She stammers; oh what grace in lifping lies!
If the fays nothing, to be fure fhe's wife.
If thrill, and with a voice to drown a quire,
Sharp-witted fhe muft be, and full of fire.
The lean, confumptive, wench, with coughs decay'd,
Is call'd a pretty, tight, and flender maid.
Th' o'er-grown, a goodly Ceres is expreft,
A bed-fellow for Bacchus at the leaft.
Flat nose the name of Satyr never misses,
And hanging blobber lips bat pout for kiffes.
The talk were endless all the reft to trace:
Yet grant the were a Venus for her face
And shape, yet others equal beauty fhare;
And time was you could live without the fair:
She does no more, in that for which you woo,
Than homelier women full as well can do.
Befides fhe daubs, and ftinks fo much of paint,
Her own attendants cannot bear the fcent,
But laugh behind, and bite their lips to hold;
Mean-time excluded, and expos'd to cold,
The whining lover ftands before the gates,
And there with humble adoration waits:
Crowning with flow'rs the threshold and the floor,
And printing kiffes on th' obdurate door:
Who, if admitted in that nick of time,
If fome unfav'ry whiff betray the crime,
Invents a quarrel straight, if there be none,
Or makes fome faint excufes to be gone;
And calls himself a doating fool to ferve,
Afcribing more than woman can deferve.
Which well they understand like cunning queens;
And hide their naftinefs behind the scenes,
From him they have allur'd, and would retain ;
But to a piercing eye 'tis all in vain :
For common fenfe brings all their cheats to view,
And the falfe light difcovers by the true:
Which a wife harlot owns, and hopes to find
A pardon for defects, that run thro' all the kind.
Nor always do they feign the fweets of love,
When round the panting youth their pliant limbs they
And cling, and heave, and moiften ev'ry kifs.
They often share, and more than fhare the blifs :
From every part, e'en to their inmoft foul,
They feel the trickling joys, and run with vigour to the goal.
Stirr'd with the fame impetuous defire,
Birds, beafts, and herds, and mares, their males require:
Because the throbbing nature in their veins
Provokes them to affuage their kindly pains:
The lufty leap th' expecting female stands,
By mutual heat compell'd to mutual bands.
Thus dogs with lolling tongues by love are ty'd;
Nor fhouting boys nor blows their union can divide:
At either end they ftrive the link to loose;
In vain, for ftronger Venus holds the noofe.
Which never would those wretched lovers do,
But that the common heats of love they know;
The pleafure therefore must be shar'd in common too:
And when the woman's more prevailing juice
Sucks in the man's, the mixture will produce
The mother's likeness; when the man prevails,
His own resemblance in the feed he feals.
But when we fee the new-begotten race
Reflect the features of each parent's face,
Then of the father's and the mother's blood
The juftly temper'd feed is understood:
When both confpire, with equal ardour bent,
From every limb the due proportion fent,
When neither party foils, when neither foil'd,
This gives the fplendid features of the child.
Sometimes the boy the grandfire's image bears;
Sometimes the more remote progenitor he shares;
Because the genial atoms of the feed
Lie long conceal'd ere they exert the breed;
And, after fundry ages paft, produce
The tardy likeness of the latent juice.
Hence families fuch different figures take,
And represent their ancestors in face, and hair, and make.
Because of the fame feed, the voice, and hair,
And shape, and face, and other members are,
And the fame antique mould the likeness does prepare.
Thus oft the father's likeness does prevail
In females, and the mother's in the male.
For fince the feed is of a double kind,
From that, where we the most refemblance find,
We may conclude the ftrongeft tincture fent,
And that was in conception prevalent.
Nor can the vain decrees of pow'rs above
Deny production to the act of love,
Or hinder fathers of that happy name,
Or with a barren womb the matron fhame;
As many think, who ftain with victims blood
The mournful altars, and with incenfe load,
To blefs the fhow'ry feed with future life,
And to impregnate the well-labour'd wife.
In vain they weary Heav'n with prayer, or fly
To Oracles, or magic numbers try:
For barrennefs of fexes will proceed
Either from too condens'd or watry feed:
The watry juice too foon diffolves away,
And in the parts projected will not ftay:
The too condens'd, unfoul'd, unwieldy mafs,
Drops fhort, nor carries to the deftin'd place;
Nor pierces to the parts, nor, tho' injected home,
Will mingle with the kindly moisture of the womb.
For nuptials are unlike in their fuccefs:
Some men with fruitful feed fome women blefs;
And from fome men fome women fruitful are;
Just as their conftitutions join or jar:
And many feeming barren wives have been,
Who, after match'd with more prolific men,
Have fill'd a family with prattling boys:
And, many, not supply'd at home with joys,
Have found a friend abroad, to ease their fmart,
And to perform the faplefs husband's part,
So much it does import, that feed with feed
Should of the kindly mixture make the breed;
And thick with thin, and thin with thick fhould join,
So to produce and propagate the line.
Of fuch concernment too is drink and food,
T'incraffate, or attenuate the blood..
Of like importance is the pofture too,
In which the genial feat of love we do:
For as the females of the four-foot kind
Receive the leapings of their males behind;
So the good wives, with loins up-lifted high,
And leaning on their hands, the fruitful stroke may try :
For in that pofture will they best conceive;
Not when, fupinely laid, they frisk and heave:
For active motions only break the blow;
And more of ftrumpets than the wives they fhow; When, anfwering ftroke with stroke, the mingled liquors flow.
Endearments eager, and too brisk a bound,
Throws off the plow-fhare from the furrow'd ground.
But common harlots in conjunction heave,
Becaufe 'tis lefs their business to conceive
Than to delight, and to provoke the deed;
A trick which honeft wives but little need.
Nor is it from the Gods, or Cupid's dart,
That many a homely woman takes the heart,
But wives well-humour'd, dutiful, and chafte,
And clean, will hold their wand'ring husbands faft;
Such are the links of love, and fuch a love will last.
For what remains, long habitude, and use,
Will kindness in domeftic bands produce:
For cuftom will a ftrong impreffion leave.
Hard bodies, which the lighteft ftroke receive,
In length of time, will moulder and decay,
And stones with drops of rain are wash'd away.
|