She speaks, behaves, and acts, just as she ought, 161 but never, never, reach'd one gen'rous thought. Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour,

content to dwell in decencies for ever.
So very reasonable, so unmov'd,
as never yet to love or to be lov'd.

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She while her lover pants upon her breast, can mark the figures on an Indian chest; and when she sees her friend in deep despair, observes how much a chintz exceeds mohair. Forbid it, Heav'n! a favour or a debt she e'er should cancel! but she may forget. Safe is your secret still in Chloe's ear; but none of Chloe's shall you ever hear. Of all her dears she never slander'd one, but cares not if a thousand are undone. Would Chloe know if you 're alive or dead? she bids her footman put it in her head. Chloe is prudent; would you too be wise? then never break your heart when Chloe dies. One certain portrait may (I grant) be seen, which Heav'n has varnish'd out and made a queen; the same for ever! and describ'd by all with truth and goodness as with crown and ball. Poets heap virtues, painters gems, at will, and shew their zeal, and hide their want of skill. 'Tis well; but, Artists! who can paint or write, to draw the naked is your true delight. That robe of quality so struts and swells, none see what parts of Nature it conceals: th' exactest traits of body or of mind we owe to models of an humble kind. If Queensberry to strip there's no compelling, 't is from a handmaid we must take a Helen.

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From peer or bishop 't is no easy thing
to draw the man who loves his God or king.
Alas! I copy (or my draught would fail)
from honest Mah'met or plain Parson Hale.

But grant in public men sometimes are shown, a Woman's seen in private life alone: our bolder talents in full light display'd,

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your virtues open fairest in the shade.

Bred to disguise, in public 't is you hide;

there none distinguish 'twixt your shame or pride, weakness or delicacy; all so nice,

that each may seem a virtue or a vice.

In men we various ruling passions find; in Women two almost divide the kind; those only fix'd they first or last obey, the love of pleasure and the love of sway.

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That Nature gives; and where the lesson taught is but to please, can pleasure seem a fault? experience this: by man's oppression curst they seek the second not to lose the first.

Men some to bus'ness some to pleasure take, 215 but ev'ry Woman is at heart a rake:

men, some to quiet, some to public strife, but ev'ry lady would be queen for life.

Yet mark the fate of a whole sex of queens! pow'er all their end, but beauty all the means: in youth they conquer with so wild a rage as leaves them scarce a subject in their age: for foreign glory, foreign joy, they roam; no thought of peace or happiness at home. But Wisdom's triumph is well tim'd retreat, as hard a science to the fair as great! Beauties, like tyrants, old and friendless yet hate repose, and dread to be alone; worn out in public, weary ev'ry eye,

grown,

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nor leave one sigh behind them when they die. 230 Pleasures the sex as children birds pursue, still out of reach, yet never out of view; sure if they catch to spoil the toy at most, to covet flying, and regret when lost: at last to follies youth could scarce defend it grows their age's prudence to pretend; asham'd to own they gave delight before, reduc'd to feign it when they give no more. As hags hold sabbaths less for joy than spight, so these their merry miserable night; still round and round the ghosts of Beauty glide, and haunt the places where their honour dy'd.

See how the World it's veterans rewards!

a youth of frolics, and old age of cards;
fair to no purpose, artful to no end,
young without lovers, old without a friend;
a fop their passion, but their prize a sot,
alive ridiculous, and dead forgot!

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Ah! Friend! to dazzle let the vain design; to raise the thought and touch the heart be thine! that charm shall grow, while what fatigues the ring flaunts and goes down an unreguarded thing. So when the sun's broad beam has tir'd the sight, all mild ascends the moon's more sober light, serene in virgin modesty she shines,

and unobserv'd' the glaring orb declines. Oh! bless'd with temper, whose unclouded ray can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day; she who can love a sister's charms, or hear sighs for a daughter with unwounded ear; she who ne'er answers till a husband cools, or if she rules him never shews she rules; charms by accepting, by submitting sways, yet has her humour most when she obeys;

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let fops or fortune fly which way they will,
disdains all loss of tickets or codille;
spleen, vapours, or small-pox, above them all,
and mistress of herself tho' china fall.

And yet believe me, good as well as ill,
woman's at best a contradiction still.
Heav'n, when it strives to polish all it can
it's last best work, but forms a softer man;
picks from each sex to make the fav'rite blest,
your love of pleasures, our desire of rest;
blends, in exception to all gen'ral rules,
your taste of follies with our scorn of fools;
reserve with frankness, art with truth ally'd,
courage with softness, modesty with pride;
fix'd principles, with fancy ever new,
shakes altogether, and produces---you.

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Be this a Woman's fame; with this unblest
toasts live a scorn, and queens may die a jest.
This Phoebus promis'd (I forget the year)
when those blue eyes first open'd on the sphere;
ascendant Phoebus watch'd that hour with care, 285
averted half your parents' simple pray'r,

and gave you beauty, but deny'd the pelf
that buys your sex a tyrant o'er itself.
The gen'rous god who wit and gold refines,
and ripens spirits as he ripens mines,

kept dross for duchesses, the world shall know it,
to you gave sense, good humour, and a poet.

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