parantem

"Tandem Phœbus adeft, morfufque inferre "Congelat, et patulos, ut erant, INDURAT hiatus h ̧”

h Ovid, of the ferpent biting at Orpheus's head.

By

By AUTHORITY.

By virtue of the Authority in Us velted by the Act for fubjecting Poets to the Power of a Licenser, we have reviled this Piece where finding the style and appellation of KING to have been given to a certain Pretender, Pfeudo-Poet, or Phantom, of the name of TIBBALD; and apprehending the fame may be deemed in Come fort a Reflection on Majefty, or at least an InCult on that Legal Authority which has bestowed on another Perlon the Crown of Poefy: We have ordered the laid Pretender, Pfeudo-Poet, or Phantom, utterly to vanish and evaporate out of this work: And do declare the said Throne of Poely from henceforth to be abdicated and vacant, unless duly and lawfully Cupplied by the LAUREATE himself. And it is hereby enacted, that no other perlon do prelume to fill the fame.

OC. Ch.

THE Propofition, the Invocation, and the Infcription. Then the Original of the great Empire of Dulness, and cause of the continuance thereof. The College of the Goddess in the City, with her private Academy for Poets in particular; the Governors of it, and the four Cardinal Virtues. Then the Poem hastes into the midst of things, presenting her, on the evening of a Lord Mayor's day, revolving the long fucceffion of her Sons, and the glories past and to come. She fixes her eye on Bays* to be the Inftrument of that great Event which is the Subject of the Poem. He is defcribed penfive among his Books, giving up the Caufe, and apprehending the Period of

VARIATION.

her

*In the first editions Tibbald was the Hero of the Poem, which will account for most of the subsequent variations.

her Empire: After debating whether to betake himfelf to the Church, or to Gaming, or to Party-writing, he raises an Altar of proper books, and (making firft his folemn prayer and declaration) purposes thereon to facrifice all his unsuccessful writings. As the pile is kindled, the Goddess beholding the flame from her feat, flies and puts it out by cafting upon it the poem of Thulé. She forthwith reveals herself to him, transports him to her Temple, unfolds her Arts, and initiates him into her Mysteries; then announcing the death of Eufden the Poet Laureate, anoints him, carries him to court, and proclaims him Succeffor.

BOOK