Psince my heart is gone before,

OR'YTHEE now, fond fool, give o'er ;

To what purpose should I stay?
Love commands another way.

DAPHNE.

Perjur'd fwain, I knew the time
When diffembling was your crime,
In pity now employ that art,

Which first betray'd, to ease my heart.

STREPHON.

Women can with pleasure feign:

Men diffemble ftill with pain.

What

To think you may perfuade us what you please,
Or venture to bring in a child alive,
That Canibals have murder'd and devour'd.
Old age explodes all but morality;
Aufterity offends aspiring youths;

But he that joins inftruction with delight,
Profit with pleasure, carries all the votes :
These are the volumes that enrich the shops,
These pass with admiration through the world,
And bring their author to eternal fame.

Be not too rigidly cenforious,

A ftring may jar in the best master's hand,
And the most skilful archer miss his aim;
But in a poem elegantly writ,

I would not quarrel with a flight mistake,
Such as our nature's frailty may excufe;
But he that hath been often told his fault,
And still perfifts, is as impertinent
As a musician that will always play,
And yet is always out at the fame note:
When fuch a positive abandon'd fop
(Among his numerous abfurdities)
Stumbles upon fome tolerable line,

I fret to see them in fuch company,
And wonder by what magic they came there.
But in long works fleep will sometimes surprise ;
Homer himself hath been obferv'd to nod.

Poems, like pictures, are of different forts,
Some better at a distance, others near,

Some love the dark, fome choose the clearest light,

And

And boldly challenge the most piercing eye,
Some please for once, fome will for ever please.
But, Pifo, (though your knowledge of the world,
Join'd with your father's precepts, make you wife)
Remember this as an important truth:
Some things admit of mediocrity,

A counsellor, or pleader at the bar,
May want Meffala's powerful eloquence,
Or be lefs read than deep Cafcellius;
Yet this indifferent lawyer is esteem'd
But no authority of gods nor men
Allow of any mean in poefy.

As an ill concert, and a coarfe perfume,
Difgrace the delicacy of a feaft,

And might with more discretion have been spar'd ;

So poefy, whofe end is to delight,

Admits of no degrees, but must be still

Sublimely good, or despicably ill.

In other things men have fome reafon left,
And one that cannot dance, or fence, or run,
Despairing of fuccess, forbears to try ;
But all (without confideration) write;
Some thinking that th' omnipotence of wealth
Can turn them into poets when they please.
But, Pifo, you are of too quick a fight
Not to discern which way your talent lies,
Or vainly with your genius to contend;
Yet if it ever be your fate to write,
Let your productions pass the strictest hands,
Mine and your father's, and not see the light

་

Till time and care have ripen'd every line.

What you keep by you, you may change and mendjes
But words once spoke can never be recall'd...
Orpheus, infpir'd by more than human power,
Did not, as poets feign, tame favage beafts,
But men as lawless and as wild as they,
And first difsuaded them from rage and blood;
Thus, when Amphion built the Theban wall,
They feign'd the stones obey'd his magic lute;
Poets, the first instructors of mankind,
Brought all things to their proper, native ufe ;
Some they appropriated to the gods,

And fome to public, fome to private ends:
Promifcuous love by marriage was restrain'd,
Cities were built, and useful laws were made;
So great was the divinity of verfe,
And fuch obfervance to a poet paid.

Then Homer's and Tyrtæus' martial Muse
Waken'd the world, and founded loud alarms.
To verse we owe the facred oracles,

And our best precepts of morality;

Some have by verse obtain❜d the love of kings,
(Who, with the Mufes, cafe their weary'd minds)
Then blush not, noble Pifo, to protect

What gods infpire, and kings delight to hear.
Some think that poets may be form'd by art,
Others maintain that Nature makes them fo;
I neither fee what art without a vein,

Nor wit without the help of art can do,

But mutually they crave each other's aid.

He

He that intends to gain th' Olympic prize
Must use himself to hunger, heat, and cold,
Take leave of wine, and the soft joys of love;
And no musician dares pretend to skill,
Without a great expence of time and pains;
little bufy fcribbler now

But every

Swells with the praises which he gives himself;
And, taking fanctuary in the crowd,

Brags of his impudence, and fcorns to mend.
A wealthy poet takes more pains to hire
A flattering audience, than poor tradesmen do
To perfuade customers to buy their goods.
'Tis hard to find a man of great estate,
That can diftinguifh flatterers from friends.
Never delude yourself, nor read your book
Before a brib'd and fawning auditor,
For he 'll commend and feign an extafy,
Grow pale or weep, do any thing to please:
True friends appear lefs mov'd than counterfeit ;
As men that truly grieve at funerals,

Are not fo loud as thofe that cry for hire.

Wife were the kings, who never chose a friend,
Till with full cups they had unmask'd his foul,
And feen the bottom of his deepest thoughts;
You cannot arm yourself with too much caré
Against the smiles of a defigning knave.

Quintilius (if his advice were afk'd)
Would freely tell you what you should correct,
Or, if you could not, bid you blot it out,
And with more care fupply the vacancy;