But if the first Eve

Hard doom did receive,
When only one apple had she,

What a punishment new

Shall be found out for you,
Who tasting, have robbed the whole tree ?

EXTEMPORANEOUS LINES,

ON THE PICTURE OF LADY MARY W. MONTAGU,

BY KNELLER.

* HE playful smiles around the dimpled

mouth,

That happy air of majesty and truth; W

So would I draw (but oh ! 'tis vain

to try, My narrow genius does the power deny :) The equal lustre of the heavenly mind, Where every grace with every virtue's joined ; Learning not vain, and wisdom not severe, With greatness easy, and with wit sincere; With just description show the work divine, And the whole princess in my work should shine.

TO MR. GAY,

WHO HAD CONGRATULATED MR. POPE ON FINISHING

HIS HOUSE AND GARDENS,

H , friend ! 'tis true—this truth you CA

lovers knowIn vain my structures rise, my

gardens grow; In vain fair Thames reflects the double scenes

Of hanging mountains, and of sloping greens : :
Joy lives not here,—to happier seats it flies,
And only dwells where Wortley casts her eyes.
What are the gay parterre, the chequered shade,
The morning bower, the evening colonnade,
But soft recesses of uneasy minds,
To sigh unheard in, to the passing winds ?
So the struck deer in some sequestered part
Lies down to die, the arrow at his heart;
He, stretched unseen in coverts hid from day,
Bleeds drop by drop, and pants his life away.

TO MRS. M. B. ON HER BIRTHDAY.

1723.

I be thou blest with all that Heaven

can send,
Long health, long youth, long plea-
was

sure, and a friend :
Not with those toys the female world admire,
Riches that vex, and vanities that tire.
With added years, if life bring nothing new,

1 This poem, first published in 1726, was also altered to form an epitaph on Henry Mordaunt, nephew of the Earl of Peterborough, who committed suicide in 1724. The first four lines ran as above, and the remainder of the epitaph was as follows: If added days of life bring nothing new, But, like a sieve, let every pleasure through, Some joy still lost, as each vain year runs o’er, And all we gain, some pensive notion more ; Is this a birthday? ah, 'tis sadly clear, 'Tis but the funeral of the former year. If there's no hope with kind, though fainter ray, To gild the evening of our future day; If every page of life's long volume tell The same dull story-Mordaunt! thou didst well.

But, like a sieve, let every blessing through, Some joy still lost, as each vain year runs

o'er,
And all we gain, some sad reflection more ;
Is that a birthday ? 'tis alas ! too clear,
'Tis but the funeral of the former year.

Let joy or ease, let affluence or content,
And the gay conscience of a life well spent,
Calm every thought, inspirit every grace,
Glow in thy heart, and smile upon thy face.
Let day improve on day, and year on year,
Without a pain, a trouble, or a fear;
Till death unfelt that tender frame destroy,
In some soft dream, or extasy of joy,
Peaceful sleep out the Sabbath of the tomb,
And wake to raptures in a life to come.

TO MR. THOMAS SOUTHERN,

ON HIS BIRTHDAY, 1742.

R9ESIGNED to live, prepared to die, SD With not one sin but poetry,

This day Tom's fair account has run

(Without a blot) to eighty-one.
Kind Boyle, before his poet, lays
A table, with a cloth of bays; ?
And Ireland, mother of sweet singers,
Presents her harp still to his fingers.3

1 Thomas Southern, the dramatist, born 1660, died 1746.

? He was invited to dine on his birthday with this nobleman, Lord Orrery, who had prepared for him the entertainment of which the bill of fare is here set down.- Warburton.

3 The harp is generally wove on the Irish linen, such as table-cloths, &c.— Warburton.

The feast, his towering genius marks In yonder wild goose and the larks ! The mushrooms show his wit was sudden ! And for his judgment, lo a pudden ! Roast beef, though old, proclaims him stout, And grace, although a bard, devout. May Tom, whom Heaven sent down to raise The price of prologues and of plays, Be every birthday more a winner, Digest his thirty-thousandth dinner; Walk to his grave without reproach, And scorn a rascal and a coach.

TO MR. JOHN MOORE,2 AUTHOR OF THE CELEBRATED WORM-POWDER.

OW much, egregious Moore, are we

Deceived by shows and forms !
k Whate'er we think, whate'er we see,
um All humankind are worms.
Man is a very worm by birth,

Vile reptile, weak and vain :
Awhile he crawls upon the earth,

Then shrinks to earth again.

1 This alludes to a story Mr. Southern told of Dry. den, about the same time, to Mr. P. and Mr. W. When Southern first wrote for the stage, Dryden was so famous for his prologues, that the players would act nothing without that decoration. His usual price till then had been four guineas; but when Southern came to him for the prologue he had bespoke, Dryden told him he must have six guineas for it; “which,” said he, “ young man, is out of no disrespect to you ; but the players have had my goods too cheap.”--War. burton.

2 First published, anonymously, in 1716.

That woman is a worm-we find

E’er since our grandam's evil;
She first conversed with her own kind,

That ancient worm, the Devil.
The learned themselves we book-worms name,

The blockhead is a slow-worm;
The nymph whose tail is all on flame,

Is aptly termed a glow-worm.
The fops are painted butterflies,

That flutter for a day;
First from a worm they take their rise,

And in a worm decay.

The flatterer an ear-wig grows;

Thus worms suit all conditions ;
Misers are muck-worms, silk-worms beaux,

And death-watches physicians.
That statesmen have the worm, is seen

By all their winding play;
Their conscience is a worm within,

That gnaws them night and day.
Ah Moore! thy skill were well employed,

And greater gain would rise,
If thou could'st make the courtier void

The worm that never dies !
O learned friend of Abchurch-lane,

Who sett’st our entrails free;
Vain is thy art, thy powder vain,

Since worms shall eat ev'n thee.
Our fate thou only canst adjourn

Some few short years, no more !
Ev'n Button's wits to worms shall turn,

Who maggots were before.