts to dulness give offence,
And blockheads hunt them down in self-defence.
When Junius, bright with all Apollo's rays,
Beams on the town a more than common blaze,
All
Grub
-Street's up in arms! its reptile breed
Of worms that spell, and some that almost read,
Among the laurels crawl which round him twine,
And
all
their pow'rs to canker them combine;
But
chief
th' arch-critic caterpillar—He
So fam'd for pride, long words, and pedantry!
A thousand feet to move his vast weight strive,
A thousand feet! and half of them alive!
But strive in vain! tho' on each foot the spur
Of
Envy
goads th' unwieldly worm to stir;
Too little all to speed him on his way,
Tho' all his hairs have stomach for the prey.
A
pension
now her golden charms displays,
The Siren conquers, a
old Grub
obeys.
A
pension
(and what cannot pensions do?)
Proclaim'd for him who shall this foe subdue,
Draws the long reptile forth the war to meet,
A task too mighty for a thousand feet!
Onward he crawleth, like a gouty snail,
Cowards to fight, or felons to a jail.
"Vengeance is mine—th' Exchequer will repay,—
"And Vengeance shall be surfeited to-day—
"
My troop of feet
shall wade thro' Junius' blood,
"And N—triumphant stem the crimson flood."
—So vaunts
old Grub
—but all his menac'd harm
Ends in the nothing of a
False Alarm.
Th' illustrious foe he slavers with his bile,
But acts, poor worm! the Viper and the File.
When in the brilliant circle of St. James,
Amelia's beauties set the court in flames;
The Macaroni butterflies beset
This flow'r so fair, and wou'd without regret
Its whiteness blot, but Nature gave these things
No pow'r to stain, except their mealy wings.
Say then, my ROSCIUS, while Apollo's hand
Around your temples twines a verdant band,
Wou'd you excepted be from Nature's law,
Retain your honours, and no envy draw?
Wou'd you the muses should your genius clasp,
And shine Parnassus' pride without a wasp?
Can you, I know you cannot, think it fair,
To be Melpomene's, Thalia's heir;
To revel in the favours of the nine,
And wear the wreathe, which they unite to twine,
From the coy maids be favor'd with a kiss,
Feel the warm raptures of Pierian bliss,
And yet forbid that
Envy
's snakes should hiss;
While on a sea of glory thus you swim,
And pleasure flows in tides that drown the brim,
Shall not the outcast floundering on the beach,
Malign those blessings which he cannot reach?
Conscience, good ROSCIUS,—Nature must prevail,
And 'tis the Wretch's privilege to rail.
What is't to you, tho' spleen-struck bards prepare,
And for the worth that hurts them spread the snare?
Erom dungeons dark and deep their vipers call,
Warm at their heart and feed them with their gall;
Give the sweet creatures, like a foundling nurse,
Envy's panado, and the pap of curse,
Till with recruited venom strong they feel,
Then turn them loose at your mercurial heel,
What is't to you?—You still may laugh and sing,
Despise the reptiles, and defy their sting.
What tho' upon the temple's sacred walls,
Brothel obscenity each miscreant scrawls,
Can such blaspheming documents of sin,
Pollute the altar's purity within?
While envy's fever burns, the raving bard
What
or
'gainst whom
he writes pays no regard,
With venom'd heart he paints the vilest crime
In vilest words, and in the vilest rhime;
Delirious runs about the crowded streets,
And turns to
Pasquin
's statue all he meets;
His glass inverts each object that he sees,
Tears from their carth-bound roots the firmest trees,
The top to base converting—with a toss
St. Paul's it fixes on its golden cross;
Makes topsy-turvy tumblers upright tread,
Bishops and Judges walk upon their head:
View'd thro'
his glass,
the eye of heav'n's not bright,
But from the glow-worm's tail should borrow light;
And if we judge by his reversing rule,
A blockhead
Lowth,
and
Shipley
is a fool;
Shakespeare
wants nature, learned
The reader is desired to observe, that
Dr. Samuel Johnson
is not meant here—but
Old Pen
—as the author would hold himself inexcusable if he
was
capable of bringing the former into
Shakespeare
's company, since the publication of his edition of that immortal bard.
Johnson
art,
Brutus
and
Wilkes
a patriotic heart:
A driv'ling stammerer, no better,
Pitt,
And
you
to cry fresh oysters scarcely fit—
—At merit thus his giddy censures sly,
Till in the flame of truth, like moths, they die.
Among the various blessings mortals know,
A worthy friend we place, and worthless foe;
No key a character more truly shews,
Than rolls authentic both of friends and foes.
When with a pen that blunts the tooth of time,
And gives to merit everlasting prime,
Some future Plutarch, great high-priest of fame,
In her eternal dome inscribes thy name,
And decks it with such plentitude of praise,
That thy
shade almost bends beneath the bays,
Wou'd'st thou he shou'd a nettle 'mong them blend,
And damn thy same with—
Bavius was his friend?
But let not anger, hasty judge, decree
That all he did was done in enmity;
To candour's eye another look it wears,
Ill-blood
perhaps, and not
ill-will
he bears;
His verse may be the
strangury of wit,
And when the rym'ster's in the burning fit,
'Tis writhing, straining, grunting, groan, and grin,
Daemoniac symptoms of the fiend within;
Hard! after all his pangs and throes, to think
No drop of wit was voided in his ink!
Wit or no wit, he'll satires write and write,
Altho' he spoils this pretty maxim by't,
"It's proper pow'r to hurt each creature feels,
"Bulls aim their horns, and asses lift their heels."
A simple truth in nature's earlier day,
And man, bird, beast, each prov'd it in his way;
Now the reverse may be as truly said,
Bavius the ass
assails US with
his head,
The length of ear that slouches from his skull,
For horns he takes, and
butts like baited bull.
Tho' all his
fancied terrors
shou'd be sped
With tenfold rage at thy devoted head,
Envy
's career unheeded let him run—
—A pigmy's breath cannot blow out the sun—
Among the thousand gifts on men bestow'd
Tho' precious all, and worthy of a God,
Supremely gracious is the firm defence
Of CONSCIOUSNESS, assign'd to INNOCENCE—
Secure in this impenetrable shield,
'Gainst the world's malice virtue takes the field.
Legions of dev'ls, with
Satan
at their head,
Or
his Lieutenant Mendax
in his stead,
Their fiery darts may hurl with fruitless aim,
Upon her Aegis dies each pointed flame.
How firm this
moral shield
your bosom knew,
When
slander
's
quiver
was discharged at
you.
If on a master-work of genius bent,
Nature her choicest qualities has lent,
'The body form'd of elements so wrought
As almost give the faculty of thought,
The soul with ev'ry touch of ev'ry mind,
Impress'd so true, HE is
himself mankind:
When this accomplish'd legate's sent to teach
Our hearts to feel,
what
precept
cannot reach,
While more distress than real suff'rings shew,
His feeling soul sustains from
fabled woe,
Should peevish Fate, grown envious of his fame,
It's arrows point or at his life or name,
Where shall a
medicine
so rare be found,
Of pow'r to salve the rankling of the wound,
And soothe the heart, to bleed for others prone,
But bleeding now with sorrows of its own?
Doubly nectareous should the verse distill,
In streams melodious each poetic rill
Shou'd num'rous flow, to give Lethaean rest
To the perturbed spirit in his breast;
But
guilt
can never into peace be sung,
Tho' with
Apollo's hair
the lyre were strung—
While
innocence
not needs a balm like sin,
And
you
that
conscious witness
bear within!
Pleasant! to see how Envy's self-defeat
Turns into favour, what was done in hate!
The nettles which she plants convert to bays,
For Envy's slander is "a kind of praise."
The
Grubstreet laureate
brands each honour'd name
With yours, and thus
reviles
you into
fame.
A
fellow-feeling
spares the dim and dark,
And shining merit's the devoted mark,
At which he levels his envenom'd darts;
Shew him but "men of choice and rarest parts,
"That each particular of duty know,"
That each particular of duty
do;
Who pillars to their country daily prove,
And as they best deserve, enjoy its love:
If the whole poem was not execrably dull, and offensively dirty, the reader would be desired to peruse the
wretched lines,
together with the
injudicious
and
illiberal notes,
in
Love in the Suds,
on those eminent barristers
John Dunning
and
James Mansfield,
Esqrs.
COMMENT ON THE NOTE.] To save the reader the trouble and mortification of looking into a poem so
execrably dull,
we shall quote the very
wretched lines
and
illiberal notes
in question.
By
Zoilus,
throws the wretch into the spleen;
His talent at mistaking
good
for
evil
In this a
fool,
in that discerns a
dev'l.
Forgive the muse that
labours to adorn
Your head with roses, if she add a thorn,
If with a gentle hand one fault she chide,
One giant fault, which friendship cannot hide!
Audacious Garrick!
in these
touchy times,
Where airy dreams 'gainst majesty are crimes;
What more than
Cromwell's fire
cou'd thee impell,
'Gainst FLEET-DITCH'
jus stercoreum
to rebell?
That ancient kingdom still maintains its sway,
And now is guarded by a
covered way.
Its monarch,
seated on a throne of mud,
Tribute receives from the polluted flood;
From
scavengers,
his treas'ry lords he takes
Custom of common sew'rs, and toll of jakes;
His claim to these
his writings all
declare,
And leave to
Cloacine
a second share.
When this
beluted prince
politely begs
Your kind acceptance of some
rotten eggs,
Filth of all sorts,
and to improve their
sweets,
Adds the rich sweepings of
Gomorrah's streets;
Shall thy fastidious spirit dare refuse,
And both the giver and the gift misuse?
His well-bred courtesy disdainful spurn,
And
talk
of
pillory
as the return?
—Ungrateful Garrick!—
But 'tis time to breathe,
And ere more ink is shed, the quill to sheathe—
Soft ye—the
muse
must now (her
letter
penn'd)
Like
other ladies
with a
postscript
end;
Like
other ladies
place the
bus'ness
there,
As stoutest soldiers fortify the
rear.
POSTSCRIPT.
Once when the fire-ey'd regent of the day,
From
Sirius
shot to earth a fervid ray,
The puny fluttering insects of the shade,
Too weak to bear the radiant god display'd,
A joint remonstrance buzz'd—and to the sky
Sent their
high wills
by the
Recorder-fly;
"Call forth thick clouds this fervour to abate,
"There's no enduring such transcendent
heat.
—
The pert demand of the remonstrant sly,
Drew from the god a smile, and this reply—
"—Flutter your hour when to the
west
I'm gone,
"But pray,
great Sir,
excuse my shining on.—
So thou, bright son of Merit and of Fame,
Wh
le thy meridian darts its wonted flame,
Scorching the eyes of
literary gnats,
Theatric beetles, and be-doctor'd bats,
Let these obscene dim children of the night,
Their malice club to execrate
thy light,
Regardless of the darklings, be it
thine,
With undiminish'd lustre still to
shine.
FINIS.
COMMENT.
The Author not having given us the argument of his Epistle, we shall begin the business of his Scholiast, by endeavouring to make it out as well as we can, for the convenience of the prosaic reader.
ARGUMENT OF THE TEXT.
As in the physical or natural world the sun cherishes alike both weeds and flowers, so in the world of letters the sun of learning shines alike, both on the scholar and the dunce, on the genius and the blockhead. [From the beginning to line 22.] Many and great are the evils which have followed this promiscuous dispensation of natural and literary blessings. [l. 22 to 27.] According to the wisdom of ages, and the laws of nature, it is a received maxim, that opposites attract opposites; as FAIRNES;
Foulness,
and so forth. The depth of Heaven's design in this is left to be sounded by the metaphysicians. [l. 27—36.] Facts alone are abided by, and the wasps, worms and flies, that prey upon our peaches and pears, are shewn to be a natural evil, and a vile blunder in the system of Providence. [l. 36—38.] The world of
letters
is still more
preposterous
than that of
nature;
dunces and blockheads constantly hunting down men of parts and genius. [l. 58 to 64.] Thus that old Grub and ministerial pensioner, the author of the
False Alarm
[hight
Dr. Sam. Johnson
] endeavoured to hunt down the well-known JUNIUS. [l. 64—100.] And thus must thou, immortal
Roscius,
favoured by all the nine, expect to be hunted up and down. Nor canst thou repine, while revelling in the embraces of the
coy
maids, at being subject to the hissing of the snakes of Envy. [l. 100—134.] While Envy's fever burns, the raving bard, Bavius, with venomed heart, paints the vilest crime, in vilest words, in the vilest rhime; [that is the author of
Leap-Frog,
hight —
Shirley,
Esq.] tosses up St. Paul's, and sets it topsy-turvey on its golden cross. It is thus he turns every thing arsey-versey; even putting the all-seeing eye of Heaven into the blind eye of a glow-worm's tail. It is thus he makes Bishop Lowth a blockhead—Dan Shakespeare unnatural—Orator Pitt a stammerer, and thou, great Roscius, a toothess old oyster-woman! [l. 134—153.] Wouldst thou be pleased that, when a future Plutarch [probably meaning Parson W—s, author of as curious a prose Epistle to D. G. Esq.] shall usher thee into the temple of Fame, he should damn thy reputation, by placing Bavius [author of
Leap-Frog
] in the next niche, as thy friend? [l. 153—167.] And yet Candour will excuse even
Bavius,
upon coolly reflecting on the present strange topsey-turvey state of nature; for, though formerly bulls butted with their horns, and asses kicked with their heels; man, bird and beast each following the dictates of nature; it is now quite otherwise; Bavius, the ass, instead of lifting his heel, kicking us with his head. [l. 167—185.] Yet thou, immaculate Roscius, need'st fear nothing, not even a legion of devils, with their Captain Satan, or their Lieutenant-Captain Mendax, at their head, being possessed of conscious innocence and the impenetrable shield of VIRTUE. [l. 185—203.] Thou hast nothing to do but to listen to my
numerous, melodious
and
nectareous
verse; which flows to give Lethaean rest to that perturbed spirit in thy breast; which, secured by virtue and innocence, does nothing but laugh and sing; while guilt can never be lulled to rest, though by a Welch harp, strung with the harmonious locks of Apollo. [l. 203—227.] It is pleasant to see repulsed the feeble attacks of that Grubstreet-laureate,
Zoilus,
author of
Love-in-the-Suds
[hight Dr.
Kenrick
] monarch of Fleet-ditch, and Usurper of the throne of Cloacina; whose cleanly revenues he receives, like another Roman Emperor, from the hands of scavengers. [227—275.]
POSTSCRIPT.
Thou art the sun, to whom the fly was once sent ambassador, from the insects, who could not bear thy meridian glory. Thou scorchest the eyes of literary gnats, theatric beetles and be-doctor'd bats; darklings, obscene, dim children of the night, who club their malice to execrate thy light; being unable to shine, till thou art retired behind the scenes, in "Thetis' lap to rest." [l. 275 ad ult.]
Line 20. The
curiosa felicitas,
or happy choice of words, and chastity of metaphor, for which our reverend author is so eminently distinguished, begin already to manifest themselves.
So that bright sun, prime
nourisher
of wit,
Which
burns
in Burke, in Lyttelton and Pitt.
This is the first time, we believe, that the
flaming brightness
or
burning heat
of the sun, has been mistaken for that
genial warmth
by which it
nourishes
either fruits or flowers.
It is with peculiar propriety also that our reverend bard has particularized the great patriot Mr. Pitt, as one of those on whom the
sun of learning
has so beneficently shone. The profundity of this great patriot's erudition, indeed, appears to singular advantage in his literary productions; which, to use the just distinction of Lord Pomfret, are written in the liberal style of a
gentleman,
and not with that grammatic propriety which betrays the vulgar pen of a literary mechanick.
Line 24. What a pity! To be sure, it is a great evil that the sun shines alike on the wise and the foolish; "on the just and the unjust." It is to be hoped the next time our wise Parson gets into the pulpit, he will expunge this blunder from the sacred text, and correct such a gross error in the laws of nature.
Line 34. In what book of Proverbs, or by what law of nature, the bard has made this discovery, we are at a loss to guess. Aristotle in his Ethics tells us,
Semper similem ducit deus ad similem;
and again, to use his own words,
. In the proverbial sayings of all ages and countries, we shall find also, that "
like
loves
like.
" "Birds of a feather flock together," &c.
Fairness
and
Foulness
therefore are
repulsive
and not
attractive;
things homogeneous only attracting each other; agreeably to the true system of the Newtonian philosophy. The truth of the matter seems to be this: the Parson had somewhere read
Envy will Merit as its shade pursue.
But then the poet adds
It like a shadow proves the substance true.
Because there can be no shadow without a substance; but then our ingenious
Master of Arts
forgot that the
shadow
bears a resemblance to the
substance
and does not differ from it as
foul
doth from
fair;
as this divine poet, or rather
poetical divine,
has above so roundly asserted.
Line 42. What elegance of imagery do we find in this description of Pomona, fruitful mother, Autumn's queen; represented here, as spreading her vegetable petticoats, the vine or the fig-leaf, to preserve her mellow clusters, from the depredation of those desperate banditti the wasps, whom he satirizes so wittily and severely for their immoral and scandalous behaviour in being before-hand with him in the robbery of orchards.
Line 47. We should be glad to know, why our poet, on whom the
sun of learning
hath doubtless deigned to shine, as well as on Burke, Lyttelton and Pitt, hath here added the plural close, common to English words, to that of
Banditti,
as if its ending in
s
were necessary to make it plural. The singular of Banditti, in English, is
Bandit,
from the French, or
Banditto,
from the Italian. Thus Milton.
No savage fierce
Bandit,
or mountaineer.
And Shakespeare,
A Roman sworder, and
Banditto
slave.
But perhaps our learned Master of Arts might, by
Banditties,
mean a number of different companies, or ruffian bands of Banditti: but a band and a Bandit are different words. The author's ignorance, therefore, is obvious; the word
Banditti
being never used as a noun of multitude in the singular number, and therefore cannot be made plural, like
band,
or other English words, by the usual termination in
s.
What a pretty Master of Arts! Really, friend Evan, you should be sent to school again, to con your accidence.
Line 48. For "Wasps, who
sing"
—we should certainly read "Wasps who
sting.
"—Of
stinging
wasps we have heard: but of
singing
wasps never. This we should have thought an errour of the press, but for the reason assigned in the next note.
Line 50. Our author seems to entertain a violent resentment, if not a rooted antipathy, against the whole
ferae naturae.
We should, however be glad to know by whom, according to his system of religion and morals, they were laid under any moral obligation, and to whom they are accountable.
The downy peach, the bloom-suffused plumb,
that
bloom-suffused
is a happy epithet!
Proclaim their wrongs with bleeding mouths, tho' dumb.
From a dumb mouth must certainly proceed a silent proclamation; which must, of course, also, be just as curious as intelligible. Our poet seems, indeed, here to be as good a naturalist as he is a moralist and divine: but as we,
Scriblerius Vapularius,
are strangers to the physical sensation and moral sentiment of vegetables, we are at a loss to guess at his meaning, either religious, philosophical, or moral.
Line 60. What a happy discovery, and how worthy a protestant divine, that the system of Providence is a
preposterous
system! It is no wonder, if he found such absurdity prevail in the system of
nature,
that he should find more in a system of
art.
Line 62. This crime of
being bright
is certainly a very capital one, though it is not likely our author will ever be found guilty of it.
Line 64. By this rhyme of
offence
and
defence,
it seems as if our poet had entered into a league offensive and defensive against English versification.
Line 68. We have heard of book-worms, natural and metaphorical, but they are such as
devour
books, instead of reading them. As to a
spelling
worm, we never heard of such a reptile either in the natural or literary system. Our author's spelling worm appears also to be, at the same time, a mere garden grub, who cankers the laurels of the poet, while he is spelling his verses.
Line 72. The chief grub having, undergone its metamorphosis, is now become a caterpillar. We find, however, that his transformation is but partial; he being still famed for
long words
and
pedantry.
This is the first time we have known a
caterpillar
reproached with the use of the
sesquipedàlia.
Had our poet called Dr. Johnson, the person here alluded to, a caterpillar or grub-worm
critic,
the metaphor would have been preserved: but he cannot be at once a human hog and a hog-horse.
Line 76. These thousand feet would be applicable enough to the critic, considered as a
millepedes,
or wood-louse, instead of a worm, or caterpillar; though it be whimsical to think an insect should carry spurs on its feet, to goad itself. As the text stands, however, our Master of Arts seems so learned a naturalist, as not to know a grub from an earwig.
Line 85. We shall leave the Doctors Cadogan, Hill, and Ingram, to decide whether snails can be afflicted with the gout or not; and if not to some future critic to discuss the propriety of this epithet. But we, must not omit to observe that, for want of grammatical construction, in these two lines,
Onward he crawleth, like a gouty snail,
Cowards to fight, or felons to a jail,
The last is downright nonsense; unless the poet meant to make sense of half of it, by saying he crawleth to fight cowards; for which, by the way, he does not seem to have occasion for a thousand feet.
Line 95. We never heard that the Apostle, or any Saint of the name of
James;
kept his court, or was surrounded with a brilliant circle at his levee. Our poetical parson must certainly mean, therefore, the brilliant circle in the drawing-room or presence-chamber, at
St. James's;
so that the above lines, instead of running as above, should be corrected, and stand as under,
When in the brilliant circle of St. James's
Amelia's beauties set the court in
flames's.
Line 100. Query, Doth the poet mean that Nature hath given butterflies power only to stain their mealy wings? or to stain any thing else
with,
or by means of, their mealy wings? If the former, he has written nonsense; if the latter, false grammar.
Line 106. The muses clasping the genius of Roscius, and his shining Parnassus' pride without a wasp, is something beautifully metaphorical, if it were but intelligible. It is pity that
clasp
and
wasp
are not the best of rhimes.
Rasp
or
hasp
would have mended the
sound
and could not have marred the
sense.
Line 112. This revelling in the savour of the nine, must be attended also with a singular kind of beatitude; especially if the maids are still so coy as to confine their savours to a simple kiss. And yet this, perhaps, is as much as he ought to wish for; since, though he might possibly be able to deflower, he could never satisfactorily enjoy them.
Line 115, Of Roscius's swimming on a sea of glory, one may form some idea, by seeing the buoy at the Nore ride over the waves, at all times of the tide; or to adapt more properly my simile to the subject, by seeing the float of a fishing-line dance upon the surface of the water, till some gudgeon bite at the hook. But what is to be understood by the tides of pleasure drowning the brim of the sea of glory, we must leave to the sagacity of happier scholiasts.
Line 119. We have frequently heard that
losers
have leave to rail; but why the loser is to be called a
wretch,
because the winner is a
rascal,
we do not comprehend. But perhaps the good Roscius can inform us why the author of Edward the
Black Prince
has reason to rail. Did that conscientious manager ever pick his pocket of five hundred pounds, in the same infamous manner as he did that of the author of
Falstaff's Wedding?
Line 129. It would indeed be a wiser way than to run to hireling pleaders and pettifogging attorneys, to avenge his cause, by proceedings little better than the subornation of perjury.
Line 135. The raving bard here pointed at, seems to be the author of a scandalous copy of verses, entitled
Leap-Frog,
descriptive of that dirty game, published in the Public Ledger; the rhimes of which were certainly bad enough, and worse than any we have ever seen, except those of our author.
Line 153. These are admirable lines and the comparison of Roscius to an oyster-woman, very applicable to the criticisms on that great actor's playing, published in the Gazeteer, before it became a vehicle to the puffs of the manager. The prosopopeia or personification of such censures is also very beautiful: it might have been mended, however, had the poet represented them as wasps, gnats, or hornets; unless by moths he meant to allude to their picking holes in the manager's coat.
Line 167. By no means. Let him not mention Bavius, but Maevius: not the irreverend author of the Black Prince, but the reverend author of the Powers of the Pen.
Qui Bavium odit amet tua carmina Maevi.
The friendship of so great a poet as our Maevius, must redound to the honour of Roscius to the latest posterity.
Line 171. This distinction between
ill-blood
ond
ill-will
is another instance of our author's wonderful discoveries in physicks and morality; or rather of his dexterous use of that rhetorical trope, the metaphor. That bad
blood
should produce a strangury of
wit,
is a circumstance, we believe, only known to our author; unless by
wit
he means
humour,
and thinks all kinds of humour alike; in which case, to be sure, a cachectic habit, arising from the abuse of the non-naturals, may preduce a strangury of wit; with which master Evan, if he ever had any wit, seems to be unhappily affected.
Facit indignatio versus
is an old adage, and seems applicable to the hasty and turbulent ebullitions of
ill blood.
Our author's appear to be the effect of
ill-will;
cold blooded verses, that have neither the heat of anger, for their excuse on the one hand, nor the warmth of
good-will,
to recommend them on the other.
Line 177. The Powers of the pen are most happily exerted in this description of a costive poet, who
Strains from hard-bound brains a line a day.
His pangs and throes are also so feelingly expressed, that they demonstratively prove the situation to be our author's own case; as indeed it is confirmed by the seven months labour of the present production—Instead of
no
drop
of wit,
we should read
no
bit
of wit,
&c. for, supposing wit a fluid, be it ever so brilliant and pellucid, it would mix and be undiscoverable in the muddy medium of an author's ink-stand. Besides the
bit
and the
wit
are so pit pat to our author's knack at alliteration, that
nostro periculo,
we will venture to declare the printer must have made a blunder.
Line 185. What wonder, when every thing both in the natural and moral world is confessedly turned topsy turvey! It is by no means more unnatural, or out of character, than to see a reverend divine kiss the backside of a stage-player!
Line 187. This
butts like baited bull,
is beautifully alliterative and idiomatical. It is a pity it puts us so much in mind of Quince and Bully Bottom; with the
—blade the bloody blameful blade
That bravely broached his boiling bloody breast.
Line 193.
Bestow'd
and
God
make another curious rhime. Indeed there is not a page in the Parson's text without one or two equally curious; witness
skull
and
bull
in the present; an excellent rhime!
Line 197. 'Gainst the world's malice virtue takes the field! What a flowing,
numerous, melodious and nectareous
line is this! It is to be equalled only by the mellifluous and elegant ease of the following;
Legions of dev'ls, with Satan at their head.
Line 203. True: for which reason he flew, like the magnanimous Capt. Bobadil, to take satisfaction at law. The impenetrable buckler of
conscious innocence
was not proof, till lined with the tough parchment of the
Crown Office.
And yet conscious innocence did not chuse to trust its buff doublet, behind even this legal target, too far.
Line 209. That
he,
whoever
he
is, for the pronoun has no antecedent in the context; we say, that
he
is of the human species, cannot be admitted; that he has a soul, or that his soul is impressed with either the virtues or the vices of humanity, WE deny. That, by his happy talent at mimickry, he takes them off most admirably cannot be disputed; but we know that mimickry is characteristic of an inferior kind of animals; so that we may justly say of this wonderful imitator of mankind, that superior mortals
Admire such mimicry in human shape,
And praise a Garrick as they praise an Ape.
That this animal has
no soul,
is notorious even to a proverb: and we hope our parson is not, like Parson Horne, so great an infidel as to think
mankind
have no souls.
Line 214. How is this!—What does our protestant Parson believe in FATE?—
Peevish fate,
dissatisfied with the choicest work of
nature!
— We were too precipitate in supposing him no atheist. The parson of Brentford is a novice to him in pagan mythology. But perhaps he will quibble, and say a
fatalist
is no atheist. Well, well, we won't dispute with him about words; let him no longer, like his brother patriot, disgrace his profession, but throw off his parson's gown, and we will set him down for a
simple heathen.
Line 223. That is the perturbed spirit, which, secure behind the Aegis or
moral shield,
of
conscious innocence,
could laugh and sing at the attack of Bavius; and defy whole legions of devils with General Satan, or even his Lieutenant (for he had seen Captains and Lieutenant Captains too) at their head. What an admirable anti-climax hath our poet borrowed from Tummas Appletree and Coster Pearmain!
Line 225. This idea of a Welch harp being strung with the carrotty locks of Apollo, is apparently too a borrowed thought; for who does not see that this device of Apollo's harmony lying in his hair, was suggested to him by Sampson's strength lying in those curling locks; of which Dalilah so perfidiously deprived him? Or, perhaps, our author, was thinking of his
crowd,
and the harmony, which a little rosin rubs into the hair of a fiddle-stick!
Line 239. What a beautiful
Epanalepsis
is exhibited in these two lines! and with what a happy
Homoiteleuton
do they close! The
know
and
do
are besides most aptly allusive to the duty of the two barristers toward their old clients
Doe
and
Roe;
of whose names this lucky rhime so naturally reminds us.
Line 241. The poet is not quite so happy here in the use of the metaphor. This distinguished pair of learned counsellors are represented as two pillars, the daily support of their country, and at the same time enjoying its merited love. The image is precisely that of a drunken patriot, tottering at the door of the Hercules'-pillars or two blue-posts; which he hugs most cordially, for fear of tumbling into the kennel. The satisfaction enjoyed by pillar or post, we leave to be explained by the archetypes of such proper emblems.
Smooth-spoken Mansfield,
Not the judge of that name, but the barrister, who is by no means a judge.
with his vacant face,
In softening accents first shall ope his case;
Which to defend, the want of Merlin's cunning
Shall be supplied by that of Grimbald Dunning.
See King Arthur, lately revived at Drury-Lane Theatre, and attend the pleadings in our courts of law and equity at Westminster, Guildhall, and Lincoln's-Inn.
It were difficult to exhibit a greater proof of stupidity than our Welch bard has done, in taking the above passages seriously. Is the one counsellor a fool because he is not a
judge?
Or the other a
devil
because he has got Grimbald's unfortunate phyz? And yet when the one sets up for
wisdom
and the other for
beauty,
a satirist need not be over and above splenetic, to call the one a booby and the other a devilish ugly fellow.
As a farther specimen of the wretched Iines contained in the above-mentioned execrably dull poem, the reader will please to take the following, which its author puts into the mouth of Roscius.
Curse on that K-NR-CK, soul of spleen and whim!
What are my puffs, and what my gains to him?
If poor and proud, can he of right complain
That wealthier men and wittier are as vain;
Why must he hint that I am past my prime,
To blast my fading laurels ere their time?
Death to my fame, and what, alas, is worse,
'Tis death, damnation, to my craving purse;
Capacious purse! by PLUTUS form'd to hold
(The God of wealth) the devil and all of gold.
Insatiate purse, that never yet ran o'er,
But swallows all, and gapes, like hell for more.
And yet, alas! how much the world will lye!
They call me miser; but no miser I;
He, brooding o'er his bags, delighted sits,
And laughs to scorn the jests of envious wits;
If fast his doors, he sets his heart at rest,
And dotes with rapture on his iron chest;
No galling paper-squibs his spirits teize,
But ev'n the boys may hoot him if they please.
He scorns the whistling of an empty name,
While I am torn 'twixt avarice and fame;
While I, so tremblingly alive all o'er,
Still bleed and agonize at every pore;
At ev'ry hiss am harrowed up with fear,
And burst with choler at a critic's sneer.
Rack'd by the gout and stone, and struck with age,
Prudence and ease advise to quit the stage;
But Fame still prompts▪ and pride can feel no pain;
And Avarice bids me sell my soul for gain.
Line 246. And hard labour it is too, Heaven knows: and what is still worse, it is likely, after all, to prove Labour-in-Vain!
Line 259. We shall not stand up for the cleanliness of
Love in the Suds:
the washing-tub, though a necessary implement to cleanliness, is itself a dirty subject, and we think the author did right, at any rate, to rid his hands of it. Should we recur, however, to the news-paper altercation it gave rise to, we shall find the Monarch of Drury-lane, even then, more deeply intrenched on his throne of mud, than his antagonist, the Monarch of Fleet-ditch.
Since the abdication of the latter, also, the cleanly Roscius seems to have succeeded to his rival, and at present to possess the throne of both kingdoms; the publication before us being the
third
tributary pamphlet his mock majesty has since received from his literary scavengers; who keep still throwing dirt on the adversary, notwithstanding the proclamation of a peace. To preserve the name of these stink-pots, would be doing too much honour to the wretches employed in such dirty work; but lest their existence should be doubted, we shall just mention their titles and authors. 1st, The
Kenrickad,
by that literary trollop, Mrs.
Brokes.
2d, The
Recantation,
&c. by that filthy Yahoo,
Paul Hiffernan.
3dly, Though last, not least of this goodly trïo, the present Epistle, by that forgiving and forgetting Christian Divine the Reverend
Evan Lloyd,
Master of Arts.
We cannot help thinking that these repeated attacks on the enemy, after having by agreement laid down his arms, would justify him in taking them up again. An authentic account of the rise progress, and accommodation of the late dispute between Dr. K. and Mr. G. seems indeed necessary for the justification of both. For though the former hath fully exculpated both himself and the latter, respecting the odious insinuation, which various circumstances unluckily contributed to cast on him, he has left it still extremely apparent, that a manager of a theatre may not be addicted to a particular vice, and yet be notwithstanding a very great rascal.
Line 262. A
beluted
prince should rather seem one upon whom dirt is thrown, than one accused of throwing, dirt.
Line 269. It was indeed but mere
talk;
his threats and vapouring being equally impudent and impotent. So far, indeed, was the god of our parson's idolatry, Mr. G. from chusing to proceed in his ridiculous prosesecution of the author of Love-in-the-Suds: whose poetical attack on him was merely laughable and ludicrous; that he thought proper to decline even the prosecution of the editor of
Leap Frog,
in which he had been explicitly and directly charged with what the former lampoon was mistakenly and falsely supposed to insinuate.
It is, on the whole, peculiarly modest in our Welch Parson, to reproach the author of Love-in-the-Suds for being a
libeller;
when he himself was not long since convicted in the court of King's-bench, and committed to the prison of that court, accordingly, for writing a libel; a libel too of the most uncharitable and infamous kind, in a man of his sacred function; being levelled at his neighbour, for exercising liberty of conscience in matters of religion and morality. It was on this occasion he obtained from
Mansfield the distinguishing appellation of THE WELCH PARSON.
Not that we mean, whatever his Lordship might do, to rouse the blood of Cadwallader, by casting any ungentlemanlike reflection on the country of Welch bards. At the same time, nevertheless, we have not the vanity to think we shall convict the present, of being the
blockhead
he really is, before a jury of his own countrymen. The
amor patriae,
which burns in the breast of every ancient Briton will effectually prevent it; as we are convinced by a story, once told us by a Welch judge; who, after summing up the evidence, against one of our author's namesakes, accused of sheep-stealing, was answered pithily and pertinently by the foreman of the jury, as follows:
Your Lortship need not taak so much trouple, as we shall find the pris'ner not guilty; hur na
me is
Lloyd,
and there never was a
Lloyd
hang'd for sheep-taaking in our time, nor, py cot, ever shall, so long as we are 'pon the
chury!
Line 277. Candour obliges us to do justice to our author, in answer to the impertinent censures of the
Monthly
and
Critical
reviews; the editors of which, will next month proceed to take him to task in the manner following:
What a wise-acre is this Welch bard, to suppose that the sun shoots its rays from
Sirius,
i. e. the dog-star, to the earth; when it is well known that Sirius is 27664 times farther from us than the sun, and that the fixed stars shine with their own, and not a borrowed light. Our poetical divine, though born and bred on the mountains of Wales, whence he might be supposed to have acquired a nearer acquaintance with the heavens, shews himself to be very ignorant of the science of astronomy. We would, therefore, recommend him to the perusal of Ptolomy, Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Ricciolus, Cassini, De la Hire, and above all, our learned countrymen Flamstead and Sir Isaac Newton.
With humble submission, however, to Goody Griffith and the Hodmandod, who may have read all the above authors (that is, the names of them, in Tom Davies's catalogue) our poet may know as much of astronomy as they do of criticism. It is true that by
Sc
ra,
as it was called by the Arabs,
by the Greeks, and
Sirius
among the Latins, is usually meant a star of the first magnitude in the mouth of
Canis major.
It is of this star, as the scholiasts tell us, that Virgil speaks, in the third book of his Aeneid,
Steriles exurit Sirius agros;
and Lucan,
Sirius exerit ignes rabidos.
Again, nothing is more common with our English poets, than to tell us, after the summer solstice, that Sirius the dog-star rages. But notwithstanding all this, our author seems to have the advantage of the reviewers; for though the best authors mean by Sirius, the dog-star, some of the worst (as we are told by Hesychius the lexicographer, or Hesychius the monk, for having neither, I cannot positively tell which) sometimes means by Sirius the
Sun.
Now, though our author seems to have betrayed a want of taste and discernment, in adopting the unclassical practice of the corrupt ages of Latinity, yet we say he should not be censured for reading bad Latin books, instead of good ones, by criticks, who never were capable of reading any at all, good, bad or indifferent.
Line 290. By
literary gnats,
our author is supposed to mean those troublesome scribblers, that so constantly annoy his friend Roscius in the London and Whitehall evening posts, together with those in the few morning papers which are not under the management of the manager.
Line 291. By
theatric beatles
are supposed to be meant the proprietors and all the players of Covent-Garden theatre; together with those even of Drury-lane, who do not sacrifice to Moloch, and bow the knee to Baal. By
be-doctor'd bats
are evidently meant those two ignorant and illiterate blockheads Doctor Samuel Johnson and Doctor William Kenrick, not omitting perhaps even that mirrour of doctorship,
Scriblerius Flagellarius
ourself; inferior to neither Busbeius, Bentleius, Budeus, Ruaeus, nor any other flagellator, ancient or modern. We would therefore advise this truant divine to mend his manners, restrain his petulance, and kiss the rod of our correction; lest he provoke a heavier chastisement, and from hi present inanity, sink into still less than nothing, beneath the weight of our castigation.
FINIS.