Two Cupids squirt before: a lake behind No artful wildness to perplex the scene; My lord advances with majestic mien, And when up ten steep slopes you've dragg'd your thighs, Just at his study door he'll bless your eyes. For Locke or Milton 'tis in vain to look ; And now the chapel's silver bell you hear, That summons you to all the pride of prayer. Light quirks of music, broken and uneven, Make the soul dance upon a jig to Heaven: On painted ceilings you devoutly stare, Where sprawl the saints of Verrio or Laguerre, On gilded clouds in fair expansion lie, And bring all paradise before your eye: To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite, Who never mentions hell to ears polite. But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call: A hundred footsteps scrape the marble hall; The rich buffet well-colour'd serpents grace, And gaping Tritons spew to wash your face. Is this a dinner? this a genial room? No, 'tis a temple and a hecatomb; A solemn sacrifice perform'd in state; You drink by measure, and to minutes eat. So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there. Between each act the trembling salvers ring, From soup to sweet wine, and God bless the king. In plenty starving, tantaliz'd in state, And complaisantly help'd to all I hate, Treated, caress'd, and tir'd, I take my leave, Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve; I curse such lavish cost and little skill, And swear no day was ever pass'd so ill. Yet hence the poor are cloth'd, the hungry fed; Health to himself, and to his infants bread The labourer bears; what his hard heart denies, His charitable vanity supplies. Another age shall see the golden ear Imbrown the slope, and nod on the parterre, Who then shall grace, or who improve the soil? Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle. 'Tis use alone that sanctifies expense, from sense. And splendour borrows all her rays Till kings call forth th' ideas of your mind, Bid temples, worthier of the God, ascend, Bid the broad arch the dangerous flood contain, The mole projected break the roaring main, Back to his bounds their subject sea command, And roll obedient rivers through the land. These honours, peace to happy Britain brings; These are imperial works, and worthy kings. EPISTLE TO MR. ADDISON. OCCASIONED BY HIS DIALOGUES ON MEDALS. SEE the wild waste of all-devouring years! Perhaps, by its own ruins sav'd from flame, Ambition sigh'd: she found it vain to trust to shore, Their ruins perish'd, and their place no more! |