The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Works of John Dryden Volume 15, by John Dryden with Walter Scott.

But the Heroic claims a loftier strain.

In the narration of some great design,

Invention, art, and fable, all must join:

Here fiction must employ its utmost grace;

All must assume a body, mind, and face:

Each virtue a divinity is seen;

Prudence is Pallas, Beauty, Paphos' queen.

'Tis not a cloud from whence swift lightnings fly,

But Jupiter, that thunders from the sky;

Nor a rough storm that gives the sailor pain,

But angry Neptune plowing up the main;

Echo's no more an empty airy sound,

But a fair nymph that weeps her lover drowned.

Thus in the endless treasure of his mind,

The poet does a thousand figures find;

Around the work his ornaments he pours,

And strows with lavish hand his opening flowers.

'Tis not a wonder if a tempest bore

The Trojan fleet against the Libyan shore;

From faithless fortune this is no surprise,

For every day 'tis common to our eyes:

But angry Juno, that she might destroy,

And overwhelm the rest of ruined Troy;

That Æolus, with the fierce goddess joined,

Opened the hollow prisons of the wind;

Till angry Neptune, looking o'er the main,

Rebukes the tempest, calms the waves again,

Their vessels from the dangerous quicksands steers.

These are the springs that move our hopes and fears:

Without these ornaments before our eyes,

The unsinewed poem languishes and dies:

Your poet in his art will always fail,

And tell you but a dull insipid tale.

In vain have our mistaken authors tried

To lay these ancient ornaments aside,

Thinking our God, and prophets that he sent,

Might act like those the poets did invent,

To fright poor readers in each line with hell,

And talk of Satan, Ashtaroth, and Bel.[74]

The mysteries which Christians must believe,

Disdain such shifting pageants to receive:

The gospel offers nothing to our thoughts

But penitence, or punishment for faults;

And mingling falsehoods with those mysteries,

Would make our sacred truths appear like lies.

Besides, what pleasure can it be to hear

The howlings of repining Lucifer,

Whose rage at your imagined hero flies,

And oft with God himself disputes the prize?

Tasso, you'll say, has done it with applause:—

It is not here I mean to judge his cause:

Yet though our age has so extolled his name,

His works had never gained immortal fame,

If holy Godfrey in his ecstasies

Had only conquered Satan on his knees;

If Tancred and Armida's pleasing form

Did not his melancholy theme adorn.

'Tis not, that Christian poems ought to be

Filled with the fictions of idolatry;

But, in a common subject, to reject

The gods, and heathen ornaments neglect;

To banish Tritons, who the seas invade,

To take Pan's whistle, or the fates degrade,

To hinder Charon in his leaky boat

To pass the shepherd with the man of note,

Is with vain scruples to disturb your mind,

And search perfection you can never find:

As well they may forbid us to present

Prudence or Justice for an ornament,

To paint old Janus with his front of brass,

And take from Time his scythe, his wings, and glass,

And everywhere, as 'twere idolatry,

Banish descriptions from our poetry.

Leave them their pious follies to pursue;

But let our reason such vain fears subdue:

And let us not, amongst our vanities,

Of the true God create a god of lies.

In fable we a thousand pleasures see,

And the smooth names seem made for poetry;

As Hector, Alexander, Helen, Phyllis,

Ulysses, Agamemnon, and Achilles:

In such a crowd, the poet were to blame

To chuse king Chilperic for his hero's name.

Sometimes the name, being well or ill applied,

Will the whole fortune of your work decide.

Would you your reader never should be tired,

Chuse some great hero, fit to be admired,

In courage signal, and in virtue bright;

Let even his very failings give delight;

Let his great actions our attention bind,

Like Cæsar, or like Scipio, frame his mind,

And not like Œdipus his perjured race;

A common conqueror is a theme too base.

Chuse not your tale of accidents too full;

Too much variety may make it dull:

Achilles' rage alone, when wrought with skill,

Abundantly does a whole Iliad fill.

Be your narrations lively, short, and smart;

In your descriptions show your noblest art:

There 'tis your poetry may be employed.

Yet you must trivial accidents avoid,

Nor imitate that fool, who, to describe

The wondrous marches of the chosen tribe,

Placed on the sides, to see their armies pass,

The fishes staring through the liquid glass;

Described a child, who, with his little hand,

Picked up the shining pebbles from the sand.

Such objects are too mean to stay our sight;

Allow your work a just and nobler flight.

Be your beginning plain; and take good heed

Too soon you mount not on the airy steed;

Nor tell your reader, in a thundering verse,

"I sing the conqueror of the universe."

What can an author after this produce?

The labouring mountain must bring forth a mouse.

Much better are we pleased with his address,

Who, without making such vast promises,

Says, in an easier style and plainer sense,

"I sing the combats of that pious prince,

Who from the Phrygian coasts his armies bore,

And landed first on the Lavinian shore."

His opening muse sets not the world on fire,

And yet performs more than we can require:

Quickly you'll hear him celebrate the fame,

And future glory of the Roman name;

Of Styx and Acheron describe the floods,

And Cæsar's wandering in the Elysian woods;

With figures numberless his story grace,

And every thing in beauteous colours trace.

At once you may be pleasing and sublime:

I hate a heavy melancholy rhyme:

I'd rather read Orlando's comic tale,

Than a dull author always stiff and stale,

Who thinks himself dishonoured in his style,

If on his works the Graces do but smile.

'Tis said, that Homer, matchless in his art,

Stole Venus' girdle to engage the heart:

His works indeed vast treasures do unfold,

And whatsoe'er he touches turns to gold:

All in his hands new beauty does acquire;

He always pleases, and can never tire.

A happy warmth he every where may boast;

Nor is he in too long digressions lost:

His verses without rule a method find,

And of themselves appear in order joined;

All without trouble answers his intent;

Each syllable is tending to the event.

Let his example your endeavours raise;

To love his writings is a kind of praise.

A poem, where we all perfections find,

Is not the work of a fantastic mind;

There must be care, and time, and skill, and pains;

Not the first heat of inexperienced brains.

Yet sometimes artless poets, when the rage

Of a warm fancy does their minds engage,

Puffed with vain pride, presume they understand,

And boldly take the trumpet in their hand:

Their fustian muse each accident confounds;

Nor can she fly, but rise by leaps and bounds,

Till, their small stock of learning quickly spent,

Their poem dies for want of nourishment.

In vain mankind the hot-brained fool decries,

No branding censures can unvail his eyes;

With impudence the laurel they invade,

Resolved to like the monsters they have made.

Virgil, compared to them, is flat and dry;

And Homer understood not poetry:

Against their merit if this age rebel,

To future times for justice they appeal.

But waiting till mankind shall do them right,

And bring their works triumphantly to light,

Neglected heaps we in bye-corners lay,

Where they become to worms and moths a prey.

Forgot, in dust and cobwebs let them rest,

Whilst we return from whence we first digrest.

The great success which tragic writers found,

In Athens first the comedy renowned.

The abusive Grecian there, by pleasing ways,

Dispersed his natural malice in his plays:

Wisdom and virtue, honour, wit, and sense,

Were subject to buffooning insolence:

Poets were publicly approved, and sought,

That vice extolled, and virtue set at nought;

A Socrates himself, in that loose age,

Was made the pastime of a scoffing stage.

At last the public took in hand the cause,

And cured this madness by the power of laws;

Forbade at any time, or any place,

To name the person, or describe the face.

The stage its ancient fury thus let fall,

And comedy diverted without gall:

By mild reproofs recovered minds diseased,

And, sparing persons, innocently pleased.

Each one was nicely shewn in this new glass,

And smiled to think he was not meant the ass:

A miser oft would laugh at first, to find

A faithful draught of his own sordid mind;

And fops were with such care and cunning writ,

They liked the piece for which themselves did sit.

You, then, that would the comic laurels wear,

To study nature be your only care.

Whoe'er knows man, and by a curious art

Discerns the hidden secrets of the heart;

He who observes, and naturally can paint

The jealous fool, the fawning sycophant,

A sober wit, an enterprising ass,

A humorous Otter,[75] or a Hudibras,—

May safely in those noble lists engage,

And make them act and speak upon the stage.

Strive to be natural in all you write,

And paint with colours that may please the sight.

Nature in various figures does abound,

And in each mind are different humours found;

A glance, a touch, discovers to the wise,

But every man has not discerning eyes.

All-changing time does also change the mind,

And different ages different pleasures find;

Youth, hot and furious, cannot brook delay,

By flattering vice is easily led away;

Vain in discourse, inconstant in desire,

In censure, rash; in pleasures, all on fire.

The manly age does steadier thoughts enjoy;

Power and ambition do his soul employ;

Against the turns of fate he sets his mind;

And by the past the future hopes to find.

Decrepit age, still adding to his stores,

For others heaps the treasure he adores;

In all his actions keeps a frozen pace;

Past times extols, the present to debase:

Incapable of pleasures youth abuse,

In others blames what age does him refuse.

Your actors must by reason be controuled;

Let young men speak like young, old men like old.

Observe the town, and study well the court;

For thither various characters resort.

Thus 'twas great Jonson purchased his renown,

And in his art had borne away the crown,

If, less desirous of the people's praise,

He had not with low farce debased his plays;

Mixing dull buffoonry with wit refined,

And Harlequin with noble Terence joined.

When in the Fox I see the tortoise hist,

I lose the author of the Alchemist.[76]

The comic wit, born with a smiling air,

Must tragic grief and pompous verse forbear;

Yet may he not, as on a market-place,

With bawdy jests amuse the populace;

With well-bred conversation you must please,

And your intrigue unravelled be with ease;

Your action still should reason's rules obey,

Nor in an empty scene may lose its way.

Your humble style must sometimes gently rise;

And your discourse sententious be, and wise:

The passions must to nature be confined;

And scenes to scenes with artful weaving joined.

Your wit must not unseasonably play;

But follow business, never lead the way.

Observe how Terence does this error shun:

A careful father chides his amorous son;

Then see that son, whom no advice can move,

Forget those orders, and pursue his love:

'Tis not a well-drawn picture we discover;

'Tis a true son, a father, and a lover.

I like an author that reforms the age,

And keeps the right decorum of the stage;

That always pleases by just reason's rule:

But for a tedious droll, a quibbling fool,

Who with low nauseous bawdry fills his plays,

Let him be gone, and on two tressels raise

Some Smithfield stage, where he may act his pranks,

And make Jack-Puddings speak to mountebanks.

In Florence dwelt a doctor of renown,

The scourge of God, and terror of the town,

Who all the cant of physic had by heart,

And never murdered but by rules of art.

The public mischief was his private gain:

Children their slaughtered parents sought in vain;

A brother here his poisoned brother wept;

Some bloodless died, and some by opium slept;

Colds, at his presence, would to phrenzies turn,

And agues, like malignant fevers, burn.

Hated, at last, his practice gives him o'er;

One friend, unkilled by drugs, of all his store,

In his new country-house affords him place;

('Twas a rich abbot, and a building ass.)

Here first the doctor's talent came in play;

He seems inspired, and talks like Wren or May;

Of this new portico condemns the face,

And turns the entrance to a better place;

Designs the stair-case at the other end:

His friend approves, does for his mason send.

He comes; the doctor's arguments prevail;

In short, to finish this our humorous tale,

He Galen's dangerous science does reject,

And from ill doctor turns good architect.

In this example we may have our part;

Rather be mason, ('tis a useful art,)

Than a dull poet; for that trade accurst,

Admits no mean betwixt the best and worst.

In other sciences, without disgrace,

A candidate may fill a second place;

But poetry no medium can admit,

No reader suffers an indifferent wit:

The ruined stationers against him bawl,

And Herringman [77] degrades him from his stall.

Burlesque at least our laughter may excite;

But a cold writer never can delight.

The Counter-scuffle [78] has more wit and art,

Than the stiff formal style of Gondibert.

Be not affected with that empty praise

Which your vain flatterers will sometimes raise;

And when you read, with ecstasy will say,

"The finished piece! the admirable play!"

Which, when exposed to censure and to light,

Cannot endure a critic's piercing sight.

A hundred authors' fates have been foretold,

And Shadwell's works are printed, but not sold.

Hear all the world; consider every thought;

A fool by chance may stumble on a fault:

Yet, when Apollo does your muse inspire,

Be not impatient to expose your fire;

Nor imitate the Settles of our times,

Those tuneful readers of their own dull rhymes,

Who seize on all the acquaintance they can meet,

And stop the passengers that walk the street:

There is no sanctuary you can chuse

For a defence from their pursuing muse.

I've said before, be patient when they blame;

To alter for the better is no shame.

Yet yield not to a fool's impertinence;

Sometimes conceited sceptics, void of sense,

By their false taste condemn some finished part,

And blame the noblest flights of wit and art.

In vain their fond opinions you deride,

With their loved follies they are satisfied;

And their weak judgment, void of sense and light,

Thinks nothing can escape their feeble sight:

}

{ Their dangerous counsels do not cure, but wound;

{ To shun the storm they run your verse aground,

{ And thinking to escape a rock, are drowned.

Chuse a sure judge to censure what you write,

Whose reason leads, and knowledge gives you light,

Whose steady hand will prove your faithful guide,

And touch the darling follies you would hide:

He, in your doubts, will carefully advise,

And clear the mist before your feeble eyes.

'Tis he will tell you, to what noble height

A generous muse may sometimes take her flight;

When too much fettered with the rules of art,

May from her stricter bounds and limits part:

But such a perfect judge is hard to see,

And every rhymer knows not poetry;

Nay some there are for writing verse extolled,

Who know not Lucan's dross from Virgil's gold.

Would you in this great art acquire renown?

Authors, observe the rules I here lay down.

In prudent lessons every where abound;

With pleasant join the useful and the sound:

A sober reader a vain tale will slight;

He seeks as well instruction as delight.

Let all your thoughts to virtue be confined,

Still offering nobler figures to our mind:

I like not those loose writers, who employ

Their guilty muse, good manners to destroy;

Who with false colours still deceive our eyes,

And show us vice dressed in a fair disguise.

Yet do I not their sullen muse approve,

Who from all modest writings banish love;

That stript the playhouse of its chief intrigue,

And make a murderer of Roderigue:

The lightest love, if decently exprest,

Will raise no vitious motions in our breast.

Dido in vain may weep, and ask relief;

I blame her folly, whilst I share her grief.

A virtuous author, in his charming art,

To please the sense needs not corrupt the heart:

His heat will never cause a guilty fire:

To follow virtue then be your desire.

In vain your art and vigour are exprest;

The obscene expression shows the infected breast.

But, above all, base jealousies avoid,

In which detracting poets are employed.

A noble wit dares liberally commend,

And scorns to grudge at his deserving friend.

Base rivals, who true wit and merit hate,

Caballing still against it with the great,

Maliciously aspire to gain renown,

By standing up, and pulling others down.

Never debase yourself by treacherous ways,

Nor by such abject methods seek for praise:

Let not your only business be to write;

Be virtuous, just, and in your friends delight.

'Tis not enough your poems be admired;

But strive your conversation be desired:

Write for immortal fame; nor ever chuse

Gold for the object of a generous muse.

I know a noble wit may, without crime,

Receive a lawful tribute for his time:

Yet I abhor those writers, who despise

Their honour, and alone their profits prize;

Who their Apollo basely will degrade,

And of a noble science make a trade.

Before kind reason did her light display,

And government taught mortals to obey,

Men, like wild beasts, did nature's laws pursue,

They fed on herbs, and drink from rivers drew;

Their brutal force, on lust and rapine bent,

Committed murder without punishment:

Reason at last, by her all-conquering arts,

Reduced these savages, and tuned their hearts;

Mankind from bogs, and woods, and caverns calls,

And towns and cities fortifies with walls:

Thus fear of justice made proud rapine cease,

And sheltered innocence by laws and peace.

These benefits from poets we received;

From whence are raised those fictions since believed,

That Orpheus, by his soft harmonious strains,

Tamed the fierce tygers of the Thracian plains;

Amphion's notes, by their melodious powers,

Drew rocks and woods, and raised the Theban towers:

These miracles from numbers did arise;

Since which, in verse heaven taught his mysteries,

And by a priest, possessed with rage divine,

Apollo spoke from his prophetic shrine.

Soon after, Homer the old heroes praised,

And noble minds by great examples raised;

Then Hesiod did his Grecian swains incline

To till the fields, and prune the bounteous vine.

Thus useful rules were, by the poet's aid,

In easy numbers to rude men conveyed,

And pleasingly their precepts did impart;

First charmed the ear, and then engaged the heart;

The muses thus their reputation raised,

And with just gratitude in Greece were praised.

With pleasure mortals did their wonders see,

And sacrificed to their divinity;

But want, at last, base flattery entertained,

And old Parnassus with this vice was stained;

Desire of gain dazzling the poets' eyes,

Their works were filled with fulsome flatteries.

Thus needy wits a vile revenue made,

And verse became a mercenary trade.

Debase not with so mean a vice thy art;

If gold must be the idol of thy heart,

Fly, fly the unfruitful Heliconian strand!

Those streams are not enriched with golden sand;

Great wits, as well as warriors, only gain

Laurels and honours for their toil and pain.

But what? an author cannot live on fame,

Or pay a reckoning with a lofty name:

A poet, to whom fortune is unkind,

Who when he goes to bed has hardly dined,

Takes little pleasure in Parnassus' dreams,

Or relishes the Heliconian streams;

}

{ Horace had ease and plenty when he writ,

{ And free from cares for money or for meat,

{ Did not expect his dinner from his wit.

'Tis true; but verse is cherished by the great,

And now none famish who deserve to eat:

What can we fear, when virtue, arts, and sense,

Receive the stars' propitious influence;

When a sharp-sighted prince, by early grants,

Rewards your merits, and prevents your wants?

Sing then his glory, celebrate his fame;

Your noblest theme is his immortal name.

Let mighty Spenser raise his reverend head,

Cowley and Denham start up from the dead;

Waller his age renew, and offerings bring,

Our monarch's praise let bright-eyed virgins sing:

Let Dryden with new rules our stage refine,

And his great models form by this design.

But where's a second Virgil, to rehearse

Our hero's glories in his epic verse?

What Orpheus sing his triumphs o'er the main,

And make the hills and forests move again;

Shew his bold fleet on the Batavian shore,

And Holland trembling as his cannons roar;

}

{ Paint Europe's balance in his steady hand,

{ Whilst the two worlds in expectation stand

{ Of peace or war, that wait on his command?

But, as I speak, new glories strike my eyes,

Glories, which heaven itself does give, and prize,

Blessings of peace; that with their milder rays

Adorn his reign, and bring Saturnian days.

Now let rebellion, discord, vice, and rage,

That have in patriots' forms debauched our age,

Vanish with all the ministers of hell;

His rays their poisonous vapours shall dispel:

}

{ 'Tis he alone our safety did create,

{ His own firm soul secured the nation's fate,

{ Opposed to all the boutefeus [79] of the state.

Authors, for him your great endeavours raise;

The loftiest numbers will but reach his praise.

For me, whose verse in satire has been bred,

And never durst heroic measures tread;

Yet you shall see me, in that famous field,

With eyes and voice, my best assistance yield;

Offer you lessons, that my infant muse

Learnt, when she Horace for her guide did chuse;

Second your zeal with wishes, heart, and eyes,

And afar off hold up the glorious prize.

But pardon too, if, zealous for the right,

A strict observer of each noble flight,

From the fine gold I separate the allay,

And show how hasty writers sometimes stray;

Apter to blame, than knowing how to mend;

A sharp, but yet a necessary friend.

TARQUIN AND TULLIA.

This piece, and that which immediately follows, bear no trace of Dryden's hand. They have been attributed, by Mr Malone, with much probability, to Mr Mainwaring, a violent Jacobite. The satire is coarse and intemperate, without having that easy flow of verse, and felicity of expression, which always distinguishes the genuine productions of our author.

The comparison of William and Mary with Tarquin and Tullia, was early insisted upon as a topic of reproach. It occurs in a letter concerning the coronation medal, which, as is well known, represented, on the reverse, the destruction of Phaeton. The letter-writer says, that "one gentleman seeing the chariot, but not understanding the Latin inscription, and having heard the town talk of Tullia, who instigated her husband Tarquinius to kill her father Servius Tullius king of the Romans, that he might succeed him in the throne, and, as Livy says, caused her chariot to be driven over his mangled body, cried out, 'Is this Tullia's chariot?' This I say shocked me, and raised my anger against the contriver, who had chosen so ill an emblem, which, upon so superficial a view, brought such an odious history into men's minds." Somers' Tracts, p. 333.

TARQUIN AND TULLIA.

In times when princes cancelled nature's law,

And declarations which themselves did draw;

When children used their parents to dethrone,

And gnaw their way, like vipers, to the crown;

Tarquin, a savage, proud, ambitious prince,

Prompt to expel, yet thoughtless of defence,

The envied sceptre did from Tullius snatch,

The Roman king, and father by the match.

}

{ To form his party, histories report,

{ A sanctuary was opened in his court,

{ Where glad offenders safely might resort.

Great was the crowd, and wonderous the success,

For those were fruitful times of wickedness;

And all that lived obnoxious to the laws,

Flocked to prince Tarquin, and embraced his cause.

'Mongst these a pagan priest for refuge fled;

A prophet deep in godly faction read;[80]

A sycophant, that knew the modish way

To cant and plot, to flatter and betray,

To whine and sin, to scribble and recant,

A shameless author, and a lustful saint.

To serve all times he could distinctions coin,

And with great ease flat contradictions join:

A traitor now, once loyal in extreme,

And then obedience was his only theme:

He sung in temples the most passive lays,

And wearied monarchs with repeated praise;

}

{ But managed awkwardly that lawful part,

{ To vent foul lies and treason was his art,

{ And pointed libels at crowned heads to dart.

This priest, and others, learned to defame,

First murder injured Tullius in his name;

With blackest calumnies their sovereign load,

A poisoned brother, and dark league abroad;

A son unjustly top'd upon the throne,[81]

Which yet was proved undoubtedly his own;

Though, as the law was then, 'twas his behoof,

Who dispossessed the heir, to bring the proof.

This hellish charge they backed with dismal frights,

The loss of property, and sacred rights,

And freedom; words which all false patriots use

As surest names the Romans to abuse;

Jealous of kings, and always malcontent,

Forward in change, yet certain to repent.

Whilst thus the plotters needful fears create,

Tarquin with open force invades the state.

Lewd nobles join him with their feeble might,

And atheist fools for dear religion fight.

The priests their boasted principles disown,

And level their harangues against the throne.

Vain promises the people's minds allure:

Slight were these ills, but desperate the cure.

'Tis hard for kings to steer an equal course,

And they who banish one oft gain a worse.

Those heavenly bodies we admire above,

Do every day irregularly move;

Yet Tullius, 'tis decreed, must lose the crown,

For faults that were his council's, not his own.

}

{ He now in vain commands even those he payed,

{ By darling troops deserted and betrayed,

{ By creatures which his generous warmth had made.

Of these a captain of the guards was worst,[82]

Whose memory to this day stands accurst.

This rogue, advanced to military trust

By his own whoredom, and his sister's lust,

Forsook his master, after dreadful vows,

And plotted to betray him to his foes;

The kindest master to the vilest slave,

As free to give, as he was sure to crave.

His haughty female, who, as books declare,[83]

Did always toss wide nostrils in the air,

}

{ Was to the younger Tullia governess,

{ And did attend her, when, in borrowed dress,

{ She fled by night from Tullius in distress.

This wretch, by letters, did invite his foes,

And used all arts her father to depose;

A father, always generously bent,

So kind, that even her wishes he'd prevent.

'Twas now high time for Tullius to retreat,

When even his daughter hastened his defeat;

When faith and duty vanished, and no more

The name of father and of king he bore:

A king, whose right his foes could ne'er dispute;

So mild, that mercy was his attribute;

Affable, kind, and easy of access;

Swift to relieve, unwilling to oppress;

Rich without taxes, yet in payment just;

So honest, that he hardly could distrust:

His active soul from labours ne'er did cease,

Valiant in war, and vigilant in peace;

Studious with traffic to enrich the land,

Strong to protect, and skilful to command

Liberal and splendid, yet without excess;

Prone to relieve, unwilling to distress:

In sum, how godlike must his nature be,

Whose only fault was too much piety!

This king removed, the assembled states thought fit,

That Tarquin in the vacant throne should sit;

Voted him regent in their senate-house,

And with an empty name endowed his spouse.[84]

The elder Tullia, who, some authors feign,

Drove o'er her father's corse a rumbling wain:

But she, more guilty, numerous wains did drive,

To crush her father and her king alive;

And in remembrance of his hastened fall,

Resolved to institute a weekly ball.[85]

The jolly glutton grew in bulk and chin,

Feasted on rapine, and enjoyed her sin;

With luxury she did weak reason force,

Debauched good-nature, and cram'd down remorse;

Yet when she drank cold tea in liberal sups,

The sobbing dame was maudling in her cups.

But brutal Tarquin never did relent,

Too hard to melt, too wicked to repent;

Cruel in deeds, more merciless in will,

And blest with natural delight in ill.

From a wise guardian he received his doom

To walk the change, and not to govern Rome.

He swore his native honours to disown,

And did by perjury ascend the throne.

Oh! had that oath his swelling pride represt,

Rome had been then with peace and plenty blest.

But Tarquin, guided by destructive fate,

The country wasted, and embroiled the state,

Transported to their foes the Roman pelf,

And by their ruin hoped to save himself.

Innumerable woes oppress the land,

When it submitted to his cursed command.

So just was heaven, that 'twas hard to tell,

Whether its guilt or losses did excel.

Men that renounced their God for dearer trade,

Were then the guardians of religion made.

}

{ Rebels were sainted, foreigners did reign,

{ Outlaws returned, preferment to obtain,

{ With frogs, and toads, and all their croaking train.

No native knew their features nor their birth;

They seemed the greasy offspring of the earth.

The trade was sunk, the fleet and army spent;

Devouring taxes swallowed lesser rent;

Taxes imposed by no authority;

Each lewd collection was a robbery.

Bold self-creating men did statutes draw,

Skilled to establish villany by law;

Fanatic drivers, whose unjust careers

Produced new ills exceeding former fears:

Yet authors here except a faithful band,

Which the prevailing faction did withstand;

And some, who bravely stood in the defence

Of baffled justice, and their exiled prince.

These shine to after-times; each sacred name

Stands still recorded in the rolls of fame.

ON THE YOUNG STATESMEN.

The following verses have been ascribed to Dryden upon slight authority, and contrary to internal evidence. They display a good deal of the turn of wit, and structure of verse, which may be observed in similar jeux d'esprit of Dorset, to whom I am tempted to ascribe them, though the name of Dryden may have been borrowed, to give them publicity.

They ought to have preceded, in point of time, those entitled "Tarquin and Tullia," but were accidentally misplaced.

As nicknames are easily perpetuated, I observe, that these verses entailed upon the young statesmen, the names of Chit Sunderland, Chit Lory, &c. in the satires of the day. This administration came into office in the latter years of Charles II.'s reign. The satire turns on a comparison between them and their predecessors of what was called the Cabal. There is a parody on these lines in the "State Poems," in which they are applied to Stillingfleet.

THE YOUNG STATESMEN.

CANTO IV.

TARQUIN AND TULLIA.

TARQUIN AND TULLIA.

ON THE YOUNG STATESMEN.