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[Footnote 1: Found in Miss Vanhomrigh’s desk, after her death, in the handwriting of Dr. Swift.—H.]
Cut the name of the man [1] who his mistress denied,
And let the first of it be only applied
To join with the prophet[2] who David did chide;
Then say what a horse is that runs very fast;[3]
And that which deserves to be first put the last;
Spell all then, and put them together, to find
The name and the virtues of him I design’d.
Like the patriarch in Egypt, he’s versed in
the state;
Like the prophet in Jewry, he’s free with the
great;
Like a racer he flies, to succour with speed,
When his friends want his aid, or desert is in need.
[Footnote 1: Jo-seph.]
[Footnote 2: Nathan.]
[Footnote 3: Swift.]
The nymph who wrote this in an amorous fit,
I cannot but envy the pride of her wit,
Which thus she will venture profusely to throw
On so mean a design, and a subject so low.
For mean’s her design, and her subject as mean,
The first but a rebus, the last but a dean.
A dean’s but a parson: and what is a rebus?
A thing never known to the Muses or Phoebus.
The corruption of verse; for, when all is done,
It is but a paraphrase made on a pun.
But a genius like hers no subject can stifle,
It shows and discovers itself through a trifle.
By reading this trifle, I quickly began
To find her a great wit, but the dean a small man.
Rich ladies will furnish their garrets with stuff,
Which others for mantuas would think fine enough:
So the wit that is lavishly thrown away here,
Might furnish a second-rate poet a year.
Thus much for the verse, we proceed to the next,
Where the nymph has entirely forsaken her text:
Her fine panegyrics are quite out of season:
And what she describes to be merit, is treason:
The changes which faction has made in the state,
Have put the dean’s politics quite out of date:
Now no one regards what he utters with freedom,
And, should he write pamphlets, no great man would
read ’em;
And, should want or desert stand in need of his aid,
This racer would prove but a dull founder’d
jade.
STELLA’S BIRTH-DAY MARCH 13, 1718-19
Stella this day is thirty-four,
(We shan’t dispute a year or more:)
However, Stella, be not troubled,
Although thy size and years are doubled
Since first I saw thee at sixteen,
The brightest virgin on the green;
So little is thy form declined;
Made up so largely in thy mind.
O, would it please the gods to split
Thy beauty, size, and years, and wit!
No age could furnish out a pair
Of nymphs so graceful, wise, and fair;
With half the lustre of your eyes,
With half your wit, your years, and size.
And then, before it grew too late,
How should I beg of gentle fate,
(That either nymph might have her swain,)
To split my worship too in twain.
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