gdom let him stretch his pen!'
He paus'd, and all the people cry'd, 'Amen.'
Then thus continu'd he: 'My son, advance
Still in new impudence, new ignorance.
Success let others teach; learn thou from me
Pangs without birth, and fruitless industry.
Let virtuosos in five years be writ;--
Yet not one thought accuse thy toil--of wit.
Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,
Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;
Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,
And, in their folly, show the writer's wit:
Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,
And justify their author's want of sense.
Let them be all by thy own model made
Of dulness, and desire no foreign aid;
That they to future ages may be known,
Not copies drawn, but issue of thy own.
Nay, let thy men of wit, too, be the same,
All full of thee, and diff'ring but in name.
But let no alien Sedley interpose,
To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.
And when false flowers of rhet'ric thou wouldst cull,
Trust Nature; do not labour to be dull;
But, write thy best, and top; and, in each line,
Sir Formal's oratory will be thine:
Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,
And does thy northern dedications fill.
Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,
By arrogating Johnson's hostile name.
Let father Flecnoe fire thy mind with praise,
And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.
Thou art my blood, where Johnson has no part:
What share have we--in nature or in art?
Where did his wit on learning fix a brand,
And rail at arts he did not understand?
Where made he love in Prince Nicander's vein,
Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?
Where sold he bargains, Whip-stitch, Kiss me ----,
Promis'd a play, and dwindled to a farce?
When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,
As thou whole Eth'rege dost transfuse to thine?
But so transfus'd as oil and waters flow;
His always floats above, thine sinks below.
This is thy province, this thy wondrous way.
New humours to invent for each new play;
This is that bloated bias of thy mind,
By which, one way, to dulness 'tis inclin'd:
Which makes thy writings lean, on one side, still;
And in all changes, _that_ way bends thy will.
Not let thy mountain-belly make pretence
Of likeness; thine's a tympany of sense.
A tun of man in thy large bulk is writ,
But sure thou art but a kilderkin of wit.
Like mine, thy gentle num