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While I, so tremblingly alive all o'er, Still bleed and agonize at every pore; At ev'ry hiss am harrow'd up with fear, And burst with choler at a critic's sneer. Rack'd by the gout and stone, and struck with age, Prudence and Ease advise to quit the stage; But Fame still prompts, and Pride can feel no pain; And Avarice bids me sell my soul for gain. Bring Nyky back, O Muse! by verse divine, The Trojan-Greeks were once transformed to swine. By verse divine B——tti 'scap'd the rope: Now love is known, what may not lovers hope! Ev'n as with Griffins[33] stallions late have join'd With blood-hounds goats may litter, as in kind; |
| IMITATIONS. |
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Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina ducite Daphnim: Carminibus Circe socios mutavit Ulyssei: Carmina vel cœlo possunt deducere lunam. Nunc scio quid sit amor—— —— —— quid non speremus amantes? Jungentur jam Gryphes equis, ævoque sequenti Cum canibus timidi venient ad pocula damæ. Torva leæna lupum sequitur, lupus ipse capellam, Te Corydon, O Alexis: trahit sua quemque voluptas. |
| NOTES. |
[33] Unnatural monsters, familiar only with the poets.
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Nay wanton kids devouring wolves may greet, And wolves with loving lyonesses meet. By different means is different love made known. And each fond lover will prefer his own. Strange lot of love! two friends, my soul's delight, Men call that M——r, this a Catamite! Yet bring him back; for who chaste roundelay Shall sing, now B—st—ff is driv'n away? Who now correct, for modest Drury-lane, Loose Wycherly's or Congreve's looser vein? With nice decorum shunning naughty jokes, Exhibit none but decent, dainty folks?[34] Ah me! how wanton wit will shame the stage, And shock this delicate, this virtuous age! |
| NOTES. |
[34] Nyky was employed by Roscius to correct the Plain-dealer of Wycherly; which he accordingly attempted, and inscribed the attempt to his patron, "as a tribute of affection and esteem for his many shining and amiable qualities." "The licentiousness of Wycherly's muse," says this modern corrector, "rendered her shocking to us, with all her charms: or, in other words, we could allow no charms in a tainted beauty, who brought contagion along with her." Of the play of the Plain-dealer, in particular, he intimates that it had been long excluded the theatre; because, to the honour of the present age, it was immoral and indecent: that on a close examination, he found in it excessive obscenity; that the character of Manly was rough even to outrageous brutality; and that he thought it necessary to work the whole materials up again, with a mixture of alloy agreeable to the rules of modern refinement! See Preface to B—— ff's Plain-dealer. What a champion for decency and delicacy, morality and humanity! What improvement may not sterling wit receive from the mixture of such alloy! What an idea may we not hence acquire of modern refinement!