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But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call;
A hundred footsteps fcrape the marble hall:
The rich buffet well-coloured ferpents grace,
And gaping Tritons fpew to wash your face.
Is this a dinner? this a genial room!
No, 'tis a temple, and a hecatomb.
A folemn facrifice perform'd in state,
You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.
So quick retires each flying course, you'd fwear
Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there. 160
Between each act the trembling falvers ring,
From foup to fweet-wine, and God bless the
King.

In plenty ftarving, tantaliz'd in state,
And complaifantly help'd to all I hate,
Treated, carefs'd, and tir'd, I take my leave,
Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve;
I curfe fuch lavish coft, and little skill,
And fwear no day was aver past so ill.

170

Yet hence the poor are cloth d, the hungry fed; Health to himself, and to his infants bread, The labourer bears: What his hard heart denies, His charitable vanity fupplies.

Another age fhall see the golden ear

Imbrown the flope, and nod on the parterre,
Deep harvest bury all his pride has plann'd,
And laughing Ceres re-affume the land.

Who then shall grace, or who improve the foil?
Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle.
'Tis ufe alone but fanctifies expence,
And fplendor borrows all her rays from fenfe. 180
His father's acres who enjoys in peace,
Or makes his neighbours glad, if he increase:
Whose cheerful tenants bless their yearly toil,
Yet to their lord owe more than to the foil;
Whole ample lawns are not afham'd to feed
The milky heifer and deferving fteed;
Whole rifing forefts, not for pride or show,
But future buildings, future navies, grow:
Let his plantations stretch from down to down,
First fhade a country, and then raife a town. 190
You too proceed make falling arts your care,
Erect new wonders, and the old repair;
Jones and Palladio to themfelves restore,
And be whate'er Vitruvius was before:
Till kings call forth th' ideas of your mind.
(Proud to accomplish what fuch hands design'd)
Bid harbours open, public ways extend,
Bid temples worthier of the god afcend;
Bid the broad archthe dangerous flood contain,
The mole projected break the roaring main; 200

Backto his bounds their fübject fea command, And oll obedient rivers through the land; These honours, peace to happy Britain brings; These are imperial works, and worthy kings.

EPISTLE V.

TO MR. ADDISON,

Occafioned by bis Dialogues on Medals.

THIS was originally written in the year 1715, when Mr. Addifon intended to publish his book of Medals; it was fome time before he was Secretary of State; but not published till Mr. Tickell's edition of his works; at which time the verfes on Mr. Craggs, which conclude the poem, were added, viz. in 1720.

As the third Epiftle treated of the extremes of avarice and profufion; and the fourth took up one particular branch of the latter, namely, the vanity of expence in people of wealth and quality, and was therefore a corollary to the third; fo this treats of one circumftance of that vanity, as it appears in the common collectors of old coins; and is, therefore, a corollary to the fourth. SEE the wild waste of all-devouring years! How Rome her own fad fepulchre appears, With nodding arches, broken temples spread! The very tombs now vanish'd like their dead; Imperial wonders rais'd on nations spoil'd, [toil'd: Where mix'd with flaves the groaning martyr Huge theatres, that now unpeopled woods, Now drain'd a diftant country of her floods: Fanes, which admiring gods with pride furvey; Statues of men, scarce lefs alive than they! Some felt the filent ftroke of mouldering age, Some hoftile fury, fome religious rage. Barbarian blindness, Chriftian zeal confpire, And Papal piety, and Gothic fire.

ΙΟ

Perhaps, by its own ruins fav'd from flame,
Some bury'd marble half preferves a name;
That name the learn'd with fierce difputes purfue,
And give to Titus old Vefpafian's due

Ambition figh'd: the found in vain to truft The faithlefs column and the crumbling buft: 20 Huge moles, whofe fhadow stretch'd from fhore to

fhore,

Their ruins perifh'd, and their place no more!
Convinc'd the now contracts her vast design,
And all her triumphs fhrink into a coin.
A narrow orb each crowded conquest keeps,
Beneath her palm here fad Judea weeps.
Now fcantier limits the proud arch confine,
And scarce are seen the proftrate Nile or Rhine;
A fmall Euphrates through the piece is roll'd,
And little eagles wave their wings in gold.
The medal, faithful to its charge of fame,
Through climesand ages bears each form and name:
In one fhort view fubjected to our eye
God's, emperors heroes, fages, beauties, lie.
With fharpen'd fight pale antiquaries pore,
Th' infcription value, but the rust adore.

30

See! fportive fate, to punish aukward pride,
Bids Bub build, and fends him fuch a guide: 20
A ftanding fermon, at each year's expence,
That never coxcomb reach'd magnificence!

You fhow us Ron e was glorious, not profufe, And pompous buildings once were things of ufe. Yet fhall (my lord) your juft, your noble rules Fill half the land with imitating fools;

Who random drawings from your fheets fhall take,

30

And of one beauty many blunders make;
Load fome vain church with old Theatric state,
Turn arts of triumph to a garden gate;
Reverse your ornaments, and hang them all
On fome patch'd dog-hole ek'd with ends of wall;
Then clap four flices of pilafter on't,
That, lac'd with bits of ruftic, makes a front.
Shall call the winds through long arcades to roar,
Proud to catch cold at a Venetian door;
Contcious they act a true Palladian part,
And if they ftarve, they flarve by rules of art.
Oft have you hinted to your brother peer,
A certain truth, which many buy too dear:
Something there is more needful than expence,
And fomething previous ev'n to tafte-'tis fenfe:
Good fenfe, which only is the gif. of Heaven,
And though no fcience, faily worth the feven:
A light, which is yourself you must perceive;
Jones and Le Nôtre have it not to give.

To build, to plant, whatever you intend,
To rear the column, or the arch to bend,
To fwell the terrace, or to fink the grot;
In all, let nature never be forgot.
But treat the goddefs like a modeft fair,
Nor over drefs, nor leave her wholly bare;
Let not each beauty every where be spy'd,
Where half the skill is decently to hide.
He gains all points, wh pleafingly confounds,
Surprifes, varies, and conceals the bounds.

40

૪૦

60

Confult the genius of the place in all; That tells the waters or to rife or fall; Or helps th' ambitious hill the heavens to scale, Or fcoops in circling theatres the vale; Calls in the country, catches opening glades, Joins willing woods, and varies fhades from fhades; Now breaks, or now directs th' intending lines; Paints as you plant and, as you work, defigns. Still follow fenfe, of every art the foul, Parts anfwering part fhall flide into a whole, Spontaneous beauties all around advance,

- Start ev'n from difficulty, frike from chance; Nature fhall join you; time shall make it grow A work to wonder at-perhaps a Stow.

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70

Without it, proud Verfailles thy glory falls And Nero's terraces Cefert their walls: The vast parterres a thousand hands fhall make, Lo Cobham comes, and floats them with a lake:

VARIATIONS.

After ver 22, in the MS.

Mat bishops, lawyers, frateimen have the skill To build, to plant, judge paintings, what you will? Then why not Kent as well our treaties draw,

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His quincunx darkens, his efpaliers meet;
The wood fupports the plain, the parts unite,
And ftrength of fhade contends with strength of
light;

A waving glow the bloomy beds display,
Blufhing in bright diversities of day,

With filver-quivering rills mæander'd o'er-
Enjoy them, you! Villario can no more;
Tir'd of the fcene parterres and fountains yield,
He finds at last he better likes a field.

Through his young woods how pleas'd Sabinus ftray'd,

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Or fate delighted in the thickening fhade,
With annual joy the reddening fhoots to greet,
Or fee the stretching branches long to meet!
His fon's fine tafte an opener vista loves,
Foe to the Dyrads of his father's groves;
One boundiefs green, or Hourifh'd carpet views,
With all the mournful family of yews:
The thriving plants ignoble broomflicks made,
Now fweep thofe alleys they were born to fhade.
At Timon's villa let us pafs a day,

Where all cry out, "What fums are thrown away.

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So proud, fo grand; of that ftupendous air,
Soft and agreeable come never there.
Greatnefs, with Timon, dwells in fuch a draught
As brings all Brobdignag before your thought.
To compaís this, his budding is a town,

His pond an ocean, his parterre a down:
Who but must laugh, the mafter when he fees,

A puny infect, fhivering at a breeze!

1.0, what huge heaps of littlenefs around!

The whole, a labour'd quarry ab ve ground, 110
Two Cupids fquirt before: a lake behind
Improves the keennefs of the northern wind.
His gardens next your admiration call.
On every fide you look behold the wall!
No pleafing intricacies intervene,
No artful wildnefs to perplex the scene;
Grove nods at grove, cach alley has a brother,
And half the platform juft reflects the other.
The fuffering eye inverted nature fees,
Trees cut to ftatues, ftatues thick as trees; 120
With here a fountain, never to be play'd;
And there a fummer houfe that knows no fhade;
Here Amphitrite fails through my: tle bowers;
There gladiators fight, or die in flowers;
Unwater'd fee the drooping fea-horfe mourn,
And fwallows rooft in Nilus' dufty urn.

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But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call;
A hundred footsteps fcrape the marble hall :
The rich buffet well-coloured ferpents grace,
And gaping Tritons fpew to wash your face.
Is this a dinner? this a genial room!
No, 'tis a temple, and a hecatomb.
A folemn facrifice perform'd in state,
You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.
So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear
Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there. 160
Between each act the trembling falvers ring,
From foup to fweet-wine, and God bless the
King.

In plenty starving, tantaliz'd in state,
And complaifantly help'd to all I hate,
Treated, carefs'd, and tir'd, I take my leave,
Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve;
I curfe fuch lavish coft, and little skill,
And fwear no day was ever past so ill.

170

Yet hence the poor are cloth d, the hungry fed; Health to himself, and to his infants bread, The labourer bears: What his hard heart denies, His charitable vanity fupplies.

Another age fhall fee the golden ear Imbrown the flope, and nod on the parterre, Deep harvest bury all his pride has plann'd, And laughing Ceres re-affume the land. Who then fhall grace, or who improve the foil? Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle. 'Tis ufe alone but fanctifies expence, And fplendor borrows all her rays from fenfe. 180 His father's acres who enjoys in peace, Or makes his neighbours glad, if he increase: Whose cheerful tenants blefs their yearly toil, Yet to their lord owe more than to the foil; Whole ample lawns are not afham'd to feed The milky heifer and deferving steed; Whole rifing forefts, not for pride or show, But future buildings, future navies, grow: Let his plantations stretch from down to down, First fhade a country, and then raise a town. 190 You too proceed! make falling arts your care, Erc& new wonders, and the old repair; Jones and Palladio to themselves restore, And be whate'er Vitruvius was before: Till kings call forth th' ideas of your mind. (Proud to accomplish what fuch hands design'd) Bid harbours open, public ways extend, Bid temples worthier of the god afcend; Bid the broad archthe dangerous flood contain, The mole projected break the roaring main; 200

Backto his bounds their fübject fea command, And oll obedient rivers through the land; These honours, peace to happy Britain brings; These are imperial works, and worthy kings.

EPISTLE V.

TO MR. ADDISON,

Occafioned by bis Dialogues on Medals.

THIS was originally written in the year 1715, when Mr. Addison intended to publish his book of Medals; it was fome time before he was Secretary of State; but not published till Mr. Tickell's edition of his works; at which time the verfes on Mr. Craggs, which conclude the poem, were added, viz. in 1720.

As the third Epiftle treated of the extremes of avarice and profufion; and the fourth took up one particular branch of the latter, namely, the vanity of expence in people of wealth and quality, and was therefore a corollary to the third; fo this treats of one circumftance of that vanity, as it appears in the common collectors of old coins; and is, therefore, a corollary to the fourth.

SEE the wild waste of all-devouring years!
How Rome her own fad fepulchre appears,
With nodding arches, broken temples spread!
The very tombs now vanish'd like their dead;
Imperial wonders rais'd on nations spoil'd, [toil'd:
Where mix'd with flaves the groaning martyr
Huge theatres, that now unpeopled woods,
Now drain'd a diftant country of her floods :
Fanes, which admiring gods with pride furvey;
Statues of men, fcarce lefs alive than they!
Some felt the filent stroke of mouldering age,
Some hoftile fury, fome religious rage.
Barbarian blindness, Chriftian zeal conspire,
And Papal piety, and Gothic fire.
Perhaps, by its own ruins fav'd from flame,
Some bury'd marble half preferves a name;
That name the learn'd with fierce difputes pursue,
And give to Titus old Vefpafian's due

ΙΟ

Ambition figh'd: the found in vain to trust The faithlefs column and the crumbling buft: 20 Huge moles, whose shadow ftretch'd from fhore to

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The medal, faithful to its charge of fame, Through climesand ages bears each form and name: In one thort view fubjected to our eye Gods, emperors heroes, fages, beauties, lie. With fharpen'd fight pale antiquaries pore, Th' infcription value, but the ruft adore.

40

This the blue varnish, that the green endears,
The facred ruft of twice ten hundred years!
To gain Pefcennius one employs his fchemes,
One grafps a Cecrops in ecstatic dreams.
Poor Vadius, long with learned spleen devour'd,
Can tafte no pleasure fince his fhield was fcour'd:
And Curio, reftlefs by the fair-one's fide,
Sighs for an Otho, and neglects his bride.

Theirs is the vanity, the learning thine:
Touch'd by thy hand, again Rome's glories fhine:
Her gods and godlike heroes rile to view,
And all her faded garlands bloom anew.
Nor blush, thefe ftudies thy regard engage;
Thefe pleas'd the fathers of poetic rage:
The verse and sculpture bore an equal part,
And art reflected images to art.

50

In living medals fee her wars enroll'd,
And vanquish'd realms fupply recording gold?
Here, rifing bold, the patriot's honeft face;
There, warriors frowning in hiftoric brass:
Then future ages with delight fhall fee
How Plato's, Bacon's, Newton's looks agree; 60
Or in fair feries laurel'd bards be shown,
A Virgil there, and here an Addifon.
Then fhall thy Craggs (and let me call him mine)
On the caft ore, another Pollio, fhine:
With afpect open fhall erect his head,
And round the orb in lafting notes be read,
“Statesman, yet friend to truth! of foul fincere,
"In action faithful, and in honour clear;
"Who broke no promife, ferv'd no private end,
"Who gain'd no title, and who lost no friend; 70

Oh, when shall Britain, confcious of her claim," Ennobled by himself, by all approv'd,
Stand emulous of Greek and Roman fame?

“And prais'd, unenvy'd, by the muse he lov’d”

EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT:.

BEING THE

PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES.

Advertisement to the firft Publication of this Epifle.

THIS paper is a fort of bill of complaint, begun many years fince, and drawn up by fnatches, as the feveral occafions offered. I had no thoughts of publishing it, till it pleased fome perfons of rank and fortune [the authors of verses to the imitator of Horace, and of an epistle to a Doctor of Divinity from a nobleman at Hampton-Court] to attack, in a very extraordinary manner, not only my writings (of which, being public, the public is judge) but my perfon, morals, and family, whereof, to those who know me not, a truer information may be requifite. Being divided between the neceflity to fay fomething of myself, and my own laziness to undertake so aukward a task, I thought it the shortest way to put the laft hand to this epiftle. If it have any thing pleasing, it will be that by which I am most defirous to please, the truth and the sentiment; and if any thing offenfive, it will be only to those I am leaft forry to offend, the vicious or the ungenerous. Many will know their own pictures in it, there being not a circumstance but what is true: but I have, for the most part, spared their names; and they may escape being laughed at, if they please. I would have some of them to know, it was owing to the request of the learned and candid friend to whom it is inscribed, that I make not as free use of theirs as they have done of mine. However, I shall have this advantage and honour on my fide, that whereas, by their proceeding, any abuse may be directed at any man, no injury can possibly be done by mine, fince a nameless character can never be found out, but by its truth and likeness.

P. SHUT, fhut the door, good John! fatigu'd I said,
Tie up the knocker, say I'm fick, I'm dead.
The dog-itar rages! nay, 'tis past a doubt,
All Bedlam, or Parnaffus, is let out:
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand,
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.
What walls can guard me, or what shades can
hide?

They pierce my thickets, through my grot they glide.
By land, by water, they renew the charge;
They ftop the chariot, and they board the barge. 10
No place is facred, not the church is free,
Ev'n Sunday fhines no Sabbath day to me;
Then from the mint walks forth the man of rhyme,
Happy to catch me, just at dinner-time.

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