BUT in her temple’s last recess inclosed, | |
| On Dulness’ lap th’ anointed head reposed. | |
| Him close she curtains round with vapours blue, | |
| And soft besprinkles with Cimmerian dew: | |
| Then raptures high the seat of Sense o’erflow, | 5 |
| Which only heads refin’d from Reason know. | |
| Hence from the straw where Bedlam’s prophet nods, | |
| He hears loud oracles, and talks with Gods; | |
| Hence the fool’s paradise, the statesman’s scheme, | |
| The air-built castle, and the golden dream, | 10 |
| The maid’s romantic wish, the chymist’s flame, | |
| And poet’s vision of eternal Fame. | |
| And now, on Fancy’s easy wing convey’d, | |
| The king descending views th’ Elysian shade. | |
| A slipshod Sibyl led his steps along, | 15 |
| In lofty madness meditating song; | |
| Her tresses staring from poetic dreams, | |
| And never wash’d but in Castalia’s streams. | |
| Taylor, their better Charon, lends an oar | |
| (Once swan of Thames, tho’ now he sings no more); | 20 |
| Benlowes, propitious still to blockheads, bows; | |
| And Shadwell nods, the poppy on his brows. | |
| Here in a dusky vale, where Lethe rolls, | |
| Old Bavius sits to dip poetic souls, | |
| And blunt the sense, and fit it for a skull | 25 |
| Of solid proof, impenetrably dull. | |
| Instant, when dipt, away they wing their flight, | |
| Where Browne and Mears unbar the gates of light, | |
| Demand new bodies, and in calf’s array | |
| Rush to the world, impatient for the day. | 30 |
| Millions and millions on these banks he views, | |
| Thick as the stars of night or morning dews, | |
| As thick as bees o’er vernal blossoms fly, | |
| As thick as eggs at Ward in pillory. | |
| Wond’ring he gazed: when, lo! a Sage appears, | 35 |
| By his broad shoulders known, and length of ears, | |
| Known by the band and suit which Settle wore | |
| (His only suit) for twice three years before: | |
| All as the vest, appear’d the wearer’s frame, | |
| Old in new state—another, yet the same. | 40 |
| Bland and familiar, as in life, begun | |
| Thus the great father to the greater son: | |
| ‘Oh! born to see what none can see awake, | |
| Behold the wonders of th’ oblivious lake! | |
| Thou, yet unborn, hast touch’d this sacred shore; | 45 |
| The hand of Bavius drench’d thee o’er and o’er. | |
| But blind to former as to future fate, | |
| What mortal knows his preëxistent state? | |
| Who knows how long thy transmigrating soul | |
| Might from Bœotian to Bœotian roll? | 50 |
| How many Dutchmen she vouchsafed to thrid? | |
| How many stages thro’ old monks she rid? | |
| And all who since, in mild benighted days, | |
| Mix’d the Owl’s ivy with the Poet’s bays? | |
| As man’s mæanders to the vital spring | 55 |
| Roll all their tides, then back their circles bring; | |
| Or whirligigs, twirl’d round by skilful swain, | |
| Suck the thread in, then yield it out again; | |
| All nonsense thus, of old or modern date, | |
| Shall in thee centre, from thee circulate. | 60 |
| For this our Queen unfolds to vision true | |
| Thy mental eye, for thou hast much to view: | |
| Old scenes of glory, times long cast behind, | |
| Shall, first recall’d, rush forward to thy mind: | |
| Then stretch thy sight o’er all her rising reign, | 65 |
| And let the past and future fire thy brain. | |
| ‘Ascend this hill, whose cloudy point commands | |
| Her boundless empire over seas and lands. | |
| See, round the poles where keener spangles shine, | |
| Where spices smoke beneath the burning Line | 70 |
| (Earth’s wide extremes), her sable flag display’d, | |
| And all the nations cover’d in her shade! | |
| ‘Far eastward cast thine eye, from whence the sun | |
| And orient Science their bright course begun: | |
| One godlike monarch all that pride confounds, | 75 |
| He whose long wall the wand’ring Tartar bounds: | |
| Heav’ns! what a pile! whole ages perish there, | |
| And one bright blaze turns learning into air. | |
| ‘Thence to the south extend thy gladden’d eyes; | |
| There rival flames with equal glory rise; | 80 |
| From shelves to shelves see greedy Vulcan roll, | |
| And lick up all their physic of the soul. | |
| ‘How little, mark! that portion of the ball, | |
| Where, faint at best, the beams of Science fall: | |
| Soon as they dawn, from hyperborean skies | 85 |
| Embodied dark, what clouds of Vandals rise! | |
| Lo! where Mæotis sleeps, and hardly flows | |
| The freezing Tanais thro’ a waste of snows, | |
| The North by myriads pours her mighty sons, | |
| Great nurse of Goths, of Alans, and of Huns! | 90 |
| See Alaric’s stern port! the martial frame | |
| Of Genseric! and Attila’s dread name! | |
| See the bold Ostrogoths on Latium fall! | |
| See the fierce Visigoths on Spain and Gaul! | |
| See where the morning gilds the palmy shore | 95 |
| (The soil that arts and infant letters bore), | |
| His conqu’ring tribes th’ Arabian prophet draws, | |
| And saving Ignorance enthrones by laws! | |
| See Christians, Jews, one heavy sabbath keep, | |
| And all the western world believe and sleep! | 100 |
| ‘Lo! Rome herself, proud mistress now no more | |
| Of arts, but thund’ring against heathen lore; | |
| Her gray-hair’d synods damning books unread, | |
| And Bacon trembling for his brazen head. | |
| Padua, with sighs, beholds her Livy burn, | 105 |
| And ev’n th’ Antipodes Virgilius mourn. | |
| See the Cirque falls, th’ unpillar’d Temple nods, | |
| Streets paved with Heroes, Tiber choked with Gods; | |
| Till Peter’s keys some christen’d Jove adorn, | |
| And Pan to Moses lends his Pagan horn. | 110 |
| See graceless Venus to a virgin turn’d, | |
| Or Phidias broken, and Apelles burn’d! | |
| ‘Behold yon isle, by Palmers, Pilgrims trod, | |
| Men bearded, bald, cowl’d, uncowl’d, shod, unshod, | |
| Peel’d, patch’d, and piebald, linsey-woolsey brothers, | 115 |
| Grave Mummers! sleeveless some and shirtless others. | |
| That once was Britain—Happy! had she seen | |
| No fiercer sons, had Easter never been. | |
| In peace, great Goddess, ever be ador’d; | |
| How keen the war, if Dulness draw the sword! | 120 |
| Thus visit not thy own! on this bless’d age | |
| O spread thy influence, but restrain thy rage. | |
| ‘And see, my son! the hour is on its way | |
| That lifts our Goddess to imperial sway; | |
| This fav’rite isle, long sever’d from her reign, | 125 |
| Dove-like, she gathers to her wings again. | |
| Now look thro’ Fate! behold the scene she draws! | |
| What aids, what armies, to assert her cause! | |
| See all her progeny, illustrious sight! | |
| Behold, and count them, as they rise to light. | 130 |
| As Berecynthia, while her offspring vie | |
| In homage to the mother of the sky, | |
| Surveys around her, in the bless’d abode, | |
| A hundred sons, and every son a God, | |
| Not with less glory mighty Dulness crown’d, | 135 |
| Shall take thro’ Grub-street her triumphant round, | |
| And her Parnassus glancing o’er at once, | |
| Behold a hundred sons, and each a Dunce. | |
| ‘Mark first that youth who takes the foremost place, | |
| And thrusts his person full into your face. | 140 |
| With all thy father’s virtues bless’d, be born! | |
| And a new Cibber shall the stage adorn. | |
| ‘A second see, by meeker manners known, | |
| And modest as the maid that sips alone; | |
| From the strong fate of drams if thou get free, | 145 |
| Another Durfey, Ward! shall sing in thee. | |
| Thee shall each alehouse, thee each gill-house mourn, | |
| And answering ginshops sourer sighs return. | |
| ‘Jacob, the scourge of grammar, mark with awe; | |
| Nor less revere him, blunderbuss of law. | 150 |
| Lo Popple’s brow, tremendous to the town, | |
| Horneck’s fierce eye, and Roome’s funereal frown. | |
| Lo sneering Goode, half malice and half whim, | |
| A fiend in glee, ridiculously grim. | |
| Each cygnet sweet, of Bath and Tunbridge race, | 155 |
| Whose tuneful whistling makes the waters pass: | |
| Each songster, riddler, ev’ry nameless name, | |
| All crowd, who foremost shall be damn’d to Fame. | |
| Some strain in rhyme: the Muses, on their racks, | |
| Scream like the winding of ten thousand jacks: | 160 |
| Some free from rhyme or reason, rule or check, | |
| Break Priscian’s head, and Pegasus’s neck; | |
| Down, down they larum, with impetuous whirl, | |
| The Pindars and the Miltons of a Curll. | |
| ‘Silence, ye wolves! while Ralph to Cynthia howls, | 165 |
| And makes night hideous—Answer him, ye owls! | |
| ‘Sense, speech, and measure, living tongues and dead, | |
| Let all give way—and Morris may be read. | |
| Flow, Welsted, flow! like thine inspirer, beer, | |
| Tho’ stale, not ripe, tho’ thin, yet never clear; | 170 |
| So sweetly mawkish, and so smoothly dull; | |
| Heady, not strong; o’erflowing, tho’ not full. | |
| Ah, Dennis! Gildon, ah! what ill-starr’d rage | |
| Divides a friendship long confirm’d by age? | |
| Blockheads with reason wicked wits abhor, | 175 |
| But fool with fool is barb’rous civil war. | |
| Embrace, embrace, my sons! be foes no more! | |
| Nor glad vile poets with true critics’ gore. | |
| ‘Behold yon pair, in strict embraces join’d; | |
| How like in manners, and how like in mind! | 180 |
| Equal in wit, and equally polite | |
| Shall this a Pasquin, that a Grumbler write; | |
| Like are their merits, like rewards they share, | |
| That shines a Consul, this Commissioner.’ | |
| ‘But who is he, in closet close y-pent, | 185 |
| Of sober face, with learned dust besprent? | |
| Right well mine eyes arede the myster wight, | |
| On parchment scraps y-fed and Wormius hight. | |
| To future ages may thy dulness last, | |
| As thou preserv’st the dulness of the past! | 190 |
| ‘There, dim in clouds, the poring scholiasts mark, | |
| Wits, who, like owls, see only in the dark, | |
| A lumberhouse of books in ev’ry head, | |
| For ever reading, never to be read! | |
| ‘But, where each science lifts its modern type, | 195 |
| Hist’ry her pot, Divinity her pipe, | |
| While proud Philosophy repines to show, | |
| Dishonest sight! his breeches rent below, | |
| Imbrown’d with native bronze, lo! Henley stands, | |
| Tuning his voice, and balancing his hands. | 200 |
| How fluent nonsense trickles from his tongue! | |
| How sweet the periods, neither said nor sung! | |
| Still break the benches, Henley! with thy strain, | |
| While Sherlock, Hare, and Gibson preach in vain. | |
| O great restorer of the good old stage, | 205 |
| Preacher at once, and Zany of thy age! | |
| O worthy thou of Egypt’s wise abodes, | |
| A decent priest where monkeys were the gods! | |
| But fate with butchers placed thy priestly stall, | |
| Meek modern faith to murder, hack, and maul; | 210 |
| And bade thee live, to crown Britannia’s praise, | |
| In Toland’s, Tindal’s, and in Woolston’s days. | |
| ‘Yet, oh, my sons! a father’s words attend | |
| (So may the Fates preserve the ears you lend): | |
| ’T is yours a Bacon or a Locke to blame, | 215 |
| A Newton’s genius, or a Milton’s flame: | |
| But, oh! with One, immortal One, dispense, | |
| The source of Newton’s light, of Bacon’s sense. | |
| Content, each emanation of his fires | |
| That beams on earth, each virtue he inspires, | 220 |
| Each art he prompts, each charm he can create, | |
| Whate’er he gives, are giv’n for you to hate. | |
| Persist, by all divine in man unawed, | |
| But learn, ye Dunces! not to scorn your God.’ | |
| Thus he, for then a ray of Reason stole | 225 |
| Half thro’ the solid darkness of his soul; | |
| But soon the cloud return’d—and thus the sire: | |
| ‘See now what Dulness and her sons admire! | |
| See what the charms that smite the simple heart, | |
| Not touch’d by Nature, and not reach’d by art.’ | 230 |
| His never-blushing head he turn’d aside | |
| (Not half so pleas’d when Goodman prophesied), | |
| And look’d, and saw a sable sorcerer rise, | |
| Swift to whose hand a winged volume flies: | |
| All sudden, Gorgons hiss, and Dragons glare, | 235 |
| And ten-horn’d Fiends and Giants rush to war; | |
| Hell rises, Heav’n descends, and dance on earth; | |
| Gods, imps, and monsters, music, rage, and mirth, | |
| A fire, a jig, a battle, and a ball, | |
| Till one wide conflagration swallows all. | 240 |
| Thence a new world, to Nature’s laws unknown, | |
| Breaks out refulgent, with a Heav’n its own: | |
| Another Cynthia her new journey runs, | |
| And other planets circle other suns. | |
| The forests dance, the rivers upward rise, | 245 |
| Whales sport in woods, and dolphins in the skies: | |
| And last, to give the whole creation grace, | |
| Lo! one vast egg produces human race. | |
| Joy fills his soul, joy innocent of thought: | |
| ‘What Power (he cries), what Power these wonders wrought?’ | 250 |
| ‘Son, what thou seek’st is in thee! look and find | |
| Each monster meets his likeness in thy mind. | |
| Yet would’st thou more? in yonder cloud behold, | |
| Whose sarsenet skirts are edged with flamy gold, | |
| A matchless youth! his nod these worlds controls, | 255 |
| Wings the red lightning, and the thunder rolls. | |
| Angel of Dulness, sent to scatter round | |
| Her magic charms o’er all unclassic ground, | |
| Yon stars, yon suns, he rears at pleasure higher, | |
| Illumes their light, and sets their flames on fire. | 260 |
| Immortal Rich! how calm he sits at ease, | |
| Midst snows of paper, and fierce hail of pease! | |
| And proud his mistress’ orders to perform, | |
| Rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm. | |
| ‘But lo! to dark encounter in mid air | 265 |
| New wizards rise; I see my Cibber there! | |
| Booth in his cloudy tabernacle shrined; | |
| On grinning dragons thou shalt mount the wind. | |
| Dire is the conflict, dismal is the din, | |
| Here shouts all Drury, there all Lincoln’s-inn; | 270 |
| Contending theatres our empire raise, | |
| Alike their labours, and alike their praise. | |
| ‘And are these wonders, Son, to thee unknown? | |
| Unknown to thee! these wonders are thy own. | |
| These Fate reserv’d to grace thy reign divine, | 275 |
| Foreseen by me, but ah! withheld from mine. | |
| In Lud’s old walls tho’ long I ruled renown’d, | |
| Far as loud Bow’s stupendous bells resound; | |
| Tho’ my own aldermen conferr’d the bays, | |
| To me committing their eternal praise, | 280 |
| Their full-fed heroes, their pacific mayors, | |
| Their annual trophies, and their monthly wars; | |
| Tho’ long my party built on me their hopes, | |
| For writing pamphlets, and for roasting Popes; | |
| Yet lo! in me what authors have to brag on! | 285 |
| Reduced at last to hiss in my own dragon. | |
| Avert it, Heav’n! that thou, my Cibber, e’er | |
| Shouldst wag a serpent-tail in Smithfield fair! | |
| Like the vile straw that ’s blown about the streets, | |
| The needy poet sticks to all he meets, | 290 |
| Coach’d, carted, trod upon, now loose, now fast, | |
| And carried off in some dog’s tail at last. | |
| Happier thy fortunes! like a rolling stone, | |
| Thy giddy dulness still shall lumber on; | |
| Safe in its heaviness, shall never stray, | 295 |
| But lick up every blockhead in the way. | |
| Thee shall the patriot, thee the courtier taste, | |
| And ev’ry year be duller than the last; | |
| Till raised from booths, to theatre, to Court, | |
| Her seat imperial Dulness shall transport. | 300 |
| Already Opera prepares the way, | |
| The sure forerunner of her gentle sway: | |
| Let her thy heart (next Drabs and Dice) engage, | |
| The third mad passion of thy doting age. | |
| Teach thou the warbling Polypheme to roar, | 305 |
| And scream thyself as none e’er scream’d before! | |
| To aid our cause, if Heav’n thou canst not bend, | |
| Hell thou shalt move; for Faustus is our friend: | |
| Pluto with Cato thou for this shalt join, | |
| And link the Mourning Bride to Proserpine, | 310 |
| Grub-street! thy fall should men and Gods conspire, | |
| Thy stage shall stand, insure it but from fire. | |
| Another Æschylus appears! prepare | |
| For new abortions, all ye pregnant fair! | |
| In flames like Semele’s, be brought to bed, | 315 |
| While opening Hell spouts wildfire at your head. | |
| ‘Now, Bavius, take the poppy from thy brow, | |
| And place it here! here, all ye heroes, bow! | |
| This, this is he foretold by ancient rhymes, | |
| Th’ Augustus born to bring Saturnian times. | 320 |
| Signs foll’wing signs lead on the mighty year! | |
| See the dull stars roll round and reappear! | |
| See, see, our own true Phœbus wears the bays! | |
| Our Midas sits Lord Chancellor of plays! | |
| On poets’ tombs see Benson’s titles writ! | 325 |
| Lo! Ambrose Philips is preferr’d for wit! | |
| See under Ripley rise a new Whitehall, | |
| While Jones’ and Boyle’s united labours fall; | |
| While Wren with sorrow to the grave descends, | |
| Gay dies unpension’d with a hundred friends, | 330 |
| Hibernian politics, O Swift! thy fate, | |
| And Pope’s, ten years to comment and translate! | |
| ‘Proceed, great days! till learning fly the shore, | |
| Till birch shall blush with noble blood no more; | |
| Till Thames see Eton’s sons for ever play, | 335 |
| Till Westminster’s whole year be holiday; | |
| Till Isis’ elders reel, their pupils’ sport, | |
| And Alma Mater lie dissolv’d in port!’ | |
| ‘Enough! enough!’ the raptured monarch cries, | |
| And thro’ the iv’ry gate the vision flies. | 340 |
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