Give light to passages too much in shade,

Nor let a doubt obscure one verse you've made; Your friend's " a Johnson," not to leave one word, However trifling, which may seem absurd;

Such erring trifles lead to serious ills,

And furnish food for critics, (1) or their quills.

As the Scotch fiddle, with its touching tune, Or the sad influence of the angry moon, All men avoid bad writers' ready tongues, As yawning waiters fly (2) Fitzscribble's (3) lungs ; Yet on he mouths-ten minutes- tedious each As prelate's homily, or placeman's speech; Long as the last years of a lingering lease, When riot pauses until rents increase.

While such a minstrel, muttering fustian, strays O'er hedge and ditch, through unfrequented ways, If by some chance he walks into a well,

And shouts for succour with stentorian yell,

Arguet ambigue dictum; mutanda notabit;
Fiet Aristarchus: nec dicet, Cur ego amicum
Offendam in nugis? hæ nugæ seria ducent
In mala derisum semel exceptumque sinistre.

Ut mala quem scabies aut morbus regius urguet,
Aut fanaticus error et iracunda Diana,
Vesanum tetigisse timent fugiuntque poetam,
Qui sapiunt; agitant pueri, incautique sequuntur.
Hic dum sublimes versus ructatur, et errat

Si veluti merulis intentus decidit auceps

In puteum, foveamve; licet, Succurrite, longum

(1) A crust for the critics."-Bayes, in the " Rehearsal."

(2) And the "waiters" are the only fortunate people who can "fly from them; all the rest, viz. the sad subscribers to the "Literary Fund," being compelled, by courtesy, to sit out the recitation without a hope of exclaiming, "Sic" (that is, by choking Fitz. with bad wine, or worse poetry)" me servavit Apollo !"

(3) ["Fitzscribble," originally "Fitzgerald." See Vol. VII. p. 225.-E.]

"A rope! help, Christians, as ye hope for grace!"
Nor woman, man, nor child will stir a pace;
For there his carcass he might freely fling,

From frenzy, or the humour of the thing.
Though this has happen'd to more bards than one ;
I'll tell you Budgell's story,—and have done.

Budgell, a rogue and rhymester, for no good, (Unless his case be much misunderstood) When teased with creditors' continual claims,

• To die like Cato,” (1) leapt into the Thames! And therefore be it lawful through the town For any bard to poison, hang, or drown. (2)

Clamet, Io cives! non sit qui tollere curet.

Si quis curet opem ferre, et demittere funem,
Qui scis an prudens huc se dejecerit, atque
Servari nolit? Dicam: Siculique poetæ
Narrabo interitum. Deus immortalis haberi

Dum cupit Empedocles, ardentem frigidus Ætnam
Insiluit: sit jus liceatque perire poetis:

(1) On his table were found these words: "What Cato did, and Addison approved, cannot be wrong." But Addison did not " approve;" and if he had, it would not have mended the matter. He had invited his daughter on the same water-party; but Miss Budgell, by some accident, escaped this last paternal attention. Thus fell the sycophant of "Atticus," and the enemy of Pope!-[Eustace Budgell, a friend and relative of Addison's, "leapt into the Thames" to escape a prosecution, on account of forging the will of Dr. Tindal; in which Eustace had provided himself with a legacy of two thousand pounds. To this Pope alludes

"Let Budgell charge low Grub-street on my quill,
And write whate'er he please - except my will."

(2) ["We talked (says Boswell) of a man's drowning himself.― JOHNSON. 'I should never think it time to make away with myself.' I put the case of Eustace Budgell, who was accused of forging a will, and sunk himself in the Thames, before the trial of its authenticity came on. Suppose, Sir,' said I, 'that a man is absolutely sure that, if he lives a few days longer, he shall be detected in a fraud, the consequence of which will be utter disgrace, and expulsion from society.' JOHNSON. Then, Sir, let him go abroad to a distant country; let him go to some place where he is not

Who saves the intended suicide receives

Small thanks from him who loathes the life he leaves;
And, sooth to say, mad poets must not lose
The glory of that death they freely choose.
Nor is it certain that some sorts of verse
Prick not the poet's conscience as a curse;
Dosed (1) with vile drams on Sunday he was found
Or got a child on consecrated ground!

And hence is haunted with a rhyming rage-
Fear'd like a bear just bursting from his cage.
If free, all fly his versifying fit,
Fatal at once to simpleton or wit.

But him, unhappy! whom he seizes,-him
He flays with recitation limb by limb;

Probes to the quick where'er he makes his breach,
And gorges like a lawyer—or a leech.

Invitum qui servat, idem facit occidenti.
Nec semel hoc fecit; nec, si retractus erit, jam
Fiet homo, et ponet famosæ mortis amorem.
Nec satis apparet cur versus factitet: utrum
Minxerit in patrios cineres, an triste bidental
Moverit incestus: certe furit, ac velut ursus,
Objectos caveæ valuit si frangere clathros,
Indoctum doctumque fugat recitator acerbus.
Quem vero arripuit, tenet, occiditque legendo,
Non missura cutem, nisi plena cruoris, hirudo.

known. Don't let him go to the devil, where he is known.'"- See Croker's Boswell, vol. ii. pp. 229. 290.-E.]

(1) If "dosed with," &c. be censured as low, I beg leave to refer to the original for something still lower; and if any reader will translate "Minxerit in patrios cineres," &c. into a decent couplet, I will insert said couplet in lieu of the present.

THE

CURSE OF MINERVA.

"Pallas te hoc vulnere, Pallas

Immolat, et pœnam scelerato ex sanguine sumit."

Eneid, lib. xii.