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To counterpoise this hero of the mode, Some for renown are singular and odd; What other men dislike is sure to please, Of all mankind, these dear antipodes:

Through pride, not malice, they run counter still,
And birthdays are their days of dressing ill.
Arbuthnot is a fool, and Foe a sage,

Sedley will fright you, Etherege engage:
By Nature streams run backward, flame descends,
Stones mount, and Sussex is the worst of friends.
They take their rest by day, and wake by night,
And blush if you surprise them in the right;
If they by chance blurt out, ere well aware,
A swan is white, or Queensberry * is fair.
Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt,
A fool in fashion, but a fool that's out;
His passion for absurdity's so strong,
He cannot bear a rival in the wrong.

Though wrong the mode, comply: more sense is shown

In wearing others' follies than your own.
If what is out of fashion most you prize,
Methinks you should endeavour to be wise.
But what in oddness can be more sublime
Than Sloane †, the foremost toyman of his time?
His nice ambition lies in curious fancies,
His daughter's portion a rich shell enhances,
And Ashmole's baby-house ‡ is, in his view,
Britannia's golden mine, a rich Peru!
How his eyes languish! how his thoughts adore
That painted coat which Joseph never wore!

* The Duchess of Queensberry, a celebrated toast.
+ Sir Hans Sloane, whose collections enrich our Museum.
The Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.

He shows, on holidays, a sacred pin

[chin.

That touch'd the ruff that touch'd Queen Bess's
'Since that great dearth our chronicles deplore,
Since the great plague that swept as many more,
Was ever year unbless'd as this? (he'll cry)
It has not brought us one new butterfly!'
In times that suffer such learn'd men as these,
Unhappy Jersey! how came you to please?
Not gaudy butterflies are Lico's game,
But in effect his chase is much the same:
Warm in pursuit, he levees all the great,
Stanch to the foot of title and estate:
Where'er their lordships go, they never find
Or Lico or their shadows lag behind;
He sets them sure where'er their lordships run,
Close at their elbows, as a morning dun;
As if their grandeur by contagion wrought,
And Fame was, like a fever, to be caught:
But after seven years' dance from place to place,
The Dane is more familiar with his Grace.
Who'd be a crutch to prop a rotten peer,
Or living pendant dangling at his ear,
For ever whispering secrets, which were blown
For months before by trumpets through the town?
Who'd be a glass, with flattering grimace,
Still to reflect the temper of his face?
Or happy pin to stick upon his sleeve,

When my lord's gracious, and vouchsafes it leave?
Or cushion, when his heaviness shall please
To loll or thump it, for his better ease?

Or a vile butt, for noon or night bespoke,

When the peer rashly swears he'll club his joke?

* A Danish dog belonging to the Duke of Argyle.

.

Who'd shake with laughter, though he could not

find

His lordship's jest; or, if his nose broke wind,
For blessings to the gods profoundly bow,
That can cry chimneysweep, or drive a plough?
With terms like these how mean the tribe that close!
Scarce meaner they who terms like these impose.

But what's the tribe most likely to comply?
The men of ink, or ancient authors lie;
The writing tribe, who, shameless auctions hold
Of praise, by inch of candle to be sold;
All men they flatter, but themselves the most,
With deathless fame their everlasting boast:
For Fame no cully makes so much her jest
As her old constant spark, the bard profess'd.
Boyle* shines in council, Mordaunt + in the fight,
Pelham's magnificent, but I can write;

And what to my great soul like glory dear?
Till some god whispers in his tingling ear,
That fame's unwholesome taken without meat,
And life is best sustain'd by what is eat:
Grown lean and wise, he curses what he's writ,
And wishes all his wants were in his wit.

Ah! what avails it, when his dinner's lost,
That his triumphant name adorns a post?
Or that his shining page (provoking fate)
Defends surloins, which sons of Dulness eat?
What foe to verse without compassion hears,
What cruel proseman can refrain from tears,
When the poor Muse, for less than half a crown,
A prostitute on every bulk in town,

Earl of Orrery.
+ Earl of Peterborough.
Duke of Newcastle.

With other whores undone, though not in print, Clubs credit for Geneva in the Mint?

Ye bards! why will you sing, though unin-
spired?

Ye bards! why will you starve to be admired?
Defunct by Phoebus' laws, beyond redress,
Why will your spectres haunt the frighted press?
Bad metre, that excrescence of the head,
Like hair, will sprout although the poet's dead.
All other trades demand, verse-makers beg:
A dedication is a wooden leg;

A barren Labeo, the true mumper's fashion,
Exposes borrow'd brats to move compassion.
Though such myself, vile bards I discommend;
Nay more, though gentle Damon is my friend.
Is't then a crime to write?'-If talent rare
Proclaim the god, the crime is to forbear:
For some, though few there are, large-minded men,
Who watch unseen the labours of the pen;
Who know the Muse's worth, and therefore court,
Their deeds her theme, their bounty her support;
Who, serve, unask'd, the least pretence to wit,
My sole excuse, alas! for having writ.
Argyle true wit is studious to restore,
And Dorset smiles, if Phoebus smiled before;
Pembroke in years the longloved arts admires, '
And Henrietta* like a Muse inspires.

But, ah! not inspiration can obtain

That fame which poets languish for in vain.
How mad their aim who thirst for glory, strive
To grasp what no man can possess alive!
Fame's a reversion, in which men take place
(O late reversion!) at their own decease:

* Lady Henrietta Cavendish Holles Harley.

This truth sagacious Lintot knows so well,
He starves his authors that their works may sell.
That fame is wealth, fantastic poets cry;
That wealth is fame, another clan reply,
Who know no guilt, no scandal, but in rags,
And swell in just proportion to their bags.
Nor only the low-born, deform'd and old,
Think glory nothing but the beams of gold:
The first young lord which in the Mall you meet,
Shall match the veriest hunks in Lombard Street,
From rescued candles' ends who raised a sum,
And starves to join a penny to a plum.
A beardless miser! 'tis a guilt unknown
To former times, a scandal all our own..

Of ardent lovers the true modern band
Will mortgage Celia to redeem their land.
For love young, noble, rich Castalio dies;
Name but the fair, love swells into his eyes.
Divine Monimia, thy fond fears lay down,
No rival can prevail,-but half a crown.
He glories to late times to be convey'd,
Not for the poor he has relieved, but made :
Not such ambition his great fathers fired,
When Harry conquer'd, and half France expired:
He'd be a slave, a pimp, a dog, for gain;
Nay, a dull sheriff for his golden chain.

Who'd be a slave?' The gallant colonel cries, While love of glory sparkles from his eyes: To deathless fame he loudly pleads his right,— Just is his title, for he will not fight. All soldiers valour, all divines have grace, As maids of honour beauty-by their place: But when, indulging on the last campaign, His lofty terms climb o'er the hills of slain,

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