Since

have bestow'd their pence,

echo'd sense.

once by providence, or chance,

Tumbled his length'ning quavers in a dance:
Since Catcott seem'd to reason, and display
The meaning of the words he meant to say ;
Since Warburton, his native pride forgot,
Bow'd to the garment of the ruling Scot;
And offer'd

ghost (a welcome gift)

And hop'd, in gratitude, to have a lift;
An universal primacy, at least,

A fit reward for such a stirring priest.
Since Horne imprudently display'd his zeal,
And made his foe the powerful reasons feel:

Since Since

has meaning in his last discourse; borrow'd honesty by force, And trembled at the measures of the friend His infant conscience shudder'd to defend ; Since in his race of vice outrun, Scrupled to do what

since hath done.

Hail, Inspiration! Catcott learns to preach,
And classic Lee attempts by thee to teach;
By inspiration North directs his tools,

And *

above by inspiration rules; Distils the thistles of the garter'd crew, And drains the sacred reservoirs of Kew. Inspir'd with hopes of rising in the kirk, Here *

*

*

* whines his Sunday's journey work;

Soft *

* undeniably a saint,

Whimpers in accent so extremely faint,
You see the substance of his empty prayer,
His nothing to the purpose in his air;
His sermons have no arguments, 'tis true,
Would you have sense and pretty figures too?
With what a swimming elegance and ease
He scatters out distorted similes!
It matters not how wretchedly applied,
Saints are permitted to set sense aside:
This oratorial novelty in town

Dies into fame, and ogles to renown;
The dowdy damsels of his chosen tribe
Are fee'd to heaven, his person is the bribe;
All who can superficial talk admire,

* *

His vanity, not beauty, sets on fire:
Enough of *
* let him ogle still,
Convince with nonsense, and with fopp'ry kill,
Pray for the secret measures of the great,

And hope the Lord will regulate the state :

Florid as Klopstock, and as quick as me,
At double epithet or simile;

His despicable talents cannot harm

Those who defy a Johnson's false alarm.
Hail, Inspiration! piously I kneel,

And call upon thy sacred name with zeal;

A German writer, some of whose works have been translated into English. See particularly the "Messiah," and the "Death of Adam."

Come, spread thy sooty pinions o'er my pen,
Teach me the secrets of the lords of men ;
In visionary prospects let me see,

How *

* employs his sense, deriv'd from thee, Display the mystic sybil of the isle,

;

And dress her wrinkled features in a smile
Of past and secret measures let me tell,
How * *
*
* pilfer'd power, and Chatham fell:
Chatham, whose patriotic actions wear
One single brand of infamy-the peer;
Whose popularity again thinks fit
To lose the coronet, revive the Pitt;
And in the upper house (where leading peers
Practise a minuet step, or scratch their ears,)
He warmly undertakes to plead the cause
Of injur'd liberty, and broken laws.

Hail, Inspiration! from whose fountain flow
The strains which circulate through all the row,
With humblest reverence thy aid I ask,
For this laborious and herculean task.
How difficult to make a piece go down
With booksellers, reviewers, and the town;
None with a Christian, charitable love,
A kind and fixed intention to approve,
The wild excursions of the muse will read.
Alas! I was not born beyond the Tweed;
To public favour I have no pretence,
If public favour is the child of sense :

To paraphrase on home in Armstrong's rhymes,
To decorate Fingal in sounding chimes,

The self-sufficient muse was never known,

But shines in trifling dulness all her own.

Where, rich with painted bricks and lifeless white,
Four dirty alleys in a cross unite,

* *

Where avaricious sons of commerce meet,
To do their public business in the street;
There stands a dome to dulness ever dear,
Where *
*models justice by the square;
Where bulky aldermen display their sense,
And Bristol patriots wager out their pence :
Here, in the malice of my stars confin'd,

I call the muses to divert my mind;
Come inspiration! mysticly instil

The spirit of a

* * *

* in my quill,

An equal terror to the small and great,
To lash an alderman or knave of state.

Here*

*

*thund'ring through the spacious court,

Grounds equity on Jeffries's report ;

And oft, explaining to the lords of trade,

Proves himself right by statutes never made;
In * * * *able politicians see

What has he else superior to the crowd?
His peruke boasts solemnity of law:

E'en there might counsellors detect a flaw.

But Providence is just, as doctors tell,
That triple mystery's a good centinel,

Was

not so noisy, and more wise,

The body corporate would close its eyes.

Useless the satire, stoically wise,

Bristol can literary rubs despise;

You'll wonder whence the wisdom may proceed;

'Tis doubtful if her aldermen can read;

This as a certainty the muse may tell,

None of her common-councilmen can spell:

Why busy

* wilt thou trouble

Their worships hear, and understand like thee.
Few beings absolutely boast the man,
Few have the understanding of a Spanne;
Every idea of a city mind

Is to commercial incidents confin'd:

True! some exceptions to this gen❜ral rule

Can shew the merchant blended with the fool.

His ample visage, oft on nothing bent,
Sleeps in vacuity of sentiment;

When in the venerable gothic hall,
Where fetters rattle, evidences bawl,
Puzzled in thought by equity or law,
Into their inner room his senses draw;