If Faith itself has diff'rent dreffes worn,

What wonder modes in Wit should take their turn? Oft', leaving what is natural and fit,

The current folly proves the ready wit;

And

tiquary Mr. Antony Wood fadly laments the deformation, as he calls it, of that University by the King's Commiffioners; and even records the blafphemous fpeeches of one of them in his own Words-We have fet DUNCE in Beccardo, with all his blind Gloffers, faft nailed up upon pofts in all common houses of easement. Upon which our venerable Antiquary thus exclaims: "If fo be, the com"miffioners had fuch disrespect for that most famous "Author J. Duns, who was fo much admired by our

predeceffors, and so DIFFICULT TO BE UNDER66 STOOD, that the Doctors of thofe times, namely Dr. "William Roper, Dr. John Kynton, Dr. William Mowfe, "etc. profeffed, that, in twenty eight years flady, they "could not understand him rightly, What then had they "for others of an inferior note ?"- -What indeed! But then, If fo be, that most famous F. Duns was fo difficult to be understood (for that this is a moft claffical proof of his great value, who doubts?) I fhould conceive our good old Antiquary to be a little mistaken. And that the nailing up this Proteus was done by the Commissioners in honour of the most famous Duns: There being no other way of catching the fenfe of fo flippery an Author, who had eluded the purfuit of three of their most renowned Doctors, in full cry after him, for twenty eight years together. And this Boccardo in which he was confined, feemed very proper for the purpofe; it being obferved, that men are never more serious and thoughtful than in that place. SCRIBL.

Ibid. Thomifts,] From Thomas Aquinas, a truly great Genius, who was, in those blind ages, the fame in Theology that Friar Bacon was in natural Philofophy: lefs happy than our Countryman in this, that he foon became furrounded with a number of dark Gloffers, who never left him till they had extinguished the radiance of that light which had pierced through the thickest night of Monkery,

450

455.

And authors think their reputation fafe,
Which lives as long as fools are pleas'd to laugh.
Some valuing those of their own fide or mind,
Still make themselves the measure of mankind :
Fondly we think we honour merit then,
When we but praise ourselves in other men.
Parties in Wit attend on those of State,
And public faction doubles private hate.
Pride, Malice, Folly, against Dryden rose,
In various shapes of Parfons, Critics, Beaus ;
But fense surviv'd, when merry jefts were paft ;
For rifing merit will buoy up at last.

461
Might he return, and bless once more our eyes,
New Blackmores and new Milbourns muft arife:
Nay fhould great Homer lift his awful head,
Zoilus again would ftart up from the dead.
Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue ;

But like a fhadow, proves the substance true;

465

Monkery, the thirteenth century, when the Waldenfes were fuppreffed, and Wickliffe not yet rifen.

VER. 445. Duck-lane] A place where old and fecond. hand books were fold formerly, near Smithfield.

VARIATIONS.

VER. 447. Between this and ver. 448.

P.

The rhyming Clowns that gladded Shakespear's age,
No more with crambo entertain the stage.
Who now in Anagrams their Patron praife,

Or fing their Mistress in Acroftic lays ?

Ev'n pulpits pleas'd with merry puns of yore;
Now all are banish'd to the Hibernian fhore!

Thus leaving what was natural and fit,
The current folly prov'd their ready wit;
And authors thought their reputation fafe,

Which liv'd as long as fools were pleas'd to laugh.'

VOL. I.

I

For

471

For envy'd Wit, like Sol eclips'd, makes known
Th' oppofing body's groffness, not its own.
When first that fun too pow'rful beams difplays,
It draws up vapours which obfcure its rays;
But ev❜n those clouds at last adorn its way,
Reflect new glories, and augment the day.
Be thou the first true merit to befriend;
His praise is loft, who ftays 'till all commend. 475
Short is the date, alas, of modern rhymes,
And 'tis but just to let them live betimes.
No longer now that golden age appears,

When Patriarch-wits furviv'd a thousand years:
Now length of Fame (our second life) is loft, 480
And bare threescore is all ev'n that can boast;
Our fons, their fathers failing language fee,
And fuch as Chaucer is, fhall Dryden be.
So when the faithful pencil has defign'd
Some bright Idea of the mafter's mind,

485 Where

VER. 468. For envy'd Wit, like Sol eclips'd, etc.] This fimilitude implies a fact too often verified; and of which we need not seek abroad for examples. It is, that frequently thofe very Authors, who have at firft done all they could to obfcure and depress a rifing genius, have at length, in order to keep themselves in fome little credit, been reduced to borrow from him, imitate his manner, and reflect what they could of his fplendor. Nor hath the poet been lefs artful, to infinuate alfo what is fometimes the cause. A youthful genius, like the Sun rifing towards the Meridian, difplays too firong and powerful beams for the dirty genius of inferior writers, which occafions their gathering, condenfing, and blackening. But as be defcends from the Meridian (the time when the Sun gives its gilding to the furrounding clouds) his rays grow milder, his heat more benign, and then

- ev'n thofe Clouds at laft adorn its way. Reflect new glories, and augment-the day.

Where a new world leaps out at his command,
And ready Nature waits upon his hand;
When the ripe colours foften and unite,
And sweetly melt into just shade and light;
When mellowing years their full perfection give,
And each bold figure just begins to live,
The treach'rous colours the fair art betray,
And all the bright creation fades away!

Unhappy Wit, like most mistaken things,
Atones not for that envy which it brings.
In youth alone its empty praife we boast,
But foon the short-liv'd vanity is loft:

49

495.

Like fome fair flow'r the early spring supplies,
That gayly blooms, but ev'n in blooming dies.
What is this Wit, which muft our cares employ?
The owner's wife, that other men enjoy ;
Then moft our trouble ftill when most admir'd,

And still the more we give, the more requir'd;

Whose fame with pains we guard, but lose with ease, Sure fome to vex, but never all to please ;

505

'Tis what the vicious fear, the virtuous shun,

By fools 'tis hated, and by knaves undone !
If Wit fo much from Ign'rance undergo,
Ah let not Learning too commence its foe!

Of old, thofe met rewards who could excell, 510
And fuch were prais'd who but endeavour'd well:
Tho' triumphs were to gen'rals only due,

Crowns were referv'd to grace the foldiers too.

VER. 507 - by knaves undane !]. By which the Poet would infinuate, a common but fhameful truth, That Men in power, if they got into it by illiberal arts, generally left Wit and Science to ftarve,

Now, they who reach Parnaffus' lofty crown,
Employ their pains to spurn some others down;
And while felf-love each jealous writer rules,
Contending wits become the fport of fools:
But ftill the worst with most regret commend,
For each ill Author is as bad a Friend.
To what bafe ends, and by what abject ways,

Are mortals urg'd thro' facred luft of praise!

Ah ne'er fo dire a thirft of glory boast,

Nor in the Critic let the Man be loft.

520

Good-nature and good-sense must ever join; 525
To err is human, to forgive, divine.

But if in noble minds fome dregs remain
Not yet purg'd off, of spleen and four disdain;
Discharge that rage on more provoking crimes,
Nor fear a dearth in these flagitious times.
No pardon vile Obscenity should find,

113

Tho' wit and art confpire to move your mind;
But Dulnefs with Obscenity muft prove

As fhameful fure as Impotence in love.

539

In

VER. 519. But fill the Worft with most regret commend, For each ill Author is as bad a Friend.] As Ignorance, when joined with Humility, produces ftupid admiration, on which account it is fo commonly obferved to be the mother of Devotion and blind homage; fo when' joined with Vanity (as it always is in bad Critics) it gives. birth to every iniquity of impudent abuse and flander. See an example (for want of a better) in a late worthlefs and now forgotten thing, called the Life of Socrates. Where the bead of the Author (as a man of wit obferved on reading the book) had just made a fhift to do the office of a Camera obfcura, to represent things in an inverted order himself above, and Sprat, Rollin, Voltaire, and every other Author of reputation, below.