In peace provides fit arms against a war?
Thus Bethel spoke, who always speaks his thought, And always thinks the very thing he ought: His equal mind I copy what I can,
And, as I love, would imitate the man.
In south-sea days not happier, when surmised
The lord of thousands, than if now excised;
In forest planted by a father's hand,
Than in five acres now of rented land.
Content with little, I can piddle here
On brocoli and mutton, round the year;
But ancient friends (though poor, or out of play)
That touch my bell, I cannot turn away.
'Tis true, no turbots dignify my boards,
But gudgeons, flounders, what my Thames affords:
To Hounslow Heath I point and Bansted Down,
Thence comes your mutton, and these chicks my own:
From yon old walnut-tree a shower shall fall;
And grapes, long lingering on my only wall,
And figs from standard and espalier join;
The devil is in you if you cannot dine:
Then cheerful healths (your mistress shall have place),
And, what's more rare, a poet shall say grace.
Fortune not much of humbling me can boast;
Though double taxed, how little have I lost?
My life's amusements have been just the same,
Before, and after, standing armies came.
My lands are sold, my father's house is gone;
I'll hire another's; is not that my own,
And yours, my friends? through whose free-opening
None comes too early, none departs too late;
(For I, who hold sage Homer's rule the best,
Welcome the coming, speed the going guest.)
"Pray heaven it last!" (cries Swift!) "as you go on;
I wish to God this house had been your ow! :
Pity! to build, without a son or wife:
Why, you'll enjoy it only all your life.”
Well, if the use be mine, can it concern one,1
Whether the name belong to Pope or Vernon?
What's property? dear Swift! you see it alter
From you to me, from me to Peter Walter;
Or, in a mortgage, prove a lawyer's share;
Or, in a jointure, vanish from the heir;
Or in pure equity (the case not clear)
The chancery takes your rents for twenty year:
At best, it falls to some ungracious son,
Who cries, "My father's damned, and all's my own."
Shades, that to Bacon could retreat afford,
Become the portion of a booby lord;
And Hemsley, once proud Buckingham's delight,
Slides to a scrivener or a city knight.
Let lands and houses have what lords they will,
Let us be fixed, and our own masters still.
ST. JOHN, whose love indulged my labours past,
Matures my present, and shall bound my last!
In a letter to this Mr. Bethel, of March 20, 1743 "My landlady, Mrs. Vernon, being dead, this garden and house
Why will you break the Sabbath of my days?1
Public too long, ah, let me hide my age!
See, modest Cibber now has left the stage:
Our generals now, retired to their estates,
Hang their old trophies o'er the garden gates,
In life's cool evening satiate of applause,
Nor fond of bleeding, even in Brunswick's cause.
A voice there is, that whispers in my ear,
('Tis reason's voice, which sometimes one can hear)
"Friend Pope! let your muse take breath,
And never gallop Pegasus to death;
Lest stiff, and stately, void of fire or force,
You limp, like Blackmore on a lord mayor's horse." 3
Farewell then verse, and love, and every toy,
The rhymes and rattles of the man or boy;
What right, what true, what fit we justly call,
Let this be all my care-for this is all:
To lay this harvest up, and hoard with haste
What every day will want, and most, the last.
But ask not, to what doctors I apply?
Sworn to no master, of no sect am I:
are offered me in sale; and, I believe (together with the cottages on each side my grass-plot next the Thames) will come at about a thousand pounds. If I thought any very particular friend would be pleased to live in it after my death (for, as it is, it serves all my purposes as well during life) I would purchase it," &c.-Warburton. 1 I.e., the 49th year, the age of the author.-Warburton.
2 Colley Cibber retired from the stage in 1733; but returned in 1734 and remained till 1745.
The fame of this heavy poet, however problematical elsewhere, was universally received in the city of London, His versification is here exactly described: stiff, and not strong; stately and yet dull, like the sober and slow-paced animal generally employed to mount the lord mayor: and therefore here humorously opposed to Pegasus.
As drives the storm, at any door I knock:
And house with Montaigne now, or now with Locke.
Sometimes a patriot, active in debate,
Mix with the world, and battle for the state,
Free as young Lyttelton, her cause pursue,
Still true to virtue, and as warm as true: 1
Sometimes with Aristippus, or St. Paul,
Indulge my candour, and grow all to all;
Back to my native moderation slide,
And win my way by yielding to the tide.
Long, as to him who works for debt, the day,
Long as the night to her whose love's away,
Long as the year's dull circle seems to run,
When the brisk minor pants for twenty-one:
So slow the unprofitable moments roll,
That lock up all the functions of my soul;
That keep me from myself; and still delay
Life's instant business to a future day:
That task, which as we follow, or despise,
The eldest is a fool, the youngest wise;
Which done, the poorest can no wants endure;
And which not done, the richest must be poor.
Late as it is, I put myself to school,
And feel some comfort, not to be a fool.
Weak though I am of limb, and short of sight,
Far from a lynx, and not a giant quite;
I'll do what Mead and Cheselden advise,
To keep these limbs, and to preserve these eyes.
Not to go back, is somewhat to advance,
And men must walk at least before they dance.
Say, does thy blood rebel, thy bosom move
1 George Lord Lyttelton, author of the Dialogues of the Dean.
With wretched avarice, or as wretched love?
Know, there are words, and spells, which can control Between the fits this fever of the soul:
Know, there are rhymes, which fresh and fresh applied
Will cure the arrantest puppy of his pride.
Be furious, envious, slothful, mad, or drunk,
Slave to a wife, or vassal to a punk,
A Switz, a High-dutch, or a Low-dutch bear;
All that we ask is but a patient ear.
'Tis the first virtue, vices to abhor;
And the first wisdom, to be fool no more.
But to the world no bugbear is so great,
As want of figure, and a small estate.
To either India see the merchant fly,
Scared at the spectre of pale poverty!
See him, with pains of body, pangs of soul,
Burn through the tropic, freeze beneath the pole !
Wilt thou do nothing for a nobler end,
Nothing to make philosophy thy friend?
To stop thy foolish views, thy long desires,
And ease thy heart of all that it admires?
Here, wisdom calls: "Seek virtue first, be bold!
As gold to silver, virtue is to gold."
There, London's voice: "Get money, money still!
And then let virtue follow, if she will."
This, this the saving doctrine, preached to all,
From low St. James's up to high St. Paul;
From him whose quills stand quivered at his ear,
To him who notches sticks at Westminster.1
Barnard in spirit, sense, and truth abounds;2
1 I.e., exchequer tallies.
2 Sir John Barnard, member for the city.
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