Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully, preached!

Men that, if now alive, would fit content
And humble learners of a Saviour's worth,

Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth,
Their thirft of knowledge, and their candour too!

And thus it is. The paftor, either vain
By nature, or by flattery made so, taught
To gaze at his own splendour, and to exalt
Abfurdly, not his office, but himself;

Or unenlightened, and too poud too learn;
Or vicious, and not therefore apt to teach;
Perverting often by the ftrefs of lewd

And loofe example, whom he should inftru&t;
Exposes, and holds up to broad difgrace,
The nobleft function, and difcredits much
The brightest truths, that man has ever feen.
For ghoftly counsel; if it either fall

Below the exigence, or be not backed

With fhow of love, at leaft with hopeful proof
Of fome fincerity on the giver's part;

Or be dishonoured in the exterior form
And mode of its conveyance by fuch tricks,
As move derifion, or by foppish airs
And hiftrionic mummery, that let down
The pulpit to the level of the stage;

Drops from the lips a difregarded thing.

The weak perhaps are moved, but are not taught, While prejudice in men of ftronger minds

Takes deeper root, confirmed by what they fee. A relaxation of religion's hold

Upon the roving and untutored heart

Soon follows, and, the curb of confcience fnapt,
The laity run wild.-But do they now?
Note their extravagance, and be convinced.

As nations, ignorant of God, contrive
A wooden one; fo we, no longer taught
By monitors, that mother church fupplies,
Now make our own. Pofterity will ask
(If e'er pofterity fee verfe of mine)

Some fifty or an hundred luftrums hence,
What was a monitor in George's days?
My very gentle reader, yet unborn,

Of whom I needs muft augur better things,
Since heaven would fure grow weary of a world
Productive only of a race like our's,

A monitor is wood plank fhaven thin.

We wear it at our backs. There, clofely braced
And neatly fitted, it compreffes hard

The prominent and moft unfightly bones,
And binds the fhoulders flat. We prove its ufe

Sovereign and moft effectual to secure

A form, not now gymnastic as of yore,
From rickets and diftortion, else our lot.
But thus admonished, we can walk erect-
One proof at leaft of manhood! while the friend
Sticks close, a Mentor worthy of his charge.
Our habits, coftlier than Lucullus wore,
And by caprice as multiplied as his,

Juft please us while the fashion is at full,
But change with every moon. The fycophant,
Who waits to dress us, arbitrates their date ;
Surveys his fair reverfion with keen eye;
Finds one ill made, another obfolete,
This fits not nicely, that is ill conceived;
And, making prize of all that he condemns,
With our expenditure defrays his own.
Variety's the very spice of life,

That gives it all its flavour. We have run
Through every change, that fancy at the loom
Exhaufted has had genius to fupply;

And, ftudious of mutation ftill, difcard
A real elegance, a little used,

For monftrous novelty and strange disguise.

We facrifice to drefs, till household joys

And comforts ceafe. Drefs drains our cellar dry,

And keeps our larder lean; puts out our fires;

And introduces hunger, froft, and woe,

Where peace and hospitality might reign.

What man that lives, and that knows how to live,
Would fail to exhibit at the public shows

A form as fplendid as the proudeft there,
Though appetite raise outcries at the coft?
A man of the town dines late, but foon enough,
With reasonable forecaft and dispatch,

To infure a fide box ftation at half price.
You think perhaps fo delicate his dress,
His daily fare as delicate. Alas!

He picks clean teeth, and, bufy as he feems
With an old tavern quill, is hungry yet!
The rout is folly's circle, which she draws
With magic wand. So potent is the fpell,
That none, decoyed into that fatal ring
Unless by heaven's peculiar grace, escape.
There we grow early gray, but never wife;
There form connexions, but acquire no friend;
Solicit pleasure hopeless of fuccefs;

Waste youth in occupations only fit

For fecond childhood, and devote old age
To fports, which only childhood could excufe.
There they are happieft, who diffemble beft
Their weariness; and they the most polite,
Who fquander time and treasure with a smile,

Though at their own destruction. She that asks
Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all,
And hates their coming. They (what can they lefs?)
Make juft reprifals; and with cringe and fhrug,
And bow obfequious, hide their hate of her.
All catch the frenzy, downward from her grace,
Whose flambeaux flash aga'nft the morning skies,
And gild our chamber ceilings as they pass,
To her, who frugal only that her thrift
May feed exceffes fhe can ill afford,

Is hackneyed home unlacqueyed; who in hafte
Alighting turns the key in her own door,

And, at the watchman's lantern borrowing light,
Finds a cold bed her only comfort left.

Wives beggar huíbands, hufbands ftarve their wives,
On fortune's velvet altar offering up

Their laft poor pittance-fortune, moft severe

Of goddeffes yet known, and costlier far

Than all, that held their routs in Juno's heaven.

So fare we in this prifon-house the world;

And 'tis a fearful fpectacle to fee

So many maniacs dancing in their chains.

They gaze upon the links, that hold them faft,
With eyes of anguish, execrate their lot,

Then shake them in despair, and dance again!