IV.
Curst be the wretch! nay doubly curst!
(If it may lawful be
To curse our greatest enemy)
Who learn'd himself that heresy first
(Which since has seiz'd on all the rest)
That knowledge forfeits all humanity;
Taught us, like Spaniards, to be proud and poor,
And fling our scraps before our door!
Thrice happy you have 'scap'd this general pest;
Those mighty epithets, learn'd, good, and great,
Which we ne'er join'd before, but in romances meet,
We find in you at last united grown.
You cannot be compar'd to one:
I must, like him that painted Venus' face,
Borrow from every one a grace;
Virgil and Epicurus will not do,
Their courting a retreat like you,
Unless I put in Cæsar's learning too:
Your happy frame at once controls
This great triumvirate of souls.
V.
Let not old Rome boast Fabius's fate;
He sav'd his country by delays,
But you by peace.
You bought it at a cheaper rate;
Nor has it left the usual bloody scar,
To show it cost, its price in war;
War that mad game the world so loves to play,
And for it does so dearly pay;
For, though with loss, or victory, a while
Fortune the gamesters does beguile,
Yet at the last the box sweeps all away.
