Poetical Works of John Oldham/Counterpart to the Satire against Virtue
PARDON me, Virtue, whatsoe'er thou art,
(For sure thou of the godhead art a part,
And all that is of him must be
The very deity)
Pardon, if I in aught did thee blaspheme,
Or injure thy pure sacred name:
Accept unfeigned repentance, prayers, and vows,
The best atonement of my penitent humble muse,
The best that heaven requires, or mankind can produce.
All my attempts hereafter shall at thy devotion be,
Ready to consecrate my ink and very blood to thee.
Forgive me, ye blest souls that dwell above,
Where you by its reward the worth of virtue prove;
Forgive, if you can do't, who know no passion now but love.
And you unhappy, happy few,
Who strive with life, and human miseries below,
Forgive me too,
If I in aught disparaged them, or else discouraged you.
2
Does to our fallen race restore
All that in Paradise we lost, and more;
Lifts us to heaven, and makes us be
The heirs and image of the deity.
Soft gentle yoke! which none but resty fools refuse,
Which before freedom I would ever choose.
Easy are all the bonds that are imposed by thee;
Easy as those of lovers are,
(If I with aught less pure may thee compare)
Nor do they force, but only guide our liberty.
By such soft ties are spirits above confined;
So gentle is the chain which them to good does bind.
Sure card, whereby this frail and tottering bark we steer
Through life's tempestuous ocean here;
Through all the tossing waves of fear,
And dangerous rocks of black despair.
Safe in thy conduct, unconcerned we move,
Secure from all the threatening storms that blow,
From all attacks of chance below,
And reach the certain haven of felicity above.
3
And are by very age increased,
By which all other glories are defaced.
Thou'rt thy own dowry, and a greater far
Than all the race of womankind e'er brought,
Though each of them like the first wife were fraught,
And half the universe did for her portion share.
That tawdry sex, which giddy senseless we
Through ignorance so vainly deify,
Are all but glorious brutes when unendowed with thee.
'Tis vice alone, the truer jilt, and worse,
In whose enjoyment though we find
A flitting pleasure, yet it leaves behind
A pain and torture in the mind,
And claps the wounded conscience with incurable remorse,
Or else betrays us to the great trepans of human kind.
4
Whereby deposing reason from its gentle sway,
That rightful sovereign which we should obey,
We undergo a various tyranny,
And to unnumbered servile passions homage pay.
These with Egyptian rigour us enslave,
And govern with unlimited command;
They make us endless toil pursue,
And still their doubled tasks renew,
To push on our too hasty fate, and build our grave,
Or which is worse, to keep us from the promised land.
Nor may we think our freedom to retrieve,
We struggle with our heavy yoke in vain:
In vain we strive to break that chain,
Unless a miracle relieve;
Unless the Almighty wand enlargement give,
We never must expect delivery,
Till death, the universal writ of ease, does set us free.
5
Like Roman slaves condemned to th' mines;
These are in its harsh Bridewell lashed and punishèd,
And with harsh labour scarce can earn their bread.
Others, ambition, that imperious dame,
Exposes cruelly, like gladiators, here
Upon the world's great theatre.
Through dangers and through blood they wade to fame,
To purchase grinning honour and an empty name,
And some by tyrant lust are captive led,
And with false hopes of pleasure fed;
'Till, tired with slavery to their own desires,
Life's o'ercharg'd lamp goes out, and in a snuff expires.
6
The stratagems and artifice
Whereby she does attract her votaries:
All those allurements, and those charms,
Which pimp transgressors to her arms,
Are but foul paint, and counterfeit disguise,
To palliate her own concealed deformities,
And for false empty joys betray us to true solid harms.
In vain she would her dowry boast,
Which clogged, with legacies, we never gain,
But with invaluable cost;
Which got, we never can retain,
But must the greatest part be lost,
To the great bubbles, age or chance, again.
'Tis vastly over-balanced by the jointure which we make,
In which our lives, our souls, our all is set at stake.
Like silly Indians, foolish we
With a known cheat a losing traffic hold;
Whilst led by an ill-judging eye,
We admire a trifling pageantry,
And merchandize our jewels and our gold,
For worthless glass and beads, or an exchange's frippery,
If we a while maintain the expensive trade,
Such mighty impost on the cargo's laid,
Such a vast custom to be paid,
We're forced at last like wretched bankrupts to give out,
Clapped up by death, and in eternal durance shut.
7
What art thou, but an empty shade
By the reflection of our actions made?
Thou, unlike others, never followest us alive;
But, like a ghost, walkest only after we are dead.
Posthumous toy! vain after-legacy!
Which only ours can be,
When we ourselves no more are we!
Fickle as vain! who dost on vulgar breath depend,
Which we by dear experience find
More changeable, more veering than the inconstant wind.
What art thou, gold, that cheat'st the miser's eyes?
Which he does so devoutly idolize;
For whom he all his rest and ease does sacrifice?
'Tis use alone can all thy value give,
And he from that no benefit can e'er receive.
Cursed mineral! near neighbouring hell begot,
Which all the infection of thy damned neighbourhood hast brought;
Thou bawd to murders, rapes, and treachery,
And every greater name of villany;
From thee they all derive their stock and pedigree;
Thou the lewd world with all its crying crimes dost store,
And hardly wilt allow the devil the cause of more.
And what is pleasure, which does most beguile,
That syren which betrays us with a flattering smile?
We listen to the treacherous harmony,
Which sings but our own obsequy,
The danger unperceived till death draws nigh;
Till, drowning, we want power to 'scape the fatal enemy.
8
Who a perpetual surfeit will endure,
Who places all his chiefest happiness
In the extravagancies of excess,
Which wise sobriety esteems but a disease!
O mighty envied happiness to eat!
Which fond mistaken sots call great!
Poor frailty of our flesh! which we each day
Must thus repair for fear of ruinous decay!
Degrading of our nature, where vile brutes are fain
To make and keep up man!
Which, when the paradise above we gain,
Heaven thinks too great an imperfection to retain!
By each disease the sickly joy's destroyed;
At every meal it's nauseous, and is cloyed,
Empty at best, as when in dream enjoyed;
When, cheated by a slumbering imposture, we
Fancy a feast, and great regalios by;
And think we taste, and think we see,
And riot on imaginary luxury.
9
Grant me the better pleasures of the mind,
Pleasures, which only in pursuit of thee we find,
Which fortune cannot mar, nor chance destroy.
One moment in thy blessed enjoyment is
Worth an eternity of that tumultuous bliss,
Which we derive from sense,
Which often cloys, and must resign to impotence.
Grant me but this, how will I triumph in my happy state,
Above the chances and reverse of fate;
Above her favours and her hate.
I'll scorn the worthless treasures of Peru,
And those of the other Indies too;
I’ll pity Caesar's self, with all his trophies and his fame,
And the vile brutish herd of epicures contemn,
And all the under-shrievalties of life not worth a name;
Nor will I only owe my bliss,
Like others, to a multitude,
Where company keeps up a forcèd happiness;
Should all mankind surcease to live,
And none but individual I survive,
Alone I would be happy, and enjoy my solitude.
Thus shall my life in pleasant minutes wear,
Calm as the minutes of the evening are,
And gentle as the motions of the upper air;
Soft as my muse, and unconfined as she,
When flowing in the numbers of Pindaric liberty.
And when I see pale ghastly death appear,
That grand inevitable test which all must bear,
Which best distinguishes the blessed and wretched here,
I'll smile at all its horrors, court my welcome destiny,
And yield my willing soul up in an easy sigh;
And epicures that see shall envy and confess
That I, and those who dare like me be good, the chiefest good possess.
- ↑ Amongst the pieces published with the Satires on the Jesuits was a Pindaric ode, entitled A Satire against Virtue, followed by some verses designed as an apology for what might otherwise have appeared to imply a serious attack on morality and religion. In these verses, which he calls an epilogue, Oldham declares that he has been merely acting in masquerade, and that the true aim of his satire is to expose the vices of the age. He avows that his muse on this occasion had intentionally spoken like one who, by converse with bullies, had grown wicked, and 'learned the mode to cry all virtue down;' but that in future, should he continue to write, he will adopt a more direct and open course:—
’Though against virtue once he drew his pen,
He'll ne'er for aught, but her defence again.
Had he a genius and poetic rage,
Great as the vices of this guilty age,
Were he all gall, and armed with store of spite,
'Twere worth his gains to undertake to write;
To noble satire he'd direct his aim,
And by't mankind and poetry reclaim;
He'd shoot his quills, just like a porcupine,
At vice, and make them stab in every line;
The world should learn to blush.'
It must be confessed that the Satire against Virtue required, not an explanation, for its purpose is obvious enough, but an apology, such as Oldham had the good sense to publish along with it. In that apology there is a sufficient justification for the exclusion of the piece from this volume. If Oldham found it necessary to deprecate its coarseness at a time when no language was considered too gross for satire, there is still greater reason for rejecting it altogether in the present age. It may be inferred from the above Counterpart, published amongst his Remains, that had he lived to revise and collect his works, he would himself have cast out a foolish poem which he earnestly regretted having written. The satire itself comes strictly within Pope's censure. It is mere bald Billingsgate, and falls flat from the dead weight of its gratuitous extravagance. Oldham mistook his powers when he attempted a masquerade of this kind, which requires to be sustained by the play of covert wit. His strength was in the opposite direction; and he always succeeded best when he went straight to his object.