But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call; k Yet hence the poor are clothed, the hungry fed1; Another age shall see the golden ear Who then shall grace, or who improve the soil? Who plants like BATHURST, or who builds like BOYLE. "Tis use alone that sanctifies expense, And splendour borrows all her rays from sense. His father's acres who enjoys in peace, Or makes his neighbours glad if he increase: iTaxes the incongruity of ornaments (though sometimes practised by the ancients), where an open mouth ejects the water into a fountain, or where the shocking images of serpents, &c., are introduced into grottoes or buffets. The proud festivals of some men are here set forth to ridicule, where pride destroys the ease, and formal regularity all the pleasurable enjoyment, of the entertainment. * See Don Quixote, chap. xlvii. This is the moral of the whole; where Providence is justified in giving riches to those who squander them in this manner. A bad taste employs more hands, and diffuses wealth more usefully than a good one. This recurs to what is laid down in Book I. Ep. ii, ver. 230-7, and in the epistle preceding this, ver. 161, &c. Whose cheerful tenants bless their yearly toil, m The Poet, after having touched upon the proper objects of magnificence and expense, in the private works of great men, comes to those great and public works which become a prince. This poem was published in the year 1732, when some of the new-built churches, by the act of Queen Anne, were ready to fall, being founded in boggy land (which is satirically alluded to in our author's imitation of Horace, Lib. II. sat. ii. "Shall half the new-built churches round thee fall?”) others were vilely executed, through fraudulent cabals between undertakers, officers, &c. Dagenham-breach had done very great mischiefs; many of the highways throughout England were hardly passable; and most of those which were repaired by turnpikes were made jobs for private lucre, and infamously executed, even to the entrance of London itself. The proposal of building a bridge at Westminster had been petitioned against and rejected; but in two years after the publication of this poem, an act for building a bridge passed through both houses. After many debates in the committee, the execution was left to the carpenter above-mentioned, who would have made it a wooden one; to which our author alludes in these lines: "Who builds a bridge that never drove a pile? Should Ripley venture, all the world would smile." EPISTLE V". TO MR ADDISON. OCCASIONED BY HIS DIALOGUES ON MEDALS. SEE the wild waste of all-devouring years! Perhaps, by its own ruins saved from flame, Ambition sigh'd: she found it vain to trust This was originally written in the year 1715, when Mr. Addison intended to publish his book of medals; it was sometime before he was Secretary of State; but not published till Mr. Tickel's edition of his works: at which time the verses on Mr. Craggs, which conclude the poem, were added, viz, in 1720. The medal, faithful to its charge of fame, Through climes and ages bears each form and name : In one short view, subjected to our eye, Gods, emperors, heroes, sages, beauties, lie. With sharpen'd sight, pale antiquaries pore, The inscription value, but the rust adore. This the blue varnish, that the green endears, The sacred rust of twice ten hundred years! To gain Pescennius one employs his schemes, One grasps a Cecrops in ecstatic dreams. Poor Vadius, long with learned spleen devour'd, Can taste no pleasure since his shield was scour'd: And Curio, restless by the fair one's side, Sighs for an Otho, and neglects his bride. Theirs is the vanity, the learning thine : Oh when shall Britain, conscious of her claim, And vanquish'd realms supply recording gold? Then shall thy CRAGGS (and let me call him mine) With aspect open, shall erect his head, And praised, unenvied, by the Muse he loved." EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT, BEING THE PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES. Motto to the first edition, published in folio, 1734: "Neque sermonibus vulgi dederis te, nec in præmiis humanis spem posueris rerum tuarum; suis te oportet illecebris ipsa virtus trahat ad verum decus. Quid de te alii loquantur, ipsi videant, sed loquentur tamen."-CICERO. Advertisement. This paper is a sort of bill of complaint, begun many years since, and drawn up by snatches, as the several occasions offered. I had no thoughts of publishing it, till it pleased some persons of rank and fortune (the authors of Verses to the Imitator of Horace, and of an Epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a Nobleman at Hampton-court) to attack in a very extraordinary manner, not only my writings (of which, being public, the public is judge) but my person, morals, and family, whereof, to those who know me not, a truer information may be requisite. Being divided between the necessity to say something of myself, and my own laziness to undertake so awkward a task, I thought it the shortest way to put the last hand to this epistle. If it have anything pleasing, it will be that by which I am most desirous to please, the truth, and the sentiment; and if anything offensive, it will be only to those I am least sorry to offend, the vicious, or the ungenerous. Many will know their own pictures in it, there being not a circumstance but what is true; but I have for the most part spared their names, and they may escape being laughed at, if they please. I would have some of them know, it was owing to the request of the learned and candid friend to whom it is inscribed, that I make not as free use of theirs, as they have done of mine. However, I shall have this advantage, and honour, on my side, that whereas, by their proceeding, any abuse may be directed at any man, no injury can possibly be done by mine, since a nameless character can never be found out, but by its truth and likeness. P. SHUT, shut the door, good John! fatigued I said, Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand, What walls can guard me, or what shades can hide? |