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A CONVERT's but a fly, that turns about, After his head 's pull'd off, to find it out,

ALL mankind is but a rabble,
As filly and unreasonable

As those that, crowding in the street,
To see a show or monster, meet;
Of whom no one is in the right,
Yet all fall out about the fight;

And, when they chance t' agree, the choice is
Still in the most and worst of vices;

And all the reasons that prevail

Are measur'd, not by weight, but tale.

AS in all great and crowded fairs Monsters and puppet-plays are wares, Which in the less will not go off, Because they have not money enough; So men in princes' courts will pass, That will not in another place.

LOGICIANS ufe to clap a propofition,
As juftices do criminals, in prifon,

And, in as learn'd authentic nonsense writ,
The names of all their moods and figures fit :
For a logician's one that has been broke
To ride and pace his reason by the book,
And by their rules, and precepts, and examples,
To put his wits into a kind of trammels.

THOSE

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THOSE get the least that take the greatest pains, But most of all i' th' drudgery of brains A natural fign of weakness, as an ant Is more laborious than an elephant ; And children are more busy at their play Than those that wifely'st pass their time away.

ALL the inventions that the world contains, Were not by reason first found out, nor brains; But pafs for theirs who had the luck to light Upon them by mistake or overfight.

A

TRIPLETS

UPON A VARICE.

S mifers their own laws enjoin,
To wear no pockets in the mine,
For fear they should the ore purloin ;
So he that toils and labours hard
To gain, and what he gets has fpar'd,
Is from the use of all debarr'd.

And, though he can produce more spankers
Than all the ufurers and bankers,

Yet after more and more he hankers;

And

And, after all his pains are done,
Has nothing he can call his own,
But a mere livelihood alone.

DESCRIPTION

O F

HOLL AN D.

A

COUNTRY that draws fifty foot of water,
In which men live as in the hold of Nature,
And, when the fea does in upon them break,
And drowns a province, does but fpring a leak;
That always ply the pump, and never think
They can be fafe, but at the rate they stink;
That live as if they had been run aground,

And, when they die, are caft away and drown'd;
That dwell in fhips, like fwarms of rats, and prey
Upon the goods all nations' fleets convey;
And, when their merchants are blown-up and crackt,
Whole towns are caft away in storms, and wreckt ;
That feed, like Cannibals, on other fishes,
And ferve their coufin-germans up in dishes :
A land that rides at anchor, and is moor'd,
In which they do not live, but go aboard.

ΤΟ

TO HIS MISTRESS.

O not unjustly blame

My guiltless breast,

For venturing to disclose a flame

It had fo long fuppreft.

In its own ashes it defign'd
For ever to have lain ;

But that my fighs, like blasts of wind,
Made it break out again.

D

то THE

O not mine affection slight,

SAME.

'Caufe my locks with age are white :

Your breasts have fnow without, and fnow within,
While flames of fire in your bright eyes are seen.

T

EPIGRA

M

ON A CLUB OF SOTS.

HE jolly members of a toping club,

Like pipe-ftaves, are but hoop'd into a tub,

And in a close confederacy link,

For nothing elfe but only to hold drink.

HUDIBRAS'S

I

HUDIBRAS'S ELEGY*.

N days of yore, when knight or fquire

By Fate were fummon'd to retire,

Some menial poet still was near,

To bear them to the hemisphere,

And there among the stars to leave them,
Until the gods fent to relieve them :

And fure our Knight, whose very fight wou'd
Entitle him Mirror of Knighthood,

Should he neglected lie, and rot,
Stink in his grave, and be forgot,
Would have just reafon to complain,
If he should chance to rife again;
And therefore, to prevent his dudgeon,
In mournful doggrel thus we trudge on.
Oh me! what tongue, what pen, can tell
How this renowned champion fell,

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* Neither this Elegy, nor the following Epitaph, is to be found in The Genuine Remains of Butler, as published by Mr. Thyer. Both however having frequently been reprinted in The Pofthumous Works of Samuel Butler; and as they, befides, relate particularly to the hero of his principal poem; there needs no apology for their being thus preferved. Some other of the postbumous poems would not have difgraced their fuppofed author; but, as they are fo pofitively rejected by Mr. Thyer, we have not ventured to admit them. N.

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