OF

THE AUTHOR'S APOLOGY.

MY works are advertis'd for sale,

And censures fly as thick as hail; While my poor scheme of publication Supplies the dearth of conversation.

"What will the world say?"-That's your cry. Who is the world? and what am I?

Once, but, thank Heaven, those days are o'er,
And persecution reigns no more,
One man, one hardy man alone,
Usurp'd the critic's vacant throne,
And thence with neither taste nor wit,
By powerful catcall from the pit,
Knock'd farce, and play, and actor down.
Who pass'd the sentence then?-the town.
So now each upstart puny elf

Talks of the world, and means himself.
Yet in the circle there are those
Who hurt e'en more than open foes:
Whose friendship serves the talking turn,
Just simmers to a kind concern,

And with a wond'rous soft expression ⚫
Expatiates upon indiscretion;
Flies from the poems to the man,
And gratifies the favourite plan
To pull down other's reputation,

And build their own on that foundation.
The scholar grave, of taste discerning,
Who lives on credit for his learning,
And has no better claim to wit
Than carping at what others writ,
With pitying kindness, friendly fear,
Whispers conjectures in your ear.
"I'm sorry-and he's much to blame-
He might have publish'd-but his name!
The thing might please a few, no doubt,
As handed privately about-
It might amuse a friend or two,
Some partial friend like me and you;
But when it comes to press and print
You'll find, I fear, but little in't.
He stands upon a dangerous brink
Who totters o'er the sea of ink,
Where reputation runs aground,
The author cast away, and drown'd.
"And then-'t was wilful and absurd,
(So well approv'd, so well preferr'd).

Abruptly thus a place to quit

A place which most his genius hit,
The theatre for Latin wit!

With critics round him chaste and terse,
To give a plaudit to his verse!"

Latin, I grant, shows college breeding,
And some school common-place of reading;
But has in moderns small pretension
To real wit or strong invention.
The excellence you critics praise
Hangs on a curious choice of phrase;
Which pick'd and chosen here and there,
From prose or verse no matter where,

Jumbled together in a dish,

Like Spanish olio, fowl, flesh, fish,
You set the classic hodge-podge on

For pedant wits to feed upon.

Your would-be genii vainly seek
Fame for their Latin, verse, or Greek;
Who would for that be most admir'd
Which blockheads may, and have acquir'd.
A mere mechanical connection

Of favourite words, a bare collection
Of phrases,-where the labour'd cento
Presents you with a dull memento,
How Virgil, Horace, Ovid join,
And club together half a line.
These only strain their motley wits
In gathering patches, shreds, and bits,
To wrap their barren fancies in,
And make a classic Harlequin.

-Were I at once impower'd to show
My utmost vengeance on my foe,
To punish with extremest rigour,
I could inflict no penance bigger
Than using him as learning's tool
To make him usher of a school.
For, not to dwell upon the toil
Of working on a barren soil,
And lab'ring with incessant pains
To cultivate a blockhead's brains,
The duties there but ill befit
The love of letters, arts, or wit.
For whosoe'er, though slightly, sips,
Their grateful flavour with his lips,
Will find it leave a smatch behind,
Shall sink so deeply in the mind,
It never thence can be eras'd-
But, rising up, you call it taste.

'T were foolish for a drudge to choose A gusto which he cannot use. Better discard the idle whim, What's he to taste? or taste to him? For me, it hurts me to the soul To brook confinement or controul; Still to be pinion'd down to teach The syntax and the parts of speech; Or, what perhaps is drudging worse, The links, and joints, and rules of verse; To deal out authors by retail, Like penny pots of Oxford ale; -Oh! 'Tis a service irksome more Than tugging at the slavish oar.

Yet such his task, a dismal truth, Who watches o'er the bent of youth; And while, a paltry stipend earning, He sows the richest seeds of learning, And tills their minds with proper care, And sees them their due produce bear, No joys, alas! his toil beguile, His own lies fallow all the while.

"Yet still he's in the road," you say,
"Of learning."-Why, perhaps, he may.
But turns like horses in a mill,
Not getting on, nor standing still:
For little way his learning reaches,
Who reads no more than what he teaches.
Yet you can send advent'rous youth,
In search of letters, taste, and truth,
Who ride the highway road to knowledge
Through the plain turnpikes of a college."
True.-Like way-posts, we serve to show
The road which travellers should go;
Who jog along in easy pace,
Secure of coming to the place,
Yet find, return whene'er they will,
The post, and its direction still:

Which stands an useful unthank'd guide,
To many a passenger beside.

"Tis hard to carve for others meat,
And not have time one's self to eat.
Though, be it always understood,
Our appetites are full as good.

"But there have been, and proofs appear,
Who bore this load from year to year;
Whose claim to letters, parts and wit,
The world has ne'er disputed yet.
Whether the flowing mirth prevail
In Wesley's song, or humorous tale;
Or happier Bourne's' expression please
With graceful turns of classic ease;
Or Oxford's well-read poet sings
Pathetic to the ear of kings:
These have indulg'd the Muses' flight,
Nor lost their time nor credit by 't;
Nor suffer'd Fancy's dreams to prey
On the due business of the day.
Verse was to them a recreation
Us'd by way of relaxation."

Your instances are fair and true,
And genius I respect with you.
I envy none their honest praise;
I seek to blast no scholar's bays:

Samuel Wesley, and Vincent Bourne, both ushers of Westminster-school, and poets, although of very unequal merit. Bourne excelled in Latin poetry. C.

Still let the graceful foliage spread
Its greenest honours round their head,
Blest if the Muses' hand entwine
A sprig at least to circle nine!

Come,-I admit, you tax me right.
Prudence, 'tis true, was out of sight,
And you may whisper all you meet,
The man was vague and indiscreet.
Yet tell me, while you censure me,
Are you from errour sound and free,
Say, does your breast no bias hide,
Whose influence draws the mind aside?
All have their hobby horse you see,
From Tristram down to you and me.
Ambition, splendour, may be thine;
Ease, indolence, perhaps are mine.
Though prudence, and our nature's pride
May wish our weaknesses to hide,

And set their hedges up before 'em,

Some sprouts will branch and straggle o'er 'em.
Strive, fight against her how you will,

Nature will be the mistress still,
And though you curb with double rein,
She'll run away with us again.

But let a man of parts be wrong,
'Tis triumph to the leaden throng,
The fools shall cackle out reproof,
The very ass shall raise his hoof;
And he who holds in his possession,
The single virtue of discretion,
Who knows no overflow of spirit,
Whose want of passions is his merit,
Whom wit and taste and judgment flies,
Shall shake his noddle, and seem wise.

THE ACTOR. "

ADDRESSED TO BONNEL THORNTON, ESQ.

ACTING, dear Thornton, its perfection draws,

From no observance of mechanic laws:
No settled maxims of a fav'rite stage,
No rules deliver'd down from age to age,
Let players nicely mark them as they will,
Can e'er entail hereditary skill.

If, 'mongst the humble hearers of the pit,
Some curious vet'ran critic chance to sit,
Is he pleas'd more because 't was acted so
By Booth and Cibber thirty years ago?
The mind recalls an object held more dear,
And hates the copy, that it comes so near.
Why lov'd he Wilks's air, Booth's nervous tone
In them 't was natural, 'twas all their own.
A Garrick's genius must our wonder raise,
But gives his mimic no reflected praise.

Thrice happy genius, whose unrival'd name
Shall live for ever in the voice of Fame!
'Tis thine to lead with more than magic skill,
The train of captive passions at thy will;
To bid the bursting tear spontaneous flow
In the sweet sense of sympathetic woe:
Through ev'ry vein I feel a chillness creep,
When horrours such as thine have murder'd sleep;
And at the old man's look and frantic stare
'Tis Lear alarms me, for I see him there.
Nor yet confin'd to tragic walks alone,
The comic Muse too claims thee for her own.
With each delightful requisite to please,
Taste, spirit, judgment, elegance, and ease,

Some placid natures fill th' allotted scene With lifeless drone, insipid and serene; While others thunder ev'ry couplet o'er, And almost crack your ears with rant and roar. More nature oft and finer strokes are shown, In the low whisper than tempestuous tone. And Hamlet's hollow voice and fixt amaze More powerful terrour to the mind conveys, Than he, who, swol'n with big impetuous rage, Bullies the bulky phantom off the stage.

He, who in earnest studies o'er his part, Will find true nature cling about his heart. The modes of grief are not included all In the white handkerchief and mournful drawl; A single look more marks th' internal woe, Than all the windings of the lengthen'd Oh. Up the face the quick sensation flies, And darts its meaning from the speaking eyes; Love, transport, madness, anger, scorn, despair, And all the passions, all the soul is there.

In vain Ophelia gives her flowrets round,
And with her straws fantastic strews the ground,
In vain now sings, now heaves the desp'rate sigh,
If phrenzy sit not in the troubled eye.
In Cibber's look commanding sorrows speak,
And call the tear fast trick'ling down my cheek.
There is a fault which stirs the critic's rage;
A want of due attention on the stage.
I have seen actors, and admir'd ones too, [cue;
Whose tongues wound up set forward from their
In their own speech who whine, or roar away,
Yet seem unmov'd at what the rest may say;
Whose eyes and thoughts on diff'rent objects
roam,

Until the prompter's voice recall them home.
Divest yourself of hearers, if you can,
And strive to speak, and be the very man.
Why should the well-bred actor wish to know
Who sits above to night, or who below?
So, 'mid th' harmonious tones of grief or rage,
Italian squallers oft disgrace the stage;
When, with a simp'ring leer, and bow profound,
The squeaking Cyrus greets the boxes round;
Or proud Mandane, of imperial race,
Familiar drops a curt'sie to her grace.

To suit the dress demands the actor's art,
Yet there are those who over-dress the part.
To some prescriptive right gives settled things,
Black wigs to murd'rers, feather'd hats to kings.
But Michael Cassio might be drunk enough,
Though all his features were not grim'd with snuff.
Why should Pol Peachum shine in satin clothes?
Why ev'ry devil dance in scarlet hose?

But in stage-customs what offends me most
Is the slip-door, and slowly-rising ghost.
Tell me, nor count the question too severe,
Why need the dismal powder'd forms appear?
When chilling horrours shake the affrighted
king,

And Guilt torments him with her scorpion sting;
When keenest feelings at his bosom pull,
And Fancy tells him that the seat is full;
Why need the ghost usurp the monarch's place,
To frighten children with his mealy face?
The king alone should form the phantom there,
And talk and tremble at the vacant chair2.

2 This has been attempted by Mr. Kemble, but not much to the satisfaction of the audience. C.

If Belvidera her lov'd loss deplore,
Why for twin spectres bursts the yawning floor?
When with disorder'd starts, and horrid cries,
She paints the murder'd forms before her eyes,
And still pursues them with a frantic stare,
"T is pregnant madness brings the visions there.
More instant horrour would enforce the scene,
If all her shudd'rings were at shapes unseen.
Poet and actor thus, with blended skill,
Mould all our passions to their instant will;
'Tis thus, when feeling Garrick treads the stage,
(The speaking comment of his Shakespear's page)
Oft as I drink the words with greedy ears,

I shake with horrour, or dissolve with tears.
O, ne'er may Folly seize the throne of Taste,
Nor Dullness lay the realms of Genius waste!
No bouncing crackers ape the thund'rer's fire,
No tumbler float upon the bending wire!
More natural uses to the stage belong,
Than tumblers, monsters, pantomime, or song.
For other purpose was that spot design'd:
To purge the passions, and reform the mind,
To give to Nature all the force of art,
And while it charms the ear to mend the heart.
Thornton, to thee, I dare with truth commend,
The decent stage as Virtue's natural friend.
Though oft debas'd with scenes profane and loose,
No reason weighs against its proper use.
Though the lewd priest his sacred function shame,
Religion's perfect law is still the same.

Shall they, who trace the passions from their rise,

Show Scorn her features, her own image Vice,
Who teach the mind its proper force to scan,
And hold the faithful mirror up to man,
Shall their profession e'er provoke disdain,
Who stand the foremost in the moral train,
Who lend reflection all the grace of art,
And strike the precept home upon the heart?

Yet, hapless artist! though thy skill can raise
The bursting peal of universal praise,
Though at thy beck Applause delighted stands,
And lifts, Briareus like, her hundred hands,
Know, Fame awards thee but a partial breath!
Not all thy talents brave the stroke of Death.
Poets to ages yet unborn appeal,

And latest times th' eternal nature feel.
Though blended here the praise of bard and play'r,
While more than half becomes the actors share,
Relentless Death untwists the mingled fame,
And sinks the player in the poet's name.
The pliant muscles of the various face,
The mien that gave each sentence strength and
grace,

The tuneful voice, the eye that spoke the mind,
Are gone, nor leave a single trace behind.

THE POETRY PROFESSORS. OLD England has not lost her pray'r, And George, (thank Heav'n!) has got an heir. A royal babe, a prince of Wales. -Poets! I pity all your nailsWhat reams of paper will be spoil'd! What graduses be daily soil'd By inky fingers, greasy thumbs, Hunting the word that never comes!

Now academics pump their wits, And lash in vain their lazy tits;

In vain they whip, and slash, and spur,
The callous jades will never stir;
Nor can they reach Parnassus' hill,
Try every method which they will.
Nay, should the tits get on for once,
Each rider is so grave a dunce,
That, as I've heard good judges say,
'Tis ten to one they'd lose their way;
Though not one wit bestrides the back
Of useful drudge, ycleped hack,
But fine bred things of mettled blood,
Pick'd from Apollo's royal stud.
Greek, Roman, nay Arabian steeds,
Or those our mother country breeds;
Some ride ye in, and ride ye out,
And to come home go round about,
Nor on the green swerd, nor the road,
And that I think they call an Ode,
Some take the pleasant country air,
And smack their whips and drive a pair,

Each horse with bells which clink and chime,
And so they march-and that is rhyme.
Some copy with prodigious skill
The figures of a buttery-bill,
Which, with great folks of erudition,
Shall pass for Coptic or Phoenician.
While some, as patriot love prevails,
To compliment a prince of Wales,
Salute the royal babe in Welsh,

And send forth gutturals like a belch.
What pretty things imagination
Will fritter out in adulation!
The pagan gods shall visit Earth,
To triumph in a Christian's birth.
While classic poets, pure and chaste,
Of trim and academic taste,

Shall lug them in by head and shoulders,
To be or speakers, or beholders.
Mars shall present him with a lance,
To humble Spain and conquer France;
The Graces, buxom, blithe, and gay,
Shall at his cradle dance the hay;
And Venus, with her train of loves,
Shall bring a thousand pair of doves
To bill, to coo, to whine, to squeak,
Through all the dialects of Greek.
How many swains of classic breed,
Shall deftly tune their oaten reed,
And bring their Doric nymphs to town,
To sing their measures up and down,
In notes alternate clear and sweet,
Like ballad-singers in a street.
While those who grasp at reputation,
From imitating imitation,

Shall hunt each cranny, nook, and creek,
For precious fragments in the Greek,
And rob the spital, and the waste,
For sense, and sentiment, and taste.

What Latin hodge-podge, Grecian hash,
With Hebrew roots, and English trash,
Shall academic cooks produce
For present show and future use!

Fellows! who've soak'd away their knowledge,
In sleepy residence at college;
Whose lives are like a stagnant pool,
Muddy and placid, dull and cool;

Mere drinking, eating; eating, drinking;

With no impertinence of thinking;
Who lack no farther erudition,

Than just to set an imposition

To cramp, demolish, and dispirit,
Each true begotten child of merit;
Censors, who, in the day's broad light,
Punish the vice they act at night;
Whose charity with self begins,
Nor covers others' venial sins;
But that their feet may safely tread,
Take up hypocrisy instead,
As knowing that must always hide
A multitude of sins beside;
Whose rusty wit is at a stand,
Without a freshman at their hand;
(Whose service must of course create
The just return of sev'n-fold hate)
Lord! that such good and useful men
Should ever turn to books agen.

Yet matter must be gravely plann'd,
And syllables on fingers scann'd,
And racking pangs rend lab'ring head,
Till lady Muse is brought to-bed :
What hunting, changing, toiling, sweating,
To bring the usual epithet in!

Where the crampt measure kindly shows
It will be verse, but should be prose.
So, when it's neither light nor dark,
To 'prentice spruce, or lawyer's clerk,
The nymph, who takes her nightly stand,
At some sly corner in the Strand.
Plump in the chest, tight in the boddice.
Seems to the eye a perfect goddess;
But canvass'd more minutely o'er,
Turns out an old, stale, batter'd whore

Yet must these sons of gowned ease,
Proud of the plumage of degrees,
Forsake their apathy a while,
To figure in the Roman stile,
And offer incense at the shrine
Of Latin poetry divine.

Upon a throne the goddess sits,
Surrounded by her bulky wits;
Fabricius, Cooper, Calepine,
Ainsworthius, Faber, Constantine;
And he, who like Dodona spoke,
De Sacra Quercu, Holyoake;
These are her counsellors of state,
Men of much words, and wits of weight;
Here Gradus, full of phrases clever,
Lord of her treasury for ever,
With liberal hand his bounty deals;
Sir Cento keeper of the seals.
Next to the person of the queen,
Old madam Prosody is seen;
Talking incessant, although dumb,
Upon her fingers to her thumb.

And all around her portraits hung
Of heroes in the Latin tongue;
Italian, English, German, French,
Who most laboriously entrench
In deep parade of language dead,
What would not in their own be read,
Without impeachment of that taste,
Which Latin idiom turns to chaste.
Santolius here, whose flippant joke,
Sought refuge in a Roman cloak:
With dull Commirius at his side,
In all the pomp of jesuit pride.
Menage, the pedant, figur'd there,
A trifler with a solemn air:
And there in loose, unseemly view,
The graceless, easy Loveling toɔ.