As a fresh miss, by fancy, face, and gown,
Render'd the topping beauty of the town,
Draws every rhyming, prating, dressing sot,
To boast of favours that he never got;
Of which, whoe'er lacks confidence to prate,
Brings his good parts and breeding in debate;
And not the meanest coxcomb you can find,
But thanks his stars, that Phillis has been kind;
Thus prostitute my Congreve's name is grown
To every lewd pretender of the town.
Troth, I could pity you; but this is it,
You find, to be the fashionable wit;
These are the slaves whom reputation chains,
Whose maintenance requires no help from brains.
For, should the vilest scribbler to the pit,
Whom sin and want e'er furnish'd out a wit;
Whose name must not within my lines be shown,
Lest here it live, when perish'd with his own;[4]
Should such a wretch usurp my Congreve's place,
And choose out wits who ne'er have seen his face;
I'll bet my life but the dull cheat would pass,
Nor need the lion's skin conceal the ass;
Yes, that beau's look, that vice, those critic ears,
Must needs be right, so well resembling theirs.
Perish the Muse's hour thus vainly spent
In satire, to my Congreve's praises meant;
In how ill season her resentments rule,
What's that to her if mankind be a fool?
Happy beyond a private Muse's fate,
In pleasing all that's good among the great,[5]