Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/169

Take human life for your original,
Keep but your draughts to that, you'll never fail,
Sometimes in plays, though else but badly writ,
With nought of force or grace of art or wit,
Some one well-humoured character we meet,
That takes us more than all the empty scenes,
And jingling toys of more elaborate pens.
Greece had command of language, wit, and sense,
For cultivating which she spared no pains;
Glory her sole design, and all her aim
Was how to gain herself immortal fame.
Our English youth another way are bred,
They're fitted for apprenticeship and trade.
And Wingate's all the authors which they've read.
'The boy has been a year at writing school,
Has learned division and the golden rule;
Scholar enough!' cries the old doting fool,
'I'll hold a piece, he'll prove an Alderman,
And come to sit at church with 's furs and chain.'
This is the top design, the only praise,
And sole ambition of the booby race.
While this base spirit in the age does reign,
And men mind nought but wealth and sordid gain,
Can we expect or hope it should bring forth
A work in poetry of any worth,
Fit for the learnèd Bodley to admit
Among its sacred monuments of wit?
A poet should inform us, or divert,
But joining both he shows his chiefest art.
Whatever precepts you pretend to give,
Be sure to lay them down both clear and brief;
By that, they're easier far to apprehend,
By this, more faithfully preserved in mind;
All things superfluous are apt to cloy
The judgment, and surcharge the memory.
Let whatsoe'er of fiction you bring in,
Be so like truth, to seem at least skin;