"This might their mutual fancy ftrike
"Since every being loves its like.
"But now, repenting what was done, 880
"She left all bufinefs to her fon;
"She puts the world in his poffeffion,
"And let him use it at difcretion."
The crier was order'd to difmifs
The court, fo made his last "O yes!".
The goddess would no longer wait;
But, rifing from her chair of state,
Left all below at fix and feven,
Harness'd her doves, and flew to heaven.
IN
'N all I wish, how happy should I be,
Thou grand Deluder, were it not for thee!
So weak thou art, that fools thy power despise;
And yet so strong, thou triumph'ft o'er the wife.
Thy traps are laid with fuch peculiar art,
They catch the cautious, let the rash depart.
Most nets are fill'd by want of thought and care:
But too much thinking brings us to thy fnare;
Where, held by thee, in flavery we stay,
And throw the pleafing part of life
But, what does most my indignation move,
Difcretion! thou wert ne'er a friend to love:
Found in Mifs Vanhomrigh's defk, after her death, in the hand-writing of Dr. Swift.
Thy chief delight is to defeat those arts,
By which he kindles mutual flames in hearts
While the blind loitering God is at his play,
Thou fteal'ft his golden-pointed darts away:
Those darts which never fail; and in their stead
Convey'ft malignant arrows tipt with lead:
The heedlefs God, fufpecting no deceits,
and thinks he has done wondrous feats; But the poor nymph, who feels her vitals burn, And from her fhepherd can find no return, Laments, and rages at the power divine, When, curft Difcretion! all the fault was thine : Cupid and Hymen thou hast set at odds, And bred fuch feuds between thofe kindred gods, That Venus cannot reconcile her fons
When one appears, away the other runs.
The former scales, wherein he us❜d to poise
Love against love, and equal joys with joys,
Are now fill'd up with avarice and pride,
Where titles, power, and riches, ftill fubfide.
Then, gentle Venus, to thy father run,
And tell him, how thy children are undone ;
Prepare his bolts to give one fatal blow,
And ftrike Difcretion to the fhades below.
CUT the name of the man * who his mistress deny'd,
And let the first of it be only apply'd
To join with the prophet † who David did chide;
Then say what a horse is that runs very fast ‡;
And that which deferves to be first put the last;
Spell all then, and put them together, to find
The Name and the Virtues of him I defign'd.
Like the Patriarch in Egypt, he's vers'd in the state;
Like the Prophet in Jewry, he's free with the great;
Like a racer he flies, to fuccour with speed,
When his friends want his aid, or defert is in need.
HE nymph who wrote this in an amorous fit, I cannot but envy the pride of her wit, Which thus fhe will venture profufely to throw On fo mean a design, and a fubject fo low. For mean's her defign, and her fubject as mean, The first but a Rebus, the last but a Dean. A Dean's but a parfon: and what is a Rebus? A thing never known to the Mufes or Phoebus. The corruption of verfe; for, when all is done, It is but a paraphrase made on a pun.
But a genius like her's no fubject can stifle,
It fhews and discovers itself through a trifle.
By reading this trifle, I quickly began
To find her a great wit, but the dean a small man.
Rich ladies will furnish their garrets with ftuff,
Which others for mantuas would think fine enough:
So the wit that is lavishly thrown away here,
Might furnish a second-rate poet a year.
Thus much for the verfe, we proceed to the next,
Where the Nymph has entirely forsaken her text :
Her fine panegyricks are quite out of season,
And what the describes to be merit, is treason:
The changes which faction has made in the ftate,
Have put the dean's politicks quite out of date:
Now no one regards what he utters with freedom,
And, fhould he write pamphlets, no great man
would read 'em ;
And should want or defert stand in need of his aid,
This racer would prove but a dull-founder'd jade.
HORACE, B. II. ODE I. PARAPHRASED.
Addreffed to RICHARD STEELE, Efq. 1714.
"En qui promittit cives, urbem fibi curæ,
Imperium fore, & Italiam, & delubra deorum."
DICK, thou'rt refolv'd, as I am told,
Some ftrange arcana to unfold,
And, with the help of Buckley's pen,
To vamp the good old caufe again:
Which thou (fuch Burnet's fhrewd advice is) 5
Muft furbish up, and nickname Crisis.
Thou pompously wilt let us know
What all the world knew long ago,
(E'er fince Sir William Gore was mayor,
And Harley fill'd the Commons' chair)
That we a German Prince muft own,
When Anne for heaven refigns her throne.
But, more than that, thou'lt keep a rout
With-who is in-and who is out;
Thou'lt rail devoutly at the peace,
And all its fecret caufes trace,
The bucket-play 'twixt Whigs and Tories,
Their ups and downs, with fifty stories
Of tricks the lord of Oxford knows,
And errors of our Plenipoes.
Thou'lt tell of leagues among the great,
Portending ruin to our state;
And that of dreadful coup d'eclat,
Which has afforded thee much chat.
The Queen, forfooth (despotic) gave
Twelve coronets without thy leave!
A breach of liberty, 'tis own'd,
For which no heads have yet aton'd!
Believe me, what thou'ft undertaken
May bring in jeopardy thy bacon;
For madmen, children, wits, and fools,
Should never meddle with edg'd tools.
But, fince thou'rt got into the fire,
And canft not easily retire,
Thou must no longer deal in farce,
Nor pump to cobble wicked verse;
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