Page images
PDF
EPUB

EPIGRAM.

ENGRAVED ON THE COLLAR OF A DOG, WHICH I GAVE
TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS.

I AM his Highness' dog at Kew;
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

EPIGRAM.

OCCASIONED BY AN INVITATION TO COURT.

IN the lines that you sent are the Muses and Graces;

You've the Nine in your wit, and the Three in your faces.

ON AN OLD GATE

ERECTED IN CHISWICK GARDENS.

O GATE, how camest thou here?

GATE. I was brought from Chelsea last year, Batter'd with wind and weather.

Inigo Jones put me together.

Sir Hans Sloane,

Let me alone:

Burlington brought me hither.

1742.

A FRAGMENT...VERSES TO MR. C.

A FRAGMENT.

247

AH, friend! 'tis true-this truth you lovers know-
In vain my structures rise, my gardens grow,
In vain fair Thames reflects the double scenes,
Of hanging mountains, and of sloping greens:
Joy lives not here,-to happier seats it flies,
And only dwells where Wortley casts her eyes.
What are the gay parterre, the chequer'd shade,
The morning bower, the evening colonnade, -
But soft recesses for uneasy minds,

To sigh unheard in, to the passing winds!
So the struck deer, in some sequester'd part,
Lies down to die, the arrow at his heart,
He, stretch'd unseen in coverts hid from day,
Bleeds drop by drop, and pants his life away.

VERSES TO MR. C.

ST. JAMES'S PLACE.

LONDON, OCTOBER 22.

FEW words are best; I wish you well;
Bethel, I'm told, will soon be here:
Some morning-walks along the Mall,
And evening friends, will end the year.

If, in this interval, between

The falling leaf and coming frost, You please to see, on Twit'nam green,

Your friend, your poet, and your host; For three whole days you here may rest,

From office, business, news, and strife; And (what most folks would think a jest) Want nothing else, except your wife.

EPITAPHS.

His saltem accumulem donis, et fungar inani
Munere!

VIRG.

ON CHARLES EARL OF DORSET,

IN THE CHURCH OF WITHYAM, SUSSEX.

DORSET, the grace of courts, the Muses' pride,
Patron of arts, and judge of Nature, died!
The scourge of pride, though sanctified or great,
Of fops in learning, and of knaves in state:
Yet soft his nature, though severe his lay,
His anger moral, and his wisdom gay.

Bless'd satirist! who touch'd the mean so true,
As show'd vice had his hate and pity too. [please,
Bless'd courtier! who could king and country
Yet sacred keep his friendships and his ease.
Bless'd peer! his great forefathers' every grace
Reflecting, and reflected in his race;

Where other Buckhursts, other Dorsets, shine, And patriots still, or poets, deck the line.

ON SIR WILLIAM TRUMBAL,

ONE OF THE PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE TO KING WILLIAM III.

Who, having resigned his Place, died in his Retirement at
Easthamsted, Berkshire, 1716.

A PLEASING form, a firm, yet cautious, mind;
Sincere, though prudent; constant, yet resign'd:
Honour unchanged, a principle profess'd,
Fix'd to one side, but moderate to the rest:

An honest courtier, yet a patriot too,
Just to his prince, and to his country true:
Fill'd with the sense of age, the fire of youth,
A scorn of wrangling, yet a zeal for truth;
A generous faith, from superstition free,
A love to peace, and hate of tyranny:
Such this man was; who now from earth removed,
At length enjoys that liberty he loved.

ON THE HON. SIMON HARCOURT,

ONLY SON OF THE LORD CHANCELLOR HARCOURT,

At the Church of Stanton-Harcourt, Oxfordshire, 1720. To this sad shrine, whoe'er thou art, draw near; Here lies the friend most loved, the son most dear; Who ne'er knew joy but friendship might divide, Or gave his father grief but when he died.

How vain is reason, eloquence how weak! If Pope must tell what Harcourt cannot speak. Oh! let thy once-loved friend inscribe thy stone, And with a father's sorrows mix his own!

ON JAMES CRAGGS, ESQ.

IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

JACOBUS CRAGGS,

REGI MAGNE BRITANNIE A SECRETIS,
ET CONSILIIS SANCTIORIBUS,

PRINCIPIS PARITER AC POPULI AMOR ET DELICIA:
VIXIT TITULIS ET INVIDIA MAJOR

ANNOS, HEU PAUCOS, XXXV.

OB. FEB. XVI. M.DCC.XX.

STATESMAN, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere, In action faithful, and in honour clear!

Who broke no promise, served no private end,
Who gain'd no title, and who lost no friend;
Ennobled by himself, by all approved,
Praised, wept, and honour'd, by the Muse he loved.

INTENDED FOR MR. ROWE,

IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

THY reliques, Rowe! to this fair urn we trust,
And sacred, place by Dryden's awful dust:
Beneath a rude and nameless stone he lies,
To which thy tomb shall guide inquiring eyes.
Peace to thy gentle shade, and endless rest!
Bless'd in thy genius, in thy love, too, bless'd!
One grateful woman to thy fame supplies
What a whole thankless land to his denies.

ON MRS. CORBET,

WHO DIED OF A CANCER IN HER BREAST.

HERE rests a woman, good without pretence,
Bless'd with plain reason and with sober sense:
No conquest she but o'er herself desired,
No arts essay'd but not to be admired.
Passion and pride were to her soul unknown,
Convinced that virtue only is our own.
So unaffected, so composed a mind,
So firm yet soft, so strong yet so refined,
Heaven, as its purest gold, by tortures tried;
The saint sustain'd it, but the woman died.

« PreviousContinue »