Classic Poem

Britons! for shame, give all this folly o'er,
Your ancient nobleness restore:
Learn to be manly, learn to be sincere,
And let the world a Briton's name revere.

Let not my countrymen become the sport
And ridicule of ev'ry foreign court;
But let them well of men and things discern,
Their virtues follow, not their vices learn.

Where is the noble race of British youth
Whose ornaments were wisdom, learning, truth?
Who, e'er they travell'd, laid a good foundation
Of lib'ral arts, of manly education;
Nor went, as some go now, a scandle to their nation,
Who travel only to corrupt the mind,
Import the bad, and leave the good behind.

To learning and to manly arts estrang'd,
As if with women sexes they'd exchang'd,
They look like females dress'd in boy's attire,
Or Salmon's waxwork babies, propp'd with wire;
And if a brace of powder'd coxcombs meet
They kiss and slabber in the open street.
Curse on this damn'd Italian pathic mode,
To Sodom and to Hell the ready road!
May they, when next they kiss, together grow,
And never after separation know.

Our Petits Maitres now are so polite
They think it ungenteel to read or write.
Learning with them is a most heinous sin,
Whose only study is to dress and grin,
To visit, to drink tea, gallant a fan,
And ev'ry foolery below a man.

Powder'd and gumm'd the plaister'd fop appears,
The monkey tail hangs 'twixt the ass's ears,
Just emblem of the empty, apish prig,
Who has more grin than grace, less wit than wig.
'Stead of a sword their person to secure
They wear a bodkin rather, or a skewer,
But with a tossil of prodigious make,
To show they wear the weapon for the top-knot's sake.

Saucy and pert, abrupt, presumptive, loud,
These shadows triumph o'er the vulgar crowd
But let a man of sense and soul appear,
They fly before him like the tim'rous deer;
For, be they ne'er so healthy or so young,
Their courage only lies upon their tongue.

They talk not of our army and our fleet,
But of the warble of Cuzzoni sweet,
Of the delicious pipe of Senesino,
And of the squalling trull of Harlequino,
Who, were she English, with united rage
Themselves would justly hiss from off the stage.
With better voice, and fifty times her skill,
Poor Robinson is always treated ill:
But such is the good-nature of the town,
'Tis now the mode to cry the English down.

Nay, there are those as warmly will debate
For the academy as for the state;
Nor care they whether credit rise or fall;
The opera with them is all in all.
They'll talk of tickets rising to a guinea,
Of pensions, duchesses, and Bononcini;
Of a new eunuch in Bernardi's place,
And of Cuzzoni's conquest or disgrace.

Not but I love enchanting music's sound
With moderation, and in reason's bound;
But would not for her syren charms reject
All other business with supine neglect.
When leisure makes it lawful to be gay,
Then tune your instruments, then sing and play.
Musicians, I shall give what you deserve,
Yet will not let all other artists starve;
But even deal with a more lib'ral hand
To him who sings what I can understand.

I hate this singing in an unknown tongue;
It does our reason and our senses wrong;
When words instruct and music cheers the mind,
Then is the art of service to mankind;
But when a castrate wretch of monst'rous size
Squeaks out a treble, shrill as infant's cries,
I curse the unintelligible ass,
Who may, for ought I know, be singing Mass.
Or when an Englishman, a trimming rogue,
Confounds his English with a foreign brogue,
Or spoils Italian with an English tone,
(Which is of late a mighty fashion grown),
It throws me out of patience, makes me sick;
I wish the squalling rascal at Old Nick;
Far otherwise it is with honest Dick.
Like Clytus he, with noble Grecian pride,
Throws all unmanly Persian arts aside,
Sings when he's ask'd, his singing at an end,
He's then a boon, facetious, witty friend.
How much unlike those fools who sing or play,
Yet for themselves have scarce a word to say;
Who shall one moment with their music please,
The next with stupid conversation tease.

But above all those men are most my jest
Who, like uncleanly birds, bewray their nest.
When Englishmen implicitly despise
Their own produce, can English merit rise?
Nipp'd in the bud, nor suffer'd once to blow,
How can it ever to perfection grow?

Yet erst for arts and arms we've been renown'd;
Our heroes and our bards with garlands crown'd;
Are we at last so despicable grown
That foreigners must reign in arts alone,
And Britain boast no genius of her own?

Can then our British syrens charm no more,
That we import these foreign minstrels o'er
At such expense from the Italian shore?
Are all our English women ravens grown?
And have they lost their melody of tone?
Must music's science be alone deny'd
To us, who shine in ev'ry art beside?
Is then our language grown a very joke,
Not fit by human creatures to be spoke?
Are we so barbarous, so unpolite?
We but usurp superior merit's right.
Let us to them our wealth, our dwellings yield,
To graze with savage brutes in open field;
And when we've learn'd to squeak Italian, then,
If they so please, we may return again.

Is music, then, of such importance grown
All other knowledge must be overthrown?
Let, then, the learned judge resign the bench
To some fine singer, some Italian wench.
Let the divine forget the labour'd text,
With tones and semi-tones to be perplex'd;
The merchant, too, regard his trade no more,
But learn to sing at sight, and write in score;
Let us forget our ancient, barb'rous speech,
And utter nought but what Italians teach;
Let's send our useless dross beyond the sea,
To fetch polite Imperial and Bohea;
Let our toupets to such a length extend
That vanquish'd France shall copy, but not mend;
And Italy itself be forc'd to say
We fiddle and we sing as well as they.