When gen'rals would their station keep,
Or turn their backs, in hearts of sheep.
In matters, whether small or great,
In private families or state,

As amongst us, the holy seer
Officiously would interfere,

With pious arts and rev'rend skill
Would bend lay bigots to his will,
Would help or injure foes or friends,
Just as it serv'd his private ends.
Whether in honest way of trade,
Traps for virginity were laid,
Or if, to make their party great,
Designs were form'd against the state,
Regardless of the common weal,

By int'rest led, which they call zeal,
Into the scale was always thrown
The will of Heav'n to back their own.
England, a happy land we know,
Where follies naturally grow;
Where without culture they arise,
And tow'r above the common size;
England a fortune-telling host,

As num'rous as the stars, could boast;
Matrons, who toss the cup, and see
The grounds of Fate in grounds of tea;
Who vers'd in ev'ry modest lore,
Can a lost maidenhead restore,
Or, if their pupils rather choose it,
Can show the readiest way to lose it;
Gipsies, who ev'ry ill can cure,
Except the ill of being poor;
Who charms"gainst love and agues sell,
Who can in henroost set a spell,
Prepar'd by arts, to them best known,
To catch all feet except their own;
Who as to fortune can unlock it,
As easily as pick a pocket;
Scotchmen who, in their country's right,
Possess the gift of second-sight,

Who (when their barren heaths they quit,
Sure argument of prudent wit,
Which reputation to maintain,
They never venture back again)
By lies prophetic heap up riches,
And boast the luxury of breeches.

Amongst the rest, in former years,
Campbell, illustrious name, appears,
Great hero of futurity,

Who, blind, could ev'ry thing foresee,
Who, dumb, could ev'ry thing foretel,
Who, Fate with equity to sell,
Always dealt out the will of Heaven
According to what price was given.

Of Scottish race, in Highlands born,
Possess'd with native pride and scorn,
He hither came, by custom led,

To curse the hands which gave him bread.
With want of truth, and want of sense,
Amply made up by impudence,
(A succedaneum, which we find
In common use with all mankind)
Caress'd and favour'd too by those,
Whose heart with patriot feelings glows;
Who foolishly, where'er dispers'd,
Still place their native country first;
(For Englishmen alone have sense
To give a stranger preference,
Whilst modest merit of their own
Is left in poverty to groan)

Campbell foretold just what he wou'd,
And left the stars to make it good;
On whom he had impress'd such awe,
His dictates current pass'd for law;
Submissive all his empire own'd:

No star durst smile, when Campbell frown'd.
This sage deceas'd, for all must die,
And Campbell's no more safe than I,
No more than I can guard the heart,
When Death shall hurl the fatal dart,
Succeeded ripe in art and years,
Another fav'rite of the spheres;
Another and another came,

Of equal skill, and equal fame ;
As white each wand, as black each gown,
As long each beard, as wise each frown;
In ev'ry thing so like, you 'd swear,
Campbell himself was sitting there.
To all the happy art was known,
To tell our fortunes, make their own.
Seated in garret, for you know,
The nearer to the stars we go,
The greater we esteem his art,

Fools curious flock'd from every part.
The rich, the poor, the maid, the married,
And those who could not walk, were carried.
The butler, hanging down his head,
By chamber-maid, or cook-maid led,
Inquires, if from his friend the Moon,
He has advice of pilfer'd spoon.

The court-bred woman of condition,
(Who, to approve her disposition
As much superior as her birth
To those compos'd of common earth,
With double spirit must engage
In ev'ry folly of the age)
The honourable arts would buy,
To pack the cards, and cog a die.

The hero (who for brawn and face
May claim right honomable pace
Amongst the chiefs of Butcher Bow,
Who might some thirty years ago,
If we may be allow'd to guess
At his employment by his dress,
Put medicines off from cart or stage,
The grand Toscano of the age,
Or might about the countries go,
High steward of a puppet show,
Steward and stewardship, most meet,
For all know puppets never eat;

Who would be thought (though, save the mark,
That point is something in the dark)
The man of honour, one like those
Renown'd in story, who lov'd blows
Fetter than victuals, and would fight,
Merely for sport, from morn to night;

Who treads, like Mavors firm, whose tongue

Is with the triple thunder hung;

Who cries to Fear-" Stand off-aloof"-
And talks as he were cannon-
n-proof;
Would be deem'd ready, when you list,
With sword and pistol, stick and fist,
Careless of points, balls, bruises, knocks,
At once to fence, fire, cudgel, box,
But at the same time bears about,
Within himself, some touch of doubt,

Of prudent doubt, which hints-that fame

Is nothing but an empty name;

That life is rightly understood

By all to be a real good;

That, even in a hero's heart,
Discretion is the better part;

That this same honour may be won,

And yet no kind of danger run,

Like Drugger comes, that magic pow'rs
May ascertain his lucky hours.
For at some hours the fickle dame
Whom Fortune properly we name,
Who ne'er considers wrong or right,
When wanted most plays least in sight,
And, like a modern court-bred jilt,
Leaves her chief fav'rites in a tilt.

Some hours there are, when from the heart
Courage into some other part,
No matter wherefore, makes retreat,
And fear usurps the vacant seat;
Whence planet-struck we often find.
Stuarts and Sackvilles of mankind.
Further he 'd know (and by his art
A conjuror can that impart)
Whether politer it is reckon'd
To have or not to have a second,
To drag the friends in, or alone
To make the danger all their own;
Whether repletion is not bad,
And fighters with full stomachs mad;
Whether before he seeks the plain,
It were not well to breathe a vein;
Whether a gentle salivation,
Consistently with reputation,
Might not of precious use be found,
Not to prevent indeed a wound,
But to prevent the consequence
Which oftentimes arises thence,

Those fevers, which the patient urge on
To gates of death, by help of surgeon;
Whether a wind at east or west
Is for green wounds accounted best ;
Whether (was he to choose) his mouth
Should point towards the north or south;
Whether more safely he might use,
On these occasions, pumps or shoes ;
Whether it better is to fight
By sun-shine, or by candle-light;
Or (lest a cunille should appear
Too mean to shine in such a sphere,
For who would of a candle tell
To light a hero into Hell,

And lest the Sun should partial rise
To dazzle one or t' other's eyes,
Or one or t' other's brains to scorch)
Might not dame Luna hold a torch?

These points with dignity discuss'd
And gravely fix'd, a task which must
Require no little time and pains,

To make our hearts friends with our brains,
The man of war would next engage
The kind assistance of the sage,
Some previous method to direct,
Which should make these of none effect.
Could he not, from the mystic school
Of Art, produce some sacred rule,
By which a knowledge might be got,
Whether men valiant were, or not,
So he that challenges might write
Only to those who would not fight?

Or could he not some way dispense,
By help of which (without offence

To Honour, whose nice nature 's such,
She scarce endures the slightest touch)

When he for want of t' other rule
Mistakes his man, and, like a fool,
With some vain fighting blade gets in,
He fairly may get out again?

Or, should some demon lay a scheme
To drive him to the last extreme,
So that he must confess his fears,
In mercy to his nose and ears,
And like a prudent recreant knight,
Rather do any thing than fight,
Could he not some expedient buy
To keep his shame from public eye?
For well he held, and men review,
Nine in ten hold the maxim too,
That Honour's like a maidenhead,
Which if in private brought to bed,
Is none the worse, but walks the town,
Ne'er lost, until the loss be known.

The parson too (for now and then
Parsons are just like other men,
And here and there a grave divine
Has passions such as your's or mine)
Burning with holy lust to know
When Fate preferment will bestow,
'Fraid of detection, not of sin,
With circumspection sneaking in
To conj'ror, as he does to whore,
Through some by-alley, or back-door,
With the same caution orthodox
Consults the stars, and gets a por.

The citizen, in fraud grown old,
Who knows no deity but gold,
Worn out, and gasping now for breath,
A medicine wants to keep off death;
Would know, if that he cannot have,
What coins are current in the grave;
If, when the stocks (which by his pow'r
Would rise or fall in half an hour,
For, though unthought of and unseen,
He work'd the springs behind the skrecu)
By his directions came about,
And rose to par, he should sell out;
Whether he safely might, or no,
Replace it in the funds below.

By all address'd, believ'd, and paid,
Many pursu'd the thriving trade,
And, great in reputation grown,
Successive held the magic throne.
Favour'd by ev'ry darling passion,
The love of novelty and fashion,
Ambition, av'rice, lust, and pride,
Riches pour'd in on ev'ry side.
But when the prudent laws thought fit
To curb this insolence of wit;
When senates wisely had provided,
Decreed, enacted, and decided,

That no such vile and upstart elves

Should have more knowledge than themselves;
When fines and penalties were laid
To stop the progress of the trade,
And stars no longer could dispense,
With honour, further influence,
And wizards (which must be confest
Was of more force than all the rest)
No certain way to tell had got,
Which were informers, and which not;
Affrighted sages were, perforce,
Oblig'd to steer some other course.
By various ways, these sons of chance
Their fortunes labour'd to advance,

Well knowing, by unerring rules,
Knaves starve not in the land of fools.
Some, with high titles and degrees,
Which wise men borrow when they please,
Without or trouble or expense,
Physicians instantly commence,
And proudly boast an equal skill
With those who claim the right to kill.
Others about the countries roam,
(For not one thought of going home)
With pistol and adopted leg
Prepar'd at once to rob or beg.

Some, the more subtle of their race,
(Who felt some touch of coward grace,
Who Tyburn to avoid had wit,
But never fear'd deserving it)
Came to their brother Smollet's aid,
And carried on the critic trade.

Attach'd to letters and the Muse,
Some verses wrote, and some wrote news;
Those each revolving month are seen,
The heroes of a Magazine;
These, ev'ry morning, great appear
In Ledger, or in Gazetteer;
Spreading the falsehoods of the day
By turns for Faden and for Say:
Like Swiss, their force is always laid
On that side where they best are paid.
Hence mighty prodigies arise,
And daily monsters strike our eyes;
Wonders, to propagate the trade,
More strange than ever Baker made,
Are hawk'd about from street to street,
And fools believe, whilst liars eat.
Now armies in the air engage,
To fright a superstitious age;
Now comets through the ether range,
In governments portending change,
Now rivers to the occan fly

So quick they leave their channels dry;
Now monstrous whales on Lambeth shore
Drink the Thames dry, and thirst for more;
And ev'ry now and then appears
An Irish savage numb'ring years
More than those happy sages cou'd,

Who drew their breath before the Flood.
Now, to the wonder of all people,
A church is left without a steeple ;
A steeple now is left in lurch,'
And mourns departure of the church,
Which, borne on wings of mighty wind,
Remov'd a furlong off we find.
Now, wrath on cattle to discharge,
Hailstones as deadly fall, and large
As those which were on Egypt sent,
At once their crime and punishment;
Or those which, as the prophet writes,
Fell on the necks of Amorites,
When, struck with wonder and amaze,
The Sun suspended, stay'd to gaze,
And, from her duty longer kept,
In Ajalon his sister slept.

But if such things no more engage
The taste of a politer age,
To help them out in time of need
Another Tofts must rabbits breed.
Fach pregnant female trembling hears,
And, overcome with spleen and fears,
Consults her faithful glass no more,
But madly bounding o'er the floor,

Feels hairs all o'er her body grow,
By Fancy turn'd into a doe.
Now to promote their private ends,
Nature her usual course suspends,
And varies from the stated plan,
Observ'd e'er since the world began.
Bodies (which foolishly we thought,
By Custom's servile maxims taught,
Needed a regular supply,

And without nourishment must die)
With craving appetites and sense
Of hunger easily dispense,
And, pliant to their wondrous skill,
Are taught, like watches, to stand still
Uninjur'd, for a month or more;
Then go on as they did before.
The novel takes, the tale succeeds,
Amply supplies its author's needs,
And Betty Canning is at least,

With Gascoyne's help, a six months' feast.
Whilst in contempt of all our pains,

The tyrant Superstition reigns
Imperious in the heart of man,

And warps his thoughts from Nature's plan :
Whilst fond Credulity who ne'er

The weight of wholesome doubts could bear,
To Reason and herself unjust,
Takes all things blindly upon trust;
Whilst Curiosity, whose rage

No mercy shows to sex or age,
Must be indulg'd at the expense
Of judgment, truth, and common-sense;
Impostures cannot but prevail,
And when old miracles grow stale,
Jugglers will still the art pursue,
And entertain the world with new.

For them, obedient to their will,
And trembling at their mighty skill,
Sad spirits, summon'd from the tomb,
Glide glaring ghastly through the gloom,
In all the usual pomp of storms,
In horrid customary forms,
A wolf, a bear, a horse, an ape,
As Fear and Fancy give them shape,
Tormented with despair and pain,
They roar, they yell, and ciank the chain.
Folly and Guilt (for Guilt, howe'er
The face of Courage it may wear,
Is still a coward at the heart)
At fear-created phantoms start.
The priest, that very word implies
That he's both innocent and wise,
Yet fears to travel in the dark,
Unless escorted by his clerk.

But let not ev'ry bungler deem
Too lightly of so deep a scheme:
For reputation of the art,

Each ghost must act a proper part,
Observe decorum's needful grace,
And keep the laws of time and place.
Must change, with happy variation,
His manners with his situation;
What in the country might pass down,
Would be impertinent in town.
No spirit of discretion here

Can think of breeding awe and fear,
"Twill serve the purpose more by half
To make the congregation laugh.
We want no ensigns of surprise,
Locks still with gore, and saucer eyes;

A SACRED Standard rule we find,
By poets held time out of mind,
To offer at Apollo's shrine,
And call on one, or all the Nine.

This custom, through a bigot zeal,
Which moderns of fine taste must feel
For those who wrote in days of yore,
Adopted stands like many more,
Though ev'ry cause, which then conspir'd
To make it practis'd and admir'd,
Yielding to Time's destructive course,
For ages past hath lost its force.

With ancient bards, an invocation
Was a true act of adoration,
Of worship an essential part,
And not a formal piece of art,
Of paltry reading a parade,
A dull solemnity in trade,
A pions fever, taught to burn
An hour or two, to serve a turn.

They talk'd not of Castalian springs,
By way of saying pretty things,
As we dress out our flinsy rhymes;
'Twas the religion of the times,
And they believ'd that holy stream
With greater force made Fancy teem,
Reckon'd by all a true specific

To make the barren brain prolific:

Thus Romish church (a scheme which bears
Not half so much excuse as theirs)
Since faith implicitly hath taught her,
Reveres the force of holy water.

The pagan system, whether true

Or false, its strength, like buildings, drew
From many parts dispos'd to bear,
In one great whole, their proper share.
Each god of eminent degree

To some vast beam compar'd might be ;
Each godling was a peg, or rather
A cramp, to keep the beams together;
And man as safely might pretend
From Jove the thunder-bolt to rend,
As with an impious pride aspire
To rob Apollo of his lyre.

With settled faith and pions awe,
Establish'd by the voice of law,
Then poets to the Muses came,

And from their altars caught the flame.
Genius, with Phoebus for his guide,
The Muse ascending by his side,
With tow'ring pinions day'd to soar,
Where eye could scarcely stra u before.

But why should we, who cannot feel
These glowings of a pagan zeal,
That wild enthusiastic force,

By which, above her common course,
Nature, in ecstasy up-borne,
Look'd down on earthly things with scorn;
Who have no more regard, 'tis known,

For their religion than our own,
And feel not half so fierce a flame

At Clio's as at Fisher's name;
Who know these boasted sacred streams
Were mere romantic idle dreams,

That Thames has waters clear as those
Which on the top of Pindus rose,
And that the fancy to refine,
Water 's not half so good as wine;
Who know, if profit strikes our eye,
Should we drink Helicon quite dry,
Th' whole fountain would not thither lead
So soon as one poor jug from Tweed;
Who, if to raise poetic fire,
The pow'r of beauty we require,
In any public place can view

More than the Grecians ever knew;
If it into the scale is thrown,
Can boast a Lennox of our own;
Why should we servile customs choose,

And court an antiquated Muse?
No matter why-to ask a reason,
In pedant bigotry is treason.

In the broad, beaten, turnpike-road
Of hackney'd panegyrie ode,
No modern poet dares to ride
Without Apollo by his side,
Nor in a sonnet take the air,
Unless his baddy Muse be there.
She, from some amaranthine grove,
Where little Loves and Graces rove,
The laurel to my lord must bear,

Or garlands make for whores to wear;
She, with soft elegiac verse,

Must grace some mighty villain's hearse;
Or for some infant, doom'd by Fate

To wallow in a large estate,
With rhymes the cradle inust adorn,
To tell the world a fool is born.

Since then our critic lords expect
No hardy poet should reject
Establish'd maxims, or presume
To place much better in their room,
By nature fearful, I submit,
And in this dearth of sense and wit,
With nothing done, and little said,
(By wild excursive Fancy led,
Into a second book thus far,
Like some unwary traveller,
Whom varied scenes of wood and law,
With treacherous delight, have drawn;
Deluded from his purpos'd way,
Whom ev'ry step leads more astray;
Who gazing round can no where spy,
Or house, or friendly cottage nigh,
And resolution seems to lack
To venture forward or go back)
Invoke some goddess to descend,
And help me to my journey's end.
Though conscious Arrow all the while
Hears the petition with a smile,
Before the glass her charms unfolds,
And in her my A se beholds.

Truth, goddess of celestial birth,
But little lov'd, or known on Earth,
Whose pow'r but seldoin rules the heart,
Whose name, with hypocritic art,
An errant stalking-horse is made,
A snug pretence to drive a trade,
An instrument convenient grown

To plant, more firmly, Falsehood's throne,
As rebels varnish o'er their cause
With specious colouring of laws,
And pious traitors draw the knife
In the king's name against his life;
Whether (from cities far away,

Where fraud and falsehood scorn thy sway)
The faithful nymph's and shepherd's pride,
With Love and Virtue by thy side,
Your hours in harmless joys are spent
Amongst the children of Content;
Or, fond of gaiety and sport,

You tread the round of England's court;
Howe'er my lord may frowning go,
And treat the stranger as a foe,
Sure to be found a welcome guest
In George's and in Charlotte's breast;
If, in the giddy hours of youth,
My constant soul adher'd to Truth;
If, from the time I first wrote man,
I still pursu'd thy sacred plan,
Tempted by interest in vain

To wear mean Falsehood's golden chain;

If, for a season drawn away,
Starting from Virtue's path astray,
All low disguise I scorn'd to try,
And dar'd to sin, but not to lie;
Hither, O hither, condescend,
Eternal Truth, thy steps to bend,
And favour him, who ev'ry hour
Confesses and obeys thy pow'r!

But come not with that easy mien,
By which you won the lively dean,
Nor yet assume that strumpet air,
Which Rabelais taught thee first to wear,
Nor yet that arch ambiguous face,
Which with Cervantes gave thee grace,
But come in sacred vesture clad,
Solemnly dull, and truly sad!

Far from thy seemly matron train
Be ideot Mirth, and Laughter vain!
For Wit and Humour, which pretend
At once to please us and amend,
They are not for my present turn,
Let them remain in France with Sterne.
Of noblest city parents born,
Whom wealth and dignities adorn,
Who still one constant tenour keep,
Not quite awake, nor quite asleep,
With thee, let formal Duliness come,
And deep Attention, ever dumb,
Who on her lips her fingers lays,
Whilst every circumstance she weighs,
Whose down-cast eye is often found
Bent without motion to the ground,
Or, to some outward thing confin'd,
Remits no image to the mind,
No pregnant mark of meaning bears,
But stupid without vision stares;
Thy steps let Gravity attend,

Wisdom's and Truth's unerring friend.
For one may see with half an eye,
That Gravity can never lie;

And his arch'd brow, pull'd o'er his eyes,
With solemn proof proclaims him wise.
Free from all waggeres and sports,
The produce of luxurious courts,
Where sloth and lust enervate youth,
Come thou, a downright City-Truth;
The city, which we ever find
A sober pattern for mankind;
Where man, in equilibrio hung,
Is seldom old, and never young,
And from the cradle to the grave,
Not Virtue's friend, nor Vice's slave;
As dancers on the tire we spy,
Hanging between the Earth and Sky.
She comes-I see her from afar
Bending her course to Temple Bar:
All sage and silent is her train,
Deportment grave, and garments plain,
Such as may suit a parson's wear,
And fit the head-piece of a mayor.

By Truth inspir'd, our Bacon's force
Open'd the way to Learning's source;
Boyle through the works of Nature ran
And Newton, something more than man,
Div'd into Nature's hidden springs,
Laid bare the principles of things,
Above the Earth our spirits bore,
And gave us worlds unknown before.
By Truth inspir'd, when Lauder's spite
O'er Milton cast the veil of night,
Douglas arose, and through the maze
Of intricate and winding ways,
Came where the subtle traitor lay,
And dragg'd him trembling to the day;
Whilst he, (O shame to noblest parts,
Dishonour to the lib'ral arts,
To traffic in so vile a scheme ')
Whilst he, our letter'd Polypheme,
Who had confed'rate forces join'd,
Like a base coward, skulk'd behind.
By Truth inspir'd, our critics go
To track Fingal in Highland snow,
To form their own and others' creed
From manuscripts they cannot read.
By Truth inspir'd, we numbers see
Of each profession and degree,
Gentle and simple, lord and cit,

Wit without wealth, wealth without wit,
When Punch and Sheridan have done,
To Fanny's ghostly lectures run.
By Truth and Fanny now inspir'd,

I feel my glowing bosom fir'd;
Desire beats high in ev'ry vein
To sing the spirit of Cock Lane;
To tell (just as the measure flows
Iu balting rhyme, half verse, half prose)
With more than mortal arts endu'd,
How she united force withstood,
And proudly gave a brave defiance
To it and Dulness in alliance.

This apparition (with relation
To ancient modes of derivation,
This we may properly so call,
Although it ne'er appears at all,
As by the way of innuendo,
Lucus is made à non lucendo)
Superior to the vulgar mode,
Nobly disdains that servile road,
Which coward ghosts, as it appears,
Have walk'd in full five thousand years,