More to my King, than to my God, I owe;
God and my father made me man,
Yet not without my mother's added aid;

But GEORGE, without or God or man,
With grace endow'd, and hallow'd me Archbishop.

ANTISTROPHE I.

In Trojan PRIAM's court a laurel grew;
SO VIRGIL Sings. But I will sing the laurel,
Which at ST. JAMES's blooms.

O may I bend my brows from that blest tree,
Not flourishing in native green,

Refresh'd with dews from AGANIPPE's spring;
But, like the precious plant of Dis*,
Glitt'ring with gold, with royal sack irriguous.

EPODE I.

So shall my awkward gratitude,
With fond presumption, to the Laureat's duty
Attune my rugged numbers blank.

Little I reck the meed of such a song;
Yet will I stretch aloof,

And tell of Tory principles,
The right divine of Kings;

See Virgil's Æneid, b. vi.

Epade I.

IMITATIONS OF MYSELF.

How shall my awkward gratitude,

And the presumption of untutor'd duty,

Attune my numbers all too rude?

Little he recks the meed of such a song,

Yet will I stretch aloof, &c.

Ikid.

And Power Supreme that brooks not bold contention: Till all the zeal monarchal

That fir'd the Preacher, in the Bard shall blaze,

And what my Sermons were, my Odes once more shall

Good PRICE*, to Kings and me a foe no more,
By LANSDOWN won, shall pay with friendly censure
His past hostility.

Nor shall not He assist, my pupil once,

Of stature small, but doughty tongue,

Bold ABINGDON, whose rhetoric unrestrain❜d,

Rushes, more lyrically wild,

Than GREENE's † mad lays, when he out-pindar'd PINDAR.

ANTISTROPHE II.

With him, too, EFFINGHAM his aid shall join,
Who, erst by GORDON led, with bonfires usher'd
His Sov'reign's natal month.

Secure in such allies, to princely themes,

To HENRYS and to EDWARDS young,

During the Administration of Lord SHELBURNE, I was told by a friend of mine, that Dr. PRICE took occasion, in his presence, to declare the most lively abhorrence of the damnable heresies which he had formerly advanced against the Jure divino doctrines contained in some of my Sermoris.

+ See a translation of PINDAR, by EDWARD BURNABY GREENE.

This alludes wholly to a private anecdote, and in no degree to certain malicious reports of the noble Earl's conduct during the riots of June 1780.

Antistrophe II.

IMITATIONS OF MYSELF.

TO HENRYS and to EDWARDS old,

Dread names, I'll meditate the faithful song, &c.

Ibid.

Dear names, I'll meditate the faithful song;
How oft beneath birch severe,

my

Like EFFINGHAM and ABINGDON, they tingled:

EPODE II.

Or to the YOUTH IMMACULATE
Ascending thence, I'll sing the strain celestial,
By PITT, to bless our isle restor'd,
Trim Plenty, not luxuriant as of old,
Peace, laurel-crown'd no more;
Justice, that smites by scores, unmov'd;

And her of verdant locks,

Commerce, like Harlequin, in motley vesture, + Whose magic sword, with sudden sleight,

Wav'd o'er the HIBERNIAN treaty, turns to bonds The dreams of airy wealth that play'd round PATRICK's)

eyes.

* The present Ministry have twice gratified the public with the awfully sublime spectacle of twenty hanged at one time.

These three lines, I must confess, have been interpolated since the introduction of the fourth Proposition in the new Irish Resolutions. They arose, however, quite naturally out of my preceding personification of

commerce.

I have taken the liberty of employing Patrick in the same sense as Paddy, to personify the people of Ireland. The latter name was too colloquial for the dignity of my blank verse.

*Epode II.

IMITATIONS OF MYSELF.

Justice with steady brow,

Trim Plenty, Laureat Peace, and green-hair'd Commerce,

In flowing robe of thousand hues, &c.

On this imitation of myself, I cannot help remarking, how happily I have now applied some of these epithets, which, it must be confessed, had not half the propriety before.

STROPHE III.

But lo! yon bark, that, rich with India spoils,
O'er the wide-swelling ocean rides triumphant :
O! to BRITANNIA's shore

In safety waft, ye winds, the precious freight:
"Tis HASTINGS; of the prostrate EAST

Despotic arbiter; whose bounty gave

My MARKHAM's delegated rule

To riot in the plunder of BENARES.

ANTISTROPHE III.

How yet affrighted GANGES, oft distain'd With GENTOO carnage, quakes through all his branches! Soon may I greet the morn,

When, HASTINGS screeu'd, DUNDAS and GEORGE'S

name

One of the many frivolous charges brought against Mr. Hastings by factious men, is the removal of a Mr. Fowxe, contrary to the orders of the Directors, that he might make room for his own appointment of my son to the Residentship of BENARES. I have ever thought it my duty to support the late Governor-General, both at Leadenhall and in the House of Peers, against all such vexatious accusations.

IMITATIONS OF MYSELF.

Strophe III.

Or trace her navy, where in towering pride
O'er the wide-swelling waste it rolls avengeful.

Through BISHOPTHORP's* glad roofs shall sound,
Familiar in domestic merriment;

Or in thy chosen PLACE, ST. JAMES,
Be carol'd loud amid th' applauding IMHOFFS!

EPODE III.

When wealthy Innocence, pursu'd
By factious Envy, courts a Monarch's succour,
Mean gifts of vulgar cost, alike
Dishonour him who gives, and him who takes.
Not thus shall HASTINGS sav'd,

Thee, BRUNSWICK, and himself disgrace.

As many of my Competitors have complained of Signor Delpini's ignorance, I cannot help remarking here, that he did not know Bishopthorp to be the name of my palace in Yorkshire; he did not know Mr. Hastings's house to be in St. James's Place; he did not know Mrs. Hastings to have two sons by Mynheer Imhoff, her former husband, still living. And what is more shameful than all in a Critical Assessor, he had never heard of the poetical figure, by which I elegantly say, thy Place, St. James, instead of St. James's Place.

Antistrophe III.

IMITATIONS OF MYSELF.

How headlong Rhone, and Ebro erst distain'd

With Moorish carnage, quakes through all her branches
Soon shall I greet the morn,

When, Europe sav'd, BRITAIN and GEORGE's name
Shall soon o'er FLANDRIA's level field,
Familiar in domestic merriment,

Or by the jolly mariner

Be carol'd loud adown the echoing Danube.

Ibid.