University of Virginia Library


113

To the Honourable ---.

An EPISTLE.

Tell me, dear ---, all impatient grow,
For you perchance alone the secret know;
What climate now a certain bard conceals,
Who writes what others wrote, yet seldom steals;
Who knows to cull, in gardens flush'd with flow'rs,
Each one that fairest smiles, or tallest tow'rs,
Yet, with strange whim, almost beyond compare,
Oddly prefers the lowest, and least fair:
Say, why in silence lies your poet's pen?
Sure bards are rank'd among the first of men—
Else why flow'd music from Pope's tuneful tongue?
Why not forgot that Addison once sung?
Young had not else high-soar'd on wings of fire,
Nor Milton stole from Heav'n a seraph's lyre,
Through all the wide Creation's glorious round,
Is no fit theme to suit his genius found?

114

No Season, to transfer into his page
The grove's soft music, or the tempest's rage?
Can he the world of politics survey,
Or morals, not less circumscrib'd than they;
Hear Fame's loud trumpet sound Britannia's praise,
Nor yet find subjects worthy of his lays?
If blame and odium to excite he's loath,
Let him remain conceal'd, and merit both.
By formal rules Candour's ne'er taught to see,
Hence Learning oft and Candour disagree.
Candour beholds with fair and honest eye,
But through lens optic Learning needs must spy.
Thus faults are magnified beyond their due,
And beauties render'd blemishes oft too.
Thus Fulvia's neck appear like parchment may,
And gems themselves a surface rough betray.
But Nature means her objects to be seen,
No artificial lying glass between;
Through which our eagle-sighted critics look,
When authors they would praise, that is, rebuke.
Yet we confess, what some perfections deem,
As faults to others may as justly seem;
For who expects, as wonders cease to be,
All should in looks, or sentiments agree,

115

Must first reverse Heav'n's universal plan,
And to an angel change the very man.
Fictitious wings o'er streams successful skim,
Inform us then what bait will answer him.
Though the sinn'd victim might from harm have stray'd,
He spies, pursues, he leaps, and is betray'd:
Yet others boldly near the surface swim,
And seize secure the insects as they skim.
But how uncertain oft the trial leaves,
When Nature courts us, or when Art deceives!
Haply of both the specious lure's the same,
The insect's pinion, or the plume of fame;
That hides a point, how fatal to the brook!
A dagger this, oft dreadfully mistook!
Your bard is silent, yet what numbers praise!
But writing would with some his merit raise.
Let him, undazzled by the shine of pelf,
Examine well his motive in himself.
If nothing hence gives vigour to his pen,
Let him remain—the silentest of men.
Say then, dear ---, does the verse invite
The nameless author, or forbid, to write?
The author nameless, though to you well known,
Who for another's beauties slights his own.

116

Builds on foundations laid from others' pelf,
Though few can lay a better than himself;
As yonder sun shines feebly by the moon,
Though he can blaze in majesty at noon.
If you the question can discreetly solve,
Go clear those doubts Time's thickest mists involve.