Put on the critick's brow, and fit
At Will's the puny judge of wit.
A nod, a fhrug, a fcornful fmile,
With caution us'd, may ferve a while..
Proceed no further in your part,
Before you learn the terms of art;
For you can never be too far gone
In all our modern criticks jargon :
Then talk with more authentic face
Of unities in time and place;
Get fcraps of Horace from your friends,
And have them at your fingers ends;
Learn Ariftotle's rules by rote,
And at all hazards boldly quote;
Judicious Rymer oft review,
Wife Dennis, and profound Boffu.
Read all the prefaces of Dryden,
For thefe our criticks much confide in
(Though merely writ at firft for filling
To raile the volume's price a fhilling).
A forward critick often dupes us
With fham quotations * peri hupfous:
And, if we have not read Longinus,
Will magifterially out-fhine us..
* A famous treatise of Longinus.
Then, left with Greek he over-run ye, Procure the book for love or money, Tranflated from Boileau's tranflation And quote quotation on quotation.
At Will's you hear a poem read,
Where Battus from the table-head,
Reclining on his elbow-chair,
Gives judgment with decifive air;
To whom the tribe of circling wits
As to an oracle fubmits.
He gives directions to the town
To cry it up, or run it down;
Like courtiers, when they fend a note,
Inftructing members how to vote.
He fets the ftamp of bad and good,
Though not a word be understood.
Your leffon learnt, you'll be secure
To get the name of connoiffeur :
And, when your merits once are known,
Procure difciples of your own.
For poets (you can never want 'em)
Spread through + Augufta Trinobantum,
Computing by their pecks of coals,
Amount to just nine thousand fouls:
* By Mr. Welfred. + The ancient name of London.
These o'er their proper diftri&ts govern,
Of wit and humour judges fov'reign.
In ev'ry street a city-bard:
Rules, like an alderman, his ward;
His indifputed rights extend
Through all the lane, from end to end; The neighbours round admire his brewdness
For fongs of loyalty and lewdness;
Out-done by none in rhyming well,
Although he never learnt to spell.
Two bordering wits contend for glory;
And one is whig, and one is tory:
And this for epicks claims the bays,
And that for elegiac lays:
Some fam'd for numbers foft and fmooth,
By lovers fpoke in Punch's booth:
And fome as juftly fame extols
For lofty lines in Smithfield drolls.
Bavius in Wapping gains renown,
And Mavius reigns o'er Kentish-town:
Tigellius plac'd in Phoebus' car
From Ludgate fhines to Temple-bar :
Harmonious Cibber entertains
The court with annual birth-day ftrains;
Whence Gay was banish'd in difgrace, Where Pope will never fhow his face; Where Young must torture his invention, To flatter knaves, or lofe his penfion.
But these are not a thousandth part Of jobbers in the poet's art, Attending each his proper ftation, And all in due fubordination; Through every alley to be found, In garrets high or under ground: And when they join their pericranies, Out skips a book of mifcellanies. Hobbes clearly proves, that ev'ry creature Lives in a ftate of war by nature. The greater for the fmalleft watch, But meddle feldom with their match. A whale of moderate fize will draw A fhoal of herrings down his maw. A fox with geefe his belly crams, A wolf deftroys a thousand lambs. But search among the rhyming race, The brave are worried by the base. If on Parnaffus' top you fit, You rarely bite, are always bit. Each poet of inferior fize On you fhall rail and criticife;
And ftrive to tear you limb from limb,
While others do as much for him.
The vermin only teafe and pinch
Their foes fuperior by an inch.
So nat'ralifts obferve, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey,
And these have fmaller ftill to bite 'em,
And fo proceed ad infinitum.
Thus ev'ry poet in his kind
Is bit by him that comes behind:
Who, though too little to be feen,
Can teaze, and gall, and give the spleen;
Call dunces fools, and fons of whores,
Lay Grubstreet at each other's doors;
Extol the Greek and Roman masters,
And curfe our modern poetafters.
Complain, as many an ancient bard did,
How genius is no more rewarded;
How wrong a tafte prevails among us;
How much our ancestors out-fung us;
Can perfonate an aukward fcorn
For those who are not poets born;
And all their brother dunces lafh,
Who croud the press with hourly trash.
● Grubstreet! how do I bemoan thee, Whofe graceless children fcorn to own thee! Their
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