95

100

105

II

MADAM, I allow 'tis true :
All these praises are your due.
You, like some acute philosopher,
Ev'ry fault have drawn a gloss over ;
Placing in the strongest light
All your virtues to my fight.
Tho'

you

lead a blameless life,
Live an humble, prudent wife ;
Answer all domestic ends,
What is this to us your friends ?
Tho'

your children by a nod
Stand in awe without the rod :
Tho' by your obliging sway
Servants love you, and obey ;
Tho' you treat us with a smile,
Clear your looks, and smooth your style ;

;
Load our plates from ev'ry dish ;
This is not the thing we wish.
Colinel-may

be your

debtor ;
We expect employment better.
You must learn, if you would gain us,
With good sense to entertain us.

SCHOLARS, when good sense describing,
Call it tasting and imbibing ;
Metaphoric meat and drink
Is to understand and think :
We may carve for others thus,
And let others carve for us :
To discourse, and to attend,
Is, to help yourself and friend.
Conversation is but carving ;
Carve for all, yourself is starving:
Give no more to ev'ry guest,
Than he's able to digest:
Give him always of the prime,
And but little at a time.

115

120

1251

130

135

140

Carte to all but just enough ;
Let them neither ftarve, nor staff:
And that you may have your due,
Let your neighbours carve for you.
This comparison will hold,
Could it well in thyme be told,
How converfing, lift'ning, thinking,
Juftly may resemble drinking;
For a friend a glass you fill,
What is this but to instill?

To conclude this long essay:
Pardon if I disobey;
Nor againft my nat'ral vein
Treat you in heroic ftrain.
I, as all the parish knows,
Hardly can be grave in profe :
Still to lash, and lashing smile,
Ill befits a lofty style.
From the planet of my birth
I encounter vice with mirth.
Wicked ministers of state
I can easier fcorn, than hate:
And I find it answers right;
Scorn torments them more than spight.
All the vices of a court
Do but serve to make me fport.
Were I in some foreign realm,
Which all vices overwhelm ;

When my muse officious ventures On the nation's representers :

16

:

Teaching by what golden rules
Into knaves they turn their fools :
How the helm is ruld by Walpole,
At whose

oars, like slaves, they all pull : Let the vessel split on shelves ;

165 With the freight enrich themselves : Safe within my little wherry, All their madness makes me merry : Like the watermen of Thames, I row by, and call them names.

170 Like the ever laughing sage, In a jeft I spend my rage. (Tho' it must be understood, I would hang them if I cou’d). If I can but fill my nitch,

175 I attempt no higher pitch. Leave to D'Anvers and his mate Maxims wife to rule the state. Pultney deep, accomplish'd St Johns, Scourge the villains with a vengeance :

180 Let me, tho' the smell be ncisom, Strip their bums; let Caleb + horse 'em, Then apply Alecto's whip, Till they wriggle, howl, and kip. Duce is in you, Mr Dean :

185 What can all this passion mean? Mention courts, you'll ne'er be quiet ; On corruptions running riot. End, as it befits your station : Come to use and application :

190 Nor with-senates keep a fuss. I submit and answer thus.

If the machinations brewing, To complete the public ruin,

+ Caleb D'Anvers, the famous writer of the paper called the Craftsman. These papers are supposed to be written by the Lord Bolingbroke, and Mr Pulteney, created Earl of Bath.

200

210

a

Never once could have the pow'r

195 To affect me half an hour; (Sooner would I write, in buskins, Mournful elegies on + Bluskins); If I laugh at Whig and Tory ; I conclude à fortiori, All your eloquence will scarce Drive me from my fav’rite farce. This I must insist on. For, as It is well observ'd by 1 Horace, Ridicule has greater pow'r

205
To reform the world, than four.
Horses thus, let jokies judge else,
Switches better guide than cudgels.
Baftings heavy, dry, obtuse,
Only dulness can produce;
While a little gentle jerking
Sets the spirits all a working.

Thus, I find it by experiment,
Scolding moves you less than merriment.
I
may storm and rage in vain;

215
It but stupifies your brain.
But with raillery to nettle,
Sets your thoughts upon their mettle :
Gives imagination scope;
Never lets

your

mind elope :
Drives out brangling and contention,
Brings in reason and invention.
For your sake, as well as mine,
I the lofty style decline.
I, who love to have a fling

225 Both at f-n-e-h-se and

; That they might some better way tread, To avoid the public hatred ;

220

230

235

240

245

Thought no method more commodious,
Than to show their vices odious;
Which I chose to make appear,
Not by anger, but a sneer :
As my method of reforming
Is by laughing, not by storming;
(For my friends have always thought
Tenderness my greatest fault);
Would you have me change my style;
On your faults no longer smile,
But, to patch up all your quarrels,
Quote your texts from Plutarch's morals ;
Or from Solomon produce
Maxims teaching wisdom's use ?

If I treat you like a C-H-
You have cheap enough compounded.
Can you put in higher claims,
Than the owners of St J-s?
You are not so great a grievance,
As the hirelings of St Stephen's.
You are of a lower class
Than my friend Sir Robert Brass.
None of these have mercy found;
I have laugh'd, and lash'd them round.

Have you seen a rocket fly?
You could swear it pierc'd the sky:
It but reach'd the middle air,
Bursting into pieces there :
Thousand sparkles falling down,
Light on many a coxcomb's crown :
See what mirth the sport creates ;
Singes hair, but breaks no pates.
Thus should I attempt to climb,
Treat you in a style sublime.
Such a rocket is my muse;
Should I lofty numbers chuse,

Vol. VII: ...r M.Ed.