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 deferve 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 satires 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 ftupendous 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.

ABSA

ABSALOM AND ACHITOPE

IT

"Si propiùs ftes,

"Te capiet magis-"

PART I.

Το THE

TOPHEL.

READER.

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 design I am fure is honeft 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 ass 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 faintship, honesty, and poetry, for the lewd, the factious, and the blockheads: but the longest chapter in Deuteronomy has not curfes enough for an Anti-Bromingham. My comfort is, their manifeft prejudice to my caufe will render their judgment of lefs authority against Yet if a poem have genius, it will force its own reception in the world. For there is a sweetness in good verfe, which tickles even while it hurts and no man can be heartily angry with him who pleases him against his will. The commendation of adverfaries is the greatest triumph of a writer, because it never

me.

:

comes

comes unless extorted. But I can be fatisfied on more eafy terms if I happen to please the more moderate fort, I fhall be fure of an honest party, and, in all probability, of the best judges: for the leaft concerned are commonly the least corrupt. And I confefs I have laid in for those, by rebating the fatire, where juftice would allow it, from carrying too fharp an edge. They who can criticise fo weakly, as to imagine I have done my worst, may be convinced at their own coft that I can write feverely, with more ease than I can gently. I have but laughed at fome men's follies, when I could have declaimed against their vices and other men's virtues I have commended, as freely as I have taxed their crimes. And now, if you are a malicious reader, I expect you should return upon me that I affect to be thought more impartial than I am: but if men are not to be judged by their profeffions, God forgive you commonwealth'smen for profeffing fo plaufibly for the government. You cannot be fo unconscionable as to charge me for not fubfcribing my name; for that would reflect too grofly upon your own party, who never dare, though they have the advantage of a jury to fecure them. If you like not my poem, the fault may poffibly be in my writing; though it is hard for an author to judge against himself. But more probably it is in your morals, which cannot bear the truth of it. The violent on both fides will condemn the character of Abfalom, as either too favourably or too hardly drawn. But they are not the violent whom I defire to pleafe. The fault on the right hand is to extenuate, palliate, and

indulge;

indulge; and to confefs freely, I have endeavoured to commit it. Befides the refpect which I owe his birth, I have a greater for his heroic virtues; and David himself could not be more tender of the young man's life, than I would be of his reputation. But fince the most excellent natures are always the most easy, and, as being fuch, are the fooneft perverted by ill counfels, especially when baited with fame and glory; it is no more a wonder that he withstood not the temptations of Achitophel, than it was for Adam not to have refifted the two devils, the ferpent and the woman. The conclufion of the ftory I purpofely forbore to profecute, because I could not obtain from myself to shew Abfalom unfortunate. The frame of it was cut out but for a picture to the waift; and if the draught be fo far true, it is as much as I designed.

Were I the inventor, who am only the hiftorian, I fhould certainly conclude the piece, with the reconcilement of Abfalom to David. And who knows but this may come to pafs? Things were not brought to an extremity where I left the ftory: there seems yet to be room left for a compofure; hereafter there may be only for pity. I have not fo much as an uncharitable with againft Achitophel; but am content to be accused of a good-natured error, and to hope with Origen, that the devil himself may at last be faved. For which reafon, in this poem, he is neither brought to fet his houfe in order, nor to difpofe of his perfon afterwards as he in wifdom fhall think fit. God is infinitely merciful; and his vicegerent is only not fo, because he is not infinite.

The

The true end of fatire is the amendment of vices by correction. And. he, who writes honeftly, is no more an enemy to the offender, than the phyfician to the patient, when he prescribes harsh remedies to an inveterate difeafe; for those are only in order to prevent the chirurgeon's work of an Enfe refcindendum, which I with not to my very enemies. To conclude all; if the body politic have any analogy to the natural, in my weak judgment, an act of oblivion were as neceffary in a hot diftempered state, as an opiate would be in a raging fever.

ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL.

IN

N pious times ere priestcraft did begin,
Before polygamy was made a fin;

When man on many multiply'd his kind,
Ere one to one was curfedly confin'd;
When nature prompted, and no law deny'd
Promifcuous use of concubine and bride;
Then Ifrael's monarch after heaven's own heart
His vigorous warmth did varioufly impart
To wives and flaves; and wide as his command,
Scatter'd his Maker's image through the land.
Michal, of royal blood, the crown did wear;
A foil ungrateful to the tiller's care :
Not fo the reft; for several mothers bore
To god-like David feveral fons before.
But fince like flaves his bed they did afcend,
No true fucceffion could their feed attend.

of