Two good eftates fir Harry Clodpole spent ;:
Sate thrice, but spoke not once, in parliament;
Two good estates are gone-Who'll take his word ?
Oh! fhould his uncle die, he'd spend a third;
He'd buy a houfe his happiness to crown,
Within a mile of fome good borough-town;
Tag, rag, and bobtail to fir Harry's run,
Men that have votes, and women that have none;
Sons, daughters, grandfons, with his honour dine;
He keeps a public-house without a fign.
Coblers and fmiths extol th' enfuing choice,
And drunken taylors boaft their right of voice.
Dearly the free-born neighbourhood is bought,
They never leave him while he's worth a groat:
So leeches stick, nor quit the bleeding wound,
'Till off they drop with skinfuls to the ground,
Of Mr. Pope's on that Subject.
Hoe'er he be that to a Tafte afpires,
Let him read this, and be what he defires.
In men and manners vers'd, from life I write,
Not what was once, but what is now polite.
Those who of courtly France have made the tour,
Can fcarce our English aukwardness endure.
But honeft men who never were abroad,
Like England only, and its Tafte applaud.
Strife ftill fubfifts, which yields the better goût;
Books or the world, the many or the few.
True Tafte to me is by this touchstone known,
That's always best that's nearest to my own.
To fhew that my pretenfions are not vain,
My father was a play'r in Drury-lane.
Pears and pistachio-nuts my mother fold,
He a dramatic poet, the a fcold.
His tragic Mufe could counteffes affright,
His wit in boxes was my lord's delight.
No mercenary prieft e'er join'd their hands,
Uncramp'd by wedlock's unpoetic bands.
Laws my Pindaric parents matter'd not,
So I was tragi-comically got.
My infant tears a fort of meafure kept,
I fquall'd in diftichs, and in triplets wept.
No youth did I in education waste,
Happy in an hereditary Tate.
Writing ne'er cramp'd the finews of my thumb,
Nor barbarous birch e'er bruth'd my tender bum.
My guts ne'er fuffer'd from à college cook,
My name ne'er enter'd in a buttery-book.
Grammar in vain the fons of Prifcian teach,
Good parts are better than eight parts of speech:
Since these declin'd, thofe undeclin'd they call,
I thank my stars, that I declin'd them all.
To Greek or Latin tongues without pretence,
I trust to mother wit and father fenfe.
Nature's my guide, all sciences I fcorn,
Pains I abhor, I was a poet born.
Yet is my goût for criticism such,
I've got fome French, and know a little Dutch.
Huge commentators grace my learned shelves,
Notes upon books out-do the books themselves.
Critics indeed are valuable men, by
But hyper-critics are as good agen..
Though Blackmore's a works my foul with raptures fill,
With notes by Bentley they'd be better ftill.ĐÊ
The Boghouse-Mifcellany's well defign'd,
To ease the body, and improve the mind. qd bygn
Swift's whims and jokes for my refentment call,
For he difpleases me that pleases all.
Verse without rhyme I never could endure, son selleks
Uncouth in numbers, and in sense obscure,
To him as nature, when he ceas'd to fee,
Milton's an univerfal blank to me.
Confirm'd and fettled by the nation's voice,
Rhyme is the poet's pride, and people's choice.s
Always upheld by national fupport,
Of market, univerfity, and court:
Thomson, write blank; but know that for that reafon,
Thefe lines fhall live when thine are out of feafon,
Rhyme binds and beautifies the poet's lays,
As London ladies owe their fhape to stays.
Had Cibber's felf the Careless Hufband wrote, $3 He for the laurel ne'er had had my vote :
a Sir Richard Blackmore, author of King Arthur, Prince Arthur, and other Epic Poems.
An infamous publication, which appeared juft before this Poem was printed.
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