And farther, farther still our wishes flew;
But oh! those hopes are o'er ; and, grief to say,
Superior gravity has gain'd the day.
Yet tax not us, Tragedians; tax not those
Who never can be real merit's foes;
We grudge you neither refuge nor applause,
Yourselves forbid, yourselves your absence cause.
The fatal cause is fatal excellence,
'Tis your own Santlow banishes you hence;
For should she hither all her beauties bring,
Nothing but her each youthful tongue would sing;
Learning less fair would shine; and every Muse,
For brighter beauties scorn'd, her lover lose.
Should Oldfield then, the bright-eyed Oldfield join,
Her complicated charms, her form divine;
Should she, like Hector's widow, as of late,
Mourn her Astyanax's double fate;
All, all would love her like Achilles's son,
All would like him be taken, and undone.
'Tis said young Ammon, when return'd from war,
Was with an eunuch's action ta'en so far,
That, spite of royalty, he leap'd for joy,
Leap'd from his throne, and kiss'd the servile boy.
Oh could he but have seen upon the stage
Oldfield in the forsaken Loveit rage;
Struck with the sight, the son of Libyan Jove
From admiration soon had rose to love;
A warmer kiss had given the nuptial sign,
And all Statira's conqueror been thine.
And yet, with all their beauties, all their care,
Nor Santlow, Wilks, nor Oldfield, please the fair.
Bless'd with their praise, Italian songsters thrive,
A beaver-race, that geld themselves to live.
Strange force of whimsy! that the fair should prize
A warbling vagabond whom all despise !
Ev'n to himself of old an eunuch seem'd
Worse than a beast, though now so much esteem'd;
So frogs by Frenchmen are as dainties stew’d,
And what was Egypt's plague is France's food.
How odd the fancy, how absurd the sight!
To see that Hercules, who in one night
Full fifty dames in heat of blood contented,
Now by a sapless gelding represented;
With greater justice from the Lydian queen,
Since dwindled from a man, he learn'd to spin.
For loftier lays, and nobler chiefs than these,
Th' ingenious Builder rais'd his edifice;
The architect, whose every work proclaims
The Terence and Vitruvius of his times;
The builder-but a noble structure's praise,
A nobler architect, commands my praise,
A Princess, who, by righteous arms abroad,
At home by fifty temples rais'd to God,
At once the French and Stygian tyrant braves,
At once the christian and the subject saves.
Ilus's niggard son, to raise his Troy, The Gods and great Alcides did employ; That done, ungrateful grew, nor would defray His hero and the hireling powers their pay; But our more pious Princess, who no less From Heaven and Marlborough has deriv'd success, By giving Blenheim and these piles, has given Their just rewards to Hercules and Heaven.
ACTING, dear Thornton, its perfection draws
From no observance of mechanic laws;
No settled maxims of a fav'rite stage,
No rules deliver'd down from age to age,
Let players nicely mark them as they will,
Can e'er entail hereditary skill.
If, 'mongst the humble hearers of the pit,
Some curious vet'ran critic chance to sit,
Is he pleas'd more because 'twas acted so
By Booth and Cibber thirty years ago?
The mind recals an object held more dear,
And hates the copy, that it comes so near:
Why lov'd we Wilks's air, Booth's nervous tone;
In them 'twas natural, 'twas all their own.
A Garrick's genius must our wonder raise,
But gives his mimic no reflected praise.
Thrice happy Genius, whose unrival'd name
Shall live for ever in the voice of Fame!
'Tis thine to lead, with more than magic skill,
The train of captive passions at thy will;
To bid the bursting tear spontaneous flow
In the sweet sense of sympathetic woe:
Through ev'ry vein I feel a chillness creep,
When horrors such as thine have murder'd sleep:
And at the old man's look and frantic stare
'Tis Lear alarms me, for I see him there.
Nor yet confin'd to tragic walks alone,
The comic muse too claims thee for her own.
With each delightful requisite to please,
Taste, spirit, judgment, elegance, and ease,
Familiar nature forms thy only rule,
From Ranger's rake to Drugger's vacant fool :
With powers so pliant, and so various blest,
That what we see the last, we like the best.
Not idly pleas'd, at judgment's dear expence,
But burst outrageous with the laugh of sense.
Perfection's top, with weary toil and pain,
'Tis genius only that can hope to gain.
The play'r's profession (tho' I hate the phrase,
'Tis so mechanic in these modern days)
Lies not in trick, or attitude, or start,
Nature's true knowledge is his only art.
The strong-felt passion bolts into the face,
The mind untouch'd, what is it but grimace?
To this one standard make your just appeal,
Here lies the golden secret; learn to FEEL.
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