And cards are dealt, and chess-boards
brought,

To ease the pain of coward thought:
Happy result of human wit!

That Alma may herself forget.

Dick, thus we act; and thus we are,
Or tossed by hope, or sunk by care.
With endless pain this man pursues
What, if he gained, he could not use:
And th' other fondly hopes to see
What never was, nor e'er shall be.
We err by use, go wrong by rules,
In gesture grave, in action fools;
We join hypocrisy to pride,
Doubling the faults we strive to hide.
Or grant that, with extreme surprise,
We find ourselves at sixty wise;
And twenty pretty things are known,
Of which we can't accomplish one;
Whilst, as my system says, the mind.
Is to these upper rooms confined:
Should I, my friend, at large repeat
Her borrowed sense, her fond conceit,
The bead-roll of her vicious tricks,
My poem will be too prolix.
For could I my remarks sustain,
Like Socrates, or Miles Montaigne,
Who in these times would read my books,
But Tom o' Stiles, or John o' Nokes?

As Brentford kings, discreet and wise,
After long thought and grave advice,
Into Lardella's coffin peeping,
Saw nought to cause their mirth or
weeping;

1558

1570

1580

So Alma, now to joy or grief
Superior, finds her late relief;
Wearied of being high or great,
And nodding in her chair of state;
Stunned and worn out with endless chat
Of Will did this, and Nan said that;
She finds, poor thing, some little crack,
Which Nature, forced by Time, must make,
Through which she wings her destined

way;

Upward she soars; and down drops clay:
While some surviving friend supplies
Hic jacet, and a hundred lies.

O Richard, till that day appears,

Which must decide our hopes and fears,
Would fortune calm her present rage,
And give us playthings for our age;
Would Clotho wash her hands in milk,
And twist our thread with gold and silk;
Would she, in friendship, peace, and plenty
Spin out our years to four times twenty;
And should we both in this condition
Have conquered love, and worse ambition;
(Else those two passions, by the way,
May chance to show us scurvy play);
Then, Richard, then should we sit down,
Far from the tumult of this town;
I fond of my well-chosen seat,
My pictures, medals, books complete.
Or, should we mix our friendly talk,
O'ershaded in that favourite walk,

1590

1600

1610

Which thy own hand had whilom planted, 1620 Both pleased with all we thought we

wanted;

Yet then, even then, one cross reflection
Would spoil thy grove, and my collection.
Thy son, and his, ere that may die,
And Time some uncouth heir supply,
Who shall for nothing else be known
But spoiling all that thou hast done.
Who set the twigs, shall he remember
That is in haste to sell the timber;
And what shall of thy woods remain,
Except the box that threw the main!
Nay, may not Time and Death remove
The near relations whom I love;

And my coz Tom, or his coz Mary,
(Who hold the plough, or skim the dairy)
My favourite books and pictures sell
To Smart, or Doiley, by the ell;
Kindly throw in a little figure,
And set the price upon the bigger!

Those who could never read the grammar,

When my dear volumes touch the hammer,
May think books best, as richest bound;
My copper medals by the pound
May be with learned justice weighed;
To turn the balance, Otho's head
May be thrown in; and for the metal,

The coin may mend a tinker's kettle.

1622

1630

1640

1650

Tired with these thoughts-Less tired than I, Quoth Dick, with your philosophyThat people live and die, I knew An hour ago, as well as you. And, if Fate spins us longer years, Or is in haste to take the shears, I know we must both fortunes try, And bear our evils, wet or dry.

Yet, let the goddess smile or frown,
Bread we shall eat, or white or brown;
And in a cottage, or a court,

Drink fine champaigne or muddled port.
What need of books these truths to tell,
Which folks perceive who cannot spell?
And must we spectacles apply,

To view what hurts our naked eye!
Sir, if it be your wisdom's aim
To make me merrier than I am;

I'll be all night at your devotion—

Come on, friend; broach the pleasing notion:
But, if you would depress my thought,
Your system is not worth a groat.

For Plato's fancies what care I!
I hope you would not have me die,
Like simple Cato, in the play,
For anything that he can say;
Even let him of ideas speak
To heathens in his native Greek.
If to be sad is to be wise,
I do most heartily despise
Whatever Socrates has said,
Or Tully writ, or Wanley 1 read.

1

Dear Drift,2 to set our matters right,
Remove these papers from my sight;
Burn Mat's Descartes and Aristotle:
Here! Jonathan, your master's bottle.

1656

1670

1680

1 Humphrey Wanley, librarian to the Earl of Oxford, author of the 'Wonders of the Little World.'-2 Mr Prior's Secretary and Executor.

Siquis Deus mihi largiatur, ut ex hac ætate repuersscam, et in cunis vagiam, valde Cic. de Senect.

recusem.

The bewailing of man's miseries hath been elegantly and copiously set forth by many, in the writings as well of philosophers, as of divines. And it is both a pleasant and a profitable contemplation. Lord Bacon's Advancement of Learning.

THE PREFACE.

Ir is hard for a man to speak of himself with any tolerable satisfaction or success. He can be no more pleased in blaming himself, than in reading a satire made on him by another; and though he may justly desire that a friend should praise him, yet, if he makes his own panegyric, he will get very few to read it. It is harder for him to speak of his own writings. An author is in the condition of a culprit; the public are his judges. By allowing too much, and condescending too far, he may injure his own cause, and become a kind of felo de se; and by pleading and asserting too boldly, he may displease the court that sits upon him: his apology may only heighten his accusation. I would avoid those extremes; and though I grant it would not be very civil to trouble the reader with a long preface, before he enters upon an indifferent poem, I would say something to persuade him to take it as it is, or to excuse it for not being better.

The noble images and reflections, the profound reasonings upon human actions, and excellent precepts for the government of life, which are found in the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and other books, commonly attributed to Solomon, afford subjects for finer poems in every kind, than have, I think, yet appeared in the Greek, Latin, or any modern language. How far they were verse in their original, is a dissertation not to be entered into at present.

Out of this great treasure, which lies heaped up together, in a confused magnificence, above all order, I had a mind to collect and digest such observations, and apothegms, as most particularly tend to the proof of that great assertion, laid down in the beginning of the Ecclesiastes, ALL IS VANITY.

Upon the subject thus chosen, such various images present themselves to a writer's mind, that he must find it easier to judge what should be rejected, than what ought to be received. The difficulty lies in drawing and disposing; or (as painters term it) in grouping such a multitude of different objects, preserving still the justice and conformity of style and colouring, the simplex duntaxat et unum, which Horace prescribes, as requisite to make the whole picture beautiful and perfect.

As precept, however true in theory, or useful in practice, would be but dry and tedious in verse, especially if the recital be long, I found it necessary to form some story, and give a kind of body to the poem. Under what species it may be comprehended, whether didascalic or heroic, I leave to the judgment of the critics; desiring them to be favourable in their censure; and not solicitous what the poem is called, provided it may be accepted.