Their drefs, their courtly manners fee;
Reform your state, and copy me.

Seek ye to thrive? In flatt'ry deal,

Your fcorn, your hate, with that conceal;
Seem only to regard your friends,
But use them for your private ends,
Stint not to truth the flow of wit,
Be prompt to lye, whene'er 'tis fit;
Bend all your force to fpatter merit ;
Scandal is conversation's spirit;
Boldly to ev'ry thing pretend,

And men your talents shall commend;
I knew the Great. Obferve me right,
So fhall you grow like man polite.

He spoke and bow'd. With mutt'ring jaws
The wondring circle grinn'd applause.
Now warm with malice, envy, spite,
Their most obliging friends they bite,

And

And fond to copy human ways,

Practise new mischiefs all their days.

Thus the dull lad, too tall for school,

With travel finishes the fool,

Studious of ev'ry coxcomb's airs,

He drinks, games, dreffes, whores and fwears, O'erlooks with scorn all virtuous arts,

For vice is fitted to his parts,

FABLE

7 Wootton in

B Baronf

FABLE XV.

The PHILOSOPHER and the PHEASANTS.

HE Sage, awak'd at early day,

TH

Through the deep forest took his way;

Drawn by the mufick of the groves,

Along the winding gloom he roves;

4

From

From tree to tree, the warbling throats

Prolong the sweet alternate notes.

But where he past he terror threw,

The fong broke fhort, the warblers flew,
The thrushes chatter'd with affright,

And nightingales abhorr'd his fight;

All animals before him ran

To fhun the hateful fight of man.
Whence is this dread of ev'ry creature?
Fly they our figure or our nature?
As thus he walk'd in mufing thought,
His ear imperfect accents caught;
With cautious step he nearer drew,
By the thick shade conceal'd from view:
High on the branch a Pheasant stood,
Around her all her lift'ning brood,
Proud of the bleflings of her neft,
She thus a mother's care exprest.

No

No dangers here fhall circumvent,

Within the woods enjoy content.

Sooner the hawk or vulture truft

Than man; of animals the worst;
In him ingratitude you find,

A vice peculiar to the kind.

The sheep, whose annual fleece is dy'd,
To guard his health, and ferve his pride,
Forc'd from his fold and native plain,
Is in the cruel fhambles flain.

The swarms, who, with induftrious skill,
His hives with wax and honey fill,
In vain whole fummer days employ'd,
Their ftores are fold, the race destroy'd.
What tribute from the goofe is paid!

Does not her wing all science aid?

Does it not lovers hearts explain,

And drudge to raise the merchant's gain?