The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare,

But wonder how the devil they got there. Were others angry: I excused them too; Well might they rage, I gave them but their due.

A man's true merit 't is not hard to find; 175 But each man's secret standard in his mind, That casting-weight Pride adds to emptiness, This, who can gratify? for who can guess? The bard whom pilfered pastorals renown, Who turns a Persian tale for half-acrown,

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Just writes to make his barrenness appear, And strains from hard-bound brains eight

lines a year;

He who still wanting, though he lives on theft,

Steals much, spends little, yet has nothing left;

And he who now to sense, now nonsense, leaning,

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Means not, but blunders round about a meaning:

And he whose fustian's so sublimely bad,
It is not poetry, but prose run mad:
All these my modest satire bade translate,
And owned that nine such poets made a
Tate.

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How did they fume, and stamp, and roar, and chafe!

And hate for arts that caused himself to rise: 200

Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,

And without sneering teach the rest to sneer;
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike;
Alike reserved to blame or to commend, 205
A tim'rous foe, and a suspicious friend;
Dreading ev'n fools; by flatterers besieged,
And so obliging that he ne'er obliged;
Like Cato, give his little Senate laws,
And sit attentive to his own applause:
While Wits and Templars ev'ry sentence
raise,

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And wonder with a foolish face of praise Who but must laugh if such a man there be? Who would not weep, if Atticus were he? What though my name stood rubric on

the walls,

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That not for Fame, but Virtue's better end,
He stood the furious foe, the timid friend,
The damning critic, half approving wit,
The coxcomb hit, or fearing to be hit;
Laughed at the loss of friends he never had,
The dull, the proud, the wicked, and the
mad;

The distant threats of vengeance on his head,

The blow unfelt, the tear he never shed;
The tale revived, the lie so oft o'erthrown, 350
Th' imputed trash and dullness not his own;
The morals blackened when the writings
'scape,

The libelled person, and the pictured shape;
Abuse on all he loved, or loved him, spread,
A friend in exile, or a father dead;

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No courts he saw, no suits would ever try, Nor dared an oath, nor hazarded a lie. Unlearned, he knew no schoolman's subtle art,

No language but the language of the heart.
By Nature honest, by Experience wise, 400
Healthy by Temp'rance and by Exercise;
His life, though long, to sickness passed
unknown,

His death was instant and without a groan.
O grant me thus to live, and thus to die!
Who sprung from kings shall know less joy
than I.

405

O friend! may each domestic bliss be thine! Be no unpleasing melancholy mine: Me, let the tender office long engage To rock the cradle of reposing Age, With lenient arts extend a Mother's breath,

410

Make Languor smile, and smooth the bed of Death;

Explore the thought, explain the asking eye,

Thou Great First Cause, least understood, 5
Who all my sense confined

To know but this, that thou art good,
And that myself am blind;

Yet gave me, in this dark estate,
To see the good from ill;

And binding Nature fast in Fate,
Left free the human Will.

What Conscience dictates to be done,
Or warns me not to do;

This teach me more than Hell to shun,
That more than Heav'n pursue.

What blessings thy free bounty gives
Let me not cast away;

For God is paid when man receives;
T' enjoy is to obey.

Yet not to earth's contracted span
Thy goodness let me bound,
Or think thee Lord alone of man,
When thousand worlds are round.

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That mercy I to others show,
That mercy show to me.
Mean though I am, not wholly so,
Since quickened by thy breath;
O lead me, wheresoe'er I go,

Through this day's life or death!

This day be bread and peace my lot:
All else beneath the sun
Thou know'st if best bestowed or not,
And let thy will be done.

To Thee, whose temple is all Space,
Whose altar earth, sea, skies,

One chorus let all Being raise,
All Nature's incense rise!

Matthew Prior (1664-1721)

A SIMILE

DEAR Thomas, didst thou never pop Thy head into a tin-man's shop? There, Thomas, didst thou never see ('T is but by way of simile)

A squirrel spend his little rage

In jumping round a rolling cage?

1738

40

45

50

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The cage, as either side turned up, Striking a ring of bells a-top?

Moved in the orb, pleased with the chimes, The foolish creature thinks he climbs:

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But here or there, turn wood or wire,

He never gets two inches higher.

So fares it with those merry blades,

That frisk it under Pindus' shades.

In noble songs and lofty odes,

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They tread on stars and talk with gods; Still dancing in an airy round,

Still pleased with their own verses' sound; Brought back, how fast soe'er they go, Always aspiring, always low.

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1707

A HYMN TO CONTENTMENT LOVELY, lasting peace of mind! Sweet delight of human-kind! Heavenly-born, and bred on high, To crown the favourites of the sky With more of happiness below, Than victors in a triumph know! Whither, O whither art thou fled, To lay thy meek, contented head: What happy region dost thou please To make the seat of calms and ease! Ambition searches all its sphere Of pomp and state, to meet thee there. Encreasing Avarice would find Thy presence in its gold enshrined. The bold adventurer ploughs his way Through rocks amidst the foaming sea, To gain thy love; and then perceives Thou wert not in the rocks and waves. The silent heart, which grief assails,

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Treads soft and lonesome o'er the vales, 20 Sees daisies open, rivers run,

And seeks, as I have vainly done,

Amusing thought; but learns to know

Pleased and blessed with God alone:
Then while the gardens take my sight,
With all the colours of delight;
While silver waters glide along,

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To please my ear, and court my song;
I'll lift my voice, and tune my string,
And thee, great source of nature, sing.
The sun that walks his airy way,
To light the world, and give the day;
The moon that shines with borrowed light; 65
The stars that gild the gloomy night;
The seas that roll unnumbered waves;
The wood that spreads its shady leaves;
The field whose ears conceal the grain,
The yellow treasure of the plain;
All of these, and all I see,

Should be sung, and sung by me:
They speak their Maker as they can,
But want and ask the tongue of man.

Go search among your idle dreams,
Your busy or your vain extremes;
And find a life of equal bliss,

Or own the next begun in this.

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That solitude's the nurse of woe.

No real happiness is found

25

A NIGHT-PIECE ON DEATH

By the blue taper's trembling light, No more I waste the wakeful night, Intent with endless view to pore The schoolmen and the sages o'er: Their books from wisdom widely stray, Or point at best the longest way.

I'll seek a readier path, and go

Where wisdom's surely taught below.

How deep yon azure dyes the sky, Where orbs of gold unnumbered lie, While through their ranks in silver pride The nether crescent seems to glide! The slumbering breeze forgets to breathe, The lake is smooth and clear beneath, Where once again the spangled show Descends to meet our eyes below. The grounds which on the right aspire, In dimness from the view retire: The left presents a place of graves,

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