"With ev'ry pleafing, ev'ry prudent part, 1 Say, what can Cloe want?"-She wants a Heart, She speaks, behaves, and acts just as she ought; 161 But never, never, reach'd one gen'rous Thought. Virtue fhe finds too painful an endeavour, Content to dwell in Decencies for ever. As never yet to love, or to be lov'd. 165 She, while her Lover pants upon her breast, Forbid it Heav'n, a Favour or a Debt She e'er fhould cancel-but the may forget. But none of Cloe's fhall you ever hear. Of all her Dears fhe never flander'd one, Would Cloe know if you're alive or dead? NOTES. 175 ones have been fubdued; for I fortune of fuch a Character, as that if, tho' reafon govern, the heart be never confulted, we intereft ourselves as little in the in any of the foregoing, which paffions or caprice drive up and down at random. Cloe is prudent-Would you too be wife? 185 One certain Portrait may (I grant) be seen, Which Heav'n has varnish'd out, and made a Queen: THE SAME FOR EVER! and defcrib'd by all With Truth and Goodnefs, as with Crown and Ball. Poets heap Virtues, Painters Gems at will, And show their zeal, and hide their want of skill. 'Tis well-but, Artists! who can paint or write, To draw the Naked is your true delight. That Robe of Quality so struts and swells, None fee what Parts of Nature it conceals: Th'exacteft traits of Body or of Mind, We owe to models of an humble kind. If QUEENSBERRY to ftrip there's no compelling, 'Tis from a Handmaid we must take a Helen. From Peer or Bishop 'tis no eafy thing 190 195 To draw the man who loves his God, or King: NOTES. VER. 181. One certain Por- | Character; fo that the satire trait-the fame for ever!-] This is intirely ironical, and conveys under it this general moral truth, that there is, in life, no fuch thing as a perfect falls not on any particular Charafter, but on the Charactermaker only. See Note on 78. I Dialogue 1738. VER. 198. Mah'met, fer 200 But grant, in Public Men fometimes are shown, A Woman's feen in Private life alone: Our bolder Talents in full light difplay'd; Your Virtues open faireft in the shade. Bred to difguife, in Public 'tis you hide; There, none diftinguish 'twixt your VARIATIONS. After 198. in the MS. Shame or Pride, Fain I'd in Fulvia fpy the tender Wife, NOTES. vant to the late King, faid to be the fon of a Turkish Bafla, whom he took at the Siege of Buda, and constantly kept about his perfon. P. Ibid. Dr. Stephen Hale, not more eftimable for his ufeful difcoveries as a natural Philofopher, than for his exemplary Life and Paftoral Charity as a Parish Priest. VER. 199. But grant, in Public, &c. In the former Ediditions, between this and the foregoing lines, a want of Connexion might be perceived, occafioned by the omiffion of cer tain Examples and Illuftrations to the Maxims laid down; and tho' fome of these have fince been found, viz. the Characters of Philomedé, Atoffa, Cloe, and fome verfes following, others are still wanting, nor can we answer that these are exactly inferted. VER. 203. Bred to disguife, in Public 'tis you bide; There is fomething particular in the turn of this affertion, as making their difguiling in public the neceflary effect of their being bred to difguife; but if we confider that female Education Weakness or Delicacy; all fo nice, That each may feem a Virtue, or a Vice. 205 Those, only fix'd, they first or last obey, VER. 207. VARIATIONS. in the first Edition, In fev'ral Men we fev'ral paffions find; NOTES. is an art of teaching not to be, but to appear, we shall have no reafon to find fault with the exactness of the expreffion. VER. 206. That each may feem a Virtue or a Vice.] For Women are taught Virtue fo artificially, and Vice fo naturally, that, in the nice exercise of them, they may be easily mistaken for one another. SCRIB. VER. 207. The former part having fhewn, that the particular Characters of Women are more various than thofe of Men, it is nevertheless obferved, that the general Characteriftic of the fex, as to the ruling Paffion, is more uniform. P. -- VER. 211. This is occafioned partly by their Nature, partly their Education, and in fome degree by Neceffity. P. VER. 211, 212. and where the leffon taught Is but to please, can, &c.] The delicacy of the poet's addrefs is here obfervable, in his manner of informing us what this PleaSure is, which makes one of the two objects of Woman's ruling Paffion. He does it in an ironical apology for it, arifing from its being a Pleasure of the beneficent and communicative kind, and not merely felfifh, like those which the other fex generally pursues. VER. 213. Experience this, &c.] The ironical apology con Experience, this; by Man's oppreffion curft, Men, fome to Bus'nefs, fome to Pleasure take; But ev'ry Woman is at heart a Rake: Men, fome to Quiet, fome to public Strife; But ev'ry Lady would be Queen for life. 216 Yet mark the fate of a whole Sex of Queens! Pow'r all their end, but Beauty all the means: 220 In Youth they conquer, with fo wild a rage, As leaves them scarce a fubject in their Age:. For foreign glory, foreign joy, they roam; No thought of peace or happiness at home. But Wisdom's triumph is well-tim'd Retreat, 225 As hard a fcience to the Fair as Great! Beauties, like Tyrants, old and friendless grown, Yet hate repofe, and dread to be alone, |