RESIGN'D to live, prepared to die,
With not one sin, but poetry,
This day Tom's fair account has run
(Without a blot) to eighty-one.
Kind Boyle, before his poet, lays
A table, with a cloth of bays;
And Ireland, mother of sweet singers,
Presents her harp still to his fingers.
The feast, his towering genius marks
In yonder wild goose and the larks !
The mushrooms show his wit was sudden!
And for his judgment, lo a pudden!
Roast beef, though old, proclaims him stout,
And grace, although a bard, devout.
May Toм, whom Heaven sent down to raise
The price of prologues and of plays,
Be every birth-day more a winner,
Digest his thirty-thousandth dinner;
Walk to his grave without reproach,
And scorn a rascal in a coach.
THE THREE GENTLE SHEPHERDS.
Or gentle Philips will I ever sing,
With gentle Philips shall the valleys ring;
My numbers too for ever will I vary,
With gentle Budgell, and with gentle Carey.
Or if in ranging of the names I judge ill,
With gentle Carey and with gentle Budgell:
Oh! may all gentle bards together place ye,
Men of good hearts, and men of delicacy.
May satire ne'er befool ye, or beknave ye,
And from all wits that have a knack, God save ye.
THE FOLLOWING LINES WERE SUNG
BY DURASTANTI WHEN SHE TOOK HER LEAVE OF THE ENGLISH STAGE.
THE WORDS WERE IN HASTE PUT TOGETHER BY MR. POPE, AT THE REQUEST OF THE EARL OF PETERBOROUGH.
GENEROUS, gay, and gallant nation,
Bold in arms, and bright in arts;
Land secure from all invasion,
All but Cupid's gentle darts!
From your charms, oh who would run?
Who would leave you for the sun?
Happy soil, adieu, adieu !
Let old charmers yield to new.
In arms, in arts, be still more shining ;
All your joys be still increasing ;
All your tastes be still refining;
All your jars for ever ceasing :
But let old charmers yield to new :-
Happy soil, adieu, adieu!
UPON THE DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH'S HOUSE AT WOODSTOCK.
Atria longa patent; sed nec cœnantibus usquam,
Nec somno locus est: quàm bene non habitas!
SEE, sir, here's the grand approach,
This way is for his Grace's coach;
There lies the bridge, and here's the clock,
Observe the lion and the cock,
The spacious court, the colonnade,
And mark how wide the hall is made!
She was brought to England by Handel to sing at the Opera, 1721, and was so great a favourite at court, that the king stood godfather to one of her children.
The chimneys are so well design'd,
They never smoke in any wind.
This gallery 's contrived for walking,
The windows to retire and talk in;
The council-chamber for debate,
And all the rest are rooms of state.
Thanks, sir, cried I, 'tis very fine,
But where d'ye sleep, or where d 'ye dine?
I find by all you have been telling,
That 'tis a house, but not a dwelling.
WITH Scornful mien, and various toss of air,
Fantastic, vain, and insolently fair,
Grandeur intoxicates her giddy brain,
She looks ambition, and she moves disdain.
Far other carriage graced her virgin life,
But charming G-y's lost in P-y's wife.
Not greater arrogance in him we find,
And this conjunction swells at least her mind :
O could the sire, renown'd in glass, produce
One faithful mirror for his daughter's use !
Wherein she might her haughty errors trace,
And by reflection learn to mend her face :
The wonted sweetness to her form restore,
Be what she was, and charm mankind once more!
Anna Maria Gumley, daughter of John Gumley of Isleworth, who realised a very great property from a glass manufactory; she married Pulteney, who received with her a very large fortune.
ON HIS LYING IN THE SAME BED WHICH WILMOT, THE CELEBRATED EARL
OF KOCHESTER, SLEPT IN, AT ADDERBURY, THEN BELONGING
TO THE DUKE OF ARGYLE, JULY 9, 1739.
WITH no poetic ardour fired
I press the bed where Wilmot lay;
That here he loved, or here expired,
Begets no numbers, grave or gay.
Beneath thy roof, Argyle, are bred
Such thoughts as prompt the brave to lie
Stretch'd out in honour's nobler bed,
Beneath a nobler roof-the sky.
Such flames as high in patriots burn
Yet stoop to bless a child or wife;
And such as wicked kings may mourn,
When freedom is more dear than life.
IN THE NAME OF MRS. BUTLER'S SPIRIT, LATELY DECEASED.
STRIPP'D to the naked soul, escaped from clay,
From doubts unfetter'd, and dissolved in day;
Unwarm'd by vanity, unreach'd by strife,
And all my hopes and fears thrown off with life;
Why am I charm'd by friendship's fond essays,
And though unbodied, conscious of thy praise?
Has pride a portion in the parted soul?
Does passion still the firmless mind control!
Can gratitude out-pant the silent breath!
Or a friend's sorrow pierce the gloom of death!
No-'tis a spirit's nobler task of bliss ;
That feels the worth it left, in proofs like this;
That not its own applause, but thine approves,
Whose practice praises, and whose virtue loves;
Who livest to crown departed friends with fame;
Then dying, late, shalt all thou gavest reclaim.
DORSET, the grace of courts, the Muses' pride,
Patron of arts, and judge of nature, died.
The scourge of pride, though sanctified or great,
Of fops in learning, and of knaves in state:
Yet soft his nature, though severe his lay,
His anger moral, and his wisdom gay.
Blest satirist! who touch'd the mean so true,
As show'd, vice had his hate and pity too.
Blest courtier! who could king and country please,
Yet sacred keep his friendships, and his ease.
Blest peer! his great forefathers every grace
Reflecting, and reflected in his race;
Where other BUCKHURSTS, other DORSETS Shine,
And patriots still, or poets, deck the line.
ONE OF THE PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE TO KING WILLIAM III.
WHO HAVING RESIGNED HIS PLACE, DIED IN HIS RETIREMENT
AT EASTHAMSTED, IN BERKSHIRE, 1716.
A PLEASING form; a firm, yet cautious mind;
Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resign'd :
Honour unchanged, a principle profest,
Fix'd to one side, but moderate to the rest :
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