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Above, below, without, within, around,
Confus'd, unnumber'd multitudes are found,
Who pass, repass, advance, and glide away,
Hosts rais'd by fear, and phantoms of a day :
Astrologers, that future fates foreshew,
Projectors, quacks, and lawyers not a few;
And priests, and party zealots, numerous bands,
With home-born lies, or tales from foreign lands;
Each talk'd aloud, or in some secret place,
And wild impatience star'd in every face.
The flying rumours gather'd as they roll❜d,
Scarce any tale was sooner heard than told;
And all who told it added something new,
And all who heard it made enlargements too;
In every ear it spread, on every tongue it grew..
Thus flying east and west, and north and south,
News travell'd with increase from mouth to mouth.
So from a spark, that kindled first by chance,
With gathering force the quickening flames advance;
Till to the clouds their curling heads aspire,
And towers and temples sink in floods of fire.
When thus ripe lies are to perfection sprung,
Full grown, and fit to grace a mortal tongue,
Through thousand vents, impatient, forth they flow,
And rush in millions on the world below:

Fame sits aloft, and points them out their course,
Their date determines, and prescribes their force;
Some to remain, and some to perish soon,
Or wane and wax alternate like the moon.
Around a thousand winged wonders fly,

Borne by the trumpet's blast, and scatter'd through the sky.

There, at one passage, oft you might survey
A lie and truth contending for the way;

And long 'twas doubtful, both so closely pent,
Which first should issue through the narrow vent;
At last agreed, together out they fly,
Inseparable now the truth and lie:

The strict companions are for ever join'd,

And this or that, unmix'd, no mortal e'er shall find.
While thus I stood, intent to see and hear,
One came, methought, and whisper'd in my ear:
'What could thus high thy rash ambition raise ?
Art thou, fond youth, a candidate for praise?'

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'Tis true, (said I) not void of hopes I came,
For who so fond as youthful bards of fame?
But few, alas! the casual blessing boast,
So hard to gain, so easy to be lost.

How vain that second life in others' breath,
The' estate which wits inherit after death!
Ease, health, and life, for this they must resign,
(Unsure the tenure, but how vast the fine!)
The great man's curse, without the gains, endure,
Be envied, wretched; and be flatter'd, poor;
All luckless wits their enemies profess'd,
And all successful, jealous friends at best.
Nor fame I slight, nor for her favours call;
She comes unlook'd for, if she comes at all.
But if the purchase costs so dear a price,
As soothing folly, or exalting vice;

Oh! if the Muse must flatter lawless sway,
And follow still where fortune leads the way;
Or if no basis bear my rising name,

But the fall'n ruins of another's fame;

Then teach me, Heav'n! to scorn the guilty bays,
Drive from my breast that wretched lust of praise;
Unblemish'd let me live, or die unknown :
Oh, grant an honest fame, or grant me none l'

EPISTLES.

סיני

ROBERT EARL OF OXFORD AND MOR TIMER.*

SUCH were the notes thy once-lov'd poet sung, Till death untimely stopp'd his tuneful tongue. Oh, just beheld and lost! admir'd and mourn'd! With softest manners, gentlest arts, adorn'd! Bless'd in each science! bless'd in every strain' Dear to the Muse! to Harley dear-in vain!

For him thou oft hast bid the world attend.
Fond to forget the statesman in the friend;
For Swift and him despis'd the farce of state,
The sober follies of the wise and great;
Dextrous the craving, fawning crowd, to quit,
And pleas'd to 'scape from flattery to wit.

Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear,
(A sigh the absent claims, the dead a tear)
Recal those nights that clos'd thy toilsome days,
Still hear thy Parnell in his living lays;
Who, careless now of interest, fame, or fate,
Perhaps forgets that Oxford e'er was great;
Or deeming meanest what we greatest call,
Beholds thee glorious only in thy fall.

Sent to the Earl of Oxford with Dr. Parnell's Poems, published by our author after the Earl's imprisonment in the Tower and retreat into the country, in the year 1721.

And sure if aught below the seats divine
Can touch immortals, 'tis a soul like thine;
A soul supreme, in each hard instance tried,
Above-all pain, all passion, and all pride,
The rage of power, the blast of public breath,
The lust of lucre, and the dread of death.

In vain to deserts thy retreat is made, The Muse attends thee to thy silent shade: 'Tis her's the brave man's latest steps to trace, Rejudge his acts, and dignify disgrace. When interest calls off all her sneaking train, And all the' oblig'd desert, and all the vain, She waits, or to the scaffold or the cell, When the last lingering friend has bid farewell. Ev'n now she shades thy evening walk with bays; (No hireling she, no prostitute to praise) Ev'n now, observant of the parting ray, Eyes the calm sunset of thy various day, Through fortune's cloud one truly great can see, Nor fears to tell that Mortimer is he.

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A SOUL, as full of worth as void of pride,
Which nothing seeks to show, or needs to hide,
Which nor to guilt nor fear its caution owes,
And boasts a warmth that from no passion flows.
A face untaught to feign; a judging eye,
That darts severe upon a rising lie,

And strikes a blush through frontless flattery.

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All this thou wert; and being this before,
Know kings and fortune cannot make thee more.
Then scorn to gain a friend by servile ways,
Nor wish to lose a foe these virtues raise;
But candid, free, sincere, as you began,
Proceed-a minister, but still a man.
Be not (exalted to whate'er degree)
Asham'd of any friend, not ev❜n of me:
The patriot's plain but untrod path pursue;
If not, 'tis I must be ashamed of you.

то

MR. JERVAS,

WITH MR. DRYDEN'S TRANSLATION OF FRESNOY's ART OF PAINTING.*

THIS verse be thine, my friend! nor thou refuse
This from no venal or ungrateful Muse.

Whether thy hand strike out some free design,
Where life awakes, and dawns at every line,
Or blend in beauteous tints the colour'd mass,
And from the canvass call the mimic face;
Read these instructive leaves, in which conspire
Fresnoy's close art and Dryden's native fire;
And reading wish, like theirs, our fate and fame,
So mix'd our studies, and so join’d our name;
Like them to shine through long succeeding age,
So just thy skill, so regular my rage.

Smit with the love of sister arts we came,
And met congenial, mingling flame with flame;

This epistle, and the two following, were written some years before the rest, and originally printed in 1717.

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