Critics in wit, or life, are hard to please;
Few write to those and none can live to these.
Too much your sex are by their forms confined, Severe to all, but most to womankind;
Custom, grown blind with age, must be your guide
Your pleasure is a vice, but not your pride;
By nature yielding, stubborn but for fame;
Made slaves by honour, and made fools by shame.
Marriage may all those petty tyrants chase,
But sets up one, a greater, in their place:
Well might you wish for change by those accursed,
But the last tyrant ever proves the worst.
Still in constraint your suffering sex remains,
Or bound in formal, or in real chains :
Whole years neglected, for some months adored,
The fawning servant turns a haughty lord.
Ah, quit not the free innocence of life,
For the dull glory of a virtuous wife;
Nor let false shows, nor empty titles please:
Aim not at joy, but rest content with ease.
The gods, to curse Pamela with her prayers,
Gave the gilt coach and dappled Flanders mares,
The shining robes, rich jewels, beds of state,
And, to complete her bliss, a fool for mate.
She glares in balls, front boxes, and the ring,
A vain, unquiet, glittering, wretched thing!
Pride, pomp, and state, but reach her outward part
She sighs, and is no dutchess at her heart.
But, madam, if the fates withstand, and you Are destined Hymen's willing victim too; Trust not too much your now resistless charms, Those, age or sickness, soon or late, disarms : Good-humour only teaches charms to 'last, Still makes new conquests, and maintains the past Love raised on beauty will, like that, decay, Our hearts may bear its slender chain a day; As flowery bands in wantonness are worn, A morning's pleasure, and at evening torn;
This binds in ties more easy, yet more strong,
The willing heart, and only holds it long.
Thus Voiture's* early care still shone the same, And Monthausier was only changed in name; By this, e'en now they live, e'en now they charm, Their wit still sparkling, and their flames still warm. Now crown'd with myrtle on the Elysian coast, Amid those lovers, joys his gentle ghost:
Pleased, while with smiles his happy lines you view,
And finds a fairer Rambouillet in you.
The brightest eyes in France inspired his muse;
The brightest eyes in Britain now peruse;
And dead, as living, 'tis our author's pride
Still to charm those who charm the world beside.
EPISTLE TO THE SAME,
On her leaving the Town after the Coronation, 1715
As some fond virgin, whom her mother's care
Drags from the town to wholesome country air,
Just when she learns to roll a melting eye,
And hear a spark, yet think no danger nigh;
From the dear man unwilling she must sever,
Yet takes one kiss before she parts for ever;
Thus from the world fair Zephalinda flew,
Saw others happy, and with sighs withdrew;
Not that their pleasures caused her discontent,
She sigh'd, not that they stay'd but that she went.
She went to plain-work, and to purling brooks,
Old-fashion'd halls, dull aunts, and croaking rooks:
She went from opera, park, assembly, play,
To morning walks, and prayers three hours a-day;
To part her time 'twixt reading and bohea,
To muse, and spill her solitary tea;
Or o'er cold coffee trifle with the spoon,
Count the slow clock, and dine exact at noon;
Divert her eyes with pictures in the fire,
Hum half a tune, tell stories to the 'squire;
Up to her godly garret after seven,
There starve and pray, for that's the way to heaven Some 'squire, perhaps, you take delight to rack; Whose game is whist, whose treat a toast in sack: Who visits with a gun, presents you birds,
Then gives a smacking buss, and cries,- No words! Or with his hounds comes hallooing from the stable, Makes love with nods, and knees beneath a table; Whose laughs are hearty, though his jests are
And loves you best of all things--but his horse.
In some fair evening, on your elbow laid,
You dream of triumphs in the rural shade;
In pensive thought recall the fancied scene,
See coronations rise on every green;
Before you pass the imaginary sights
Of lords, and earls, and dukes, and garter'd knights,
While the spread fan o'ershades your closing eyes;
Then give one flirt, and all the vision flies.
Thus vanish sceptres, coronets, and balls,
And leave you in lone woods, or empty walls!
So when your slave, at some dear idle time,
Not plagued with headaches, or the want of rhyme,
Stands in the streets, abstracted from the crew,
And while he seems to study, thinks of you;
Just when his fancy paints your sprightly eyes,
Or sees the blush of soft Parthenia rise,
Gay pats my shoulder, and you vanish quite,
Streets, chairs, and coxcombs, rush upon my sight,
Vex'd to be still in town I knit my brow,
Look sour, and hum a tune, as you may now.
THE BASSET-TABLE,
AN ECLOGUE.
THE basset-table spread, the tallier come; Why stays Smilinda in the dressing-room? Rise, pensive nymph; the tallier waits for you.
Ah, madam, since my Sharper is untrue,
joyless make my once adored alphiew.
I saw him stand behind Ombrelia's chair,
And whisper with that soft deluding air,
And those feign'd sighs which cheat the list'ning fair
Is this the cause of your romantic strains?
A mightier grief my heavy heart sustains.
As you by love, so I by fortune cross'd;
One, one bad deal, three septlevas have lost.
Is that the grief which you compare with mine? With ease the smiles of fortune I resign: Would all my gold in one bad deal were gone, Were lovely Sharper mine, and mine alone.
A lover lost, is but a common care;
And prudent nymphs against that change prepare: The knave of clubs thrice lost; oh! who could guess This fatal stroke, this unforeseen distress?
See Betty Lovet! very a-propos,
She all the cares of love and play does know:
Dear Betty shall the important point decide;
Betty who oft the pain of each has tried:
Impartial, she shall say who suffers most,
By cards, ill-usage, or by lovers lost.
Tell, tell your griefs; attentive will I stay, Though time is precious, and I want some tea
Behold this equipage, by Mathers wrought,
With fifty guineas (a great penn'worth) bought.
See, on the tooth-pick Mars and Cupid strive;
And both the struggling figures seem alive.
Upon the bottom shines the queen's bright face :
A myrtle foliage round the thimble-case.
Jove, Jove himself does on the scissars shine;
The metal, and the workmanship, divine!
This snuff-box; once the pledge of Sharper's love When rival beauties for the present strove ;
At Corticelli's he the raffle won;
Then first his passion was in public shown.
Hazardia blush'd, and turn'd her head aside,
A rival's envy (all in vain) to hide.
This snuff-box,-on the hinge see brilliants shine!
This snuff-box will I stake; the prize is mine.
Alas! far lesser losses than I bear,
Have made a soldier sigh, a lover swear.
And, oh! what makes the disappointment hard,
'Twas my own lord that drew the fatal card.
In complaisance I took the queen he gave;
Though my own secret wish was for the knave
The knave won sonica, which I had chose
And the next pull, my septleva I lose.
But, ah! what aggravates the killing smart,
The cruel thought, that stabs me to the heart;
This cursed Ombrelia, this undoing fair,
By whose vile arts this heavy grief I bear;
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