SINCE my old friend is grown so great,
As to be minister of state,
I'm told, but 'tis not true, I hope,
That Craggs will be ashamed of Pope.
Alas! if I am such a creature,
To grow the worse for growing greater;
Why, faith, in spite of all my brags,
"Tis Pope must be ashamed of Craggs.
ERECTED IN CHISWICK GARDENS.
O GATE, how camest thou here?
Gate.-I was brought from Chelsea last year, Batter'd with wind and weather.
Inigo Jones put me together.
Sir Hans Sloane
Let me alone :
Burlington brought me hither.
ON CHARLES, EARL OF DORSET.
IN THE CHURCH OF WYTHAM, IN SUSSEX.
DORSET, the grace of courts, the Muses' pride,
Patron of arts, and judge of nature, died.
The scourge of pride, though sanctified or great;
Of fops in learning, and of knaves in state:
Yet soft his nature, though severe his lay;
His anger moral, and his wisdom gay.
Bless'd satirist! who touch'd the mean so true,
As show'd vice had his hate and pity too.
Bless'd courtier! who could king and country
please,
Yet sacred keep his friendships and his ease.
Bless'd peer! his great forefathers' every grace
Reflecting, and reflected in his race;
Where other Buckhursts, other Dorsets shine ;
And patriots still, or poets, deck the line.
ON SIR WILLIAM TRUMBULL.
A PLEASING form; a firm, yet cautious mind;
Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resign'd:
Honour unchanged, a principle profess'd,
Fix'd to one side, but moderate to the rest :
An honest courtier, yet a patriot too;
Just to his prince, and to his country true :
Fill'd with the sense of age, the fire of youth,
A scorn of wrangling, yet a zeal for truth;
A generous faith from superstition free;
A love to peace, and hate of tyranny:
Such this man was; who now, from earth removed, At length enjoys that liberty he loved.
ON THE HON. SIMON HARCOURT,
ONLY SON OF THE LORD CHANCELLOR HARCOURT.
At the Church of Stanton-Harcourt, in Oxfordshire, 1720. To this sad shrine, whoe'er thou art, draw near! Here lies the friend most loved, the son most dear: Who ne'er knew joy, but friendship might divide; Or gave his father grief but when he died.
How vain is reason, eloquence how weak! If Pope must tell what Harcourt cannot speak. O, let thy once-loved friend inscribe thy stone, And, with a father's sorrows, mix his own!
ON JAMES CRAGGS, ESQ.
IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
JACOBUS CRAGGS,
REGNI MAGNE BRITANNIE A SECRETIS
ET CONSILIIS SANCTIORIBUS,
PRINCIPIS PARITER AC POPULI AMOR ET DELICLE:
VIXIT TITULIS ET INVIDIA MAJOR
ANNOS, HEU PAUCOS, XXXV.
STATESMAN, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere,
In action faithful, and in honour clear!
Who broke no promise, served no private end,
Who gain'd no title, and who lost no friend;
Ennobled by himself, by all approved,
Praised, wept, and honour'd by the Muse he loved.
ON MR. ROWE,*
IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
THY relics, Rowe ! to this sad shrine we trust,
And near thy Shakspear place thy honour'd bust.
O next him, skill'd to draw the tender tear,
For never heart felt passion more sincere :
To nobler sentiment to fire the brave,
For never Briton more disdain'd a slave!
Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest,
Bless'd in thy genius, in thy love too bless'd!
And bless'd, that timely from our scene removed,
Thy soul enjoys the liberty it loved.
10
To these, so mourn'd in death; so loved in life,
The childless parent and the widow'd wife,
With tears inscribes this monumental stone;
That holds their ashes, and expects her own.
ON MRS. CORBET,
WHO DIED OF A CANCER IN HER BREAST,
HERE rests a woman, good without pretence,
Bless'd with plain reason and with sober sense :
No conquests she, but o'er herself, desired;
No arts essay'd, but not to be admired.
Passion and pride were to her soul unknown,
Convinced that virtue only is our own.
So unaffected, so composed a mind;
So firm, yet soft; so strong, yet so refined;
Heaven, as its purest gold, by tortures tried:
The saint sustain'd it, but the woman died.
* Pope first wrote a similar but shorter epitaph on Rowe; he afterwards substituted the one here given, which is inscribed on his monument in Westminster Abbey.
MONUMENT OF THE HON. ROBERT DIGBY,
Erected by their father, the Lord Digby, in the church of
Sherborne, in Dorsetshire, 1727.
Go! fair example of untainted youth,
Of modest wisdom, and pacific truth :
Composed in sufferings, and in joy sedate;
Good without noise, without pretension great :
Just of thy word, in every thought sincere,
Who knew no wish but what the world might hear:
Of softest manners, unaffected mind,
Lover of peace, and friend of human kind:
Go, live! for heaven's eternal year is thine ;
Go, and exalt thy moral to divine.
And thou, bless'd maid! attendant on his doom,
Pensive hast follow'd to the silent tomb,
Steer'd the same course to the same quiet shore,
Not parted long, and now to part no more!
Go then, where only bliss sincere is known!
Go, where to love and to enjoy are one!
Yet take these tears, mortality's relief,
And till we share your joys, forgive our grief:
These little rites, a stone, a verse, receive;
"Tis all a father, all a friend, can give!
ON SIR GODFREY KNELLER.
IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 1723.
KNELLER, by Heaven, and not a master taught,
Whose art was nature, and whose pictures thought;
Now for two ages having snatch'd from fate
Whate'er was beauteous, or whate'er was great,
Lies crown'd with princes' honours, poets' lays,
Due to his merit, and brave thirst of praise.
Living, great Nature fear'd he might outvie
Her works; and dying, fears herself may die.
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