And you, brave Cobham! to the latest breath Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death; Such in those moments as in all the past,
And, at the bottom, barbarous still and rude, We are restrained, indeed, but not subdued. The very remedy, however sure,
"O, save my country, Heaven!" shall be your Springs from the mischief it intends to cure, last.
CONTRADICTION.
FROM "CONVERSATION.'
YE powers who rule the tongue, if such there
And make colloquial happiness your care,
Preserve me from the thing I dread and hate,
A duel in the form of a debate.
The clash of arguments and jar of words,
Worse than the mortal brunt of rival swords,
Decide no question with their tedious length,
For opposition gives opinion strength,
Divert the champions prodigal of breath,
And put the peacefully disposed to death.
O, thwart me not, Sir Soph, at every turn,
Nor carp at every flaw you may discern!
Though syllogisms hang not on my tongue,
I am not surely always in the wrong;
"T is hard if all is false that I advance,
A fool must now and then be right by chance.
Not that all freedom of dissent I blame;
No,
there I grant the privilege I claim.
A disputable point is no man's ground;
Rove where you please, 't is common all around.
Discourse may want an animated No,
To brush the surface, and to make it flow;
But still remember, if you mean to please,
To press your point with modesty and ease.
The mark at which my juster aim I take,
Is contradiction for its own dear sake.
Set your opinion at whatever pitch,
Knots and impediments make something hitch;
Adopt his own, 't is equally in vain,
Your thread of argument is snapped again.
The wrangler, rather than accord with you,
Will judge himself deceived, and prove it too.
Vociferated logic kills me quite ;
A noisy man is always in the right.
I twirl my thumbs, fall back into my chair,
Fix on the wainscot a distressful stare,
And, when I hope his blunders are all out,
Reply discreetly, — “To be sure — no doubt!”
THE point of honor has been deemed of use, To teach good manners, and to curb abuse; Admit it true, the consequence is clear, Our polished manners are a mask we wear,
And savage in its principle appears,
Tried, as it should be, by the fruit it bears.
'T is hard, indeed, if nothing will defend
Mankind from quarrels but their fatal end;
That now and then a hero must decease,
That the surviving world may live in peace.
Perhaps at last close scrutiny may show
The practice dastardly and mean and low;
That men engage in it compelled by force,
And fear, not courage, is its proper source;
The fear of tyrant custom, and the fear
Lest fops should censure us, and fools should
At least, to trample on our Maker's laws,
And hazard life for any or no cause,
To rush into a fixed eternal state
Out of the very flames of rage and hate,
Or send another shivering to the bar
With all the guilt of such unnatural war,
Whatever Use may urge, or Honor plead,
On Reason's verdict is a madman's deed.
Am I to set my life upon a throw
Because a bear is rude and surly? No, -
A moral, sensible, and well-bred man
Will not affront me; and no other can.
They should encounter with well-loaded fists;
Were I empowered to regulate the lists,
A Trojan combat would be something new,
Let Dares beat Entellus black and blue;
Then each might show, to his admiring friends,
In honorable bumps his rich amends,
And carry, in contusions of his skull,
A satisfactory receipt in full.
FROM "AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE IV.
WHAT'S fame? -a fancied life in others' breath,
A thing beyond us, e'en before our death.
Just what you hear, you have; and what's un
known
The same (my lord) if Tully's, or your own.
All that we feel of it begins and ends
In the small circle of our foes or friends;
To all beside, as much an empty shade
A Eugene living as a Cæsar dead;
Alike or when or where they shone or shine,
Or on the Rubicon, or on the Rhine.
A wit's a feather, and a chief a rod;
An nonest man 's the noblest work of God.
HER house is all of Echo made
Where never dies the sound;
And as her brows the clouds invade,
Her feet do strike the ground.
IN facile natures fancies quickly grow,
But such quick fancies have but little root.
Soon the narcissus flowers and dies, but slow
The tree whose blossoms shall mature to fruit.
Grace is a moment's happy feeling, Power
A life's slow growth; and we for many an hour
Must strain and toil, and wait and weep, if we
The perfect fruit of all we are would see.
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REASON AND INSTINCT.
FROM AN ESSAY ON MAN," EPISTLE III.
WHETHER with reason or with instinct blest,
Know, all enjoy that power which suits them best;
To bliss alike by that direction tend,
And find the means proportioned to their end.
Say, where full instinct is the unerring guide,
What pope or council can they need beside?
Reason, however able, cool at best,
Cares not for service, or but serves when prest,
Stays till we call, and then not often near;
But honest instinct comes a volunteer,
Sure never to o'ershoot, but just to hit ;
While still too wide or short is human wit,
Sure by quick nature happiness to gain,
From the Italian of LEONARDO DA VINCI. Which heavier reason labors at in vain.
Translation of W. W. STORY.
I'll tell you, friend; a wise man and a fool.
You'll find, if once the monarch acts the monk
Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk,
Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow;
The rest is all but leather or prunella.
Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with
strings,
That thou mayst be by kings, or whores of kings;
Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race,
In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece ;
But by your fathers' worth if yours you rate,
Count me those only who were good and great.
This too serves always, reason never long;
One must go right, the other may go wrong.
See then the acting and comparing powers
One in their nature, which are two in ours;
And reason raise o'er instinct as you can,
In this 't is God directs, in that 't is man.
Who taught the nations of the field and wood
To shun their poison and to choose their food?
Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand,
Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand?
Who made the spider parallels design,
Sure as De Moivre, without rule or line?
Who bid the stork, Columbus-like, explore
Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before!
Who calls the council, states the certain day,
Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way!
FROM "EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT," BEING THE "PRO
LOGUE TO THE SATIRES."
CURSED be the verse, how well soe'er it flow,
That tends to make one worthy man my foe,
Give virtue scandal. innocence a fear,
Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear!
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Yet wanting sensibility) the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail
That crawls at evening in the public path;
But he that has humanity, forewarned,
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight,
And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes,
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes
Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die :
A necessary act incurs no blame.
Not so when, held within their proper bounds,
And guiltless of offence, they range the air,
Or take their pastime in the spacious field :
There they are privileged; and he that hunts
Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong,
Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm,
Who, when she formed, designed them an abode.
The sum is this: If man's convenience, health,
Or safety interfere, his rights and claims
Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs.
Else they are all the meanest things that are ---
As free to live, and to enjoy that life,
As God was free to form them at the first,
Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all.
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too.
FROM "PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY."
SHAME upon thee, savage monarch-man, proud monopolist of reason;
Shame upon creation's lord, the fierce ensanguined despot :
What, man! are there not enough, hunger aud diseases and fatigue,
And yet must thy goad or thy thong add another sorrow to existence ?
What! art thou not content thy sin hath dragged down suffering and death
On the poor dumb servants of thy comfort, ard yet must thou rack them with thy spite? The prodigal heir of creation hath gambled away his all,
Shall he add torment to the bondage that is galling his forfeit serfs?
The leader in nature's paan himself hath marred her psaltery,
Shall he multiply the din of discord by overstraining all the strings?
The rebel hath fortified his stronghold, shutting in his vassals with him,
Shall he aggravate the woes of the besieged by oppression from within?
Thou twice-deformed image of thy Maker, thou hateful representative of Love, For very shame be merciful, be kind unto the creatures thou hast ruined!
Earth and her million tribes are cursed for thy sake,
Earth and her million tribes still writhe beneath
Liveth there but one among the million that shall not bear witness against thee,
A pensioner of land or air or sea that hath not whereof it will accuse thee?
From the elephant toiling at a launch, to the shrew-mouse in the harvest-field, From the whale which the harpooner hath stricken, to the minnow caught upon a pin, From the albatross wearied in its flight, to the wren in her covered nest,
From the death-moth and lace-winged dragon-fly to the lady-bird and the gnat, The verdict of all things is unanimous, finding their master cruel :
The dog, thy humble friend, thy trusting, honest friend;
And the stag at bay, and the worm in thy path, and the wild bird pining in captivity, And all things that minister alike to thy life and thy comfort and thy pride,
Void of all honor, avaricious, rash,
The daring tribe compound their boasted trash, -
Tincture or syrup, lotion, drop or pill ;
All tempt the sick to trust the lying bill :
Testify with one sad voice that man is a cruel And twenty names of cobblers turned to squires master.
FROM "THE SEASONS SPRING."
ENSANGUINED man
Is now become the lion of the plain,
And worse. The wolf, who from the nightly fold
Aid the bold language of these blushless liars.
There are among them those who cannot read,
And yet they'll buy a patent, and succeed;
Will dare to promise dying sufferers aid.
For who, when dead, can threaten or upbraid?
With cruel avarice still they recommend
More draughts, more syrup, to the journey's end.
"I feel it not." "Then take it every hour."
"It makes me worse." "Why, then it shows
its power."
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her I fear to die." "Let not your spirits sink,
Nor wore her warming fleece; nor has the steer,
At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs,
E'er ploughed for him. They too are tempered
With hunger stung and wild necessity;
Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast.
But man, whom nature formed of milder clay,
With every kind emotion in his heart,
You're always safe while you believe and drink."
Troubled with something in your bile or blood,
You think your doctor does you little good;
And, grown impatient, you require in haste
The nervous cordial, nor dislike the taste;
It comforts, heals, and strengthens; nay, you
think
It makes you better every time you drink ;
And taught alone to weep, while from her lap Who tipples brandy will some comfort feel,
She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs,
And fruits as numerous as the drops of rain
Or beams that gave them birth,
Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on
heaven,
E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd,
And dip his tongue in gore? The beast of prey,
Blood-stained, deserves to bleed; but you, ye
flocks,
What have ye done? ye peaceful people, what,
To merit death? you who have given us milk
In luscious streams, and lent us your own coat
Against the winter's cold? And the plain ox,
That harmless, honest, guileless animal,
In what has he offended? he whose toil,
Patient and ever-ready, clothes the land
With all the pomp of harvest, shall he bleed,
And struggling groan beneath the cruel hand,
Even of the clown he feeds? and that, perhaps,
To swell the riot of the autumnal feast,
Won by his labor?
Observe what ills to nervous females flow,
When the heart flutters and the pulse is low:
If once induced these cordial sips to try,
All feel the ease, and few the danger fly;
For, while obtained, of drams they 've all the
force,
And when denied, then drams are the resource.
Who would not lend a sympathizing sigh,
To hear yon infant's pity-moving cry ?
Then the good nurse (who, had she borne a brain,
Hed sought the cause that made her babe com-
Has all her efforts, loving soul! applied
To set the cry, and not the cause, aside;
She gave her powerful sweet without remorse,
The sleeping cordial, she had tried its force,
Repeating oft; the infant, freed from pain,
Rejected food, but took the dose again,
But now our Quacks are gamesters, and they Sinking to sleep, while she her joy expressed, play
With craft and skill to ruin and betray;
That her dear charge could sweetly take his rest. Soon may she spare her cordial; not a doubt With monstrous promise they delude the mind, Remains but quickly he will rest without.
And thrive on all that tortures human-kind.
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