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For now suppose thy avarice poffeft

Of all the splendour of the glittʼring East,
Of Crœfus' mass of wealth, of Cyrus' crown,
Suppofe the ocean's treasure all thy own,
Still would thy foul repine, still ask for more,
Unbleft with plenty, with abundance poor.
Fabricius in himself, in virtue, great,

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Difdain'd a monarch's bribe, defpis'd his ftate; 245 Serranus as he grac'd the Conful's chair

So could he guide the plough's laborious share; 'The fam'd, the warlike, Curii deign'd to dwell In a poor lonely cot and humble cell:

Such a retreat to me is more glorious far

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Than all thy pomp than all thy triumphs are.
Give me my folitary native home,

Take thou thy rising tow'r, thy lofty dome:
Tho' there thy furniture of radiant die
Abstracts and ravishes the curious eye,
Tho' each apartment, ev'ry fpacious room,

Shines with the glories of the Tyrian loom,

Yet here I view a more delightful fcene:

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Where Nature's freshest bloom and beauties reign, Where the warm zephir's genial balmy wing

Playing diffuses an eternal spring:

Tho' there thy lewd lafcivious limbs are laid
On a rich downy couch or golden bed,
Yet here extended on the flow'ry grafs

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More free from carę my guiltless hours 1 pafs; 265

Tho' there thy fycophants, a fervile race!
Cringe at thy levees and refound thy praise,
Yet here a murm'ring ftream or warbling bird
To me does fweeter harmony afford.

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Nature on all the pow'r of bliss bestows, Which from her bounteous fource perpetual flows, But he alone with happiness is bleft

Who knows to use it rightly when poffeft;

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A doctrine if well poiz'd in Reason's scale
Nor luxury nor want would thus prevail,
Nor would our fleets fo frequent plough the main,
Nor our embattled armies ftrew the plain.

But oh! Rufinus is to reafon blind;

A ftrange hydropick thirft inflames his mind:
No bribes his growing appetite can fate,
For new poffeffions new defires create.
No fenfe of fhame, no modefty, restrains
Where avarice or where ambition reigns.

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When with strict caths his profer'd faith he binds
Falfe are his vows and treach'rous his defigns. 285
Now fhould a patriot rife, his pow'r oppose,
Should he affert a finking nation's cause,
He stirs a vengeance nothing can control,
Such is the rancour of his haughty foul;
Fell as a lionefs in Libya's plain

When tortur'd with the jav'lin's pointed pain,

Or a spurn'd ferpent as she shoots along,

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With lightning in her eyes and poison in her tongue.

Nor will thofe families eras'd fuffice,

But provinces and cities he destroys;

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Urg'd on with blind revenge and fettled hate

He labours the confufion of the state,

Subverts the nation's old establish'd frame,
Explodes her laws and tramples on her fame.

If e'er in mercy he pretends to fave
A man purfu'd by faction from the grave,
Then he invents new punishments, new pains,
Condemns to filence, and from truth restrains *;
Then racks and pillories, and bonds and bars,
Then ruin and impeachments, he prepares.
O dreadful mercy! more than death fevere!
That doubly tortures whom it seems to spare!
All feem enflav'd, all bow to him alone,

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Nor dare their hate their juft refentments own, But inward grieve, their fighs and pangs confin'd, Which with convulfive forrow tear the mind.

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Envy is mute-it is treafon to difclofe

The baneful fource of their eternal woes.

appears

But Stilico's fuperiour foul
Unfhock'd, unmov'd, by bafe ignoble fears.

He is the polar ftar directs the state

When parties rage and publick tempests beat;
He is the fafe retreat, the fweet repose,
Can footh and calm afflicted Virtue's woes;

*

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Alluding to the fentence then recently paffed on Dr. Sacheverell, for whom our Author was a profeffed advocate.

He is the folid, firm, unfhaken, force
That only knows to ftem th' invader's course.
So when a river fwell'd with winter's rains
The limits of its wonted fhore difdains,
Bridges, and stones, and trees, in vain oppose,
With unrefifted rage the torrent flows,

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But as it rolling meets a mighty rock
Whofe fix'd foundations can repel the shock,
Elided furges roar in eddies round,

The rock unmov'd reverberates the found.

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THE STUMBLINGBLOCK,

FROM CLAUDIAN'S RUFINUS *.

TWENTY Conundrums have of late
Been buzzing in my addle pate,
If earthly things are rul'd by Heav'n,
Or matters go at fix and fev'n,

The coach without a coachman driv'n?
A pilot at the helm to guide,

Or the ship left to wind and tide?
A great First Cause to be ador'd,
Or whether all is a lott'ry board?
For when in viewing Nature's face
1 fpy fo regular a grace,

So just a symmetry of features

From ftern to ftern in all her creatures,

*See a serious tranflation above.

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How fummer, winter, fpring, and fall,

Dance round in fo exact a hawl,

How like a chequer day and night

One is mark'd with black and one with white.

Quoth I, I ken it well from hence

There is a Prefiding Influence

Which won't permit the rambling stars

To fall together by the ears,

feafon

Which orders ftill the proper
For hay and oats, and beans and peafen,
Which trims the fun with its own beams,
Whilft the moon ticks for her's it feenis,
And, as afham'd of the disgrace,

Unmasks but feldom all her face,

Which bounds the ocean within banks
To hinder all its madcap pranks,
Which does the globe to an axle fit,
Like wheel to nave or joint to fpit.

But then again, how can it be

Whilft fuch vait tracks of earth we fee

O'errun by barb'rous tyranny?

Vile fycophants in clover bleft

Whilft patriots with Duke Humphry feaft,
Browbeaten, bully'd, and oppreft?

Pimps rais'd to honour, riches, rule,
Whilft he who feems to be a tool

Is the priest's knave, the placeman's fool!

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