And, viewing well, discover'd more
Than all the learn'd had done before.
Quoth he, A little thing is slunk
Into the long star-gazing trunk,
And now is gotten down so nigh,
I have him just against mine eye.
This being overheard by one
Who was not so far overgrown
In any virtuous speculation,
To judge with mere imagination,
Immediately he made a guess
At solving all appearances,
A way far more significant
Than all their hints of th' elephant,
And found, upon a second view,
His own hypothesis most true;
For he had scarce applied his eye
To th' engine, but immediately
He found a mouse was gotten in
The hollow tube, and, shut between
The two glass windows in restraint,
Was swell'd into an elephant,
And prov'd the virtuous occasion
Of all this learned dissertation:
And, as a mountain heretofore

Was great with child they say, and bore,
A silly mouse, this mouse, as strange,
Brought forth a mountain in exchange.
Meanwhile the rest in consultation
Had penn'd the wonderful narration,
And set their hands, and seals, and wit,
T'attest the truth of what they 'ad writ,
When this accurs'd phenomenon
Confounded all they'd said or done:
For 'twas no sooner hinted at,
But they all were in a tumult straight,
More furiously enrag'd by far,

Than those that in the moon made war,
To find so admirable a hint,

When they had all agreed to have seen't,
And were engag'd to make it out,
Obstructed with a paltry doubt.

[At this crisis, a learned member, devoted to natural history, told his brethren that Truth was of a coy character, and so obscure, that mistakes were often made about her, and he was of opinion that each man should in the meantime restrict himself to one department of science, and not pretend to decide on things half made out by others.]

This said, the whole assembly allow'd
The doctrine to be right and good,

And, from the truth of what they 'ad heard,
Resolv'd to give truth no regard,
But what was for their turn to vouch,
And either find, or make it such :
That 'twas more noble to create
Things like truth out of strong conceit,
Than with vexatious pains and doubt
To find, or think t' have found, her out.
This being resolv'd, they, one by one,
Review'd the tube, the mouse, and moon;
But still the narrower they pried,
The more they were unsatisfied,
In no one thing they saw agreeing,
As if they 'ad sev'ral faiths of seeing;
Some swore, upon a second view,
That all they 'ad seen before was true,
And that they never would recant
One syllable of th' elephant;
Avow'd his snout could be no mouse's,
But a true elephant's proboscis.
Others began to doubt and waver,
Uncertain which o' th' two to favour,
And knew not whether to espouse
The cause of th' elephant or mouse.
Some held no way so orthodox
To try it, as the ballet-box,

And, like the nation's patriots,

To find, or make, the truth by votes:
Others conceiv'd it much more fit
T'unmount the tube, and open it,
And for their private satisfaction,
To re-examine the transaction,
And after explicate the rest,
As they should find cause for the best.
To this, as th' only expedient,
The whole assembly gave consent;
But ere the tube was half let down,
It clear'd the first phenomenon ;
For, at the end, prodigious swarms
Of flies and gnats, like men in arms,
Had all pass'd muster, by mischance,
Both for the Sub- and Prevolvans.
This being discovered, put them all
Into a fresh and fiercer brawl,
Asham'd that men so grave and wise
Should be chaldes'd by gnats and flies,
And take the feeble insects' swarms
For mighty troops of men at arms;
As vain as those who, when the moon
Bright in a crystal river shone,
Threw casting nets as subtily at her,
To catch and pull her out o' the water.
But when they had unscrew'd the glass,
To find out where the impostor was,
And saw the mouse, that, by mishap,
Had made the telescope a trap,
Amaz'd, confounded, and afflicted,
To be so openly convicted,
Immediately they get them gone,
With this discovery alone,
That those who greedily pursue
Things wonderful, instead of true,
That in their speculations choose
To make discoveries strange news,
And natural history a gazette
Of tales stupendous and far-fet;
Hold no truth worthy to be known,
That is not huge and overgrown,
And explicate appearances,
Not as they are, but as they please;
In vain strive nature to suborn,
And, for their pains, are paid with scorn.

[Miscellaneous Thoughts.]

[From Butler's Remains.]

The truest characters of ignorance
Are vanity, and pride, and arrogance;
As blind men use to bear their noses higher
Than those that have their eyes and sight entire.

All wit and fancy, like a diamond,
The more exact and curious 'tis ground,
Is forc'd for every carat to abate
As much in value as it wants in weight.

Love is too great a happiness
For wretched mortals to possess;
For could it hold inviolate
Against those cruelties of fate
Which all felicities below
By rigid laws are subject to,
It would become a bliss too high
For perishing mortality;

Translate to earth the joys above;
For nothing goes to Heaven but Love.
All love at first, like generous wine,
Ferments and frets until 'tis fine;
For when 'tis settled on the lee,
And from the impurer matter free,
Becomes the richer still the older,
And proves the pleasanter the colder.

352

And some delight to me the while,

Though nature now does weep in rain, To think that I have seen her smile, And haply may I do again. If the all-ruling Power please

We live to see another May, We'll recompense an age of these

Foul days in one fine fishing day. We then shall have a day or two,

Perhaps a week, wherein to try What the best master's hand can do With the most deadly killing fly. A day with not too bright a beam; A warm, but not a scorching sun; A southern gale to curl the stream; And, master, half our work is done. Then, whilst behind some bush we wait The scaly people to betray, We'll prove it just, with treacherous bait, To make the preying trout our prey; And think ourselves, in such an hour,

Happier than those, though not so high, Who, like leviathans, devour

Of meaner men the smaller fry.
This, my best friend, at my poor home,

Shall be our pastime and our theme; But then-should you not deign to come, You make all this a flattering dream.

[A Welsh Guide.]

[From A Voyage to Ireland."]

The sun in the morning disclosed his light,
With complexion as ruddy as mine over night;
And o'er th' eastern mountains peeping up's head,
The casement being open, espied me in bed;
With his rays he so tickled my lids, I awaked,
And was half asham'd, for I found myself naked;
But up I soon start, and was dress'd in a trice,
And call'd for a draught of ale, sugar, and spice;
Which having turn'd off, I then call to pay,
And packing my nawls, whipt to horse, and away.
A guide I had got who demanded great vails,
For conducting me over the mountains of Wales:
Twenty good shillings, which sure very large is;
Yet that would not serve, but I must bear his charges;
And yet for all that, rode astride on a beast,
The worst that e'er went on three legs, I protest;
It certainly was the most ugly of jades;
His hips and his rump made a right ace of spades;
His sides were two ladders, well spur-gall'd withal;
His neck was a helve, and his head was a mall;
For his colour, my pains and your trouble I'll spare,
For the creature was wholly denuded of hair;
And, except for two things, as bare as my nail,
A tuft of a mane, and a sprig of a tail;

Now, such as the beast was, even such was the rider,
With a head like a nutmeg, and legs like a spider;
A voice like a cricket, a look like a rat,

The brains of a goose, and the heart of a cat;

Good God! how sweet are all things here!
How beautiful the fields appear!

How cleanly do we feed and lie!
Lord! what good hours do we keep!
How quietly we sleep!

What peace, what unanimity!
How innocent from the lewd fashion,
Is all our business, all our recreation!

Oh, how happy here's our leisure!
Oh, how innocent our pleasure!
O ye valleys! O ye mountains!
O ye groves, and crystal fountains!
How I love, at liberty,

By turns to come and visit ye!

Dear Solitude, the soul's best friend, That man acquainted with himself dost make, And all his Maker's wonders to intend, With thee I here converse at will, And would be glad to do so still,

For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake. How calm and quiet a delight

Is it, alone,

To read, and meditate, and write,

By none offended, and offending none!

To walk, ride, sit, or sleep at one's own ease,

And, pleasing a man's self, none other to displease.

O my beloved nymph, fair Dove,
Princess of rivers, how I love

Upon thy flowery banks to lie,
And view thy silver stream,
When gilded by a summer's beam!
And in it all thy wanton fry,
Playing at liberty;

And with my angle, upon them
The all of treachery

I ever learn'd, industriously to try!

Such streams Rome's yellow Tiber cannot show;
The Iberian Tagus, or Ligurian Po,

The Maese, the Danube, and the Rhine,
Are puddle water all compared with thine;
And Loire's pure streams yet too polluted are
With thine, much purer to compare ;
The rapid Garonne and the winding Seine
Are both too mean,
Beloved Dove, with thee

To vie priority;

Nay, Tame and Isis, when conjoin'd, submit, And lay their trophies at thy silver feet.

my beloved rocks, that rise

To awe the earth and brave the skies,
From some aspiring mountain's crown,
How dearly do I love,

Giddy with pleasure, to look down;
And, from the vales, to view the noble heights above!
O my beloved caves! from dog-star's heat,
And all anxieties, my safe retreat;

What safety, privacy, what true delight,
In the artificial night,

Your gloomy entrails make,
Have I taken, do I take!

The Retirement.

Stanzas Irreguliers, to Mr Izaak Walton. Farewell, thou busy world, and may

We never meet again;
Here I can eat, and sleep, and pray,
And do more good in one short day
Than he who his whole age out-wears

Upon the most conspicuous theatres,
Where nought but vanity and vice appears.

To hide me from society,

E'en of my dearest friends, have I,

In your recesses' friendly shade,
All my sorrows open laid,

And my most secret woes intrusted to your privacy!
Lord! would men let me alone,
What an over-happy one

Should I think myself to be;

Might I in this desert place
(Which most men in discourse disgrace)
Live but undisturb'd and free!

354

Let no vain hope your easy mind seduce, For rich ill poets are without excuse;

'Tis very dangerous tampering with the Muse;
The profit's small, and you have much to lose;
For though true wit adorns your birth or place,
Degenerate lines degrade the attainted race.
No poet any passion can excite,

But what they feel transport them when they write.
Have you been led through the Cumaan cave,
And heard th' impatient maid divinely rave?
I hear her now; I see her rolling eyes;

And panting, Lo, the god, the god! she cries:
With words not hers, and more than human sound,
She makes th' obedient ghosts peep trembling through
the ground.

But though we must obey when heaven commands,
And man in vain the sacred call withstands,
Beware what spirit rages in your breast;
For ten inspir'd, ten thousand are possess'd:
Thus make the proper use of each extreme,
And write with fury, but correct with phlegm.
As when the cheerful hours too freely pass,
And sparkling wine smiles in the tempting glass,
Your pulse advises, and begins to beat
Through every swelling vein a loud retreat:
So when a Muse propitiously invites,
Improve her favours, and indulge her flights;
But when you find that vigorous heat abate,
Leave off, and for another summons wait.
Before the radiant sun, a glimmering lamp,
Adulterate measures to the sterling stamp
Appear not meaner than mere human lines,
Compar'd with those whose inspiration shines:
These nervous, bold; those languid and remiss;
There, cold salutes; but here, a lover's kiss.
Thus have I seen a rapid headlong tide,
With foaming waves the passive Saone divide,
Whose lazy waters without motion lay,

While he with eager force urg'd his impetuous way!

On the Day of Judgment.
[Version of the 'Dies Ira."]

That day of wrath, that dreadful day,
Shall the whole world in ashes lay,
As David and the Sibyls say.

What horror will invade the mind,
When the strict Judge, who would be kind,
Shall have few venial faults to find!

The last loud trumpet's wondrous sound,
Shall through the rending tombs rebound,
And wake the nations under ground.
Nature and Death shall, with surprise,
Behold the pale offender rise,

And view the Judge with conscious eyes.

Then shall, with universal dread,
The sacred mystic book be read,
To try the living and the dead.

The Judge ascends his awful throne
He makes each secret sin be known,
And all with shame confess their own.

O then, what interest shall I make
To save my last important stake,
When the most just have cause to quake?

Thou mighty formidable King,
Thou mercy's unexhausted spring,
Some comfortable pity bring!

Forget not what my ransom cost,
Nor let my dear-bought soul be lost
In storms of guilty terror tost.

*

Prostrate my contrite heart I rend, My God, my Father, and my Friend, Do not forsake me in my end!

Well may they curse their second breath,
Who rise to a reviving death.
Thou great Creator of mankind,
Let guilty man compassion find!

EARL OF ROCHESTER,

JOHN WILMOT, EARL OF ROCHESTER (1647-1680), is known principally from his having (to use the figurative language of Johnson) blazed out his youth and his health in lavish voluptuousness,' and died from physical exhaustion and decay at the age of thirty-three. Like most of the courtiers of the day, Rochester travelled in France and Italy. He was at sea with the Earl of Sandwich and Sir Edward Spragge, and distinguished himself for bravery. In the heat of an engagement, he went to carry a message in an open boat amidst a storm of shot. This manliness of character forsook Rochester in England, for he was accused of betraying cowardice in street quarrels, and he refused to fight with the Duke of Buckingham. In the profligate court of Charles, Rochester was the most profligate; his intrigues, his low amours and disguises, his erecting a stage and playing the mountebank on Tower-hill, and his having been five years in a state of inebriety, are circumstances well-known and partly admitted by himself. It is remarkable, however, that his domestic letters, which were published a few years ago, show him in a totally different light-tender, playful, and alive to all the affections of a husband, a father, and a son.' His repentance itself says something for the natural character of the unfortunate profligate. To judge from the memoir left by Dr Burnet, who was his lordship's spiritual guide on his deathbed, it was sincere and unreserved. We may, therefore, with some confidence, set down Rochester as one of those whose vices are less the effect of an inborn tendency, than of external cor rupting circumstances. It may fairly be said of him, Nothing in his life became him like the leav ing it.' His poems consist of slight effusions, thrown off without labour. Many of them are so very licen tious as to be unfit for publication; but in one of these, he has given in one line a happy character of Charles II.

A merry monarch, scandalous, and poor. His songs are sweet and musical. Rochester wrote a poem Upon Nothing, which is merely a string of puns and conceits. It opens, however, with a fine image

Nothing! thou elder brother ev'n to shade,
That hadst a being ere the world was made,
And, well fix'd, art alone of ending not afraid.

Song.

While on those lovely looks I gaze,
To see a wretch pursuing,
In raptures of a bless'd amaze,
His pleasing happy ruin;
"Tis not for pity that I move;
His fate is too aspiring,
Whose heart, broke with a load of love,
Dies wishing and admiring.
But if this murder you'd forego,

Your slave from death removing,
Let me your art of charming know,
Or learn you mine of loving.
But whether life or death betide,
In love 'tis equal measure;
The victor lives with empty pride,
The vanquish'd die with pleasure.