On Mr. DRYDEN'S RELIGIO LAICI.
By the Earl of ROSCOMMON.
E gone, you flaves, you idle vermin go,
Fly from the fcourges, and your mafter know; Let free, impartial, men from Dryden learn Myfterious fecrets, of a high concern,
And weighty truths, folid convincing fenfe,
Explain'd by unaffected eloquence.
What can you (Reverend Levi) here take ill?
Men ftill had faults, and men will have them ftill;
He that hath none, and lives as angels do,
Muft be an angel; but what's that to you?
While mighty Lewis finds the pope too great,
And dreads the yoke of his impofing feat,
Our fects a more tyrannic power affume,
And would for scorpions change the rods of Rome;
That church detain'd the legacy divine;
Fanatics caft the pearls of heaven to fwine:
What then have thinking honeft men to do,
But chufe a mean between th' ufurping two?
Nor can th' Ægyptian patriarch blame thy muse,
Which for his firmnefs does his heat excuse;
Whatever councils have approv'd his creed,
The preface fure was his own act and deed.
Our church will have that preface read, you'll fay :
'Tis true: but fo fhe will th' Apocrypha;
And fuch as can believe them, freely may.
But did that God (fo little understood)
Whose darling attribute is being good,
From the dark womb of the rude chaos bring
Such various creatures and make man their king,
Yet leave his favourite man, his chiefeft care,
More wretched than the vileft infects are?
O! how much happier and more safe are they?
If helpless millions must be doom'd a prey
To yelling furies, and for ever burn
In that fad place from whence is no return,
For unbelief in one they never knew,
Or for not doing what they could not do !
The very fiends know for what crime they fell,
And fo do all their followers that rebel :
If then a blind, well-meaning, Indian stray,
Shall the great gulph be fhew'd him for the way?
For better ends our kind Redeemer dy'd,
Or the faln angels room will be but ill supply'd.
That Chrift, who at the great deciding day,
(For he declares what he refolves to say)
Will damn the goats for their ill-natur'd faults,
And fave the fheep for actions, not for thoughts,
Hath too much mercy to send men to hell,
For humble charity, and hoping well.
To what stupidity are zealots grown,
Whofe inhumanity, profufely fhown
In damning crowds of fouls, may damn their own.
I'll err at least on the fecurer fide,
A convert free from malice and from pride.
To my Friend, Mr. JOHN DRYDEN, on his feveral excellent Tranflations of the ancient Poets.
By G. GRANVILLE, Lord LANSDOWNE,
As flow'rs, tranfplanted from a fouthern iky,
But hardly bear, or in the railing die;
Miffing their native fun, at beft retain
But a faint odour, and furvive with pain:
Thus ancient wit, in modern numbers taught,
Wanting the warmth with which its author wrote,
Is a dead image, and a fenfelefs draught.
While we transfufe, the nimble fpirit flies,
Escapes unfeen, evaporates, and dies.
Who then to copy Roman wit defire,
Muft imitate with Roman force and fire,
In elegance of style and phrase the same,
And in the sparkling genius, and the flame.
Whence we conclude from thy tranflated fong,
So juft, fo fmooth, fo foft, and yet so strong,
Coeleftial poet! foul of harmony!
That every genius was reviv'd in thee.
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