Shall men, like figures, pass for high, or base,
Slight, or important, only by their place?
Titles are marks of honest men, and wise;
The fool, or knave, that wears a title, lyes.
They that on glorious ancestors enlarge,
Produce their debt, instead of their discharge.
Dorset, let those who proudly boast their line,
Like thee, in worth hereditary, shine.
Vain as false greatness is, the Muse must own
We want not fools to buy that Bristol stone.
Mean sons of earth, who on a South-sea tide
Of full success, swam into wealth and pride,
Knock with a purse of gold at Anstis' gate,
And beg to be descended from the great.
When men of infamy to grandeur soar,
They light a torch to show their shame the more.
Those governments which curb not evils, cause!
And a rich knave 's a libel on our laws.
Belus with solid glory will be crown'd;
He buys no phantom, no vain empty sound;
But builds himself a name; and, to be great,
Sinks in a quarry an immense estate!
In cost and grandeur, Chandos he 'll outdo;
And Burlington, thy taste is not so true.
The pile is finish'd; every toil is past;
And full perfection is arriv'd at last;
When lo! my lord to some small corner runs,
And leaves state-rooms to strangers and to duns.
The man who builds, and wants wherewith to pay, Provides a home from which to run away. In Britain, what is many a lordly seat,
But a discharge in full for an estate?
In smaller compass lies Pygmalion's fame;
Not domes, but antique statues, are his flame:
Not Fountaine's self more Parian charms has known;
Nor is good Pembroke more in love with stone.
The bailiffs come (rude men, prophanely bold!)
And bid him turn his Venus into gold.
"No, sirs," he cries; "I'll sooner rot in jail :
Shall Grecian arts be truck'd for English bail?”
Such heads might make their very bustos laugh:
His daughter starves; but Cleopatra 's safe. *
Men, overloaded with a large estate,
May spill their treasure in a nice conceit :
The rich may be polite; but, oh! 't is sad
To say you 're curious, when we swear you 're mad.
By your revenue measure your expense;
And to your funds and acres join your sense.
No man is bless'd by accident or guess;
True wisdom is the price of happiness :
Yet few without long discipline are sage;
And our youth only lays up sighs for age.
But how, my Muse, canst thou resist so long
The bright temptation of the courtly throng,
Thy most inviting theme? The court affords
Much food for satire ; - it abounds in lords.
"What lords are those saluting with a grin ?"
One is just out, and one as lately in.
"How comes it then to pass, we see preside
On both their brows an equal share of pride?"
Pride, that impartial passion, reigns through all,
Attends our glory, nor deserts our fall.
As in its home it triumphs in high place,
And frowns a haughty exile in disgrace.
Some lords it bids admire their hands so white,
Which bloom, like Aaron's, to their ravish'd sight:
Some lords it bids resign; and turns their wands,
Like Moses', into serpents in their hands.
These sink, as divers, for renown; and boast,
With pride inverted, of their honours lost.
But against reason sure 't is equal sin,
The boast of merely being out, or in.
What numbers here, through odd ambition, strive To seem the most transported things alive! As if by joy, desert was understood: And all the fortunate were wise and good. Hence aching bosoms wear a visage gay, And stifled groans frequent the ball and play. Completely dress'd by Monteuil * and grimace, They take their birth-day suit and public face: Their smiles are only part of what they wear, Put off at night, with Lady B.
What bodily fatigue is half so bad?
With anxious care they labour to be glad.
What numbers, here, would into fame advance, Conscious of merit, in the coxcomb's dance; The tavern! park! assembly! mask! and play! Those dear destroyers of the tedious day! That wheel of fops! that saunter of the town! Call it diversion, and the pill goes down. Fools grin on fools, and, stoic-like, support, Without one sigh, the pleasures of a court.
Courts can give nothing to the wise and good,
But scorn of pomp, and love of solitude.
High stations tumult, but not bliss, create:
None think the great unhappy, but the great :
Fools gaze, and envy; envy darts a sting,
Which makes a swain as wretched as a king.
I envy none their pageantry and show;
I envy none the gilding of their woe.
Give me, indulgent gods! with mind serene,
And guiltless heart, to range the sylvan scene;
No splendid poverty, no smiling care,
No well-bred hate, or servile grandeur, there:
There pleasing objects useful thoughts suggest;
The sense is ravish'd, and the soul is blest;
On every thorn delightful wisdom grows;
In every rill a sweet instruction flows.
But some, untaught, o'erhear the whispering rill,
In spite of sacred leisure, blockheads still ;
Nor shoots up folly to a nobler bloom
In her own native soil, the drawing-room.
The squire is proud to see his coursers strain,
Or well-breath'd beagles sweep along the plain.
Say, dear Hippolytus, (whose drink is ale,
Whose erudition is a Christmas tale,
Whose mistress is saluted with a smack,
And friend receiv'd with thumps upon the back,)
When thy sleek gelding nimbly leaps the mound,
And Ringwood opens on the tainted ground,
Is that thy praise? Let Ringwood's fame alone;
Just Ringwood leaves each animal his own;
Nor envies, when a gypsey you commit,
And shake the clumsy bench with country wit;
When you the dullest of dull things have said,
And then ask pardon for the jest you made.
Here breathe, my Muse! and then thy task renew:
Ten thousand fools unsung are still in view.
Fewer lay-atheists made by church debates;
Fewer great beggars fam'd for large estates;
Ladies, whose love is constant as the wind ;
Cits, who prefer a guinea to mankind;
Fewer grave lords to Scrope discreetly bend;
And fewer shocks a statesman gives his friend.
Is there a man of an eternal vein,
Who lulls the town in winter with his strain,
At Bath, in summer, chants the reigning lass,
And sweetly whistles as the waters pass?
Is there a tongue, like Delia's o'er her cup,
That runs for ages without winding-up?
Is there, whom his tenth epic mounts to fame?
Such, and such only, might exhaust my theme:
Nor would these heroes of the task be glad,
For who can write so fast as men run mad?
My Muse, proceed, and reach thy destin'd end;
Though toils and danger the bold task attend.
Heroes and gods make other poems fine;
Plain Satire calls for sense in every line:
Then, to what swarms thy faults I dare expose!
All friends to vice and folly are thy foes.
When such the foe, a war eternal wage;
'T is most ill-nature to repress thy rage:
And if these strains some nobler Muse excite,
I'll glory in the verse I did not write.
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