And, far more generous and free,
In contemplation only of him did agree,
Both fully satisfy'd; the one
With those fresh laurels he had won,
And all the brave renowned feats
He had perform'd in arms;
The other with his person and his charms :
For just as larks are catch'd in nets,
By gazing on a piece of glass;
So while the ladies view'd his brighter eyes,
And smoother polish'd face,
Their gentle hearts, alas! were taken by surprise.
Never did bold knight, to relieve
Distressed dames, such dreadful feats achieve,
As feeble damsels, for his sake,
Would have been proud to undertake ;
And bravely ambitious to redeem
The world's loss and their own,
Strove who should have the honour to lay down,
And change a life with him:
But finding all their hopes in vain
To move his fix'd determined fate,
Their life itself began to hate,
As if it were an infamy
To live, when he was doom'd to die;
Made loud appeals and moans,
To less hard-hearted grates and stones;
Came, swell'd with sighs, and drown'd in tears,
To yield themselves his fellow-sufferers ;
And follow'd him, like prisoners of war,
Chain'd to the lofty wheels of his triumphant car.
UPON SIR JOHN DENHAM'S RECOVERY FROM HIS MADNESS.
SIR, you've outlived so desperate a fit,
As none could do, but an immortal wit;
Had yours been less, all helps had been in vain,
And thrown away, tho' on a less sick brain.
But you were so far from receiving hurt,
You grew improved, and much the better for 't.
As when th' Arabian bird does sacrifice,
And burn himself in his own country's spice,
A maggot first breeds in her pregnant urn,
Which after does to a young phoœnix turn:
So your hot brain, burnt in its native fire,
Did life renew'd and vig'rous youth acquire;
And with so much advantage, some have guess'd,
Your after-wit is like to be your best;
And now expect far greater matters of ye,
Than the bought Cooper's Hill,2 or borrow'd Sophy; Such as your Tully lately dress'd in verse,
Like those he made himself, or not much worse;
And Seneca's dry sand, unmix'd with lime,
Such as you cheat the King with, botch'd in rhyme. 20
Nor were your morals less improved; all pride
And native insolence quite laid aside;
And that ungovern'd outrage, that was wont
All, that you durst with safety, to affront:
Wood, in his 'Athenæ,' informs us, that Sir John Denham, in the year 1661, was made Knight of the Bath, and was esteemed by the King for his ingenuity; but upon some discontent arising from a second match, became crazed for a time. Some say that he poisoned his wife from jealousy of the 2Cooper's Hill:' alluding to reports of plagiarism brought
Duke of York. against Sir J. D.
No china cupboard rudely overthrown ;
Nor lady tipp'd, by being accosted, down;
No poet jeer'd, for scribbling amiss,
With verses forty times more lewd than his :
Nor did your crutch give battle to your duns,
And hold it out, where you had built a sconce ;
Nor furiously laid orange-wench aboard,
For asking what in fruit and love you'd scored;
But all civility and complacence,
More than you ever used before or since.
Beside, you never over-reach'd the King1
One farthing, all the while, in reckoning,
Nor brought in false account, with little tricks
Of passing broken rubbish for whole bricks;
False mustering of workmen by the day,
Deduction out of wages, and dead pay
For those that never lived; all which did come,
By thrifty management, to no small sum.
You pull'd no lodgings down, to build them worse; ?
Nor repair'd others, to repair your purse,
As you were wont; till all you built appear'd
Like that Amphion with his fiddle rear'd :
For had the stones (like his), charm'd by your verse,
Built up themselves, they could not have done worse:
And sure, when first you ventured to survey,
You did design to do 't no other way.
All this was done before those days began, In which you were a wise and happy man ;
''Over-reach'd the King:' Wood says, 'That King Charles 1. granted to Sir John the reversion of the place of surveyor of his buildings, after the death of Inigo Jones, which place he entered upon at the Restoration, and held to his death, and got by it seven thousand pounds.' - .2 To build them worse: ' the office which Sir John lived in near Whitehall, was of his own building, whilst he was the King's surveyor. H
For who e'er lived in such a Paradise,
Until fresh straw and darkness oped your eyes?
Who ever greater treasure could command,
Had nobler palaces, and richer land,
Than you had then, who could raise sums as vast,
As all the cheats of a Dutch war could waste,
Or all those practised upon public money?
For nothing, but your cure, could have undone ye.
For ever are you bound to curse those quacks
That undertook to cure your happy cracks;
For, tho' no art can ever make them sound,
The tamp'ring cost you threescore thousand pound.
How high might you have lived, and play'd, and lost,
Yet been no more undone by being choust,
Nor forced upon the King's account to lay
All that, in serving him, you lost at play!
For nothing, but your brain, was ever found
To suffer sequestration, and compound.
Yet you've an imposition laid on brick,
For all you then laid out, at Beast, or Gleek :1
And when you've raised a sum, straight let it fly,
By understanding low, and vent'ring high;
Until you have reduced it down to tick,
And then recruit again from lime and brick.
At Beast, or Gleek:' Beast (French, Bête) is a game at cards, like loo. Gleek is also a game at cards.
WHO JUDGE OF MODERN PLAYS PRECISELY BY THE RULES OF THE ANCIENTS.1
WHO ever will regard poetic fury,
When it is once found idiot by a jury;
And ev'ry pert and arbitrary fool
Can all poetic licence over-rule ;
Assume a barb'rous tyranny to handle
The Muses worse than Ostrogoth and Vandal;
Make 'em submit to verdict and report,
And stand or fall to th' orders of a court?
Much less be sentenced by the arbitrary
Proceedings of a witless plagiary,
That forges old records and ordinances
Against the right and property of fancies,
More false and nice than weighing of the weather
To th' hundredth atom of the lightest feather;
Or measuring of air upon Parnassus
With cylinders of Torricellian glasses;
Reduce all Tragedy, by rules of art,
Back to its antique theatre, a cart;
And make them henceforth keep the beaten roads
Of reverend choruses and episodes;
Reform and regulate a puppet-play,
According to the true and ancient way;
That not an actor shall presume to squeak,
Unless he have a licence for 't in Greek;
1 This warm invective was very probably occasioned by Mr Rymer, Historiographer to Charles II. and the worst of critics.
|