Epistles To Mr. Pope. Epistle I Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BBCCDDEEFFGGHHIJKKLL MMNNOOPPQQRRSSHHTTUV WWXXDDYYZZA2A2B2B2C2 C2GGSSD2D2E2E2E2E2TT F2G2E2E2H2H2I2I2DDJ2 J2K2K2L2M2N2N2J2J2O2 O2E2E2P2P2E2E2E2E2Q2 Q2BBR2R2M2M2E2E2E2E2 S2S2J2J2T2T2U2U2HHV2 KW2W2KKX2X2E2E2Y2Y2Z 2Z2A3A3B3B3E2E2G2G2U 2U2C3C3E2E2D3D3E3E3U 2U2U2U2F3G3U2U2E2E2U 2U2U2U2SN2U2U2U2U2E2 E2H3H3E2E2U2U2E2E2E2 E2I3I3SSJ3J3K3K3I3I3 L3M3N3N3E2E2U2U2O3O3 FFE2E2D3D3U2U2U2U2E2 E2E2E2E2E2E2E2E2E2GP 3U2U2U2U2E2E2AAS2KU2 U2U2U2E2E2SSH2HKKP3P 3N3N3T2T2U2U2E2E2U2U 2D3D3U2U2Q3Q3U2U2HHH 2H2C3C3R3R3U2U2C3C3U 2U2U2U2E2E2E2E2S3S3E 2E2G3G3FFE2E2IIE2E2E 2E2U2U2U2U2C3C3| Concerning the Authors of the Age | A |
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| Whilst you at Twickenham plan the future wood | B |
| Or turn the volumes of the wise and good | B |
| Our senate meets at parties parties bawl | C |
| And pamphlets stun the streets and load the stall | C |
| So rushing tides bring things obscene to light | D |
| Foul wrecks emerge and dead dogs swim in sight | D |
| The civil torrent foams the tumult reigns | E |
| And Codrus' prose works up and Lico's strains | E |
| Lo what from cellars rise what rush from high | F |
| Where speculation roosted near the sky | F |
| Letters essays sock buskin satire song | G |
| And all the garret thunders on the throng | G |
| O Pope I burst nor can nor will refrain | H |
| I'll write let others in their turn complain | H |
| Truce truce ye Vandals my tormented ear | I |
| Less dreads a pillory than a pamphleteer | J |
| I've heard myself to death and plagu'd each hour | K |
| Shan't I return the vengeance in my power | K |
| For who can write the true absurd like me | L |
| Thy pardon Codrus who I mean but thee | L |
| Pope if like mine or Codrus' were thy style | M |
| The blood of vipers had not stain'd thy file | M |
| Merit less solid less despite had bred | N |
| They had not bit and then they had not bled | N |
| Fame is a public mistress none enjoys | O |
| But more or less his rival's peace destroys | O |
| With fame in just proportion envy grows | P |
| The man that makes a character makes foes | P |
| Slight peevish insects round a genius rise | Q |
| As a bright day awakes the world of flies | Q |
| With hearty malice but with feeble wing | R |
| To show they live they flutter and they sting | R |
| But as by depredations wasps proclaim | S |
| The fairest fruit so these the fairest fame | S |
| Shall we not censure all the motley train | H |
| Whether with ale irriguous or champaign | H |
| Whether they tread the vale of prose or climb | T |
| And whet their appetites on cliffs of rhyme | T |
| The college sloven or embroider'd spark | U |
| The purple prelate or the parish clerk | V |
| The quiet quidnunc or demanding prig | W |
| The plaintiff tory or defendant whig | W |
| Rich poor male female young old gay or sad | X |
| Whether extremely witty or quite mad | X |
| Profoundly dull or shallowly polite | D |
| Men that read well or men that only write | D |
| Whether peers porters tailors tune the reeds | Y |
| And measuring words to measuring shapes succeeds | Y |
| For bankrupts write when ruin'd shops are shut | Z |
| As maggots crawl from out a perish'd nut | Z |
| His hammer this and that his trowel quits | A2 |
| And wanting sense for tradesmen serve for wits | A2 |
| By thriving men subsists each other trade | B2 |
| Of every broken craft a writer's made | B2 |
| Thus his material paper takes its birth | C2 |
| From tatter'd rags of all the stuff on earth | C2 |
| Hail fruitful isle to thee alone belong | G |
| Millions of wits and brokers in old song | G |
| Thee well a land of liberty we name | S |
| Where all are free to scandal and to shame | S |
| Thy sons by print may set their hearts at ease | D2 |
| And be mankind's contempt whene'er they please | D2 |
| Like trodden filth their vile and abject sense | E2 |
| Is unperceiv'd but when it gives offence | E2 |
| Their heavy prose our injur'd reason tires | E2 |
| Their verse immoral kindles loose desires | E2 |
| Our age they puzzle and corrupt our prime | T |
| Our sport and pity punishment and crime | T |
| What glorious motives urge our authors on | F2 |
| Thus to undo and thus to be undone | G2 |
| One loses his estate and down he sits | E2 |
| To show in vain he still retains his wits | E2 |
| Another marries and his dear proves keen | H2 |
| He writes as an hypnotic for the spleen | H2 |
| Some write confin'd by physic some by debt | I2 |
| Some for 'tis Sunday some because 'tis wet | I2 |
| Through private pique some do the public right | D |
| And love their king and country out of spite | D |
| Another writes because his father writ | J2 |
| And proves himself a bastard by his wit | J2 |
| Has Lico learning humour thought profound | K2 |
| Neither why write then He wants twenty pound | K2 |
| His belly not his brains this impulse give | L2 |
| He'll grow immortal for he cannot live | M2 |
| He rubs his awful front and takes his ream | N2 |
| With no provision made but of his theme | N2 |
| Perhaps a title has his fancy smit | J2 |
| Or a quaint motto which he thinks has wit | J2 |
| He writes in inspiration puts his trust | O2 |
| Tho' wrong his thoughts the gods will make them just | O2 |
| Genius directly from the gods descends | E2 |
| And who by labour would distrust his friends | E2 |
| Thus having reason'd with consummate skill | P2 |
| In immortality he dips his quill | P2 |
| And since blank paper is denied the press | E2 |
| He mingles the whole alphabet by guess | E2 |
| In various sets which various words compose | E2 |
| Of which he hopes mankind the meaning knows | E2 |
| So sounds spontaneous from the sibyl broke | Q2 |
| Dark to herself the wonders which she spoke | Q2 |
| The priests found out the meaning if they could | B |
| And nations star'd at what none understood | B |
| Clodio dress'd danc'd drank visited the whole | R2 |
| And great concern of an immortal soul | R2 |
| Oft have I said Awake exist and strive | M2 |
| For birth nor think to loiter is to live | M2 |
| As oft I overheard the demon say | E2 |
| Who daily met the loit'rer in his way | E2 |
| I'll meet thee youth at White's the youth replies | E2 |
| I'll meet thee there and falls his sacrifice | E2 |
| His fortune squander'd leaves his virtue bare | S2 |
| To ev'ry bribe and blind to ev'ry snare | S2 |
| Clodio for bread his indolence must quit | J2 |
| Or turn a soldier or commence a wit | J2 |
| Such heroes have we all but life they stake | T2 |
| How must Spain tremble and the German shake | T2 |
| Such writers have we all but sense they print | U2 |
| Ev'n George's praise is dated from the mint | U2 |
| In arms contemptible in arts profane | H |
| Such swords such pens disgrace a monarch's reign | H |
| Reform your lives before you thus aspire | V2 |
| And steal for you can steal celestial fire | K |
| O the just contrast O the beauteous strife | W2 |
| 'Twixt their cool writings and pindaric life | W2 |
| They write with phlegm but then they live with fire | K |
| They cheat the lender and their works the buyer | K |
| I reverence misfortune not deride | X2 |
| I pity poverty but laugh at pride | X2 |
| For who so sad but must some mirth confess | E2 |
| At gay Castruchio's miscellaneous dress | E2 |
| Though there's but one of the dull works he wrote | Y2 |
| There's ten editions of his old lac'd coat | Y2 |
| These nature's commoners who want a home | Z2 |
| Claim the wide world for their majestic dome | Z2 |
| They make a private study of the street | A3 |
| And looking full on every man they meet | A3 |
| Run souse against his chaps who stands amaz'd | B3 |
| To find they did not see but only gaz'd | B3 |
| How must these bards be rapt into the skies | E2 |
| you need not read you feel their ecstasies | E2 |
| Will they persist 'Tis Madness Lintot run | G2 |
| See them confin'd O that's already done | G2 |
| Most as by leases by the works they print | U2 |
| Have took for life possession of the mint | U2 |
| If you mistake and pity these poor men | C3 |
| est Ulubris they cry and write again | C3 |
| Such wits their nuisance manfully expose | E2 |
| And then pronounce just judges learning's foes | E2 |
| O frail conclusion the reverse is true | D3 |
| If foes to learning they'd be friends to you | D3 |
| Treat them ye judges with an honest scorn | E3 |
| And weed the cockle from the generous corn | E3 |
| There's true good nature in your disrepect | U2 |
| In justice to the good the bad neglect | U2 |
| For immortality if hardships plead | U2 |
| It is not theirs who write but ours who read | U2 |
| But O what wisdom can convince a fool | F3 |
| But that 'tis dulness to conceive him dull | G3 |
| 'Tis sad experience takes the censor's part | U2 |
| Conviction not from reason but from smart | U2 |
| a virgin author recent from the press | E2 |
| The sheets yet wet applauds his great success | E2 |
| Surveys them reads them takes their charms to bed | U2 |
| Those in his hand and glory in his head | U2 |
| 'Tis joy too great a fever of delight | U2 |
| His heart beats thick nor close his eyes all night | U2 |
| But rising the next morn to clasp his fame | S |
| He finds that without sleeping he could dream | N2 |
| So sparks they say take goddesses to bed | U2 |
| And find next day the devil in their stead | U2 |
| In vain advertisements the town o'erspread | U2 |
| They're epitaphs and the work is dead | U2 |
| Who press for fame but small recruits will raise | E2 |
| 'Tis volunteers alone can give the bays | E2 |
| A famous author visits a great man | H3 |
| Of his immortal work displays the plan | H3 |
| And says Sir I'm your friend all fears dismiss | E2 |
| Your glory and my own shall live by this | E2 |
| Your power is fixt your fame thro' time convey'd | U2 |
| And Britain Europe's queen if I am paid | U2 |
| A statesman has his answer in a trice | E2 |
| Sir such a genius is beyond all price | E2 |
| What man can pay for this Away he turns | E2 |
| His work is folded and his bosom burns | E2 |
| His patron he will patronize no more | I3 |
| But rushes like a tempest out of door | I3 |
| Lost is the patriot and extinct his name | S |
| Out comes the piece another and the same | S |
| For A his magic pen evokes an O | J3 |
| And turns the tide of Europe on the foe | J3 |
| He rams his quill with scandal and with scoff | K3 |
| But 'tis so very foul it wont go off | K3 |
| Dreadful his thunders while unprinted roar | I3 |
| But when once publish'd they are heard no more | I3 |
| Thus distant bugbears fright but nearer draw | L3 |
| The block's a block and turns to mirth your awe | M3 |
| Can those oblige whose heads and hearts are such | N3 |
| No every party's tainted by their touch | N3 |
| Infected persons fly each public place | E2 |
| And none or enemies alone embrace | E2 |
| To the foul fiend their every passion's sold | U2 |
| They love and hate extempore for gold | U2 |
| What image of their fury can we form | O3 |
| Dulness and rage a puddle in a storm | O3 |
| Rest they in peace If you are pleas'd to buy | F |
| To swell your sails like Lapland winds they fly | F |
| Write they with rage The tempest quickly flags | E2 |
| A state Ulysses tames 'em with his bags | E2 |
| Let him be what he will Turk Pagan Jew | D3 |
| For Christian ministers of state are few | D3 |
| Behind the curtain lurks the fountain head | U2 |
| That pours his politics through pipes of lead | U2 |
| Which far and near ejaculate and spout | U2 |
| O'er tea and coffee poison to the rout | U2 |
| But when they have bespatter'd all they may | E2 |
| The statesman throws his filthy squirts away | E2 |
| With golden forceps these another takes | E2 |
| And state elixirs of the vipers makes | E2 |
| The richest statesman wants wherewith to pay | E2 |
| A servile sycophant if well they weigh | E2 |
| How much it costs the wretch to be so base | E2 |
| Nor can the greatest powers enough disgrace | E2 |
| Enough chastise such prostitute applause | E2 |
| If well they weigh how much it stains their cause | E2 |
| But are our writers ever in the wrong | G |
| Does virtue ne'er seduce the venal tongue | P3 |
| Yes if well brib'd for virtue's self they fight | U2 |
| Still in the wrong tho' champions for the right | U2 |
| Whoe'er their crimes for interest only quit | U2 |
| Sin on in virtue and good deeds commit | U2 |
| Nought but inconstancy Britannia meets | E2 |
| And broken faith in their abandon'd sheets | E2 |
| From the same hand how various is the page | A |
| What civil war their brother pamphlets wage | A |
| Tracts battle tracts self contradictions glare | S2 |
| Say is this lunacy I wish it were | K |
| If such our writers startled at the sight | U2 |
| Felons may bless their stars they cannot write | U2 |
| How justly Proteus' transmigrations fit | U2 |
| The monstrous changes of a modern wit | U2 |
| Now such a gentle stream of eloquence | E2 |
| As seldom rises to the verge of sense | E2 |
| Now by mad rage transform'd into a flame | S |
| Which yet fit engines well applied can tame | S |
| Now on immodest trash the swine obscene | H2 |
| Invites the town to sup at Drury Lane | H |
| A dreadful lion now he roars at power | K |
| Which sends him to his brothers at the Tower | K |
| He's now a serpent and his double tongue | P3 |
| Salutes nay licks the feet of those he stung | P3 |
| What knot can bind him his evasion such | N3 |
| One knot he well deserves which might do much | N3 |
| The flood flame swine the lion and the snake | T2 |
| Those fivefold monsters modern authors make | T2 |
| The snake reigns most snakes Pliny says are bred | U2 |
| When the brain's perish'd in a human head | U2 |
| Ye grov'ling trodden whipt stript turncoat things | E2 |
| Made up of venom volumes stains and stings | E2 |
| Thrown from the tree of knowledge like you curst | U2 |
| To scribble in the dust was snake the first | U2 |
| What if the figure should in fact prove true | D3 |
| It did in Elkenah why not in you | D3 |
| Poor Elkenah all other changes past | U2 |
| For bread in Smithfield dragons hist at last | U2 |
| Spit streams of fire to make the butchers gape | Q3 |
| And found his manners suited to his shape | Q3 |
| Such is the fate of talents misapplied | U2 |
| So liv'd your prototype and so he died | U2 |
| Th' abandon'd manners of our writing train | H |
| May tempt mankind to think religion vain | H |
| But in their fate their habit and their mien | H2 |
| That gods there are is eminently seen | H2 |
| Heaven stands absolv'd by vengeance on their pen | C3 |
| And marks the murderers of fame from men | C3 |
| Through meagre jaws they draw their venal breath | R3 |
| As ghastly as their brothers in Macbeth | R3 |
| Their feet through faithless leather meet the dirt | U2 |
| And oftener chang'd their principles than shirt | U2 |
| The transient vestments of these frugal men | C3 |
| Hastens to paper for our mirth again | C3 |
| Too soon O merry melancholy fate | U2 |
| They beg in rhyme and warble through a grate | U2 |
| The man lampoon'd forgets it at the sight | U2 |
| The friend through pity gives the foe through spite | U2 |
| And though full conscious of his injur'd purse | E2 |
| Lintot relents nor Curll can wish them worse | E2 |
| So fare the men who writers dare commence | E2 |
| Without their patent probity and sense | E2 |
| From these their politics our quidnuncs seek | S3 |
| And Saturday's the learning of the week | S3 |
| These labouring wits like paviours mend our ways | E2 |
| With heavy huge repeated flat essays | E2 |
| Ram their coarse nonsense down though ne'er so dull | G3 |
| And hem at every thump upon your skull | G3 |
| These staunch bred writing hounds begin the cry | F |
| And honest folly echoes to the lie | F |
| O how I laugh when I a blockhead see | E2 |
| Thanking a villain for his probity | E2 |
| Who stretches out a most respectful ear | I |
| With snares for woodcocks in his holy leer | I |
| It tickles thro' my soul to hear the cock's | E2 |
| Sincere encomium on his friend the fox | E2 |
| Sole patron of his liberties and rights | E2 |
| While graceless Reynard listens till he bites | E2 |
| As when the trumpet sounds th' o'erloaded state | U2 |
| Discharges all her poor and profligate | U2 |
| Crimes of all kinds dishonour'd weapons wield | U2 |
| And prisons pour their filth into the field | U2 |
| Thus nature's refuse and the dregs of men | C3 |
| Compose the black militia of the pen | C3 |
Edward Young
(1)
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About Epistles To Mr. Pope. Epistle I
Epistles To Mr. Pope. Epistle I is a poem by Edward Young. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.