From his deep fund our author largely draws,
Nor sinks his credit lower than it was.
Tho' plays for honour in old time he made,
'Tis now for better reasons — to be paid.
Believe him, he has known the world too long,
And seen the death of much immortal song.
He says, poor poets lost, while players won,
As pimps grow rich, while gallants are undone.
Tho' Tom the poet writ with ease and pleasure,
The comick Tom abounds in other treasure.
Fame is at best an unperforming cheat;
But 'tis substantial happiness, to eat.
Let ease, his last request, be of your giving,
Nor force him to be damn'd to get his living.
AUTHORS are judg'd by strange capricious rules;
The great ones are thought mad, the small ones fools:
Yet sure the best are most severely fated;
For fools are only laugh'd at, wits are hated.
Blockheads with reason men of sense abhor;
But fool 'gainst fool, is barbarous civil war.
Why on all authors then should criticks fall?
Since some have writ, and shown no wit at all.
Condemn a play of theirs, and they evade it;
Cry, "Damn not us, but damn the French, who made it."
