"But who art thou?" methinks Florello cries; "Of all thy species art thou only wise?" Since smallest things can give our sins a twitch, As crossing straws retard a passing witch, Florello! thou my monitor shalt be,

I'll conjure thus some profit out of thee.
O thou myself! abroad our counsels roam,
And, like ill husbands, take no care at home:
Thou, too, art wounded with the common dart,
And Love of Fame lies throbbing at thy heart;
And what wise means to gain it hast thou chose?
Know, Fame and Fortune both are made of prose.
Is thy ambition sweating for a rhyme,

Thou unambitious fool! at this late time?
While I a moment name, a moment's past ;
I'm nearer death in this verse than the last :
What then is to be done? be wise with speed:
A fool at forty is a fool indeed.

And what so foolish as the chase of fame?
How vain the prize? how impotent our aim?
For what are men who grasp at praise sublime,
But bubbles on the rapid stream of time,
That rise, and fall, that swell, and are no more,
Born and forgot, ten thousand in an hour?

31

LOVE OF FAME, &c.

SATIRE III.

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE MR. DODINGTON.

LONG, Dodington! in debt, I long have sought
To ease the burden of my grateful thought;
And now a poet's gratitude you see,

Grant him two favours, and he'll ask for three:
For whose the present glory or the gain?
You give protection, I a worthless strain.
You love and feel the poet's sacred flame,
And know the basis of a solid fame;

Tho' prone to like, yet cautious to command,
You read with all the malice of a friend;
Nor favour my attempts that way alone,
But more to raise my verse, conceal your own.
An ill tim❜d modesty! turn ages o’er,

When wanted Britain bright examples more?
Her learning, and her genius too, decays,
And dark and cold are her declining days;
As if men now were of another cast,
They meanly live on alms of ages past.
Men still are men; and they who boldly dare,
Shall triumph o'er the sons of cold Despair;
Or if they fail, they justly still take place
Of such who run in debt for their disgrace

Who borrow much, then fairly make it known, And damn it with improvements of their own. We bring some new materials, and what's old New cast with care, and in no borrow'd mould : Late times the verse may read, if these refuse, And from sour critics vindicate the Muse.

"Your work is long," the critics cry: 'Tis true, And lengthens still, to take in fools like you: Shorten my labour, if its length you blame; For grow but wise, you rob me of my game; As hunted hags, who, while the dogs pursue, Renounce their four legs, and start up on two.

Like the bold bird upon the banks of Nile,
That picks the teeth of the dire crocodile,
Will I enjoy (dread feast!) the critic's rage,
And with the fell destroyer feed my page;
For what ambitious fools are more to blame
Than those who thunder in the critic's name?
Good authors damn'd have their revenge in this,
To see what wretches gain the praise they miss.
Balbutius, muffled in his sable cloak,

Like an old Druid from his hollow oak,
As ravens solemn, and as boding cries,
"Ten thousand worlds for the three unities!"
Ye Doctors sage! who thro' Parnassus teach,
Or quit the tub, or practise what you preach.

One judges as the weather dictates; right The poem is at noon, and wrong at night: Another judges by a surer guage, An author's principles or parentage: Since his great ancestors in Flanders fell, The poem doubtless must be written well. Another judges by the writer's look ; Another judges, for he bought the book: Some judge, their knack of judging wrong to keep; Some judge, because it is too soon to sleep.

Thus all will judge, and with one single aim, To gain themselves, not give the writer, fame. The very best ambitiously advise,

Half to serve you, and half to pass for wise.
Critics on verse, as squibs on triumphs wait,
Proclaim the glory, and augment the state:
Hot, envious, noisy, proud, the scribbling fry
Burn, hiss, and bounce, waste paper, stink, and die.
Rail on, my friends! what more my verse can crown
Than Compton's smile, and your obliging frown?
Not all on books their criticism waste;
The genius of a dish some justly taste,

And eat their way to fame. With anxious thought
The salmon is refus'd, the turbot bought.

Impatient Art rebukes the sun's delay,

And bids December yield the fruits of May:

Their various cares in one great point combine
The bus'ness of their lives, that is to dine.
Half of their precious day they give the feast,
And to a kind digestion spare the rest.
Apicius, here, the taster of the Town,
Feeds twice a-week to settle their renown.
These worthies of the palate guard with care
The sacred annals of their bills of fare;
In those choice books their panegyrics read,
And scorn the creatures that for hunger feed.
If man by feeding well commences great,
Much more the worm, to whom that man is meat.
To glory some advance a lying claim,

Thieves of renown, and pilferers of fame :

Their front supplies what their ambition lacks;

They know a thousand lords behind their backs. Cottil is apt to wink upon a peer,

When turn'd away, with a familiar leer;

And H-y's eyes, unmercifully keen,

Have murder'd fops, by whom she ne'er was seen.

Niger adopts stray libels, wisely prone

To covet shame still greater than his own.
Bathyllus, in the winter of threescore,

Belies his innocence, and keeps a whore.
Absence of mind Brabantio turns to fame,

Learns to mistake, nor knows his brother's name;