IRELAND is now our care, | |
| We lately fix’d our viceroy there: | |
| How near was she to be undone, | |
| Till pious love inspired her son! | |
| What cannot our vicegerent do, | 5 |
| As poet and as patriot too? | |
| Let his success our subjects sway, | |
| Our inspirations to obey, | |
| And follow where he leads the way. | |
| Then study to correct your taste, | 10 |
| Nor beaten paths be longer traced. | |
| No simile shall be begun, | |
| With rising or with setting sun; | |
| And let the secret head of Nile | |
| Be ever banished from your isle. | 15 |
| When wretched lovers live on air, | |
| I beg you’ll the chameleon spare; | |
| And when you’d make a hero grander, | |
| Forget he’s like a salamander. | |
| No son of mine shall dare to say, | 20 |
| Aurora ushered in the day, | |
| Or ever name the milky-way. | |
| You all agree, I make no doubt, | |
| Elijah’s mantle is worn out. | |
| The bird of Jove shall toil no more | 25 |
| To teach the humble wren to soar. | |
| Your tragic heroes shall not rant, | |
| Nor shepherds use poetic cant. | |
| Simplicity alone can grace | |
| The manners of the rural race. | 30 |
| Theocritus and Philips be | |
| Your guides to true simplicity. | |
| When Damon’s soul shall take its flight, | |
| Though poets have the second-sight, | |
| They shall not see a trail of light. | 35 |
| Nor shall the vapours upwards rise, | |
| Nor a new star adorn the skies; | |
| For who can hope to place one there, | |
| As glorious as Belinda’s hair? | |
| Yet, if his name you’d eternise, | 40 |
| And must exalt him to the skies, | |
| Without a star this may be done: | |
| So Tickell mourn’d his Addison. | |
| If Anna’s happy reign you praise, | |
| Pray, not a word of halcyon days; | 45 |
| Nor let my votaries show their skill | |
| In aping lines from Cooper’s Hill; | |
| For know I cannot bear to hear | |
| The mimicry of deep, yet clear. | |
| Whene’er my viceroy is address’d, | 50 |
| Against the phœnix I protest. | |
| When poets soar in youthful strains, | |
| No Phaeton to hold the reins. | |
| When you describe a lovely girl, | |
| No lips of coral, teeth of pearl. | 55 |
| Cupid shall ne’er mistake another, | |
| However beauteous, for his mother; | |
| Nor shall his darts at random fly | |
| From magazine in Celia’s eye. | |
| With woman compounds I am cloy’d, | 60 |
| Which only pleased in Biddy Floyd. | |
| For foreign aid what need they roam, | |
| Whom fate has amply blest at home? | |
| Unerring Heaven, with bounteous hand, | |
| Has form’d a model for your land, | 65 |
| Whom Jove endued with every grace; | |
| The glory of the Granard race; | |
| Now destined by the powers divine | |
| The blessing of another line. | |
| Then, would you paint a matchless dame, | 70 |
| Whom you’d consign to endless fame? | |
| Invoke not Cytherea’s aid, | |
| Nor borrow from the blue-eyed maid; | |
| Nor need you on the Graces call; | |
| Take qualities from Donegal. | 75 |
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