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THE SEVENTH EPISTLE OF THE FIRST BOOK OF HORACE [ ] - Alexander Pope, The Complete Poetical Works of Alexander Pope [1903]

Edition used:

The Complete Poetical Works of Alexander Pope. Cambridge Edition, ed. Henry W. Boynton (Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Co., 1903).

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THE SEVENTH EPISTLE OF THE FIRST BOOK OF HORACE[ ]

IN THE MANNER OF DR. SWIFT

    • ’T is true, my Lord, I gave my word
    • I would be with you June the third;
    • Changed it to August, and (in short)
    • Have kept it—as you do at Court.
    • You humour me when I am sick,
    • Why not when I am splenetic?
    • In Town what objects could I meet?
    • The shops shut up in every street,
    • And funerals black’ning all the doors,
    • And yet more melancholy whores:10
    • And what a dust in every place!
    • And a thin Court that wants your face,
    • And fevers raging up and down,
    • And W[ard] and H[enley] both in town!
    • ‘The dogdays are no more the case.’
    • ’T is true, but winter comes apace:
    • Then southward let your bard retire,
    • Hold out some months ’twixt sun and fire,
    • And you shall see the first warm weather
    • Me and the butterflies together.20
    • My Lord, your favours well I know;
    • ’T is with distinction you bestow,
    • And not to every one that comes,
    • Just as a Scotchman does his plums.
    • ‘Pray take them, Sir—enough’s a feast:
    • Eat some, and pocket up the rest:’
    • What, rob your boys? those pretty rogues!
    • ‘No, Sir, you’ll leave them to the hogs.’
    • Thus fools with compliments besiege ye,
    • Contriving never to oblige ye.30
    • Scatter your favours on a Fop,
    • Ingratitude’s the certain crop;
    • And ’t is but just, I’ll tell ye wherefore,
    • You give the things you never care for.
    • A wise man always is, or should,
    • Be mighty ready to be good,
    • But makes a diff’rence in his thought
    • Betwixt a guinea and a groat.
    • Now this I’ll say, you’ll find in me
    • A safe companion, and a free;40
    • But if you’d have me always near,
    • A word, pray, in Your Honour’s ear:
    • I hope it is your resolution
    • To give me back my constitution,
    • The sprightly wit, the lively eye,
    • Th’ engaging smile, the gayety
    • That laugh’d down many a summer sun,
    • And kept you up so oft till one;
    • And all that voluntary vein,
    • As when Belinda rais’d my strain.50
    • A Weasel once made shift to slink
    • In at a corn-loft thro’ a chink,
    • But having amply stuff’d his skin,
    • Could not get out as he got in;
    • Which one belonging to the house
    • (’T was not a man, it was a mouse)
    • Observing, cried, ‘You ’scape not so;
    • Lean as you came, Sir, you must go.’
    • Sir, you may spare your application;
    • I’m no such beast, nor his relation,60
    • Nor one that Temperance advance,
    • Cramm’d to the throat with ortolans;
    • Extremely ready to resign
    • All that may make me none of mine.
    • South-Sea subscriptions take who please,
    • Leave me but liberty and ease:
    • ’T was what I said to Craggs and Child ,
    • Who praised my modesty, and smil’d.
    • ‘Give me,’ I cried (enough for me)
    • ‘My bread and independency!’70
    • So bought an annual rent or two,
    • And lived—just as you see I do;
    • Near fifty, and without a wife,
    • I trust that sinking fund, my life.
    • Can I retrench? Yes, mighty well,
    • Shrink back to my paternal cell,
    • A little house, with trees a row,
    • And, like its master, very low;
    • There died my father, no man’s debtor,
    • And there I’ll die, nor worse nor better.80
    • To set this matter full before ye,
    • Our old friend Swift will tell his story.
    • ‘Harley, the nation’s great support’—
    • But you may read it, I stop short.

[Page 216.]The Seventh Epistle of the First Book of Horace.

[Line 67.]Child. Sir Francis Child, the banker. (Bowles.)