174 Whitford Another satirist, an amateur at the art of ridicule and rebuke, ordered his muse to Retail like Cumberland the holy writ, And bid the ten commandments pass for wit. 43 And still another wrote a piece of "Friendly Advice to Dr. C-mb-rl-d" in ballad metre, urging him to leave literary work for his trade of tailoring. Two typical stanzas are as follows: Phoebus, sworn foe to Midas' ears, Will thine most rudely pull, And when thy tragic strains he hears, Cry Thou'rt damnation dull. Minerva thinks 'tis her own owl, When thou attempt'st to soar; That arch-wag, Hermes, d-ns his soul, 'He ne'er saw such a bore. '" All this is genial pleasantry, neither pointless nor witless. But the best of satirical criticisms of Cumberland was one of^the eaJrliest, Goldsmith's in Retaliation. $$M Dr. Goldsmith characterized his fellow-dramatist as a "sweetbread" and then bestowed upon him this critical epi- taph: Here Cumberland lies, having acted his parts, The Terence of England, the mender of hearts; A flattering painter, who made it his care To draw men as they ought to be, not as they are. His gallants are all faultless, his women divine, And comedy wonders at being so fine; Like a tragedy queen he has dizen'd her out, Or rather like tragedy giving a rout. His fools have their follies so lost in a crowd Of virtues and feelings, that folly grows proud; And coxcombs, alike in their failings alone, Adopting his portraits, are pleas'd with their own. Say, where has our poet this malady caught? Or, wherefore his characters thus without fault? The New Foundling Hospital for Wit (London, 1784), I, 96; Bath', Its Beauties and Amusements by ". . . Ellis, Esq."
"Ibid., I, 111.
