And wits by our creation they become, Juft fo, as titular bishops made at Rome, 'Tis not a tale, 'tis not a jest

Admir'd with laughter at a feast,

Nor florid talk, which can that title gain;
The proofs of wit for ever muft remain.

4.

'Tis not to force fome lifeless verfes meet
With their five gouty feet.

All every where, like man's, must be the foul,
And reafon the inferior powers controul.

Such were the numbers, which could call
The ftones into the Theban wall.

Such miracles are ceas'd; and now we fee
No towns or houses [ƒ] rais'd by poetry.

5.

Yet, 'tis not to adorn, and gild each part;
That fhows more coft, than art.

Jewels at nofe and lips but ill appear;
Rather, than all things, wit, let none be there.

Several lights will not be seen,

If there be nothing else between.

[f] Houses] Here used in the double sense of houses, properly fo called, and of families.

Men

Men doubt, because they fand fo thick ith' tky,
If those be fears, which paint the galaxy [g].

Tis not, where two like words make up one noife
Jefts for Dutch men, and English boys:
In which who finds out wit, the fame may fee
In anagrams and acroftics, poetry.

Much lefs can that have any place!
At which a virgin hides her face;

Such drofs the fire muft purge away; 'tis juft,
The author blufh there, where the reader muft

7፡

"Tis not fuch lines as almoft crack the Rtages When Bajazet begins to rage.

[g] This idea has been borrowed by Mr. Addifoh, and applied, with much elegance, to our poet himself. For, fpeaking of Mr. Cowley's wit, he fays

"One glittring thought no fooner strikes our eyes
With filent wonder, but new wonders rife:

"As in the milky way a shining white!
"O'erflows the heav'ns with one continued light;
"That not a single star can fhew his rays,

"Whilft jointly all promote the common blaze."

Account of English poets, to Mr. H. S

Nor

Nor a tall metaphor in the bombaft way,^
Nor the dry chips of fhort-lung'd Seneca [b].
Nor upon all things to obtrude

And force fome odd fimilitude. :
What is it then, which, like the power divine,
We only can by negatives define?[i]

On the Death of Mr. JORDAN,

Second Mafter at Weftminfter-School.

HERE lies the mafter of my

tender years,

The guardian of my parent's[k] hope and fears,

[b] Short-lung'd Seneca.] Meaning his bort fentences, as if he had not breath enough to ferve him for longer anhelanti fimilis-Yet, in another sense, he is, perhaps, the moft long-winded author of antiquity. For, as Mr. Bayle has well obferved, "Il n'y a guere d'ecrivain "dont le verbiage foit plus grand que celui de Seneque : "Cicero mettroit dans une periode de fix lignes ce que Seneque dit dans fix periodes qui tiennent huit ou neuf "lignes." Lettres, t. ii. p. 150.

66

[i] The two concluding ftanzas of this ode are omitted. [K] my parent's] That is, of his mother's, under whofe difcipline he was bred; for he was born (Dr. Sprat tells us) after his father's death.

VOL. I.

I

Whofe

Whofe government ne'er ftood me in a tear;
All weeping was referv'd to spend it here.

He pluck'd from youth the follies and the crimes.
And built up men against the future times;
For deeds of age are in their causes then,

And though he taught but boys, he made the men.
Hence 'twas, a master, in those ancient days
When men fought knowledge firft, and by it praise,
Was a thing full of reverence, profit, fame;
Father itself was but a fecond name.
And if a Mufe hereafter smile on me,
And fay, "Be thou a poet," men shall fee
That none could a more grateful scholar have;
For what I ow'd his life, I'll pay his grave [].

IV.

On the Death of Mr. WILLIAM HERVEY [m].

"Immodicis brevis eft ætas, & rara fenectus."

1.

MART. L. VI. Ep. xxix.

T was a difmal, and a fearful night,

IT

Scarce could the morn drive on th'unwilling light,

[] The rest of this poem (one of those which were written, as he fays, when he was very young) is fuppreffed. [p] Mr. William Hervey.] The author's beloved

When

When fleep, death's image, left my troubled breaft,
By fomething, liker death, poffeft.
My eyes with tears did uncommanded flow,

And on my foul hung the dull weight

Of fome intolerable fate.

What bell was that? Ah me! too much I know.

2.

My fweet companion, and my gentle peer,
Why haft thou left me thus unkindly here,
Thy end for ever, and my life to moan;
O thou haft left me all alone!
Thy foul and body, when death's agony
Befieg'd, around, thy noble heart,
Did not with more reluctance part,
Than I, my dearest friend, do part from thee.

3.

My dearest friend, would I had dy'd for thee [7]!
Life and this world henceforth will tedious be.

friend. This poem came from the heart, and is therefore more natural and pleafing than most others in the collection. Unluckily, it occafioned the poet's introduction to the Lord St. Albans [fee Life, p. 8]; that is, it ruined his fortune.

33

[n]ould I had dy'd for thee !] From 2 Sam. xviii.