When Lesbia first I saw, so heavenly fair, With eyes so bright, and with that awful air, I thought my heart, which durst so high aspire, As bold as his who snatched celestial fire; But soon as e’er the beauteous idiot spoke, Forth from her coral lips such folly broke, Like balm the trickling nonsense healed my wound, And what her eyes enthralled, her tongue unbound.
_On a dumb Boy, very beautiful, and of great quickness of parts._
I sing the boy, who, gagged and bound, Has been by nature robbed of sound; Yet has she found a generous way, One loss by many gifts to pay. His voice, indeed, she close confined, But blest him with a speaking mind; And every muscle of his face Discourses with peculiar grace: The ladies tattling o’er their tea, Might learn to charm by copying thee. If silence thus can man become, All women beauties would be dumb. Then, happy boy, no more complain, Nor think thy loss of speech a pain: Nature has used thee like good liquor, And corked thee but to make thee quicker.
_Written on the Chamber Door of King Charles II._
Here lies the mutton-eating king, Whose word no man relies on; Who never said a foolish thing, Nor ever did a wise one.
The crimes of men began to grow so great, That how to punish justly puzzled Fate; Heaven sighed at last, that to his sons so dear A punishment’s decreed, and so severe: Go, says eternal justice, hell-hounds, go, And execute my dread commands below; Fix your rapacious claws on every door, Despoil the rich, and poorer make the poor; Pity not age, add to his weight of years, And fill the wretched widow’s eyes with tears; Disturb their sleep, and poison every dish, Nor let them taste, without a doubt, a wish: The judge supreme, who each effect foresaw, Cried, Havock, and let loose the dogs of law.
_To a young Gentleman who loved to drive hard with a sorry pair of Horses._
Thy nags, the leanest things alive, So very hard thou lov’st to drive, I heard thy anxious coachman say It cost thee more in whips than hay.
When Loveless married Lady Jenny, Whose beauty was the ready penny; I chose her, said he, like old plate, Not for the fashion, but the weight.
Reader, beware immoderate love of pelf: Here lies the worst of thieves, who robbed himself.