Whilft other maids a fhameless path pursue,
Neither to int'reft, nor to honour true,

And proud to fwell the triumph of their eyes,
Exult in love from lovers they despise;

Their maxims all revers'd I mean to prove,
And though I like the lover, quit the love.

EPISTLES

In the Manner of O v I D.

MONIMIA to PHILOCLES.

By the Same:

INCE language never can describe my pain,

SIN

How can I hope to move when I complain?

But fuch is woman's frenzy in distress,

We love to plead, tho' hopeless of redress.

Perhaps, affecting ignorance, thou'lt fay,

From whence these lines? whose message to convey ?
Mock not my grief with that feign'd cold demand,
Too well you know the hapless writer's hand:
But if you force me to avow my shame,
Behold it prefac'd with Monimia's name.
Loft to the world, abandon'd and forlorn,
Expos'd to infamy, reproach, and scorn,

Το

To mirth and comfort loft, and all for you,
Yet loft, perhaps, to your remembrance too,
How hard my lot! what refuge can I try,
Weary of life, and yet afraid to die!
Of hope, the wretch's laft resort, bereft,
By friends, by kindred, by my lover, left.
Oh! frail dependence of confiding fools!
On lovers oaths, or friendship's facred rules
How weak in modern hearts, too late I find,
Monimia's faln, and Philocles unkind!
To these reflections, each flow wearing day,
And each revolving night a conftant prey,
Think what I fuffer, nor ungentle hear
What madness dictates in my fond defpair;
Grudge not this fhort relief, (too faft it flies)
Nor chide that weakness I myfelf despise.
One moment fure may be at least her due,
Who facrific'd her all of life for you.
Without a frown this farewel then receive,
For, 'tis the laft my hapless love fhall give;
Nor this I wou'd, if reafon cou'd command,
But what reftriction réins a lover's hand?
Nor prudence, fhame, nor pride, nor int'reft fways,
The hand implicitly the heart obeys :

Too well this maxim has my conduct fhewn,
Too well that conduct to the world is known.
Oft have I writ, and often to the flame
Condemn'd this after-witness of my fhame;

F 2

Oft

Oft in my cooler recollected thought,

Thy beauties, and my fondness half forgot, (How short those intervals for reason's aid!) Thus to myself in anguish have I said.

Thy vain remonstrance, foolish maid, give o'er,
Who act the wrong, can ne'er that wrong deplore.
Then fanguine hopes again delufive reign,

I form'd thee melting, as I tell my pain.
If not of rock thy flinty heart is made,
Nor tygers nurs'd thee in the desart shade,
Let me at least thy cold compaffion prove,
That flender fuftenance of greedy love:
Tho' no return my warmer wishes find,
Be to the wretch, tho' not the mistress, kind;
Nor whilft I court my melancholy state,

Forget 'twas love, and thee, that wrought my fate.
Without restraint habituate to range

The paths of pleasure; can I bear this change?
Doom'd from the world unwilling to retire,
In bloom of life, and warm with young defire,
In lieu of roofs with regal splende gay,
Condemn'd in diftant wilds to drag the day;
Where beafts of prey maintain their favage court,
Or human brutes (the worst of brutes) resort.
Yes, yes, the change I cou'd unfighing fee,
For none I mourn, but what I find in thee,
There center all my woes, thy heart estrang'd,
I weep my lover, not my fortune, chang'd;

Blefs'

Blefs'd with thy prefence, I could all forget,
Nor gilded palaces in huts regret,

But exil'd thence, fuperfluous is the rest,
Each place the fame, my hell is in my breaft;
To pleasure dead, and living but to pain,
My only fenfe to fuffer, and complain.

As all my wrongs distressful I repeat,

Say, can thy pulse with equal cadence beat?

Can'ft thou know peace? is conscience mute within?

That upright delegate for fecret fin;

my part

?

Is nature fo extinguish'd in thy heart,
That not one spark remains to take
Not one repentant throb, one grateful figh?
Thy breast unruffled, and unwet thy eye?
Thou cool betrayer, temperate in ill!

Thou nor remorfe, nor thought humane can't feel:
Nature has form'd thee of the rougher kind,
And education more debas'd thy mind,

Born in an age when guilt and fraud prevail,
When Justice fleeps, and Int'reft holds the scale;
Thy loose companions a licentious crew,
Moft to each other, all to us untrue,

Whom chance, or habit mix, but rarely choice,
Nor leagu'd in friendship, but in focial vice,
Who indigent of honour, or of shame,
Glory in crimes which others blush to name;
By right or wrong difdaining to be mov'd,
Unprincipled, unloving, and unlov'd.

The fair who trufts their prostituted vows,
If not their falfhood, ftill their boasts expose;
Nor knows the wifeft to elude the harm,

Ev'n fhe whose prudence fhuns the tinsel charm
They know to flander, though they fail to warm:
They make her languish in fictitious flame,
Affix fome fpecious flander on her name,
And baffled by her virtue, triumph o'er her fame.
Thefe are the leaders of thy blinded youth,
These vile feducers laugh'd thee out of truth;
Whofe fcurril jefts all folemn ties profane,
Or Friendship's band, or Hymen's facred chain;
Morality as weakness they upbraid,

Nor even revere Religion's hallow'd head;
Alike they spurn divine and human laws,
And treat the honeft like the chriftian cause.
Curfe on that tongue whofe vile pernicious art
Delights the ear but to corrupt the heart,
That takes advantage of the chearful hour,
When weaken'd Virtue bends to Nature's pow'r,
And would the goodness of the foul efface,
To fubftitute dishonour in her place.

With fuch you lose the day in false delights,
In lewd debauch you revel out the nights,
(O fatal commerce to Monimia's peace!)
Their arguments convince because they please;
Whilft fophiftry for reason they admit,
And wander dazzled by the glare of wit,