Then in a vizard, to avoid grimace,
Allows all freedom but to ſee the face.
In pulpits and at bar ſhe wears a gown,
In camps a ſword, in palaces a crown.
Reſolv’d to combat with this motley beaſt,25
Our poet comes to ſtrike one ſtroke at leaſt.
His glaſs he means not for this jilt or beau,
Some features of you all he means to ſhow;
On choſen heads nor lets the thunder fall,
But ſcatters his artillery—at all.30
Yet to the fair he fain would quarter ſhow;
His tender heart recoils at ev’ry blow:
If unawares he gives too ſmart a ſtroke,
He means but to correct, and not provoke.34
PROLOGUE
TO THE BRITISH ENCHANTERS.
Poets by obſervation find it true
’T is harder much to pleaſe themſelves than you:
To weave a plot, to work and to refine
A labour’d ſcene, to poliſh ev’ry line,
Judgment muſt ſweat, and feel a mother’s pains.5
Vain Fools! thus to diſturb and rack their brains,
When, more indulgent to the writer’s eaſe,
You are too good to be ſo hard to pleaſe:
No ſuch convulſive pangs it will require
To write the pretty things which you admire.10
