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Thus grown a member of the club,
No longer dread the rage of Grub.

How oft am I for rhyme to feek!
To drefs a thought I toil a week :
And then how thankful to the town,
If all my pains will earn a crown!
Whilft ev'ry critick can devour
My work and me in half an hour.
Would men of genius ceafe to write,
The rogues muft die for want and fpight,
Muft die for want of food and raiment,
If scandal did not find them payment,
How chearfully the hawkers cry
A fatire, and the gentry buy!
While my hard-labour'd poem pines
Unfold upon the printer's lines.

A genius in the rev'rend gown
Muft ever keep its owner down ;
'Tis an unnatural conjunction,
And spoils the credit of the function.
Round all your brethren caft your eyes;

Point out the fureft men to rife:
That club of candidates in black,
The least deferving of the pack,
Afpiring, factious, fierce and loud,
With grace and learning unendow'd,
Will fooner coin a thousand lyes
Than fuffer men of parts to rife;

They croud about preferment's gate,
And prefs you down with all their weight.
For, as of old mathematicians

Were by the vulgar thought magicians;
So academick dull ale-drinkers

Pronounce all men of wit free-thinkers.

Wit, as the chief of virtue's friends,
Difdains to serve ignoble ends.
Obferve what loads of ftupid rhymes
Opprefs us in corrupted times :
What pamplets in a court's defence
Shew reafon, grammar, truth, or fenfe?
For, though the muse delights in fiction,
She ne'er infpires against conviction.
Then keep your virtue ftill unmixt,
And let not faction come betwixt :
By party steps no grandeur clime at,
Though it would make you England's
primate :

First learn the fcience to be dull,
You then may foon your confcience lull;
If not, however seated high,

Your genius in your face will fly.

When Jove was from his teeming head Of wit's fair goddess brought to bed, There follow'd at his lying-in For after-birth a Sooterkin;

Which, as the nurse purfu'd to kill,
Attain'd by flight the mufes hill;
There in the foil began to root,
And litter'd at Parnaffus' foot.
From hence the critick vermin fprung
With harpy claws and pois'nous tongue,
Who fatten on poetick scraps,

Too cunning to be caught in traps.
Dame nature, as the learned fhow,
Provides each animal its foe:

Hounds hunt the hare, the wily fox.
Devours your geefe, the wolf your flocks:
Thus envy pleads a natʼral claim
To perfecute the mufes fame;
On poets in all times abufive,
From Homer down to Pope inclufive.

Yet what avails it to complain?
You try to take revenge in vain.
A rat your utmost rage defies,
That fafe behind the wainscot lies:
Say, did you ever know by fight
In cheese an individual mite ?
.Shew me the fame numerick flea,
That bit your neck but yesterday:
You then may boldly go in queft
To find the Grub-freet pocts neft;
What fpunging-houfe in dread of jayl
Receives them, while they wait for bail;

What alley they are nestled in
To flourish o'er a cup of gin:
Find the laft garret where they lay,
Or cellar, where they ftarve to-day.
Suppofe you had them all trepann'd,
With each a libel in his hand,
What punishment would you inflict?
Or call 'em rogues, or get 'em kickt?
These they have often try'd before;
You but oblige 'em fo much more:
Themselves would be the firft to tell,
To make their trash the better fell.

You have been libell'd---Let us know, What fool officious told you fo? Will you regard the hawker's cries, Who in his titles always lies? Whate'er the noify fcoundrel fays, It might be fomething in your praife: And praise bestow'd in Grub-ftreet rhymes Would vex one more a thousand times. Till criticks blame, and judges praise, The poet cannot claim his bays. On me when dunces are fatirick, I take it for a panegyrick. Hated by fools, and fools to hate, Be that my motto, and my fate.

On

An Imitation of Petronius.

Somnia quæ mentes ludunt volitantibus umbris, etc.

TH

HOSE dreams, that on the filent night intrude,

And with falfe flitting fhades our minds delude,

Jove never fends us downward from the skies; Nor can they from infernal manfions rife; But are all meer productions of the brain, And fools confult interpreters in vain.

For, when in bed we reft our weary limbs, The mind unburthen'd fports in various whims ;

The bufy head with mimick art runs o'er The scenes and actions of the day before.

The drowsy tyrant, by his minions led, To regal rage devotes fome patriot's head. With equal terrors, not with equal guilt, The murd'rer dreams of all the blood he fpilt.

The foldier fmiling hears the widow's

cries,

And ftabs the fon before the mother's eyes. With like remorse his brother of the trade, The butcher, fells the lamb beneath his blade.

The

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