The Fourth Satyr of Boileau to W. K.
1687.
Believe me, Will, that those who have least Sense,
Think they to VVisdom have the sole Pretence;
And that those VVretches who in Bethlem are,
Deserve it less than those who put them there.
The haughty Pedant, swoln with Frothy Name
Of Learned Man, big with his Classick Fame;
A thousand Books read o're and o're again,
Does word for word most perfectly retain,
Heap'd in the Lumber-Office of his Brain;
Yet this cram'd Skull, this undigested Mass,
Does very often prove an arrant Ass;
Believes all Knowledge is to Books confin'd,
That reading only can inform the Mind;
That Sense must Err, and Reason ramble wide,
If Sacred Aristotle ben't their Guide.
While, on the other hand, a Flutt'ring thing,
VVith a full Roll, and three pil'd Crevat string,
Whose Life's a Visit, who alone takes care
To say fine things, write Songs, and count the Fair;
Laughs at the musty Precepts of the School,
Calls the Learn'd Writer an Authentick Fool;
Swears that all Learning is a thing unfit
A well-bread Person, or a Man of Wit;
Names proper only to the Sparks o'th' Town,
And dams his Scholar to his Colledge Gown.
The fierce Bigot, who vainly does believe
His bantring Zeal can Heaven it self deceive;
With Saint-like Looks the bleer-ey'd Crowd does blind,
And the Jilt Villain damns all Human kind.
While the wild Libertine, that Beast of Prey,
Who bears down all that stops him in his way,
Ranges o're all, and takes his savage fill
In the wild Forest of a boundless will:
Swears that Heaven, Jove's, and Hells Eternal Pain,
Are the sick Dreams of a Distemper'd Brain,
Tales fit for Children, a meer holy Jest,
to starve the People, and to glut the Priest.
The sharpest Satyrist with Poetick Rage
Strives to reform the Vices of the Age;
Laughs at the Fool, and at the Villain rails;
Yet Folly reigns, and Villany prevails;
VVhile the crack'd Skull shows all that has been said,
Leaves Marks on nothing but the Poet's Head:
For partial Man, try'd by himself alone,
Protesting every Sentence but his own;
Severe to all Men, to himself too kind,
Sees others Faults, but to his own is blind.
The sordid Miser, a meer lump of Clay,
Form'd into Man e're from its gross Allay,
It was refin'd by the Souls Heavenly Ray,
VVhose Thirst of Wealth encreases with his Store,
And to spend less, does covet to have more;
VVho Midas-like, to feed his Avarice,
Starves in the enjoyment of a golden wish;
Thinks himself wise, boasts of being provident,
And down-right Scraping calls good Management.
The Love of VVealth is madness, and I hate
The very trouble of a great Estate:
'Tis perfect Dirt, cries the vain Prodigal,
Mad till 'tis gone, and when he has spent all,
The beggar'd Fool calls himself Liberal.
Now weigh them both, and tell me, if you can,
VVhich of the two seems the most prudent Man:
The Gamester swears both shou'd in Bethlem be,
That Fortune-monger, maddest of the three,
VVhose Life, whose Soul, whose very Heav'n is Play,
At which the Bubble throws them all away;
Who every moment waits his Destiny
From the uncertain running of a Die;
And, if he chance to lose, then how he stares!
Then how the Fury, with his bristled Hairs
Curses his Fate! Earth, hell, and Heaven defies,
And with Oaths heap'd on Oaths, he storms the Skies.
I could name thousands more, but to draw all
The Shapes of this false Reasoning Animal,
Wou'd be as hard, as to count all that die
Each Spring and Fall by Low'r and Mercury:
Or say how of th'impatient Heir, to have
The Old Man's wealth, has wisht him in his Grave:
A Drudgery so great my Pen declines,
Content to sum up all in these four Lines.
Greece boasts seven Sages, but the Story lies,
For the whole World ne'r saw one truly VVise:
All Men are Mad; and the sole Difference
Lies in the More, or the Less, want of Sense.
