Volume Ii Part 3 (1/2)

Stella, when you these lines transcribe, Lest you should take them for a bribe, Resolved to mortify your pride, I'll here expose your weaker side.

Your spirits kindle to a flame, Moved by the lightest touch of blame; And when a friend in kindness tries To show you where your error lies, Conviction does but more incense; Perverseness is your whole defence; Truth, judgment, wit, give place to spite, Regardless both of wrong and right; Your virtues all suspended wait, Till time has open'd reason's gate; And, what is worse, your pa.s.sion bends Its force against your nearest friends, Which manners, decency, and pride, Have taught from you the world to hide; In vain; for see, your friend has brought To public light your only fault; And yet a fault we often find Mix'd in a n.o.ble, generous mind: And may compare to aetna's fire, Which, though with trembling, all admire; The heat that makes the summit glow, Enriching all the vales below.

Those who, in warmer climes, complain From Phoebus' rays they suffer pain, Must own that pain is largely paid By generous wines beneath a shade.

Yet, when I find your pa.s.sions rise, And anger sparkling in your eyes, I grieve those spirits should be spent, For n.o.bler ends by nature meant.

One pa.s.sion, with a different turn, Makes wit inflame, or anger burn: So the sun's heat, with different powers, Ripens the grape, the liquor sours: Thus Ajax, when with rage possest, By Pallas breathed into his breast, His valour would no more employ, Which might alone have conquer'd Troy; But, blinded by resentment, seeks For vengeance on his friends the Greeks.

You think this turbulence of blood From stagnating preserves the flood, Which, thus fermenting by degrees, Exalts the spirits, sinks the lees.

Stella, for once you reason wrong; For, should this ferment last too long, By time subsiding, you may find Nothing but acid left behind; From pa.s.sion you may then be freed, When peevishness and spleen succeed.

Say, Stella, when you copy next, Will you keep strictly to the text?

Dare you let these reproaches stand, And to your failing set your hand?

Or, if these lines your anger fire, Shall they in baser flames expire?

Whene'er they burn, if burn they must, They'll prove my accusation just.

[Footnote 1: At Bridewell; see vol. i, ”A Beautiful Young Nymph,” at p. 201.--_W. E. B_.]

[Footnote 3: A cant word for a rhyme.--_W. E. B._]

TO STELLA VISITING ME IN MY SICKNESS 1720

Pallas, observing Stella's wit Was more than for her s.e.x was fit, And that her beauty, soon or late, Might breed confusion in the state, In high concern for human kind, Fix'd honour in her infant mind.

But (not in wrangling to engage With such a stupid, vicious age) If honour I would here define, It answers faith in things divine.

As natural life the body warms, And, scholars teach, the soul informs, So honour animates the whole, And is the spirit of the soul.

Those numerous virtues which the tribe Of tedious moralists describe, And by such various t.i.tles call, True honour comprehends them all.

Let melancholy rule supreme, Choler preside, or blood, or phlegm, It makes no difference in the case, Nor is complexion honour's place.

But, lest we should for honour take The drunken quarrels of a rake: Or think it seated in a scar, Or on a proud triumphal car; Or in the payment of a debt We lose with sharpers at piquet; Or when a wh.o.r.e, in her vocation, Keeps punctual to an a.s.signation; Or that on which his lords.h.i.+p swears, When vulgar knaves would lose their ears; Let Stella's fair example preach A lesson she alone can teach.

In points of honour to be tried, All pa.s.sions must be laid aside: Ask no advice, but think alone; Suppose the question not your own.

How shall I act, is not the case; But how would Brutus in my place?

In such a case would Cato bleed?

And how would Socrates proceed?

Drive all objections from your mind, Else you relapse to human kind: Ambition, avarice, and l.u.s.t, A factious rage, and breach of trust, And flattery tipt with nauseous fleer, And guilty shame, and servile fear, Envy, and cruelty, and pride, Will in your tainted heart preside.

Heroes and heroines of old, By honour only were enroll'd Among their brethren in the skies, To which (though late) shall Stella rise.

Ten thousand oaths upon record Are not so sacred as her word: The world shall in its atoms end, Ere Stella can deceive a friend.

By honour seated in her breast She still determines what is best: What indignation in her mind Against enslavers of mankind!

Base kings, and ministers of state, Eternal objects of her hate!

She thinks that nature ne'er design'd Courage to man alone confined.

Can cowardice her s.e.x adorn, Which most exposes ours to scorn?

She wonders where the charm appears In Florimel's affected fears; For Stella never learn'd the art At proper times to scream and start; Nor calls up all the house at night, And swears she saw a thing in white.

Doll never flies to cut her lace, Or throw cold water in her face, Because she heard a sudden drum, Or found an earwig in a plum.