To my School-Fellow, Mr. William Pattison , Upon his Departure from Appleby School
Lend me thy Muse, thy Merits to proclaim,
And give thy Worth its just intrinsick Fame;
My Muse too humble, and my Lays too slow,
My Wings too slender, and my Verse too low.
To me a while, my Friend, thy Muse impart,
Grief chills my Vigour, and disarms my Heart;
Thy Verse alone can tell thy boundless Praise,
Thy Lays alone are worthy of thy Lays.
Say, never-dying, ever tuneful Nine,
How oft the Bard attended at your Shrine,
How oft he' as rais'd the Voice, and tun'd the String,
How oft he' as sung your Fame,—how oft shall sing.
Ye verdant Trees, that in green Order rear
Your waving Tresses in the fluid Air;
In a more formidable Prospect stand,
With nodding Foliage on poetick Land.
Ye purling Streams, that run by Cowley 's Side,
Have learn'd, by him, in smoother Feet to glide;
His Verse discover'd Hederinda 's Shade,
With Age and Jvy, memorable made:
The Rock affords her never-dying Bays,
To crown her Poet with immortal Praise.
Your lovely Laura 's Name shall never die,
But live co-eval, with Eternity.
Venus , and all the Goddesses around,
Drest in your Verse, with surer Light'nings wound
The little Loves, and Smiles in Numbers roll,
And Cupid 's Arrows steal upon the Soul.
But now no more the Naïds prattling play,
But in soft Silence slumber out the Day;
Cupid 's full Quiver, and the Court of Love,
The checquer'd Scene of Hederinda 's Grove,
No more, alas! its wonted Joy displays,
He's gone, that drest them in vivisick Lays:
He's gone—in Homer no Delights abound,
No sweet Variety in Virgil 's found,
Nor Musick which can heal a Lover's Wound!
Sorrow, like the prismatick Glass, does show
One undistinguish'd Spectacle of Woe;
His Presence ev'ry sweetest Joy improv'd
Still lov'd, and honour'd, by the Muse he lov'd.
As soon as he was well settled in the University, he wrote an Epistle to his beloved F LORIO , in the North , describing a College-Life . Here it was, he pursued—that Plan his Friend, Mr. Noble , had given him, and went through the Classicks , as well as all our English Poets, with great Advantage; now, and then, recreating himself in following the Fortune of the Angle, Fishing being always his chief Amusement.
But here I must digress (tho' it will greatly tend to the Reader's Entertainment) in giving some Account of the Raptures Mr. Pattison was in, upon reading the Poetical Works of Mr. William Browne , an imperfect Copy of which he had purchased for a Shilling, and which, thro' his Misfortunes, was the whole Library he left behind him.
From some Instances which I shall produce, it will, I doubt not, appear even to our most infallible Criticks, that, tho' Mr. Browne wrote an hundred and eleven Years ago, his Language is as nervous, his Numbers as harmonious, his Descriptions as natural, his Numbers as harmonious, his Descriptions as natural, his Panegyrick as soft, and his Satire as pointed, as any that are to be found in the Whip-syllibub Poetasters of the present Century.
Who Verses write, as soft, as smooth, as Cream,
The Poem ended, no one knows the Theam.
I will first, to be regular, give you Mr. Browne 's Character of himself, which I think equal to the Exegi Monumentum of Ovid , viz.
Struck by the Concert of the sacred Nine,
I like the pleasing Cadence of a Line.
And in a Study find as much to please,
As others in the greatest Palaces.
Instead of Hounds that make the wooded Hills,
Talk in a hundred Voices to the Rills,
In lieu of Hawks, the Raptures of my Soul,
Transcend their Pitch, and baser Earths controul.
For running Horses, Contemplation flies
With quickest Speed to win the greatest Prize.
For courtly Dancing, I can take more Pleasure,
To hear a Verse keep Time, and equal Measure.
For winning Riches, seek the best Directions,
How I may well subdue mine own Affections.
For raising stately Piles for Heirs to come,
Here, in this Poem, I erect my Tomb.
And Time may be so kind, in these weak Lines,
To keep my Name enroll'd, past his, that shines
In gilded Marble, or in brazen Leaves;
Since Verse preserves, when Stone and Brass deceives.
Or if (as worthless) Time not lets it live,
To those full Days which other Muses give,
Yet I am sure I shall be heard and sung
Of most severest Eld , and kinder young ,
Beyond my Days, and maugre Envy's Strife,
Add to my Name some Hours beyond my Life.
And give thy Worth its just intrinsick Fame;
My Muse too humble, and my Lays too slow,
My Wings too slender, and my Verse too low.
To me a while, my Friend, thy Muse impart,
Grief chills my Vigour, and disarms my Heart;
Thy Verse alone can tell thy boundless Praise,
Thy Lays alone are worthy of thy Lays.
Say, never-dying, ever tuneful Nine,
How oft the Bard attended at your Shrine,
How oft he' as rais'd the Voice, and tun'd the String,
How oft he' as sung your Fame,—how oft shall sing.
Ye verdant Trees, that in green Order rear
Your waving Tresses in the fluid Air;
In a more formidable Prospect stand,
With nodding Foliage on poetick Land.
Ye purling Streams, that run by Cowley 's Side,
Have learn'd, by him, in smoother Feet to glide;
His Verse discover'd Hederinda 's Shade,
With Age and Jvy, memorable made:
The Rock affords her never-dying Bays,
To crown her Poet with immortal Praise.
Your lovely Laura 's Name shall never die,
But live co-eval, with Eternity.
Venus , and all the Goddesses around,
Drest in your Verse, with surer Light'nings wound
The little Loves, and Smiles in Numbers roll,
And Cupid 's Arrows steal upon the Soul.
But now no more the Naïds prattling play,
But in soft Silence slumber out the Day;
Cupid 's full Quiver, and the Court of Love,
The checquer'd Scene of Hederinda 's Grove,
No more, alas! its wonted Joy displays,
He's gone, that drest them in vivisick Lays:
He's gone—in Homer no Delights abound,
No sweet Variety in Virgil 's found,
Nor Musick which can heal a Lover's Wound!
Sorrow, like the prismatick Glass, does show
One undistinguish'd Spectacle of Woe;
His Presence ev'ry sweetest Joy improv'd
Still lov'd, and honour'd, by the Muse he lov'd.
As soon as he was well settled in the University, he wrote an Epistle to his beloved F LORIO , in the North , describing a College-Life . Here it was, he pursued—that Plan his Friend, Mr. Noble , had given him, and went through the Classicks , as well as all our English Poets, with great Advantage; now, and then, recreating himself in following the Fortune of the Angle, Fishing being always his chief Amusement.
But here I must digress (tho' it will greatly tend to the Reader's Entertainment) in giving some Account of the Raptures Mr. Pattison was in, upon reading the Poetical Works of Mr. William Browne , an imperfect Copy of which he had purchased for a Shilling, and which, thro' his Misfortunes, was the whole Library he left behind him.
From some Instances which I shall produce, it will, I doubt not, appear even to our most infallible Criticks, that, tho' Mr. Browne wrote an hundred and eleven Years ago, his Language is as nervous, his Numbers as harmonious, his Descriptions as natural, his Numbers as harmonious, his Descriptions as natural, his Panegyrick as soft, and his Satire as pointed, as any that are to be found in the Whip-syllibub Poetasters of the present Century.
Who Verses write, as soft, as smooth, as Cream,
The Poem ended, no one knows the Theam.
I will first, to be regular, give you Mr. Browne 's Character of himself, which I think equal to the Exegi Monumentum of Ovid , viz.
Struck by the Concert of the sacred Nine,
I like the pleasing Cadence of a Line.
And in a Study find as much to please,
As others in the greatest Palaces.
Instead of Hounds that make the wooded Hills,
Talk in a hundred Voices to the Rills,
In lieu of Hawks, the Raptures of my Soul,
Transcend their Pitch, and baser Earths controul.
For running Horses, Contemplation flies
With quickest Speed to win the greatest Prize.
For courtly Dancing, I can take more Pleasure,
To hear a Verse keep Time, and equal Measure.
For winning Riches, seek the best Directions,
How I may well subdue mine own Affections.
For raising stately Piles for Heirs to come,
Here, in this Poem, I erect my Tomb.
And Time may be so kind, in these weak Lines,
To keep my Name enroll'd, past his, that shines
In gilded Marble, or in brazen Leaves;
Since Verse preserves, when Stone and Brass deceives.
Or if (as worthless) Time not lets it live,
To those full Days which other Muses give,
Yet I am sure I shall be heard and sung
Of most severest Eld , and kinder young ,
Beyond my Days, and maugre Envy's Strife,
Add to my Name some Hours beyond my Life.
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