To compass this, his building is a town, His pond an ocean, his parterre a down: Who but must laugh, the master when he sees, A puny insect, shivering at a breeze!

Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around!

The whole a labour'd quarry above ground; 110 Two Cupids squirt before: a lake behind Improves the keenness of the northern wind.

His gardens next your admiration call, On every side you look, behold the wall!

No pleasing intricacies intervene, No artful wildness to perplex the scene; Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother, And half the platform just reflects the other.

The suffering eye inverted nature sees, Trees cut to statues, statues thick as trees; 120 With here a fountain, never to be play'd; And there a summer-house, that knows no shade; Here Amphitrite sails through myrtle bowers; There gladiators fight, or die in flowers; Unwater'd see the drooping sea-horse mourn, And swallows roost in Nilus' dusty urn.

My lord advances with majestic mien, Smit with the mighty pleasure, to be seen: But soft--by regular approach--not yet-- First through the length of yon hot terrace sweat; 130 And when up ten steep slopes you've dragg'd your thighs, Just at his study-door he'll bless your eyes.

His study! with what authors is it stored?

In books, not authors, curious is my lord; To all their dated backs he turns you round: These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound.

Lo! some are vellum, and the rest as good For all his lordship knows, but they are wood.

For Locke or Milton 'tis in vain to look, 140 These shelves admit not any modern book.

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,[51]

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[51] to ears polite. 150

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[53] and his wand were there. 160 Between each act the trembling salvers ring, From soup to sweet-vine, and God bless the king.

In plenty starving, tantalised in state, And complaisantly help'd to all I hate, Treated, caress'd, and tired, 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 clothed, the hungry fed; Health to himself, and to his infants bread 170 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, Deep harvests bury all his pride has plann'd, And laughing Ceres reassume the land.

Who then shall grace, or who improve the soil?-- Who plants like Bathurst, or who builds like Boyle.

'Tis use alone that sanctifies expense, And splendour borrows all her rays from sense. 180

His father's acres who enjoys in peace, Or makes his neighbours glad, if he increase: Whose cheerful tenants bless their yearly toil, Yet to their lord owe more than to the soil; Whose ample lawns are not ashamed to feed The milky heifer and deserving steed; Whose rising forests, not for pride or show, But future buildings, future navies, grow: Let his plantations stretch from down to down, First shade a country, and then raise a town. 190

You, too, proceed! make falling arts your care, Erect new wonders, and the old repair; Jones and Palladio to themselves restore, And be whate'er Vitruvius was before: Till kings call forth the ideas of your mind, (Proud to accomplish what such hands design'd.) Bid harbours open, public ways extend, Bid temples, worthier of the god, ascend; Bid the broad arch the dangerous flood contain, The mole projected break the roaring main; 200 Back to his bonds 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.

VARIATION.

After VER. 22 in the MS.--

Must bishops, lawyers, statesmen have the skill To build, to plant, judge paintings, what you will?

Then why not Kent as well our treaties draw, Bridginan explain the gospel, Gibs the law?

EPISTLE V. TO MR ADDISON.

OCCASIONED BY HIS DIALOGUES ON MEDALS.[54]

See the wild waste of all-devouring years!

How Rome her own sad sepulchre appears, With nodding arches, broken temples spread!

The very tombs now vanish'd, like their dead!

Imperial wonders raised on nations spoil'd Where mix'd with slaves the groaning martyr toil'd: Huge theatres, that now unpeopled woods, Now drain'd a distant country of her floods: Fanes, which admiring gods with pride survey, Statues of men, scarce less alive than they! 10 Some felt the silent stroke of mouldering age, Some hostile fury, some religious rage, Barbarian blindness, Christian zeal conspire, And Papal piety, and Gothic fire.

Perhaps, by its own ruins saved from flame, Some buried marble half-preserves a name; That name the learn'd with fierce disputes pursue, And give to Titus old Vespasian's due.

Ambition sigh'd: she found it vain to trust The faithless column, and the crumbling bust: 20 Huge moles, whose shadow stretch'd from shore to shore, Their ruins perish'd, and their place no more!

Convinced, she now contracts her vast design, And all her triumphs shrink into a coin.

A narrow orb each crowded conquest keeps, Beneath her palm, here sad Judaea weeps.

Now scantier limits the proud arch confine, And scarce are seen the prostrate Nile or Rhine; A small Euphrates through the piece is roll'd, And little eagles wave their wings in gold. 30

The medal, faithful to its charge of fame, Through climes and ages bears each form and name: In one short view subjected to our eye Gods, emperors, heroes, sages, beauties, lie.

With sharpen'd sight, pale antiquaries pore, The inscription value, but the rust adore.

This the blue varnish, that the green endears, The sacred rust of twice ten hundred years!

To gain Pescennius one employs his schemes, One grasps a Cecrops in ecstatic dreams. 40 Poor Vadius,[55] long with learned spleen devour'd.

Can taste no pleasure since his shield was scour'd: And Curio, restless by the fair one's side, Sighs for an Otho, and neglects his bride.

Theirs is the vanity, the learning thine: Touch'd by thy hand, again Rome's glories shine; Her gods, and god-like heroes rise to view, And all her faded garlands bloom anew.

Nor blush, these studies thy regard engage; These pleased the fathers of poetic rage; 50 The verse and sculpture bore an equal part, And Art reflected images to Art.

Oh! when shall Britain, conscious of her claim, Stand emulous of Greek and Roman fame?

In living medals see her wars enroll'd, And vanquish'd realms supply recording gold?

Here, rising bold, the patriot's honest face; There, warriors frowning in historic brass: Then future ages with delight shall see How Plato's, Bacon's, Newton's looks agree; 60 Or in fair series laurell'd bards be shown, A Virgil there, and here an Addison.

Then shall thy Craggs (and let me call him mine) On the cast ore, another Pollio, shine; With aspect open, shall erect his head, And round the orb in lasting notes be read, 'Statesman, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere, In action faithful, and in honour clear; Who broke no promise, served no private end, Who gain'd no title, and who lost no friend; 70 Ennobled by himself, by all approved, And praised, unenvied, by the Muse he loved.'

TRANSLATIONS AND IMITATIONS.

SAPPHO TO PHAON.

FROM THE FIFTEENTH OF OVID'S EPISTLES.

Say, lovely youth, that dost my heart command, Can Phaon's eyes forget his Sappho's hand?

Must then her name the wretched writer prove, To thy remembrance lost, as to thy love?

Ask not the cause that I new numbers choose, The lute neglected and the lyric Muse; Love taught my tears in sadder notes to flow, And tuned my heart to elegies of woe, I burn, I burn, as when through ripen'd corn By driving winds the spreading flames are borne! 10 Phaon to aetna's scorching fields retires, While I consume with more than aetna's fires!

No more my soul a charm in music finds; Music has charms alone for peaceful minds.

Soft scenes of solitude no more can please; Love enters there, and I'm my own disease.

No more the Lesbian dames my passion move, Once the dear objects of my guilty love; All other loves are lost in only thine, Ah, youth ungrateful to a flame like mine! 20 Whom would not all those blooming charms surprise, Those heavenly looks, and dear deluding eyes!

The harp and bow would you like Phoebus bear, A brighter Phoebus Phaon might appear; Would you with ivy wreath your flowing hair, Not Bacchus' self with Phaon could compare: Yet Phoebus loved, and Bacchus felt the flame, One Daphne warm'd, and one the Cretan dame; Nymphs that in verse no more could rival me, Than e'en those gods contend in charms with thee. 30 The Muses teach me all their softest lays, And the wide world resounds with Sappho's praise.

Though great Alcaeus more sublimely sings, And strikes with bolder rage the sounding strings, No less renown attends the moving lyre, Which Venus tunes, and all her loves inspire.

To me what nature has in charms denied, Is well by wit's more lasting flames supplied.

Though short my stature, yet my name extends To heaven itself, and earth's remotest ends. 40 Brown as I am, an Ethiopian dame Inspired young Perseus with a generous flame; Turtles and doves of different hues unite, And glossy jet is pair'd with shining white.

If to no charms thou wilt thy heart resign, But such as merit, such as equal thine, By none, alas! by none thou canst be moved, Phaon alone by Phaon must be loved!

Yet once thy Sappho could thy cares employ, Once in her arms you centred all your joy: 50 No time the dear remembrance can remove, For, oh! how vast a memory has love!

My music, then, you could for ever hear, And all my words were music to your ear.

You stopp'd with kisses my enchanting tongue, And found my kisses sweeter than my song, In all I pleased, but most in what was best; And the last joy was dearer than the rest.

Then with each word, each glance, each motion fired, You still enjoy'd, and yet you still desired, 60 Till, all dissolving, in the trance we lay, And in tumultuous raptures died away.

The fair Sicilians now thy soul inflame; Why was I born, ye gods, a Lesbian dame?