There can be no danger in sweetness and youth,
Where love is secur'd by good-nature and truth.
On her beauty I'll gaze, and of pleasure complain;
While every kind look adds a link to my chain.
'Tis more to maintain, than it was to surprise,
But her wit leads in triumph the slave of her eyes:
I beheld, with the loss of my freedom before;
But, hearing, for ever must serve and adore.

Too bright is my goddess, her temple too weak:
Retire, divine image! I feel my heart break.
Help, Love; I dissolve in a rapture of charms,
At the thought of those joys I should meet in her

arms.

UPON

HIS LEAVING HIS MISTRESS.

'Tis not that I am weary grown Of being yours, and yours alone: But with what face can I incline

To damn you to be only mine:

You, whom some kinder power did fashion, By merit, and by inclination,

The joy at least of a whole nation?

Let meaner spirits of your sex,

With humble aims their thoughts perplex:
And boast, if, by their arts, they can
Contrive to make one happy man.
While, mov'd by an impartial sense,
Favours, like Nature, you dispense,
With universal influence.

UPON

DRINKING IN A BOWL.

VULCAN, contrive me such a cup
As Nestor us'd of old;

Show all thy skill to trim it up,
Damask it round with gold.

Make it so large, that, fill'd with sack
Up to the swelling brim,
Vast toasts on the delicious lake,
Like ships at sea, may swim.
Engrave not battle on his cheek;
With war I've nought to do;

I'm none of those that took Mæstrick,
Nor Yarmouth leaguer knew.

Let it no name of planets tell,
Fix'd stars, or constellations:

For I am no sir Sidrophel,

Nor none of his relations.

But carve thereon a spreading vine;
Then add two lovely boys;
Their limbs in amorous folds entwine,
The type of future joys.
Cupid and Bacchus my saints are.
May drink and love still reign!
With wine I wash away my care,
And then to Love again.
VOL VIIL

A SONG.

As Chloris, full of harmless thoughts,
Beneath a willow lay,

Kind Love a youthful shepherd brought,
Το pass the time away.

She blush'd to be encounter'd so,

And chid the amorous swain;
But, as she strove to rise and go,
He pull❜d her down again.
A sudden passion seiz'd her heart,
In spite of her disdain ;
She found a pulse in every part,

And love in every vein.

"Ah, youth!" said she, "what charms are these, That conquer and surprise?

Ah! let me for, unless you please,

I have no power to rise."

She fainting spoke, and trembling lay,
For fear he should comply;
Her lovely eyes her heart betray,
And give her tongue the lie.

Thus she, who princes had deny'd,
With all their pomp and train,
Was in the lucky minute try'd,
And yielded to a swain.

A SONG.

GIVE me leave to rail at you,
I ask nothing but my due;

To call you false, and then to say,

You shall not keep my heart a day:
But, alas! against my will,

I must be your captive still.
Ah! be kinder then; for I

Cannot change, and would not die.

Kindness has resistless charms,
All besides but weakly move,
Fiercest anger it disarms,

And clips the wings of flying Love.
Beauty does the heart invade,
Kindness only can persuade;

It gilds the lover's servile chain,

And makes the slaves grow pleas'd again.

Though you still possess my heart, Scorn and rigour I must feign: Ah! forgive that only art

Love has left your love to gain.

You, that could my heart subdue, To new conquests ne'er pretend : Let th' example make me true,

And of a conquer'd foe a friend. Then, if e'er I should complain Of your empire, or my chain, Summon all the powerful charms, And kill the rebel in your arms.

CONSTANCY.

A SONG.

I CANNOT change, as others do,
Though you unjustly scorn;
Since that poor swain that sighs for you,
For you alone was born.

No, Phillis, no, your heart to move
A surer way I'll try ;

And, to revenge my slighted love,

Will still love on, will still love on, and die.

When, kill'd with grief, Amyntas lies,
And you to mind shall call
The sighs that now unpity'd rise,
The tears that vainly fall;

That welcome hour, that ends this smart,
Will then begin your pain;

For such a faithful tender heart

Can never break, can never break in vain.

A SONG.

My dear mistress has a heart

Soft as those kind looks she gave me, When, with Love's resistless art,

Aud her eyes, she did enslave me. But her constancy's so weak,

She 's so wild and apt to wander, That my jealous heart would break, Should we live one day asunder. Melting joys about her move,

Killing pleasures, wounding blisses: She can dress her eyes in love,

And her lips can warm with kisses. Angels listen when she speaks,

She's my delight, all mankind's wonder; But my jealous heart would break, Should we live one day asunder.

A SONG,

IN IMITATION OF SIR JOHN EATON.

Too late, alas! I must confess,
You need not arts to move me;
Such charms by nature you possess,
"Twere madness not to love ye.

Then spare a heart you may surprise,
And give my tongue the glory
To boast, though my unfaithful eyes
Betray a tender story.

A LETTER

FROM ARTEMISA IN THE TOWN, TO CHLOE IN THE
COUNTRY.

CHLOE, by your command in verse I write ;
Shortly you'll bid me ride astride and fight:
Such talents better with our sex agree,
Than lofty flights of dangerous poetry.
Among the men, I mean the men of wit,
(At least they pass'd for such before they writ)
How many bold adventurers for the bays,
Proudly designing large returns of praise,
Who durst that stormy pathless world explore,
Were soon dash'd back, and wreck'd on the dull
shore,

Broke of that little stock they had before!
How would a woman's tottering bark be tost,
Where stoutest ships (the men of wit) are lost!
When I reflect on this, I straight grow wise,
And my own self I gravely thus advise:
"Dear Artemisa! poetry 's a snare;
Bedlam has many mansions, have a care;
Your Muse diverts you, makes the reader sad;
You think yourself inspir'd, he thinks you mad.
Consider too, 'twill be discreetly done,

To make yourself the fiddle of the town.
To find th' ill-humour'd pleasure at their need:
Curs'd when you fail, and scorn'd when you succeed."
Thus, like an arrant woman as I am,
No sooner well convinc'd writing 's a shame,
That whore is scarce a more reproachful name
Than poetess

Like men that marry, or like maids that woo,
Because 'tis th' very worst thing they can do,
Pleas'd with the contradiction and the sin,
Methinks I stand on thorns till I begin.

Y' expect to hear, at least, what love has past
In this lewd town, since you and I saw last;
What change has happen'd of intrigues, and whether
The old ones last, and who and who's together.
But how, my dearest Chloe, should I set
My pen to write what I would fain forget!
Or name that lost thing Love, without a tear,
Since so debauch'd by ill-bred customs here?
Love, the most generous passion of the mind,
The softest refuge innocence can find ;
The safe director of unguided youth,
Fraught with kind wishes, and secur'd by Truths
That cordial-drop Heaven in our cup has thrown,
To make the nauseous draught of life go down;
On which one only blessing God might raise,
In lands of atheists, subsidies of praise:
For none did e'er so dull and stupid prove,
But felt a God, and bless'd his power, in love:
This only joy, for which poor we are made,
Is grown, like play, to be an arrant trade:
The rooks creep in, and it has got of late
As many little cheats and tricks as that;
But, what yet more a woman's heart would vex,
'Tis chiefly carry'd on by our own sex;
Our silly sex, who born, like monarchs, free,
Turn gipsies for a meaner liberty,

And hate restraint, though but from infamy:

That call whatever is not common nice,
And, deaf to Nature's rule, or Love's advice,
Forsake the pleasure, to pursue the vice.
To an exact perfection they have brought
The action love, the passion is forgot.
'Tis below wit, they tell you, to admire,
And e'ven without approving they desire:
Their private wish obeys the public voice,
Twixt good and bad whimsy decides, not choice:
Fashions grow up for taste, at forms they strike,
They know what they would have, not what they
like.

Bovy's a beauty, if some few agree

To call him so, the rest to that degree
Affected are, that with their ears they see.
Where I was visiting the other night,
Comes a fine lady, with her humble knight,
Who had prevail'd with her, through her own skill,
At his request, though much against his will,
To come to London-

As the coach stopt, I heard her voice, more loud
Than a great-belly'd woman's in a crowd;
Telling the knight, that her affairs require
He, for some hours, obsequiously retire.

I think she was asham'd he should be seen:
Hard fate of husbands! the gallant had been,
Though a diseas'd, ill-favour'd fool, brought in.
"Dispatch," says she," the business you pretend,
Your beastly visit to your drunken friend,
A bottle ever makes you look so fine;
Methinks I long to smell you stink of wine.
Your country drinking breath 's enough to kill;
Sour ale corrected with a lemon-peel.
Prythee, farewell; we'll meet again anon:"
The necessary thing bows, and is gone.

She flies up stairs, and all the haste does show
That fifty antic postures will allow;

And then bursts out-" Dear madam, am not I
The strangest, alter'd, creature? let me die,
I find myself ridiculously grown,
Embarrast with my being out of town:
Rude and untaught, like any Indian queen,
My country nakedness is plainly seen.

How is Love govern'd? Love, that rules the state;
And pray who are the men most worn of late?
When I was marry'd, fools were à-la-mode,
The men of wit were then held incommode:
Slow of belief, and fickle in desire,

Who, ere they'll be persuaded, must inquire,
As if they came to spy, and not t' admire:
With searching wisdom, fatal to their ease,
They still find out why what may should not
please;

Nay, take themselves for injur'd, when we dare
Make them think better of us than we are;
And if we hide our frailties from their sights,
Call us deceitful jilts and hypocrites;
They little guess, who at our arts are griev'd,
The perfect joy of being well deceiv'd;
Inquisitive as jealous cuckolds grow;
Rather than not be knowing, they will know
What, being known, creates their certain woe.
Women should these, of all mankind, avoid,
For wonder, by clear knowledge, is destroy'd.
Woman, who is an arrant bird of night,
Bold in the dusk, before a fool's dull sight
Must fly, when Reason brings the glaring light,
But the kind easy fool, apt to admire
Himself, trusts us; his follies all conspire
To flatter his, and favour our desire:

She to the window runs, where she had spy'd
Her much-esteem'd dear friend, the monkey, ty'd;
With forty smiles, as many antic bows,
As if 't had been the lady of the house,
The dirty chattering monster she embrac'd,
And made it this fine tender speech at last:

"Kiss me, thou curious miniature of man;
How odd thou art, how pretty, how japan!
Oh! I could live and die with thee!"-then on,
For half an hour, in compliments she ran:
I took this time to think what Nature meant,
When this mixt thing into the world she sent,
So very wise, yet so impertinent:
One that knows every thing that God thought fit
Should be an ass through choice, not want of wits
Whose foppery, without the help of sense,
Could ne'er have rose to such an excellence:
Nature 's as lame in making a true fop
As a philosopher; the very top
And dignity of folly we attain

By studious search and labour of the brain,
By observation, counsel, and deep thought:
God never made a coxcomb worth a groat;
We owe that name to industry and arts:
An eminent fool must be a fool of parts,
And such a one was she, who had turn'd o'er
As many books as men, lov'd much, read more,
Had a discerning wit; to her was known
Every one's fault, or merit, but her own.
All the good qualities that ever blest
A woman so distinguish'd from the rest,
Except discretion only, she possest,

But now, "Mon cher, dear Pug," she cries, "adieu;"
And the discourse broke off does thus renew:

"You smile to see me, who the world perchance Mistakes to have some wit, so far advance The interest of fools, that I approve Their merit more than men of wit in love; But in our sex too many proofs there are Of such whom wits undo, and fools repair. This, in my time, was so observ'd a rule, Hardly a wench in town but had her fool; The meanest common slut, who long was grown The jest and scorn of every pit buffoon, Had yet left charms enough to have subdued Some fop or other, fond to be thought lewd. Foster could make an Irish lord a Nokes, And Betty Morris had her city Cokes. A woman 's ne'er so ruin'd, but she can Be still reveng'd on her undoer, man: How lost soe'er, she 'll find some lover more A lewd abandon'd fool than she a whore. That wretched thing Corinna, who has run Through all the several ways of being undone : Cozen'd at first by Love, and living then By turning the too dear-bought cheat on men: Gay were the hours, and wing'd with joy they

flew,

When first the town her early beauties knew;

Born to myself, I like myself alone,

And must conclude my judgment good, or none:
For could my sense be naught, how should I know
Whether another man's were good or no?
Thus I resolve of my own poetry,

That 'tis the best; and there's a fame for me.
If then I'm happy, what does it advance,
Whether to merit due, or arrogance?
Oh, but the world will take offence hereby!
Why then the world shall suffer for 't, not I.
Did e'er this saucy world and I agree,
To let it have its beastly will on me?
Why should my prostituted sense be drawn
To every rule their musty customs spawn?
But men may censure you; 'tis two to one,
Whene'er they censure, they'll be in the wrong.
There's not a thing on Earth, that I can name,
So foolish, and so false, as common fame.

It calls the courtier knave, the plain man rude,
Haughty the grave, and the delightful lewd,
Impertinent the brisk, morose the sad,
Mean the familiar, the reserv'd-one mad.
Poor helpless woman is not favour'd more,
She's a sly hypocrite, or public whore.

Then who the Devil would give this-to be free
From th' innocent reproach of infamy?
These things consider'd, make me (in despite
Of idle rumour) keep at home and write.

Apollo, well pleas'd with so bonny a lad,
T'oblige him, he told him he should be huge glad,
Had he half so much wit, as he fancy'd he had.
Nat Lee stepp'd in next in hopes of a prize,
Apollo remember'd he had hit once in thrice;
By the rubies in 's face, he could not deny,
But he had as much wit as wine could supply;
Confess'd that indeed he had a musical note,
But sometimes strain'd so hard that he rattled in
throat;

Yet owning he had sense, t' encourage him for 't,
He made him his Ovid in Augustus's court.
Poor Settle, his trial was the next came about,
He brought him an Ibrahim with the preface torn out,
And humbly desir'd he might give no offence;
"D-n him," cries Shadwell, "he cannot write

sense:"

"And Bancks," cry'd Newport, "I hate that dull
Apollo, considering he was not in vogue, [rogue;"
Would not trust his dear bays with so modest a fool,
And bid the great boy be sent back to school.
Tom Otway came next, Tom Shadwell's dear Zany,
And swears, for heroics, he writes best of any:
Don Carlos his pockets so amply had fill'd,
That his mange was quite cur'd, and his lice were
Anababaluthu put in for a share, [all kill'd;

And little Tom Essence's author was there:
But Apollo had seen his face on the stage,
And prudently did not think fit to engage
The scum of a playhouse, for the prop of an age.
In the numerous crowd that encompass'd him round,

IN IMITATION OF A SATIRE IN BOILEAU.

His cravat-string new iron'd, he gently did stretch
His lily-white hand out, the laurel to reach.
Alleging, that he had most right to the bays,
For writing romances, and sh-ting of plays:
Apollo rose up, and gravely confess'd,
Of all men that writ, his talent was best;
For since pain and dishonour man's life only damn,
The greatest felicity mankind can claim,

In the head of the gang,

That ancient grave wit so long lov'd and fear'd,
But Apollo had heard a story in town,

Of his quitting the Muses, to wear the black gown;
And so gave him leave now his poetry 's done,
To let him turn priest, since R is turn'd nun.
This reverend author was no sooner set by,
But Apollo had got gentle George' in his eye,
And frankly confess'd, of all men that writ, [wit:
There's none had more fancy, sense, judgment, and
But in th' crying sin, idleness, he was so harden'd,
That his long seven years silence was not to be par-

don'd.

W--y 3 was the next man show'd his face, But Apollo e'en thought him too good for the place; No gentleman writer that office should bear, But a trader in wit the laurel should wear, As none but a cit e'er makes a lord-mayor. Next into the crowd, Tom Shadwell does wallow, And swears by his guts, his paunch, and his tallow, That 'tis he alone best pleases the age, Himself and his wife have supported the stage:

See The Session of the Poets, in the State Poems, vol. i. and The Election of the Poet Laureat, 1719, in Sheffield duke of Buckingham's works. * Sir George Etherege. 3 Mr. Wycherley.

to want sense of smart, and be past sense of
shame;

And to perfect his bliss in poetical rapture,
He bid him be dull to the end of the chapter.
The poetess Afra next show'd her sweet face,
And swore by her poetry, and her black ace,
The laurel by a double right was her own,
For the plays she had writ, and the conquests she had
Apollo acknowledg'd 'twas hard to deny her, [won.
Yet, to deal frankly and ingenuously by her,
He told her, were conquests and charms her pretence,
She ought to have pleaded a dozen years since.
Nor could D'Urfey forbear for the laurel to stickle,
Protesting that he had the honour to tickle
Th' ears of the town, with his dear madam Fickle.
With other pretenders, whose names I'd rehearse,
But that they're too long to stand in my verse:
Apollo, quite tir'd with their tedious harangue,
At last found Tom Betterton's face in the gang,
For, since poets without the kind players may hang
By his one sacred light he solemnly swore,
That in search of a laureat, he 'd look out no more
A general murmur ran quite through the hall,
To think that the bays to an actor should fall;
Tom told them, to put his desert to the test,
That he had MAID plays as well as the best,
And was the great'st wonder the age ever bore,
Of all the play-scribblers that e'er writ before,
His wit had most worth, and modesty in 't,
For he had writ plays, yet ne'er came in print,