SATYR.
89
To hang so dull a Clog upon his Wit,
And make his Reason to his Rhime submit.
Without this Plague, I freely might have spent
60 My happy Days with Leisure and Content;
Had nothing in the World to do, or think,
Like a fat Priest, but whore, and eat, and drink;
Had past my Time as pleasantly away,
Slept all the Night, and loiter'd all the Day.
65 My Soul, that's free from Care, and Fear, and Hope,
Knows how to make her own Ambition stoop,
T'avoid uneasy Greatness, and Resort,
Or for Preferment following the Court.
How happy had I been, if, for a Curse,
70 The Fates had never sentenc'd me to Verse?
But, ever since this peremptory Vein
With restless Frenzy first possess'd my Brain,
And that the Devil tempted me, in spite
Of my own Happiness, to judge, and write,
75 Shut up against my Will, I waste my Age
In mending this, and blotting out that Page;
And grow so weary of the slavish Trade,
I envy their Condition, that write bad.
O happy Scudery! whose easy Quill
80 Can, once a Month, a mighty Volume fill.
And make his Reason to his Rhime submit.
Without this Plague, I freely might have spent
60 My happy Days with Leisure and Content;
Had nothing in the World to do, or think,
Like a fat Priest, but whore, and eat, and drink;
Had past my Time as pleasantly away,
Slept all the Night, and loiter'd all the Day.
65 My Soul, that's free from Care, and Fear, and Hope,
Knows how to make her own Ambition stoop,
T'avoid uneasy Greatness, and Resort,
Or for Preferment following the Court.
How happy had I been, if, for a Curse,
70 The Fates had never sentenc'd me to Verse?
But, ever since this peremptory Vein
With restless Frenzy first possess'd my Brain,
And that the Devil tempted me, in spite
Of my own Happiness, to judge, and write,
75 Shut up against my Will, I waste my Age
In mending this, and blotting out that Page;
And grow so weary of the slavish Trade,
I envy their Condition, that write bad.
O happy Scudery! whose easy Quill
80 Can, once a Month, a mighty Volume fill.
