when almost all the wit we have is applied this way; and when I have already been a martyr to such unjust suspicion. Of which I will relate one instance. While I was last winter laid up in the gout, with a favourite child dying on one bed, and my wife in a condition very little better on another, attended with other circumstances which served as very proper decorations to such a scene, I received a letter from a friend, desiring me to vindicate myself from two very opposite reflections, which two opposite parties thought fit to cast on me, viz., the one of writing in the Champion (though I had not then written in it for upwards of half a year), the other, of writing in the Gazetteer, in which I never had the honour of inserting a single word.

To defend myself therefore as well as I can from all past, and to enter a caveat against all future, censure of this kind, I once more solemnly declare, that since the end of June, 1741, I have not, besides Joseph Andrews, published one word, except The Opposition, a Vision; A Defence of the Duchess of Marlborough's Book; Miss Lucy in Town (in which I had a very small share). And I do further protest, that I will never hereafter publish any book or pamphlet whatever, to which I will not put my name. A promise which, as I shall sacredly keep, so will it, I hope, be so far believed, that I may henceforth receive no more praise or censure to which I have not the least title.

And now, my good-natured reader, recommending my works to your candour, I bid you heartily farewell; and take this with you, that you may never be interrupted in the reading these Miscellanies with that degree of heartache which hath often discomposed me in the writing them.

OF TRUE GREATNESS

AN EPISTLE TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

GEORGE DODINGTON, Esq.

"TIS strange, while all to greatness homage pay,
So few should know the goddess they obey;
That men should think a thousand things the same,
And give contending images one name.

Not Greece, in all her temples' wide abodes,
Held a more wild democracy of gods
Than various deities we serve, while all
Profess before one common shrine to fall.

Whether ourselves of greatness are possess'd, Or worship it within another's breast.

While a mean crowd of sycophants attend, And fawn and flatter, creep and cringe and bend; The fav'rite blesses his superior state,

Rises o'er all, and hails himself the great.

Vain man! can such as these to greatness raise?
Can honour come from dirt? from baseness, praise?
Then India's gem on Scotland's coast shall shine,
And the Peruvian ore enrich the Cornish mine.

Behold, in blooming May, the May-pole stand, Dress'd out in garlands by the peasant's hand; Around it dance the youth, in mirthful mood; And all admire the gaudy, dress'd-up wood.

See, the next day, of all its pride bereft,
How soon the unregarded post is left.
So thou, the wonder of a longer day,
Raised high on power, and dress'd in titles gay,
Stripp'd of these summer garlands, soon wouldst see
The mercenary slaves adored, not thee;

Wouldst see them thronging thy successor's gate,
Shadows of power, and properties of state.
As the sun insects, power court-friends begets,
Which wanton in its beams, and vanish as it sets.

Thy highest pomp the hermit dares despise,
Greatness (cries this) is to be good and wise.
To titles, treasures, luxury and show,
The gilded follies of mankind, a foe.
He flies society, to wilds resorts,

And rails at busy cities, splendid courts.
Great to himself, he in his cell appears,

As kings on thrones, or conquerors on cars.

O thou, that dar'st thus proudly scorn thy kind,
Search, with impartial scrutiny, thy mind;
Disdaining outward flatteries to win,

Dost thou not feed a flatterer within?
While other passions temperance may guide,
Feast not with too delicious meals thy pride.
On vice triumphant while thy censures fall,
Be sure no envy mixes with thy gall.

Ask thyself oft, to power and grandeur born,
Had power and grandeur then incurr'd thy scorn?
If no ill-nature in thy breast prevails,

Enjoying all the crimes at which it rails?
A peevish sour perverseness of the will,
Oft we miscall antipathy to ill.

Scorn and disdain the little cynic hurl'd

At the exulting victor of the world.

Greater than this what soul can be descried?
His who contemns the cynic's snarling pride.
Well might the haughty son of Philip see
Ambition's second lot devolve on thee;

Whose breast pride fires with scarce inferior joy,
And bids thee hate and shun men, him destroy.

But hadst thou, Alexander, wish'd to prove
Thyself the real progeny of Jove,

Virtue another path had bid thee find,
Taught thee to save, and not to slay, mankind.

Shall the lean wolf, by hunger fierce and bold,
Bear off no honours from the bloody fold?
Shall the dead flock his greatness not display;
But shepherds hunt him as a beast of prey?
While man, not drove by hunger from his den,
To honour climbs o'er heaps of murder'd men.
Shall ravaged fields and burning towns proclaim
The hero's glory, not the robber's shame?
Shall thousands fall, and millions be undone,
To glut the hungry cruelty of one?

Behold, the plain with human gore grow red,
The swelling river heave along the dead.
See, through the breach the hostile deluge flow,
Along it bears the unresisting foe:

Hear, in each street the wretched virgin's cries,
Her lover sees her ravish'd as he dies.
The infant wonders at its mother's tears,
And smiling feels its fate before its fears.
Age, while in vain for the first blow it calls,
Views all its branches lopp'd before it falls.
Beauty betrays the mistress it should guard,
And, faithless, proves the ravisher's reward:
Death, their sole friend, relieves them from their ills
Their kindest victor he who soonest kills.

Could such exploits as these thy pride create?
Could these, O Philip's son, proclaim thee great?
Such honours Mahomet expiring craved,

Such were the trophies on his tomb engraved.
If greatness by these means may be possess'd,
Ill we deny it to the greater beast.

Single and arm'd by nature only, he

That mischief does, which thousands do for thee.

Not on such wings to fame did Churchill soar,
For Europe, while defensive arms he bore;
Whose conquests, cheap at all the blood they cost,
Saved millions by each noble life they lost.

Oh, name august! in capitals of gold,
In fame's eternal chronicle enroll'd!
Where Cæsar, viewing thee, ashamed withdraws,
And owns thee greater in a greater cause.
Thee, from the lowest depth of time, on high
Blazing, shall late posterity descry;

And own the purchase of thy glorious pains,
While Liberty, or while her name, remains.

But quit, great sir, with me this higher scene, And view false greatness with more awkward mien, For now, from camps to colleges retreat;

No cell, no closet here without the great.

See, how pride swells the haughty pedant's looks;
How pleased he smiles o'er heaps of conquer'd books.
Tully to him, and Seneca, are known,

And all their noblest sentiments his own.
These, on each apt occasion, he can quote;
Thus the false count affects the man of note,
Awkward and shapeless in a borrow'd coat.

Thro' books some travel, as thro' nations some, Proud of their voyage, yet bring nothing home. Critics thro' books, as beaus thro' countries stray, Certain to bring their blemishes away.