Our author fhuns by vulgar fprings to move,
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying love we but our weakness show,
And wild ambition well deferves its woe.
Here tears hall flow from a more gen'rous caufe,
Such tears as patriots fhed for dying laws:
He bids your breafts with ancient ardour rise,
And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes.
Virtue confefs'd in human shape he draws,
What Plato thought, and godlike Cato was;
No common object to your fight difplays,
But what with pleasure heav'n itself surveys;
A brave man ftruggling in the ftorms of fate,
And greatly falling with a falling state!
While Cato gives his little fenate laws,
What bofom beats not in his countrey's caufe?
Who fees him act, but envies ev'ry deed?
Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed?
Ev'n when proud Cafar 'midft triumphal cars,
The spoils of nations, and the pomp of wars,
Ignobly vain, and impotently great,
Show'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state;
As her dead father's rev'rend image past,
The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercaft,
The triumph ceas'd-Tears gufh'd from ev'ry eye;
The world's great victor pass'd unheeded by;
Her laft good man dejected Rome ador'd,
And honour'd Cafar's lefs than Cato's fword.
Britains attend; Be worth like this approv'd,
And fhow, you have the virtue to be mov'd.
With honeft fcorn the first fam'd Cato view'd
Rome learning arts from Greece, whom the fubdu'd;
Our scene precariously fubfifts too long
On French translation, and Italian song.
Dare to have sense your felves; affert the stage,
Be juftly warm'd with your own native rage,
Such plays alone fhould please a British ear,
As Cato's felf had not difdain'd to hear.
Defign'd for Mrs. OLDFIELD.
Rodigious this! the frail one of our play
From her own sex should mercy find to day!
You might have held the pretty head afide, Peep'd in your fans, been serious, thus, and cry'd, The play may pafs-but that ftrange creature, Shore, indeed now- I fo hate a whore
Juft as a blockhead rubs his thoughtless skull,
And thanks his ftars he was not born a fool;
So from a fifter finner you shall hear,
"How ftrangely you expofe your felf my dear? G 5
But let me die, all raillery apart,
Our sex are still forgiving at their heart;
And did not wicked cuftom fo contrive,
We'd be the best good natur'd things alive.
There are, 'tis true, who tell another tale,
That virtuous ladies envy while they rail;
Such rage without betrays the fire within;
In fome close corner of the foul, they fin:
Still hoarding up, moft fcandaloufly nice,
Amidft their virtues, a referve of vice.
The godly dame who fleshly failings damns,
Scolds with her maid, or with her chaplain crams,
Wou'd you enjoy foft nights and folid dinners?
Faith, gallants, board with faints, and bed with finners.
Well, if our author in the wife offends,
He has a husband that will make amends.
He draws him gentle, tender, and forgiving;
And fure fuch kind good creatures may be living.
In days of old they pardon'd breach of vows,
Stern Cato's felf was no relentless spouse:
Plu-Plutarch, what's his name that writes his life?
Tells us, that Cato dearly lov'd his wife.
Yet if a friend a night, or fo, fhould need her,
He'd recommend her as a special breeder.
To lend a wife, few here would fcruple make,
But pray which of you all would take her back?
Tho' with the Stoick Chief our ftage may ring,
The Stoick Hufband was the glorious thing.
The man had courage, was a fage, 'tis true,
And lov'd his country-but what's that to you?
Thofe ftrange examples ne'er were made to fit ye,
But the kind cuckold might inftruct the city:
There, many an honest man may copy Cato,
Who ne'er faw naked fword, or look'd in Plate.
If, after all, you think it a disgrace,
That Edward's Mifs thus perks it in your face,
To fee a piece of failing flesh and blood,
In all the reft fo impudently good;
Faith, let the modeft matrons of the town
Come here in crowds, and flare the ftrumpet down.
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