To BENEDICK

Ha! Benedick! and are you there? Caught in your own designing snare! Doth K—k's eclogue say no more Than common same had said before? So horrid is't become the crime To turn the town-talk into rhime? To hint in dark and distant terms What foul-mouth'd rumour loud affirms? Is satire only too severe, When more is meant than meets the ear? So cruel is't to speak not out, But leave avow'd report in doubt? Fame is, we know, a lying strumpet; And yet the muses blow her trumpet. Your lines would else not run so glib, At ev'ry second word a fib. Lying, 'tis therefore plain, in thy sense, Is founded on poetic licence. A falshood all that you relate, Of Falstaff's Wedding and its fate; Of G—k's patronizing charity: How ill bestow'd so great a rarity! Tho' K—k e'er had too much pride To kiss a manager's backside Shunn'd, with vile Nyky to be seen, In G—k's train, behind the scene; Yet, not so far the world above His labour to give up for Love; His lawful right he still maintains, To what he claim'd as honest gains. Nor this alone the secret cause Why K—k his dread goose-quill draws. Let others crouch; but, while a man, He never will forgive, nor can, 'Till full redress'd on fair confession, A bare affront, or base oppression. Much less will he restrain his pen, In fear of wretches less than men: That pen, which truth excites to gall Both the great vulgar, and the small; The scourge of guilt, when Justice claims Its aid against the greatest names. Much less will he its aid refuse, Or tamely check his daring muse, Because a stage-play'r stalks abroad, Whose antic tricks the crowd applaud; By his profession dead to shame, And trusting to theatric fame; Presumptuous that our English laws Perverted, to avenge his cause, The free-born muse in chains will bind, Disgraceful unto human kind; Of ridicule will check the vein, And satire's wholesome power restrain; That Vice and Folly, thus set free, May laugh at future infamy. No, Sir, next Term indeed, or Hillary, May bring your Nyky to the pillory; Securely as you think he's closetted, And safe from law's pursuit deposited. But think not the indignant town Will let his farces still go down; Or that with such a hateful croney, You still may share the public money: Attempt it not; lest, in a rage, The audience drive thee from the stage.