FullReads

We grant, that Butler ravishes the Heart,
As Shakespear soar’d beyond the reach of Art;
(For Nature form’d those Poets without Rules,
To fill the world with imitating Fools.)
What Burlesque could, was by that Genius done;
Yet faults it has, impossible to shun:
Th’ unchanging strain for want of grandeur cloys,
And gives too oft the horse-laugh mirth of Boys:
The short-legg’d verse, and double-gingling Sound,
So quick surprize us, that our heads run round:
Yet in this Work peculiar Life presides,
And Wit, for all the world to glean besides.

Here pause, my Muse, too daring and too young!
Nor rashly aim at Precepts yet unsung.
Can Man the Master of the Dunciad teach?
And these new Bays what other hopes to reach?
‘Twere better judg’d, to study and explain
Each ancient Grace he copies not in vain;
To trace thee, Satire, to thy utmost Spring,
Thy Form, thy Changes, and thy Authors sing.

All Nations with this Liberty dispense,
And bid us shock the Man that shocks Good Sense.
Great Homer first the Mimic Sketch design’d
What grasp’d not Homer’s comprehensive mind?
By him who Virtue prais’d, was Folly curst,
And who Achilles sung, drew Dunce the First.[26]

Next him Simonides, with lighter Air,
In Beasts, and Apes, and Vermin, paints the Fair :
The good Scriblerus in like forms displays
The reptile Rhimesters of these later days.

More fierce, Archilochus ! thy vengeful flame;
Fools read and dy’d : for Blockheads then had Shame.

The Comic-Satirist[27] attack’d his Age,
And found low Arts, and Pride, among the Sage:
See learned Athens stand attentive by,
And Stoicks learn their Foibles from the Eye.

Latium’s fifth Homer [28] held the Greeks in view;
Solid, tho’ rough, yet incorrect as new.
Lucilius, warm’d with more than mortal flame
Rose next[29], and held a torch to ev’ry shame.
See stern Menippus, cynical, unclean;
And Grecian Cento‘s, mannerly obscene.
Add the last efforts of Pacuvius’ rage,
And the chaste decency of Varro‘s page.[30]

See Horace next, in each reflection nice,
Learn’d, but not vain, the Foe of Fools nor Vice.
Each page instructs, each Sentiment prevails,
All shines alike, he rallies, but ne’er rails:
With courtly ease conceals a Master’s art,
And least-expected steals upon the heart.
Yet Cassius [31] felt the fury of his rage,
( Cassius, the We—-d of a former age)
And sad Alpinus, ignorantly read,
Who murder’d Memnon, tho’ for ages dead.

Then Persius came: whose line tho’ roughly wrought,
His Sense o’erpaid the stricture of his thought.
Here in clear light the Stoic -doctrine shines,
Truth all subdues, or Patience all resigns.
A Mind supreme![32] impartial, yet severe:
Pure in each Act, in each Recess sincere!
Yet rich ill Poets urg’d the Stoic‘s Frown,
And bade him strike at Dulness and a Crown [33].

The Vice and Luxury Petronius
drew,
In Nero meet: th’ imperial point of view:
The Roman Wilmot, that could Vice chastize,
Pleas’d the mad King he serv’d, to satirize.