Blefs'd, who can unconcern'dly find
Hours, days, and years, slide soft away,
In health of body, peace of mind,
Quiet by day.
Sound fleep by night; ftudy and ease
Together mix'd; fweet recreation;
And innocence, which most does please,
With meditation.
Thus let me live, unfeen, unknown,
Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lie.
THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL.
VITAL fpark of heav'nly flame!
Quit, oh quit this mortal frame!
Trembling, hoping, ling'ring, flying;
Oh the pain, the blifs of dying!
Ceafe, fond Nature! ceafe thy ftrife,
And let me languish into life.
Hark! they whisper; angels fay,
Sifter Spirit, come away.
What is this abforbs me quite!
Steals my fenfes, fhuts my fight,
Drowns my fpirits, draws my breath?
Tell me, my Soul! can this be Death?
The world recedes; it difappears!
Heav'n opens on my eyes! my ears
With founds feraphic ring:
Lend, lend your wings! I mount! I fly!
O Grave! where is thy victory?
O Death! where is thy fting?
YES, thank my ftars! as early as I knew
This Town, I had the fenfe to hate it too;
Yet here, as e'en in hell, there must be ftill
One giant vice fo excellently ill,
That all befide one pities, not abhors,
As who knows Sappho fmiles at other whores.
I grant that poetry's a crying fin;
It brought (no doubt) th' Excife and Army in :
Catch'd like the plague, or love, the Lord knows how,
But that the cure is ftarving all allow.
Yet like the Papift's is the poet's ftate,
Poor and difarm'd, and hardly worth your hate!
Here lean a bard, whose wit could never give
Himfelf a dinner, makes an actor live:
The thief condemn'd, in law already dead,
So prompts and faves a rogue who cannot read.
SIR, tho' (I thank God for it) I do hate
Perfectly all this Town, yet there's one state
In all ill things fo excellently beft,
That hate towards them breeds pity towards the reft. Tho' poetry, indeed, be fuch a fin
As I think that brings dearth and Spaniards in
Tho' like the peftilence and old-fashion'd love,
Ridlingly it catch men, and doth remove
Never till it be ftarv'd out; yet their state
Is poor, difarm'd, like Papifts, not worth hate:
One, (like a wretch, which at bar judg'd as dead,
Yet prompts him which stands next, and cannot read,
Thus as the pipes of fome carv'd organ move,
The gilded puppets dance and mount above:
Heavn by th' breath th' infpiring bellows blow;
Th' infpiring bellows lie and pant below.
One fings the fair; but fongs no longer move;
No rat is rhym'd to death, nor maid to love:
In Love's, in Nature's, fpite the fiege they hold,
And scorn the flesh, the devil, and all but gold.
These write to lords, fome mean reward to get, 25 As needy beggars fing at doors for meat : Those write because all write, and fo have ftill Excufe for writing, and for writing ill.
Wretched, indeeed! but far more wretched yet
Is he who makes his meal on others wit:
'Tis chang'd, no doubt, from what it was before;
His rank digeftion makes it wit no more:
Senfe pafs'd thro' him no longer is the fame;
For food digefted takes another name.
I pafs o'er all thofe confeilors and martyrs
Who live like S-tt-n, or who die like Chatres,
And faves his life) gives idiot actors means,
(Starving himself) to live by's labour'd fcenes.
As in fome organs puppets dance above,
And bellows pant below which them do move,
One would move love by rhymes; but witchcraft's
charms
Bring not now their old fears nor their old harms.
Rams and flings now are filly battery;
Piftolets are the best artillery:
And they who write to lords rewards to get,
Are they not like fingers at doors for meat?
And they who write, becaufe all write, have still
Th' excufe for writing, and for writing ill.
But he is worst who (beggarly) doth chaw
Others' wits' fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rankly digested, doth thofe things out-fpue
As his own things: and they're his own, 'tis true;
For if one eat my meat, tho' it be known
The meat was mine, th' excrement is his own.
Outcant old Efdras, or outdrink his heir,
Out-ufure Jews, or Irishmen out-fwear;
Wicked as pages, who in early years
Acts fins which Prifca's confeffor fcarce hears.
E'en thofe I pardon, for whofe finful fake
Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make;
Of whole ftrange crimes no canonist can tell
In what commandment's large contents they dwell.
One, one man only breeds my just offence,
Whom crimes gave wealth, and wealth gave impu-
Time, that at lalt matures a clap to pox,
Whofe gentle progress makes a calf an ox,
And brings all natural events to pass,
Hath made him an Attorney of an Afs.
No young divine, new-benefic'd, can be
More pert, more proud, more pofitive, than he.
What further could I wish the fop to do
But turn a wit, and fcribble verses too?
Pierce the foft lab'rinth of a lady's ear
With rhymes of this per cent. and that per year?
But thefe do me no harm, nor they which use
out-fure Jews,
T'out-drink the fea, t' out-fwear the Litany,
Who with fins all kinds as familiar be
As confeffors, and for whose finful fake,
Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make;
Whofe ftrange fins canonifts could hardly tell
In which commandment's large receipt they dwell.
But these punish themfelves. The infolence
Of Cofcus only breeds my just offence,
Whom time (which rots all, and makes botches pox,
And plodding on must make a calf an ox)
Hath made a lawyer, which (alas!) of late,
But fcarce a poet, jollier of this state
Than are new. benefic'd minifters: he throws,
Like nets or lime-twigs, wherefo'er he goes,
His title of Barrister on every wench,
And wooes in language of the Pleas and Bench
Words, words which would tear
The tender labyrinth of a maid's foft ear,
Or courts a wife, fpread out his wily parts,
Like nets, or lime twigs, for rich widows' hearts;
Call himfelf barrifter to ev'ry wench,
And wooe in language of the Pleas and Bench?
Language which Boreas might to Auster hold,
More rough than forty Germans when they fcold.
Curs'd be the wretch, fo venal and fo vain,
Paltry and proud as drabs in Drury-Lane.
'Tis fuch a bounty as was never known,
If Peter deigns to help you to your own :
What thanks, what praife, if Peter but fupplies!
And what a folemn face if he denies !
Grave, as when pris'ners shake the head, and fwear
'Twas only furetyship that brought 'em there.
His office keeps your parchment fates entire,
He ftarves with cold to fave them from the fire;
For you he walks the ftreets thro' rain or dust,
For not in chariots Peter puts his truft:
For you he fweats and labours at the laws,
Takes God to witnefs he affects your caufe,
And lies to ev'ry lord in ev'ry thing,
Like a king's favourite-or like a king.
Thefe are the talents that adorn them all,
From wicked Waters e'en to godly
More, more than ten Sclavonians fcoldings, more
Than when winds in our ruin'd abbys roar.
When fick with poetry, and poffefs'd with Muse
Thou waft, and mad, hop'd; but men which chuse
Law practice for meer gain, bold souls repute
Worfe than imbrothell'd ftrumpets prostitute.
Now like an owl-like watchman he must walk,
His hand ftill at a bill; now he must talk
Idly, like pris'ners, which whole months will fwear
That only furetyfhip hath brought them there,
And to ev'ry fuitor lie in ev'ry thing,
Like a king's favourite, or like a king:
Like a wedge in a block wring to the bar,
Bearing like affes, and more fhameless far
Than carted whores, lye to the grave judge; for
Bastardy abounds not in kings' titles, nor
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