At church, in silks and satins new,

With hoop of monstrous size; She never slumber'd in her pew

But when she shut her eyes.

Her love was sought, I do aver,

By twenty beaus and more;
The king himself has follow'd her-

When she has walk'd before.

But now her wealth and fin’ry fled,

Her hangers-on cut short-all; The doctors found, when she was dead,

Her last disorder mortal.

Let us lament, in sorrow sore,

For Kent-street well may say, That, had she liv'd a twelvemonth more,

She had not dy'd to-day.

A

SONNET.

WEEPING, murmuring, complaining,

Lost to ev'ry gay delight; Myra, too sincere for feigning,

Fears th’approaching bridal night.

Yet why impair thy bright perfection!

Or dim thy beauty with a tear? Had Myra follow'd my direction,

She long had wanted cause of fear.

FROM THE

ORATORIO

OF

THE CAPTIVITY.

SONG.

The wretch condemn’d with life to part,

Still, still on hope relies;
And ev'ry pang that rends the heart,

Bids expectation rise.

Hope, like the glimm’ring taper's light,

Adorns and cheers the way,
And still, as darker grows the night,

Emits a brighter ray.

SONG.

O MEMORY! thou fond deceiver,

Still importunate and vain, To former joys recurring ever,

And turning all the past to pain;

Thou, like the world, th'opprest oppressing,

Thy smiles increase the wretch's woe! And he who wants each other blessing,

In thee must ever find a foe.

A

PROLOGUE,

WRITTEN AND SPOKEN BY

THE POET LABERIUS,

A ROMAN KNIGHT,

WHOM CÆSAR FORCED UPON THE STAGE.

PRESERVED BY MACROBIUS!.

What! no way left to shun th’inglorious stage,
And save from infamy my sinking age!
Scarce half alive, oppress’d with many a year,
What in the name of dotage drives me here?
A time there was, when glory was my guide,
Nor force nor fraud could turn my steps aside ;

1 This translation was first printed in one of our author's earliest works, “ The present State of Learning in Europe,” 12mo. 1759.