To shape their weeds as fits their ease,
And place their patches as they please.
This should be granted without grudging,
Since we all know they 're best at judging,
What from mankind demands devotion,
In gefture, garb, free airs, and motion.
But you, unworthy of my pen!
Unworthy to be clafs'd with men !
Hafte to Caffar', ye clumsy fots,
And there make love to Hottentots.

Another fet with ballads waste
Our paper, and debauch our tafte
With endless 'larums on the street,
Where crowds of circling rabble meet.
The vulgar judge of poetry,

By what these hawkers fing and cry;
Yea, fome who claim to wit amifs,
Cannot diftinguish that from this:
Hence poets are accounted now,
In Scotland, a mean empty crew,
Whose heads are craz'd, who spend their time

In that poor wretched trade of rhyme:
Yet all the learn'd difcerning part
Of mankind own the heav'nly art

Is as much diftant from fuch trash

As 'lay'd Dutch coin from fterling cafh.

Others

Others in lofty nonsense write,
Incomprehenfible 's their flight;
Such magic pow'r is in their pen,
They can bestow on worthlefs men
More virtue, merit, and renown,
Than ever they cou'd call their own.
They write with arbitrary power,
And pity 'tis they should fall lower;
Or stoop to truth, or yet to meddle
With common fenfe, for crambo diddle.

But none of all the rhyming herd
Are more encourag'd and rever'd,
By heavy fouls to theirs ally'd,
Than fuch who tell who lately died.
No fooner is the spirit flown

From its clay cage to lands unknown,
Than fome rash hackney gets his name,
And thro' the town laments the fame :
An honeft burgess cannot die,

But they must weep in elegy:

Even when the virtuous foul is foaring
Thro' middle air, he hears it roaring.

Thefe ills, and many more abuses,

Which plague mankind, and vex the muses,
On pain of poverty fhall cease,

And all the fair fhall live in

peace:

And

And every one shall die contented,
Happy when not by them lamented.
For great Apollo, in his name,
Has order'd me thus to proclaim :

"Forafmuch as a grov'ling crew,
"With narrow mind, and brazen brow,
"Wou'd fain to poet's title mount,

"And with vile maggots rub affront

"On an old virtuofo nation,

"Where our lov'd Nine maintain their station;

"We order strict, that all refrain

"To write, who learning want, and brain; "Pedants, with Hebrew roots o'ergrown, "Learn'd in each language but their own; "Each spiritlefs half-ftarving finner,

"Who knows not how to get his dinner; "Dealers in fmall ware, clinks, whim-whams, "Acroftics, puns, and anagrams; "And all who their productions grudge, "To be canvafs'd by fkilful judge, "Who can find out indulgent trip, "While 'tis in harmless manufcript: "But to all them who disobey, "And jog on still in their own way, "Be 't kend to all men that our will is, "Since all they write fo wretched ill is,

They must dispatch their fhallow ghosts "To Pluto's jakes, and take their posts,

"There

"There to attend till Dis fhall deign "To use their works-the ufe is plain."

Now know, ye fcoundrels, if ye ftand
To huph and ha at this command,
The furies have prepar'd a halter,

To hang, or drive ye helter skelter,
Thro' bogs and moors, like rats and mice,
Purfu'd with hunger, rags, and lice,
If e'er ye dare again to croak,

And god of harmony provoke :
Wherefore pursue some craft for bread,
Where hands may better serve than head;

Nor ever hope in verse to shine,

Or fhare in Homer's fate or

WEALTH, OR THE WOODY:

A POEM ON THE SOUTH SEA.

THALIA*, ever welcome to this isle,
Descend, and glad the nation with a smile :

See frae yon bank where South Sea ebbs and

flows,

How fand-blind Chance woodies and wealth be

stows:

Aided by thee, I'll fail the wond'rous deep,
And thro' the crowded alleys cautious creep.
No easy task to plow the fwelling wave,
Or in stock-jobbing press my guts to save;
But naithing can our wilder paffions tame,
Wha rax for riches or immortal fame.

Long had the grumblers us'd this murm'ring found,

"Poor Britain in her public debt is drown'd!" At fifty millions late we started a',

And, wow, we wonder'd how the debt wad fa'

But

* The cheerful mufe, who delights to imitate the actions of mankind, and to produce the laughing comedy; that kind of poetry which is ever acceptable to Britons.