OT twice a twelve-month you appear in print, And when it comes, the court fee nothing in't. You grow correct, that once with rapture writ, And are, befides, too moral for a wit.
Decay of parts, 'alas! we all must feel—
Why now this moment, don't I fee fteal?
'Tis all from Horace; Horace long before ye
Said,» Tories cail'd him Whig, and Whigs a Tory;
And taught his Romans, in much better metre,
» To laugh at fools who put their trust in Peter a
But Horace, Sir, was delicate, was nice;
Bubo obferves, he lash'd no fort of vice:
Horace would fay, Sir Billy ferv'd the crown,
Blunt could do bus'nefs, H-ggins knew the town i
In Sappho touch the failings of the fex,
In rev'rend bishops note fome small neglects,
And own, the Spaniard did a waggish thing,
Who cropt our ears, and sent them to the king.
His fly, polite, infinuating style
Could please at court, and make Auguftus smile:
An artful manager, that crept between
His friend and shame, and was a kind of screen.
But 'faith your very friends will foon be fore:
Patriots there are, who wish you'd jeft no more
And where's the glory? 'twill be only thought
The great man never offer'd you a groat.
Go fee Sir Robert-
P. See Sir Robert!-hum-
And never laugh-for all my life to come?
Seen him I have, but in his happier hour
Of focial pleasure, ill exchang'd for pow'r;
Seen him, uncumber'd with the venal tribe,
Smile without art, and win without a bribe.
Would he oblige me? let me only find,
He does not think me what he thinks mankind.
Come, come, at all I laugh he laughs, no doubt;
The only diff'rence is, I dare laugh out.
F. Why yes: with scripture ftill you may be free; A horfe-laugh, if you please, at honesty; A joke on Jekyl, or fome odd old Whig Who never chang'd his principle, or wig: A patriot is a fool in ev'ry age,
Whom all lord Chamberlains allow the stage These nothing hurts; they keep their fashion still
And wear their strange old virtue, as they will,
If any ask you,» Who's the man, fo near
» His prince, that writes in verse, and has his ear ? ą
Why, anfwer, Lyttelton, and I'll engage
The worthy youth shall ne'er be in a rage:
But were his verses vile, his whisper base,
You'd quickly find him in lord Fanny's cafe.
Sejanus, Wolfey, hurt not honest Fleury,
But well may put some statesmen in a fury.
Laugh then at any, but at fools or foes;
Thefe you
but anger, and you mend not thofe,
Laugh at your friends, and, if your friends are fore,
So much the better, you may laugh the more.
To vice and folly to confine the jeft,
Sets half the world, God knows, against the reft;
Did not the fneer of more impartial men
At fenfe and virtue, balance all agen.
Judicious wits fpread wide the ridicule,
And charitably comfort kuave and fool.
P. Dear Sir, forgive the prejudice of youth:
Adieu diftin&tion, fatire, warmth, and truth!
Come, harmless characters that no one hit;
Come, Henley's oratory, Osborn's wit!
The honey dropping from Favonio's tongue,
The flow'rs of Bubo, and the flow of Y-ng!
The gracious dew of pulpit eloquence,
And all the well-whipt cream of courtly sense,
That first was H-vy's, F's next, and then
The S-te's, and then H-vy's once agen.
that eafy, Ciceronian style,
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