Around him wide a sable army stand,

A low-born, cell-bred, selfish, servile band,

Prompt or to guard or stab, or saint or damn,
Heaven's Swiss, who fight for any god or man.

Through Lud's famed gates, along the well-known

Fleet,

Rolls the black troop, and overshades the street,
Till showers of Sermons, Characters, Essays,
In circling fleeces whiten all the ways:
So clouds replenish'd from some bog below,
Mount in dark volumes, and descend in snow.
Here stopt the goddess; and in pomp proclaims
A gentler exercise to close the games.

'Ye critics! in whose heads, as equal scales,

I weigh what author's heaviness prevails;

Which most conduce to soothe the soul in slumbers,

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My H-ley's periods, or my Blackmore's numbers; 290
Attend the trial we propose to make :

If there be man who o'er such works can wake,
Sleep's all-subduing charms who dares defy,
And boasts Ulysses' ear with Argus' eye;
To him we grant our amplest powers to sit
Judge of all present, past, and future wit;
To cavil, censure, dictate, right or wrong,
Full and eternal privilege of tongue.'

Three college sophs, and three pert Templars came; The same their talents, and their tastes the same! 300

Each prompt to query, answer, and debate,

And smit with love of poesy and prate.

The ponderous books two gentle readers bring;

The heroes sit, the vulgar form a ring :

The clamorous crowd is hush'd with mugs of mum,
Till all tuned equal send a general hum.

Then mount the clerks, and in one lazy tone

Through the long, heavy, painful page drawl on;

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Soft creeping words on words the sense compose,
At every line they stretch, they yawn, they doze.
As to soft gales top-heavy pines bow low
Their heads, and lift them as they cease to blow ;
Thus oft they rear, and oft the head decline,
As breathe, or pause, by fits, the airs divine.
And now to this side, now to that they nod,
As verse, or prose, infuse the drowsy god.
Thrice Budgel aim'd to speak, but thrice supprest
By potent Arthur, knock'd his chin and breast.
Toland and Tindal, prompt at priests to jeer,
Yet silent bow'd to 'Christ's no kingdom here.'
Who sat the nearest, by the words o'ercome,
Slept first; the distant nodded to the hum;
Then down are roll'd the books; stretched o'er 'em
lies

Each gentle clerk, and muttering seals his eyes.
What Dulness dropt among her sons imprest
A motion from one circle to the rest :

So from the midmost the nutation spreads,
Round and more round, o'er all the sea of heads.
At last Centlivre felt her voice to fail ;
Motteux himself unfinish'd left his tale;

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330

Boyer the state, and Law the stage gave o'er;
Morgan and Mandeville could prate no more;
Norton, from Daniel and Ostroa sprung,

Bless'd with his father's front and mother's tongue,
Hung silent down his never-blushing head,
And all was hush'd, as Folly's self lay dead.
Thus the soft gifts of sleep conclude the day,
And stretch'd on bulks, as usual, poets lay.
Why should I sing what bards the nightly Muse
Did slumbering visit, and convey to stews;
Who prouder march'd, with magistrates in state
To some famed roundhouse, ever-open gate!

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How Henley lay inspired beside a sink,
And to mere mortals seem'd a priest in drink :
While others, timely, to the neighbouring Fleet
(Haunt of the Muses) made their safe retreat?

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BOOK III.

THE DESCENT TO THE SHADES.

After the other persons are disposed in their proper places of rest,

the goddess transports the king to her temple, and there lays him to slumber with his head on her lap; a position of marvellous virtue, which causes all the visions of wild enthusiasts, projectors, politicians, inamoratos, castle builders, chymists, and poets-He is immediately carried on the wings of fancy, and led by a mad poetical sibyl to the Elysian shade; where, on the banks of Lethe, the souls of the dull are dipped by Bavius, before their entrance into this world-There he is met by the ghost of Settle, and by him made acquainted with the wonders of the place, and with those which he himself is destined to perform-He takes him to a mount of vision, from whence he shows him the past triumphs of the empire of Dulness; then, the present; and, lastly, the future: how small a part of the world was ever conquered by science, how soon those conquests were stopped, and those very nations again reduced to her dominion-Then distinguishing the island of Great Britain, shows by what aids, by what persons, and by what degrees, it shall be brought to her empire-Some of the persons he causes to pass in review before his eyes, describing each by his proper figure, character, and qualifications-On a sudden the scene shifts, and a vast number of miracles and prodigies appear, utterly surprising and unknown to the king himself, till they are explained to be the wonders of his own reign now commencing-On this subject Settle breaks into a congratulation, yet not unmixed with concern, that his own times were but the types of theseHe prophesies how first the nation shall be overrun with farces, operas, and shows; how the throne of Dulness shall be

advanced over the theatres, and set up even at court; then how her sons shall preside in the seats of arts and sciences; giving a glimpse, or Pisgah-sight, of the future fulness of her glory, the accomplishment whereof is the subject of the fourth and last

book.

BUT in her temple's last recess inclosed,

On Dulness' lap th' anointed head reposed.
Him close she curtains round with vapours blue,
And soft besprinkles with Cimmerian dew:
Then raptures high the seat of sense o'erflow,
Which only heads refined from reason know:
Hence, from the straw where Bedlam's prophet nods,
He hears loud oracles, and talks with gods;
Hence the fool's paradise, the statesman's scheme,
The air-built castle, and the golden dream,
The maid's romantic wish, the chymist's flame,
And poet's vision of eternal fame.

And now, on Fancy's easy wing convey'd,
The king descending views th' Elysian shade.
A slipshod sibyl led his steps along,
In lofty madness meditating song;
Her tresses staring from poetic dreams,

And never wash'd but in Castalia's streams.
Taylor, their better Charon, lends an oar,

IO

(Once swan of Thames, though now he sings no more ;) 20 Benlowes, propitious still to blockheads, bows;

And Shadwell nods, the poppy on his brows.

Here in a dusky vale, where Lethé rolls,

Old Bavius sits to dip poetic souls,

And blunt the sense, and fit it for a skull

Of solid proof, impenetrably dull :

Instant, when dipt, away they wing their flight,

Where Browne and Mears unbar the gates of light,

Demand new bodies, and in calf's array

Rush to the world, impatient for the day.

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