To live diffolv'd in pleasures ftill they feign,
Though their whole life's but intermitting pain :
So much of furfeits, head-aches, claps are seen,
We scarce perceive the little time between :
Well-meaning men who make this grofs mistake,
And pleafure lofe only for pleafure's fake;
Each pleasure has its price, and when we pay
Too much of pain, we fquander life away.
:
Thus Dorfet, purring like a thoughtful cat,
Marry'd, but wifer pufs ne'er thought of that
And first he worry'd her with railing rhime,
Like Pembroke's maftives at his kindest time;
Then for one night fold all his flavish life,
A teeming widow, but a barren wife;
Swell'd by contact of fuch a fulfom toad,
He lugg'd about the matrimonial load ;
Till fortune, blindly kind as well as he,
Has ill reftor'd him to his liberty;
Which he would use in his old fneaking way,
Drinking all night, and dozing all the day;
Dull as Ned Howard, whom his brisker times
Had fam'd for dulnefs in malicious rhymes.
Mulgrave had much ado to scape the fnare, Though learn'd in all those arts that cheat the fair : For after all his vulgar marriage-mocks, With beauty dazzled, Numps was in the stocks; Deluded parents dry'd their weeping eyes, To fee him catch his tartar for his prize : Th' impatient town waited the wifh'd-for change, And cuckolds fmil'd in hopes of sweet revenge;
Till Petworth plot made us with forrow fee,
As his eftate, his perfon too was free:
Him no foft thoughts, no gratitude could move;
To gold he fled from beauty and from love;
Yet failing there he keeps his freedom ftill,
Forc'd to live happily againft his will:
'Tis not his fault, if too much wealth and power
Break not his boasted quiet every hour.
And little Sid. for fimile renown'd,
Pleasure has always fought but never found:
Though all his thoughts on wine and women fall,
His are fo bad, fure he ne'er thinks at all.
The flesh he lives upon is rank and strong,
His meat and mistresses are kept too long.
But fure we all mistake this pious man,
Who mortifies his perfon all he can :
What we uncharitably take for fin,
Are only rules of this odd capuchin ;
For never hermit under grave pretence,
Has liv'd more contrary to common sense;
And 'tis a miracle we may suppose,
No naftiness offends his fkilful nofe;
Which from all fink can with peculiar art
Extract perfume and effence from a f-t:
Expecting fupper is his great delight;
He toils all day but to be drunk at night :
Then o'er his cups this night-bird chirping fits,
Till he takes Hewet and Jack Hall for wits.
Rochefter I defpife for want of wit,
Though thought to have a tail and cloven feet;
I 4
For while he mifchief means to all mankind,
Himself alone the ill effects does find:
And fo like witches juftly fuffers shame,
Whofe harmless malice is fo much the fame.
Falfe are his words, affected is his wit;
So often he does aim, fo feldom hit;
To every face he cringes while he speaks,
But when the back is turn'd the head he breaks :
Mean in each action, lewd in every limb,
Manners themselves are mifchievous in him :
A proof that chance alone makes every creature,
A very Killigrew without good-nature.
For what a Beffus has he always liv'd,
And his own kickings notably contriv'd?
For, there's the folly that's ftill mixt with fear,
Cowards more blows than any hero bear;
Of fighting fparks fome may their pleasures fay,
But 'tis a bolder thing to run away :
The world may well forgive him all his ill,
For every fault does prove his penance
ftill:
Falfely he falls into fome dangerous noose,
And then as meanly labours to get loose;
A life fo infamous is better quitting,
Spent in bafe injury and low fubmitting.
I'd like to have left out his poetry;
Forgot by all almost as well as me.
Sometimes he has fome humour, never wit,
And if it rarely, very rarely, hit,
'Tis under fo much nafty rubbish laid,
To find it out's the cinderwoman's trade;
Who for the wretched remnants of a fire,
Muft toil all day in afhes and in mire.
So lewdly dull his idle works appear,
The wretched texts deserve no comments here;
Where one poor thought fometimes, left all alone,
For a whole page of dulnefs must atone.
How vain a thing is man, and how unwife;
Ev'n he, who would himself the most despise!
I, who so wife and humble feem to be,
Now my own vanity and pride can't fee.
While the world's nonfenfe is fo fharply fhewn,
We pull down others but to raise our own;
That we may angels feem, we paint them elves,
And are but fatires to fet up ourselves.
I, who have all this while been finding fault,
Ev'n with my master, who first satire taught;
And did by that describe the task so hard,
It seems stupendous and above reward;
Now labour with unequal force to climb
That lofty hill, unreach'd by former time:
'Tis just that I should to the bottom fall,
Learn to write well, or not to write at all.
2:
ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL. 2
2
"Si propiùs ftes, "Te capiet magis
Το THE
READER.
IT
T is not my intention to make an apology for my
poem fome will think it needs no excufe, and
others will receive none. The defign I am fure is ho-
neft but he who draws his pen for one party, must
expect to make enemies of the other. For wit and
fool are confequents of Whig and Tory; and every
man is a knave or an afs to the contrary fide. There
is a treafury of merits in the Fanatic church, as well as
in the Popish; and a pennyworth to be had of faint-
fhip, honefty, and poetry, for the lewd, the factious,
and the blockheads: but the longeft chapter in Deu-
teronomy has not curfes enough for an Anti-Broming-
ham. My comfort is, their manifeft prejudice to my
caufe will render their judgment of lefs authority against
me. Yet if a poem have genius, it will force its own
reception in the world. For there is a fweetness in
good verfe, which tickles even while it hurts and no
man can be heartily angry with him who pleafes him
against his will. The commendation of adverfaries
is the greatest triumph of a writer, because it never
comes
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