Wise, if a minister; but, if a king,

More wise, more learn'd, more just, more ev'ry thing.
Court-virtues bear, like gems, the highest rate, 141
Born where heav'n's influence scarce can penetrate :
In life's low vale, the soil the virtues like,
They please as beauties, here as wonders strike.
Tho' the same sun with all-diffusive rays

Blush in the rose, and in the di'mond blaze,
We prize the stronger effort of his pow'r,
And justly set the gem above the flow'r.

'Tis education forms the common mind,
Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclin❜d.
Boastful and rough, your first son is a 'squire;
The next a tradesman, meek, and much a liar;
Tom struts a soldier, open, bold, and brave;
Will sneaks a scriv'ner, an exceeding knave:
Is he a churchman? then he's fond of pow'r :
A quaker? sly: a presbyterian? sour:
A smart free-thinker? all things in an hour.
Ask men's opinions: Scoto now shall tell
How trade increases, and the world
goes
Strike off his pension, by the setting sun,
And Britain, if not Europe, is undone.

well;

That gay free-thinker, a fine talker once,
What turns him now a stupid silent dunce?
Some god, or spirit he has lately found;
Or chanc'd to meet a minister that frown'd.

145

150

155

160

165

Judge

VER. 165. Or chanc'd to meet Sir Robert when he frown'd.

Judge we by nature? Habit can efface,
Int'rest o'ercome, or policy take place :
By actions? those uncertainty divides:
By passions? these dissimulation hides:
Opinions? they still take a wider range :
Fird, if you can, in what you cannot change.

170

Manners with fortunes, humours turn with climes, Tenets with books, and principles with times.

III.

180

Search then the RULING PASSION: There, alone, The wild are constant, and the cunning known; 175 The fool consistent, and the false sincere ; Priests, princes, women, no dissemblers here. This clue once found, unravels all the rest, The prospect clears, and WHARTON stands confest. Wharton, the scorn and wonder of our days, Whose ruling passion was the lust of praise : Born with whate'er could win it from the wise, Women and fools must like him, or he dies: Tho' wond'ring senates hung on all he spoke, The club must hail him master of the joke. Shall parts so various aim at nothing new? He'll shine a Tully and a Wilmot too. Then turns repentant, and his God adores

185

With the same spirit that he drinks and whores;

Enough

VER. 187. John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, famous for his wit

and extravagancies in the time of Charles the Second.

Enough, if all around him but admire,

And now the punk applaud, and now the fryer.
Thus with each gift of nature and of art,
And wanting nothing but an honest heart;
Grown all to all, from no one vice exempt;
And most contemptible to shun contempt;
His passion still, to covet gen'ral praise,
His life, to forfeit it a thousand ways;
A constant bounty which no friend has made;
An angel tongue, which no man can persuade !
A fool, with more of wit than half mankind,
Too rash for thought, for action too refin'd:
A tyrant to the wife his heart approves;
A rebel to the very king he loves;

190

195

200

205

He dies, sad outcast of each church and state,
And, harder still! flagitious, yet not great.
Ask you why Wharton broke through ev'ry rule?
'Twas all for fear the knaves should call him fool.

Nature well known, no prodigies remain,

Comets are regular, and WHARTON plain.

Yet, in this search, the wisest may mistake, 21Q If second qualities for first they take.

When

VER. 206. Ask you why Wharton] "This celebrated peer," says Lord Orford, "like Buckingham and Rochester, comforted all the grave and dull by throwing away the brightest profusion of parts on witty fooleries, debaucheries, and scrapes, which may mix graces with a great character, but never can compose one." VER. 208. In the former editions,

Nature well known, no Miracles remain. Altered as above, for very obvious reasons.

When Cataline by rapine swell'd his store;

When Cæsar made a noble dame a whore;

In this the last, in that the avarice

Were means, not ends: ambition was the vice.

215

That very Cæsar born in Scipio's days,

Had aim'd, like him, by chastity at praise.
Lucullus, when frugality could charm,
Had roasted turnips in the Sabin farm.
In vain th' observer eyes the builder's toil,
But quite mistakes the scaffold for the pile.

In this one passion man can strength enjoy,
As fits give vigour, just when they destroy.
Time, that on all things lays his lenient hand,

220

Yet tames not this; it sticks to our last sand.

225

Consistent in our follies and our sins,
Here honest nature ends as she begins.
Old politicians chew on wisdom past,
And totter on in bus'ness to the last;
As weak, as earnest; and as gravely out,

As sober Lanesb'row dancing in the gout.
Behold a rev'rend sire, whom want of grace

Has made the father of a nameless race,

230

Shov'd

VER. 213. When Casar made] This was Servilia, the sister of Cato, and the mother of Brutus.

VER. 231. Lanesb'row] An ancient nobleman, who continued this practice long after his legs were disabled by the gout. Upon the death of Prince George of Denmark, he demanded an audience of the Queen, to advise her to preserve her health and lispel her grief by dancing.

Shov'd from the wall perhaps, or rudely press'd
By his own son, that passes by unbless'd:
Still to his wench he crawls on knocking knees,
And envies ev'ry sparrow that he sees.

235

A salmon's belly, Helluo, was thy fate ; The doctor call'd, declares all help too late : "Mercy!" cries Helluo, " mercy on my soul! 240 "Is there no hope?-Alas!-then bring the jowl." The frugal crone, whom praying priests attend, Still tries to save the hallow'd taper's end, Collects her breath, as ebbing life retires,

For one puff more, and in that puff expires.

245

"Odious! in woollen! 'twould a saint provoke,"

(Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke ;) "No, let a charming chintz and Brussels lace << Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face: "One would not, sure, be frightful when one's dead— "And-Betty-give this cheek a little red."

251

The courtier smooth, who forty years had shin'd

An humble servant to all human kind,

Just brought out this, when scarce his tongue could stir, “If—where I'm going-I could serve you, Sir?" "I give and I devise" (old Euclio said,

And sigh'd)

66 my lands and tenements to Ned."

256

Your

VER. 242. The frugal crone, &c.] A fact told him by Lady Bolinbroke, of an old countess at Paris.

VER. 247. Narcissa] Mrs. Oldfield the actress, who gave these orders with her dying breath. Betty was Mrs. Saunders, an actress, her friend and confidante.