An Essay on Man [39]
So humble, he has knocked at Tibbald's door,
Has drunk with Cibber, nay has rhymed for Moore.
Full ten years slandered, did he once reply?
Three thousand sons went down on Welsted's lie.
To please a mistress one aspersed his life;
He lashed him not, but let her be his wife.
Let Budgel charge low Grubstreet on his quill,
And write whate'er he pleased, except his will;
Let the two Curlls of town and court abuse
His father, mother, body, soul, and muse.
Yet why? that father held it for a rule,
It was a sin to call our neighbour fool:
That harmless mother thought no wife a w***e:
Hear this, and spare his family, James Moore!
Unspotted names, and memorable long!
If there be force in virtue, or in song.
Of gentle blood (part shed in honour's cause
While yet in Britain honour had applause)
Each parent sprung-- A. What fortune, pray?- P. Their own,
And better got, than Bestia's from the throne.
Born to no pride, inheriting no strife,
Nor marrying discord in a noble wife,
Stranger to civil and religious rage,
The good man walked innoxious through his age.
Nor courts he saw, no suits would ever try,
Nor dared an oath, nor hazarded a lie.
Unlearned he knew no schoolman's subtle art,
No language, but the language of the heart.
By nature honest, by experience wise,
Healthy by temperance, and by exercise;
His life, though long, to sickness past unknown,
His death was instant, and without a groan.
O grant me thus to live, and thus to die!
Who sprung from kings shall know less joy than I.
O friend! may each domestic bliss be thine!
Be no unpleasing melancholy mine:
Me, let the tender office long engage,
To rock the cradle of reposing age,
With lenient arts extend a mother's breath,
Make languor smile, and smooth the bed of death,
Explore the thought, explain the asking eye,
And keep a while one parent from the sky!
On cares like these if length of days attend,
May Heaven, to bless those days, preserve my friend,
Preserve him social, cheerful, and serene,
And just as rich as when he served a queen.
A. Whether that blessing be denied or given,
Thus far was right, the rest belongs to Heaven.
SATIRES AND EPISTLES OF HORACE IMITATED.
ADVERTISEMENT.
The occasion of publishing these Imitations was the clamour raised on some
of my Epistles. An answer from Horace was both more full, and of more
dignity, than any I could have made in my own person; and the example of
much greater freedom in so eminent a divine as Dr. Donne, seemed a proof
with what indignation and contempt a Christian may treat vice or folly, in
ever so low, or ever so high a station. Both these authors were acceptable
to the princes and ministers under whom they lived. The Satires of Dr.
Donne I versified, at the desire of the Earl of Oxford while he was Lord
Treasurer, and of the Duke of Shrewsbury who had been Secretary of State,
neither of whom looked upon a satire on vicious courts as any reflection on
those they served in. And indeed there is not in the world a greater
error, than that which fools are so apt to fall into, and knaves with good
reason to encourage, the mistaking a satirist for a libeller; whereas to a
true satirist nothing is so odious as a libeller, for the same reason as to
a man truly virtuous nothing is so hateful as a hypocrite.
UNI AEQUUS VIRTUTI ATQUE EJUS AMICIS. P.
THE FIRST SATIRE OF THE SECOND BOOK OF HORACE.
SATIRE I.
TO MR. FORTESCUE.
P. There are (I scarce can think it, but am told),
There are, to whom my satire seems too bold:
Scarce to wise Peter complaisant enough,
And something said of Chartres much too rough.
The lines are weak another's pleased to say,
Lord Fanny spins a thousand such a day.
Timorous by nature, of the rich in awe,
I come to counsel learned in the law:
You'll give me, like a friend both sage and free,
Advice; and (as you use) without a fee.
F. I'd write no more. P. Not write? but then I think,
And for my soul I cannot sleep a wink.
I nod in company, I wake at night,
Fools rush into my head,