But after he's once sav'd, to make amends,
In each succeeding health they damn his friends:
So God begins, but still the devil ends.
What if fome one, inspir'd with zeal, should call,
Come, let's go cry, God save him at Whitehall ?
His best friends would not like this over-care,
Or think him ere the fafer for this prayer.
Five praying saints are by an act allow'd;
But not the whole church-militant in croud.
Yet, should heaven all the true petitions drain
Of Presbyterians, who would kings maintain,
Of forty thousand, five would scarce remain.
EPILOGUE to the same.
A Virgin poet was ferv'd up to-day,
Who, till this hour, ne'er cackled for a play.
He's neither yet a Whig nor Tory-boy;
But, like a girl, whom several would enjoy,
Begs leave to make the best of his own nat'ral toy.
Were I to play my callow author's game,
The king's house would instruct me by the name.
There's loyalty to one; I wish no more::
A commonwealth founds like a common whore.
Let husband or gallant be what they will,
One part of woman is true Tory still.
If any factious spirit should rebel,
Our fex, with ease, can ev'ry rifing quell.
Then, as you hope we should your failings hide,
An honest jury for our play provide.
Whigs at their poets never take offence;
They save dull culprits, who have murder'd sense.
Tho nonsense is a nauseous heavy mass,
The vehicle call'd Faction makes it pass.
Faction in play's the commonwealth-man's bribe;
The leaden farthing of the canting tribe:
Tho void in payment laws and statutes make it,
The neighbourhood, that knows the man, will
'Tis faction buys the votes of half the pit;
Their's is the penfion-parliament of wit.
In city-clubs their venom let them vent;
For there 'tis safe, in its own element.
Here, where their madness can have no pretence,
Let them forget themselves an hour of fenfe.
In one poor ifle, why should two factions be?
Small diff'rence in your vices I can fee:
In drink and drabs both fides too well agree.
Would there were more preferments in the land:
If places fell, the party could not stand:
Of this damn'd grievance ev'ry Whig complains, They grunt like hogs till they have got their grains, Mean time you fee what trade our plots advance; We send each year good money into France; And they that know what merchandize we need, Send o'er true Protestants to mend our breed.
SPOKEN by Mr. HART,
At the Acting of the SILENT WOMAN.
HAT Greece, when learning flourish'd,
only knew,
Athenian judges, you this day renew.
Here too are annual rites to Pallas done,
And here poetic prizes lost or won.
Methinks I fee you, crown'd with olives, fit,
And strike a sacred horror from the pit.
A day of doom is this of your decree,
Where even the best are but by mercy free:
A day, which none but Jonson durft have with'd
Here they, who long have known the useful stage,
Come to be taught themselves to teach the age.
As your commiffioners our poets go,
To cultivate the virtue which you fow;
In your Lyceum first themselves refin'd,
And delegated thence to human-kind.
But as ambassadors, when long from home,
For new instructions to their princes come;
So poets, who your precepts have forgot,
Return, and beg they may be better taught:
Follies and faults elsewhere by them are shown,
But by your manners they correct their own.
Th'illiterate writer, emperic-like, applies
To minds diseas'd, unsafe, chance, remedies :
The learned in schools, where knowlege first
Studies with care the anatomy of man;
Sees virtue, vice, and paffions in their cause,
And fame from science, not from fortune, draws.
So Poetry, which is in Oxford made
An art, in London only is a trade.
There haughty dunces, whose unlearned pen Could ne'er spell grammar, would be reading men. Such build their poems the Lucretian way;
So many huddled atoms make a play;
And if they hit in order by some chance,
T
They call that nature, which is ignorance.
To such a fame let mere town-wits aspire,
And their gay nonsense their own cits admire.
Our poet, could he find forgiveness here,
Would wish it rather than a plaudit there.
He owns no crown from those Prætorian bands,
But knows that right is in the senate's hands,
Not impudent enough to hope your praise,
Low at the Muses feet his wreath he lays,
And, where he took it up, resigns his bays.
Kings make their poets whom themselves think fit,
But 'tis your fuffrage makes authentic wit.
SPOKEN BY THE SAME.
Nopoor Dutch peafant, wing'd with all his fear,
Flies with more haste, when the French
Than we with our poetic train come down,
For refuge hither, from th' infected town :
VOL. II.
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