On fuch a scheme, with a defign
To write or read such stuff as mine,
And idly waste his precious time
In all th' impertinence of rhyme.
My good, wife, venerable fir!
Why about nonfenfe all this ftir!
Is it, that you would stand alone,
And read no nonsense but your own;
Tho' you're (to tell you, by the bye)
Not half fo great a fool as I;
Or is it that you make pretence,
Being a fool, to have some sense?
Employ herself in writing news,
And most unconscionably teize her
With rhyming to Warfaw and Wefer;
Or tofs up a poetic olio,
Merely to bring in Marshal Broglio?
Should I recite what now is doing,
Or what for future times is brewing,
Or triumph that the poor French fee all
Their hopes defeated at Montreal,
Or fhould I your attention carry
To Fred'rick, Ferdinand, or Harry,
Of flying Ruffian, daftard Swede,
And baffled Auftria let you read;
Or gravely tell with what defign
The youthful Henry pass'd the Rhine?
Or fhould I shake my empty head,
And tell you that the king is dead,
Obferve what changes will enfue,
What will be what, and who'll be who,
Or leaving these things to my betters,
Before you set the state of letters ?
Or fhould I tell domestic jars,
How author against author wars,
How both with mutual envy rankling,
Fr--k--ng damns M--rp--y, M--rp--y Fr--k--ng?
Or will it more your mind engage
To talk of actors and the ftage,
To tell, if any words could tell,
What GARRICK acts ftill, and how well,
That SHERIDAN with all his care
Will always be a labour'd play'r,
And that his acting at the best
Is all but art, and art confeft;
That BRIDE, if reafon may prefume
To judge by things past, things to come,
In future times will tread the stage,
Equally form'd for love and rage,
Whilft POPE for comic humour fam'd,
Shall live when CLIVE no more is nam'd.
Your wisdom I fuppofe can't bear
About dull pantomime to hear;
Nor would you have a fingle word
Of Harlequin, and wooden fword,
Of dumb fhew, fools tricks, and wry faces,
And wit which lies all in grimaces,
Nor fhould I any thing advance
Of new invented comic dance.
Callous, perhaps, to things like these,
Would it your worship better please,
That I, more loaden than the camels,
Should crawl in philofophic trammels?
Should I attack the stars, and stray
In triumph o'er the milky way,
And like the TITANS try to move
From feat of empire royal Jove,
Then spread my terrors all around, –
And his Satellites confound,
Teach the war far and wide to rage,
And ev'ry ftar by turns engage?
The danger we should share between us,
You fight with MARS and I with VENUS.
Or fhould I rather, if I cou'd,
Talk of words little understood,
Centric, eccentric, epicycle,
Fine words the vulgar ears to tickle!
A vacuum, plenum, gravitation,
And other words of like relation,
with ftudious men,
But hurt my teeth, and gag my pen;
Things of fuch grave and ferious kind
Puzzle my head and plague my mind;
Befides in writing to a friend
A man may any nonsense send,
And the chief merit to impart,
The honeft feelings of his heart.
INSCRIBED TO THE REV. MR. HANBURY.
ORTH is excis'd, and Virtue pays
A heavy Tax for barren praise.
A friend to univerfal Man,
Is univerfal good your plan?
GOD may perhaps your project bless,
But man fhall ftrive to thwart fuccefs.
Tho' the grand scheme thy thoughts pursue,
Befpeak a noble generous view,
Where CHARITY o'er all prefides,
And SENSE approves what VIRTUE guides,
Yet wars and tumults will commence,
For Rogues hate virtue, Blockheads sense.
Believe me, Oppofition grows
Not always from our real foes,
But (where it feldom ever ends)
From our more dangerous feeming friends.
I hate not foes, for they declare,
'Tis War for War, and dare who dare;
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