UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.
DISCORD and plots, which have undone our age,
With the same ruin have o'erwhelm'd the stage.
Our House has suffer'd in the common woe,
We have been troubled with Scotch rebels too.
Our brethren are from Thames to Tweed departed,
And, of our sisters, all the kinder-hearted,
To Edinborough gone, or coach'd, or carted.
With bonny Bluecap there they act all night
For Scotch half-crown, in English threepence hight.
One nymph, to whom fat Sir John Falstaff's lean,
There with a single person fills the scene.
Another, with long use and age decay'd,
Dived here old woman, and rose there a maid.
Our trusty door-keepers of former time
There strut and swagger in heroic rhyme.
Tack but a copper lace to drugget suit,
And there's a hero made without dispute;
And that which was a capon's tail before,
Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.
But all his subjects, to express the care
Of imitation, go, like Indians, bare:
Laced linen there would be a dangerous thing;
It might, perhaps, a new rebellion bring;
The Scot who wore it would be chosen king.
But why should I these renegades describe,
When you yourselves have seen a lewder tribe?
Teague has been here, and to this learned pit,
With Irish action slander'd English wit;
You have beheld such barbarous Macs appear,
As merited a second massacre;
Such as, like Cain, were branded with disgrace,
And had their country stamp'd upon their face.
When strollers durst presume to pick your purse,
We humbly thought our broken troop not worse.
How ill soe'er our action may deserve,
Oxford's a place where Wit can never starve.
UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.
THOUGH actors cannot much of learning boast,
Of all who want it we admire it most;
We love the praises of a learned pit,
As we remotely are allied to Wit.
We speak our poet's wit, and trade in ore,
Like those who touch upon the golden shore;
Betwixt our judges can distinction make,
Discern how much, and why, our poems take;
Mark if the fools, or men of sense, rejoice;
Whether the' applause be only sound or voice.
When our top-gallants, or our City-folly,
Clap over-loud, it makes us melancholy:
We doubt that scene which does their wonder raise,
And, for their ignorance, contemn their praise.
Judge then if we who act, and they who write,
Should not be proud of giving you delight.
London likes grossly; but this nicer pit
Examines, fathoms, all the depths of wit;
The ready finger lays on every blot,
Knows what should justly please, and what should Nature herself lies open to your view, 1
You judge by her what draught of her is true,
Where outline's false, and colours seem too faint,
Where bunglers daub, and where true poets paint.
But, by the sacred Genius of this place,
By every Muse, by each domestic Grace,
Be kind to Wit, which but endeavours well,
And, where you judge, presumes not to excel.
Our poets hither for adoption come,
As nations sued to be made free of Rome;
Not in the suffragating tribes to stand,
But in your utmost, last, provincial band.
If his ambition may those hopes pursue,
Who, with religion, loves your arts and you;
Oxford to him a dearer name shall be
Than his own mother-university.
Thebes did his green, unknowing youth engage ;
He chooses Athens in his riper age.
SPOKEN BY MR. BETTERTON.
How comes it, Gentlemen, that now-a-days,
When all of you so shrewdly judge of plays,
Our poets tax you still with want of sense?
All prologues treat you at your own expense!
Sharp citizens a wiser way can go ;
They make you fools, but never call you so:
They, in good manners, seldom make a slip,
But treat a common whore with Ladyship:
But here each saucy wit at random writes,
And uses ladies as he uses knights.
Our Author, young, and grateful in his nature,
Vows that from him no nymph deserves a satire:
Nor will he ever draw-I mean his rhyme,
Against the sweet partaker of his crime.
Nor is he yet so bold an undertaker
To call men fools; 'tis railing at their Maker.
Besides, he fears to split upon that shelf;
He's young enough to be a fop himself;
And if his praise can bring you all a-bed,
He swears such hopeful youth no nation ever bred.
Your nurses, we presume, in such a case
Your father chose, because he liked the face,
And often they supplied your mother's place.
The dry nurse was your mother's ancient maid,
Who knew some former slip she ne'er betray'd.
Betwixt them both, for milk and sugar-candy,
Your sucking bottles were well stored with brandy.
Your father, to initiate your discourse,
Meant to have taught you first to swear and curse,
But was prevented by each careful nurse.
For, leaving Dad and Mam, as names too common,
They taught you certain parts of man and woman.
I pass your schools; for there, when first you came,
You would be sure to learn the Latin name.
In colleges you scorn'd the art of thinking,
But learn'd all moods and figures of good drinking:
Thence, come to Town, you practise play, to know
The virtues of the high dice and the low:
Each thinks himself a sharper most profound;
He cheats by pence, is cheated by the pound.
With these perfections, and what else he gleans,
The spark sets up for love behind our scenes,
Hot in pursuit of princesses and queens.
There, if they know their man, with cunning carriage,
Twenty to one but it concludes in marriage.
He hires some homely room, Love's fruits to gather,
And, garret-high, rebels against his father:
But he once dead-
Brings her in triumph, with her portion down,
A toilet, dressing-box, and half a crown.
Some marry first, and then they fall to scowering,
Which is refining marriage into whoring.
Our women batten well on their good nature,
All they can rap and rend for the dear creature;
But while abroad so liberal the dolt is,
Poor spouse at home as ragged as a colt is.
Last, some there are who take their first degrees
Of lewdness in our middle galleries:
The doughty bullies enter bloody drunk,
Invade and grubble one another's punk;
They caterwaul, and make a dismal rout,
Call sons of whores, and strike, but ne'er lug out:
Thus, while for paltry punk they roar and stickle,
They make it bawdier than a conventicle.
KING AND QUEEN,
UPON THE UNION OF THE TWO COMPANIES IN 1686.
SINCE Faction ebbs, and rogues grow out of fashion, Their penny scribes take care to inform the nation How well men thrive in this or that plantation
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