What life in all that ample body, say ?
What heavenly particle inspires the clay?
The soul subsides, and wickedly inclines
To seem but mortal, even in sound divines.
On morning wings how active springs the
mind

80

85

That leaves the load of yesterday behind!
How easy every labour it pursues!
How coming to the poet every Muse!
Not but we may exceed, some holy time,
Or tired in search of truth, or search of rhyme;
Ill health some just indulgence may engage;
And more the sickness of long life, old age:
For fainting age what cordial drop remains,
If our intemperate youth the vessel drains? 90
Our fathers praised rank venison. You sup-

pose,

Perhaps, young men ! our fathers had no nose.
Not so: a buck was then a week's repast,
And 'twas their point, I ween, to make it last;
More pleased to keep it till their friends could

come,

95

100

Than eat the sweetest by themselves at home.
Why had not I in those good times my birth,
Ere coxcomb-pies or coxcombs were on earth?
Unworthy he, the voice of fame to hear,
That sweetest music to an honest ear;
(For 'faith, Lord Fanny! you are in the wrong,
The world's good word is better than a song,)
Who has not learned fresh sturgeon and ham-
pie

105

Are no rewards for want and infamy!
When luxury has licked up all thy pelf,
Cursed by thy neighbours, thy trustees, thyself,
To friends, to fortune, to mankind a shame,
Think how posterity will treat thy name;
And buy a rope, that future times may tell

Thou hast at least bestowed one penny well. 110 'Right," cries his Lordship, "for a rogue in

need

To have a taste is insolence indeed :

In me 'tis noble, suits my birth and state,
My wealth unwieldy, and my heap too great."
Then, like the sun, let bounty spread her ray,
And shine that superfluity away.

116

Oh impudence of wealth! with all thy store, How darest thou let one worthy man be poor? Shall half the new-built churches round thee

fall ?

121

Make quays, build bridges, or repair Whitehall:
Or to thy country let that heap be lent,
As Mo's was, but not at five per cent.1
Who thinks that Fortune cannot change her
mind,

Prepares a dreadful jest for all mankind.
And who stands safest ? tell me, is it he 125
That spreads and swells in puffed prosperity;
Or, blessed with little, whose preventing care
In peace provides fit arms against a war?

Thus Bethel spoke, who always speaks his thought,

And always thinks the very thing he ought: 130 His equal mind I copy what I can,

And, as I love, would imitate the man.

2

In South-sea days not happier, when surmised
The lord of thousands, than if now excised;
In forest planted by a father's hand,3

1 The Duchess of Marlborough.

135

2 See Moral Essays, iii. 117, 120. Pope had SouthSea stock, which he did not sell out. It was valued at between £20,000 and £30,000 when it fell.— Warburton.

3 Pope's father bought twenty acres of land in Windsor Forest. He sold them in 1716.

Than in five acres now of rented land.1
Content with little, I can piddle here,
On brocoli and mutton, round the year;
But ancient friends (though poor, or out of
play),

140

That touch my bell, I cannot turn away. 'Tis true, no turbots dignify my boards, But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames affords:

To Hounslow Heath I point, and Bansted Down, Thence comes your mutton, and these chicks

own:

my

From yon old walnut-tree a shower shall fall; 145
And grapes, long lingering on my only wall,
And figs from standard and espalier join;
The devil is in you if you cannot dine :

Then cheerful healths (your mistress shall have place),

And, what's more rare, a poet shall say grace. 150
Fortune not much of humbling me can boast:
Though double taxed, how little have I lost! 2
My life's amusements have been just the same,
Before and after standing armies came.3
My lands are sold; my father's house is gone;
I'll hire another's; is not that my own,
156
And yours, my friends? through whose free

opening gate

3

None comes too early, none departs too late; (For I, who hold sage Homer's rule the best, Welcome the coming, speed the going guest).* 160 1 At Twickenham.

to

2 Roman Catholics and Nonjurors had at that time additional taxes.-Carruthers.

pay

The standing army was established in 1689, the year after Pope's birth.

4 In Pope's translation of the Odyssey, xv. 74, the line runs :

"Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest."

"Pray Heaven it last! (cries Swift!) as you

go on;

1

I wish to God this house had been your own:
Pity to build without a son or wife;
Why, you'll enjoy it only all your life.”
Well, if the use be mine, can it concern one, 165
Whether the name belong to Pope or Vernon?
What's property? dear Swift! you see it alter
From you to me, from me to Peter Walter;
Or, in a mortgage, prove a lawyer's share;
Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir;
Or, in pure equity (the case not clear)
The Chancery takes your rents for twenty year:
At best, it falls to some ungracious son,

170

Who cries, "My father's damned, and all's my

own."

Shades, that to Bacon could retreat afford, 175 Become the portion of a booby lord;

3

2

And Helsmley, once proud Buckingham's delight,

Slides to a scrivener or a city knight:

Let lands and houses have what lords they will, Let us be fixed, and our own masters still. 180

1 Mrs. Vernon, Pope's landlady.

2 William, first Viscount Grimston, then owner of Gorhambury, the seat of Lord Bacon, near St. Albans.

3 Helmsley, in Yorkshire, which had belonged to Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, was purchased by Sir Charles Duncombe, Knight, Lord Mayor of London in 1709, who changed its name to Duncombe Park.Carruthers.

THE FIRST EPISTLE

OF THE

FIRST BOOK OF HORACE.1

TO LORD BOLINGBROKE.

T. JOHN, whose love indulged my labours past,

Matures my present, and shall bound my last!

5

Why will you break the Sabbath of my days?
Now sick alike of envy and of praise.
Public too long, ah, let me hide my age!
See, modest Cibber now has left the stage:
Our generals now, retired to their estates,
Hang their old trophies o'er the garden gates;2
In life's cool evening satiate of applause,
Nor fond of bleeding, even in Brunswick's

cause.

ΙΟ

A voice there is, that whispers in my ear, ('Tis Reason's voice, which sometimes one can

hear)

"Friend Pope! be prudent, let your Muse take breath,

1 Written in 1738. Lord Bolingbroke (see Essay on Man, Ep. i.) was at this time in France.

2 He is said to have alluded to the entrance of Lord Peterborough's lawn at Bevismount, near Southampton.-Warton.