And flatt'ring dreams delusive shed
Gay gilded visions round his head.
When, swift as thought, the goddess lewd Shifts the light gale; and tempests rude, Such as the northern skies deform,
When fell DESTRUCTION guides the storm,
Transport him to some dreary isle
Where FAVOUR never deign'd to smile.
Where waking, helpless, all alone,
'Midst craggy steeps and rocks unknown;
Sad scenes of woe his pride confound,
And DESOLATION stalks around.
Where the dull months no pleasures bring,
And years roll round without a spring;
Where He all hopeless, lost, undone,
Sees chearless days that know no sun;
Where jibing SCORN her throne maintains,
Midst mildews, blights, and blasts, and rains.
Let others, with submissive knee, Capricious goddess! bow to Thee; Let them with fixt incessant aim Court fickle favour, faithless fame; Let vanity's fastidious slave
Lose the kind moments nature gave,
In invocations to the shrine
Of Phoebus and the fabled Nine,
An author, to his latest days,
From hunger, or from thirst of praise,
Let him thro' every subject roam
To bring the useful morsel home;
Write upon LIBERTY opprest,
On happiness, when most distrest,
Turn bookseller's obsequious tool,
A monkey's cat, a mere fool's fool;
Let him, unhallow'd wretch! profane
The muse's dignity for gain,
Yield to the dunce his sense contemns,
Cringe to the knave his heart condemns,
And, at a blockhead's bidding, force
Reluctant genius from his course;
Write ode, epistle, essay, libel,
Make notes, or steal them, for the bible;
Or let him, more judicial, sit
The dull Lord Chief, on culprit wit,
With rancour read, with passion blame,
Talk high, yet fear to put his name,
And from the dark, but useful shade,
(Fit place for murd'rous ambuscade,)
Weak monthly shafts at merit hurl,
The GILDON of some modern CURL.
For me, by adverse fortune plac'd Far from the colleges of taste,
I jostle no poetic name;
I envy none their
And if sometimes an easy vein,
With no design, and little pain,
Form'd into verse, hath pleas'd awhile,
And caught the reader's transient smile,
My muse hath answer'd all her ends,
Pleasing herself, while pleas'd her friends;
But, fond of Liberty, disdains
To bear restraint, or clink her chains.
Quid tibi cum Cirrhá? quid cum Permessidos undá?
Romanum propius divitiusque Forum est. Mart.
Now Christ Church left, and fixt at Lincoln's Inn,
Th' important studies of the Law begin..
Now groan the shelves beneath th' unusual charge
Of Records, Statutes, and Reports at large.
Each Classic Author seeks his peaceful nook,
And modest Virgil yields his place to Coke.
No more, ye Bards, for vain precedence hope,
But even Jacob take the lead of Pope!
While the pil'd shelves sink down on one another, And each huge folio has it's cumb❜rous brother; While,arm'd with these, the Student views with awe His rooms become the magazine of Law; Say whence so few succeed? where thousands aim, So few e'er reach the promis'd goal of fame ;
Say, why Cæcilius quits a gainful trade
For regimentals, sword, and smart cockade ?
Or Sextus why his first profession leaves
For narrower band, plain shirt, and pudding sleeves?
The depth of Law asks study, thought, and care?
Shall we seek these in rich Alonzo's heir?
Such diligence, alas! is seldom found
In the brisk heir to forty thousand pound.
Wealth, that excuses folly, sloth creates,
Few, who can spend, e'er learn to get estates.
What is to him dry case, or dull report,
Who studies fashions at the Inns of Court;
And proves that thing of emptiness and show,
That mungrel, half-form'd thing, a Temple-Beau?
Observe him daily saunt'ring up and down,
In purple slippers, and in silken gown;
Last night's debauch, his morning conversation;
The coming, all his evening preparation.
By Law let others toil to gain renown!
Florio's a gentleman, a man o'th' town.
He nor courts, clients, or the law regarding,
Hurries from Nando's down to Covent-Garden:
Yet he's a Scholar;-mark him in the Pit
With critic catcall sound the stops of wit!
|