Economy, A Rhapsody, Addressed To Young Poets Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABC DEE F AGAAHAIJKLAMAAMAJNOP QAAQARSTJUVWAJXAAJAJ VAAPJYAVPVVJQMZAAQAJ AA2 JJJJVB2C2AAA2AQQJQJJ AD2E2F2AVG2HH2I2AAAJ I2J2K2AL2AQJL2JAM2QJ VJQAVAAN2AQJWAAQQA2J AJO2P2Q2XJJAAAAL2RL2 AL2JL2AQRQQJAL2AAL2A O2JJL2AJG2AA2AB2QAAJ G2AInsanis omnes gelidis quaecunqne lacernis | A |
Sunt tibi Nasones Virgiliosque vides | A |
Mart | B |
Imitation | C |
- | |
Thou know'st not what thou say'st | D |
In garments that scarce fence them from the cold | E |
Our Ovids and our Virgils you behold | E |
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Part first | F |
- | |
To you ye Bards whose lavish breast requires | A |
This monitory lay the strains belong | G |
Nor think some miser vents his sapient saw | A |
Or some dull cit unfeeling of the charms | A |
That tempt profusion sings while friendly Zeal | H |
To guard from fatal ills the tribe he loves | A |
Inspires the meanest of the Muse's train | I |
Like you I loathe the grovelling progeny | J |
Whose wily arts by creeping time matured | K |
Advance them high on Power's tyrannic throne | L |
To lord it there in gorgeous uselessness | A |
And spurn successless Worth that pines below | M |
See the rich churl amid the social sons | A |
Of wine and wit regaling hark he joins | A |
In the free jest delighted seems to show | M |
A meliorated heart he laughs he sings | A |
Songs of gay import madrigals of glee | J |
And drunken anthems set agape the board | N |
Like Demea in the play benign and mild | O |
And pouring forth benevolence of soul | P |
Till Micio wonder or in Shakspeare's line | Q |
Obstreperous Silence drowning Shallow's voice | A |
And startling Falstaff and his mad compeers | A |
He owns 'tis prudence ever and anon | Q |
To smooth his careful brow to let his purse | A |
Ope to a sixpence's diameter | R |
He likes our ways he owns the ways of wit | S |
Are ways of pleasance and deserve regard | T |
True we are dainty good society | J |
But what art thou Alas consider well | U |
Thou bane of social pleasure know thyself | V |
Thy fell approach like some invasive damp | W |
Breathed through the pores of earth from Stygian caves | A |
Destroys the lamp of mirth the lamp which we | J |
Its flamens boast to guard we know not how | X |
But at thy sight the fading flame assumes | A |
A ghastly blue and in a stench expires | A |
True thou seem'st changed all sainted all enskied | J |
The trembling tears that charge thy melting eyes | A |
Say thou art honest and of gentle kind | J |
But all is false an intermitting sigh | V |
Condemns each hour each moment given to smiles | A |
And deems those only lost thou dost not lose | A |
Even for a demi groat this open'd soul | P |
This boon companion this elastic breast | J |
Revibrates quick and sends the tuneful tongue | Y |
To lavish music on the rugged walls | A |
Of some dark dungeon Hence thou Caitiff fly | V |
Touch not my glass nor drain my sacred bowl | P |
Monster ingrate beneath one common sky | V |
Why shouldst thou breathe beneath one common roof | V |
Thou ne'er shalt harbour nor my little boat | J |
Receive a soul with crimes to press it down | Q |
Go to thy bags thou Recreant hourly go | M |
And gazing there bid them be wit be mirth | Z |
Be conversation Not a face that smiles | A |
Admits thy presence not a soul that glows | A |
With social purport bid or even or morn | Q |
Invest thee happy but when life declines | A |
May thy sure heirs stand tittering round thy bed | J |
And ushering in their favourites burst thy locks | A |
And fill their laps with gold till Want and Care | A2 |
With joy depart and cry 'We ask no more ' | - |
Ah never never may the harmonious mind | J |
Endure the worldly Poets ever void | J |
Of guile distrustless scorn the treasured gold | J |
And spurn the miser spurn his deity | J |
Balanced with friendship in the poet's eye | V |
The rival scale of interest kicks the beam | B2 |
Than lightning swifter From his cavern'd store | C2 |
The sordid soul with self applause remarks | A |
The kind propensity remarks and smiles | A |
And hies with impious haste to spread the snare | A2 |
Him we deride and in our comic scenes | A |
Contemn the niggard form Moliere has drawn | Q |
We loathe with justice but alas the pain | Q |
To bow the knee before this calf of gold | J |
Implore his envious aid and meet his frown | Q |
But 'tis not Gomez 'tis not he whose heart | J |
Is crusted o'er with dross whose callous mind | J |
Is senseless as his gold the slighted Muse | A |
Intensely loathes 'Tis sure no equal task | D2 |
To pardon him who lavishes his wealth | E2 |
On racer foxhound hawk or spaniel all | F2 |
But human merit who with gold essays | A |
All but the noblest pleasure to remove | V |
The wants of Genius and its smiles enjoy | G2 |
But you ye titled youths whose nobler zeal | H |
Would burnish o'er your coronets with fame | H2 |
Who listen pleased when poet tunes his lay | I2 |
Permit him not in distant solitudes | A |
To pine to languish out the fleeting hours | A |
Of active youth then Virtue pants for praise | A |
That season unadorn'd the careless bard | J |
Quits your worn threshold and like honest Gay | I2 |
Contemns the niggard boon ye time so ill | J2 |
Your favours then like trophies given the tomb | K2 |
The enfranchised spirit soaring not perceives | A |
Or scorns perceived and execrates the smile | L2 |
Which bade his vigorous bloom to treacherous hopes | A |
And servile cares a prey expire in vain | Q |
Two lawless powers engaged by mutual hate | J |
In endless war beneath their flags enrol | L2 |
The vassal world this Avarice is named | J |
That Luxury 'tis true their partial friends | A |
Assign them softer names usurpers both | M2 |
That share by dint of arms the legal throne | Q |
Of just Economy yet both betray'd | J |
By fraudful ministers The niggard chief | V |
Listening to want all faithless and prepared | J |
To join each moment in his rival's train | Q |
His conduct models by the needless fears | A |
The slave inspires while Luxury a chief | V |
Of amplest faith to Plenty's rule resigns | A |
His whole campaign 'Tis Plenty's flattering sounds | A |
Engross his ear 'tis Plenty's smiling form | N2 |
Moves still before his eye Discretion strives | A |
But strives in vain to banish from the throne | Q |
The perjured minion he secure of trust | J |
With latent malice to the hostile camp | W |
Day night and hour his monarch's wealth conveys | A |
Ye towering minds ye sublimated souls | A |
Who careless of your fortunes seal and sign | Q |
Set let contract acquit with easier mien | Q |
Than fops take snuff whose economic care | A2 |
Your green silk purse engrosses easy pleased | J |
To see gold sparkle through the subtle folds | A |
Lovely as when the Hesperian fruitage smiled | J |
Amid the verdurous grove who fondly hope | O2 |
Spontaneous harvests harvests all the year | P2 |
Who scatter wealth as though the radiant crop | Q2 |
Glitter'd on every bough and every bough | X |
Like that the Trojan gather'd once avulsed | J |
Were by a splendid successor supplied | J |
Instant spontaneous listen to my lays | A |
For 'tis not fools whate'er proverbial phrase | A |
Have long decreed that quit with greatest ease | A |
The treasured gold Of words indeed profuse | A |
Of gold tenacious their torpescent soul | L2 |
Clenches their coin and what electral fire | R |
Shall solve the frosty gripe and bid it flow | L2 |
'Tis Genius Fancy that to wild expense | A |
Of health of treasure stimulates the soul | L2 |
These with officious care and fatal art | J |
Improve the vinous flavour these the smile | L2 |
Of Cloe soften these the glare of dress | A |
Illume the glittering chariot gild anew | Q |
And add strange wisdom to the furs of Power | R |
Alas that he amid the race of men | Q |
That he who thinks of purest gold with scorn | Q |
Should with unsated appetite demand | J |
And vainly court the pleasure it procures | A |
When Fancy's vivid spark impels the soul | L2 |
To scorn quotidian scenes to spurn the bliss | A |
Of vulgar minds what nostrum shall compose | A |
Its fatal tension in what lonely vale | L2 |
Of balmy Medicine's various field aspires | A |
The blest refrigerant Vain ah vain the hope | O2 |
Of future peace this orgasm uncontroll'd | J |
Impatient hence of all the frugal mind | J |
Requires to eat to drink to sleep to fill | L2 |
A chest with gold the sprightly breast demands | A |
Incessant rapture life a tedious load | J |
Denied its continuity of joy | G2 |
But whence obtain philosophy requires | A |
No lavish cost to crown its utmost prayer | A2 |
Suffice the root built cell the simple fleece | A |
The juicy viand and the crystal stream | B2 |
Even mild Stupidity rewards her train | Q |
With cheap contentment Taste alone requires | A |
Entire profusion Days and nights and hours | A |
Thy voice hydropic Fancy calls aloud | J |
For costly draughts inundant bowls of joy | G2 |
Rivers of rich regalement seas of bliss | A |
William Shenstone
(1)
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