FullReads

The vulgar thus through imitation err;
As oft the learned by being singular.
So much they scorn the crowd that if the throng
By chance go right they purposely go wrong:
So schismatics the plain believers quit,
And are but damned for having too much wit.
Some praise at morning what they blame at night,
But always think the last opinion right.
A muse by these is like a mistress used,
This hour she’s idolized, the next abused;
While their weak heads, like towns unfortified,
‘Twixt sense and nonsense daily change their side.
Ask them the cause, they’re wiser still they say;
And still to-morrow’s wiser than to-day.
We think our fathers fools, so wise we grow;
Our wiser sons, no doubt, will think us so.
Once school-divines this zealous isle o’erspread.
Who knew most sentences was deepest read, [441]
Faith, Gospel, all, seemed made to be disputed,
And none had sense enough to be confuted:
Scotists and Thomists now in peace remain, [444]
Amidst their kindred cobwebs in Duck Lane. [445]
If faith itself has different dresses worn,
What wonder modes in wit should take their turn?
Oft, leaving what is natural and fit,
The current folly proves the ready wit;
And authors think their reputation safe,
Which lives as long as fools are pleased to laugh.

Some valuing those of their own side or mind,
Still make themselves the measure of mankind:
Fondly we think we honor merit then,
When we but praise ourselves in other men.
Parties in wit attend on those of state,
And public faction doubles private hate.
Pride, malice, folly against Dryden rose,
In various shapes of parsons, critics, beaux; [459]
But sense survived, when merry jests were past;
For rising merit will buoy up at last.
Might he return, and bless once more our eyes,
New Blackmores and new Millbourns must arise: [463]
Nay, should great Homer lift his awful head,
Zoilus again would start up from the dead [465]
Envy will merit, as its shade, pursue,
But like a shadow, proves the substance true:
For envied wit, like Sol eclipsed, makes known
The opposing body’s grossness, not its own.
When first that sun too powerful beams displays,
It draws up vapors which obscure its rays,
But even those clouds at last adorn its way
Reflect new glories and augment the day

Be thou the first true merit to befriend
His praise is lost who stays till all commend
Short is the date alas! of modern rhymes
And ’tis but just to let them live betimes
No longer now that golden age appears
When patriarch wits survived a thousand years [479]
Now length of fame (our second life) is lost
And bare threescore is all even that can boast,
Our sons their fathers failing language see
And such as Chaucer is shall Dryden be
So when the faithful pencil has designed
Some bright idea of the master’s mind
Where a new world leaps out at his command
And ready nature waits upon his hand
When the ripe colors soften and unite
And sweetly melt into just shade and light
When mellowing years their full perfection give
And each bold figure just begins to live
The treacherous colors the fair art betray
And all the bright creation fades away!

Unhappy wit, like most mistaken things
Atones not for that envy which it brings
In youth alone its empty praise we boast
But soon the short lived vanity is lost.
Like some fair flower the early spring supplies
That gayly blooms but even in blooming dies
What is this wit, which must our cares employ?
The owner’s wife that other men enjoy
Then most our trouble still when most admired
And still the more we give the more required
Whose fame with pains we guard, but lose with ease,
Sure some to vex, but never all to please,
‘Tis what the vicious fear, the virtuous shun,
By fools ’tis hated, and by knaves undone!