Volume Iv Part 39 (2/2)

But when we play the fool, how wide The theatre expands! beside, How long the audience sits before us!

How many prompters! what a chorus!

Walter Savage Landor [1775-1864]

THE REMEDY WORSE THAN THE DISEASE

I sent for Ratcliffe; was so ill, That other doctors gave me over: He felt my pulse, prescribed his pill, And I was likely to recover.

But, when the wit began to wheeze, And wine had warmed the politician, Cured yesterday of my disease, I died last night of my physician.

Matthew Prior [1664-1721]

THE NET OF LAW

The net of law is spread so wide, No sinner from its sweep may hide.

Its meshes are so fine and strong, They take in every child of wrong.

O wondrous web of mystery!

Big fish alone escape from thee!

James Jeffrey Roche [1847-1908]

COLOGNE

In Koln, a town of monks and bones, And pavements fanged with murderous stones, And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches; I counted two and seventy stenches, All well defined, and several stinks!

Ye Nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks, The river Rhine, it is well known, Doth wash your city of Cologne; But tell me, Nymphs! what power divine Shall henceforth wash the river Rhine?

Samuel Taylor Coleridge [1772-1834]

EPITAPH ON CHARLES II

Here lies our Sovereign Lord the King, Whose word no man relies on, Who never said a foolish thing, Nor ever did a wise one.

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