One single positive weighs more,
You know, than negatives a score.
In politics, I hear, you're stanch,
Directly bent against the French;
Deny to have your free-born toc
Dragoon'd into a wooden shoe:
Are in no plots; but fairly drive at
The public welfare, in your private:
And will, for England's glory, try
Turks, Jews, and Jesuits to defy,
And keep your places till
For me, whom wand'ring Fortune threw
From what I lov'd, the town and you;
Let me just tell you how my time is
Past in a country-life.-Imprimis,
As soon as Phoebus' rays inspect us,
First, Sir, I read, and then I breakfast;
So on, till foresaid god does set,
I sometimes study, sometimes eat.
Thus, of your heroes and brave boys,
With whom old Homer makes such noise,
The greatest actions I can find,
Are, that they did their work, and din'd.
The books of which I'm chiefly fond,
Are such, as you have whilom conn'd;
That treat of China's civil law,
And subjects' rights in Golconda ;
Of highway-elephants at Ceylan,
That rob in clans, like men o' th' Highland;
Of apes that storm, or keep a town,
As well almost as count Lauzun ;
Of unicorns and aligators,
Elks, mermaids, mummies, witches, satyrs,
And twenty other stranger matters;
Which, though they're things I've no concern in, Make all our grooms admire
Critics I read on other men,
And hypers upon them again;
From whose remarks I give opinion
On twenty books, yet ne'er look in one.
Then all your wits, that fleer and sham,
Down from Don Quixote to Tom Tram;
From whom I jests and puns purloin,
And slily put them off for mine:
Fond to be thought a country wit:
The rest, when fate and you think fit.
Sometimes I climb my mare, and kick her
To bottled ale, and country vicar;
Sometimes at Stamford take a quart,
Squire Shephard's health,-with all my heart.
Thus, without much delight, or grief,
I fool away an idle life;
Till Shadwell from the town retires,
(Chok'd up with fame and sea-coal fires),
To bless the wood with peaceful lyric;
Then hey for praise and panegyric;
Justice restor'd, and nations freed,
And wreaths round William's glorious head.
TO THE COUNTESS OF DORSET,
WRITTEN IN HER MILTON, BY MR. BRADBURY.
SEE here how bright the first-born virgin shone,
And how the first fond lover was undone.
Such charming words our beauteous mother spoke,
As Milton wrote, and such as yours her look.
Yours, the best copy of th' original face,
Whose beauty was to furnish all the race:
Such chains no author could escape but he;
There's no way to be safe, but not to see.
HERE reading how fond Adam was betray'd,
And how by sin Eve's blasted charms decay'd;
Our common loss unjustly you complain;
So small that part of it, which you sustain.
You still, fair mother, in your offspring trace
1 Elizabeth, daughter of Baptist Noel, Viscount Campden. She died 30 July, 1719. Her husband, Charles Earl of Berkeley (when Lord Dursley), had been envoy extraordinary and plenipotentiary to the States of Holland, from whence he returned in 1695.
The stock of, beauty destin'd for the race:
Kind nature, forming them, the pattern took
For Heav'n's first work, and Eve's original look.
You, happy saint, the serpent's power control:
Scarce any actual guilt defiles your soul:
And hell does o'er that mind vain triumph boast,
Which gains a Heav'n, for earthly Eden lost.
With virtue strong as yours had Eve been arm'd, In vain the fruit had blush'd, or serpent charm'd: Nor had our bliss by penitence been bought; Nor had frail Adam fall'n, nor Milton wrote.
VERY YOUNG, PLAYING WITH A CAT.
THE am'rous youth, whose tender breast
Was by his darling cat possest,
Obtain'd of Venus his desire,
Howe'er irregular his fire:
Nature the pow'r of love obey'd:
The cat became a blushing maid;
And, on the happy change, the boy
Employ'd his wonder, and his joy.
Take care, O beauteous child, take care,
Lest thou prefer so rash a pray'r:
1 Lionel, afterwards Duke of Dorset, to whom Prior dedicated his poems.
Nor vainly hope, the queen of love
Will e'er thy fav'rite's charms improve.
O quickly from her shrine retreat;
Or tremble for thy darling's fate.
The queen of love, who soon will see
Her own Adonis live in thee,
Will lightly her first loss deplore;
Will easily forgive the boar:
Her eyes with tears no more will flow;
With jealous rage her breast will glow:
And on her tabby rival's face
She deep will mark her new disgrace.
WHILE from our looks, fair nymph, you guess
The secret passions of our mind,
My heavy eyes, you say, confess
A heart to love and grief inclin’d.
There needs, alas! but little art,
To have this fatal secret found:
With the same ease you threw the dart, 'Tis certain you may show the wound.
How can I see you, and not love;
While you as op'ning east are fair?
While cold as northern blasts you prove;
How can I love, and not despair?
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