a man warm and resolute to be able to claim and obtain the restoring of these high honours. I have cause to fear the most of the candidates would be liable, either through the influence of ministers, or for rewards or favours, to give up the glorious rights of the Laureate: yet I am not without hopes there is one, from whom a serious and steady assertion of these privileges may be expected; and if there be such a one, I must do him the justice to say it is Mr DENNIS, the worthy president of our society.
PRINTED IN THE JOURNALS, 1730.
WHEREAS, upon occasion of certain pieces relating to the gentlemen of the Dunciad, some have been willing to suggest, as if they looked upon them as an abuse, we can do no less than own it is our opinion, that to call these gentlemen bad authors is no sort of abuse, but a great truth. We cannot alter this opinion without some reason; but we promise to do it in respect to every person who thinks it an injury to be represented as no wit, or poet, provided he procures a certificate of his being really such, from any three of his companions in the Dunciad, or from Mr Dennis singly, who is esteemed equal to any three of the number.
MR ADDISON'S TRAGEDY OF CATO.
To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the heart,
To make mankind, in conscious virtue bold,
Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold:
For this the Tragic Muse first trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream through every age;
Tyrants no more their savage nature kept,
And foes to virtue wonder'd how they wept.
Our author shuns by vulgar springs to move
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying love, we but our weakness show,
And wild ambition well deserves its woe.
Here tears shall flow from a more generous cause,
Such tears as patriots shed for dying laws :
He bids your breasts with ancient ardour rise,
And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes.
Virtue confess'd in human shape he draws,
What Plato thought, and godlike Cato was :
No common object to your sight displays,
But what with pleasure Heaven itself surveys,—
A brave man struggling in the storms of fate,
And greatly falling with a falling state.
While Cato gives his little senate laws,
What bosom beats not in his country's cause?
Who sees him act, but envies every deed?
Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed?
Even when proud Cæsar, 'midst triumphal cars,
The spoils of nations, and the pomp of wars,
Ignobly vain, and impotently great,
Show'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state;
As her dead father's reverend image pass'd,
The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercast;
The triumph ceased, tears gush'd from every eye;
The world's great victor pass'd unheeded by;
Her last good man dejected Rome adored,
And honour'd Cæsar's less than Cato's sword.
Britons, attend! be worth like this approved,
And show you have the virtue to be moved.
With honest scorn the first famed Cato view'd
Rome learning arts from Greece, whom she subdued;
Your scene precariously subsists too long
On French translation, and Italian song.
Dare to have sense yourselves; assert the stage,
Be justly warm'd with your own native rage: {
Such plays alone should win a British ear,
As Cato's self had not disdain'd to hear.
TO A PLAY FOR MR DENNIS'S BENEFIT IN 1733, WHEN HE WAS OLD, BLIND, AND IN GREAT DISTRESS, A LITTLE BEFORE HIS DEATH.
As when that hero, who in each campaign
Had braved the Goth, and many a Vandal slain,
Lay fortune-struck, a spectacle of woe!
Wept by each friend, forgiven by every foe;
Was there a generous, a reflecting mind,
But pitied BELISARIUS old and blind?
Was there a chief but melted at the sight?
A common soldier, but who clubb'd his mite?
Such, such emotions should in Britons rise,
When press'd by want and weakness DENNIS lies;
Dennis, who long had warr'd with modern Huns,
Their quibbles routed, and defied their puns;
A desperate bulwark, sturdy, firm, and fierce,
Against the Gothic sons of frozen verse:
How changed from him who made the boxes groan,
And shook the stage with thunders all his own!
Stood up to dash each vain PRETENDER's hope,
Maul the French tyrant, or pull down the POPE!
If there's a Briton then, true bred and born,
Who holds dragoons and wooden shoes in scorn;
If there's a critic of distinguish'd rage;
If there's a senior, who contemns this age;
Let him to-night his just assistance lend,
And be the critic's, Briton's, old man's friend.
THE basset-table spread, the tallier come;
Why stays SMILINDA in the dressing-room?
Rise, pensive nymph, the tallier waits for you!
Ah, madam, since my SHARPER is untrue,
I joyless make my once adored Alpeu.
I saw him stand behind OMBRELIA's chair,
And whisper with that soft, deluding air,
And those feign'd sighs which cheat the listening fair.
Is this the cause of your romantic strains? A mightier grief my heavy heart sustains.
As you by love, so I by fortune cross'd;
One, one bad deal, three Septlevas have lost.
Is that the grief which you compare with mine? With ease, the smiles of fortune I resign: Would all my gold in one bad deal were gone! Were lovely SHARPER mine, and mine alone.
A lover lost, is but a common care:
And prudent nymphs against that change prepare:
The KNAVE OF CLUBS thrice lost! Oh! who could guess
This fatal stroke, this unforeseen distress?
See BETTY LOVET! very à propos,
She all the cares of love and play does know:
Dear BETTY shall the important point decide ·
BETTY, who oft the pain of each has tried;
Impartial, she shall say who suffers most,
By cards' ill usage, or by lovers lost.
Tell, tell your griefs; attentive will I stay, Though time is precious, and I want some tea.
Behold this equipage, by Mathers wrought,
With fifty guineas (a great pen'orth) bought.
See on the toothpick Mars and Cupid strive:
And both the struggling figures seem alive.
Upon the bottom shines the queen's bright face;
A myrtle foliage round the thimble-case.
Jove, Jove himself, does on the scissors shine;
The metal and the workmanship divine!
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