SATIRE I. (My verse is Satire; Dorset, lend your…)

My verse is Satire; Dorset, lend your ear, And patronize a muse you cannot fear; To poets sacred is a Dorset's name, Their wonted passport thro' the gates of Fame; It bribes the partial reader into praise, And throws a glory round the shelter'd lays; The dazzled judgment fewer faults can see, And gives applause to B—e, or to me. But you decline the mistress we pursue! Others are fond of Fame, but Fame of you. Instructive Satire, true to Virtue's cause! Thou shining supplement of public laws! When flatter'd crimes of a licentious age Reproach our silence and demand our rage; When purchas'd follies from each distant land, Like arts, improve in Britain's skilful hand; When the law shews her teeth, but dares not bite, And South-sea treasures are not brought to light; When Churchmen Scripture for the Classics quit, Polite apostates from God's Grace to Wit; When men grow great from their revenue spent, And fly from bailiffs into parliament; When dying sinners, to blot out their score, Bequeath the church the leavings of a whore; To chafe our spleen when themes like these increase, Shall Panegyric reign, and Censure cease? Shall Poesy, like Law, turn wrong to right, And dedications wash an Aethiop white, Set up each senseless wretch for Nature's boast, On whom praise shines as trophies on a post? Shall Funeral Eloquence her Colours spread, And scatter roses on the wealthy dead? Shall authors smile on such illustrious days, And satirize with nothing—but their praise? Why slumbers Pope, who leads the tuneful train, Nor hears that Virtue, which he loves, complain? Donne, Dorset, Dryden, Rochester, are dead, And Guilt's chief foe in Addison is fled; Congreve, who, crown'd with laurels fairly won, Sits smiling at the goal while others run, He will not write; and (more provoking still!) Ye Gods! he will not write, and Maevius will. Doubly distrest, what author shall we find Discreetly daring, and severely kind, The courtly Roman's shining path to tread, And sharply smile prevailing Folly dead? Will no superior genius snatch the quill, And save me, on the brink, from writing ill? Tho' vain the strife, I'll strive my voice to raise. What will not men attempt for sacred Praise? The love of Praise, howe'er conceal'd by art, Reigns, more or less, and glows in ev'ry heart: The proud, to gain it, toils on toils endure; The modest shun it, but to make it sure. O'er globes and scepters, now, on thrones it swells; Now, trims the midnight lamp in college-cells. 'Tis Tory, Whig; it plots, prays, preaches, pleads, Harangues in senates, squeaks in masquerades; Here, to S—e's humour makes a bold pretence; There, bolder, aims at Pulteney's eloquence. It aids the dancer's heel, the writer's head, And heaps the plain with mountains of the dead; Nor ends with life; but nods in sable plumes, Adorns our herse, and flatters on our tombs. What is not proud? The Pimp is proud to see So many like himself in high degree: The Whore is proud her beauties are the dread Of peevish Virtue, and the marriage-bed; And the brib'd Cuckold, like crown'd victims born To slaughter, glories in his gilded horn. Some go to church, proud humbly to repent, And come back much more guilty than they went. One way they look, another way they steer, Pray to the gods, but would have mortals hear; And when their sins they set sincerely down, They'll find that their religion has been one. Others with wishful eyes on Glory look, When they have got their picture towards a book. Or pompous Title, like a gaudy sign Meant to betray dull sots to wretched wine. If at his Title T—— had dropt his quill, T— might have pass'd for a great genius still; But T—, alas! (excuse him, if you can) Is now a scribbler, who was once a man. Imperious, some, a classic Fame demand, For heaping up, with a laborious hand, A waggon-load of meanings for one word, While A's depos'd, and B with pomp restor'd. Some, for Renown, on scraps of learning dote, And think they grow immortal as they quote. To patch-work learn'd quotations are ally'd; Both strive to make our Poverty our Pride. On Glass how witty is a noble peer? Did ever diamond cost a man so dear? Polite diseases make some idiots vain, Which, if unfortunately well, they feign. On death-beds some in conscious glory lie, Since of the doctor in the mode they die; Whose wond'rous skill is, headsman-like, to know, For better pay to give a surer blow. Of Folly, Vice, Disease, men proud we see; And (stranger still) of blockhead's flattery, Whose praise defames; as if a fool should mean, By spitting on your face, to make it clean. Nor is't enough all hearts are swol'n with Pride, Her pow'r is mighty, as her realm is wide. What can she not perform? The love of Fame Made bold Alphonsus his Creator blame, Empedocles hurl'd down the burning steep, And (stronger still!) made Alexander weep. Nay, it holds Delia from a second bed, Tho' her lov'd lord has four half months been dead. This passion with a pimple have I seen Retard a cause, and give a judge the spleen, By this inspir'd (O! ne'er to be forgot) Some lords have learnt to spell, and some to knot. It makes globose a speaker in the house; He hems, and is deliver'd of his mouse. It makes dear self on well-bred tongues prevail, And I the little hero of each tale. Sick with the love of Fame what throngs pour in, Unpeople court, and leave the senate thin? My growing subject seems but just begun, And, chariot-like, I kindle as I run. Aid me, great Homer! with thy Epic rules, To take a catalogue of British fools. Satire! had I thy Dorset's force divine, A knave, or fool, should perish in each line; Tho', for the first, all Westminster should plead, And, for the last, all Gresham intercede. Begin. Who first the catalogue shall grace? To Quality belongs the highest place. My lord comes forward; forward let him come! Ye vulgar! at your peril give him room; He stands for Fame on his forefather's feet, By heraldry prov'd valiant, or discreet. With what a decent pride he throws his eyes Above the man by three descents less wise? If virtues at his noble hand you crave, You bid him raise his fathers from the grave, Men should press forward in Fame's glorious chace, Nobles look backward, and so lose the race. Let high birth triumph! What can be no more great? Nothing—but Merit in a low estate. To Virtue's humblest son let none prefer Vice, tho' descended from the Conqueror. 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, lies. They that on glorious ancestors inlarge, 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 shew 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 out-do, And, Burlington, thy taste is not so true. The pile is finish'd, ev'ry 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 antick statues are his flame. Not F—t—n'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 truckt for English bail?" Such heads might make their very busto's 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! 'tis sad To say you're curious, when we swear you're mad. By your revenue measure your expence, And to your funds and acres join your sense; No man is blest 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, can'st thou refuse 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 is 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 thro' 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 wands so white, Which bloom, like Aaron's, to their ravisht 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, 'tis equal sin, To boast of merely being out, or in. What numbers, here, thro' odd ambition, strive To seem the most transported things alive? As if by joy desert was understood, And all the fortunate were wise, or good. Hence aching bosoms wear a visage gay, And stifled groans frequent the ball, and play. Compleatly dress'd by Monteuel, 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—'s hair. 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 Santer 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 tumults, 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 ravisht and the soul is blest; On every thorn delightful Wisdom grows, In ev'ry rill a sweet instruction flows; But some, untaught, o'erhear the whisp'ring 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 courser strain, Or well-breath'd beagles sweep along the plain. Say, dear Hippolitus (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 gipsy 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 Scroope 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?