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Some of your council, more candid than the rest, admit the abandoned
profligacy of the present House of Commons, but oppose their
dissolution, upon an opinion, I confess, not very unwarrantable, that
their successors would be equally at the disposal of the treasury. I
cannot persuade myself that the nation will have profited so little by
experience. But if that opinion were well founded, you might then
gratify our wishes at an easy rate, and appease the present clamour
against your government, without offering any material injury to the
favourite cause of corruption.

You have still an honourable part to act. The affections of your
subjects may still be recovered. But before you subdue their hearts you
must gain a noble victory over your own. Discard those little, personal
resentments which have too long directed your public conduct. Pardon
this man the remainder of his punishment; and, if resentment still
prevails, make it what it should have been long since--an act, not of
mercy, but of contempt. He will soon fall back into his natural
station, a silent senator, and hardly supporting the weekly eloquence
of a newspaper. The gentle breath of peace would leave him on the
surface, neglected and unremoved. It is only the tempest that lifts him
from his place.

Without consulting your minister, call together your whole council. Let
it appear to the public that you can determine and act for yourself.
Come forward to your people. Lay aside the wretched formalities of a
king, and speak to your subjects with the spirit of a man and in the
language of a gentleman. Tell them you have been fatally deceived. The
acknowledgment will be no disgrace, but rather an honour, to your
understanding. Tell them you are determined to remove every cause of
complaint against your government, that you will give your confidence
to no man who does not possess the confidence of your subjects, and
leave it to themselves to determine, by their conduct at a future
election, whether or no it be in reality the general sense of the
nation that their rights have been arbitrarily invaded by the present
House of Commons, and the constitution betrayed. They will then do
justice to their representatives and to themselves.

These sentiments, Sir, and the style they are conveyed in, may be
offensive, perhaps, because they are new to you. Accustomed to the
language of courtiers, you measure their affections by the vehemence of
their expressions, and when they only praise you indifferently, you
admire their sincerity. But this is not a time to trifle with your
fortune. They deceive you, Sir, who tell you that you have many
friends, whose affections are founded upon a principle of personal
attachment. The first foundation of friendship is not the power of
conferring benefits, but the equality with which they are received and
may be returned. The fortune which made you a king forbade you to have
a friend. It is a law of nature which cannot be violated with impunity.
The mistaken prince who looks for friendship will find a favourite, and
in that favourite the ruin of his affairs.

The people of England are loyal to the House of Hanover, not from a
vain preference of one family to another, but from a conviction that
the establishment of that family was necessary to the support of their
civil and religious liberties. This, Sir, is a principle of allegiance
equally solid and rational, fit for Englishmen to adopt, and well
worthy of your Majesty's encouragement. We cannot long be deluded by
nominal distinctions. The name of Stuart, of itself, is only
contemptible; armed with the sovereign authority, their principles are
formidable. The prince who imitates their conduct should be warned by
their example, and, while he plumes himself upon the security of his
title to the crown, should remember that, as it was acquired by one
revolution, it may be lost by another.




ROBERT BURNS.

(1759-1796.)


XLVI. ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID, OR THE RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS.

My son, these maxims make a rule,
And lump them aye thegither;
The Rigid Righteous is a fool,
The Rigid Wise anither;
The cleanest corn that ere was dight
May ha'e some pyles o' caff in;
So ne'er a fellow-creature slight
For random fits o' daffin'.--_Solomon_.--Eccles. vii. 16.

This undoubtedly ranks as one of the noblest satires in our
literature. It was first published as a broadside, and afterwards
incorporated in the Kilmarnock and Edinburgh editions.


Oh ye wha are sae guid yoursel',
Sae pious an' sae holy,
Ye've nought to do but mark an' tell
Your neebour's fauts an' folly!
Whase life is like a weel-gaun[216] mill,
Supplied wi' store o' water,
The heaped happer's[217] ebbing still,
An' still the clap plays clatter.

Hear me, ye venerable core,
As counsel for poor mortals,
That frequent pass douce Wisdom's door,
For glaiket[218] Folly's portals;
I, for their thoughtless, careless sakes,
Would here propone defences,
Their donsie[219] tricks, their black mistakes
Their failings an' mischances.

Ye see your state wi' theirs compar'd,
An' shudder at the niffer[220],
But cast a moment's fair regard,
What mak's the mighty differ?
Discount what scant occasion gave
That purity ye pride in,
An' (what's aft mair than a' the lave)
Your better art o' hiding.

Think, when your castigated pulse
Gi'es now an' then a wallop,
What ragings must his veins convulse,
That still eternal gallop.
Wi' wind an' tide fair i' your tail,
Right on ye scud your sea-way;
But in the teeth o' baith to sail,
It makes an unco lee-way.

See social life an' glee sit down,
All joyous an' unthinking,
Till, quite transmugrified, they're grown
Debauchery an' drinking:
Oh would they stay to calculate
Th' eternal consequences;
Or your more dreaded hell to state,
Damnation of expenses!

Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames,
Tied up in godly laces,
Before ye gi'e poor frailty names,
Suppose a change o' cases;
A dear loved lad, convenience snug,
A treacherous inclination--
But, let me whisper i' your lug[221],
Ye'er aiblins[222] nae temptation.

Then gently scan your brother man,
Still gentler sister woman;
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang,
To step aside is human:
One point must still be greatly dark,
The moving why they do it:
An' just as lamely can ye mark,
How far perhaps they rue it.

Who made the heart, 'tis He alone
Decidedly can try us,
He knows each chord--its various tone,
Each spring--its various bias:
Then at the balance let's be mute,
We never can adjust it;
What's done we partly may compute,
But know not what's resisted.

[Footnote 216: well-going.]

[Footnote 217: hopper.]

[Footnote 218: idle.]

[Footnote 219: unlucky.]

[Footnote 220: exchange.]

[Footnote 221: ear.]

[Footnote 222: perhaps.]



XLVII. HOLY WILLIE'S PRAYER.

The hero of this daring exposition of Calvinistic theology was
William Fisher, a farmer in the neighbourhood of Mauchline, and an
elder in Mr. Auld's session. He had signalized himself in the
prosecution of Mr. Hamilton, elsewhere alluded to; and Burns
appears to have written these verses in retribution of the rancour
he had displayed on that occasion. Fisher was afterwards convicted
of appropriating the money collected for the poor. Coming home one
night from market in a state of intoxication, he fell into a ditch,
where he was found dead next morning. The poem was first published
in 1801, along with the "Jolly Beggars".


Oh Thou, wha in the heavens dost dwell,
Wha, as it pleases best thysel',
Sends ane to heaven, an' ten to hell,
A' for thy glory,
An' no for ony guid or ill
They've done afore thee!

I bless an' praise thy matchless might,
Whan thousands thou hast left in night,
That I am here afore thy sight,
For gifts an' grace
A burnin' and a shinin' light
To a' this place.

What was I, or my generation,
That I should get sic exaltation,
I wha deserve sic just damnation,
For broken laws,
Five thousand years 'fore my creation,
Thro' Adam's cause?

When frae my mither's womb I fell,
Thou might ha'e plunged me deep in hell,
To gnash my gums, to weep an' wail,
In burnin' lake,
Whare damned devils roar an' yell,
Chain'd to a stake.

Yet I am here, a chosen sample;
To show thy grace is great an' ample;
I'm here a pillar in thy temple,
Strong as a rock,
A guide, a buckler, an example,
To a' thy flock.

But yet, oh Lord! confess I must,
At times I'm fash'd[223] wi' fleshly lust;
An' sometimes, too, wi' warldly trust,
Vile self gets in:
But Thou remembers we are dust,
Defil'd in sin.

Maybe thou lets this fleshly thorn
Beset thy servant e'en an' morn
Lest he owre high an' proud should turn,
'Cause he's sae gifted;
If sae, Thy ban' maun e'en be borne,
Until Thou lift it.

Lord, bless Thy chosen in this place,
For here Thou hast a chosen race:
But God confound their stubborn face,
And blast their name,
Wha bring Thy elders to disgrace
And public shame.

Lord, mind Cawn Hamilton's deserts,
He drinks, and swears, and plays at cartes[224],
Yet has sae mony takin' arts,
Wi' grit an' sma'[225],
Frae God's ain priests the people's hearts
He steals awa'.

And whan we chasten'd him therefore,
Thou kens how he bred sic a splore[226],
As set the warld in a roar
O' laughin' at us,--
Curse Thou his basket and his store,
Kail and potatoes.

Lord, hear my earnest cry and pray'r
Against the Presbyt'ry of Ayr;
Thy strong right hand, Lord, mak' it bare
Upo' their heads,
Lord, weigh it down, and dinna spare,
For their misdeeds.

Oh Lord my God, that glib-tongu'd Aiken,
My very heart and saul are quakin',
To think how we stood groanin', shakin',
And swat wi' dread,
While he wi' hingin' lips and snakin',
Held up his head.

Lord, in the day of vengeance try him,
Lord, visit them wha did employ him,
And pass not in thy mercy by 'em,
Nor hear their pray'r;
But for thy people's sake destroy 'em,
And dinna spare,

But, Lord, remember me and mine,
Wi' mercies temp'ral and divine,
That I for gear[227] and grace may shine,
Excell'd by nane,
And a' the glory shall be thine,
Amen, amen!


EPITAPH ON HOLY WILLIE.


Here Holy Willie's sair-worn clay
Tak's up its last abode;
His saul has ta'en some ither way,
I fear the left-hand road.

Stop! there he is, as sure's a gun,
Poor, silly body, see him;
Nae wonder he's as black's the grun',
Observe wha's standing wi' him.

Your brunstane[228] devilship, I see,
Has got him there before ye;
But haud your nine-tail cat a wee,
Till ance you've heard my story.

Your pity I will not implore,
For pity ye ha'e nane;
Justice, alas! has gi'en him o'er,
And mercy's day is gane.

But hear me, sir, de'il as ye are,
Look something to your credit;
A coof[229] like him wad stain your name,
If it were kent ye did it.

[Footnote 223: troubled.]

[Footnote 224: cards.]

[Footnote 225: great and small.]

[Footnote 226: row.]

[Footnote 227: wealth.]

[Footnote 228: brimstone.]

[Footnote 229: fool.]




CHARLES LAMB.

(1775-1835.)


XLVIII. A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO.

Published originally in 1811 in _The Reflector_, No. 4. As Lamb
himself states, it was meditated for two years before it was
committed to paper in 1805, but not published until six years
afterwards.


May the Babylonish curse
Straight confound my stammering verse,
If I can a passage see
In this word-perplexity,
Or a fit expression find,
Or a language to my mind
(Still the phrase is wide or scant),
To take leave of thee, Great Plant!
Or in any terms relate
Half my love, or half my hate:
For I hate yet love thee so,
That, whichever thing I show,
The plain truth will seem to be
A constrained hyperbole,
And the passions to proceed
More from a mistress than a weed.

Sooty retainer to the vine,
Bacchus' black servant, negro fine;
Sorcerer, that mak'st us dote upon
Thy begrimed complexion,
And, for thy pernicious sake,
More and greater oaths to break
Than reclaimed lovers take
'Gainst women: thou thy siege dost lay
Much too in the female way,
While thou suck'st the lab'ring breath
Faster than kisses or than death.

Thou in such a cloud dost bind us,
That our worst foes cannot find us,
And ill fortune, that would thwart us,
Shoots at rovers, shooting at us;
While each man, through thy heightening steam,
Does like a smoking Etna seem,
And all about us does express
(Fancy and wit in richest dress)
A Sicilian fruitfulness

Thou through such a mist dost show us,
That our best friends do not know us,
And, for those allowed features,
Due to reasonable creatures,
Liken'st us to fell Chimeras--
Monsters that, who see us, fear us;
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon,
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion.

Bacchus we know, and we allow
His tipsy rites. But what art thou,
That but by reflex canst show
What his deity can do,
As the false Egyptian spell
Aped the true Hebrew miracle?
Some few vapours thou may'st raise,
The weak brain may serve to amaze.
But to the reins and nobler heart
Canst nor life nor heat impart.

Brother of Bacchus, later born,
The old world was sure forlorn
Wanting thee, that aidest more
The god's victories than before
All his panthers, and the brawls
Of his piping Bacchanals.
These, as stale, we disallow,
Or judge of _thee_ meant: only thou
His true Indian conquest art;
And, for ivy round his dart,
The reformed god now weaves
A finer thyrsus of thy leaves.

Scent to match thy rich perfume
Chemic art did ne'er presume
Through her quaint alembic strain,
None so sovereign to the brain.
Nature, that did in thee excel,
Framed again no second smell.
Roses, violets, but toys
For the smaller sort of boys,
Or for greener damsels meant;
Thou art the only manly scent.

Stinking'st of the stinking kind,
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,
Africa, that brags her foison,
Breeds no such prodigious poison,
Henbane, nightshade, both together,
Hemlock, aconite--
Nay, rather,
Plant divine, of rarest virtue;
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you.
'Twas but in a sort I blamed thee;
None e'er prospered who defamed thee;
Irony all, and feigned abuse,
Such as perplexed lovers use
At a need, when, in despair
To paint forth their fairest fair,
Or in part but to express
That exceeding comeliness
Which their fancies doth so strike,
They borrow language of dislike,
And, instead of Dearest Miss,
Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
And those forms of old admiring,
Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
Basilisk, and all that's evil,
Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor,
Monkey, Ape, and twenty more;
Friendly Trait'ress, Loving Foe,--
Not that she is truly so,
But no other way they know
A contentment to express,
Borders so upon excess,
That they do not rightly wot
Whether it be pain or not.

Or as men, constrained to part
With what's nearest to their heart,
While their sorrow's at the height,
Lose discrimination quite,
And their hasty wrath let fall,
To appease their frantic gall,
On the darling thing whatever
Whence they feel it death to sever,
Though it be, as they, perforce
Guiltless of the sad divorce.

For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee.
For thy sake, Tobacco, I
Would do anything but die,
And but seek to extend my days
Long enough to sing thy praise.
But, as she who once hath been
A king's consort is a queen
Ever after, nor will bate
Any title of her state,
Though a widow or divorced,
So I, from thy converse forced,
The old name and style retain,
A right Katherine of Spain;
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys
Of the blest Tobacco Boys;
Where, though I, by sour physician,
Am debarred the full fruition
Of thy favours, I may catch
Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Sidelong odours, that give life
Like glances from a neighbour's wife;
And still live in the byplaces
And the suburbs of thy graces,
And in thy borders take delight,
An unconquered Canaanite.




THOMAS MOORE.

(1779-1852.)


XLIX. LINES ON LEIGH HUNT.

Suggested by Hunt's _Byron and his Contemporaries_.


Next week will be published (as "Lives" are the rage)
The whole Reminiscences, wondrous and strange,
Of a small puppy-dog that lived once in the cage
Of the late noble lion at Exeter 'Change.

Though the dog is a dog of the kind they call "sad",
'Tis a puppy that much to good breeding pretends;
And few dogs have such opportunities had
Of knowing how lions behave--among friends.

How that animal eats, how he moves, how he drinks,
Is all noted down by this Boswell so small;
And 'tis plain, from each sentence, the puppy-dog thinks
That the lion was no such great things after all.

Though he roar'd pretty well--this the puppy allows--
It was all, he says, borrow'd--all second-hand roar;
And he vastly prefers his own little bow-wows
To the loftiest war-note the lion could pour.

'Tis indeed as good fun as a cynic could ask,
To see how this cockney-bred setter of rabbits
Takes gravely the lord of the forest to task,
And judges of lions by puppy-dog habits.

Nay, fed as he was (and this makes it a dark case)
With sops every day from the lion's own pan,
He lifts up his leg at the noble beast's carcase,
And--does all a dog, so diminutive, can.

However the book's a good book, being rich in
Examples and warnings to lions high-bred,
How they suffer small mongrelly curs in their kitchen,
Who'll feed on them living, and foul them when dead.




GEORGE CANNING.

(1770-1827.)


L. EPISTLE FROM LORD BORINGDON TO LORD GRANVILLE.

Published in _Fugitive Verses_, and thence included among Canning's
works.


Oft you have ask'd me, Granville, why
Of late I heave the frequent sigh?
Why, moping, melancholy, low,
From supper, commons, wine, I go?
Why bows my mind, by care oppress'd,
By day no peace, by night no rest?
Hear, then, my friend, and ne'er you knew
A tale so tender, and so true--
Hear what, tho' shame my tongue restrain,
My pen with freedom shall explain.
Say, Granville, do you not remember,
About the middle of November,
When Blenheim's hospitable lord
Received us at his cheerful board;
How fair the Ladies Spencer smiled,
Enchanting, witty, courteous, mild?
And mark'd you not, how many a glance
Across the table, shot by chance
From fair Eliza's graceful form,
Assail'd and took my heart by storm?
And mark'd you not, with earnest zeal,
I ask'd her, if she'd have some veal?
And how, when conversation's charms
Fresh vigour gave to love's alarms,
My heart was scorch'd, and burnt to tinder,
When talking to her at the _winder_?
These facts premised, you can't but guess
The cause of my uneasiness,
For you have heard, as well as I,
That she'll be married speedily;
And then--my grief more plain to tell--
Soft cares, sweet fears, fond hopes,--farewell!
But still, tho' false the fleeting dream,
Indulge awhile the tender theme,
And hear, had fortune yet been kind,
How bright the prospect of the mind.
O! had I had it in my power
To wed her--with a suited dower--
And proudly bear the beauteous maid
To Saltrum's venerable shade,--
Or if she liked not woods at Saltrum,
Why, nothing easier than to alter 'em,--
Then had I tasted bliss sincere,
And happy been from year to year.
How changed this scene! for now, my Granville,
Another match is on the anvil.
And I, a widow'd dove, complain,
And feel no refuge from my pain--
Save that of pitying Spencer's sister,
Who's lost a lord, and gained a Mister.



LI. REFORMATION OF THE KNAVE OF HEARTS.

This is an exquisite satire on the attempts at criticism which were
current in _pre-Edinburgh Review_ days, when the majority of the
journals were mere touts for the booksellers. The papers in
question are taken from Nos. 11 and 12 of the _Microcosm_,
published on Monday, February 12th, 1787--when Canning was
seventeen years of age.


The epic poem on which I shall ground my present critique has for its
chief characteristics brevity and simplicity. The author--whose name I
lament that I am, in some degree, prevented from consecrating to
immortal fame, by not knowing what it is--the author, I say, has not
branched his poem into excrescences of episode, or prolixities of
digression; it is neither variegated with diversity of unmeaning
similitudes, nor glaring with the varnish of unnatural metaphor. The
whole is plain and uniform; so much so, indeed, that I should hardly be
surprised if some morose readers were to conjecture that the poet had
been thus simple rather from necessity than choice; that he had been
restrained, not so much by chastity of judgment, as sterility of
imagination.

Nay, some there may be, perhaps, who will dispute his claim to the
title of an epic poet, and will endeavour to degrade him even to the
rank of a ballad-monger. But I, as his commentator, will contend for
the dignity of my author, and will plainly demonstrate his poem to be
an epic poem, agreeable to the example of all poets, and the consent of
all critics heretofore.

First, it is universally agreed that an epic poem should have three
component parts--a beginning, a middle, and an end; secondly, it is
allowed that it should have one grand action or main design, to the
forwarding of which all the parts of it should directly or indirectly
tend, and that this design should be in some measure consonant with,
and conducive to, the purposes of morality; and thirdly, it is
indisputably settled that it should have a hero. I trust that in none
of these points the poem before us will be found deficient. There are
other inferior properties which I shall consider in due order.

Not to keep my readers longer in suspense, the subject of the poem is
"The Reformation of the Knave of Hearts". It is not improbable that
some may object to me that a knave is an unworthy hero for an epic
poem--that a hero ought to be all that is great and good. The objection
is frivolous. The greatest work of this kind that the world has ever
produced has "the Devil" for its hero; and supported as my author is by
so great a precedent, I contend that his hero is a very decent hero,
and especially as he has the advantage of Milton's, by reforming, at
the end, is evidently entitled to a competent share of celebrity.

I shall now proceed to the more immediate examination of the poem in
its different parts. The beginning, say the critics, ought to be plain
and simple--neither embellished with the flowers of poetry, nor turgid
with pomposity of diction. In this how exactly does our author conform
to the established opinion! He begins thus:

"The Queen of Hearts
She made some tarts".

Can anything be more clear! more natural! more agreeable to the true
spirit of simplicity? Here are no tropes, no figurative expressions,
not even so much as an invocation to the Muse. He does not detain his
readers by any needless circumlocution, by unnecessarily informing them
what he _is_ going to sing, or still more unnecessarily enumerating
what he _is not_ going to sing; but, according to the precept of
Horace:--

_In medias res,
Non secus ac notas, auditorem rapit--_

That is, he at once introduces us and sets us on the most easy and
familiar footing imaginable with her Majesty of Hearts, and interests
us deeply in her domestic concerns. But to proceed--

"The Queen of Hearts
She made some tarts,
All on a summer's day".

Here indeed the prospect brightens, and we are led to expect some
liveliness of imagery, some warmth of poetical colouring; but here is
no such thing. There is no task more difficult to a poet than that of
rejection. Ovid among the ancients, and Dryden among the moderns, were
perhaps the most remarkable for the want of it. The latter, from the
haste in which he generally produced his compositions, seldom paid much
attention to the _limae labor_, "the labour of correction", and seldom,
therefore, rejected the assistance of any idea that presented itself.
Ovid, not content with catching the leading features of any scene or
character, indulged himself in a thousand minutiae of description, a
thousand puerile prettinesses, which were in themselves uninteresting,
and took off greatly from the effect of the whole; as the numberless
suckers and straggling branches of a fruit-tree, if permitted to shoot
out unrestrained, while they are themselves barren and useless,
diminish considerably the vigour of the parent stock. Ovid had more
genius but less judgment than Virgil; Dryden more imagination but less
correctness than Pope; had they not been deficient in these points the
former would certainly have equalled, the latter infinitely outshone
the merits of his countryman. Our author was undoubtedly possessed of
that power which they wanted, and was cautious not to indulge too far
the sallies of a lively imagination. Omitting, therefore, any mention
of sultry Sirius, sylvan shade, sequestered glade, verdant hills,
purling rills, mossy mountains, gurgling fountains, &c., he simply
tells us that it was "All on a summer's day". For my own part I confess
that I find myself rather flattered than disappointed, and consider the
poet as rather paying a compliment to the abilities of his readers,
than baulking their expectations. It is certainly a great pleasure to
see a picture well painted; but it is a much greater to paint it well
oneself. This, therefore, I look upon as a stroke of excellent
management in the poet. Here every reader is at liberty to gratify his
own taste, to design for himself just what sort of "summer's day" he
likes best; to choose his own scenery, dispose his lights and shades as
he pleases, to solace himself with a rivulet or a horse-pond, a shower
or a sunbeam, a grove or a kitchen-garden, according to his fancy. How
much more considerate this than if the poet had, from an affected
accuracy of description, thrown us into an unmannerly perspiration by
the heat of the atmosphere, forced us into a landscape of his own
planning, with perhaps a paltry good-for-nothing zephyr or two, and a
limited quantity of wood and water. All this Ovid would undoubtedly
have done. Nay, to use the expression of a learned brother
commentator--_quovis pignore decertem_, "I would lay any wager", that
he would have gone so far as to tell us what the tarts were made of,
and perhaps wandered into an episode on the art of preserving cherries.
But _our_ poet, above such considerations, leaves every reader to
choose his own ingredients, and sweeten them to his own liking; wisely
foreseeing, no doubt, that the more palatable each had rendered them to
his own taste, the more he would be affected at their approaching loss.

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