The mob his kind acceptance begs
Of dirt, and stones, and addle-eggs.
O GENIUS! tho' thy noble skill
Can guide thy Pegasus at will,
Fleet let him bear thee as the wind
DULLNESS mounts up and clings behind,
In vain you spur, and whip, and fmack,
You cannot shake her from your back.
Ill-nature springs as merit grows,
Clofe as the thorn is to the rose.
Could HERCULANEUM's friendly earth
Give MAVIUS' works a fecond birth,
MALEVOLENCE, with lifted eyes,
Would fanctify the noble prize.
While modern critics fhould behold
Their near relation to the old,
And wondring gape at one another,
To fee the likeness of a brother.
But with us rhiming moderns here,
Critics are not the only fear;
The poet's bark meets fharper fhocks
From other fands, and other rocks.
Not fuch alone who understand, Whose book and memory are at hand,
Who fcientific fkill profefs,
(Whether distinguish'd by degree,
They write A. M. or sign M. D.
Or make advances fomewhat higher
And take a new degree of 'SQUIRE.)
Who read your authors, Greek and Latin,
And bring you strange quotations pat in,
As if each fentence grew more terse
From odds and ends, and fcraps of verfe;
Who with true poetry dispense,
So focial found fuits fimple fenfe,
And load one Letter with the labours,
Which fhould be fhar'd among its neighbours.
Who know that thought produces pain,
And deep reflection mads the brain,
And therefore, wife and prudent grown,
Have no ideas of their own.
But if the man of Nature speak,
Advance their Bayonets of Greek,
And keep plain fenfe at fuch a diftance,
She cannot give a friend afliftance.
Not thefe alone in judgment rife,
And fhoot at genius as it flies,
But those who cannot spell, will TALK,
As women fcold, who cannot walk.
Your man of habit, who's wound up
To eat and drink, and dine and sup,
But has not either will or pow'r
To break out of his formal hour;
Who lives by rule, and ne'er outgoes it;
Moves like a clock, and hardly knows it;
Who is a kind of breathing being,
Which has but half the pow'r of seeing;
Who ftands for ever on the brink,
Yet dare not plunge enough to think,
Nor has one reason to supply
Wherefore he does a thing, or why,
But what he does proceeds fo right,
You'd think him always guided by't;
Joins poetry and vice together
Like fun and rain in April weather,
Holds rake and wit as things the fame,
And all the difference but a NAME.
A Rake! Alas! how many wear
The brow of mirth, with heart of care!
The desperate wretch reflection flies,
And fhuns the way where madness lies,
Dreads each increafing pang of grief,
And runs to FOLLY for relief.
There, 'midst the momentary joys
Of giddy mirth and frantic noise,
FORGETFULNESS, her eldest born,
Smooths the World's hate, and blockhead's fcorn,
Then PLEASURE wins upon the mind,
Ye CARES, go whistle to the wind;
Then welcome frolic, welcome whim!
The world is all alike to him.
Distress is all in apprehenfion;
It ceases when 'tis past prevention :
And happiness then preffes near,
When not a hope's left, nor a fear.
-But you've enough, nor want my preaching,
And I was never form'd for teaching:
Male prudes we know, (those driv❜ling things) Will have their gibes, and taunts, and flings. How will the fober Cit abufe,
The fallies of the Culprit muse;
To her and Poet fhut the door
And whip the beggar, with his whore?
POET!-a FOOL! a WRETCH! a KNAVE!
A mere mechanic dirty flave!
What is his verse, but cooping sense
Within an arbitrary fence?
At best, but ringing that in rhime,
Which profe would fay in half the time?
Measure and numbers! what are those
But artificial chains for profe?
Which mechanism quaintly joins
In parallels of fee-faw lines.
And when the frisky wanton writes
In PINDAR'S (what d'ye call 'em)—flights
Th' uneven measure, fhort and tall,
Now rhiming twice, now not at all,
In curves and angles twirls about,
Like Chinese railing, in and out.
Thus when you've labour'd hours on hours,
Cull'd all the sweets, cull'd all the flow'rs,
The churl, whofe dull imagination
Is dead to every fine fenfation,
Too gross to relish nature's bloom,
Or taste her fimple rich perfume,
Shall caft them by as useless stuff,
And fly with keenefs to his-fnuff,
|