18
THE ELEPHANT
This being overheard by one,
Who was not so far overgrown
In any virtuous Speculation,
To judge with mere Imagination,
345 Immediately he made a Guess
At solving all Appearances,
A Way far more significant,
Than all their Hints of th' Elephant;
And found, upon a second View,
350 His own Hypothesis most true;
For he had scarce apply'd his Eye
To th' Engine, but immediately
He found, a Mouse was gotten in
The hollow Tube, and shut between
355 The two Glass-windows in Restraint
Was swell'd into an Elephant;
And prov'd the virtuous Occasion,
Of all this learned Dissertation.
And, as a Mountain heretofore
360 Was great with Child, they say, and bore
A silly Mouse; this Mouse, as strange,
Brought forth a Mountain, in Exchange.
Mean while, the rest in Consultation
Had penn'd the wonderful Narration;[1]
Who was not so far overgrown
In any virtuous Speculation,
To judge with mere Imagination,
345 Immediately he made a Guess
At solving all Appearances,
A Way far more significant,
Than all their Hints of th' Elephant;
And found, upon a second View,
350 His own Hypothesis most true;
For he had scarce apply'd his Eye
To th' Engine, but immediately
He found, a Mouse was gotten in
The hollow Tube, and shut between
355 The two Glass-windows in Restraint
Was swell'd into an Elephant;
And prov'd the virtuous Occasion,
Of all this learned Dissertation.
And, as a Mountain heretofore
360 Was great with Child, they say, and bore
A silly Mouse; this Mouse, as strange,
Brought forth a Mountain, in Exchange.
Mean while, the rest in Consultation
Had penn'd the wonderful Narration;[1]
- ↑ 385, 386.This Disquisition,———Is, half of it, in my Discission.] The Defect in the first of these Lines must not be imputed to any in the Manuscript, which is very fair, but to the
Poet's
