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A mifer oft would laugh at firft, to find

A faithful draught of his own fordid mind;

And fops were with fuch care and cunning writ, They lik'd the piece for which themselves did fit. 785 You then that would the comic laurels wear,

To study nature be your only care:

Whoe'er knows man, and by a curious art
Difcerns the hidden fecrets of the heart;
He who obferves, and naturally can paint
The jealous fool, the fawning fycophant,
A fober wit, an enterprising ass,
A humorous Otter, or a Hudibras;
May safely in thofe noble lifts engage,

And make them act and speak upon the stage.
Strive to be natural in all you write,

And paint with colours that may please the fight.
Nature in various figures does abound;
And in each mind are different humours found:
A glance, a touch, difcovers to the wife;
But every man has not difcerning eyes.
All-changing time does alfo change the mind;
And different ages different pleasures find:
Youth, hot and furious, cannot brook delay,
By flattering vice is easily led away;
Vain in discourse, inconftant in defire,
In cenfure, rash; in pleafures, all on fire.
The manly age does fteadier thoughts enjoy;
Power and ambition do his foul employ:
Against the turns of fate he fets his mind;
And by the past the future hopes to find.
Decrepid age ftill adding to his stores,
For others heaps the treasure he adores;

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In all his actions keeps a frozen pace;

Paft times extols, the prefent to debase:
Incapable of pleasures youth abuse,

In others blames what age does him refufe.
Your actors must by reafon be control'd;

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Let young men fpeak like young, old men like old: Obferve the town, and ftudy well the court;

For thither various characters refort:

Thus 'twas great Jonfon purchas'd his renown,
And in his art had borne away the crown;
If, lefs defirous of the people's praise,
He had not with low farce debas'd his plays;
Mixing dull buffoonry with wit refin'd,
And Harlequin with noble Terence join'd.
When in the Fox I fee the tortoise hift,
I lose the author of the Alchemist.

The comic wit, born with a smiling air,
Muft tragic grief and pompous verse forbear;
Yet may he not, as on a market-place,
With baudy jefts amuse the populace:
With well-bred converfation you must please,
And your intrigue unravell'd be with ease:
Your action still should reafon's rules obey,
Nor in an empty fcene may lofe its way.
Your humble style must sometimes gently rife;
And your difcourfe fententious be, and wife:
The paffions muft to nature be confin'd;
And scenes to scenes with artful weaving join'd.
Your wit must not unseasonably play;
But follow business, never lead the way.
"Obferve how Terence does this error fhun;
A careful father chides his amorous fon:

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Then fee that fon, whom no advice can move,
Forget those orders, and purfue his love:
'Tis not a well-drawn picture we discover:
'Tis a true fon, a father, and a lover.
I like an author that reforms the age,
And keeps the right decorum of the stage;
That always pleases by juft reafon's rule:
But for a tedious droll, a quibbling fool,
Who with low naufeous baudry fills his plays;
Let him be gone, and on two treffels raise
Some Smithfield ftage, where he may act his pranks,
And make Jack-Puddings speak to mountebanks.

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CANTO IV.

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IN Florence dwelt a doctor of renown,
The fcourge of God, and terror of the town,
Who all the cant of phyfic had by heart,
And never murder'd but by rules of art.
The public mischief was his private gain;
Children their flaughter'd parents fought in vain :
A brother here his poifon'd brother wept;
Some bloodlefs dy'd, and fome by opium flept. 865
Colds, at his prefence, would to frenzies turn;
And agues, like malignant fevers, burn.
Hated, at last, his practice gives him o'er;
One friend, unkill'd by drugs, of all his store,
In his new country-house affords him place;
"Twas a rich abbot, and a building afs:
Here firft the doctor's talent came in play,
He feems infpir'd, and talks like Wren or May:
Of this new portico condemns the face,
And turns the entrance to a better place;
Defigns the stair-cafe at the other end,
His friend approves, does for his mafon fend:
He comes; the doctor's arguments prevail.
In short, to finish this our humorous tale,
He Galen's dangerous fcience does reject,
And from ill doctor turns good architect.

In this example we may have our part:
Rather be mafon, 'tis a useful art!

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Than a dull poet; for that trade accurft,

Admits no mean betwixt the beft and worst.

In other sciences, without difgrace,

A candidate may fill a fecond place;
But poetry no medium can admit,
No reader fuffers an indifferent wit:
The ruin'd stationers againft him baul,
And Herringman degrades him from his stall.
Burlesque, at least our laughter may excite:
But a cold writer never can delight.

The Counter-Scuffle has more wit and art,
Than the ftiff formal ftyle of Gondibert.
Be not affected with that empty praise
Which your vain flatterers will fometimes raise,
And when you read, with ecftafy will fay,
"The finish'd piece! the admirable play!"
Which, when expos'd to cenfure and to light,
Cannot endure a critic's piercing fight.

A hundred author's fates have been foretold,
And Shadwell's works are printed, but not fold.
Hear all the world; confider every thought;
A fool by chance may stumble on a fault :
Yet, when Apollo does your mufe inspire,
Be not impatient to expofe your fire;

Nor imitate the Settles of our times,

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Thofe tuneful readers of their own dull rhimes.
Who feize on all the acquaintance they can meet, 910
And stop the paffengers that walk the street:

There is no fanctuary you can chufe
For a defence from their purfuing mufe.
I've faid before, be patient when they blame;
To alter for the better is no fhame

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