If the guilt of all lying consists in deceit,
Lie on—'tis your duty, sweet youth!
For believe me, then only we find you a cheat,
When you cunningly tell us the truth.
"As Dick and I at Charing Cross were walking,
Whom should we see on t'other side pass by,
But INFORMATOR with a stranger talking,
So I exclaimed—"O, what a lie!"
Quoth Dick, "What, can you hear him?" Stuff!
I saw him open his mouth—an't that enough?"
* * * * *
ON OBSERVING A LADY LICKING HER LAP-DOG,
Thy Lap-dog Rufa, is a dainty beast;
It don't surprise me in the least,
To see thee lick so dainty clean a beast,
But that so dainty clean a beast licks thee—
Yes—that surprises me.
* * * * *
Jack writes his verses with more speed
Than the printer's boy can set 'em;
Quite as fast as we can read,
But only—not so fast as we forget 'em.
Mr. Coleridge accompanied these epigrams with the translation of one of LESSING'S pieces, where the felicity of the expression, in its English form, will excite in most readers a suspicion, that no German original, could equal the poem in its new dress.
MY LOVE.
I ask'd my love, one happy day,
What I should call her in my lay!
By what sweet name from Rome or Greece;
Iphigenia, Clelia, Chloris,
Laura, Lesbia, or Doris,
Dorimene, or Lucrece?
Ah! replied my gentle fair,
Beloved! what are names but air!
Take whatever suits the line:
Call me Clelia, call me Chloris,
Laura, Lesbia, or Doris,
Only, only, call me thine.