The Romans first with Julius Caesar came,Including all the nations of that name,Gauls, Greeks, and Lombards, and, by computation,Auxiliaries or slaves of every nation.With Hengist, Saxons; Danes with Sueno came;In search of plunder, not in search of fame.Scots, Picts, and Irish from th' Hibernian shore,And conquering William brought the Normans o'er.All these their barbarous offspring left behind,The dregs of armies, they of all mankind;Blended with Britons, who before, were here.Of whom the Welsh ha' blessed the character.From this amphibious ill-born mob beganThat vain, ill-natured thing, an Englishman.
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And lest by length of time it be pretendedThe climate may this modern breed ha' mended,Wise Providence, to keep us where we are,Mixes us daily with exceeding care.We have been Europe's sink, the Jakes where sheVoids all her offal outcast progeny.From our fifth Henry's time, the strolling bandsOf banished fugitives from neighbouring landsHave here a certain sanctuary found:Th' eternal refuge of the vagabond,Where, in but half a common age of time,Borrowing new blood and mariners from the clime,Proudly they learn all mankind to contemn;And all their race are true-born Englishmen.Dutch, Walloons, Flemings, Irishmen, and Scots,Vaudois, and Valtelins, and Huguenots,In good Queen Bess's charitable reign,Supplied us with three hundred thousand men.Religion—God, we thank thee!—sent them hither,Priests, Protestants, the Devil and all together:
Of all professions and of every trade,All that were persecuted or afraid;Whether for debt or other crimes they fled,David at Hachilah was still their head.The offspring of this miscellaneous crowd,Had not their new plantations long enjoyed,But they grew Englishmen, and raised their votesAt foreign shoals for interloping Scots.The royal branch from Pictland did succeed,With troops of Scots and Scabs from North-by-Tweed.The seven first years of his pacific reignMade him and half his nation Englishmen.Scots from the northern frozen banks of Tay,With packs and plods came whigging all away;Thick as the locusts which in Egypt swarmed,With pride and hungry hopes completely armed;With native truth, diseases, and no money,Plundered our Canaan of the milk and honey.Here they grew quickly lords and gentlemen,—And all their race are true-born Englishmen.
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The wonder which remains is at our pride,To value that which all wise men deride.For Englishmen to boast of generationCancels their knowledge, and lampoons the nation.A true-born Englishman's a contradiction,In speech an irony, in fact a fiction;A banter made to be a test of fools,Which those that use it justly ridicules;A metaphor invented to expressA man akin to all the universe.
Hail hieroglyphic state-machine,Contrived to punish fancy in!Men that are men in thee can feel no pain,And all thy insignificants disdain.Contempt, that false new word for shame,Is, without crime, an empty name,A shadow to amuse mankind,But never frights the wise or well-fixed mind:Virtue despises human scorn,And scandals innocence adorn.
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Sometimes, the air of scandal to maintain,Villains look from thy lofty loops in vain;But who can judge of crimes by punishmentWhere parties rule and L[ord]s subservient?Justice with, change of interest learns to bow,And what was merit once is murder now:Actions receive their tincture from the times,And as they change, are virtues made or crimes.Thou art the state-trap of the law,But neither can keep knaves nor honest men in awe;These are too hardened in offence,And those upheld by innocence.
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Thou art no shame to truth and honesty,Nor is the character of such defaced by theeWho suffer by oppressive injury.Shame, like the exhalations of the sun,Falls back where first the motion was begun;And he who for no crime shall on thy brows appearBears less reproach than they who placed him there.
But if contempt is on thy face entailed,Disgrace itself shall be ashamed;Scandal shall blush that it has not prevailedTo blast the man it has defamed.Let all that merit equal punishmentStand there with him, and we are all content.
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Thou bugbear of the law, stand up and speak,Thy long misconstrued silence break;Tell us who 'tis upon thy ridge stands there,So full of fault and yet so void of fear;And from the paper in his hat,Let all mankind be told for what.Tell them it was because he was too bold,And told those truths which should not ha' been told,
Extol the justice of the land,Who punish what they will not understand.Tell them he stands exalted thereFor speaking what we would not hear;And yet he might have been secureHad he said less or would he ha' said more.Tell them that this is his rewardAnd worse is yet for him prepared,Because his foolish virtue was so niceAs not to sell his friends, according to his friends' advice.
And thus he's an example made,To make men of their honesty afraid,That for the time to come they mayMore willingly their friends betray;Tell them the m[en] who placed him hereAre sc[anda]ls to the times;But at a loss to find his guilt,They can't commit his crimes.
Behold in awful march and dread arrayThe long-extended squadrons shape their way!Death, in approaching terrible, impartsAn anxious horror to the bravest hearts;Yet do their beating breasts demand the strife,And thirst of glory quells the love of life.No vulgar fears can British minds control:Heat of revenge and noble pride of soulO'er look the foe, advantaged by his post,Lessen his numbers, and contract his host;Though fens and floods possessed the middle space,That unprovoked they would have feared to pass,Nor fens nor floods can stop Britannia's bandsWhen her proud foe ranged on their borders stands.
But, O my Muse, what numbers wilt thou findTo sing the furious troops in battle joined!Methinks I hear the drum's tumultuous soundThe victor's shouts and dying groans confound,The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies,And all the thunder of the battle rise!'Twas then great Malborough's mighty soul was proved,That, in the shock of charging hosts unmoved,Amidst confusion, horror, and despair,Examined all the dreadful scenes of death surveyed,To fainting squadrons sent the timely aid,Inspired repulsed battalions to engage,And taught the doubtful battle where to rage.So when an angel by divine commandWith rising tempests shakes a guilty land,Such as of late o'er pale Britannia passed,Calm and serene he drives the furious blast,And, pleases th' Almighty's orders to perform,Rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm.
The spacious firmament on high,With all the blue ethereal sky,And spangled heavens, a shining frame,Their great Original proclaim.Th' unwearied sun from day to dayDoes his Creator's power display;And publishes to every landThe work of an almighty hand.
Soon as the evening shades prevail,The moon takes up the wondrous tale;And nightly to the listening earthRepeats the story of her birth:Whilst all the stars that round her burn,And all the planets in their turn,Confirm the tidings as they roll,And spread the truth from pole to pole.
What though in solemn silence allMove round the dark terrestrial ball;What though nor real voice nor soundAmidst their radiant orbs be found?In reason's ear they all rejoice,And utter forth a glorious voice:Forever singing as they shine,'The hand that made us is divine.'
Lords, knights, and squires, the numerous bandThat wear the fair Miss Mary's fetters,Were summoned, by her high command,To show their passions by their letters.
My pen amongst the rest I took,Lest those bright eyes that cannot readShould dart their kindling fires, and lookThe power they have to be obeyed.
Nor quality nor reputationForbid me yet my flame to tell;Dear five years old befriends my passion,And I may write till she can spell.
For while she makes her silk-worms bedsWith all the tender things I swear,Whilst all the house my passion readsIn papers round her baby's hair,
She may receive and own my flame;For though the strictest prudes should know it,She'll pass for a most virtuous dame,And I for an unhappy poet.
Then, too, alas! when she shall tearThe lines some younger rival sends,She'll give me leave to write, I fear,And we shall still continue friends;
For, as our different ages move,'Tis so ordained (would fate but mend it!)That I shall be past making loveWhen she begins to comprehend it.
Spare, generous victor, spare the slaveWho did unequal war pursue,That more than triumph he might haveIn being overcome by you.
In the dispute whate'er I said,My heart was by my tongue belied,And in my looks you might have readHow much I argued on your side.
You, far from danger as from fear,Might have sustained an open fight:For seldom your opinions err;Your eyes are always in the right.
Why, fair one, would you not relyOn reason's force with beauty's joined?Could I their prevalence deny,I must at once be deaf and blind.
Alas! not hoping to subdue,I only to the fight aspired;To keep the beauteous foe in viewWas all the glory I desired.
But she, howe'er of victory sure,Contemns the wreath too long delayed,And, armed with more immediate power,Calls cruel silence to her aid.
Deeper to wound, she shuns the fight:She drops her arms, to gain the field;Secures her conquest by her flight,And triumphs when she seems to yield.
So when the Parthian turned his steedAnd from the hostile camp withdrew,With cruel skill the backward reedHe sent, and as he fled he slew.
Poor, little, pretty, fluttering thing,Must we no longer live together?And dost thou prune thy trembling wing,To take thy flight, thou know'st not whither?Thy humorous vein, thy pleasing folly,Lies all neglected, all forgot:And pensive, wavering, melancholy,Thou dread'st and hop'st, thou know'st not what.
Dear Chloe, how blubbered is that pretty face!Thy cheek all on fire, and thy hair all uncurled!Prithee quit this caprice, and (as old Falstaff says)Let us e'en talk a little like folks of this world.
How canst thou presume thou hast leave to destroyThe beauties which Venus but lent to thy keeping?Those looks were designed to inspire love and joy;More ordinary eyes may serve people for weeping.
To be vexed at a trifle or two that I writ,Your judgment at once and my passion you wrong;You take that for fact which will scarce be found wit:Od's life! must one swear to the truth of a song?
What I speak, my fair Chloe, and what I write, showsThe difference there is betwixt nature and art:I court others in verse, but I love thee in prose;And they have my whimsies, but thou hast my heart.
The god of us verse-men (you know, child), the sun,How after his journeys he sets up his rest;If at morning o'er earth 'tis his fancy to run,At night he reclines on his Thetis's breast.
So when I am wearied with wandering all day,To thee, my delight, in the evening I come:No matter what beauties I saw in my way;They were but my visits, but thou art my home.
Then finish, dear Chloe, this pastoral war,And let us like Horace and Lydia agree;For thou art a girl as much brighter than herAs he was a poet sublimer than me.
A spacious hive, well stocked with bees,That lived in luxury and ease;And yet as famed for laws and arms,As yielding large and early swarms;Was counted the great nurseryOf sciences and industry.
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Vast numbers thronged the fruitful hive;Yet those vast numbers made 'em thrive;Millions endeavouring to supplyEach others lust and vanity,While other millions were employedTo see their handiworks destroyed;They furnished half the universe,Yet had more work than labourers.Some with vast stocks, and little pains,Jumped into business of great gains;And some were damned to scythes and spades,And all those hard laborious tradesWhere willing wretches daily sweatAnd wear out strength and limbs, to eat;While others followed mysteriesTo which few folks, bind prentices,That want no stock but that of brass,And may set up without a cross,—As sharpers, parasites, pimps, players,Pickpockets, coiners, quacks, soothsayers,And all those that in enmityWith downright working, cunninglyConvert to their own use the labourOf their good-natured heedless neighbour.These were called knaves; but bar the name,The grave industrious were the same:All trades and places knew some cheat,No calling was without deceit.
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Thus every part was full of vice,Yet the whole mass a paradise:Flattered in peace, and feared in wars,They were th' esteem of foreigners,And lavish of their wealth and lives,The balance of all other hives.Such were the blessings of that state;Their crimes conspired to make them great.
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The root of evil, avarice,That damned, ill-natured, baneful vice,Was slave to prodigality,That noble sin; whilst luxuryEmployed a million of the poor,And odious pride a million more;Envy itself, and vanity,Were ministers of industry;Their darling folly—ficklenessIn diet, furniture, and dress—That strange, ridiculous vice, was madeThe very wheel that turned the trade.Their laws and clothes were equallyObjects of mutability;For what was well done for a time,In half a year became a crime.
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How vain, is mortal happiness!Had they but known the bounds of bliss,And that perfection here belowIs more than gods can well bestow,The grumbling brutes had been contentWith ministers and government.But they, at every ill success,Like creatures lost without redress,Cursed politicians, armies, fleets;While every one cried, 'Damn the cheats!'And would, though conscious of his own,In others barbarously bear none.One that had got a princely storeBy cheating master, king, and poor,Dared cry aloud, 'The land must sinkFor all its fraud'; and whom d'ye thinkThe sermonizing rascal chid?A glover that sold lamb for kid!The least thing was not done amiss,Or crossed the public business,But all the rogues cried brazenly,'Good Gods, had we but honesty!'Mercury smiled at th' impudence,And others called it want of sense,Always to rail at what they loved:But Jove, with indignation moved,At last in anger swore he'd ridThe bawling hive of fraud; and did.The very moment it departs,And honesty fills all their hearts,There shews 'em, like th' instructive tree,Those crimes which they're ashamed to see,Which now in silence they confessBy blushing at their ugliness;Like children that would hide their faultsAnd by their colour own their thoughts,Imagining when they're looked upon,That others see what they have done.But, O ye Gods! what consternation!How vast and sudden was th' alternation!In half an hour, the nation round,Meat fell a penny in the pound.
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Now mind the glorious hive, and seeHow honesty and trade agree.The show is gone; it thins apace,And looks with quite another face.For 'twas not only that they wentBy whom vast sums were yearly spent;But multitudes that lived on them,Were daily forced to do the same.In vain to other trades they'd fly;All were o'erstocked accordingly.
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As pride and luxury decrease,So by degrees they leave the seas.Not merchants now, but companies,Remove whole manufactories.All arts and crafts neglected lie:Content, the bane of industry,Makes 'em admire their homely store,And neither seek nor covet more.So few in the vast hive remain,The hundredth part they can't maintainAgainst th' insults of numerous foes,Whom yet they valiantly oppose,Till some well-fenced retreat is found,And here they die or stand their ground.No hireling in their army's known;But bravely fighting for their ownTheir courage and integrityAt last were crowned with victory.They triumphed not without their cost,For many thousand bees were lost.Hardened with toil and exercise,They counted ease itself a vice;Which so improved their temperanceThat, to avoid extravagance,They flew into a hollow tree,Blessed with content and honesty.
Then leave complaints: fools only striveTo make a great an honest hive.T' enjoy the world's conveniences,Be famed in war, yet live in ease,Without great vices, is a vainUtopia seated in the brain.
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Where'er my flattering passions rove,I find a lurking snare;'Tis dangerous to let loose our loveBeneath th' eternal fair.
Souls whom the tie of friendship binds,And things that share our blood,Seize a large portion of our minds,And leave the less for God.
Nature has soft but powerful bands,And reason she controls;While children with their little handsHang closest to our souls.
Thoughtless they act th' old Serpent's part;What tempting things they be!Lord, how they twine about our heart,And draw it off from Thee!
Our hasty wills rush blindly onWhere rising passion rolls,And thus we make our fetters strongTo bind our slavish souls.
Dear Sovereign, break these fetters off.And set our spirits free;God in Himself is bliss enough;For we have all in Thee.
When the fierce north-wind with his airy forces,Bears up the Baltic to a foaming fury;And the red lightning with a storm of hail comesRushing amain down;
How the poor sailors stand amazed and tremble,While the hoarse thunder, like a bloody trumpet,Roars a loud onset to the gaping waters,Quick to devour them.
Such shall the noise be, and the wild disorder(If things eternal may be like these earthly),Such the dire terror when the great ArchangelShakes the creation;
Tears the strong pillars of the vault of heaven,Breaks up old marble, the repose of princes.See the graves open, and the bones arising,Flames all around them!
Hark, the shrill outcries of the guilty wretches!Lively bright horror and amazing anguishStare through their eyelids, while the living worm liesGnawing within them.
Thoughts like old vultures, prey upon their heart-strings,And the smart twinges, when the eye beholds theLofty Judge frowning, and a flood of vengeanceRolling afore Him.Hopeless immortals! how they scream and shiver,While devils push them to the pit wide-yawningHideous and gloomy, to receive them headlongDown to the centre!
Stop here, my fancy: (all away, ye horridDoleful ideas!) come, arise to Jesus,How He sits God-like! and the saints around HimThroned, yet adoring!
O may I sit there when He comes triumphant,Dooming the nations! then arise to glory,While our hosannas all along the passageShout the Redeemer.
O God, our help in ages past,Our hope for years for to come,Our shelter from the stormy blast,And our eternal home:
Under the shadow of Thy throne,Thy saints have dwelt secure;Sufficient is Thine arm alone,And our defense is sure.
Before the hills in order stood,Or earth received her frame,From everlasting Thou art God,To endless years the same.
A thousand ages in Thy sightAre like an evening gone;Short as the watch that ends the nightBefore the rising sun.
Time, like an ever-rolling stream,Bears all its sons away;They fly forgotten, as a dreamDies at the opening day.
O God, our help in ages past;Our hope for years to come;Be thou our guard while troubles last,And our eternal home!
Hush! my dear, lie still and slumber,Holy angels guard thy bed!Heavenly blessings without numberGently falling on thy head.
Sleep, my babe; thy food and raiment,House and home, thy friends provide;All without thy care or payment:All thy wants are well supplied.
How much better thou'rt attendedThan the Son of God could be,When from Heaven He descendedAnd became a child like thee!
Soft and easy is thy cradle:Coarse and hard thy Saviour lay,When His birthplace was a stableAnd His softest bed was hay.
Blessed babe! what glorious features—Spotless fair, divinely bright!Must He dwell with brutal creatures?How could angels bear the sight?
Was there nothing but a mangerCursed sinners could affordTo receive the heavenly stranger?Did they thus affront their Lord?
Soft, my child: I did not chide thee,Though my song might sound too hard;'Tis thy mother sits beside thee,And her arms shall be thy guard.
Yet to read the shameful storyHow the Jews abused their King,How they served the Lord of Glory,Makes me angry while I sing.
See the kinder shepherds round Him,Telling wonders from the sky!Where they sought Him, there they found Him,With His virgin mother by.
See the lovely babe a-dressing;Lovely infant, how He smiled!When He wept, the mother's blessingSoothed and hushed the holy child.
Lo, He slumbers in His manger,Where the hornèd oxen fed;Peace, my darling: here's no danger,Here's no ox a-near thy bed.
'Twas to save thee, child, from dying.Save my dear from burning flame,Bitter groans and endless crying,That thy blest Redeemer came.
May'st thou live to know and fear him,Trust and love Him all thy days;Then go dwell forever near Him,See His face, and sing His praise!
'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skillAppear in writing or in judging ill;But, of the two, less dangerous is th' offenseTo tire our patience, than mislead our sense.Some few in that, but numbers err in this,Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss;A fool might once himself alone expose,Now one in verse makes many more in prose.
'Tis with our judgments as our watches, noneGo just alike, yet each believes his own.In poets as true genius is but rare,True taste as seldom is the critic's share;Both must alike from heaven derive their light,These born to judge, as well as those to write.Let such teach others who themselves excel,And censure freely who have written well.Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true,But are not critics to their judgment too?
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But you who seek to give and merit fameAnd justly bear a critic's noble name,Be sure yourself and your own reach to know,How far your genius, taste, and learning go;Launch not beyond your depth, but be discreet,And mark that point where sense and dulness meet.
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First follow Nature, and your judgment frameBy her just standard, which is still the same:Unerring Nature, still divinely bright,One clear, unchanged, and universal light,Life, force, and beauty, must to all impart,At once the source, and end, and test of art.Art from that fund each just supply provides,Works without show, and without pomp presides:In some fair body thus th' informing soulWith spirit feeds, with vigour fills the whole.Each motion guides, and every nerve sustains;Itself unseen, but in th' effects, remains.Some, to whom Heaven in wit has been profuse,Want as much more, to turn it to its use;For wit and judgment often are at strife,Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife.'Tis more to guide than spur the Muse's steed;Restrain his fury, than provoke his speed;The wingèd courser, like a generous horse,Shows most true mettle when you check his course.
Those rules of old discovered, not devised,Are Nature still, but Nature methodized;Nature, like liberty, is but restrainedBy the same laws which first herself ordained.
You, then, whose judgment the right course would steer,Know well each ancient's proper character;His fable, subject, scope in every page;Religion, country, genius of his age:Without all these at once before your eyes,Cavil you may, but never criticise,Be Homer's works your study and delight,Read them by day, and meditate by night;Thence form your judgment, thence your maxims bring,And trace the Muses upward to their spring.Still with itself compared, his text peruse;And let your comment be the Mantuan Muse.
When first young Maro in his boundless mindA work t' outlast immortal Rome designed,Perhaps he seemed above the critic's law,And but from nature's fountains scorned to draw:But when t' examine every part he came,Nature and Homer were, he found, the same.Convinced, amazed, he checks the bold design;And rules as strict his laboured work confineAs if the Stagirite o'erlooked each line.Learn hence for ancient rules a just esteem;To copy nature is to copy them.
Some beauties yet no precepts can declare,For there's a happiness as well as care.Music resembles poetry, in eachAre nameless graces which no methods teach,And which a master-hand alone can reach.If, where the rules not far enough extend,(Since rules were made but to promote their end)Some lucky license answer to the fullTh' intent proposed, that license is a rule.Thus Pegasus, a nearer way to take,May boldly deviate from the common track;From vulgar bounds with brave disorder part,And snatch a grace beyond the reach of art,Which without passing through the judgment, gainsThe heart, and all its end at once attains.In prospects thus, some objects please our eyes,Which out of nature's common order rise,The shapeless rock, or hanging precipice.Great wits sometimes may gloriously offend,And rise to faults true critics dare not mend.But tho' the ancients thus their rules invade,(As kings dispense with laws themselves have made)Moderns, beware! or if you must offendAgainst the precept, ne'er transgress its end;Let it be seldom and compelled by need;And have, at least, their precedent to plead.The critic else proceeds without remorse,Seizes your fame, and puts his laws in force.
I know there are, to whose presumptuous thoughtsThose freer beauties, e'en in them, seem faults.Some figures monstrous and misshaped appear,Considered singly, or beheld too near,Which, but proportioned to their light or place,Due distance reconciles to form and grace.A prudent chief not always must displayHis powers in equal ranks, and fair array,But with th' occasion and the place comply,Conceal his force, nay, seem sometimes to fly.Those oft are stratagems which errors seem,Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream.
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A little learning is a dangerous thing;Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,And drinking largely sobers us again.Fired at first sight with what the Muse imparts,In fearless youth we tempt the heights of arts,While from the bounded level of our mind,Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind;But more advanced, behold with strange surpriseNew distant scenes of endless science rise!So pleased at first the towering Alps we try,Mount o'er the vales, and seem to tread the sky,Th' eternal snows appear already past,And the first clouds and mountains seem the last;But, those attained, we tremble to surveyThe growing labours of the lengthened way,Th' increasing prospects tire our wandering eyes,Hills peep o'er hills, and Alps on Alps arise!
A perfect judge will read each work of witWith the same spirit that its author writ:Survey the whole, nor seek slight faults to findWhere nature moves, and rapture warms the mind;Nor lose, for that malignant dull delight,The gen'rous pleasure to be charmed with wit.But in such lays as neither ebb, nor flow,Correctly cold, and regularly low,That shunning faults, one quiet tenor keep;We cannot blame indeed—but we may sleep.In wit, as nature, what affects our heartsIs not th' exactness of peculiar parts:'Tis not a lip, or eye, we beauty call,But the joint force and full result of all.Thus when we view some well-proportioned dome,(The world's just wonder, and e'en thine, O Rome!)So single parts unequally surprise,All comes united to th' admiring eyes;No monstrous height, or breadth, or length appear;The whole at once is bold, and regular.
Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see,Thinks what ne'er was, nor is, nor e'er shall be.In every work regard the writer's end,Since none can compass more than they intend;And if the means be just, the conduct true,Applause, in spite of trivial faults, is due;As men of breeding, sometimes men of wit,T' avoid great errors, must the less commit:Neglect the rules each verbal critic lays,For not to know some trifles, is a praise.Most critics, fond of some subservient art,Still make the whole depend upon a part:They talk of principles, but notions prize,And all to one loved folly sacrifice.
Once on a time, La Mancha's knight, they say,A certain bard encountering on the way,Discoursed in terms as just, with looks as sage,As e'er could Dennis of the Grecian stage;Concluding all were desperate sots and fools,Who durst depart from Aristotle's rules.Our author, happy in a judge so nice,Produced his play, and begged the knight's advice;Made him observe the subject, and the plot,The manners, passions, unities, what not?All which, exact to rule, were brought about,Were but a combat in the lists left out.'What! leave the combat out?' exclaims the knight;Yes, or we must renounce the Stagirite.'Not so, by Heaven' (he answers in a rage),'Knights, squires, and steeds, must enter on the stage.'So vast a throng the stage can ne'er contain.'Then build a new, or act it in a plain.'
Thus critics, of less judgment than caprice,Curious not knowing, not exact but nice,Form short ideas; and offend in arts(As most in manners) by a love to parts.
Some to conceit alone their taste confine,And glitt'ring thoughts struck out at every line;Pleased with a work where nothing's just or fit;One glaring chaos and wild heap of wit.Poets like painters, thus unskilled to traceThe naked nature and the living grace,With gold and jewels cover every part,And hide with ornaments their want of art.True wit is nature to advantage dressed,What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed;Something, whose truth convinced at sight we find,That gives us back the image of our mind.As shades more sweetly recommend the light,So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit.For works may have more wit than does 'em good,As bodies perish through excess of blood.
Others for language all their care express,And value books, as women, men, for dress:Their praise is still,—the style is excellent;The sense, they humbly take upon content.Words are like leaves; and where they most abound,Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,Its gaudy colours spreads on every place;The face of nature we no more survey,All glares alike, without distinction gay:But true expression, like th' unchanging sun,Clears and improves whate'er it shines upon,It gilds all objects, but it alters none.Expression is the dress of thought, and stillAppears more decent, as more suitable;A vile conceit in pompous words expressed,Is like a clown in regal purple dressed:For different styles with different subjects sort,As several garbs with country, town, and court.Some by old words to fame have made pretence,Ancients in phrase, mere moderns in their sense;Such laboured nothings, in so strange a style,Amaze th' unlearn'd, and make the learnèd smile.Unlucky, as Fungoso in the play,These sparks with awkward vanity displayWhat the fine gentleman wore yesterday;And but so mimic ancient wits at best,As apes our grandsires, in their doublets dressed.In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold;Alike fantastic, if too new, or old:Be not the first by whom the new are tried,Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.
But most by numbers judge a poet's song;And smooth or rough, with them, is right or wrong:In the bright Muse though thousand charms conspire,Her voice is all these tuneful fools admire;Who haunt Parnassus but to please their ear,Not mend their minds; as some to church repair,Not for the doctrine, but the music there.These equal syllables alone require,Though oft the ear the open vowels tire;While expletives their feeble aid do join,And ten low words oft creep in one dull line:While they ring round the same unvaried chimes,With sure returns of still expected rhymes;Where'er you find 'the cooling western breeze,'In the next line, it 'whispers through the trees;'If crystal streams 'with pleasing murmurs creep,'The reader's threatened (not in vain) with 'sleep':Then, at the last and only couplet fraughtWith some unmeaning thing they call a thought,A needless Alexandrine ends the song,That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along.Leave such to tune their own dull rhymes, and knowWhat's roundly smooth or languishingly slow;And praise the easy vigour of a line,Where Denham's strength, and Waller's sweetness join.True ease in writing comes from art, not chance.As those move easiest who have learned to dance.'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence,The sound must seem an echo to the sense.Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar.When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,The line too labours, and the words move slow;Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.Hear how Timotheus' varied lays surprise,And bid alternate passions fall and rise!While, at each change, the son of Libyan JoveNow burns with glory, and then melts with love;Now his fierce eyes with sparkling fury glow,Now sighs steal out, and tears begin to flow:Persians and Greeks like turns of nature found,And the world's victor stood subdued by sound!The power of music all our hearts allow,And what Timotheus was, is Dryden now.
Avoid extremes; and shun the fault of such,Who still are pleased too little or too much.At every trifle scorn to take offence,That always shows great pride, or little sense;Those heads, as stomachs, are not sure the best,Which nauseate all, and nothing can digest.Yet let not each gay turn thy rapture move;For fools admire, but men of sense approve:As things seem large which we through mists descry,Dulness is ever apt to magnify.
Some foreign writers, some our own despise;The ancients only, or the moderns prize.Thus wit, like faith, by each man is appliedTo one small sect, and all are damned beside.Meanly they seek the blessing to confine,And force that sun but on a part to shine,Which not alone the southern wit sublimes,But ripens spirits in cold northern climes;Which from the first has shone on ages past,Enlights the present, and shall warm the last;Though each may feel increases and decays,And see now clearer and now darker days.Regard not, then, if wit be old or new,But blame the false, and value still the true.
Some ne'er advance a judgment of their own,But catch the spreading notion of the town;They reason and conclude by precedent,And own stale nonsense which they ne'er invent.Some judge of author's names, not works, and thenNor praise nor blame the writings, but the men.Of all this servile herd, the worst is heThat in proud dulness joins with Quality.A constant critic at the great man's board,To fetch and carry nonsense for my Lord.What woful stuff this madrigal would be,In some starved hackney sonneteer, or me?But let a Lord once own the happy lines,How the wit brightens! how the style refines!Before his sacred name flies every fault,And each exalted stanza teems with thought!
* * * * *
Learn then what morals critics ought to show,For 'tis but half a judge's task, to know,'Tis not enough, taste, judgment, learning join;In all you speak, let truth and candour shine:That not alone what to your sense is dueAll may allow; but seek your friendship too.
Be silent always when you doubt your sense;And speak, though sure, with seeming diffidence:Some positive, persisting fops we know,Who, if once wrong, will needs be always so;But you, with pleasure own your errors past,And make each day a critic on the last.
'Tis not enough, your counsel still be true;Blunt truths more mischief than nice falsehoods do;Men must be taught as if you taught them not,And things unknown proposed as things forgot.Without good breeding, truth is disapproved;That only makes superior sense beloved.
* * * * *
The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read,With loads of learnèd lumber in his head,With his own tongue still edifies his ears,And always listening to himself appears.All books he reads, and all he reads assails,From Dryden's Fables down to Durfey's Tales.With him, most authors steal their works, or buy;Garth did not write his own Dispensary.Name a new play, and he's the poet's friend,Nay, showed his faults—but when would poets mend?No place so sacred from such fops is barred,Nor is Paul's church more safe than Paul's churchyard:Nay, fly to altars; there they'll talk you dead:For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks,It still looks home, and short excursions makes;But rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks,And never shocked, and never turned aside,Bursts out, resistless, with a thundering tide.
But where's the man, who counsel can bestow,Still pleased to teach, and yet not proud to know?Unbiassed, or by favour, or by spite;Not dully prepossessed, nor blindly right;Though learn'd, well-bred; and though well-bred, sincere,Modestly bold, and humanly severe:Who to a friend his faults can freely show,And gladly praise the merit of a foe?Blest with a taste exact, yet unconfined;A knowledge both of books and human kind:Gen'rous converse; a soul exempt from pride;And love to praise, with reason on his side?
Not with more glories, in th' ethereal plain,The sun first rises o'er the purpled main,Than, issuing forth, the rival of his beamsLaunched on the bosom of the silver Thames.Fair nymphs, and well-dressed youths around her shone,But every eye was fixed on her alone.On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.Her lively looks a sprightly mind disclose,Quick as her eyes, and as unfixed as those;Favours to none, to all she smiles extends;Oft she rejects, but never once offends.Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers strike,And, like the sun, they shine on all alike.Yet graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride,Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide;If to her share some female errors fall,Look on her face, and you'll forget 'em all.
This nymph, to the destruction of mankind,Nourished two locks, which graceful hung behindIn equal curls, and well conspired to deckWith shining ringlets the smooth ivory neck.Love in these labyrinths his slaves detains,And mighty hearts are held in slender chains.With hairy springes, we the birds betray,Slight lines of hair surprise the finny prey,Fair tresses man's imperial race ensnare,And beauty draws us with a single hair.
Th' adventurous baron the bright locks admired;He saw, he wished, and to the prize aspired.Resolved to win, he meditates the way,By force to ravish, or by fraud betray;For when success a lover's toil attends,Few ask if fraud or force attained his ends.
For this, ere Phoebus rose, he had imploredPropitious Heaven, and every power adored,But chiefly Love; to Love an altar built,Of twelve vast French romances, neatly gilt.There lay three garters, half a pair of gloves,And all the trophies of his former loves;With tender billets-doux he lights the pyre,And breathes three amorous sighs to raise the fire.Then prostrate falls, and begs with ardent eyesSoon to obtain, and long possess the prize.The powers gave ear, and granted half his prayer;The rest the winds dispersed in empty air.
But now secure the painted vessel glides,The sunbeams trembling on the floating tides;While melting music steals upon the sky,And softened sounds along the waters die;Smooth flow the waves, the zephyrs gently play,Belinda smiled, and all the world was gay.All but the sylph—with careful thoughts oppressed,Th' impending woe sat heavy on his breast.He summons straight his denizens of air;The lucid squadrons around the sails repair;Soft o'er the shrouds aërial whispers breathe,That seemed but zephyrs to the train beneath.Some to the sun their insect wings unfold,Waft on the breeze, or sink in clouds of gold;Transparent forms, too fine for mortal sight,Their fluid bodies half dissolved in light.Loose to the wind their airy garments flew,Thin glittering textures of the filmy dew,Dipped in the richest tincture of the skies,Where light disports in ever-mingling dyes,While every beam new transient colours flings,Colours that change whene'er they wave their wings.Amid the circle, on the gilded mast,Superior by the head, was Ariel placed;His purple pinions opening to the sun,He raised his azure wand, and thus begun:
'Ye sylphs and sylphids, to your chief give ear!Fays, fairies, genii, elves, and demons, hear!Ye know the spheres, and various tasks assignedBy laws eternal to th' aërial kind.Some in the fields of purest aether play,And bask and whiten in the blaze of day.Some guide the course of wandering orbs on high,Or roll the planets through the boundless sky.Some less refined, beneath the moon's pale lightPursue the stars that shoot athwart the night,Or suck the mists in grosser air below,Or dip their pinions in the painted bow,Or brew fierce tempests on the wintry main,Or o'er the glebe distil the kindly rain;Others on earth o'er human race preside,Watch all their ways, and all their actions guide:Of these the chief the care of nations own,And guard with arms divine the British throne.
'Our humbler province is to tend the fair,Not a less pleasing, though less glorious care;To save the powder from too rude a gale,Nor let th' imprisoned essences exhale;To draw fresh colours from the vernal flowers;To steal from rainbows, ere they drop in showers,A brighter wash; to curl their waving hairs,Assist their blushes, and inspire their airs;Nay, oft in dreams, invention we bestow,To change a flounce, or add a furbelow.
'This day, black omens threat the brightest fairThat e'er deserved a watchful spirit's care;Some dire disaster, or by force, or sleight;But what, or where, the fates have wrapped in night.Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,Or some frail china jar receive a flaw;Or stain her honour, or her new brocade;Forget her prayers, or miss a masquerade;Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball;Or whether Heaven has doomed that Shock must fall.Haste, then, ye spirits! to your charge repair;The fluttering fan be Zephyretta's care;The drops to thee, Brillante, we consign;And, Momentilla, let the watch be thine;Do thou, Crispissa, tend her favourite lock;Ariel himself shall be the guard of Shock.To fifty chosen sylphs, of special note,We trust th' important charge, the petticoat:Oft have we known that sevenfold fence to fail,Though stiff with hoops, and armed with ribs of whale;Form a strong line about the silver bound,And guard the wide circumference around.
'Whatever spirit, careless of his charge,His post neglects, or leaves the fair at large,Shall feel sharp vengeance soon o'ertake his sins,Be stopped in vials, or transfixed with pins;Or plunged in lakes of bitter washes lie,Or wedged whole ages in a bodkin's eye;Gums and pomatums shall his flight restrain,While clogged he beats his silken wings in vain;Or alum styptics with contracting powerShrink his thin essence like a rivelled flower;Or, as Ixion fixed, the wretch shall feelThe giddy motion of the whirling mill,In fumes of burning chocolate shall glow,And tremble at the sea that froths below!'
He spoke; the spirits from the sails descend;Some, orb in orb, around the nymph extend;Some thrid the mazy ringlets of her hair;Some hang upon the pendants of her ear;With beating hearts the dire event they wait,Anxious, and trembling for the birth of fate.
Close by those meads, forever crowned with flowers,Where Thames with pride surveys his rising towers,There stands a structure of majestic frame,Which from the neighbouring Hampton takes its name.Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoomOf foreign tyrants and of nymphs at home;Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey,Dost sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.
Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort,To taste awhile the pleasures of a court;In various talk th' instructive hours they passed,Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last;One speaks the glory of the British Queen,And one describes a charming Indian screen;A third interprets motions, looks, and eyes;At every word a reputation dies.Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat,With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that.Meanwhile, declining from the noon of day,The sun obliquely shoots his burning ray;The hungry judges soon the sentence sign,And wretches hang that jurymen may dine;The merchant from th' Exchange returns in peace,And the long labours of the toilet cease.Belinda now, whom thirst of fame invites,Burns to encounter two adventurous knights,At ombre singly to decide their doom;And swells her breast with conquests yet to come.Straight the three bands prepare in arms to join,Each band the number of the sacred nine.Soon as she spreads her hand, th' aërial guardDescend, and sit on each important card:First, Ariel perched upon a Matadore,Then each, according to the rank they bore;For sylphs, yet mindful of their ancient race,Are, as when women, wondrous fond of place.
Behold, four kings in majesty revered,With hoary whiskers and a forky beard;And four fair queens whose hands sustain a flower,Th' expressive emblem of their softer power;Four knaves in garbs succinct, a trusty band,Caps on their heads, and halberts in their hand;And parti-coloured troops, a shining train,Draw forth to combat on the velvet plain.
The skilful nymph reviews her force with care:Let spades be trumps! she said, and trumps they were.
Now moved to war her sable Matadores,In show like leaders of the swarthy Moors.Spadillio first, unconquerable lord!Led off two captive trumps, and swept the board.As many more Manillio forced to yieldAnd marched a victor from the verdant field.Him Basto followed, but his fate more hardGained but one trump and one plebeian card.With his broad sabre next, a chief in years,The hoary Majesty of Spades appears,Puts forth one manly leg, to sight revealed,The rest, his many-coloured robe concealed.The rebel knave, who dares his prince engage,Proves the just victim of his royal rage.Even mighty Pam, that kings and queens o'erthrew,And mowed down armies in the fights of Loo,Sad chance of war! now destitute of aid,Falls undistinguished by the victor spade!
Thus far both armies to Belinda yield;Now to the baron fate inclines the field.His warlike Amazon her host invades,The imperial consort of the crown of spades;The club's black tyrant first her victim died,Spite of his haughty mien, and barbarous pride.What boots the regal circle on his head,His giant limbs, in state unwieldy spread;That long behind he trails his pompous robe,And, of all monarchs, only grasps the globe?
The baron now his diamonds pours apace;Th' embroidered king who shows but half his face,And his refulgent queen, with powers combined,Of broken troops an easy conquest find.Clubs, diamonds, hearts, in wild disorder seen,With throngs promiscuous strew the level green.Thus when dispersed a routed army runs,Of Asia's troops, and Afric's sable sons,With like confusion different nations fly,Of various habit, and of various dye,The pierced battalions disunited fall,In heaps on heaps; one fate o'erwhelms them all.
The knave of diamonds tries his wily arts,And wins (oh shameful chance!) the queen of hearts.At this the blood the virgin's cheek forsook,A livid paleness spreads o'er all her look;She sees, and trembles at th' approaching ill,Just in the jaws of ruin, and codille.And now (as oft in some distempered state)On one nice trick depends the general fate.An ace of hearts steps forth; the king unseenLurked in her hand, and mourned his captive queen:He springs to vengeance with an eager pace,And falls like thunder on the prostrate ace.The nymph exulting fills with shouts the sky;The walls, the woods, and long canals reply.
Oh thoughtless mortals! ever blind to fate,Too soon dejected, and too soon elate.Sudden, these honours shall be snatched away,And cursed forever this victorious day.
For lo! the board with cups and spoons is crowned,The berries crackle, and the mill turns round;On shining altars of Japan they raiseThe silver lamp; the fiery spirits blaze;From silver spouts the grateful liquors glide,While China's earth receives the smoking tide:At once they gratify their scent and taste,And frequent cups, prolong the rich repast.Straight hover round the fair her airy band;Some, as she sipped, the fuming liquor fanned,Some o'er her lap their careful plumes displayed,Trembling, and conscious of the rich brocade.Coffee (which makes the politician wise,And see through all things with his half-shut eyes)Sent up in vapours to the baron's brainNew stratagems the radiant lock to gain.Ah, cease, rash youth! desist ere 'tis too late,Fear the just gods, and think of Scylla's fate!Changed to a bird, and sent to flit in air,She dearly pays for Nisus' injured hair!
But when to mischief mortals bend their will,How soon they find fit instruments of ill!Just then Clarissa drew with tempting graceA two-edged weapon from her shining case:So ladies in romance assist their knight,Present the spear, and arm him for the fight.He takes the gift with reverence, and extendsThe little engine on his fingers' ends;This just behind Belinda's neck he spread,As o'er the fragrant steams she bends her head.Swift to the lock a thousand sprites repair,A thousand wings, by turns, blow back the hair;And thrice they twitched the diamond in her ear;Thrice she looked back, and thrice the foe drew near.Just in that instant, anxious Ariel soughtThe close recesses of the virgin's thought;As on the nosegay in her breast reclined,He watched th' ideas rising in her mind,Sudden he viewed, in spite of all her art,An earthly lover lurking at her heart.Amazed, confused, he found his power expired,Resigned to fate, and with a sigh retired.
The peer now spreads the glittering forfex wide,T' inclose the lock; now joins it, to divide.E'en then, before the fatal engine closed,A wretched sylph too fondly interposed;Fate urged the shears, and cut the sylph in twain(But airy substance soon unites again).The meeting points the sacred hair disseverFrom the fair head, forever, and forever!
Then flashed the living lightning from her eyes,And screams of horror rend th' affrighted skies.Not louder shrieks to pitying Heaven are cast,When husbands, or when lap-dogs breathe their last;Or when rich China vessels, fallen from high,In glittering dust and painted fragments lie!
'Let wreaths of triumph now my temples twine,'The victor cried; 'the glorious prize is mine!While fish in streams, or birds delight in air,Or in a coach and six the British fair,As long as Atalantis shall be read,Or the small pillow grace a lady's bed,While visits shall be paid on solemn days,When numerous wax-lights in bright order blaze,While nymphs take treats, or assignations give,So long my honour, name, and praise shall live!What Time would spare, from steel receives its date,And monuments, like men, submit to fate!Steel could the labour of the gods destroy,And strike to dust th' imperial towers of Troy;Steel could the works of mortal pride confound,And hew triumphal arches to the ground.What wonder then, fair nymph! thy hairs should feel,The conquering force of unresisted steel?'
'How would the sons of Troy, in arms renowned,And Troy's proud dames, whose garments sweep the ground,Attaint the lustre of my former name,Should Hector basely quit the field of fame?My early youth was bred to martial pains,My soul impels me to th' embattled plains:Let me be foremost to defend the throne,And guard my father's glories and my own.Yet come it will, the day decreed by fates,(How my heart trembles while my tongue relates!)The day when thou, imperial Troy! must bend,And see thy warriors fall, thy glories end.And yet no dire presage so wounds my mind,My mother's death, the ruin of my kind,Not Priam's hoary hairs defil'd with gore,Not all my brothers gasping on the shore,As thine, Andromache! Thy griefs I dread:I see thee trembling, weeping, captive led,In Argive looms our battles to design,And woes of which so large a part was thine!To bear the victor's hard commands, or bringThe weight of waters from Hyperia's spring!There, while you groan beneath the load of life,They cry, "Behold the mighty Hector's wife!"Some haughty Greek, who lives thy tears to see,Embitters all thy woes by naming me.The thoughts of glory past and present shame,A thousand griefs, shall waken at the name!May I lie cold before that dreadful day,Pressed with a load of monumental clay!Thy Hector, wrapped, in everlasting sleep,Shall neither hear thee sigh, nor see thee weep.'
Thus having spoke, th' illustrious chief of TroyStretched his fond arms to clasp the lovely boy.The babe clung crying to his nurse's breast,Scared at the dazzling helm and nodding crest.With secret pleasure each fond parent smiled,And Hector hasted to relieve his child;The glittering terrors from his brows unbound,And placed the beaming helmet on the ground.Then kissed the child, and, lifting high in air,Thus to the gods preferred a father's prayer:
'O thou! whose glory fills th' ethereal throne,And all ye deathless powers! protect my son!Grant him, like me, to purchase just renown,To guard the Trojans, to defend the crown,Against his country's foes the war to wage,And rise the Hector of the future age!So when, triumphant from successful toils,Of heroes slain he bears the reeking spoils,Whole hosts may hail him with deserved acclaim,And say, "This chief transcends his father's fame":While pleased, amidst the general shouts of Troy,His mother's conscious heart o'erflows with joy.'
He spoke, and fondly gazing on her charms,Restored the pleasing burthen to her arms;Soft on her fragrant breast the babe she laid,Hushed to repose, and with a smile surveyed.The troubled pleasure soon chastised by fear,She mingled with the smile a tender tear.The softened chief with kind compassion viewed,And dried the falling drops, and thus pursued:
'Andromache! my soul's far better part,Why with untimely sorrows heaves thy heart?No hostile hand can antedate my doom,Till fate condemns me to the silent tomb.Fixed is the term to all the race of earth,And such the hard condition of our birth.No force can then resist, no flight can save:All sink alike, the fearful and the brave.No more—but hasten to thy tasks at home,There guide the spindle, and direct the loom;Me glory summons to the martial scene,The field of combat is the sphere for men.Where heroes war, the foremost place I claim,The first in danger as the first in fame.'
From AN ESSAY ON MAN
Awake, my St. John! leave all meaner thingsTo low ambition, and the pride of kings.Let us (since life can little more supplyThan just to look about us, and to die)Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man;A mighty maze! but not without a plan;A wild, where weeds and flowers promiscuous shoot;Or garden, tempting with forbidden fruit.Together let us beat this ample field,Try what the open, what the covert yield;The latent tracts, the giddy heights, exploreOf all who blindly creep, or sightless soar;Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it flies,And catch the manners living as they rise;Laugh where we must, be candid where we can,But vindicate the ways of God to man.
Say first, of God above, or man below,What can we reason, but from what we know?Of man, what see we but his station hereFrom which to reason or to which refer?Through worlds unnumbered though the God be known,'Tis ours to trace him only in our own.He, who through vast immensity can pierce,See worlds on worlds compose one universe,Observe how system into system runs.What other planets circle other suns,What varied being peoples every star,May tell why Heaven has made us as we are.But of this frame the bearings, and the ties,The strong connections, nice dependencies,Gradations just, has thy pervading soulLooked through? or can a part contain the whole?