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But Lintot is at vast expense,
And pays prodigious dear for-sense.
Their books are useful but to few,
A scholar, or a wit ot two:

Lintot's for gen'ral use are fit;

For some folks read, but all folks sh→.

TO MR. JOHN MORE,

AUTHOR OF THE CELEBRATED WORM-POWDER.

How much, egregious MORE, are we
Deceiv'd by shows and forms!
Whate'er we think, whate'er we see,
All human kind are worms.

Man is a very worm by birth,
Vile reptile, weak and vain !
Awhile he crawls upon the earth,
Then shrinks to earth again.

That woman is a worm, we find,
E'er since our grandame's evil;
She first convers'd with her own kind,
That ancient worm, the devil.

The learn'd themselves we book-worms name,

The blockhead is a slow-worm ;

The nymph, whose tail is all on flame,

Is aptly term'd a glow-worm,

The fops are painted butterflies,
That flutter for a day;

First from a worm they take their rise,
And in a worm decay.

The flatterer an ear-wig grows;

Thus worms suit all conditions ;

Misers are muck-worms, silk-worms beaus,
And death-watches physicians.

That statesmen have the worm, is seen
By all their winding play;
Their conscience is a worm within,
That gnaws them night and day.

Ah More thy skill were well employ'd,
And greater gain would rise,

If thou could'st make the courtier void
The worm that never dies!

O learned friend of Abchurch-lane,*
Who sett'st our entrails free!

Vain is thy art, thy powder vain,
Since worms shall eat e'en thee!

Our fate thou only canst adjourn
Some few short years, no more!

E'en Button'st wits to worms shall turn,
Who maggots were before.

* Mr. John More was an advertising apothecary in Abchurchlane. N.

+ Button's coffee-house, in Covent-garden, frequented by the wifs of that time. H.

VERSES

•CCASIONED BY AN &C. AT THE END OF MR. D'URFEY'S

NAME, IN THE TITLE TO ONE OF HIS PLAYS.

JOVE call'd before him t'other day

The vowels, U, O, I, E, A ;

All dipthongs, and all consonants,
Either of England, or of France;
And all that were, or wish'd to be,
Rank'd in the name of Tom D'Urfey.
Fierce in this cause the letters spoke all,
Liquids grew rough, and mutes turn'd vocal.
Those four proud syllables alone

Were silent, which by Fate's decree
Chim'd in so smoothly, one by one,

To the sweet name of Tom D'Urfey.
N, by whom names subsist, declar'd,
To have no place in this 'twas hard:
And Q maintain'd 'twas but his due
Still to keep company with U;
So hop'd to stand no less than he

In the great name of Tom D'Urfey.
E show'd a Comma ne'er could claim

A place in any British name

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Yet, making here a perfect botch,

Thrusts your poor vowel from his notch ;

Hiatus mi valdè deflendus !

From which, good Jupiter, defend us!

Sooner I'd quit my part in thee,

Than be no part in Tom D'Urfey.

*

*This accident happened by Mr. D'Urfey's having made a flour ish there, which the printer mistook for an &c. H.

P protested, puff'd, and swore,

He'd not be serv'd. so like a beast;
He was a piece of emperor,

And made up half a pope at least.
C vow'd, he'd frankly have releas'd
His double share in Cæsar Caius
For only one in Tom Durfeius.
I, consonant and vowel too,
To Jupiter did humbly sue,

That of his grace he would proclaim
Durfeius his true Latin name :

For though, without them both, 'twas clear
Himself could ne'er be Jupiter;

Yet they'd resign that post so high,
To be the genitive, Durfei,

B and L swore b- and w—s!
X and Z cried, p-x and z-s!
G swore, by G-d, it ne'er should be;
And W would not lose, not he,
An English letter's property

In the great name of Tom D'Urfey.
In short, the rest were all in fray,
From christ-cross to et cætera.

They, tho' but standers by, too mutter'd;

Diphthongs and triphthongs swore and flutter'd :

That none had so much right to be

Part of the name of stuttering T—

T-Tom--a--as-De-D'Ur-fey-fey.
Then Jove thus spake : "With care and pain
We form'd this name, renown'd in rhyme :
Not thine, immortal Neufgermain !**

Cost studious cabalists more time.

*A poet, who used to make verses ending with the last syllable of the names of those persons he praised: which Voiture turned against him in a poem of the same kind. H,

Yet now, as then, you all declare,
Far hence to Egypt you'll repair,

And turn strange hi'roglyphics there,
Rather than letters longer be,

Unless i' th' name of Tom D'Urfey.
Were you all pleas'd, yet what, I pray,
To foreign letters could I say?

What if the Hebrew next should aim
To turn quite backward D'Urfey's name?
Should the Greek quarrel too, by Styx, I
Could never bring in Psi and XI;
Omicron and Omega from us

Would each hope to be O in Thomas;

And all th' ambitious vowels vie,
No less than Pythagoric Y,

To have a place in Tom D'Urfey.

Then well-belov'd and trusty letters!
Cons'nants, and vowels much their betters,
We, willing to repair this breach,
And, all that in us lies, please each,
Et cæt'ra to our aid must call;
Et cat'ra represents ye all:

Et cat'ra, therefore, we decree,
Henceforth for ever join'd shall be

To the great name of Tom D'Urfey."

PROLOGUE

DESIGNED FOR MR. D'URFEY'S LAST PLAY:

GROWN old in rhyme, 'twere barbarous to discard Your persevering, unexhausted bard;

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