Volume Ii Part 7 (2/2)

All languages I can command, Yet not a word I understand.

Without my aid, the best divine In learning would not know a line: The lawyer must forget his pleading; The scholar could not show his reading.

Nay; man my master is my slave; I give command to kill or save, Can grant ten thousand pounds a-year, And make a beggar's brat a peer.

But, while I thus my life relate, I only hasten on my fate.

My tongue is black, my mouth is furr'd, I hardly now can force a word.

I die unpitied and forgot, And on some dunghill left to rot.

ON GOLD

All-ruling tyrant of the earth, To vilest slaves I owe my birth, How is the greatest monarch blest, When in my gaudy livery drest!

No haughty nymph has power to run From me; or my embraces shun.

Stabb'd to the heart, condemn'd to flame, My constancy is still the same.

The favourite messenger of Jove, And Lemnian G.o.d, consulting strove To make me glorious to the sight Of mortals, and the G.o.ds' delight.

Soon would their altar's flame expire If I refused to lend them fire.

By fate exalted high in place, Lo, here I stand with double face: Superior none on earth I find; But see below me all mankind Yet, as it oft attends the great, I almost sink with my own weight.

At every motion undertook, The vulgar all consult my look.

I sometimes give advice in writing, But never of my own inditing.

I am a courtier in my way; For those who raised me, I betray; And some give out that I entice To l.u.s.t, to luxury, and dice.

Who punishments on me inflict, Because they find their pockets pickt.

By riding post, I lose my health, And only to get others wealth.

ON THE POSTERIORS

Because I am by nature blind, I wisely choose to walk behind; However, to avoid disgrace, I let no creature see my face.

My words are few, but spoke with sense; And yet my speaking gives offence: Or, if to whisper I presume, The company will fly the room.

By all the world I am opprest: And my oppression gives them rest.

Through me, though sore against my will, Instructors every art instil.

By thousands I am sold and bought, Who neither get nor lose a groat; For none, alas! by me can gain, But those who give me greatest pain.

Shall man presume to be my master, Who's but my caterer and taster?

Yet, though I always have my will, I'm but a mere depender still: An humble hanger-on at best; Of whom all people make a jest.

In me detractors seek to find Two vices of a different kind; I'm too profuse, some censurers cry, And all I get, I let it fly; While others give me many a curse, Because too close I hold my purse.

But this I know, in either case, They dare not charge me to my face.

'Tis true, indeed, sometimes I save, Sometimes run out of all I have; But, when the year is at an end, Computing what I get and spend, My goings-out, and comings-in, I cannot find I lose or win; And therefore all that know me say, I justly keep the middle way.

I'm always by my betters led; I last get up, and first a-bed; Though, if I rise before my time, The learn'd in sciences sublime Consult the stars, and thence foretell Good luck to those with whom I dwell.

ON A HORN

The joy of man, the pride of brutes, Domestic subject for disputes, Of plenty thou the emblem fair, Adorn'd by nymphs with all their care!

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