That neither all mens' scorn and hate,
Nor being laugh'd and pointed at,
Nor bray'd so often in a mortar,
Can teach you wholesome sense and nurture;
But (like a reprobate) what course
Soever's us'd, grow worse and worse?
Can no transfusion of the blood,
That makes fools cattle, do you good?
Nor putting pigs t' a bitch to nurse,
To turn 'em into mungrel-curs,
Put you into a way, at least,
To make yourself a better beast?
Can all your critical intrigues
Of trying sound from rotten eggs;
Your several new-found remedies
Of curing wounds and scabs in trees;
Your arts of fluxing them for claps,
And purging their infected saps;
Recov'ring shanker's, chrystallines,
And nodes and botches in their rinds,
Have no effect to operate
Upon that duller block, your pate?
But still it must be lewdly bent
Tompt your own due punishment;
And, like your whymsy'd chariots, draw,
The boys to course you without law;
As if the art you have so long
Profess'd, of making old dogs young,
In you had virtue to renew
Not only youth, but childhood too.
Can you that understand all books,
By judging only with your looks,
Resolve all problems with your face,
As others do with B's and A's;
Unriddle all that mankind knows
With solid bending of your brows;
All arts and sciences advance,
With screwing of your countenance,
And, with a penetrating eye,
Into th' abstrusest learning pry?
Know more of any trade b' a hint,
Than those that have been bred up, in't;
And yet have no art, true or false,
To help your own bad naturals;
But still, the more you strive t' appear,
Are found to be the wretcheder:
For fools are known by looking wise,
As men find woodcocks by their eyes.
Hence 'tis that 'cause y' have gain'd o' th' college
A quarter share (at most) of knowledge,
And brought in none, but spent repute,
Y'assume a pow'r as absolute
To judge, and censure, and controll,
As if you were the sole Sir Poll;
And saucily pretend to know
More than your dividend comes to.
You'll find the thing will not be done
With ignorance and face alone:
No, though y' have purchas'd to your name,
In history, so great a fame;
That now your talents, so well known,
For having all belief out grown,
That ev'ry strange prodigious tale
Is measur'd by your German scale;
By which the virtuosi try
The magnitude of ev'ry lie,
Cast up to what it does amount,
And place the bigg'st to your account?
That all those stories that are laid
Too truly to you, and those made,
Are now still charg'd upon your score
And lesser authors nam'd no more.
Alas! that faculty betrays
Those soonest it designs to raise;
And all your vain renown will spoil,
As guns o'ercharg'd the more recoil.
Though he that has but impudence,
To all things has a fair pretence;
And put among his wants but shame,
To all the world may lay his claim:
Though you have try'd that nothing's borne
With greater ease than public scorn,
That all affrouts do still give place
To your impenetrable face,
That makes your way through all affairs,
As pigs through hedges creep with theirs;
Yet as 'tis counterfeit, and brass,
You must not think 'twill always pass;
For all impostors, when they're known,
Are past their labour, and undone.
And all the best that can befal
An artificial natural,
Is that which madmen find as soon
As once they're broke loose from the moon,
And, proof against her influence,
Relapse to e'er so little sense,
To turn stark fools, and subjects fit
For sport of boys, and rabble-wit.
The Argument.
The Knight and Squire, resolve at once,
The one the other to renounce.
They both approach the Lady's Bower;
The Squire t' inform, the Knight to woo her.
She treats them with a Masquerade,
By Furies aud Hobgoblins made;
From which the Squire conveys the Knight,
And steals him from himself, by Night.
"TIS true, no lover has that pow'r
T'enforce a desperate amour,
As he that has two strings t' his bow,
And burns for love and money too;
For then he's brave and resolute,
When only by themselves they're hindred,
For trusting those they made her kindred;
And still the harsher and hide-bounder
The damsels prove, become the fonder.
For what mad lover ever dy'd
To gain a soft and gentle bride?
Or for a lady tender-hearted,
In purling streams or hemp departed?
Leap'd headlong int' Elysium,
Through th' windows of a dazzling room?
But for some cross, ill-natur'd dame,
The am'rous fly burnt in his flame.
This to the Kuight could be no news,
With all mankind so much in use;
Who therefore took the wiser course,
To make the most of his amours,
Resolv'd to try all sorts of ways,
As follows in due time and place.
No sooner was the bloody fight,
Between the Wizard and the Knight,
With all th' appurtenances, over,
But he relaps'd again t' a lover;
As he was always wont to do,
When h' had discomfited a foe;
And us'd the only antique b philters,
Deriv'd from old heroic tilters.
But now triumphant, and victorious,
He held th' atchievement was too glorious
For such a conqueror to meddle
With petty constable or beadle;
Or fly for refuge to the Hostess
Of th' Inns of Court and Chancery, Justice;
Who might, perhaps, reduce his cause
To th' e ordeal trial of the laws;
Where none escape, but such as branded
With red-hot irons have past hare-handed;
And, if they cannot read one verse
I' th' Psalms, must sing it, and that's worse.
He therefore judging it below him,
To tempt a shame the Devil might owe him,
|