But show'd his Breeding and his Wit;
He did his best to seem to eat,
And cry'd, "I vow you're mighty neat.
"But Lord, my Friend, this savage
Scene!
175
"For God's sake, come, and live with
Men:

"Consider, Mice, like Men, must die,
"Both small and great, both you and I:
"Then spend your life in Joy and Sport,
"(This doctrine, Friend, I learnt at
Court)."
180

The veriest Hermit in the Nation
May yield, God knows, to strong tempta-

204

210

Was ever such a happy Swain?
He stuffs and swills, and stuffs again.
"I'm quite asham'd-'tis mighty rude
"To eat so much-but all's so good.
"I have a thousand thanks to give-
"My Lord alone knows how to live."
No sooner said, but from the Hall
Rush Chaplain, Butler, Dogs and all:
"A Rat, a Rat! clap to the door❞—
The Cat comes bouncing on the floor.
O for the heart of Homer's Mice,
Or Gods to save them in a trice!
(It was by Providence they think,
For your damn'd Stucco has no chink.)
"An't please your Honour, quoth the
Peasant,

215

"This same Dessert is not so pleasant:
"Give me again my hollow Tree,
"A crust of Bread, and Liberty!"

220

BOOK IV. ODE I.

TO VENUS1.

GAIN? new Tumults in my breast?

AGAIN? new is! let me, let me rest!

I am not now, alas! the man

As in the gentle Reign of My Queen Anne.

Ah sound no more thy soft alarms,

Nor circle sober fifty with thy Charms.

Mother too fierce of dear Desires!

Turn, turn to willing hearts your wanton fires.

To Number five direct your Doves,

There spread round MURRAY all your blooming Loves;

Noble and young, who strikes the heart

With ev'ry sprightly, ev'ry decent part;

Equal, the injur'd to defend,

To charm the Mistress, or to fix the Friend.

1 It may be worth observing, that the measure Pope has here chosen is precisely the same that Ben Jonson used in a translation of this very Ode. Warton.

5

ΙΟ

* The number of Murray's lodgings in King's Bench Walks. Bowles. [See Imitations of Horace, Bk. 1. Ep. vi. 49, note.]

He, with a hundred Arts refin'd,

Shall stretch thy conquests over half the kind:
To him each Rival shall submit,

Make but his Riches equal to his Wit1.
Then shall thy Form the Marble grace,

(Thy Grecian Form) and Chloe lend the Face:

His House, embosom'd in the Grove,

Sacred to social life and social love,

Shall glitter o'er the pendant green,

Where Thames reflects the visionary scene:
Thither, the silver-sounding lyres

Shall call the smiling Loves, and young Desires;
There, ev'ry Grace and Muse shall throng,
Exalt the dance, or animate the song;

There Youths and Nymphs, in concert gay,
Shall hail the rising, close the parting day.
With me, alas! those joys are o'er;

For me, the vernal garlands bloom no more.
Adieu, fond hope of mutual fire,

The still-believing, still-renew'd desire;

Adieu, the heart-expanding bowl,

And all the kind Deceivers of the soul!

But why? ah tell me, ah too dear3!

Steals down my cheek th' involuntary Tear?
Why words so flowing, thoughts so free,

Stop, or turn nonsense, at one glance of thee?
Thee, drest in Fancy's airy beam,

Absent I follow thro' th' extended Dream;

Now, now I seize, I clasp thy charms,

And now you burst (ah cruel!) from my arms;

And swiftly shoot along the Mall,

Or softly glide by the Canal,

Now, shown by Cynthia's silver ray,

And now, on rolling waters snatch'd away.

15

20

35

30

35

PART OF THE NINTH ODE OF THE FOURTH BOOK 4.

LES Which sounds the Silver Thames along,

EST you should think that verse should die,

Taught, on the wings of Truth to fly
Above the reach of vulgar song;

Tho' daring Milton sits sublime,
In Spenser native Muses play;
Nor yet shall Waller yield to time,
Nor pensive Cowley's moral lay.

1 [Lord Mansfield is reported to have been in embarrassed circumstances during the early part of his career.]

2 This alludes to Mr Murray's intention at one time of taking the lease of Pope's house and

grounds at Twickenham. Bowles.
3 This was in the original:

'But why, my Patty, ah too dear'-
relating to Martha Blount. Bowles.
4 [Viz. stanzas 1, 2, 3, 7.]

5

ROBERT EARL OF OXFORD, AND EARL MORTIMER 1.

S

UCH were the notes thy once-lov'd Poet sung,
'Till Death untimely stopp'd his tuneful tongue.

Oh just beheld, and lost! admir'd and mourn'd!
With softest manners, gentlest Arts adorn'd!
Blest in each science, blest in ev'ry strain !
Dear to the Muse! to HARLEY dear-in vain!
For him, thou oft hast bid the World attend,
Fond to forget the statesman in the friend;
For SWIFT and him despis'd the farce of state,
The sober follies of the wise and great;
Dext'rous the craving, fawning crowd to quit,
And pleas'd to 'scape from Flattery to Wit.

Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear
(A sigh the absent claims, the dead a tear);

1 Epist. to Robert Earl of Oxford,] This Epistle was sent to the Earl of Oxford with Dr Parnell's Poems published by our Author, after the said Earl's Imprisonment in the Tower, and Retreat into the Country, in the Year 1721. P. [As to Parnell v. ante p. 437. Robert Harley, though descended from a Puritan family and in the early part of his career an extreme Whig, had, by a transition not unparalleled in political history, become the leader of the Country Party; and was chosen_Speaker of the House of Commons in 1701. In 1704 he became Secretary of State in the Godolphin Ministry, and after being expelled from office succeeded in obtaining the

5

ΙΟ

Chancellorship of the Exchequer by employing female intrigue and raising the cry of the Church in danger.' (Macknight.) He subsequently was created Earl of Oxford and made Lord Treasurer; and it was at this time that he principally availed himself of the services of Swift and his friends. The rivalry between himself and Bolingbroke ended in his downfall immediately after the death of Queen Anne; in 1716, he was impeached for treasonable intrigues with the Jacobites during his tenure of power; and confined in the Tower. In 1717 the trial was abandoned; and he died in retirement in 1724.]

2 [Verg. Æn. VI. 870.]

Recall those nights that clos'd thy toilsome days;
Still hear thy Parnell in his living lays,
Who, careless now of Int'rest, Fame, or Fate,
Perhaps forgets that OXFORD e'er was great;
Or, deeming meanest what we greatest call,
Beholds thee glorious only in thy Fall.

And sure, if aught below the seats divine
Can touch Immortals, 'tis a Soul like thine:
A Soul supreme in each hard instance try'd,
Above all Pain, all Passion, and all Pride,
The rage of Pow'r, the blast of public breath,
The lust of Lucre, and the dread of Death.
In vain to Deserts thy retreat is made;
The Muse attends thee to thy silent shade:
'Tis hers, the brave man's latest steps to trace,
Rejudge his acts, and dignify disgrace.
When Int'rest calls off all her sneaking train,
And all th' oblig'd desert, and all the vain;
She waits, or to the scaffold, or the cell,
When the last ling'ring friend has bid farewell.

15

20

25

30

Ev'n now, she shades thy Ev'ning-walk with bays
(No hireling she, no prostitute to praise);

35

Ev'n now, observant of the parting Ray,
Eyes the calm Sun-set of thy various Day,

Thro' Fortune's cloud one truly great can see,

Nor fears to tell, that MORTIMER is he.

40

EPISTLE TO JAMES CRAGGS', Esq.
SECRETARY OF STATE2.

SOUL as full of Worth, as void of Pride,

A Which nothing seeks to shew, or needs to hide,

Which nor to Guilt nor Fear, its Caution owes,
And boasts a Warmth that from no Passion flows.

A Face untaught to feign; a judging Eye,

That darts severe upon a rising Lie,

And strikes a blush thro' frontless Flattery.

All this thou wert, and being this before,

Know, Kings and Fortune cannot make thee more.
Then scorn to gain a Friend by servile ways,
Nor wish to lose a Foe these Virtues raise;
But candid, free, sincere, as you began,
Proceed, -a Minister, but still a Man.

1 James Craggs was made Secretary at War in 1717, when the Earl of Sunderland and Mr Addison were appointed Secretaries of State. Bowles. [He succeeded Addison in the latter office in 1720, and to him Addison dedicated his works in the last letter which he ever composed. Craggs was afterwards involved in the South Sea speculations (concerning which he advised Pope);

10