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Dear Thomas, didst thou never pop
Thy head into a tinman's shop?
There, Thomas, didst thou never see
('Tis but by way of simile)

A squirrel spend his little rage
In jumping round a rolling cage?
The cage, as either side turned up,
Striking a ring of bells a-top?

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To be vext at a trifle or two that I writ.
Your judgment at once and my passion you
wrong:

Moved in the orb, pleased with the chimes You take that for fact which will scarce be

The foolish creature thinks he climbs:

But here or there, turn wood or wire,

He never gets two inches higher.

So fares it with those merry blades,
That frisk it under Pindus '1 shades.
In noble songs, and lofty odes,

They tread on stars, and talk with gods;
Still dancing in an airy round,

Still pleased with their own verses' sound; Brought back, how fast soe'er they go, Always aspiring, always low.

AN ODE

The merchant, to secure his treasure, Conveys it in a borrowed name: Euphelia serves to grace my measure; But Cloe is my real flame.

My softest verse, my darling lyre,
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay;

When Cloe noted2 her desire

That I should sing, that I should play.

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise;

But with my numbers3 mix my sighs: And whilst sing Euphelia's praise, I fix my soul on Cloe's eyes.

Fair Cloe blushed: Euphelia frowned:

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found wit:

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JOHN GAY (1685-1732)

FROM FABLES

XLIV. THE HOUND AND THE HUNTSMAN

Impertinence at first is borne

With heedless slight, or smiles of scorn;
Teased into wrath, what patience bears
The noisy fool who perseveres?

The morning wakes, the Huntsman sounds,
At once rush forth the joyful hounds.
They seek the wood with eager pace,
Through bush, through brier, explore the chase.
Now scattered wide, they try the plain,
And snuff the dewy turf in vain.
What care, what industry, what pains!
What universal silence reigns!

Ringwood, a Dog of little fame,
Young, pert, and ignorant of game,
At once displays his babbling throat;
The pack, regardless of the note,
Pursue the scent; with louder strain
He still persists to vex the train.

The Huntsman to the clamour flies;
The smacking lash he smartly plies.
His ribs all welked, with howling tone
The puppy thus expressed his moan:

"I know the music of my tongue
Long since the pack with envy stung.
What will not spite? These bitter smarts
I owe to my superior parts.

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"Spare your comparisons,'' replied
An angry Rose who grew beside.

"Of all mankind you should not flout us;
20 What can a Poet do without us?
In every love-song roses bloom;
We lend you colour and perfume.
Does it to Chloe's charms conduce,
To found her praise on our abuse?
Must we, to flatter her, be made
To wither, envy, pine, and fade?''

"When puppies prate,'' the Huntsman cried, "They show both ignorance and pride: Fools may our scorn, not envy, raise, For envy is a kind of praise.

Had not thy forward noisy tongue
Proclaimed thee always in the wrong,
Thou might'st have mingled with the rest,
And ne'er thy foolish nose confest.
But fools, to talking ever prone,

Are sure to make their follies known."

XLV. THE POET AND THE ROSE

I hate the man who builds his name

On ruins of another's fame.

Thus prudes, by characters o'erthrown,
Imagine that they raise their own.
Thus scribblers, covetous of praise,
Think slander can transplant the bays.
Beauties and bards have equal pride,
With both all rivals are decried.

Who praises Lesbia's eyes and feature,
Must call her sister awkward creature;
For the kind flattery's sure to charm,
When we some other nymph disarm,

6 covered with ridges 7 Understand "do,'

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ALEXANDER POPE (1688-1744)

ODE ON ST. CECILIA'S DAY.*

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Descend, ye Nine! descend and sing:
The breathing instruments inspire;
Wake into voice each silent string,
And sweep the sounding lyre!
In a sadly-pleasing strain
Let the warbling lute complain:
Let the loud trumpet sound,

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This ode, composed in 1708, when Pope was but twenty years of age, is interesting chiefly for comparison with the odes written by Dryden for similar occasions. Pope has drawn freely upon classical mythology-the nine Muses, Morpheus, god of dreams, the voyage of the Argonauts with Orpheus drawing the trees of Mt. Pelion down to the sea by the sweetness of his strain, and especially the sad story of Orpheus' descent into Hades to win back his lost Eurydice only to lose her again and wander forlorn until the jealous and enraged Bacchantes stoned him to death and threw his limbs into the Hebrus. It is pointed out by Mr. W. J. Courthope that Dryden, by weaving in history instead of legend, secured greater human interest.

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But when our country's cause provokes to arms,
How martial music every bosom warms!
So when the first bold vessel dared the seas,
High on the stern the Thracian raised his
strain,

While Argo saw her kindred trees
Descend from Pelion to the main.
Transported demi-gods stood round,
And men grew heroes at the sound,
Inflamed with glory's charms:
Each chief his sevenfold shield displayed,
And half unsheathed the shining blade
And seas, and rocks, and skies rebound,
To arms, to arms, to arms!

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But when through all th' infernal bounds, Which flaming Phlegethon surrounds,

Love, strong as Death, the poet led

To the pale nations of the dead,

What sounds were heard,

What scenes appeared,

O'er all the dreary coasts!

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Sullen moans,

Hollow groans,

And cries of tortured ghosts! But hark! he strikes the golden lyre; And see! the tortured ghosts respire,

See, shady forms advance!

Thy stone, O Sisyphus, stands still,
Ixion rests upon his wheel,

And the pale spectres dance!

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The Furies sink upon their iron beds, And snakes uncurled hang listening round their heads.

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By the streams that ever flow,
By the fragrant winds that blow
O'er th' Elysian flowers;

By those happy souls who dwell
In yellow meads of asphodel,

Or amaranthine bowers;
By the hero's armed shades,
Glittering through the gloomy glades,
By the youths that died for love,
Wandering in the myrtle grove,
Restore, restore Eurydice to life:
Oh take the husband, or return the wife!

He sung, and hell consented

To hear the poet's prayer:
Stern Proserpine relented,
And gave him back the fair.

Thus song could prevail
O'er death, and o'er hell,

A conquest how hard and how glorious!
Though fate had fast bound her
With Styx nine times round her,
Yet music and love were victorious.

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But soon, too soon, the lover turns his eyes; Again she falls, again she dies, she dies! How wilt thou now the fatal sisters1 move? No crime was thine, if 'tis no crime to love. Now under hanging mountains,

Beside the fall of fountains,

Or where Hebrus wanders,

Rolling in meanders,

All alone,

Unheard, unknown, He makes his moan;

1 The three fates.

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And calls her ghost.
For ever, ever, ever lost!
Now with Furies surrounded,
Despairing, confounded,
He trembles, he glows,
Amidst Rhodope's snows;

See, wild as the winds, o'er the desert he flies; Hark! Hamus resounds with the Bacchanals' eries

Ah see, he dies!

Yet even in death Eurydice he sung, Eurydice still trembled on his tongue,

Eurydice the woods,

Eurydice the floods,

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First follow Nature and your judgment
frame

By her just standard, which is still the same:
Unerring Nature, still divinely bright,

Eurydice the rocks, and hollow mountains rung. One clear, unchanged, and universal light,

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FROM AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM. 'Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill Appear in writing or in judging ill; But, of the two, less dangerous is th' offence To tire our patience, than mislead our sense. Some few in that, but numbers err in this, Ten censure wrong for one who writes amiss; A fool might once himself alone expose, Now one in verse makes many more in prose. 'Tis with our judgments as our watches, none Go just alike, yet each believes his own. In poets as true genius is but rare, True taste as seldom is the critic's share; Both must alike from Heaven derive their light, These born to judge, as well as those to write. Let such teach others, who themselves excel. And censure freely who have written well. Authors are partial to their wit, 'tis true, But are not critics to their judgment too? ? A mountain of Thrace.

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Life, force, and beauty, must to all impart, At once the source, and end, and test of Art. Art from that fund each just supply provides, Works without show, and without pomp pre

sides;

In some fair body thus th' informing1 soul
With spirits feeds, with vigour fills the whole,
Each motion guides, and every nerve sustains;
Itself unseen, but in th' effects, remains.
Some, to whom Heaven in wit* has been pro-
fuse,

Want as much more to turn it to its use; 81
For wit and judgment often are at strife;
Though meant each other's aid, like man and
wife.

"Tis more to guide, than spur the Muse's steed;

Restrain his fury, than provoke his speed;
The winged courser, like a generous horse,
Shows most true mettle when you check his

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And taught the world with reason to admire.
Then Criticism the Muse's handmaid proved,
To dress her charms and make her more be-
loved:

But following wits from that intention strayed,
Who could not win the mistress, wooed the
maid;

Against the poets their own arms they turned,
Sure to hate most the men from whom they
learned.

So modern 'pothecaries, taught the art
By doctor's bills3 to play the doctor's part,
Bold in the practice of mistaken rules, 110
Prescribe, apply, and call their masters fools.
Some on the leaves of ancient authors prey,
Nor time nor moths c'er spoiled so much as
they.

Some drily plain without invention's aid,
Write dull receipts how poems may be made;
These leave the sense, their learning to display,
And those explain the meaning quite away.
You then whose judgment the right course
would steer,

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Know well each ancient's proper character;
His fable, subject, scope in every page;
Religion, country, genius of his age;
Without all these at once before your eyes,
Cavil you may, but never criticise.
Be Homer's works your study and delight,
Read them by day, and meditate by night;
Thence form your judgment, thence your max
ims bring,

And trace the Muses upward to their spring.
Still with itself compared, his text peruse;
And let your comment be the Mantuan Muse.
When first young Maro in his boundless

mind

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in them, seem

Moderns beware! or if you must ofiend
Against the precept, ne'er transgress its end;
Let it be seldom, and compelled by need;
And have, at least, their precedent to plead.
The critic else proceeds without remorse,
Seizes your fame and puts his laws in force.
I know there are to whose presumptuous
thoughts
Those freer beauties, even
faults.
Some figures monstrous and mis-shaped appear,
Considered singly, or beheld too near,
Which, but proportioned to their light or place,
Due distance reconciles to form and grace.
A prudent chief not always must display
His powers in equal ranks, and fair array,
But with th' occasion and the place comply,
Conceal his force, nay, seem sometimes to fly.

A work t'outlast immortal Rome designed, 131 Those oft are stratagems which errors seem,
Perhaps he seemed above the critic's law,
And but from nature's fountains scorned to

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Nor is it Homer nods, but we that dream. 180

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