Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry | Page 8

talks in an engaging,
friendly way:
A third is a barbarian, rude and free;
Straightforward
and courageous let him be:
A fourth is apt to break into a flame;
An
ardent spirit--make we that his name.
This is the sovereign recipe, be
sure,
To win men's hearts, and having won, secure.
But WE put virtue down to vice's score,
And foul the vessel that was
clean before:
See, here's a modest man, who ranks too low
In his
own judgment; him we nickname slow:
Another, ever on his guard,
takes care
No enemy shall catch him unaware,
(Small wonder, truly,
in a world like this,
Beset with dogs that growl and snakes that hiss);

We turn his merit to a fault, and style
His prudence mere disguise,
his caution guile.
Or take some honest soul, who, full of glee,

Breaks on a patron's solitude, like me,
Finds his Maecenas book in
hand or dumb,
And pokes him with remarks, the first that come;

We cry "He lacks e'en common tact." Alas!
What hasty laws against
ourselves we pass!
For none is born without his faults: the best
But
bears a lighter wallet than the rest.
A man of genial nature, as is fair,

My virtues with my vices will compare,
And, as with good or bad
he fills the scale,
Lean to the better side, should that prevail:

So,
when he seeks my friendship, I will trim
The wavering balance in my
turn for him.
He that has fears his blotches may offend
Speaks
gently of the pimples of his friend:
For reciprocity exacts her dues,

And they that need excuse must needs excuse.

Now, since resentment, spite of all we do,
Will haunt us fools, and
other vices too,
Why should not reason use her own just sense,
And
square her punishments to each offence?
Suppose a slave, as he
removes the dish,
Licks the warm gravy or remains of fish,
Should
his vexed master gibbet the poor lad,
He'd be a second Labeo,
STARING mad.
Now take another instance, and remark
A case of
madness, grosser and more stark.
A friend has crossed you:--'tis a
slight affair;
Not to forgive it writes you down a bear:--
You hate
the man and his acquaintance fly,
As Ruso's debtors hide from Ruso's
eye;
Poor victims, doomed, when that black pay-day's come,
Unless
by hook or crook they raise the sum,
To stretch their necks, like
captives to the knife,
And listen to dull histories for dear life.
Say,
he has drunk too much, or smashed some ware,
Evander's once,
inestimably rare,
Or stretched before me, in his zeal to dine,
To
snatch a chicken I had meant for mine;
What then? is that a reason he
should seem
Less pleasant, less deserving my esteem?
How could I
treat him worse, were he to thieve,
Betray a secret, or a trust deceive?
Your men of words, who rate all crimes alike,
Collapse and founder,
when on fact they strike:
Sense, custom, all, cry out against the thing,

And high expedience, right's perennial spring.
When men first
crept from out earth's womb, like worms,
Dumb speechless creatures,
with scarce human forms,
With nails or doubled fists they used to
fight
For acorns or for sleeping-holes at night;
Clubs followed next;
at last to arms they came,
Which growing practice taught them how
to frame,
Till words and names were found, wherewith to mould

The sounds they uttered, and their thoughts unfold;
Thenceforth they
left off fighting, and began
To build them cities, guarding man from
man,
And set up laws as barriers against strife
That threatened
person, property, or wife.
'Twas fear of wrong gave birth to right,
you'll find,
If you but search the records of mankind.
Nature knows
good and evil, joy and grief,
But just and unjust are beyond her brief:

Nor can philosophy, though finely spun,
By stress of logic prove

the two things one,
To strip your neighbour's garden of a flower

And rob a shrine at midnight's solemn hour.
A rule is needed, to
apportion pain,
Nor let you scourge when you should only cane.

For that you're likely to be overmild,
And treat a ruffian like a
naughty child,
Of this there seems small danger, when you say
That
theft's as bad as robbery in its way,
And vow all villains, great and
small, shall swing
From the same tree, if men will make you king.
But tell me, Stoic, if the wise, you teach,
Is king, Adonis, cobbler, all
and each,
Why wish for what you've got? "Tou fail to see
What
great Chrysippus means by that," says he.
"What though the wise
ne'er shoe nor slipper made,
The wise is still a brother of the trade.

Just as Hennogenes, when silent, still
Remains a singer of
consummate skill,
As sly Alfenius, when he had let drop
His
implements of art and shut up shop,
Was still a barber, so the wise is
best
In every craft, a king's among the rest."
Hail to your majesty!
yet, ne'ertheless,
Rude boys are pulling at your beard, I guess;
And
now, unless your cudgel keeps them off,
The mob begins to hustle,
push, and scoff;
You, all forlorn, attempt to stand at bay,
And roar
till your imperial lungs give way.
Well, so we part: each takes his
separate path:
You make your progress to your farthing bath,
A
king, with ne'er a follower in your train,
Except