But, when its short-liv'd beauties die,
Dissolves to common air again.*
So 'tis with us, my jovial souls:

Let friendship reign while here we stay ;
Let's crown our joys with flowing bowls :-
When Jove us calls we must obey.

SONG IX.

GIVE me but a friend and a glass, boys,
I'll show ye what 'tis to be gay;
I'll not care a fig for a lass, boys,
Nor love my brisk youth away :
Give me but an honest fellow,
That's pleasantest when he is mellow,
We'll live twenty-four hours a day.

"Tis woman in chains does bind, boys,
But 'tis wine that makes us free;
'Tis woman that makes us blind, boys,
But wine makes us doubly see.
The female is true to no man,
Deceit is inherent to woman,

But none in a brimmer can be.

* [Here closes Mr. Pilkington's ode to Lycidas, printed in 1730 with his poems; the spurious addition has been thus refined from its Bacchanalian heathenism, in the song-collections of Mr. Plumptre.] So 'tis with us;-life is not long,

Let friendship reign while here we stay :

Let virtue aid the cheerful song;

When Heav'n shall call, we must obey.]

SONG X.*

BID me, when forty winters more
Have furrow'd deep my pallid brow;
When from my head, a scanty store,
Lankly the wither'd tresses flow;
When the warm tide, that bold and strong
Now rolls impetuous on and free,
Languid and slow scarce steals along ;
Then bid me court sobriety.

Nature, who form'd the varied scene
Of rage and calm, of frost and fire,
Unerring guide, could only mean
That age should reason, youth desire :
Shall then that rebel man presume
(Inverting nature's law) to seize
The dues of age in youth's high bloom,
And join impossibilities?

No-let me waste the frolic May
In wanton joys and wild excess,
In revel sport, and laughter gay,
And mirth, and rosy cheerfulness.
Woman, the soul of all delights,

And wine, the aid of love, be near:
All charms me that to joy incites,
And ev'ry she that's kind, is fair.

* Quære, if not by Sir John Hill, M. D.?

SONG XI.

BY MR. GAY.*

YOUTH's the season made for joys,
Love is then our duty,

She alone, who that employs,
Well deserves her beauty.

Let's be gay,

While we may,

Beauty's a flower despis'd in decay.

Let us drink and sport to-day,
Ours is not to-morrow;
Love with youth flies swift away,

Age is nought but sorrow.

Dance and sing,

Time's on the wing,

Life never knows the return of spring.

SONG XII.

BY DR. DALTON.†

PREACH not to me your musty rules,
Ye drones that mould in idle cell;
The heart is wiser than the schools,
The senses always reason well.

* In the Beggar's Opera.'

↑ In his excellent alteration of the masque of 'Comus.'

If short my span, I less can spare
To pass a single pleasure by ;
An hour is long, if lost in care;
They only live, who life enjoy.

SONG XIII.*

COME now, all ye social pow'rs,
Shed your influence o'er us ;
Crown with joy the present hours,
Enliven those before us.

Bring the flask, the music bring,
Joy shall quickly find us;

Drink and dance, and laugh and sing;
And cast dull care behind us.

Love, thy godhead we adore,
Source of generous passion;
But will ne'er bow down before
Those idols wealth or fashion,
Bring the flask, &c.

Friendship with thy smile divine,

Brighten all our features;

What but friendship, love and wine,

Can make us happy creatures.

Bring the flask, &c.

* Altered and enlarged from the finale of Bickerstaff's 'School for Fathers.'

Why the deuce should we be sad,
While on earth we moulder;
Grave or gay, or wise or mad,
We every day grow older.
Bring the flask, &c.

Then since time will steal away,

Spite of all our sorrow;
Heighten every joy to-day,
Never mind to-morrow.

Bring the flask, the music bring,
Joy shall quickly find us ;

Drink, and dance, and laugh, and sing,
And cast dull care behind us.

SONG XIV.

CATO'S ADVICE.*

WHAT Cato advises, most certainly wise is,
Not always to labour, but sometimes to play,
To mingle sweet pleasure with search after treasure,
Indulging at night for the toils of the day:

* By Harry Carey; which familiar appellative the reader is desired to prefer in every place to the more stately one of Mr. Henry. Cato's real advice (whoever he was) is comprised in the following distich, prefixed by honest Harry, in his Musical Century,' as a motto to the song:

Interpone tuis interdum gaudia curis,

Ut possis animo quemvis sufferre laborem. Distich, lib. 3.