Who thinks that fortune cannot change her mind,

Prepares a dreadful jest for all mankind.

And " who ftands fafeft? tell me, is it he
That spreads and fwells in puff'd Prosperity,
Or bleft with little, whofe preventing care
In peace provides fit arms against a war?

130

▾ Thus BETHEL fpoke, who always fpeaks his thought,

And always thinks the very thing he ought:

His equal mind I copy what I can,

And as I love, would imitate the Man.

In South-fea days not happier, when furmis'd

135

The Lord of Thousands, than if now" Excis'd; 140

In foreft planted by a Father's hand,

Than in five acres now of rented land.

Content with little, I can piddle here

On brocoli and mutton, round the year;

But y ancient friends (tho' poor, or out of play)

That touch my bell, I cannot turn away.

'Tis true, no Turbots dignify my boards,

But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames affords:

NOTES.

apology for this liberty, in the preceding line, where he pays a fine compliment to Augufus :

quare

Templa ruunt antiqua Deûm ?

which oblique Panegyric the Imitator has very properly turned into a just stroke of fatire.

O pueri, nituiftis, ut huc novus incola venit?

NOTES.

VER. 156. And, what's more rare, a Poet Shall fay Grace.] The pleafantry of this line confifts in the supposed rarity of a Poet's having a table of his own; or a fense of gratitude for the bleffings he receives. But it contains,

2

To Hounflow-heath I point and Banfted-down,

Thence comes your mutton, and thefe chicks my

own:

• From yon old walnut-tree a show'r fhall fall; And grapes, long ling'ring on my only wall, And figs from ftandard and espalier join;

The dev❜l is in you if you cannot dine :

150

Then 'chearful healths (your Mistress shall have place) And, what's more rare, a Poet fhall fay Grace. 156 Fortune not much of humbling me can boast;

Tho' double tax'd, how little have I loft?

с

160

My Life's amufements have been juft the fame,
Before, and after Standing Armies came.
My lands are fold, my father's house is gone;
I'll hire another's; is not that my own,
And yours, my friends? thro' whofe free-opening gate
None comes too early, none departs too late;

(For I, who hold fage Homer's rule the best,

165

Welcome the coming, speed the going guest.) "Pray heav'n it laft! (cries SWIFT!) as you go on; "I wish to God this house had been your own: "Pity! to build, without a fon or wife: "Why, you'll enjoy it only all your life." Well, if the use be mine, can it concern one, Whether the name belong to Pope or Vernon?

NOTES.

170

too, a fober reproof of People of Condition, for their unmanly and brutal difufe of to natural a duty.

Nam & propriae telluris herum natura neque illum,

Nec me, nec quemquam ftatuit. nos expulit ille;

с

Illum aut nequities aut vafri infcitia juris,

Poftremum expellet certe vivacior heres.

Nunc ager Umbreni fub nomine, nuper Ofelli

Dictus erat: nulli proprius; fed cedit in usum

Nunc mihi, nunc alii. i quocirca vivite fortes,

Fortiaque adverfis opponite pectora rebus.

NOTES.

VER, 183. proud Buckingham's etc.] Villers Duke of Buckingham. P.

VER. 185. Let lands and houses etc.] The turn of his

d

с

What's Property? dear Swift! you fee it alter
From
you to me, from me to Peter Walter ;
Or, in a mortgage, prove a Lawyer's fhare;
Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir;
Or in pure f equity (the cafe not clear)
The Chanc'ry takes your rents for twenty year:
At beft, it falls to some ungracious son,

175

Who cries, "My father's damn'd, and all's my own.

h

1 Shades, that to BACON could retreat afford,

Become the portion of a booby Lord;

And Hemfley, once proud Buckingham's delight,
Slides to a Scriv❜ner or a city Knight.

Let lands and houses have what Lords they will,
Let Us be fix'd, and our own masters still.

NOTES.

181

imitation, in the concluding part, obliged him to diverfify the fentiment. They are equally noble: but Horace's is expreffed with the greater force.