Forbid it heav'n a favour or a debt
She e'er fhould cancel-but fhe may forget.
Safe is your fecret still in Chloe's ear;
But none of Chloe's fhall
you ever
Of all her dears fhe never flander'd one,
But cares not if a thousand are undone.
Would Chloe know if you're alive or dead?
She bids her footman put it in her head,
Chloe is prudent-Would you too be wife?
Then never break your heart when Chloe dies.
One certain portrait may (I grant) be seen,
Which heav'n has varnish'd out, and made a Queen:
THE SAME FOR EVER! and defcrib'd by all
With truth and goodness, as with crown and ball.
Poets heap virtues, painters gems at will,
And fhew their zeal, and hide their want of skill.
'Tis well-but, artifts! who can paint or write,
To draw the naked is your true delight.
That robe of quality fo ftruts and fwells,
None fee what parts of nature it conceals:
Th' exacteft traits of body or of mind,
We owe to models of an humble kind.
If QUEENSBERRY to ftrip there's no compelling,
'Tis from a handmaid we must take a Helen. From peer or bishop 'tis no easy thing
To draw the man who loves his god, or king:
Alas! I copy, (or my draught would fail)
From honeft Mah'met, or plain parfon Hale.
But grant, in public men fometimes are shown,
A woman's feen in private life alone:
Our bolder talents in full light display'd;
Your virtues open faireft in the fhade.
Bred to difguife, in public 'tis you hide;
There, none diftinguish 'twixt your fhame or pride,
Weakness or delicacy; all fo nice,
That each may feem a virtue, or a vice.
In men we various ruling paffions find;
In women, two almoft divide the kind;
The Love of Pleasure & the Love of Sway.
Thofe, only fix'd, they firft or laft obey,
The love of pleasure and the love of sway.
That, nature gives; and where the leffon taught,.
Is but to please, can pleasure feem a fault?
Experience, this; by man's oppreffion curst,
They feek the fecond not to lose the first.
Men, fome to bus'nefs, fome to pleasure take;
But ev'ry woman is at heart a rake :
Men, fome to quiet, fome to public ftrife;
But ev'ry lady would be queen for life.
Yet mark the fate of a whole fex of queens!
Pow'r all their end, but beauty all the means:
In youth they conquer with fo wild a rage,
As leaves them fcarce a fubject in their age :.
For foreign glory, foreign joy, they roam;
No thought of peace or happiness at home.
But wisdom's triumph is well-tim'd retreat,
As hard a fcience to the fair as great!
Beauties, like tyrants, old and friendless grown,
Yet hate repofe, and dread to be alone,
Worn out in public, weary ev'ry eye,
Nor leave one figh behind them when they die.
Pleasures the fex, as children birds, pursue,
Still out of reach, yet never out of view;
Sure, if they catch, to fpoil the toy at moft,
To covet flying, and regret when loft:
At last, to follies youth could fcarce defend,
It grows their age's prudence to pretend;
Afham'd to own they gave delight before,
Reduc'd to feign it, when they give no more:
As hags hold fabbaths, less for joy than spite,
So these their merry, miferable night;
Still round and round the ghofts of beauty glide,
And haunt the places where their honour dy'd.
See how the world its veterans rewards!
A youth of frolicks, an old age of cards;
Fair to no purpose, artful to no end,
Young without lovers, old without a friend;
A fop their paffion, but their prize a fot,
Alive, ridiculous, and dead, forgot!
Ah! friend! to dazzle let the vain defign;
To raise the thought, and touch the heart, be thine! 250
That charm shall grow, while what fatigues the ring,
Flaunts and goes down, an unregarded thing:
So when the fun's broad beam has tir❜d the fight,
All mild afcends the moon's more sober light,
Serene in virgin modefty fhe'fhines,
And unobferv'd the glaring orb declines.
Oh! bleft with temper, whofe unclouded ray
Can make to-morrow chearful as to-day :
She, who can love a fifter's charms, or hear
Sighs for a daughter with unwounded ear;
She, who ne'er anfwers 'till a husband cools,
Or, if she rules him, never fhews she rules;
Charms by accepting, by fubmitting fway's,
Yet has her humour moft, when she obey's;
Let fops or fortune fly which way they will;
Difdains all lofs of tickets, or codille;
Spleen, vapours, or small-pox, above them all,
And miftrefs of herself, tho' China fåll.
And yet, believe me, good as well as ill,
Woman's at beft a contradiction ftill.
Heav'n when it ftrives to polish all it can
Its laft beft work, but forms a fofter man ;
Picks from each fex, to make the fav'rite bleft,
Your love of pleasure, our defire of reft:
Blends, in exception to all gen'ral rules,
Your taste of follies, with our scorn of fools:
Referve with franknefs, art with truth ally'd,
Courage with softness, modefty with pride;
Fix'd principles, with fancy ever new :
Shakes all together, and produces-You.
Be this a woman's fame: with this unbleft,
Toafts live a scorn, and queens may die a jeft!
This Phoebus promis'd (I forget the year)
When those blue eyes firft open'd on the sphere;
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