63 } Would ye be * bleft? defpife low Joys, low Gains; y But art thou one, whom new opinions fway, One who believes as Tindal leads the way, Who Virtue and a Church alike difowns, 65 Thinks that but words, and this but brick and ftones ? Fly then, on all the wings of wild defire, Is Wealth thy paffion? Hence! from Pole to Pole, Prevent the greedy, and out-bid the bold: 70 Add one round hundred, and (if that's not fair) 75 Add fifty more, and bring it to a fquare. For, mark th advantage; juft fo many score b Will gain a Wife with half as many more, e (Believe me, many a German Prince is worse, Who proud of Pedigree, is poor of Purfe) f His Wealth brave Timon gloriously confounds; 85 Afk'd for a groat, he gives a hundred pounds; Si poffet centum scenae praebere rogatus, Qui poffum tot? ait: tamen et quaeram, et quot habebo h Mittam: poft paulo fcribit, fibi millia quinque k Mercemur fervum, qui dictet nomina, laevum n Çui volet, importunus ebur: " Frater, Pater, adde: Ut cuique eft aetas, ita quemque facetus adopta. Si P bene qui coenat, bene vivit; lucet: eamus Ɔr if three Ladies like a luckless Play, 1 مو Not for your felf, but for your Fools and Knaves; Something, which for your Honour they may cheat, And which it much becomes you to forget. h If Wealth alone then make and keep us bleft, 95 Still, ftill be getting, never, never rest. iBut if to Pow'r and Place your paffion lie, If in the Pomp of Life confift the joy; k 110 Then hire a Slave, or (if you will) a Lord m 1 "This may be troublesome, is near the Chair: 106 "That makes three Members, this can chufe a "May`r." Inftructed thus, you bow, embrace, protest, n Adopt him " Son, or Coufin at the least, } Then turn about, and laugh at your own Jeft. S Or if your life be one continu'd Treat, If to live well means nothing but to eat; Quo ducit gula: pifcemur, venemur, ut ¶ olim Gargilius: qui mane plagas, venabula, fervos, Differtum tranfire forum populumque jubebat, Unus ut e multis populo fpectante referret. Emtum mulus aprum. 'crudi, tumidique lavemur, Quid deceat, quid non, obliti; Caerite cera S Digni; remigium vitiofum Ithacenfis Ulyffei; Cui potior patria fuit interdicta voluptas. VIR. 127. Wilmot.] Earl of Rochester. Ibid. 129. And SwIFT fay wifely, "Vive la Bagatelle !”] Our Poet, speaking in one place of the purpose of his fatire, fays, In this impartial glass, my Mufe intends Fair to expofe myself, my foes, my friends. and, in another, he makes his Court-Adviser say, Laugh at your Friends, and if your Friends before, So much the better, you may laugh the more. because their impatience under reproof would fhew, they had a great deal which wanted to be set right. On this principle, Swift falls under his correction. He could not bear to see a friend he fo much valued, live in the miserable abufe of one of Nature's beft gifts, unadmonished of his folly. Swift (as we may fee by fome pofthumous Volumes, lately publifhed, fo difhonourable and injurious to his memory) trifled away his old age in a diffipation that women and boys might be ashamed of. For when men have given into a long habit of With hounds and horns go hunt an Appetite 115 t V 121 125 Renounce our Country, and degrade our Name ? employing their wit only to fhew their parts, to edge their fpleen, to pander to a faction; or, in fhort, to any thing but that for which Nature beftowed it, namely, to recommend, and set off Truth; old age, which abates the paffions, will never rectify the abuses they occafioned. But the remains of wit, instead of seeking and recovering their proper channel, will run into that miferable depravity of taste here condemned: and in which Dr. Swift seems to have placed no inconfiderable part of his wisdom. "I chufe (says he, in a Letter to Mr. Pope) my Com. "panions amongst those of the leaft confequence, and moft "compliance: I read the moft trifling Books I can find: and " whenever I write, it is upon the most trifling subjects." And again, "I love La Bagatelle better than ever. I am always writ"ing bad profe or worfe verfes, either of rage or raillery," etc. And again, in a letter to Mr. Gay, "My rule is, Vive la |