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I own 't was wrong, when thousands call'd me back, | Gaudy devotion, like a Roman, shown,

To make that hopeless, ill-advis'd, attack;
All say, 't was madness; nor dare I deny;
Sure never fool so well deserv'd to die."
Could this deceive in others, to be free,
It ne'er, Vincenna, could deceive in thee;
Whose conduct is a comment to thy tongue,
So clear, the dullest cannot take thee wrong.
Thou on one sleeve wilt thy revenues wear;
And haunt the court, without a prospect there.
Are these expedients for renown? Confess
Thy little self, that I may scorn thee less.

Be wise, Vincenna, and the court forsake;
Our fortunes there, nor thou nor I shall make.
Even men of merit, ere their point they gain,
In hardy service make a long campaign;
Most manfully besiege the patron's gate,
And, oft repuls'd, as oft attack the great
With painful art, and application warm,
And take, at last, some little place by storm;
Enough to keep two shoes on Sunday clean,
And starve upon discreetly, in Sheer-Lane.
Already this thy fortune can afford;
Then starve without the favour of my lord.
'T is true, great fortunes some great men confer:
But often, even in doing right, they err :
From caprice, not from choice, their favours come:
They give, but think it toil to know to whom :
The man that 's nearest, yawning, they advance :
'T is inhumanity to bless by chance.
If merit sues, and greatness is so loth
To break its downy trance, I pity both.

;

I grant at court, Philander, at his need, (Thanks to his lovely wife,) finds friends indeed. Of every charm and virtue she's possest: Philander! thou art exquisitely blest; The public envy! Now then, 't is allow'd, The man is found, who may be justly proud: But, see! how sickly is ambition's taste! Ambition feeds on trash, and loaths a feast For, lo! Philander, of reproach afraid, In secret loves his wife, but keeps her maid. Some nymphs sell reputation; others buy; And love a market where the rates run high: Italian music 's sweet, because 't is dear; Their vanity is tickled, not their ear: Their tastes would lessen, if the prices fell, And Shakspeare's wretched stuff do quite as well; Away the disenchanted fair would throng, And own, that English is their mother tongue.

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To show how much our northern tastes refine, Imported nymphs our peeresses outshine While tradesmen starve, these Philomels are gay; For generous lords had rather give than pay.

Behold the masquerade's fantastic scene! The legislature join'd with Drury-Lane! When Britain calls, th' embroider'd patriots run, And serve their country—if the dance is done. "Are we not then allow'd to be polite ?" Yes, doubtless! but first set your notions right. Worth, of politeness is the needful ground; Where that is wanting, this can ne'er be found. Triflers not e'en in trifles can excel; 'Tis solid bodies only polish well.

Great, chosen prophet! for these latter days, To turn a willing world from righteous ways! Well, Heydegger, dost thou thy master serve; Well has he seen his servant should not starve. Thou to his name hast splendid temples rais'd; In various forms of worship seen him prais'd,

And sung sweet anthems in a tongue unknown.
Inferior offerings to thy god of vice
Are duly paid, in fiddles, cards, and dice;
Thy sacrifice supreme, an hundred maids !
That solemn rite of midnight masquerades!
If maids the quite exhausted town denies,
An hundred head of cuckolds may suffice.
Thou smil'st, well pleas'd with the converted land,
To see the fifty churches at a stand.
And that thy minister may never fail,
But what thy hand has planted still prevail,
Of minor prophets a succession sure
The propagation of thy zeal secure.

See commons, peers, and ministers of state,
In solemn council met, and deep debate!
What god-like enterprise is taking birth?
What wonder opens on th' expecting Earth?
'Tis done! with loud applause the council rings!
Fix'd is the fate of whores and fiddle-strings !

Though bold these truths, thou, Muse, with truths like these,

Wilt none offend, whom 't is a praise to please:
Let others flatter to be flatter'd; thou,
Like just tribunals, bend an aweful brow.
How terrible it were to common-sense,
To write a satire, which gave none offence!
And, since from life I take the draughts you see,
If men dislike them, do they censure me?
The fool, and knave, 't is glorious to offend,
And god-like an attempt the world to mend;
The world, where lucky throws to blockheads fall,
Knaves know the game, and honest men pay all.

How hard for real worth to gain its price!
A man shall make his fortune in a trice,
If blest with pliant, though but slender, sense,
Feign'd modesty, and real impudence:
A supple knee, smooth tongue, an easy grace,
A curse within, a smile upon his face:
A beauteous sister, or convenient wife,
Are prizes in the lottery of life;
Genius and virtue they will soon defeat,
And lodge you in the bosom of the great.
To merit, is but to provide a pain
For men's refusing what you ought to gain.

May, Dodington, this maxim fail in you,
Whom my presaging thoughts already view
By Walpole's conduct fir'd, and friendship grac
Still higher in your prince's favour plac'd;
And lending, here, those aweful councils aid,
Which you, abroad, with such success obey'd!
Bear this from one, who holds your friendship dear;
What most we wish, with ease we fancy near.

SATIRE IV.

TO THE RIGHT HON. SIR SPENCER COMPTON

ROUND Some fair tree th' ambitious woodhine grows,

And breathes her sweets on the supporting boughs:
So sweet the verse, th' ambitious verse, should be,
(O! pardon mine) that hopes support from thee;
Thee, Compton, born o'er senates to preside,
Their dignity to raise, their councils guide ;
Deep to discern, and widely to survey,
And kingdoms' fates, without ambition, weigh;
Of distant virtues nice extremes to blend,
The crown's assertor, and the people's friend :

Nor dost thou scorn, amid sublimer views,
To listen to the labours of the Muse;
Chy smiles protect her, while thy talents fire,
And 't is but half thy glory to inspire.
Vex'd at a public fame, so justly won,
The jealous Chremes is with spleen undone;
Chremes, for airy pensions of renown,
Devotes his service to the state and crown:
All schemes he knows, and, knowing, all improves,
Though Britain's thankless, still this patriot loves:
But patriots differ; some may shed their blood,
He drinks his coffee, for the public good;
Consults the sacred steam, and there foresees
What storms, or sunshine, Providence decrees;
Knows, for each day, the weather of our fate;
A quidnunc is an almanac of state.

You smile, and think this statesman void of use; Why may not time his secret worth produce? ince apes can roast the choice Castanian nut; Since steeds of genius are expert at put; since half the Senate "Not content" can say, Feese nations save, and puppies plots betray. What makes him model realms, and counsel kings?

An incapacity for smaller things:

Poor Chremes can't conduct his own estate,
And thence has undertaken Europe's fate.
Sehenno leaves the realm to Chremes' skill,
And boldly claims a province higher still:
fo raise a name, th' ambitious boy has got,
At once, a Bible, and a shoulder-knot;
Deep in the secret, he looks through the whole,
And pities the dull rogue that saves his soul;
To talk with rev'rence you must take good heed,
Nor shock his tender reason with the Creed; '
Howe'er well-bred, in public he complies,
Obliging friends alone with blasphemies.

Peerage is poison, good estates are bad
For this disease; poor rogues run seldom mad.
Have not attainders brought unhop'd relief,
And falding stocks quite cur'd an unbelief?
While the Sun shines, Blunt talks with wondrous
force;

But thunder mars small beer, and weak discourse.
Such useful instruments the weather show,
Just as their mercury is high or low:
Health chiefly keeps an atheist in the dark;
A fever argues better than a Clarke :
Let but the logic in his pulse decay,

The Grecian he 'll renounce, and learn to pray;
While C-mourns, with an unfeigned zeal,
Th' apostate youth, who reason'd once so well.
C, who makes merry with the Creed,
He almost thinks he disbelieves indeed;
But only thinks so: to give both their due,
Satan, and he, believe, and tremble too.
Of some for glory such the boundless rage,
That they 're the blackest scandal of their age.
Narcissus the Tartarian club disclaims;
Nay, a free-mason, with some terrour, names;
Omits no duty; nor can envy say,

He miss'd, these many years, the church, or play:
He makes no noise in parliament, 't is true;
But pays his debts, and visit, when 't is due;
His character and gloves are ever clean,
And then, he can out-bow the bowing dean;
A smile eternal on his lip he wears,
Which equally the wise and worthless shares.
In gay fatigues, this most undaunted chief,
Patient of idleness beyond belief,

Most charitably leads the town his face,
For ornament, in every public place;
As sure as cards, he to th' assembly comes,
And is the furniture of drawing-rooms:
When ombre calls, his hand and heart are free,
And, join'd to two, he fails not to make three :
Narcissus is the glory of his race;

For who does nothing with a better grace?

To deck my list, by nature were design'd Such shining expletives of human kind, Who want, while through blank life they dream along,

Sense to be right, and passion to be wrong.

To counterpoise this hero of the mode,
Some for renown are singular and odd;
What other men dislike, is sure to please,
Of all mankind, these dear antipodes;
Through pride, not malice, they run counter still,
And birth-days are their days of dressing ill.
Arbuthnot is a fool, and F- -a sage,
S-ly will fright you, E engage;

By nature streams run backward, flame descends,
Stones mount, and Sussex is the worst of friends;
They take their rest by day, and wake by night,
And blush, if you surprise them in the right;
If they by chance blurt out, ere well aware,
A swan is white, or Queensberry is fair.

Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt,
A fool in fashion, but a fool that 's out.
His passion for absurdity 's so strong,
He cannot bear a rival in the wrong;
Though wrong the mode, comply; more sense is
shown

In wearing others' follies, than your own.
If what is out of fashion most you prize,
Methinks you should endeavour to be wise.
But what in oddness can be more sublime
Than Sloane, the foremost toyman of his time?
His nice ambition lies in curious fancies,
His daughter's portion a rich shell inhances,
And Ashmole's baby-house is, in his view,
Britannia's golden mine, a rich Peru!
How his eyes languish! how his thoughts adore
That painted coat, which Joseph never wore!
He shows, on holidays, a sacred pin,

That touch'd the ruff, that touch'd Queen Bess's chin.
"Since that great dearth our chronicles deplore,
Since that great plague that swept as many more,
Was ever year unblest as this?" he 'll cry,
"It has not brought us one new butterfly!"
In times that suffer such learn'd men as these,
Unhappy Iy! how came you to please?

Not gaudy butterflies are Lico's game;
But, in effect, his chase is much the same:
Warm in pursuit, he levées all the great,
Stanch to the foot of title and estate:
Where'er their lordships go, they nev find
Or Lico, or their shadows, lag behind,
He sets them sure, where'er their lordships run,
Close at their elbows, as a morning-dun ;
As if their grandeur by contagion wrought,
And fame was like a fever, to be caught:
But after seven years' dance, from place to place,
The Dane is more familiar with his grace.
Who 'd be a crutch to prop a rotten peer;

Or living pendant dangling at his ear,
For ever whispering secrets, which were blown
For months before, by trumpets through the town?

* A Danish dog of the Duke of Argyll.

Who'd be a glass, with flattering grimace,
Still to reflect the temper of his face?
Or happy pin to stick upon his sleeve,
When my lord's gracious, and vouchsafes it leave?
Or cushion, when his heaviness shall please
To loll, or thump it, for his better ease?
Or a vile butt, for noon, or night, bespoke,
When the peer rashly swears he 'll club his joke?
Who'd shake with laughter, though he could not
find

His lordship's jest; or, if his nose broke wind,
For blessings to the gods profoundly bow,
That can cry, "Chimney sweep," or drive a plough?
With terms like these, how mean the tribe that close!
Scarce meaner they, who terms like these impose.

But what's the tribe most likely to comply?
The men of ink, or ancient authors lye;
The writing tribe, who shameless auctions hold
Of praise, by inch of candle to be sold:
All men they flatter, but themselves the most,
With deathless fame, their everlasting boast:
For Fame no cully makes so much her jest,
As her old constant spark, the bard profest.
"Boyle shines in council, Mordaunt in the fight,
Pelham's magnificent; but I can write,
And what to my great soul like glory dear?"
Till some god whispers in his tingling ear,
That fame's unwholesome taken without meat,
And life is best sustain'd by what is eat:
Grown lean, and wise, he curses what he writ,
And wishes all his wants were in his wit.

Ah! what avails it, when his dinner 's lost,
That his triumphant name adorns a post?
Or that his shining page (provoking fate!)
Defends sirloins, which sons of dullness eat?
What foe to verse without compassion hears,
What cruel prose-man can refrain from tears,
When the poor Muse, for less than half-a-crown,
A prostitute on every bulk in town,
With other whores undone, though not in print,
Clubs credit for Geneva in the Mint?

Ye bards! why will you sing, though uninspir'd?
Ye bards! why will you starve, to be admir'd?
Defunct by Phoebus' laws, beyond redress,
Why will your spectres haunt the frighted press?
Bad metre, that excrescence of the head,
Like hair, will sprout, although the poet's dead.
All other trades demand, verse-makers beg;
A dedication is a wooden-leg;

A barren Labeo, the true mumper's fashion,
Exposes borrow'd brats to move compassion.
Though such myself, vile bards I discommend;
Nay more, though gentle Damon is my friend.
"Is 't then a crime to write ?"-If talent rare
Proclaim the god, the crime is to forbear:
For some, though few, there are, large-minded

men,

Who watch unseen the labours of the pen;
Who know the Muse's worth, and therefore court,
Their deeds her theme, their bounty her support;
Who serve, unask'd, the least pretence to wit;
My sole excuse, alas! for having writ.
Argyll true wit is studious to restore;
And Dorset smiles, if Phœbus smil'd before;
Pembroke in years the long-lov'd arts admires,
And Henrietta like a Muse inspires.

But ah! not inspiration can obtain
That fame, which poets languish for in vain.
How mad their aim, who thirst for glory, strive
To grasp, what no man can possess alive!

Fame 's a reversion, in which men take place
(O late reversion !) at their own decease.
This truth sagacious Lintot knows so well,
He starves his authors, that their works may sell.
That fame is wealth, fantastic poets cry;
That wealth is fame, another clan reply;
Who know no guilt, no scandal, but in rags;
And swell in just proportion to their bags.
Nor only the low-born, deform'd, and old,
Think glory nothing but the beams of gold;
The first young lord, which in the Mall you meet,
Shall match the veriest hunks in Lombard-street,
From rescued candles' ends who rais'd a sum,
And starves, to join a penny to a plum.
A beardless miser! 'T is a guilt unknown
To former times, a scandal all our own.

Of ardent lovers, the true modern band
Will mortgage Celia to redeem their land.
For love, young, noble, rich, Castalio dies;
Name but the fair, love swells into his eyes.
Divine Monimia, thy fond fears lay down;
No rival can prevail — but half a crown.

He glories to late times to be convey'd, Not for the poor he has reliev'd, but made: Not such ambition his great fathers fir'd, When Harry conquer'd, and half France expir'd; He'd be a slave, a pimp, a dog, for gain: Nay, a dull sheriff for his golden chain. "Who'd be a slave?" the gallant Colonel crie, While love of glory sparkles from his eyes. To deathless fame he loudly pleads his rightJust is his title - for he will not fight: All soldiers valour, all divines have grace, As maids of honour beauty-by their place: But, when indulging on the last campaign, His lofty terms climb o'er the hills of slain; He gives the foes he slew, at each vain word, A sweet revenge, and half absolves his sword

Of boasting more than of a bomb afraid, A soldier should be modest as a maid: Fame is a bubble the reserv'd enjoy; Who strive to grasp it, as they touch, destroy. "T is the world's debt to deeds of high degree; But if you pay yourself, the world is free. Were there no tongue to speak them but his own, Augustus' deeds in arms had ne'er been known, Augustus' deeds! if that ambiguous name Confounds my reader, and misguides his aim, Such is the prince's worth, of whom I speak; The Roman would not blush at the mistake.

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The sex we honour, though their faults we blame ;

ay, thank their faults for such a fruitful theme: theme, fair -! doubly kind to me, nce satirizing those is praising thee; Who wouldst not bear, too modestly refin'd, panegyric of a grosser kind.

Britannia's daughters, much more fair than nice,
oo fond of admiration, lose their price;
Jorn in the public eye, give cheap delight
o throngs, and tarnish to the sated sight:
s un reserv'd, and beauteous, as the Sun,
hrough every sign of vanity they run;
ssemblies, parks, coarse feasts in city-halls;
ectures, and trials, plays, committees, balls,
Wells, bedlams, executions, Smithfield scenes,
nd fortune-tellers, caves, and lions' dens,
averns, exchanges, bridewells, drawing-rooms,
stalments, pillories, coronations, tombs,
umblers, and funerals, puppet-shows, reviews,
ales, races, rabbits, (and, still stranger!) pews.
Clarinda's bosom burns, but burns for Fame;
nd love lies vanquish'd in a nobler flame;
Varm gleams of hope she, now, dispenses; then,
ike April suns, dives into clouds again :
With all her lustre, now, her lover warms;
hen, out of ostentation, hides her charms;
fis, next, her pleasure sweetly to complain,
and to be taken with a sudden pain;
-'hen, she starts up, all ecstasy and bliss,
And is, sweet soul! just as sincere in this:
) how she rolls her charming eyes in spite !
And looks delightfully with all her might!
But, like our heroes, much more brave than wise,
the conquers for the triumph, not the prize.

Zara resembles Etna crown'd with snows;
Without she freezes, and within she glows:
Twice ere the Sun descends, with zeal inspir'd,
From the vain converse of the world retir'd,
she reads the psalms and chapters for the day,
In-Cleopatra, or the last new play.
Thus gloomy Zara, with a solemn grace,
Deceives mankind, and hides behind her face.
Nor far beneath her in renown, is she,
Who through good-breeding is ill company;
Whose manners will not let her larum cease,
Who thinks you are unhappy, when at peace;
To find you news, who racks her subtle head,
And vows" that her great-grandfather is dead."
A dearth of words a woman need not fear;
But 't is a task indeed to learn to hear:
In that the skill of conversation lies;
That shows, or makes, you both polite and wise.
Xantippe cries, "Let nymphs who nought can

say

Be lost in silence, and resign the day;
And let the guilty wife her guilt confess,
By tame behaviour, and a soft address!"
Through virtue, she refuses to comply
With all the dictates of humanity;
Through wisdom, she refuses to submit
To wisdom's rules, and raves to prove her wit;
Then, her unblemish'd honour to maintain,
Rejects her husband's kindness with disdain :
But if, by chance, an ill-adapted word
Drops from the lip of her unwary lord,
Her darling china, in a whirlwind sent,
Just intimates the lady's discontent.

Wine may indeed excite the meekest dame ;
But keen Xantippe, scorning borrow'd flame,

Can vent her thunders, and her lightnings play,
O'er cooling gruel, and composing tea:
Nor rests by night, but, more sincere than nice,
She shakes the curtains with her kind advice:
Doubly, like echo, sound is her delight,
And the last word is her eternal right.
Is 't not enough plagues, wars, and famines, rise
To lash our crimes, but must our wives be wise?
Famine, plague, war, and an unnumber'd throng
Of guilt-avenging ills, to man belong :

What black, what ceaseless cares besiege our state!
What strokes we feel from fancy, and from fate!
If fate forbears us, fancy strikes the blow;
We make misfortune; suicides in woe.
Superfluous aid! unnecessary skill!
Is Nature backward to torment, or kill?
How oft the noon, how oft the midnight, bell,
(That iron tongue of Death!) with solemn knell,
On Folly's errands as we vainly roam, [home!
Knocks at our hearts, and finds our thoughts from
Men drop so fast, ere life's mid-stage we tread,
Few know so many friends, alive, as dead.
Yet, as immortal, in our up-hill chase
We press coy Fortune with unslacken'd pace;
Our ardent labours for the toys we seek,
Join night to day, and Sunday to the week:
Our very joys are anxious, and expire.
Between satiety and fierce desire.

Now what reward for all this grief and toil?
But one, a female friend's endearing smile;
A tender smile, our sorrows' only balm,
And, in life's tempest, the sad sailor's calm.

How have I seen a gentle nymph draw nigh,
Peace in her air, persuasion in her eye;
Victorious tenderness! it all o'ercame,
Husbands look'd mild, and savages grew tame.

The sylvan race our active nymphs pursue;
Man is not all the game they have in view :
In woods and fields their glory they complete;
There Master Betty leaps a five-barr'd gate;
While fair Miss Charles to toilets is confin'd,
Nor rashly tempts the barbarous sun and wind.
Some nymphs affect a more heroic breed,
And volt from hunters to the managed steed;
Command his prancings with a martial air,
And Fobert has the forming of the fair.

More than one steed must Delia's empire feel,
Who sits triumphant o'er the flying wheel;
And as she guides it through th' admiring throng,
With what an air she smacks the silken thong!
Graceful as John, she moderates the reins,
And whistles sweet her diuretic strains:
Sesostris-like, such charioteers as these
May drive six harness'd monarchs, if they please:
They drive, row, run, with love of glory smit,
Leap, swim, shoot flying, and pronounce on wit.

O'er the belles-lettres lovely Daphne reigns;
Again the god Apollo wears her chains:
With legs toss'd high, on her sophee she sits,
Vouchsafing audience to contending wits:
Of each performance she 's the final test;
One act read o'er, she prophesies the rest;
And then, pronouncing with decisive air,
Fully convinces all the town-she 's fair.
Had lovely Daphne Hecatessa's face,
How would her elegance of taste decrease!
Some ladies' judgment in their features lies,
And all their genius sparkles from their eyes.

"But hold," she cries, "lampooner! have a care; Must I want common sense, because I'm fair?"

O no: see Stella; her eyes shine as bright,
As if her tongue was never in the right;
And yet what real learning, judgment, fire!
She seems inspir'd, and can herself inspire:
How then (if malice rul'd not all the fair)
Could Daphne publish, and could she forbear?
We grant that beauty is no bar to sense,
Nor is 't a sanction for impertinence.

Sempronia lik'd her man; and well she might;
The youth in person, and in parts, was bright;
Possess'd of every virtue, grace, and art,
That claims just empire o'er the female heart :
He met her passion, all her sighs return'd,
And, in full rage of youthful ardour, burn'd:
Large his possessions, and beyond her own;
Their bliss the theme and envy of the town:
The day was fix'd, when, with one acre more,
In stepp'd deform'd, debauch'd, diseas'd, threescore.
The fatal sequel I, through shame, forbear;
Of pride and avarice who can cure the fair?

Man 's rich with little, were his judgment true;
Nature is frugal, and her wants are few;
Those few wants answer'd, bring sincere delights;
But fools create themselves new appetites:
Fancy and pride seek things at vast expense,
Which relish not to reason, nor to sense.
When surfeit, or unthankfulness, destroys,
In nature's narrow sphere, our solid joys,
In fancy's airy land of noise and show,
Where nought but dreams, no real pleasures grow;
Like cats in air-pumps, to subsist we strive
On joys too thin to keep the soul alive.
Lemira's sick; make haste; the doctor call:
He comes; but where 's his patient? At the ball.
The doctor stares; her woman curt'sies low,
And cries, " My lady, sir, is always so:
Diversions put her maladies to flight;
True, she can't stand, but she can dance all night:
I've known my lady (for she loves a tune)
For fevers take an opera in June:

You, in the morning, a fair nymph invite;
To keep her word, a brown one comes at night:
Next day she shines in glossy black; and then
Revolves into her native red again:

Like a dove's neck, she shifts her transient cham
And is her own dear rival in your arms.

But one admirer has the painted lass;
Nor finds that one, but in her looking-glass:
Yet Laura's beautiful to such excess,
That all her art scarce makes her please us less.
To deck the female cheek, HE only knows,
Who paints less fair the lily and the rose.

Грош

How gay they smile! Such blessings Natu
O'erstock'd mankind enjoy but half her stores:
In distant wilds, by human eyes unseen,
She rears her flowers, and spreads her velvet green ;
Pure gurgling rills the lonely desert trace,
And waste their music on the savage race.
Is Nature then a niggard of her bliss?
Repine we guiltless in a world like this?
But our lewd tastes her lawful charms refuse,
And painted art's deprav'd allurements choose.
Such Fulvia's passion for the town; fresh air
(An odd effect!) gives vapours to the fair;
Green fields, and shady groves, and crystal springs,
And larks, and nightingales, are odious things;
But smoke, and dust, and noise, and crowds delight;
And to be press'd to death, transports her quite
Where silver rivulets play through flowery meads,
And woodbines give their sweets, and limes their
shades,

Black kennels' absent odours she regrets,
And stops her nose at beds of violets.

Is stormy life preferr'd to the serene?
Or is the public to the private scene?
Retir'd, we tread a smooth and open way:
Through briers and brambles in the world we stray;
Stiff opposition, and perplex'd debate,
And thorny care, and rank and stinging hate,
Which choke our passage, our career controul,

And, though perhaps you 'll think the practice bold, And wound the firmest temper of our soul.

A midnight park is sovereign for a cold;

With colics, breakfasts of green fruit agree;
With indigestions, supper just at three."
A strange alternative, replies Sir Hans,
Must women have a doctor, or a dance?
Though sick to death, abroad they safely roam,
But droop and die, in perfect health, at home:
For want but not of health, are ladies ill;
And tickets cure beyond the doctor's bill.

Alas, my heart! how languishingly fair
Yon lady lolls! With what a tender air!
Pale as a young dramatic author, when,
O'er darling lines, fell Cibber waves his pen.
Is her lord angry, or has Veny chid?
Dead is her father, or the mask forbid?
"Late sitting-up has turn'd her roses white."
Why went she not to bed? "Because 't was night."
Did she then dance or play?" Nor this, nor that."
Well, night soon steals away in pleasing chat.
"No, all alone, her prayers she rather chose,
Than be that wretch to sleep till morning rose."
Then lady Cynthia, mistress of the shade,
Goes, with the fashionable owls, to bed:
This her pride covets, this her health denies;
Her soul is silly, but her body 's wise.

Others, with curious arts, dim charms revive,
And triumph in the bloom of fifty-five.

⚫ Lap-dog.

O sacred solitude! divine retreat!
Choice of the prudent! envy of the great!
By thy pure stream, or in thy waving shade,
We court fair Wisdom, that celestial maid:
The genuine offspring of her lov'd embrace
(Strangers on Earth!) are innocence and peace:
There, from the ways of men laid safe ashore,
We smile to hear the distant tempest roar;
There, bless'd with health, with business unperplex',
This life we relish, and ensure the next;
There too the Muses sport; these numbers free,
Pierian Eastbury! I owe to thee.

There sport the Muses; but not there alone:
Their sacred force Amelia feels in town.
Nought but a genius can a genius fit;

A wit herself, Amelia weds a wit:
Both wits! though miracles are said to cease,
Three days, three wondrous days! they liv'd in

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