EPILOGUE TO THE SATIRES.

DIALOGUE II.

F. 'Tis all a libel-Paxton,* sir, will say.
P. Not yet, my friend! to-morrow, faith, it
may;

And for that very cause I print to-day.
How should I fret to mangle every line,
In reverence to the sins of thirty-nine !+
Vice with such giant strides comes on amain,
Invention strives to be before in vain :

Feign what I will, and paint it e'er so strong,
Some rising genius sins up to my song.

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F. Yet none but you by name the guilty lash; E'en Guthrie saves half Newgate by a dash :‡ Spare then the person, and expose the vice.

P. How, sir! not damn the sharper, but the dice?

Come on then, Satire! general, unconfined,
Spread thy broad wing, and souse on all the kind.
Ye statesmen, priests, of one religion all !
Ye tradesmen, vile, in army, court, or hall!
Ye reverend atheists! F. Scandal! name them!
Who?

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P. Why that's the thing you bid me not to do. Who starved a sister, who forswore a debt, I never named; the town's inquiring yet.

* Michael Paxton, solicitor to the Treasury. A.D. 1739; this Dialogue being written in 1738. "The ordinary of Newgate, who publishes the 'Memoirs of the Malefactors,' and is often prevailed on to be so tender of their reputation, as to set down no more than the initials of their names."

The poisoning dame-F. You mean-P. I don't. F. You do.

P. See, now I keep the secret, and not you! The bribing statesman-F. Hold, too high you go. P. The bribed elector-F. There you stoop too low.

P. I fain would please you, if I knew with what :

Tell me, which knave is lawful game, which not?
Must great offenders, once escaped the crown,
Like royal harts, be never more run down?
Admit your law to spare the knight requires, 30
As beasts of nature may we hunt the 'squires?
Suppose I censure-you know what I mean-
To save a bishop, may I name a dean?

F. A dean, sir? No: his fortune is not made; You hurt a man that's rising in the trade.

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P. If not the tradesman who set up to-day,
Much less the 'prentice who to-morrow may.
Down, down, proud Satire! though a realm be
spoil'd,
Arraign no mightier thief than wretched Wild ;*
Or, if a court or country's made a job,
Go, drench a pickpocket, and join the mob.
But, sir, I beg you, for the love of vice!
The matter's weighty; pray, consider twice:
Have you less pity for the needy cheat,
The poor and friendless villain, than the great!
Alas! the small discredit of a bribe

Scarce hurts the lawyer, but undoes the scribe.
Then better, sure, it charity becomes

To tax directors, who (thank God!) have plums;
Still better, ministers; or if the thing

May pinch e'en there,-why, lay it on a king.
F. Stop! stop!

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P. Must satire, then, nor rise nor

fall?

Speak out, and bid me blame no rogues at all.

* Jonathan Wild, a notorious thief.

F. Yes, strike that Wild; I'll justify the blow. P. Strike! why, the man was hang’d ten years

ago:

Who now that obsolete example fears?

E'en Peter trembles only for his ears.

F. What, always Peter? Peter thinks you mad;

You make men desperate if they once are bad: Else might he take to virtue some years henceP. As Selkirk, if he lives, will love the Prince. 61 F. Strange spleen to Selkirk !

P. Do I wrong the man? God knows, I praise a courtier where I can. When I confess, there is who feels for fame, And melts to goodness, need I Scarborough

name?

*

Pleased let me own, in Esher's peaceful grove,+
Where Kent and nature vie for Pelham's + love,
The scene, the master opening to my view,
I sit and dream I see my Craggs anew!

**

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E'en in a bishop I can spy desert: Secker § is decent, Rundell || has a heart; Manners with candour are to Benson ¶ given; To Berkeley, every virtue under heaven. But does the court a worthy man remove? That instant, I declare, he has my love; I shun his zenith, court his mild decline: Thus Somers ++ once, and Halifax, ‡‡ were mine. Oft, in the clear, still mirror of retreat,

I studied Shrewsbury, §§ the wise and great.

* Richard Lumley, second Earl of Scarborough.

The Honourable Mr. Pelham, brother of the Duke of Newcastle; he lived at Esher.

William Kent, an architect, and the founder of landscape gardening.

Dr. Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury.
Dr. Thomas Rundell, Bishop of Derry.

Dr. George Benson, a Nonconformist divine.

** Dr. George Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne.

tt John, Lord Somers, deprived of the seals, 1700.

tt Lord Halifax, disgraced, 1710.

$"Charles Talbot, Duke of Shrewsbury, had been

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Carleton's calm sense and Stanhope's + noble
flame,
Compared, and knew their generous end the same.
How pleasing Atterbury's softer hour!

How shined the soul, unconquer'd in the Tower!
How can I Pulteney, Chesterfield, forget,
While Roman spirit charms, and Attic wit?
Argyll, the state's whole thunder born to wield,
And shake alike the senate and the field?
Or Wyndham,§ just to freedom and the throne,
The master of our passions, and his own?
Names, which I long have loved, nor loved in

vain;

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Rank'd with their friends, not number'd with their train;

And if yet higher the proud list should end,
Still let me say, 'No follower, but a friend.'
Yet think not, friendship only prompts my lays;
I follow virtue; where she shines, I praise;
Point she to priest or elder, Whig or Tory,
Or round a Quaker's beaver cast a glory.
I never, to my sorrow I declare,

Dined with the Man of Ross, or my Lord Mayor. Some, in their choice of friends (nay, look not grave),

Have still a secret bias to a knave:

To find an honest man I beat about,

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And love him, court him, praise him, in or out. F. Then why so few commended?

P. Not so fierce : Find you the virtue, and I'll find the verse.

He

Secretary of State, ambassador in France, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Lord Chamberlain, and Lord Treasurer. several times quitted his employments, and was often recalled."

* Henry Boyle, Lord Carleton.

↑ James, Earl Stanhope.

John, the great Duke of Argyll.

Sir William Wyndham, Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Sir John Barnard, Lord Mayor in 1738, the year Pope

wrote this Epilogue.

But random praise-the work can ne'er be done ;
Each mother asks it for her booby son;

Each widow asks it for 'the best of men,'
For him she weeps, for him she weds again.
Praise cannot stoop, like satire, to the ground; 110
The number may be hang'd, but not be crown'd:
Enough for half the greatest of these days,
To 'scape my censure, not expect my praise.
Are they not rich? what more can they pretend?
Dare they to hope a poet for their friend?

What Richelieu wanted, Louis scarce could gain, And what young Ammon wish'd, but wish'd in vain.

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No power the Muse's friendship can command;
No power, when virtue claims it, can withstand:
To Cato, Virgil paid one honest line;
O, let my country's friends illumine mine!
-What are you thinking? F. Faith, the thought's
no sin :

I think your friends are out, and would be in.
P. If merely to come in, sir, they go out,
The way they take is strangely roundabout.
F. They too may be corrupted, you'll allow?
P. I only call those knaves who are so now.
Is that too little? Come then, I'll comply:
Spirit of Arnall!* aid me while I lie.
Cobham's a coward, Polwarth is a slave,
And Littleton a dark designing knave;
St. John has ever been a wealthy fool;
But let me add, Sir Robert's mighty dull;
Has never made a friend in private life;
And was, besides, a tyrant to his wife.

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But pray, when others praise him, do I blame? Call Verres, Wolsey, any odious name? Why rail they then, if but a wreath of mine, O all-accomplish'd St. John! deck thy shrine?

*William Arnall, an attorney, and one of the writers for the Walpole ministry.

† Hon. Hugh Hume, grandson of Patrick, Earl of Marchmont.