B. What Nature wants, commodious gold be stows; "Tis thus we eat the bread another sows. P. But how unequal it bestows, observe! Useful, I grant, it serves what life requires ; B. Trade it may help, society extend. P. But lures the pirate, and corrupts the friend. B. It raises armies in a nation's aid. 31 P. But bribes a senate, and the land's betray'd. In vain may heroes fight and patriots rave, If secret gold sap on from knave to knave. The Waters here mentioned is the same person who is introduced under the character of Wise Peter,' whose name was Walter, though sometimes called Waters. Fr. Chartres, a man infamous for all manner of vices. When he was an ensign in the army, he was drummed out of the regiment for a cheat: he was next banished Brussels, and drummed out of Ghent, on the same account. After a hundred tricks at the gaming-tables, he took to lending of money at exorbitant interest and on great penalties, accumulating premium, interest, and capital into a new capital, and seizing to a minute when the payments became due: in a word, by a constant attention to the vices, wants, and follies of mankind, he acquired an immense fortune. He was twice condemned, and pardoned; but the last time not without imprisonment in Newgate, and large confiscations. He died in Scotland in 1731, aged sixty-two. The populace at his funeral raised a great riot, almost tore the body out of the coffin, and cast dead dogs, &c. into the grave along with it.-Pope. 32 But bribes a senate, &c. Evidently levelled at sir Robert Walpole's administration, and the supposed corrupt mode by which he maintained his influence in parliament. Once, we confess, beneath the patriot's cloak, 35 Our fates and fortunes, as the winds shall blow: 40 45 50 O! that such bulky bribes as all might see, Still, as of old, encumber'd villany! Could France or Rome divert our brave designs, With all their brandies or with all their wines? What could they more than knights and squires confound, Or water all the quorum ten miles round? A statesman's slumbers how this speech would spoil! Sir, Spain has sent a thousand jars of oil; 55 35 Beneath the patriot's cloak. This is a true story, which happened in the reign of William III. to an unsuspected old patriot, who coming out at the back-door from having been closeted by the king, where he had received a large bag of guineas, the bursting of the bag discovered his business there.-Pope. 44 Or ship off senates to a distant shore. Alludes to several ministers, counsellors, and patriots banished in our times to Siberia, and to that more glorious fate of the parliament of Paris, banished to Pontoise in the year 1720.-Pope. 60 66 Huge bales of British cloth blockade the door; and all. 70 75 62 Some misers of great wealth, proprietors of the coalmines, had entered at this time into an association to keep up coals to an extravagant price, whereby the poor were reduced almost to starve; till one of them, taking the advantage of underselling the rest, defeated the design. One of those misers was worth £10,000, another £7000 a year.-Pope. 65 Colepepper's. Sir William Colepepper, bart., a person of an ancient family and fortune, without one other quality of a gentleman; who, after ruining himself at the gaming-table, passed the rest of his days in sitting there to see the ruin of others; preferring to subsist on borrowing and begging, rather than to enter into any reputable method of life; and refusing a post in the army, which was offered him.-Pope. P. What riches give us let us then inquire: Meat, fire, and clothes. B. What more? P. Meat, clothes, and fire. 80 Is this too little? would you more than live? 82 Turner. One who, being possessed of £300,000, laid down his coach, because interest was reduced from five to four per cent., and then put £70,000 into the Charitable Corporation for better interest; which sum having lost, he took it so much to heart, that he kept his chamber ever after. It is thought he would not have outlived it, but that he was heir to another estate, which he daily expected; and that by this course of life he saved both clothes and all other expenses.Pope. 84 Unhappy Wharton. A nobleman of great qualities; but as unfortunate in the application of them, as if they had been vices and follies.-Pope. 85 Hopkins. A citizen, whose rapacity obtained him the name of Vulture Hopkins. He lived worthless, but died worth £300,000, which he would give to no person living, but left it so as not to be inherited till after the second generation. His counsel representing to him how many years it must be before this could take effect, and that his money could only lie at interest all that time, he expressed great joy thereat, and said, 'They would then be as long in spending, as he had been in getting it.' But the chancery afterwards set aside the will, and gave it to the heir at law.-Pope. 86 Japhet, nose and ears? Japhet Crook, alias sir Peter Stranger, was punished with the loss of those parts, for having forged a conveyance of an estate to himself, on which he took up several thousand pounds: he was at the same time sued in chancery for having fraudulently obtained a will, by which he possessed another considerable estate, in wrong of the brother of the deceased. By these means he was worth a great sum, which, in reward for the small loss of his ears, he Can they in gems bid pallid Hippia glow? With all the embroidery plaster'd at thy tail? 90 95 To some, indeed, Heaven grants the happier fate, To enrich a bastard, or a son they hate. Perhaps you think the poor might have their part? Bond damns the poor, and hates them from his heart. enjoyed in prison till his executor.-Pope. 100 death, and quietly left to his 96 Endow a college or a cat. La belle Stuart,' of Grammont's Memoirs, was the endower. The poet ridicules her pensions to cats; but Warton explains, that her provision for their maintenance, was, in fact, nothing more than an ingenious, though whimsical contrivance, for giving annuities to several poor relations, who would have been too proud to receive direct benefaction. By quartering her cats on them, she saved their delicacy. 100 Bond damns the poor, &c. This Epistle was written in the year 1730, when a corporation was established to lend money to the poor on pledges, by the name of the Charitable Corporation; but the whole was turned only to an iniquitous method of enriching particular people, to the ruin of such numbers, that it became a parliamentary concern to endeavor the relief of those unhappy sufferers; and three of the managers, who were members of the house, were expelled.Pope. |