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Why risk the World's great empire for a Punk?
Cæfar perhaps might answer, he was drunk.
But, fage hiftorians! 'tis your task to prove

One action Conduct; one, heroic Love.

'Tis from high Life high characters are drawn; 135 A Saint in Crape is twice a Saint in Lawn ;

A Judge is juft, a Chancellor juster still;

A Gownman, learn'd; a Bishop, what you will;
Wife, if a Minifter; but, if a King,

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More wife, more learn'd, more juft, more every thing.
Court-Virtues bear, like Gems, the highest rate,
Born where Heaven's influence scarce can penetrate :
In life's low vale, the foil the Virtues like,
They please as beauties, here as wonders strike.
Though the fame fun with all-diffusive rays
Blush in the Rofe, and in the Diamond blaze,
We prize the stronger effort of his
power,
And justly set the Gem above the Flower.
'Tis Education forms the common mind,
Juft as the twig is bent, the tree's inclin’d.
Boastful and rough, your first son is a 'Squire;
The next a Tradesman, meek, and much a lyar;
Tom ftruts a Soldier, open, bold and brave;
Will fneaks a Scrivener, an exceeding knave:
Is he a Churchman? then he's fond of power:
A Quaker? fly: A Presbyterian? fower:
A fmart Free-thinker? all things in an hour.
Ask mens Opinions: Scoto now shall tell
How Trade increases, and the world goes well;

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Strike off his Penfion, by the setting fun,
And Britain, if not Europe, is undone.

That gay Free-thinker, a fine talker once,
What turns him now a stupid filent dunce ?
Some God, or Spirit, he has lately found;

Or chanc'd to meet a Minifter that frown'd.
Judge we by Nature? Habit can efface,
Interest o'ercome, or policy take place
By Actions? those Uncertainty divides;
By Paffions? thefe Diffimulation hides:
Opinions they still take a wider range:
Find, if you can, in what you cannot change.

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Manners with Fortunes, Humours tern with Climes,

Tenets with Books, and Principles with Times.
Search then the Ruling Paffion: There, alone,
The Wild are conftant, and the Cunning known; 175
The Fool confiftent, and the False fincere ;
Priefts, Princes, Women, no diffemblers here.
This clue once found, unravels all the reft,
The profpect clears, and Wharton stands confeft.
Wharton, the fcorn and wonder of our days,

Whose ruling Paffion was the Luft of Praise :
Born with whate'er could win it from the Wife,
Women and Fools muft like him, or he dies:
Though wondering Senates hung on all he spoke,
The Club muft hail him master of the joke.
Shall parts fo various aim at nothing new?
He'll fhine a Tully and a Wilmot too.

Then turns repentant, and his God adores

With the fame spirit that he drinks and whores;

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Enough if all around him but admire

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And now the Punk applaud, and now the Frier.

Thus with each gift of nature and of art,

And wanting nothing but an honeft heart;

Grown all to all, from no one vice exempt;
And moft contemptible, to fhun contempt;
His Paffion ftill, to covet general praise;
His Life, to forfeit it a thousand ways;
A conftant Bounty which no friend has made;
An Angel Tongue, which no man can perfuade;
A Fool, with more of Wit than half mankind,
Too rafh for Thought, for Action too refin'd:
A Tyrant to the wife his heart approves ;
A Rebel to the very king he loves ;

He dies, fad outcast of each church and state,
And, harder ftill! flagitious, yet not great.

Afk you why Wharton broke through every rule?
'Twas all for fear the Knaves fhould call him Fool.
Nature well known, no prodigies remain,
Comets are regular, and Wharton plain.

Yet, in this fearch, the wifeft may mistake,
If fecond qualities for firft they take.
When Catiline by rapine fwell'd his store;
When Cæfar made a noble dame a whore ;
In this the Luft, in that the Avarice,

Were means, not ends; Ambition was the vice.

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That

VARIATION.

In the former Editions, ver. 208.

Nature well known, no Miracles remain.

Altered, as above, for very obvious reasons.

That very Cæfar, born in Scipio's days,
Had aim'd, like him, by Chastity, at praise.
Lucullus, when Frugality could charm,
Had roasted turnips in the Sabine farm.
In vain th' obferver eyes the builder's toil,
But quite mistakes the scaffold for the pile.

In this one paffion man can strength enjoy,
As Fits give vigour, just when they destroy.
Time, that on all things lays his lenient hand,
Yet tames not this; it sticks to our laft fand.
Confiftent in our follies and our fins,
Here honeft Nature ends as he begins.
Old Politicians chew on wisdom past,
And totter on in business to the last;
As weak, as earneft; and as gravely out,
As fober Lanesborow dancing in the gout.

Behold a reverend fire, whom want of grace

Has made the father of a nameless race.
Shov'd from the wall perhaps, or rudely press'd
By his own fon, that paffes by unblefs'd:
Still to his wench he crawls on knocking knees,
And envies every sparrow that he fees.

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A falmon's belly, Helluo, was thy fate;
The doctor call'd, declares all help too late :
"Mercy! cries Helluo, mercy on my foul !
"Is there no hope?-Alas!-then bring the jowl."
The frugal Crone, whom praying priests attend,
Still strives to fave the hallow'd taper's end,
Collects her breath, as ebbing life retires,
For one puff more, and in that puff expires.

H 4

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"Odious!

"Odious! in woollen! 'twould a faint provoke, (Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke) "No, let a charming Chintz, and Bruffels lace, "Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face: "One would not, fure, be frightful when one's dead"And-Betty-give this Cheek a little Red."

The Courtier smooth, who forty years had shin'd An humble fervant to all human-kind,

Just brought out this, when scarce his tongue could stir, "If-where I'm going-I could ferve you, Sir !" 255 "I give and I devife (old Euclio faid,

And figh'd) " my lands and tenements to Ned." Your money, Sir?" My money, Sir, what all? "Why, if I must-(then wept) I give it Paul." The manor, Sir?" The manor! hold, he cry'd. 260 "Not that, I cannot part with that"—and dy'd.

And you! brave Cobham, to the latest breath, Shall feel your ruling paffion strong in death: Such in those moments as in all the past,

Oh, fave my Country, Heaven!" fhall be your last.

MORAL

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