ON HIS GROTTO AT TWICKENHAM, Composed of Marble, Spars, Gems, Ores, and Minerals. THOU who shalt stop, where Thames' translucent wave Shines a broad mirror through the shadowy cave; soul. Let such, such only, tread this sacred floor, TO MRS M. B. ON HER BIRTHDAY. OH, be thou blest with all that Heaven can send, Long health, long youth, long pleasure, and a Not with those toys the female world admire, Is that a birthday? 'tis, alas! too clear, 'Tis but the funeral of the former year. Let joy or ease, let affluence or content, And the gay conscience of a life well spent, Calm ev'ry thought, inspirit ev'ry grace, Glow in thy heart, and smile upon thy face. Let day improve on day, and year on year, Without a pain, a trouble, or a fear; Till death unfelt that tender frame destroy, In some soft dream, or ecstasy of joy. Peaceful sleep out the sabbath of the tomb, And wake to raptures in a life to come. TO MR. THOMAS SOUTHERN, RESIGN'D to live, prepar'd to die, With not one sin, but poetry, This day Tom's fair account has run TO LADY MARY WORTLEY MONTAGUE*. N beauty or wit, IN No mortal as yet, To question your empire has dar'd; Have thought that in learning, To yield to a lady was hard. Impertinent schools, With musty dull rules, Have reading to females denied: So papists refuse. The Bible to use, Lest flocks should be wise as their guide. 'Twas a woman at first (Indeed she was curst) In knowledge that tasted delight, And sages agree The laws should decree To the first of possessors the right. Then bravely, fair dame, Resume the old claim, Which to your whole sex does belong; From a second bright Eve, The knowledge of right and of wrong. * This panegyric on Lady Mary Wortley Montague might have been suppressed by Mr. Pope, on account of her having satirized him in her verses to the imitator of Horace; which abuse he returned in the first satire of the second book of Horace. From furious Sappho, scarce a milder fate, But if the first Eve Hard doom did receive, When only one apple had she, Shall be found out for you, Who tasting, have robb'd the whole tree? THE FOURTH EPISTLE OF THE FIRST BOOK OF HORACE'S EPISTLES*. A modern Imitation. SAY, St. John, who alone peruse Or, urg'd by unquench'd native heat, Does St. John Greenwich sports repeat? * This satire on Lord Bolingbroke, and the praise bestowed on him in a letter to Mr. Richardson, where Mr. Pope says, The sons shall blush their fathers were his foes: being so contradictory, probably occasioned the former to be suppressed. S. Ad Albium Tibullum. + Albi, nostrorum sermonum candide judex, Quid nunc te dicam facere in regione Pedana ? Scribere, quod Cassi Parmensis opuscula vincat? The lines here quoted occur in the Essay on Man. § An tacitam silvas inter reptare salubres? Where (emulous of Chartres' fame) * To you (th' all-envy'd gift of heaven) Th' indulgent gods, unask'd, have given A form complete in ev'ry part, And, to enjoy that gift, the art. + What could a tender mother's care Amidst thy various ebbs of fear, In spite of fears, of mercy spite, Di tibi formam Di tibi divitias dederant, artemque fruendi. + Quid voveat dulci nutricula majus alumno, Quam sapere, et fari posset quæ sentiat, et cui Gratia, fama, valetudo contingat abunde, non deficiente crumena? Inter spem, curamque, timores inter et iras. § Omnem crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum. Me pinguem, et nitidum bene curata cute vises, Cum ridere voles Epicuri de grege porcum. |