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And those that have writ best, had they been That neither th' other can abide,

rich,

Had ne'er been clapp'd with a poetic itch;
Had lov'd their ease too well to take the pains
To undergo that drudgery of brains;

But, being for all other trades unfit,
Only to avoid being idle, set up wit.

THEY that do write in others' praises,
And freely give their friends their voices,
Are not confin'd to what is true;
That's not to give, but pay a due:

For praise, that 's due, does give no more
To worth, than what it had before;
But to commend, without desert,
Requires a mastery of art,

That sets a gloss on what 's amiss,

And writes what should be, not what is.

IN foreign universities,

When a king's born, or weds, or dies,
Straight other studies are laid by,
And all apply to poetry:
Some write in Hebrew, some in Greek,
And some, more wise, in Arabic,
T'avoid the critic, and th' expense
Of difficulter wit and sense;

And seem more learnedish than those
That at a greater charge compose.
The doctors lead, the students follow;
Some call him Mars, and some Apollo,
Some Jupiter, and give him th' odds,
On even terms, of all the gods;
Then Cæsar he 's nicknam'd, as duly as
He that in Rome was christen'd Julius,
And was address'd too by a crow,
As pertinently, long ago;

And, as wit goes by colleges,

As well as standing and degrees,

He still writes better than the rest,

That's of the house that 's counted best.

FAR greater numbers have been lost by hopes Than all the magazines of daggers, ropes, And other ammunitions of despair,

Were ever able to dispatch by fear.

THERE's nothing our felicities endears

But too much reason on each side?

AUTHORITY is a disease and cure,

Which men can neither want nor well endure.

DAME Justice puts her sword into the scales, With which she's said to weigh out true and false, With no design but, like the antique Gaul, To get more money from the capital.

ALL that which Law and Equity miscalls
By th' empty idle names of True and False,
Is nothing else but maggots blown between
False witnesses and falser jurymen.
No court allows those partial interlopers
Of Law and Equity, two single paupers,
T'encounter hand to hand at bars, and trounce
Each other gratis in a suit at once:

For one at one time, and upon free cost, is
Enough to play the knave and fool with Justice;
And, when the one side bringeth custom in,
And th' other lays out half the reckoning,
The Devil himself will rather choose to play
At paltry small-game than sit out, they say;
But when at all there's nothing to be got,

The old wife, Law and Justice, will not trot.

THE law, that makes more knaves than e'er it hung,

Little considers right or wrong;

But, like authority, 's soon satisfy'd
When 'tis to judge on its own side.

THE law can take a purse in open court, Whilst it condemns a less delinquent for 't.

WHO can deserve, for breaking of the laws, A greater penance than an honest cause?

ALL those that do but rob and steal enough, Are punishment and court-of-justice proof, And need not fear, nor be concern'd a straw, In all the idle bugbears of the law, But confidently rob the gallows too, As well as other sufferers, of their due.

OLD laws have not been suffer'd to be pointed,

Like that which falls among our doubts and fears, To leave the sense at large the more disjointed,

And furnish lawyers, with the greater ease,
To turn and wind them any way they please.
The statute law 's their scripture, and reports
The ancient reverend fathers of their courts;
Records their general councils; and decisions
Of judges on the bench their sole traditions,
For which, like catholics, they 've greater awe,
As th' arbitrary and unwritten law,

And strive perpetually to make the standard
Of right between the tenant and the landlord;
And, when two cases at a trial meet,
That, like indentures, jump exactly fit,
And all the points, like chequer-tallies, suit,
The court directs the obstiuat'st dispute;
There's no decorum us'd of time, nor place,
Nor quality, nor person, in the case.

A MAN of quick and active wit For drudgery is more unfit, Compar'd to those of duller parts, Than running-nags to draw in carts.

Too much or too little wit Do only render th' owners fit For nothing, but to be undone Much easier than if they 'ad none.

As those that are stark blind can trace The nearest ways from place to place, And find the right way easier out, Than those that hoodwink'd try to do 't; So tricks of state are manag'd best By those that are suspected least, And greatest finesse brought about By engines most unlike to do 't.

ALL the politics of the great Are like the cunning of a cheat, That lets his false dice freely run, And trusts them to themselves alone, But never lets a true one stir Without some fingering trick or slur; And, when the gamesters doubt his play, Conveys his false dice safe away, And leaves the true ones in the lurch, T endure the torture of the search.

WHAT else does history use to tell us,
But tales of subjects being rebellious;
The vain perfidiousness of lords,
And fatal breach of princes' words;
The sottish pride and insolence

of statesmen, and their want of sense;
Their treachery, that undoes, of custom,

Their own selves first, next those who trustthem?

BECAUSE a feeble limb 's carest,

And more indulg'd than all the rest,
So frail and tender consciences

Are humour'd to do what they please;
When that which goes for weak and feeble
is found the most incorrigible,
To outdo all the fiends in Hell
With rapine, murder, blood, and zeal.

As, at th' approach of winter, all
The leaves of great trees use to fall,
And leave them naked to engage
With storms and tempests when they rage;
VOL VIIL

While humbler plants are found to wear
Their fresh green liveries all the year:
So, when the glorious season 's gone
With great men, and hard times come on,
The great'st calamities oppress
The greatest still, and spare the less.

As when a greedy raven sees
A sheep entangled by the fleece,
With hasty cruelty he flies
Tattack him, and pick out his eyes;
So do those vultures use, that keep
Poor prisoners fast like silly sheep,
As greedily to prey on all

That in their ravenous clutches fall:
For thorns and brambles, that came in
To wait upon the curse for sin,
And were no part o' th' first creation,
But, for revenge, a new plantation,
Are yet the fitt st materials

T'enclose the Earth with living walls.

So jailors, that are most accurst,
Are found most fit in being worst.

THERE needs no other charm, nor conjurer, To raise infernal spirits up, but fear; That makes men pull their horns in like a snail, That's both a prisoner to itself, and jail; Draws more fantastic shapes, than in the grains Of knotted wood, in some men's crazy brains, When all the cocks they think they see, and bulls, Are only in the insides of their sculls.

THE Roman mufti, with his triple crown,

Does both the Earth, and Hell, and Heaven, own, Beside th' imaginary territory,

He lays a title to in Purgatory;

Declares himself an absolute free prince

In his dominions, only over sins;

But as for Heaven, since it lies so far

Above him, is but only titular,

And, like his cross-keys badge upon a tavern,

Has nothing there to tempt, command, or govern:
Yet, when he comes to take account, and share
The profit of his prostituted ware,

He finds his gains increase, by sin and women,
Above his richest titular dominion.

A JUBILEE is but a spiritual fair,

T" expose to sale all sorts of impious ware,
In which his holiness buys nothing in,
To stock his magazines, but deadly sin,
And deals in extraordinary crimes,
That are not vendible at other times;
For dealing both for Judas and th' high-priest,
He makes a plentifuller trade of Christ.

THAT Spiritual pattern of the church, the ark, In which the ancient world did once embark, Had ne'er a helm in 't to direct its way, Although bound through an universal sea; When all the modern church of Rome's concern Is nothing else but in the helm and stern.

In the church of Rome to go to shrift, Is but to put the soul on a clean shift.

An ass will with his long ears fray The flies, that tickle him, away;

But man delights to have his ears Blown maggots in by flatterers.

ALL wit does but divert men from the road In which things vulgarly are understood, And force Mistake and Ignorance to own A better sense than commonly is known.

IN little trades, more cheats and lying Are us'd in selling than in buying; But in the great, unjuster dealing Is us'd in buying than in selling.

ALL smatterers are more brisk and pert Than those that understand an art; As little sparkles shine more bright Than glowing coals, that give them light.

LAW does not put the least restraint
Upon our freedom, but maintain 't;
Or, if it does, 'tis for our good,
To give us freer latitude:

For wholesome laws preserve us free,
By stinting of our liberty.

THE world has long endeavour'd to reduce
Those things to practice that are of no use;
And strives to practise things of speculation,
And bring the practical to contemplation;
And by that errour renders both in vain,
By forcing Nature's course against the grain.

In all the world there is no vice Less prone t' excess than avarice; It neither cares for food nor clothing: Nature's content with little, that with nothing.

IN Rome no temple was so low As that of Honour, built to show How humble honour ought to be, Though there 'twas all authority.

It is a harder thing for men to rate Their own parts at an equal estimate, Than cast up fractions, in th' account of Heaven, Of time and motion, and adjust them even; For modest persons never had a true Particular of all that is their due.

SOME people's fortunes, like a weft or stray, Are only gain'd by losing of their way.

As he that makes his mark is understood To write his name, and 'tis in law as good; So he, that cannot write one word of sense, Believes he has as legal a pretence To scribble what he does not understand, As idiots have a title to their land.

WERE Tully now alive, he 'd be to seek In all our Latin terms of art and Greek; Would never understand one word of sense The most irrefragable schoolman means: As if the schools design'd their terms of art Not to advance a science, but divert; As Hocus Pocus conjures, to amuse The rabble from observing what he does.

As 'tis a greater mystery, in the art Of painting, to foreshorten any part

Than draw it out; so 'tis in books the chief Of all perfections to be plain and brief.

THE man, that for his profit 's bought t' obey, Is only hir'd, on liking, to betray; And, when he's bid a liberaller price, Will not be sluggish in the work, nor nice.

OPINIATORS naturally differ

From other men; as wooden legs are stiffer Than those of pliant joints, to yield and bow, Which way soe'er they are design'd to go.

NAVIGATION, that withstood

The mortal fury of the Flood,
And prov'd the only means to save
All earthly creatures from the wave,
Has, for it, taught the sea and wind
To lay a tribute on mankind,
That, by degrees, has swallow'd more
Than all it drown'd at once before.

THE prince of Syracuse, whose destin'd fate It was to keep a school and rule a state, Found, that his sceptre never was so aw'd, As when it was translated to a rod; And that his subjects ne'er were so obedient, As when he was inaugurated pedant: For to instruct is greater than to rule, And no command 's so imperious as a school

As he, whose destiny does prove To dangle in the air above, Does lose his life for want of air, That only fell to be his share; So he, whom Fate at once design'd To plenty and a wretched mind, Is but condemn'd t' a rich distress, And starves with niggardly excess.

THE universal med'cine is a trick,

That Nature never meant, to cure the sick,
Unless by death, the singular receipt,
To root out all diseases by the great:
For universals deal in no one part
Of Nature, nor particulars of Art;

And therefore that French quack, that set up physic.
Call'd his receipt a general specific.

For, though in mortal poisons every one
Is mortal universally alone,

Yet Nature never made an antidote
To cure them all as easy as they 're got;
Much less, among so many variations
Of different maladies and complications,
Make all the contrarieties in Nature
Submit themselves t' an equal moderator.

A CONVERT 's but a fly, that turns about, After his head 's pull'd off, to find it out.

ALL mankind is but a rabble,
As silly and unreasonable

As those that, crowding in the street,
To see a show or monster, meet;
Of whom no one is in the right,

Yet all fall out about the sight;

And, when they chance t' agree, the choice is
Still in the most and worst of vices;
And all the reasons that prevail

Are measur'd, not by weight, but tale.

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Do not mine affection slight, 'Cause my locks with age are white:

227

THOSE get the least that take the greatest pains, Your breasts have snow without, and snow within, But most of all i' th' drudgery of brains;

A natural sign of weakness, as an ant

Is more laborious than an elephant ;

And children are more busy at their play,

Than those that wisely'st pass their time away.

ALL the inventions that the world contains, Were not by reason first found out, nor brains; But pass for theirs who had the luck to light Upon them by mistake or oversight.

While flames of fire in your bright eyes are seen.

EPIGRAM ON A CLUB OF SOTS.

THE jolly members of a toping club,
Like pipe-staves, are but hoop'd into a tub,
And in a close confederacy link,

For nothing else but only to hold drink.

TRIPLETS UPON AVARICE.

As misers their own laws enjoin,
To wear no pockets in the mine,

For fear they should the ore purloin;

So he that toils and labours hard
To gain, and what he gets has spar'd,

Is from the use of all debarr'd.

And, though he can produce more spankers

Than all the usurers and bankers,

Yet after more and more he hankers;

And, after all his pains are done,
Has nothing he can call his own,
But a mere livelihood alone.

DESCRIPTION OF HOLLAND.

A COUNTRY that draws fifty foot of water,
In which men live as in the hold of Nature,
And, when the sea does in upon them break,
And drowns a province, does but spring a leak;
That always ply the pump, and never think
They can be safe, but at the rate they stink;
That live as if they had been run aground,
And, when they die, are cast away and drown'd;
That dwell in ships, like swarms of rats, and prey
Upon the goods all nations' fleets convey;
And, when their merchants are blown-up and crackt,
Whole towns are cast away in storms, and wreckt;
That feed, like cannibals, on other fishes,
And serve their cousin-germans up in dishes :
A land that rides at anchor, and is moor'd,
la which they do not live, but go aboard.

HUDIBRAS'S ELEGY'.

IN days of yore, when knight or squire
By Fate were summon'd to retire,
Some menial poet still was near,

To bear them to the hemisphere,

And there among the stars to leave them,
Until the gods sent to relieve them:

And sure our knight, whose very sight wou'd
Entitle him Mirror of Knighthood,
Should he neglected lie, and rot,
Stink in his grave, and be forgot,
Would have just reason to complain,
If he should chance to rise again;

And therefore, to prevent his dudgeon,
In mournful doggrel thus we trudge on.

Oh me! what tongue, what pen, can tell
How this renowned champion fell,
But must reflect, alas! alas!
All human glory fades like grass,
And that the strongest martial feats
Of errant knights are all but cheats!
Witness our knight, who sure has done
More valiant actions, ten to one,
Than of More-Hall the mighty More,
Or him that made the Dragon roar;
Has knock'd more men and women down
Than Bevis of Southampton town,

I Neither this elegy, nor the following epitaph, is to be found in The Genuine Remains of Butler, as published by Mr. Thyer. Both however having frequently been reprinted in The Posthumous Works of Samuel Butler, and as they, besides, relate to the hero of his particular poem, there needs no apology for their being thus preserved. Some other of the posthumous poems would not have disgraced their supposed author; but, as they are so positively rejected by Mr. Thyer, we have not ventured to admit them. N.

Or than our modern heroes can,
To take them singly man by man.
No, sure, the grisly king of terrour
Has been to blame, and in an errour,
To issue his dead-warrant forth
To seize a knight of so much worth,
Just in the nick of all his glory;
I tremble when I tell the story.

Oh! help me, help me, some kind Muse,
This surly tyrant to abuse,
Who, in his rage, has been so cruel
To rob the world of such a jewel!

A knight, more learned, stout, and good,
Sure ne'er was made of flesh and blood:
All his perfections were so rare,
The wit of man could not declare
Which single virtue, or which grace,
Above the rest had any place,
Or which he was most famous for,
The camp, the pulpit, or the bar;
Of each he had an equal spice,
And was in all so very nice,

That, to speak truth, th' account it lost,
In which he did excel the most.
When he forsook the peaceful dwelling,
And out he went a colonelling,
Strange hopes and fears possest the nation,
How he could manage that vocation,
Until he show'd it to a wonder,
How nobly he could fight and plunder.
At preaching, too, he was a dab,
More exquisite by far than Squab;
He could fetch uses, and infer,
Without the help of metaphor,
From any scripture text, howe'er
Remote it from the purpose were;
And with his fist, instead of a stick,
Beat pulpit, drum ecclesiastic,
Till he made all the audience weep,
Excepting those that fell asleep.
Then at the bar he was right able,
And could bind o'er as well as swaddle;

And famous, too, at petty sessions,

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'Gainst thieves and whores, for long digressions, He could most learnedly determine

To Bridewell, or the stocks, the vermin.
For his address and way of living,
All his behaviour, was so moving,
That, let the dame be ne'er so chaste,
As people say, below the waist,
If Hudibras but once came at her,
He'd quickly made her chaps to water;
Then for his equipage and shape,
On vestals they 'd commit a rape;
Which often, as the story says,
Have made the ladies weep both ways.
Ill has he read, that never heard
How he with widow Tomson far'd,
And what hard conflict was between
Our knight and that insulting quean.
Sure captive knight ne'er took more pains,
For rhymes for his melodious strains,
Nor beat his brains, or made more faces,
To get into a jilt's good graces,
Than did sir Hudibras to get
Into this subtle gipsy's net ;
Who, after all her high pretence
To modesty and innocence,

Was thought by most to be a woman
That to all other knights was common.

Hard was his fate in this, I own,
Nor will I for the trapes atone;
Indeed to guess I am not able,
What made her thus inexorable,
Unless she did not like his wit,
Or, what is worse, his perquisite.
Howe'er it was, the wound she gave
The knight, he carry'd to his grave:
Vile harlot! to destroy a knight,
That could both plead, and pray, and fight.
Oh! cruel, base, inhuman drab,

To give him such a mortal stab,
That made him pine away and moulder,
As though that he had been no soldier:
Could'st thou find no one else to kill,
Thou instrument of Death and Hell!
But Hudibras, who stood the bears
So oft against the cavaliers,
And in the very heat of war
Took stout Crowdero prisoner;
And did such wonders all along,
That far exceed both pen and tongue?
If he had been in battle slain,
We 'ad had less reason to complain;
But to be murder'd by a whore,
Was ever knight so serv'd before?
But, since he 's gone, all we can say,
He chanc'd to die a lingering way;
If he had liv'd a longer date,

He might, perhaps, have met a fate
More violent, and fitting for

A knight so fam'd in civil war.

To sum up all-from love and danger
He 's now (O happy knight !) a stranger;
And, if a Muse can aught foretell,
His fame shall fill a chronicle,
And he in after-ages be

Of errant knights th' epitome.

HUDIBRAS'S EPITAPH.

UNDER this stone rests Hudibras,
A knight as errant as e'er was;
The controversy only lies,
Whether he was more stout than wise;
Nor can we here pretend to say,
Whether he best could fight or pray;
So, till those questions are decided,
His virtues must rest undivided.
Full oft he suffer'd bangs and drubs,
And full as oft took pains in tubs;
Of which the most that can be said,
He pray'd and fought, and fought and pray'd.
As for his personage and shape,
Among the rest we 'll let them 'scape;
Nor do we, as things stand, think fit
This stone should meddle with his wit.
One thing, 'tis true, we ought to tell,
He liv'd and dy'd a colonel;
And for the good old cause stood buff,
'Gainst many a bitter kick and cuff.
But, since his worship 's dead and gone,
And mouldering lies beneath this stone,
The reader is desir'd to look,
For his achievements in his book;
Which will preserve of knight the tale,
Till Time and Death itself shall fail.

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