All languages I can command,
Yet not a word I understand. aid the best divine
In learning would not know a line :
The lawyer muft forget his pleading:
The scholar could not fhew his reading.
Nay, man my mafter is
I give command to kill or fave
Can grant ten thousand pounds a-year,
And make a beggar's brat a peer.
But while I thus my life relate,
I only haften on my fate,
My tongue is black, my mouth is furr'd,
I hardly now can force a word.
I die unpitied and forgot,
And on fome dunghill left to rot.
ANOTHER.
ALL-ruling tyrant of the earth,
To vilest flaves I owe my birth.
How is the greatest monarch blefs'd,
When in my gaudy livery drefs'd!
No haughty nymph has power to run
From me, or my embraces fhun.
To make me glorious to the fight
Of mortals, and the gods delight.
Soon would their altars flame expire,
If I refus'd to lend them fire.
Y fate exalted high in place,
Lo, here I ftand with double face;
Superior none on earth I find;
But fee below me all mankind.
Yet, as it oft attends the great,
I almoft fink with my own weight.
At every motion undertook,
The vulgar all confult my lock.
I fometimes give advice in writing,
But never of my own inditing.
I am a courtier in my way,
For those who rais'd me, I betray;
And fome give out that I entice
To luft, and luxury, and dice ;
Who punishments on me inflict,
Because they find their pockets pick'd.
By riding poft I lose my health;
And only to get others wealth.
BEcause I am by nature blind,
I wifely chufe to walk behind; However, to avoid difgrace,
I let no creature fee my face.
My words are few, but fpoke with fenfe; yet my fpeaking gives offence:
Or, if to whisper I prefume,
The company will fly the room.
By all the world I am oppreft,
And my oppreffion gives them reft.
Through me, though fore against my will,
Inftructors ev'ry art inftil.
By thousands I am fold and bought,
Who neither get, nor lose a groat;
For none, alas, by me can gain,
But those who give me greatest pain,
Shall man prefume to be my mafter,
Who's but my caterer and tafter?
Yet though I always have my will,
I'm but a mere depender still :
An humble hanger-on at beft;
Of whom all people make a jeft.
In me detractors feek to find
Two vices of a diff'rent kind:
I'm too profufe, fome cens'rers cry,
And all I get, I let it fly :
While others give me many a curfe,
Because too close I hold my purse.
But this I know, in either cafe
They dare not charge me to my face.
'Tis true indeed, fometimes I fave,
Sometimes run out of all I have;
But when the year is at an end,
Computing what I get and spend,
My goings out, and comings in,
I cannot find I lose or win;
And therefore all that know me fay,
I juftly keep the middle way.
I'm always by my betters led;
I laft get up, am first abed;
Though, if I rife before my time,
The learn'd in fciences fublime
Confult the stars, and thence foretell
Good luck to those with whom I dwell.
THE joy of man, the pride of brutes,
Domeftic fubject for disputes,
Of plenty thou the emblem fair,
Adorn'd by nymphs with all their care;
I faw thee rais'd to high renown,
Supporting half the British crown;
And often have I seen thee grace
The chafte Diana's infant-face;
And whenfoe'er you please to shine,
Lefs useful is her light than thine :
Thy num'rous fingers know their way,
And oft in Celia's treffes play.
To place thee in another view,
Ill fhew the world ftrange things and true;
What lords and dames of high degree
May juftly claim their birth from thee.
The foul of man with fpleen you vex;
Of spleen you cure the female fex.
Thee for a gift the courtier fends
With pleasure to his fpecial friends:
He gives; and with a gen'rous pride,
Contrives all means the gift to hide :
Nor oft can the receiver know,
Whether he has the gift or no,
On airy wings you take your flight,
And fly unfeen both day and night;
Conceal your form with various tricks ;
And few know how or where you fix.
Yet fome, who ne'er bestow'd thee, boast
That they to others give thee most,
Mean time, the wife a question start,
If thou a real being art;
Or but a creature of the brain,
That gives imaginary pain :
But the fly giver better knows thee;
Who feels true joy when he bestows thee.
THough I, alas! a pris'ner be,
My trade is pris'ners to fet free.
No flave his Lord's commands obeys
With fuch infinuating ways.
My genius piercing, fharp, and bright,
Wherein the men of wit delight.
|