31 et every child another song will sing, * Virtue, brave boys! 'tis virtue makes a king.' True, conscious honour, is to feel no sin, He's arm'd without that's innocent within; Be this thy screen, and this thy wall of brass ; Compared to this, a minister 's an ass.

And say, to which shall our applause belong This new court-jargon, or the good old song ? The modern language of corrupted peers, Or what was spoke at Cressy or Poitiers ? Who counsels best? who whispers, ‘Be but great, With praise or infamy, leave that to fate; Get place and wealth, if possible, with grace; If not, by any means get wealth and place :' For what? to have a box where eunuchs sing, And foremost in the circle eye a king : Or he, who bids thee face with steady view Proud fortune, and look shallow greatness through: And, while he bids thee, sets the example too? If such a doctrine, in St. James's air, Should chance to make the well-dress'd rabble

stare;
În honest S*z take scandal at a spark,
That less admires the palace than the park :
'Faith I shall give the answer Reynard gave:
• I cannot like, dread sire, your royal cave;
Because I see, by all the tracks about,
Full many a beast goes in, but none come out'
Adieu to Virtue, if you 're once a slave:
Send her to court, you send ler to her grave.

Well, if a king's a lion, at the least
The people are a many-headed beast ;
Can they direct what measures to pursue,
Who know themselves so little what to do?
Alike in nothing but one lust of gold,
Just half the land would buy, and half be sold :
Their country's wealth our mightier misere drsin,
Cr Cross, io plunder provinces, the main;

The rest, some farm the poor-box, some the pows;
Some keep assemblies, and would keep the stews,
Some with fat bucks on childless dotards fawn;
Some win rich widows by their chine and brawn;
While with the silent growth of ten per cent,
In dirt and darkness, hundreds stink content.

Of all these ways, if each pursues his own,
Satire, be kind, and let the wretch alone:
But show me one who has it in his power
To act consistent with himself an hour.
Sir Job sail'd forth, the evening bright and still :

No place on eartis, he cried, 'like Greenwich-hill"
Up starts a palace; lo, the obedient base
Slopes at its foot, the woods its sides embracc,
The silver Thames reflects its marble face.
Now let some whimsy, or that devil within,
Which guides all those who know not what they

mean, But give the knight (or give his lady) spleen ; • Away, away! take all your scaffolds down, For snug 's the word: my dear, we'll live in town:'

At amorous Flavio is the stocking thrown? That very night he longs to lie alone. The fool whose wife elopes some thrice a quarter, For matrimonial solace dies a martyr. Did ever Proteus, Merlin, any witch, Transform themselves so strangely as the rich ? Well, but the poor-the poor have the same itch; They change their weekly barber, weekly news, Prefer a new japanner to their shoes ; Discharge their garrets, move their beds, and run (They know not whither) in a chaise and one;, They hire their sculler, and when once aboard, Grow sick, and damn the climate-like a lord.

You laugh, half-beau half-sloven if I stand, My wig all powder, and all snuff my band : You laugh, if coat and brecches strangely vary, White gloves, and linen worthy lady Mary!

But when no prelate's lawn, with hair-shirt lined,
Is half so incoherent as my mind,
When (each opinion with the next at strife ;
One ebb and flow of follies all my life,)
I plant, root up; I build and then confound;
Turn round to square, and square again to round;
You never change one muscle of your face,
You think this madness but a common case,
Nor once to Chancery, nor to Hale apply ;
Yet hang your lip to see a seam awry !
Careless how ill I with myself agree,
kind to my dress, my figure, not to me,
Is this my guide, philosopher, and friend ?
This he, who loves me, and who ought to mend?
Who ought to make me (what he can, or none)
That man divine whom Wisdom calls her own;
Great without title, without fortune bless'd;
Rich e'en when plunder’d, honour'd while oppress’d;
Loved without youth, and follow'd without power :
At home, though exiled; free, though in the Tower ;
In short, that reasoning, high immortal thing,
Just less than Jove, and much above a king ;
Nay, half in heaven-except (what's mighty odd)
A fit of vapours clouds this demi-god!

BOOK I.-EPISTLE VI.

TO MR. MURRAY.

This piece is the most finished of all his imitations, and executed in the high manner the Italian painters call con amore ; by which they mean, the exertion of that principle which puts the faculties on the stretch, and produces the supreme degree of excellence. For the poet had all the warmth of affection for the great lawyer to whom it is addressed ; and, indeed, no man ever more deserved to have a poet for his friend.

In

the obtaining of which, as neither vanity, party, not fear, had any share, so he supported his title to it by all the offices of true friendship.

"Nor to admire, is all the art I know, To make men happy, and to keep them so.' (Plain truth, dear Murray, needs no flowers of speech, So take it in the very words of Creech.)

This vault of air, this congregated ball,
Self-centred sun, and stars that rise and fall,
There are, my friend! whose philosophic eyes
Look through, and trust the Ruler with his skies ;
To him commit the hour, the day, the year,
And view this dreadful all without a fear.

Admire we then what earth's low entrails holde
Arabian shores, or Indian seas infold ;
All the mad trade of fools and slaves for gold ?
Or popularity ? or stars and strings ?
The mob's applauses, or the gifts of kings ?
Bay with what eyes we ought at courts to gaze,
And pay the great our homage of amaze ?

If weak the pleasure that from these can spring, The fear to want them is as weak a thing : Whether we dread, or whether we desire,

I either case, believe me, we admire; Whether we joy or grieve, the same the curse, Surprised at better, or surprised at worse. Thus good or bad, to one extreme betray The unbalanced mind, and snatch the man away : For virtue's self may too much zeal be had ; The worst of madmen is a saint run inad. Go then, and if

you can,

admire the state Of beaming diamonds, and reflected plate; Procure a taste to double the surprise, And gaze on Parian charms with learned eyes : 3e struck with bright brocade, or Tyrian dye, Or birth-day nobles' splendid livery.

If not so pleased, at council-board rejoice
To see their judgments hang upon thy voice ;
From morn to night, at senate, rolls, and hall,
Plead much, read more, dine late, or not at all.
But wherefore all this labour, all this strife ?
For fame, for riches, for a noble wife ?
Shall one whom nature, learning, birth conspired
To form, not to admire, but be admired,
Sigh while his Chloe, blind to wit and worth,
Weds the rich dulness of some son of earth?
Yet time ennobles, or degrades each line :
It brighten'd Craggs's, and may darken thine.
And what is fame ? the meanest have their day:
The greatest can but blaze, and pass away.
Graced as thou art, with all the power of words,
So known, so honour'd, at the house of lords :
Conspicuous scene ! another yet is nigh
(More silent far,) where kings and poets lie :
Where Murray (long enough his country's pride)
Shall be no more than Tully or than Hyde !

Rack'd with sciatics, martyr'd with the stone,
Will any mortal let himself alone ?
See Ward by batter'd beaux invited over,
And desperate misery lays hold on Dover.
The case is easier in the mind's disease ;
There all men may be cured whene'er they please.
Would ye be bless'd ? despise low joys, low gains ;
Disdain whatever Cornbury disdains ;
Be virtuous, and be happy for your pains.

But art thou one, whom new opinions sway? One who believes as Tindal leads the way, Who virtue and a church alike disowns, Thinks that but words, and this but brick and

stones? Fly then on all the wings of wild desire, Admire whate'er the maddest can admire. Is wealth thy passion ? Hence! from pole to pole, Where winds can carry, or where waves can roll;