Be it a weakness, it deserves fome praise, We love the play-place of our early days ; The scene is touching, and the heart is stone That feels not at that fight, and feels at none. The wall on which we tried our graving skill, The very name we carv'd fubfifting still, The bench on which we fat while deep em

ploy'd, Though mangled, hack'd, and hew'd, not yet de

stroy'd ;
The little ones unbutton'd, glowing hot,
Playing our games, and on the very spot,
As happy as we once, to kneel and draw
The chalky ring, and knuckle down at taw,
To pitch the ball into the grounded hat,
Or drive it devious with a dext'rous pat ;
The pleafing spectacle at once excites
Such recollection of our own delights,
That viewing it, we seem almost t' obtain
Our innocent sweet fimple years again.
This fond attachment to the well-known place
Whence first we started into life's long race,
Maintains its hold with such unfailing fway,
We feel it ev’n in age, and at our latest day.
Hark? how the fire of chits, whose future

Thare
Of claffic food begins to be his care,

With

With his own likeness plac'd on either knee,
Indulges all a father's heart-felt glee,
And tells them, as he strokes their filver locks,
That they must soon learn Latin, and to box;
Then turning, he regales his lift'ning wife
With all th' adventures of his early life,
His skill in coachmanship, or driving chaise,
In bilking tavern bills and spouting plays,
What shifts he us'd, detected in a scrape,
How he was flogg'd, or had the luck t'escape,
What sums he loft at play, and how he fold
Watch, feals, and all 'till all his pranks are

told.
Retracing thus his frolics ('tis a name
That palliates deeds of folly and of shame)
He gives the local bias all its sway,
Resolves that where he play'd his sons shall

play, And destines their bright genius to be shown Just in the scene where he display'd his own. The meek and bashful boy will soon be taught To be as bold and forward as he ought, The rude will scuffle through with ease enough, Great schools suit best the sturdy and the rough. Ah happy defignation, prudent choice, Th’event is fure, expect it and rejoice! Soon see your with fulfill'd in either child, The pert made perter, and the tame made wild.

The

The great indeed, by titles, riches, birth, Excus'd th' incumbrance of more folid worth, Are best dispos’d of, where with most success They may acquire that confident address, Those habits of profuse and lewd expence, That scorn of all delights but those of sense, Which though in plain plebeians we condemn, With so much reason all expect from them. But families of lefs illustrious fame, Whose chief distinction is their spotless name, Whose heirs, their honours none, their income

small, Must shine by true desert, or not at all, What dream they of, that with so little care They risk their hopes, their dearest treasure

there? They dream of little Charles or William grac'd With wig prolix, down-flowing to his waist, They see th' attentive crowds his talents draw, They hear him fpeak—the oracle of law. The father who designs his babe a priest, Dreains him episcopally such at least, And while the playful jockey scours the room Briskly, aftride upon the parlour broom, In fancy sees him more superbly ride In coach with purple lin'd, and mitres on its fide.

Events

}

Events improbable and strange as these,
Which only a parental eye foresees,
A public school shall bring to pass with ease.
But how ? resides such virtue in that air
As must create an appetite for pray'r ?
And will it breathe into him all the zeal
That candidates for such a prize should feel,
To take the lead and be the foremost still
In all true worth and literary skill ?
« Ah blind to bright futurity, untaught
· The knowledge of the world, and dull of

" thought !
« Church-ladders are not always mounted best

By learned Clerks and Latinists profess’d. « Th' exalted prize demands an upward look, • Not to be found by poring on a book. • Small skill in Latin, and still lefs in Greek, • Is more than adequate to all I seek; « Let erudition grace

him or not grace, • I give the bawble but the second place, · His wealth, faine, honours, all that I intend, « Sublist and center in one point~a friend. • A friend, whate'er he studies or neglects,

Shall give him confequence, heal all defects, · His intercourse with peers, and sons of peersThere dawns the splendour of his future years, In that bright quarter his propitious Ikies

« Shall

Shall blush betimes, and there his glory rise. • Your Lordship and your Grace ! what school can

o teach • A rhetric equal to those parts of speech? « What need of Homer's verse or Tully's profe,

Sweet interjections ! if he learn but those ?

Let rev'rend churls his ignorance rebuke, • Who starve upon a dog's-ear'd Pentateuch, • The parson knows enough who knows a

. Duke.' Egregious purpose ! worthily begun In barb'rous prostitution of your son, Press’d on his part by means that would disgrace A fcriv'ner's clerk or footman out of place, And ending, if at last its end be gain’d, In facrilege, in God's own house profan'd. It may succeed ; and if his fins should call For more than common punishment, it fhall ; The wretch shall rise, and be the thing on earth Least qualified in honour, learning, worth, To occupy a facred, awful post, In which the best and worthiest tremble moft. The royal letters are a thing of course, A king that would, might recommend his horse, And Deans, no doubt, and Chapters, with one

voice, As bound in duty, would confirm the choice. VOL. II.

M

Behold