FOOTNOTES:[107]When Jove had driven his father into banishment, the Silver Age began, according to the poets.[108]The poet makes Justice and Chastity sisters; and says, thatthey fled to heaven together, and left earth for ever.[109]When the Roman women were forbidden to bed with their husbands.[110]She fled to Egypt, which wondered at the enormity of her crime.[111]He tells the famous story of Messalina, wife to the Emperor Claudius.[112]His meaning is, that a wife, who brings a large dowry, may do what she pleases, and has all the privileges of a widow.[113]A ring of great price, which Herod Agrippa gave to his sister Berenice. He was king of the Jews, but tributary to the Romans.[114]Cornelia was mother to the Gracchi, of the family of the Cornelii, from whence Scipio the African was descended, who triumphed over Hannibal.[115]He alludes to the known fable of Niobe, in Ovid. Amphion was her husband. Pæan was Apollo; who with his arrows killed her children, because she boasted that she was more fruitful than Latona, Apollo's mother.[116]He alludes to the white sow in Virgil, who farrowed thirty pigs.[117]Women then learned Greek, as ours speak French.[118]All the Romans, even the most inferior, and most infamous sort of them, had the power of making wills.[119]TheBona Dea, or Good Goddess, at whose feasts no men were to be present.[120]He alludes to the story of P. Clodius, who, disguised in the habit of a singing woman, went into the house of Cæsar, where the feast of the Good Goddess was celebrated, to find an opportunity with Cæsar's wife, Pompeia.[121]A famous singing boy.[122]That such an actor, whom they love, might obtain the prize.[123]He who inspects the entrails of the sacrifice, and from thence foretels the success of the prayer.[124]The ancients endeavoured to help the moon, during an eclipse, by sounding trumpets.[125]A woman-grammarian, who corrects her husband for speaking false Latin, which is called breaking Priscian's head.[126]i. e.of the milk asses.[127]Sicilian tyrants were grown to a proverb, in Latin, for their cruelty.[128]Bellona's priests were a sort of fortune-tellers; and their high priest an eunuch.[129]A garment was given to the priest, which he threw, or was supposed to throw, into the river; and that, they thought, bore all the sins of the people, which were drowned with it.[130]Chaldeans are thought to have been the first astrologers.[131]Otho succeeded Galba in the empire, which was foretold him by an astrologer.[132]Mars and Saturn are the two unfortunate planets; Jupiter and Venus the two fortunate.[133]A famous astrologer; an Egyptian.[134]The Brachmans are Indian philosophers, who remain to this day; and hold, after Pythagoras, the translation of souls from one body to another.[135]Juvenal's meaning is, help her to any kind of slops which may cause her to miscarry, for fear she may be brought to bed of a black Moor, which thou, being her husband, art bound to father; and that bastard may, by law, inherit thy estate.[136]The Romans thought it ominous to see a black Moor in the morning, if he were the first man they met.[137]Cæsonia, wife to Caius Caligula, the great tyrant. It is said she gave him a love-potion, which, flying up into his head, distracted him, and was the occasion of his committing so many acts of cruelty.[138]The hippomanes, a fleshy excrescence, which the ancients supposed grew in the forehead of a foal, and which the mare bites off when it is born. It was supposed to be a sovereign ingredient in philtres.Editor.[139]Agrippina was the mother of the tyrant Nero, who poisoned her husband Claudius, that Nero might succeed, who was her son, and not Britannicus, who was the son of Claudius, by a former wife.[140]The widow of Drymon poisoned her sons, that she might succeed to their estate: This was done in the poet's time, or just before it.[141]The Belides were fifty sisters, married to fifty young men, their cousin-germans; and killed them all on their wedding-night, excepting Hipermnestra, who saved her husband Linus.
[107]When Jove had driven his father into banishment, the Silver Age began, according to the poets.
[107]When Jove had driven his father into banishment, the Silver Age began, according to the poets.
[108]The poet makes Justice and Chastity sisters; and says, thatthey fled to heaven together, and left earth for ever.
[108]The poet makes Justice and Chastity sisters; and says, thatthey fled to heaven together, and left earth for ever.
[109]When the Roman women were forbidden to bed with their husbands.
[109]When the Roman women were forbidden to bed with their husbands.
[110]She fled to Egypt, which wondered at the enormity of her crime.
[110]She fled to Egypt, which wondered at the enormity of her crime.
[111]He tells the famous story of Messalina, wife to the Emperor Claudius.
[111]He tells the famous story of Messalina, wife to the Emperor Claudius.
[112]His meaning is, that a wife, who brings a large dowry, may do what she pleases, and has all the privileges of a widow.
[112]His meaning is, that a wife, who brings a large dowry, may do what she pleases, and has all the privileges of a widow.
[113]A ring of great price, which Herod Agrippa gave to his sister Berenice. He was king of the Jews, but tributary to the Romans.
[113]A ring of great price, which Herod Agrippa gave to his sister Berenice. He was king of the Jews, but tributary to the Romans.
[114]Cornelia was mother to the Gracchi, of the family of the Cornelii, from whence Scipio the African was descended, who triumphed over Hannibal.
[114]Cornelia was mother to the Gracchi, of the family of the Cornelii, from whence Scipio the African was descended, who triumphed over Hannibal.
[115]He alludes to the known fable of Niobe, in Ovid. Amphion was her husband. Pæan was Apollo; who with his arrows killed her children, because she boasted that she was more fruitful than Latona, Apollo's mother.
[115]He alludes to the known fable of Niobe, in Ovid. Amphion was her husband. Pæan was Apollo; who with his arrows killed her children, because she boasted that she was more fruitful than Latona, Apollo's mother.
[116]He alludes to the white sow in Virgil, who farrowed thirty pigs.
[116]He alludes to the white sow in Virgil, who farrowed thirty pigs.
[117]Women then learned Greek, as ours speak French.
[117]Women then learned Greek, as ours speak French.
[118]All the Romans, even the most inferior, and most infamous sort of them, had the power of making wills.
[118]All the Romans, even the most inferior, and most infamous sort of them, had the power of making wills.
[119]TheBona Dea, or Good Goddess, at whose feasts no men were to be present.
[119]TheBona Dea, or Good Goddess, at whose feasts no men were to be present.
[120]He alludes to the story of P. Clodius, who, disguised in the habit of a singing woman, went into the house of Cæsar, where the feast of the Good Goddess was celebrated, to find an opportunity with Cæsar's wife, Pompeia.
[120]He alludes to the story of P. Clodius, who, disguised in the habit of a singing woman, went into the house of Cæsar, where the feast of the Good Goddess was celebrated, to find an opportunity with Cæsar's wife, Pompeia.
[121]A famous singing boy.
[121]A famous singing boy.
[122]That such an actor, whom they love, might obtain the prize.
[122]That such an actor, whom they love, might obtain the prize.
[123]He who inspects the entrails of the sacrifice, and from thence foretels the success of the prayer.
[123]He who inspects the entrails of the sacrifice, and from thence foretels the success of the prayer.
[124]The ancients endeavoured to help the moon, during an eclipse, by sounding trumpets.
[124]The ancients endeavoured to help the moon, during an eclipse, by sounding trumpets.
[125]A woman-grammarian, who corrects her husband for speaking false Latin, which is called breaking Priscian's head.
[125]A woman-grammarian, who corrects her husband for speaking false Latin, which is called breaking Priscian's head.
[126]i. e.of the milk asses.
[126]i. e.of the milk asses.
[127]Sicilian tyrants were grown to a proverb, in Latin, for their cruelty.
[127]Sicilian tyrants were grown to a proverb, in Latin, for their cruelty.
[128]Bellona's priests were a sort of fortune-tellers; and their high priest an eunuch.
[128]Bellona's priests were a sort of fortune-tellers; and their high priest an eunuch.
[129]A garment was given to the priest, which he threw, or was supposed to throw, into the river; and that, they thought, bore all the sins of the people, which were drowned with it.
[129]A garment was given to the priest, which he threw, or was supposed to throw, into the river; and that, they thought, bore all the sins of the people, which were drowned with it.
[130]Chaldeans are thought to have been the first astrologers.
[130]Chaldeans are thought to have been the first astrologers.
[131]Otho succeeded Galba in the empire, which was foretold him by an astrologer.
[131]Otho succeeded Galba in the empire, which was foretold him by an astrologer.
[132]Mars and Saturn are the two unfortunate planets; Jupiter and Venus the two fortunate.
[132]Mars and Saturn are the two unfortunate planets; Jupiter and Venus the two fortunate.
[133]A famous astrologer; an Egyptian.
[133]A famous astrologer; an Egyptian.
[134]The Brachmans are Indian philosophers, who remain to this day; and hold, after Pythagoras, the translation of souls from one body to another.
[134]The Brachmans are Indian philosophers, who remain to this day; and hold, after Pythagoras, the translation of souls from one body to another.
[135]Juvenal's meaning is, help her to any kind of slops which may cause her to miscarry, for fear she may be brought to bed of a black Moor, which thou, being her husband, art bound to father; and that bastard may, by law, inherit thy estate.
[135]Juvenal's meaning is, help her to any kind of slops which may cause her to miscarry, for fear she may be brought to bed of a black Moor, which thou, being her husband, art bound to father; and that bastard may, by law, inherit thy estate.
[136]The Romans thought it ominous to see a black Moor in the morning, if he were the first man they met.
[136]The Romans thought it ominous to see a black Moor in the morning, if he were the first man they met.
[137]Cæsonia, wife to Caius Caligula, the great tyrant. It is said she gave him a love-potion, which, flying up into his head, distracted him, and was the occasion of his committing so many acts of cruelty.
[137]Cæsonia, wife to Caius Caligula, the great tyrant. It is said she gave him a love-potion, which, flying up into his head, distracted him, and was the occasion of his committing so many acts of cruelty.
[138]The hippomanes, a fleshy excrescence, which the ancients supposed grew in the forehead of a foal, and which the mare bites off when it is born. It was supposed to be a sovereign ingredient in philtres.Editor.
[138]The hippomanes, a fleshy excrescence, which the ancients supposed grew in the forehead of a foal, and which the mare bites off when it is born. It was supposed to be a sovereign ingredient in philtres.Editor.
[139]Agrippina was the mother of the tyrant Nero, who poisoned her husband Claudius, that Nero might succeed, who was her son, and not Britannicus, who was the son of Claudius, by a former wife.
[139]Agrippina was the mother of the tyrant Nero, who poisoned her husband Claudius, that Nero might succeed, who was her son, and not Britannicus, who was the son of Claudius, by a former wife.
[140]The widow of Drymon poisoned her sons, that she might succeed to their estate: This was done in the poet's time, or just before it.
[140]The widow of Drymon poisoned her sons, that she might succeed to their estate: This was done in the poet's time, or just before it.
[141]The Belides were fifty sisters, married to fifty young men, their cousin-germans; and killed them all on their wedding-night, excepting Hipermnestra, who saved her husband Linus.
[141]The Belides were fifty sisters, married to fifty young men, their cousin-germans; and killed them all on their wedding-night, excepting Hipermnestra, who saved her husband Linus.
THE ARGUMENT.
The Poet's design, in this divine Satire, is, to represent the variouswishes and desires of mankind, and to set out the folly of them. Heruns through all the several heads, of riches, honours, eloquence,fame for martial achievements, long life, and beauty; and gives instancesin each, how frequently they have proved the ruin of thosethat owned them. He concludes, therefore, that, since we generallychoose so ill for ourselves, we should do better to leave it to the godsto make the choice for us. All we can safely ask of heaven, lieswithin a very small compass—it is but health of body and mind; andif we have these, it is not much matter what we want besides; forwe have already enough to make us happy.
The Poet's design, in this divine Satire, is, to represent the variouswishes and desires of mankind, and to set out the folly of them. Heruns through all the several heads, of riches, honours, eloquence,fame for martial achievements, long life, and beauty; and gives instancesin each, how frequently they have proved the ruin of thosethat owned them. He concludes, therefore, that, since we generallychoose so ill for ourselves, we should do better to leave it to the godsto make the choice for us. All we can safely ask of heaven, lieswithin a very small compass—it is but health of body and mind; andif we have these, it is not much matter what we want besides; forwe have already enough to make us happy.
Look round the habitable world, how fewKnow their own good, or, knowing it, pursue.How void of reason are our hopes and fears!What in the conduct of our life appearsSo well designed, so luckily begun,But when we have our wish, we wish undone?Whole houses, of their whole desires possest,Are often ruined at their own request.In wars and peace things hurtful we require,When made obnoxious to our own desire.With laurels some have fatally been crowned;}Some, who the depths of eloquence have found,}In that unnavigable stream were drowned.}The brawny fool, who did his vigour boast;In that presuming confidence was lost;[142]But more have been by avarice opprest,And heaps of money crowded in the chest:Unwieldy sums of wealth, which higher mountThan files of marshalled figures can account;To which the stores of Crœsus, in the scale,}Would look like little dolphins, when they sail}In the vast shadow of the British whale.}For this, in Nero's arbitrary time,When virtue was a guilt, and wealth a crime,A troop of cut-throat guards were sent to seizeThe rich men's goods, and gut their palaces:The mob, commissioned by the government,Are seldom to an empty garret sent.The fearful passenger, who travels late,Charged with the carriage of a paltry plate,Shakes at the moonshine shadow of a rush,And sees a red-coat rise from every bush;The beggar sings, even when he sees the placeBeset with thieves, and never mends his pace.Of all the vows, the first and chief requestOf each, is—to be richer than the rest:And yet no doubts the poor man's draught controul,He dreads no poison in his homely bowl;Then fear the deadly drug, when gems divineEnchase the cup, and sparkle in the wine.Will you not now the pair of sages praise,Who the same end pursued by several ways?One pitied, one contemned, the woeful times;One laughed at follies, one lamented crimes.Laughter is easy; but the wonder lies,What stores of brine supplied the weeper's eyes.Democritus could feed his spleen, and shakeHis sides and shoulders, till he felt them ache;Though in his country town no lictors were,Nor rods, nor axe, nor tribune, did appear;Nor all the foppish gravity of show,Which cunning magistrates on crowds bestow.What had he done, had he beheld on highOur prætor seated in mock majesty;His chariot rolling o'er the dusty place,While, with dumb pride, and a set formal face,He moves, in the dull ceremonial track,With Jove's embroidered coat upon his back!A suit of hangings had not more opprestHis shoulders, than that long laborious vest;A heavy gewgaw, called a crown, that spreadAbout his temples, drowned his narrow head,And would have crushed it with the massy freight,But that a sweating slave sustained the weight;A slave, in the same chariot seen to ride,To mortify the mighty madman's pride.Add now the imperial eagle, raised on high,With golden beak, the mark of majesty;Trumpets before, and on the left and rightA cavalcade of nobles, all in white;In their own natures false and flattering tribes,But made his friends by places and by bribes.In his own age, Democritus could findSufficient cause to laugh at human kind:Learn from so great a wit; a land of bogs,With ditches fenced, a heaven fat with fogs,May form a spirit fit to sway the state,And make the neighbouring monarchs fear their fate.He laughs at all the vulgar cares and fears;At their vain triumphs, and their vainer tears:An equal temper in his mind he found,When fortune flattered him, and when she frowned.'Tis plain, from hence, that what our vows requestAre hurtful things, or useless at the best.Some ask for envied power; which public hatePursues, and hurries headlong to their fate:Down go the titles; and the statue crowned,Is by base hands in the next river drowned.The guiltless horses, and the chariot wheel,The same effects of vulgar fury feel:The smith prepares his hammer for the stroke,While the lung'd bellows hissing fire provoke.Sejanus, almost first of Roman names,[143]The great Sejanus crackles in the flames:Formed in the forge, the pliant brass is laid}On anvils; and of head and limbs are made,}Pans, cans, and piss-pots, a whole kitchen trade.}Adorn your doors with laurels; and a bull,Milk white, and large, lead to the Capitol;Sejanus with a rope is dragged along,The sport and laughter of the giddy throng!Good Lord! they cry, what Ethiop lips he has;How foul a snout, and what a hanging face!By heaven, I never could endure his sight!But say, how came his monstrous crimes to light?What is the charge, and who the evidence,(The saviour of the nation and the prince?)Nothing of this; but our old Cæsar sentA noisy letter to his parliament.Nay, sirs, if Cæsar writ, I ask no more;He's guilty, and the question's out of door.How goes the mob? (for that's a mighty thing,)When the king's trump, the mob are for the king:They follow fortune, and the common cryIs still against the rogue condemned to die.But the same very mob, that rascal crowd,Had cried Sejanus, with a shout as loud,Had his designs (by fortune's favour blest)Succeeded, and the prince's age opprest.But long, long since, the times have changed their face,The people grown degenerate and base;Not suffered now the freedom of their choiceTo make their magistrates, and sell their voice.Our wise forefathers, great by sea and land,Had once the power and absolute command;All offices of trust themselves disposed;Raised whom they pleased, and whom they pleased deposed:But we, who give our native rights away,And our enslaved posterity betray,Are now reduced to beg an alms, and goOn holidays to see a puppet-show.There was a damned design, cries one, no doubt,For warrants are already issued out:I met Brutidius in a mortal fright,He's dipt for certain, and plays least in sight;I fear the rage of our offended prince,Who thinks the senate slack in his defence.Come, let us haste, our loyal zeal to show,And spurn the wretched corpse of Cæsar's foe:But let our slaves be present there; lest theyAccuse their masters, and for gain betray.—Such were the whispers of those jealous times,About Sejanus' punishment and crimes.Now, tell me truly, wouldst thou change thy fate,To be, like him, first minister of state?To have thy levees crowded with resort,Of a depending, gaping, servile court;Dispose all honours of the sword and gown,Grace with a nod, and ruin with a frown;To hold thy prince in pupillage, and swayThat monarch, whom the mastered world obey?While he, intent on secret lusts alone,Lives to himself, abandoning the throne;Cooped in a narrow isle,[144]observing dreamsWith flattering wizards, and erecting schemes!I well believe thou wouldst be great as he,For every man's a fool to that degree:All wish the dire prerogative to kill;Even they would have the power, who want the will:But wouldst thou have thy wishes understood,To take the bad together with the good?Wouldst thou not rather choose a small renown,To be the mayor of some poor paltry town;Bigly to look, and barbarously to speak;To pound false weights, and scanty measures break?Then, grant we that Sejanus went astrayIn every wish, and knew not how to pray;For he, who grasped the world's exhausted store,Yet never had enough, but wished for more,Raised a top-heavy tower, of monstrous height,Which, mouldering, crushed him underneath the weight.What did the mighty Pompey's fall beget,And ruined him, who, greater than the Great,[145]The stubborn pride of Roman nobles broke,And bent their haughty necks beneath his yoke:What else but his immoderate lust of power,Prayers made and granted in a luckless hour?For few usurpers to the shades descendBy a dry death, or with a quiet end.The boy, who scarce has paid his entrance downTo his proud pedant, or declined a noun,(So small an elf, that, when the days are foul,He and his satchel must be borne to school,)Yet prays, and hopes, and aims at nothing less,To prove a Tully, or Demosthenes:But both those orators, so much renowned,In their own depths of eloquence were drowned:[146]The hand and head were never lost of thoseWho dealt in doggrel, or who punned in prose."Fortune foretuned the dying notes of Rome,Till I, thy consul sole, consoled thy doom."[147]His fate had crept below the lifted swords,Had all his malice been to murder words.I rather would be Mævius, thrash for rhymesLike his, the scorn and scandal of the times,Than that Philippic[148], fatally divine,Which is inscribed the second, should be mine.Nor he, the wonder of the Grecian throng,Who drove them with the torrent of his tongue,Who shook the theatres, and swayed the stateOf Athens, found a more propitious fate.Whom, born beneath a boding horoscope,His sire, the blear-eyed Vulcan of a shop,From Mars his forge, sent to Minerva's schools,To learn the unlucky art of wheedling fools.With itch of honour, and opinion vain,All things beyond their native worth we strain;The spoils of war, brought to Feretrian Jove,An empty coat of armour hung aboveThe conqueror's chariot and in triumph borne,A streamer from a boarded galley torn,A chap-fallen beaver loosely hanging byThe cloven helm, an arch of victory;On whose high convex sits a captive foe,And, sighing, casts a mournful look below;[149]—Of every nation each illustrious name,Such toys as these have cheated into fame;Exchanging solid quiet, to obtainThe windy satisfaction of the brain.So much the thirst of honour fires the blood;So many would be great, so few be good:For who would Virtue for herself regard,Or wed, without the portion of reward?Yet this mad chace of fame, by few pursued,Has drawn destruction on the multitude;This avarice of praise in times to come,Those long inscriptions crowded on the tomb;Should some wild fig-tree take her native bent,And heave below the gaudy monument,Would crack the marble titles, and disperseThe characters of all the lying verse.For sepulchres themselves must crumbling fallIn time's abyss, the common grave of all.Great Hannibal within the balance lay,And tell how many pounds his ashes weigh;Whom Afric was not able to contain,Whose length runs level with the Atlantic main,And wearies fruitful Nilus, to conveyHis sun-beat waters by so long a way;Which Ethiopia's double clime divides,And elephants in other mountains hides.Spain first he won, the Pyreneans past,And steepy Alps, the mounds that nature cast;And with corroding juices, as he went,A passage through the living rocks he rent:Then, like a torrent rolling from on high,He pours his headlong rage on Italy,In three victorious battles over-run;Yet, still uneasy, cries,—There's nothing done,Till level with the ground their gates are laid,And Punic flags on Roman towers displayed.Ask what a face belonged to this high fame,His picture scarcely would deserve a frame:A sign-post dauber would disdain to paintThe one-eyed hero on his elephant.Now, what's his end, O charming Glory! say,What rare fifth act to crown this huffing play?In one deciding battle overcome,He flies, is banished from his native home;Begs refuge in a foreign court, and thereAttends, his mean petition to prefer;Repulsed by surly grooms, who wait beforeThe sleeping tyrant's interdicted door.What wonderous sort of death has heaven designed,}Distinguished from the herd of human kind,}For so untamed, so turbulent a mind?}Nor swords at hand, nor hissing darts afar,Are doomed to avenge the tedious bloody war;But poison, drawn through a ring's hollow plate,Must finish him—a sucking infant's fate.Go, climb the rugged Alps, ambitious fool,To please the boys, and be a theme at school.One world sufficed not Alexander's mind;Cooped up, he seemed in earth and seas confined,And, struggling, stretched his restless limbs aboutThe narrow globe, to find a passage out:Yet entered in the brick-built town,[150]he triedThe tomb, and found the strait dimensions wide.Death only this mysterious truth unfolds,The mighty soul how small a body holds.Old Greece a tale of Athos would make out,[151]Cut from the continent, and sailed about;Seas hid with navies, chariots passing o'erThe channel, on a bridge from shore to shore:Rivers, whose depth no sharp beholder sees,Drunk at an army's dinner to the lees;With a long legend of romantic things,Which in his cups the bowsy poet sings.But how did he return, this haughty brave,Who whipt the winds, and made the sea his slave?(Though Neptune took unkindly to be bound,}And Eurus never such hard usage found}In his Æolian prison under ground;)}What god so mean, even he who points the way,[152]So merciless a tyrant to obey!But how returned he, let us ask again?}In a poor skiff he passed the bloody main,}Choked with the slaughtered bodies of his train.}For fame he prayed, but let the event declareHe had no mighty penn'worth of his prayer.Jove, grant me length of life, and years good storeHeap on my bending back! I ask no more.—Both sick and healthful, old and young, conspireIn this one silly mischievous desire.Mistaken blessing, which old age they call,'Tis a long, nasty, darksome hospital:A ropy chain of rheums; a visage rough,Deformed, unfeatured, and a skin of buff;A stitch-fallen cheek, that hangs below the jaw;Such wrinkles as a skilful hand would drawFor an old grandame ape, when, with a grace,She sits at squat, and scrubs her leathern face.In youth, distinctions infinite abound;No shape, or feature, just alike are found;The fair, the black, the feeble, and the strong:}But the same foulness does to age belong.}The self-same palsy, both in limbs and tongue;}The skull and forehead one bald barren plain,And gums unarmed to mumble meat in vain;Besides, the eternal drivel, that suppliesThe dropping beard, from nostrils, mouth, and eyes.His wife and children lothe him, and, what's worse,Himself does his offensive carrion curse!Flatterers forsake him too; for who would killHimself, to be remembered in a will?His taste not only pall'd to wine and meat,But to the relish of a nobler treat.The limber nerve, in vain provoked to rise,Inglorious from the field of battle flies;Poor feeble dotard! how could he advanceWith his blue head-piece, and his broken lance?Add, that, endeavouring still, without effect,A lust more sordid justly we suspect.Those senses lost, behold a new defeat,The soul dislodging from another seat.What music, or enchanting voice, can cheerA stupid, old, impenetrable ear?No matter in what place, or what degreeOf the full theatre he sits to see;Cornets and trumpets cannot reach his ear;Under an actor's nose he's never near.His boy must bawl, to make him understandThe hour o'the day, or such a lord's at hand;The little blood that creeps within his veins,Is but just warmed in a hot fever's pains.In fine, he wears no limb about him sound,With sores and sicknesses beleaguered roundAsk me their names, I sooner could relateHow many drudges on salt Hippia wait;What crowds of patients the town doctor kills,Or how, last fall, he raised the weekly bills;What provinces by Basilus were spoiled;What herds of heirs by guardians are beguiled;How many bouts a-day that bitch has tried;How many boys that pedagogue can ride;What lands and lordships for their owner knowMy quondam barber, but his worship now.This dotard of his broken back complains;One his legs fail, and one his shoulder pains:Another is of both his eyes bereft,And envies who has one for aiming left;A fifth, with trembling lips expecting standsAs in his childhood, crammed by others hands;One, who at sight of supper opened wide}His jaws before, and whetted grinders tried,}Now only yawns, and waits to be supplied;}Like a young swallow, when, with weary wings,Expected food her fasting mother brings.His loss of members is a heavy curse,But all his faculties decayed, a worse.His servants' names he has forgotten quite;Knows not his friend who supped with him last night:Not even the children he begot and bred;Or his will knows them not; for, in their stead,In form of law, a common hackney jade,Sole heir, for secret services, is made:So lewd, and such a battered brothel whore,That she defies all comers at her door.Well, yet suppose his senses are his own,He lives to be chief mourner for his son:Before his face, his wife and brother burns;He numbers all his kindred in their urns.These are the fines he pays for living long,And dragging tedious age in his own wrong;Griefs always green, a household still in tears,}Sad pomps, a threshold thronged with daily biers,}And liveries of black for length of years.}Next to the raven's age, the Pylian king[153]Was longest lived of any two-legged thing.Blest, to defraud the grave so long, to mountHis numbered years, and on his right hand count![154]Three hundred seasons, guzzling must of wine!—But hold a while, and hear himself repineAt fate's unequal laws, and at the clueWhich, merciless in length, the midmost sister drew.[155]When his brave son upon the funeral pyreHe saw extended, and his beard on fire,He turned, and, weeping, asked his friends, what crimeHad cursed his age to this unhappy time?Thus mourned old Peleus for Achilles slain,And thus Ulysses' father did complain.How fortunate an end had Priam made,Among his ancestors a mighty shade,While Troy yet stood; when Hector, with the raceOf royal bastards, might his funeral grace;Amidst the tears of Trojan dames inurned,And by his loyal daughters truly mourned!Had heaven so blest him, he had died beforeThe fatal fleet to Sparta Paris bore:But mark what age produced,—he lived to seeHis town in flames, his falling monarchy.In fine, the feeble sire, reduced by fate,To change his sceptre for a sword, too late,His last effort before Jove's altar tries,A soldier half, and half a sacrifice:Falls like an ox that waits the coming blow,Old and unprofitable to the plough.[156]At least he died a man; his queen survived,To howl, and in a barking body lived.[157]I hasten to our own; nor will relateGreat Mithridates,[158]and rich Crœsus' fate;[159]Whom Solon wisely counselled to attendThe name of happy, till he knew his end.That Marius was an exile, that he fled,Was ta'en, in ruined Carthage begged his bread;All these were owing to a life too long:For whom had Rome beheld so happy, young?High in his chariot, and with laurel crowned,When he had led the Cimbrian captives roundThe Roman streets, descending from his state,In that blest hour he should have begged his fate;Then, then, he might have died of all admired,And his triumphant soul with shouts expired.Campania, Fortune's malice to prevent,To Pompey an indulgent fever sent;But public prayers imposed on heaven to giveTheir much loved leader an unkind reprieve;The city's fate and his conspired to saveThe head reserved for an Egyptian slave.[160]Cethegus, though a traitor to the state,And tortured, 'scaped this ignominious fate;[161]And Sergius, who a bad cause bravely tried,All of a piece, and undiminished, died.[162]To Venus, the fond mother makes a prayer,That all her sons and daughters may be fair:True, for the boys a mumbling vow she sends,But for the girls the vaulted temple rends:They must be finished pieces; 'tis allowedDiana's beauty made Latona proud,And pleased to see the wondering people prayTo the new-rising sister of the day.And yet Lucretia's fate would bar that vow;And fair Virginia[163]would her fate bestowOn Rutila, and change her faultless makeFor the foul rumple of her camel back.But, for his mother's boy, the beau, what frightsHis parents have by day, what anxious nights!Form joined with virtue is a sight too rare;Chaste is no epithet to suit with fair.Suppose the same traditionary strainOf rigid manners in the house remain;Inveterate truth, an old plain Sabine's heart;Suppose that nature too has done her part,Infused into his soul a sober grace,And blushed a modest blood into his face,(For nature is a better guardian farThan saucy pedants, or dull tutors are;)Yet still the youth must ne'er arrive at man,(So much almighty bribes and presents can;)Even with a parent, where persuasions fail,Money is impudent, and will prevail.We never read of such a tyrant king,Who gelt a boy deformed, to hear him sing;Nor Nero, in his more luxurious rage,E'er made a mistress of an ugly page:Sporus, his spouse, nor crooked was, nor lame,}With mountain back, and belly, from the game}Cross-barred; but both his sexes well became.}Go, boast your Springal, by his beauty curstTo ills, nor think I have declared the worst;His form procures him journey-work; a strifeBetwixt town-madams, and the merchant's wife:Guess, when he undertakes this public war,What furious beasts offended cuckolds are.Adulterers are with dangers round beset;Born under Mars, they cannot 'scape the net;And, from revengeful husbands, oft have triedWorse handling than severest laws provide:One stabs, one slashes, one, with cruel art,Makes colon suffer for the peccant part.But your Endymion, your smooth smock-faced boy,Unrivalled, shall a beauteous dame enjoy.Not so: one more salacious, rich, and old,Outbids, and buys her pleasure for her gold:Now, he must moil, and drudge, for one he lothes;She keeps him high in equipage and clothes;She pawns her jewels, and her rich attire,And thinks the workman worthy of his hire.In all things else immoral, stingy, mean,But, in her lusts, a conscionable quean.She may be handsome, yet be chaste, you say;—Good observator, not so fast away;Did it not cost the modest youth his life,Who shunned the embraces of his father's wife?[164]And was not t'other stripling forced to fly,}Who coldly did his patron's queen deny,}And pleaded laws of hospitality?[165]}The ladies charged them home, and turned the tale;With shame they reddened, and with spite grew pale.'Tis dangerous to deny the longing dame;She loses pity, who has lost her shame.Now Silius wants thy counsel, give advice;Wed Cæsar's wife, or die—the choice is nice.[166]Her comet-eyes she darts on every grace,And takes a fatal liking to his face.Adorned with bridal pomp, she sits in state;The public notaries and Aruspex wait;The genial bed is in the garden dressed,}The portion paid, and every rite expressed,}Which in a Roman marriage is professed.}'Tis no stolen wedding this; rejecting awe,She scorns to marry, but in form of law:In this moot case, your judgment to refuseIs present death, besides the night you lose:If you consent, 'tis hardly worth your pain,A day or two of anxious life you gain;Till loud reports through all the town have past,And reach the prince—for cuckolds hear the last.Indulge thy pleasure, youth, and take thy swing,For not to take is but the self-same thing;Inevitable death before thee lies,But looks more kindly through a lady's eyes.What then remains? are we deprived of will;Must we not wish, for fear of wishing ill?Receive my counsel, and securely move;—Intrust thy fortune to the powers above;Leave them to manage for thee, and to grantWhat their unerring wisdom sees thee want:In goodness, as in greatness, they excel;Ah, that we loved ourselves but half so well!We, blindly by our head-strong passions led,Are hot for action, and desire to wed;Then wish for heirs; but to the gods alone}Our future offspring, and our wives, are known;}The audacious strumpet, and ungracious son.}Yet, not to rob the priests of pious gain,That altars be not wholly built in vain,Forgive the gods the rest, and stand confinedTo health of body, and content of mind;A soul, that can securely death defy,And count it nature's privilege to die;Serene and manly, hardened to sustainThe load of life, and exercised in pain;Guiltless of hate, and proof against desire,That all things weighs, and nothing can admire;That dares prefer the toils of Hercules,To dalliance, banquet, and ignoble ease.The path to peace is virtue: what I show,Thyself may freely on thyself bestow;Fortune was never worshipped by the wise,But, set aloft by fools, usurps the skies.
Look round the habitable world, how fewKnow their own good, or, knowing it, pursue.How void of reason are our hopes and fears!What in the conduct of our life appearsSo well designed, so luckily begun,But when we have our wish, we wish undone?Whole houses, of their whole desires possest,Are often ruined at their own request.In wars and peace things hurtful we require,When made obnoxious to our own desire.With laurels some have fatally been crowned;}Some, who the depths of eloquence have found,}In that unnavigable stream were drowned.}The brawny fool, who did his vigour boast;In that presuming confidence was lost;[142]But more have been by avarice opprest,And heaps of money crowded in the chest:Unwieldy sums of wealth, which higher mountThan files of marshalled figures can account;To which the stores of Crœsus, in the scale,}Would look like little dolphins, when they sail}In the vast shadow of the British whale.}For this, in Nero's arbitrary time,When virtue was a guilt, and wealth a crime,A troop of cut-throat guards were sent to seizeThe rich men's goods, and gut their palaces:The mob, commissioned by the government,Are seldom to an empty garret sent.The fearful passenger, who travels late,Charged with the carriage of a paltry plate,Shakes at the moonshine shadow of a rush,And sees a red-coat rise from every bush;The beggar sings, even when he sees the placeBeset with thieves, and never mends his pace.Of all the vows, the first and chief requestOf each, is—to be richer than the rest:And yet no doubts the poor man's draught controul,He dreads no poison in his homely bowl;Then fear the deadly drug, when gems divineEnchase the cup, and sparkle in the wine.Will you not now the pair of sages praise,Who the same end pursued by several ways?One pitied, one contemned, the woeful times;One laughed at follies, one lamented crimes.Laughter is easy; but the wonder lies,What stores of brine supplied the weeper's eyes.Democritus could feed his spleen, and shakeHis sides and shoulders, till he felt them ache;Though in his country town no lictors were,Nor rods, nor axe, nor tribune, did appear;Nor all the foppish gravity of show,Which cunning magistrates on crowds bestow.What had he done, had he beheld on highOur prætor seated in mock majesty;His chariot rolling o'er the dusty place,While, with dumb pride, and a set formal face,He moves, in the dull ceremonial track,With Jove's embroidered coat upon his back!A suit of hangings had not more opprestHis shoulders, than that long laborious vest;A heavy gewgaw, called a crown, that spreadAbout his temples, drowned his narrow head,And would have crushed it with the massy freight,But that a sweating slave sustained the weight;A slave, in the same chariot seen to ride,To mortify the mighty madman's pride.Add now the imperial eagle, raised on high,With golden beak, the mark of majesty;Trumpets before, and on the left and rightA cavalcade of nobles, all in white;In their own natures false and flattering tribes,But made his friends by places and by bribes.In his own age, Democritus could findSufficient cause to laugh at human kind:Learn from so great a wit; a land of bogs,With ditches fenced, a heaven fat with fogs,May form a spirit fit to sway the state,And make the neighbouring monarchs fear their fate.He laughs at all the vulgar cares and fears;At their vain triumphs, and their vainer tears:An equal temper in his mind he found,When fortune flattered him, and when she frowned.'Tis plain, from hence, that what our vows requestAre hurtful things, or useless at the best.Some ask for envied power; which public hatePursues, and hurries headlong to their fate:Down go the titles; and the statue crowned,Is by base hands in the next river drowned.The guiltless horses, and the chariot wheel,The same effects of vulgar fury feel:The smith prepares his hammer for the stroke,While the lung'd bellows hissing fire provoke.Sejanus, almost first of Roman names,[143]The great Sejanus crackles in the flames:Formed in the forge, the pliant brass is laid}On anvils; and of head and limbs are made,}Pans, cans, and piss-pots, a whole kitchen trade.}Adorn your doors with laurels; and a bull,Milk white, and large, lead to the Capitol;Sejanus with a rope is dragged along,The sport and laughter of the giddy throng!Good Lord! they cry, what Ethiop lips he has;How foul a snout, and what a hanging face!By heaven, I never could endure his sight!But say, how came his monstrous crimes to light?What is the charge, and who the evidence,(The saviour of the nation and the prince?)Nothing of this; but our old Cæsar sentA noisy letter to his parliament.Nay, sirs, if Cæsar writ, I ask no more;He's guilty, and the question's out of door.How goes the mob? (for that's a mighty thing,)When the king's trump, the mob are for the king:They follow fortune, and the common cryIs still against the rogue condemned to die.But the same very mob, that rascal crowd,Had cried Sejanus, with a shout as loud,Had his designs (by fortune's favour blest)Succeeded, and the prince's age opprest.But long, long since, the times have changed their face,The people grown degenerate and base;Not suffered now the freedom of their choiceTo make their magistrates, and sell their voice.Our wise forefathers, great by sea and land,Had once the power and absolute command;All offices of trust themselves disposed;Raised whom they pleased, and whom they pleased deposed:But we, who give our native rights away,And our enslaved posterity betray,Are now reduced to beg an alms, and goOn holidays to see a puppet-show.There was a damned design, cries one, no doubt,For warrants are already issued out:I met Brutidius in a mortal fright,He's dipt for certain, and plays least in sight;I fear the rage of our offended prince,Who thinks the senate slack in his defence.Come, let us haste, our loyal zeal to show,And spurn the wretched corpse of Cæsar's foe:But let our slaves be present there; lest theyAccuse their masters, and for gain betray.—Such were the whispers of those jealous times,About Sejanus' punishment and crimes.Now, tell me truly, wouldst thou change thy fate,To be, like him, first minister of state?To have thy levees crowded with resort,Of a depending, gaping, servile court;Dispose all honours of the sword and gown,Grace with a nod, and ruin with a frown;To hold thy prince in pupillage, and swayThat monarch, whom the mastered world obey?While he, intent on secret lusts alone,Lives to himself, abandoning the throne;Cooped in a narrow isle,[144]observing dreamsWith flattering wizards, and erecting schemes!I well believe thou wouldst be great as he,For every man's a fool to that degree:All wish the dire prerogative to kill;Even they would have the power, who want the will:But wouldst thou have thy wishes understood,To take the bad together with the good?Wouldst thou not rather choose a small renown,To be the mayor of some poor paltry town;Bigly to look, and barbarously to speak;To pound false weights, and scanty measures break?Then, grant we that Sejanus went astrayIn every wish, and knew not how to pray;For he, who grasped the world's exhausted store,Yet never had enough, but wished for more,Raised a top-heavy tower, of monstrous height,Which, mouldering, crushed him underneath the weight.What did the mighty Pompey's fall beget,And ruined him, who, greater than the Great,[145]The stubborn pride of Roman nobles broke,And bent their haughty necks beneath his yoke:What else but his immoderate lust of power,Prayers made and granted in a luckless hour?For few usurpers to the shades descendBy a dry death, or with a quiet end.The boy, who scarce has paid his entrance downTo his proud pedant, or declined a noun,(So small an elf, that, when the days are foul,He and his satchel must be borne to school,)Yet prays, and hopes, and aims at nothing less,To prove a Tully, or Demosthenes:But both those orators, so much renowned,In their own depths of eloquence were drowned:[146]The hand and head were never lost of thoseWho dealt in doggrel, or who punned in prose."Fortune foretuned the dying notes of Rome,Till I, thy consul sole, consoled thy doom."[147]His fate had crept below the lifted swords,Had all his malice been to murder words.I rather would be Mævius, thrash for rhymesLike his, the scorn and scandal of the times,Than that Philippic[148], fatally divine,Which is inscribed the second, should be mine.Nor he, the wonder of the Grecian throng,Who drove them with the torrent of his tongue,Who shook the theatres, and swayed the stateOf Athens, found a more propitious fate.Whom, born beneath a boding horoscope,His sire, the blear-eyed Vulcan of a shop,From Mars his forge, sent to Minerva's schools,To learn the unlucky art of wheedling fools.With itch of honour, and opinion vain,All things beyond their native worth we strain;The spoils of war, brought to Feretrian Jove,An empty coat of armour hung aboveThe conqueror's chariot and in triumph borne,A streamer from a boarded galley torn,A chap-fallen beaver loosely hanging byThe cloven helm, an arch of victory;On whose high convex sits a captive foe,And, sighing, casts a mournful look below;[149]—Of every nation each illustrious name,Such toys as these have cheated into fame;Exchanging solid quiet, to obtainThe windy satisfaction of the brain.So much the thirst of honour fires the blood;So many would be great, so few be good:For who would Virtue for herself regard,Or wed, without the portion of reward?Yet this mad chace of fame, by few pursued,Has drawn destruction on the multitude;This avarice of praise in times to come,Those long inscriptions crowded on the tomb;Should some wild fig-tree take her native bent,And heave below the gaudy monument,Would crack the marble titles, and disperseThe characters of all the lying verse.For sepulchres themselves must crumbling fallIn time's abyss, the common grave of all.Great Hannibal within the balance lay,And tell how many pounds his ashes weigh;Whom Afric was not able to contain,Whose length runs level with the Atlantic main,And wearies fruitful Nilus, to conveyHis sun-beat waters by so long a way;Which Ethiopia's double clime divides,And elephants in other mountains hides.Spain first he won, the Pyreneans past,And steepy Alps, the mounds that nature cast;And with corroding juices, as he went,A passage through the living rocks he rent:Then, like a torrent rolling from on high,He pours his headlong rage on Italy,In three victorious battles over-run;Yet, still uneasy, cries,—There's nothing done,Till level with the ground their gates are laid,And Punic flags on Roman towers displayed.Ask what a face belonged to this high fame,His picture scarcely would deserve a frame:A sign-post dauber would disdain to paintThe one-eyed hero on his elephant.Now, what's his end, O charming Glory! say,What rare fifth act to crown this huffing play?In one deciding battle overcome,He flies, is banished from his native home;Begs refuge in a foreign court, and thereAttends, his mean petition to prefer;Repulsed by surly grooms, who wait beforeThe sleeping tyrant's interdicted door.What wonderous sort of death has heaven designed,}Distinguished from the herd of human kind,}For so untamed, so turbulent a mind?}Nor swords at hand, nor hissing darts afar,Are doomed to avenge the tedious bloody war;But poison, drawn through a ring's hollow plate,Must finish him—a sucking infant's fate.Go, climb the rugged Alps, ambitious fool,To please the boys, and be a theme at school.One world sufficed not Alexander's mind;Cooped up, he seemed in earth and seas confined,And, struggling, stretched his restless limbs aboutThe narrow globe, to find a passage out:Yet entered in the brick-built town,[150]he triedThe tomb, and found the strait dimensions wide.Death only this mysterious truth unfolds,The mighty soul how small a body holds.Old Greece a tale of Athos would make out,[151]Cut from the continent, and sailed about;Seas hid with navies, chariots passing o'erThe channel, on a bridge from shore to shore:Rivers, whose depth no sharp beholder sees,Drunk at an army's dinner to the lees;With a long legend of romantic things,Which in his cups the bowsy poet sings.But how did he return, this haughty brave,Who whipt the winds, and made the sea his slave?(Though Neptune took unkindly to be bound,}And Eurus never such hard usage found}In his Æolian prison under ground;)}What god so mean, even he who points the way,[152]So merciless a tyrant to obey!But how returned he, let us ask again?}In a poor skiff he passed the bloody main,}Choked with the slaughtered bodies of his train.}For fame he prayed, but let the event declareHe had no mighty penn'worth of his prayer.Jove, grant me length of life, and years good storeHeap on my bending back! I ask no more.—Both sick and healthful, old and young, conspireIn this one silly mischievous desire.Mistaken blessing, which old age they call,'Tis a long, nasty, darksome hospital:A ropy chain of rheums; a visage rough,Deformed, unfeatured, and a skin of buff;A stitch-fallen cheek, that hangs below the jaw;Such wrinkles as a skilful hand would drawFor an old grandame ape, when, with a grace,She sits at squat, and scrubs her leathern face.In youth, distinctions infinite abound;No shape, or feature, just alike are found;The fair, the black, the feeble, and the strong:}But the same foulness does to age belong.}The self-same palsy, both in limbs and tongue;}The skull and forehead one bald barren plain,And gums unarmed to mumble meat in vain;Besides, the eternal drivel, that suppliesThe dropping beard, from nostrils, mouth, and eyes.His wife and children lothe him, and, what's worse,Himself does his offensive carrion curse!Flatterers forsake him too; for who would killHimself, to be remembered in a will?His taste not only pall'd to wine and meat,But to the relish of a nobler treat.The limber nerve, in vain provoked to rise,Inglorious from the field of battle flies;Poor feeble dotard! how could he advanceWith his blue head-piece, and his broken lance?Add, that, endeavouring still, without effect,A lust more sordid justly we suspect.Those senses lost, behold a new defeat,The soul dislodging from another seat.What music, or enchanting voice, can cheerA stupid, old, impenetrable ear?No matter in what place, or what degreeOf the full theatre he sits to see;Cornets and trumpets cannot reach his ear;Under an actor's nose he's never near.His boy must bawl, to make him understandThe hour o'the day, or such a lord's at hand;The little blood that creeps within his veins,Is but just warmed in a hot fever's pains.In fine, he wears no limb about him sound,With sores and sicknesses beleaguered roundAsk me their names, I sooner could relateHow many drudges on salt Hippia wait;What crowds of patients the town doctor kills,Or how, last fall, he raised the weekly bills;What provinces by Basilus were spoiled;What herds of heirs by guardians are beguiled;How many bouts a-day that bitch has tried;How many boys that pedagogue can ride;What lands and lordships for their owner knowMy quondam barber, but his worship now.This dotard of his broken back complains;One his legs fail, and one his shoulder pains:Another is of both his eyes bereft,And envies who has one for aiming left;A fifth, with trembling lips expecting standsAs in his childhood, crammed by others hands;One, who at sight of supper opened wide}His jaws before, and whetted grinders tried,}Now only yawns, and waits to be supplied;}Like a young swallow, when, with weary wings,Expected food her fasting mother brings.His loss of members is a heavy curse,But all his faculties decayed, a worse.His servants' names he has forgotten quite;Knows not his friend who supped with him last night:Not even the children he begot and bred;Or his will knows them not; for, in their stead,In form of law, a common hackney jade,Sole heir, for secret services, is made:So lewd, and such a battered brothel whore,That she defies all comers at her door.Well, yet suppose his senses are his own,He lives to be chief mourner for his son:Before his face, his wife and brother burns;He numbers all his kindred in their urns.These are the fines he pays for living long,And dragging tedious age in his own wrong;Griefs always green, a household still in tears,}Sad pomps, a threshold thronged with daily biers,}And liveries of black for length of years.}Next to the raven's age, the Pylian king[153]Was longest lived of any two-legged thing.Blest, to defraud the grave so long, to mountHis numbered years, and on his right hand count![154]Three hundred seasons, guzzling must of wine!—But hold a while, and hear himself repineAt fate's unequal laws, and at the clueWhich, merciless in length, the midmost sister drew.[155]When his brave son upon the funeral pyreHe saw extended, and his beard on fire,He turned, and, weeping, asked his friends, what crimeHad cursed his age to this unhappy time?Thus mourned old Peleus for Achilles slain,And thus Ulysses' father did complain.How fortunate an end had Priam made,Among his ancestors a mighty shade,While Troy yet stood; when Hector, with the raceOf royal bastards, might his funeral grace;Amidst the tears of Trojan dames inurned,And by his loyal daughters truly mourned!Had heaven so blest him, he had died beforeThe fatal fleet to Sparta Paris bore:But mark what age produced,—he lived to seeHis town in flames, his falling monarchy.In fine, the feeble sire, reduced by fate,To change his sceptre for a sword, too late,His last effort before Jove's altar tries,A soldier half, and half a sacrifice:Falls like an ox that waits the coming blow,Old and unprofitable to the plough.[156]At least he died a man; his queen survived,To howl, and in a barking body lived.[157]I hasten to our own; nor will relateGreat Mithridates,[158]and rich Crœsus' fate;[159]Whom Solon wisely counselled to attendThe name of happy, till he knew his end.That Marius was an exile, that he fled,Was ta'en, in ruined Carthage begged his bread;All these were owing to a life too long:For whom had Rome beheld so happy, young?High in his chariot, and with laurel crowned,When he had led the Cimbrian captives roundThe Roman streets, descending from his state,In that blest hour he should have begged his fate;Then, then, he might have died of all admired,And his triumphant soul with shouts expired.Campania, Fortune's malice to prevent,To Pompey an indulgent fever sent;But public prayers imposed on heaven to giveTheir much loved leader an unkind reprieve;The city's fate and his conspired to saveThe head reserved for an Egyptian slave.[160]Cethegus, though a traitor to the state,And tortured, 'scaped this ignominious fate;[161]And Sergius, who a bad cause bravely tried,All of a piece, and undiminished, died.[162]To Venus, the fond mother makes a prayer,That all her sons and daughters may be fair:True, for the boys a mumbling vow she sends,But for the girls the vaulted temple rends:They must be finished pieces; 'tis allowedDiana's beauty made Latona proud,And pleased to see the wondering people prayTo the new-rising sister of the day.And yet Lucretia's fate would bar that vow;And fair Virginia[163]would her fate bestowOn Rutila, and change her faultless makeFor the foul rumple of her camel back.But, for his mother's boy, the beau, what frightsHis parents have by day, what anxious nights!Form joined with virtue is a sight too rare;Chaste is no epithet to suit with fair.Suppose the same traditionary strainOf rigid manners in the house remain;Inveterate truth, an old plain Sabine's heart;Suppose that nature too has done her part,Infused into his soul a sober grace,And blushed a modest blood into his face,(For nature is a better guardian farThan saucy pedants, or dull tutors are;)Yet still the youth must ne'er arrive at man,(So much almighty bribes and presents can;)Even with a parent, where persuasions fail,Money is impudent, and will prevail.We never read of such a tyrant king,Who gelt a boy deformed, to hear him sing;Nor Nero, in his more luxurious rage,E'er made a mistress of an ugly page:Sporus, his spouse, nor crooked was, nor lame,}With mountain back, and belly, from the game}Cross-barred; but both his sexes well became.}Go, boast your Springal, by his beauty curstTo ills, nor think I have declared the worst;His form procures him journey-work; a strifeBetwixt town-madams, and the merchant's wife:Guess, when he undertakes this public war,What furious beasts offended cuckolds are.Adulterers are with dangers round beset;Born under Mars, they cannot 'scape the net;And, from revengeful husbands, oft have triedWorse handling than severest laws provide:One stabs, one slashes, one, with cruel art,Makes colon suffer for the peccant part.But your Endymion, your smooth smock-faced boy,Unrivalled, shall a beauteous dame enjoy.Not so: one more salacious, rich, and old,Outbids, and buys her pleasure for her gold:Now, he must moil, and drudge, for one he lothes;She keeps him high in equipage and clothes;She pawns her jewels, and her rich attire,And thinks the workman worthy of his hire.In all things else immoral, stingy, mean,But, in her lusts, a conscionable quean.She may be handsome, yet be chaste, you say;—Good observator, not so fast away;Did it not cost the modest youth his life,Who shunned the embraces of his father's wife?[164]And was not t'other stripling forced to fly,}Who coldly did his patron's queen deny,}And pleaded laws of hospitality?[165]}The ladies charged them home, and turned the tale;With shame they reddened, and with spite grew pale.'Tis dangerous to deny the longing dame;She loses pity, who has lost her shame.Now Silius wants thy counsel, give advice;Wed Cæsar's wife, or die—the choice is nice.[166]Her comet-eyes she darts on every grace,And takes a fatal liking to his face.Adorned with bridal pomp, she sits in state;The public notaries and Aruspex wait;The genial bed is in the garden dressed,}The portion paid, and every rite expressed,}Which in a Roman marriage is professed.}'Tis no stolen wedding this; rejecting awe,She scorns to marry, but in form of law:In this moot case, your judgment to refuseIs present death, besides the night you lose:If you consent, 'tis hardly worth your pain,A day or two of anxious life you gain;Till loud reports through all the town have past,And reach the prince—for cuckolds hear the last.Indulge thy pleasure, youth, and take thy swing,For not to take is but the self-same thing;Inevitable death before thee lies,But looks more kindly through a lady's eyes.What then remains? are we deprived of will;Must we not wish, for fear of wishing ill?Receive my counsel, and securely move;—Intrust thy fortune to the powers above;Leave them to manage for thee, and to grantWhat their unerring wisdom sees thee want:In goodness, as in greatness, they excel;Ah, that we loved ourselves but half so well!We, blindly by our head-strong passions led,Are hot for action, and desire to wed;Then wish for heirs; but to the gods alone}Our future offspring, and our wives, are known;}The audacious strumpet, and ungracious son.}Yet, not to rob the priests of pious gain,That altars be not wholly built in vain,Forgive the gods the rest, and stand confinedTo health of body, and content of mind;A soul, that can securely death defy,And count it nature's privilege to die;Serene and manly, hardened to sustainThe load of life, and exercised in pain;Guiltless of hate, and proof against desire,That all things weighs, and nothing can admire;That dares prefer the toils of Hercules,To dalliance, banquet, and ignoble ease.The path to peace is virtue: what I show,Thyself may freely on thyself bestow;Fortune was never worshipped by the wise,But, set aloft by fools, usurps the skies.