_Ad Astra Per Otium_

AS I read over old John Dryden's verse, The rhymes of men like William Blake, and Gay, The stuff that helped fill Edmund Waller's purse, And that which placed on Marvell's brow the bay,

It doth appear to me that in those times The Muses quaffed not sparkling wine, but grog, And that to grow immortal through one's rhymes Was 'bout as hard as falling off a log.