On solid nonsense that abides all tests.
Wit, like tierce-claret, when't begins to pall,
Neglected lies, and's of no use at all,
But, in its full perfection of decay,
Turns vinegar, and comes again in play.
Thou hast a brain, such as it is indeed;
On what else mould thy worm of fancy feed?
Yet in a Filbert I have often known
Maggots survive when all the kernel's gone.
This simile shall stand, in thy defence,
'Gainst such dull rogues as now and then write sense.
Thy style's the same, whatever be thy theme,
As some digestion turns all meat to phlegm.
He lyes, dear Ned, who says, thy brain it barren,
Where deep conceits, like vermin breed in carrion.
Thy stumbling founder'd jade can trot as high
As any other Pegasus can fly.
So the dull Eel moves nimbler in the mud,
Than all the swift-finn'd racers of the flood.
As skilful divers to the bottom fall,
Sooner than those that cannot swim at all,
So in the way of writing, without thinking,
Thou hast a strange alacrity in sinking.
Thou writ'st below ev'n thy own nat'ral parts,
And with acquir'd dulness, and new arts
Of studied nonsense, tak'st kind readers hearts.
Therefore dear Ned, at my advice forbear,
Such loud complaints 'gainst critics to prefer,
Since thou art turn'd an arrant libeller:
Thou sett'st thy name to what thyself do'st write;
Did ever libel yet so sharply bite?

* * * * *

Mrs. APHRA BEHN,

A celebrated poetess of the last age, was a gentlewoman by birth, being
descended, as her life-writer says, from a good family in the city of
Canterbury. She was born in Charles Ist's reign[1], but in what year is
not known. Her father's name was Johnson, whose relation to the lord
Willoughby engaged him for the advantageous post of lieutenant general
of Surinam, and six and thirty islands, to undertake a voyage, with his
whole family, to the West-Indies, at which time our poetess was very
young. Mr. Johnson died at sea, in his passage thither; but his family
arrived at Surinam, a place so delightfully situated, and abounding
with such a vast profusion of beauties, that, according to Mrs. Behn's
description, nature seems to have joined with art to render it perfectly
elegant: her habitation in that country, called St. John's Hill, she has
challenged all the gardens in Italy, nay, all the globe of the world, to
shew so delightful a recess. It was there our poetess beca