No individual could resent,

Where thousands equally were meant:

His satire points at no defect,

But what all mortals may correct;
For he abhor'd the senseless tribe
Who call it humour when they gibe:
He spar'd a bump, or crooked nose,
Whose owners set not up for beaux.
True genuine dullness mov'd his pity,
Unless it offer'd to be witty.
Those who their ignorance confest,
He ne'er offended with a jest;
But laugh'd to hear an ideot quote
A verse from Horace learn'd by rote.
Vice, if it e'er can be abash'd,
Must be or ridicul'd or lash'd.
If you resent it, who 's to blame?

He neither knows you, nor your name.
Should vice expect to 'scape rebuke,
Because its owner is a duke?
His friendships, still to few confin'd,
Were always of the middling kiud ;
No fools of rank, or mongrel breed,
Who fain would pass for lords indeed :
Where titles give no right or power,
And peerage is a wither'd flower;
He would have deem'd it a disgrace,
If such a wretch had known his face.
On rural squires, that kingdom's bane,
He vented oft his wrath in vain :

******* squires to market brought, Who sell their souls and **** for nought: The **** **** go joyful back,

To rob the church, their tenants rack;

Go snacks with ***** justices,

And keep the peace to pick up fees;

In every jobb to have a share,

A jail or turnpike to repair;
And turn ******* to public roads
Commodious to their own abodes.

"He never thought an honour done him,
Because a peer was proud to own him;
Would rather slip aside, and choose
To talk with wits in dirty shoes;

And scorn the tools with stars and garters,
So often seen caressing Chartres.
He never courted men in station,
Nor persons held in admiration;
Of no mau's greatness was afraid,
Because he sought for no man's aid.
Though trusted long in great affairs,
He gave himself no haughty airs:
Without regarding private ends,
Spent all his credit for his friends;
And only chose the wise and good;
No flatterers; no allies in blood:
But succour'd virtue in distress,
And seldom fail'd of good success;
As numbers in their hearts must own,
Who, but for him, had been unknown.

"He kept with princes due decorum ;
Yet never stood in awe before 'em.
He follow'd David's lesson just ;
In princes never put his trust:
And, would you make him truly sour,
Provoke him with a slave in power.
The Irish senate if you nam`d,
With what impatience he declaim'd!

Fair LIBERTY was all his cry;
For her he stood prepar'd to die;
For her he boldly stood alone;
For her he oft expos'd his own.
Two kingdoms, just as faction led,
Had set a price upon his head;
But not a traitor could be found,
To sell him for six hundred pound.

"Had he but spar'd his tongue and pen,
He might have rose like other men:
But power was never in his thought,
And wealth be valued not a groat:
Ingratitude he often found,
And pity'd those who meant the wound;
But kept the tenour of his mind,
To merit well of human-kind;
Nor made a sacrifice of those
Who still were true, to please his foes.
He labour'd many a fruitless hour,
To reconcile his friends in power;
Saw mischief by a faction brewing,
While they pursued each other's ruin.
But, finding vain was all his care,

He left the court in mere despair.

66

And, oh how short are human schemes !

Here ended all our golden dreams.

What St. John's skill in state affairs,
What Ormond's valour, Oxford's cares,
To save their sinking country lent,
Was all destroy'd by one event.
Too soon that precious life was ended,
On which alone our weal depended.
When up a dangerous faction starts,
With wrath and vengeance in their hearts;
By solemn league and covenant bound,
To ruin, slaughter, and confound;
To turn religion to a fable,
And make the government a Babel;
Pervert the laws, disgrace the gown,
Corrupt the senate, rob the crown;
To sacrifice Old England's glory,
And make her infamous in story:
When such a tempest shook the land,
How could unguarded virtue stand!

"With horrour, grief, despair, the dean
Beheld the dire destructive scene:
His friends in exile, or the Tower,
Himself within the frown of power;
Pursued by base envenom'd pens,
Far to the land of s and fens;

A servile race in folly nurs'd,
Who truckle most, when treated worst.
By innocence and resolution,

He bore continual persecution;
While numbers to preferment rose,
Whose merit was to be his foes;
When ev'n his own familiar friends,
Intent upon their private ends,
Like renegadoes now he feels,
Against him lifting up their heels.

"The dean did, by his pen, defeat,
An infamous destructive cheat;
Taught fools their interest how to know,
And gave them arms to ward the blow.
Envy hath own'd it was his doing,
To save that hapless land from ruin;
While they who at the steerage stood,
And reap'd the profit, sought his blood,

To save them from their evil fate,
In him was held a crime of state.
A wicked monster on the bench,
Whose fury blood could never quench;
As vile and profligate a villain,
As modern Scroggs, or old Tressilian;
Who long all justice had discarded,
Nor fear'd he God, nor man regarded;
Vow'd on the dean his rage to vent,
And make him of his zeal repent:
But Heaven his innocence defends,
The grateful people stand his friends;'
Not strains of law, nor judges' frown,
Nor topics brought to please the crown,
Nor witness hir'd, nor jury pick'd,
Prevail to bring him in convict.

In exile, with a steady heart,
He spent his life's declining part;
Where folly, pride, and faction say,
Remote from St. John, Pope, and Gay."
"Alas, poor dean! his only scope
Was to be held a misanthrope.
This into general odium drew him,

Which if he lik'd, much good may 't do him.
His zeal was not to lash our crimes
But discontent against the times :
For, had we made him timely offers
To raise his post, or fill his coffers,
Perhaps he might have truckled down,
Like other brethren of his gown;
For party he would scarce have bled :-
I say no more-because he 's dead.-
What writings has he left behind?”

"I hear they 're of a different kind: A few iu verse; but most in prose--" "Some high-flown pamphlets, I suppose :— All scribbled in the worst of times, To palliate his friend Oxford's crimes;

To praise queen Aune, nay more, defend her
As never favouring the Pretender:
Or libels yet conceal'd from sight,
Against the court to show his shite:
Perhaps his travels, part the third;
A lie at every second word—
Offensive to a loyal car :-
But not one sermon, you may

swear."

"He knew an hundred pleasing stories,
With all the turns of Whigs and Tories:
Was cheerful to his dying-day;
And friends would let him have his way.
As for his works in verse or prose,

I own myself no judge of those.
Nor can I tell what critics thought them;
But this I know, all people bought them,
As with a moral view design'd
To please and to reform mankind:
And, if he often miss'd his aim,
The world must own it to their shame,
The praise is his, and theirs the blame.
He gave the little wealth he had
To build a house for fools and mad;
To show, by one satiric touch,
No nation wanted it so much.
That kingdom he hath left his debtor,
I wish it soon may have a better.
And, since you dread no further lashes,
Blethinks you may forgive his ashes."

Lady Santry got out of the church when she grew
And, as fast as she could, to the deanery flew sick.
Miss Morice was (I can assure you 'tis true) sick :
For, who would not be in that numerous crew sick?
Such music would make a fanatic or Jew sick,
Yet, ladies are seldom at ombre or lue sick: [sick.
Nor is old Nanny Shales, whene'er she does brew,
My footman came home from the church of a bruise
[sick;

sick,

And look'd like a rake, who was made in the stews But you learned doctors can make whom you choose sick:

And poor I myself was, when I withdrew, sick; [sick, For the smell of them made me like garlic and rue And I got through the crowd, though not let by a clue, sick.

You hop'd to find many (for that was your cue) sick; But there was not a dozen (to give them their due) sick,

And those, to be sure, stuck together like glew, sick. So are ladies in crowds, when they squeeze and they screw, sick. [sick

You may find they are all, by their yellow pale hue, So am I, when tobacco, like Robin, I chew, sick.

TO DR. SHERIDAN.

IF I write any more, it will make my poor Muse sick.

This night I came home with a very cold dew sick,
And I wish I may soon be not of an ague sick;
But I hope I shall ne'er be, like you, of a shrew sick,
Who often has made me, by looking askew, sick.

DR. HELSHAM'S ANSWER.

THE doctor's first rhyme would make any Jew sick:
I know it has made a tine lady in blue sick,
For which she is gone in a coach to Killbrew sick,
Like a hen I once had, from a fox when she flew sick.
Last Monday a lady at St. Patrick's did spew sick,
And made all the rest of the folks in the pew sick;

1 This medley (for it cannot be called a poem) is given as a specimen of those bagatelles for which the dean hath perhaps been two severely censured, Some, which were still more exceptionable, are suppressed, N.

The surgeon who bled her, his lancet out drew sick,
And stopt the distemper, as being but new sick.
The yacht, the last storm, had all her whole crew sick;
Had we two been there, it would have made me and
you sick :

A lady that long'd, is by eating of glew sick;
Did you ever know one in a very good Q sick?
I'm told that my wife is by winding a clue sick;
The doctors have made her by rhyme and by rue sick.
There's a gamester in town, for a throw that he
threw sick,

And yet the old trade of his dice he 'll pursue sick;
I've known an old miser for paying his due sick;
At present I'm grown by a pinch of my shoe sick,
And what would you have me with verses to do sick?
Send rhymes, and I'll send you some others in lue
Of rhymes I've a plenty, (sick.
And therefore send twenty.
Answered the same day when sent, Nov. 23.
I desire you will carry both these to the doctor,
together with his own; and let him know we are
not persons to be insulted.

"Can you match with me,
Who send thirty-three?
You must get fourteen more,
To make up thirty-four:
But, if me you can conquer,
I'll own you a strong cur 2,"

This morning I'm growing by smelling of yew sick; My brother's come over with gold from Peru sick; Last night I came home in a storm that then blew sick; This moment my dog at a cat I halloo sick; [sick, I hear, from good hands, that my poor cousin Hugh's By quaffing a bottle, and pulling a screw sick : And now there 's no more I can write (you'll excuse) sick;

You see that I scorn to mention word musick.

I'll do my best,

TO THE Reverend DR. SWIFT. WITH A PRESENT OF A PAPER-BOOK FINELY BOUND, ON HIS BIRTH-DAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1732.

BY JOHN EARL OF ORRERY.

To thee, dear Swift, these spotless leaves I send;
Sinall is the present, but sincere the friend.
Think not so poor a book below thy care;
Who knows the price that thou canst make it bear?
Though tawdry now, and, like Tyrilla's face,
The specious front shines out with borrow'd grace;
Though paste-boards, glittering like a tinsel'd coat,
A rasa tabula within denote:

Yet, if a venal and corrupted age,

And modern vices, should provoke thy rage;

If, warn'd once more by their impending fate,
A sinking country and an injur'd state
Thy great assistance should again demand,
And call forth reason to defend the land;
Then shall we view these sheets with glad surprise
Inspir'd with thought, and speaking to our eyes:
Each vacant space shall then, enrich'd, dispense
True force of eloquence, and nervous sense;
Inform the judgment, animate the heart,
And sacred rules of policy impart.
The spangled covering, bright with splendid ore
Shall cheat the sight with empty show no more;
But lead us inward to those golden mines,
Where all thy soul in native lustre shines.
So when the eye surveys some lovely fair,
With bloom of beauty grac'd, with shape and air;
How is the rapture heighten'd, when we find
Her form excell'd by her celestial mind!

VERSES

LEFT WITH A SILVER STANDISH

ON THE DEAN OF ST. PATRICK'S DESK

ON HIS BIRTH-DAY.

BY DR. DELANY.

HITHER from Mexico I came,
To serve a proud Iernian dame :
Was long submitted to her will;
At length she lost me at quadrille.
Through various shapes I often pass'd,
Still hoping to have rest at last;
And still ambitious to obtain
Admittance to the patriot dean;
And sometimes got within his door,

But soon turn'd out to serve the poor 1;
Not strolling Idleness to aid,
But honest Industry decay'd.
At length an artist purchas'd me,

And wrought me to the shape you see.
This done, to Hermes I apply'd:
"O Hermes! gratify my pride;
Be it my fate to serve a sage,
The greatest genius of his age:
That matchless pen let me supply,
Whose living lines will never die !"
"I grant your suit," the god reply'd;
And here he left me to reside.

The king of brutes (to make it plain,
Of quadrupeds I only mean)
By proclamation gave command,
That every subject in the land
Should to the priest confess their sins
And thus the pious wolf begins:
"Good father, I must own with shame,
That often I have been to blame :

I must confess, on Friday last,
Wretch that I was! I broke my fast:
But I defy the basest tongue

To prove I did my neighbour wrong;
Or ever went to seek my food
By rapine, theft, or thirst of blood."
The ass, approaching next, confess'd,
That in his heart he lov'd a jest:

A wag he was, he needs must own.
And could not let a dunce alone:
Sometimes his friend he would not spare,
And might perhaps be too severe :
But yet, the worst that could be said,
He was a wit both born and bred;
And, if it be a sin or shame,
Nature alone must bear the blame:
One fault he hath, is sorry for 't,
His ears are half a foot too short;
Which could he to the standard bring,
He'd show his face before the king:
Then for his voice, there's none disputes
That he 's the nightingale of brutes.

The swine with contrite heart allow'd,
His shape and beauty made him proud:
In diet was perhaps too nice
But gluttony was ne'er his vice:
In every turn of life content,
And meekly took what fortune sent:
Inquire through all the parish round,
A better neighbour ne'er was found:
His vigilance might some displease;
'Tis true, he hated sloth like pease.

The mimic ape began his chatter, How evil tongues his life bespatter: Much of the censuring world complain'd, Who said, his gravity was feign'd : Indeed the strictness of his morals Engag'd him in a hundred quarrels: He saw, and he was griev'd to see 't, His zeal was sometimes indiscreet: He found his virtues too severe For our corrupted times to bear; Yet such a lewd licentious age Might well excuse a stoic's rage.

The goat advanc'd with decent pace; And first excus'd his youthful face; Forgiveness begg'd, that he appear'd ('Twas nature's fault) without a beard. 'Tis true, he was not much inclin'd To fondness for the female kind; Not, as his enemies object, From chance, or natural defect; Not by his frigid constitution; But through a pious resolution: For he had made a holy vow Of chastity, as monks do now; Which he resolv'd to keep for ever hence, And strictly too, as doth his reverence 1. Apply the tale, and you shall find, How just it suits with human-kind.

LI

The priest his confessor.

Some faults we own: but, can you guess?
-Why, virtues carried to excess,
Wherewith our vanity endows us,
Though rather foe nor friend allows us.
The lawyer swears (you may rely on 't)
He never squeez'd a needy client;
And this he makes his constant rule;
For which his brethren call him fool:
His conscience always was so nice,
He freely gave the poor advice;
By which he lost, he may affirm,
A hundred fees last Easter-term.
While others of the learned robe
Would break the patience of a Job,
No pleader at the bar could match
His diligence and quick dispatch;
Ne'er kept a cause, he well may boast,
Above a term, or two at most.

The cringing knave who seeks a place
Without success, thus tells his case:
Why should he longer mince the matter?
He fail'd, because he could not flatter;
He had not learn'd to turn his coat,
Nor for a party give his vote:
His crime he quickly understood;
Too zealous for the nation's good:
He found the ministers resent it,
Yet could not for his heart repent it.

The chaplain vows he cannot fawn,
Though it would raise him to the lawn:
He pass'd his hours among his books;
You find it in his meagre looks:
He might, if he were worldly wise,
Preferment get, and spare his eyes;
But own'd he had a stubborn spirit,
That made him trust alone to merit:
Would rise by merit to promotion;
Alas! a mere chimeric notion.

The doctor, if you will believe him,
Confess'd a sin; and (God forgive him!)
Call'd up at midnight, ran to save
A blind old beggar from the grave:
But see how Satan spreads his snares;
He quite forgot to say his prayers.
He cannot help it for his heart
Sometimes to act the parson's part:
Quotes from the Pible many a sentence,
That moves his patients to repentance :
And, when his medicines do no good,
Supports their minds with heavenly food,
At which, however well intended,
He hears the clergy are offended,
And grown so bold behind his back,
To call him hypocrite and quack.
In his own church he keeps a seat ;
Says grace before and after meat ;
And calls, without affecting airs,
His household twice a day to prayers.
He shuns apothecaries' shops,

And hates to cram the sick with slops:
He scorns to make his art a trade,
Nor bribes my lady's favourite maid:
Old nurse-keepers would never hire,
To recommend him to the squire;
Which others, whom he will not name,
Have often practis'd to their shame.

The statesman tells you, with a sneer,
His fault is to be too sincere ;
And, having no sinister ends,
Is apt to disoblige his friends.

The nation's good, his master's glory,
Without regard to Whig or Tory,
Were all the schemes he had in view;
Yet he was seconded by few:

Though some had spread a thousand lyes,
'Twas he defeated the excise.

"Twas known, though he had borne aspersion,
That standing troops were his aversion :
His practise was, in every station,
To serve the king, and please the nation;
Though hard to find in every case
The fittest man to fill a place:
His promises he ne'er forgot,
But took memorials on the spot:
His enemies, for want of charity,
Said, he affected popularity:
'Tis true, the people understood,
That all he did was for their good;
Their kind affections he has try'd;
No love is lost on either side.

He came to court with fortune clear,
Which now he runs out every year:
Must, at the rate that he goes on,
Inevitably be undone :

Oh! if his majesty would please
To give him but a writ of ease,
Would grant him licence to retire,
As it hath long been his desire,
By fair accounts it would be found,
He's poorer by ten thousand pound.
He owns, and hopes it is no sin,
He ne'er was partial to his kin;
He thought it base for men in stations
To crowd the court with their relations:
His country was his dearest mother,
And every virtuous inan his brother;
Through modesty or awkward shame
(For which he owns himself to blame),
He found the wisest man he could,
Without respect to friends or blood;
Nor never acts on private views,
When he hath liberty to choose.

The sharper swore he hated play,
Except to pass an hour away:
And well he might; for, to his cost,
By want of skill he always lost:
He heard there was a club of cheats,
Who had contriv'd a thousand feats;
Could change the stock, or cog a dye,
And thus deceive the sharpest eye.
Nor wonder how his fortune sunk ;
His brothers fleece him when he 's drunk.
I own the moral not exact:
Besides, the tale is false in fact;
And so absurd, that could I raise up
From fields Flysian, fabling

sop,

I would accuse him to his face
For libeling the four-foot race.
Creatures of every kind but ours
Well comprehend their natural powers;
While we, whom reason ought to sway,
Mistake our talents every day.
The ass was never known so stupid
To act the part of Tray or Cupid;
Nor leaps upon his master's lap,
There to be strok'd, and fed with pap,
As Esop would the world persuade;
He better understands his trade:
Nor comes, whene'er his lady whistles;
But carries loads, and feeds on thistles.