And, join'd in league with ftrong neceffity,
Pleasure must flie, or else by famine die.
Flaminius, whom a confulfhip had grac❜d,
(Then cenfor) from the fenate I displac'd;
When he in Gaul, a conful, made a feast,
A beauteous courtezan did him request
To fee the cutting off a prifoner's head;
This crime I could not leave unpunished,
Since by a private villainy he ftain'd
That public honour, which at Rome he gain'd.
Then to our age (when not to pleasures bent)
This seems an honour, not disparagement.
We, not all pleasures like the Stoicks hate;
But love and feek thofe which are moderate.
(Though divine Plato thus of pleasures thought,
They us, with hooks and baits, like fishes caught)
When quæftor, to the gods, in public halls
I was the firft, who fet up festivals.
Not with high taftes our appetites did force,
'But fill'd with converfation and difcourfe;
Which feasts Convivial Meetings we did name :
Not like the ancient Greeks, who to their shame,
Call'd it a Compotation, not a feast;
Declaring the worst part of it the best.
Thofe entertainments I did then frequent
Sometimes with youthful heat and merriment :
But now I thank my age, which gives me ease
From those exceffes; yet myself I please
With chearful talk to entertain my guests,
(Difcourfes are to age continual feasts)
The love of meat and wine they recompenfe,
And chear the mind, as much as those the sense.
I'm not more pleas'd with gravity among
The ag'd, than to be youthful with the young;
Nor 'gainft all pleasures proclaim open war,
To which, in age, fome natural motions are.
And ftill at my Sabinum I delight
To treat my neighbours till the depth of night.
But we the fenfe of guft and pleasure want,
Which youth at full poffeffes, this I grant ;
But age feeks not the things which youth requires,
And no man needs that which he not defires.
When Sophocles was afk'd, if he deny'd
Himself the use of pleasures, he reply'd,
I humbly thank th' immortal gods, who me
From that fierce tyrant's infolence fet free.
But they, whom preffing appetites constrain,
Grieve when they cannot their defires obtain.
Young men the use of pleasure understand,
As of an object new, and near at hand :
Though this ftands more remote from age's fight,
Yet they behold it not without delight :
As ancient foldiers, from their duties eas'd,
With fenfe of honour and rewards are pleas'd;
So from ambitious hopes and lufts releast,
Delighted with itself, our age doth rest.
No part of life's more happy, when with bread
Of ancient knowledge, and new learning fed,
All youthful pleasures by degrees must cease;
But thofe of age ev'n with our years increase.
We love not loaded boards, and goblets crown'd,
But free from furfeits our repofe is found.
When old Fabricius to the Samnites went,
Ambaffador, from Rome to Pyrrhus fent,
He heard a grave philofopher maintain,
That all the actions of our life were vain,
Which with our fenfe of pleasure not confpir'd;
Fabricius the philofopher defir'd,
That he to Pyrrhus would that maxim teach,
And to the Samnites the fame doctrine preach;
Then of their conqueft he fhould doubt no more,
Whom their own pleasures overcame before.
Now into ruftic matters I must fall,
Which pleasure feems to me the chief of all.
Age no impediment to those can give,
Who wifely by the rules of nature live.
Earth (though our mother) chcarfully obeys
All the commands her race upon her lays.
For whatsoever from our hand fhe takes,
Greater or lefs, a vast return fhe makes.
Nor am I only pleas'd with that refource,
But with her ways, her method, and her force,
The seed her bosom (by the plough made fit)
Receives, where kindly fhe embraces it,
Which, with her genuine warmth diffus'd and spread,
Sends forth betimes a green and tender head,
Then gives it motion, life, and nourishment,
Which from the root through nerves and veins are fent,
Streight in a hollow fheath upright it grows,
And, form receiving, doth itself disclose :
Drawn up in ranks and files, the bearded spikes
Guard it from birds, as with a stand of pikes.
When of the vine I speak, I feem infpir'd,
And with delight, as with her juice, am fir'd';
At nature's god-like power I ftand amaz'd,
Which fuch vaft bodies hath from atoms rais'd.
The kernel of a grape, the fig's small grain,
Can cloath a mountain, and o'ershade a plain :
But thou, dear vine, forbid'ft me to be long,
Although thy trunk be neither large nor ftrong,
Nor can thy head (not helpt) itself sublime,
Yet, like a ferpent, a tall tree can climb;
Whate'er thy many fingers can entwine,
Proves thy support, and all its strength is thine.
Though nature gave not legs, it gave thee hands,
By which thy prop the proudest cedar stands ;
As thou haft hands, fo hath thy offspring wings,
And to the highest part of mortals springs.
But left thou should'ft confume thy wealth in vain,
And ftarve thyself to feed a numerous train,
Or like the bee (fweet as thy blood) design'd
To be destroy'd to propagate his kind,
Left thy redundant and fuperfluous juice
Should fading leaves instead of fruits produce,
The pruner's hand, with letting blood, must quench
Thy heat, and thy exuberant parts retrench:
Then from the joints of thy prolific stem
A fwelling knot is raised (call'd a gem),
Whence, in fhort space, itself the clufter fhows,
And from earth's moisture mixt with fun-beams grows.
I' th' fpring, like youth, it yields an acid taste,
But fummer doth, like age, the fourness waste;
Then cloath'd with leaves, from heat and cold fecure,
Like virgins, fweet, and beauteous, when mature.
On fruits, flowers, herbs, and plants, I long could dwell,
At once to please my eye, my taste, my smell,
My walks of trees, all planted by my hand,
Like children of my own begetting stand.
To tell the feveral natures of each earth,
What fruits from each most properly take birth :
And with what arts to enrich every mold,
The dry to moiften, and to warm the cold.
But when we graft, or buds inoculate,
Nature by art we nobly meliorate ;
As Orpheus' mufic wildest beafts did tame,
From the four crab the fweeteft apple came :
The mother to the daughter goes to school,
The fpecies changed, doth her laws o'er-rule;
Nature herself doth from herself depart,
(Strange tranfmigration) by the power of art.
How little things give law to great! we fee
The fmall bud captivates the greatest tree.
Here even the power divine we imitate,
And feem not to beget, but to create.
Much was I pleas'd with fowls and beasts, the tame
For food and profit, and the wild for game.
Excuse me when this pleasant ftring I touch,
(For age, of what delights it, speaks too much.)
Who twice victorious Pyrrhus conquered,
The Sabines and the Samnites captive led,
|