Alas! man makes that great which makes him little: I grant you in a church ’tis very well: What speaks of Heaven should by no means be brittle, But strong and lasting, till no tongue can tell Their names who rear’d it; but huge houses fit ill— And huge tombs worse—mankind, since Adam fell: Methinks the story of the tower of Babel Might teach them this much better than I’m able. Babel was Nimrod’s hunting-box, and then A town of gardens, walls, and wealth amazing, Where Nabuchadonosor, king of men, Reign’d, till one summer’s day he took to grazing, And Daniel tamed the lions in their den, The people’s awe and admiration raising; ’Twas famous, too, for Thisbe and for Pyramus, And the calumniated queen Semiramis. That injured Queen by chroniclers so coarse Has been accused (I doubt not by conspiracy) Of an improper friendship for her horse (Love, like religion, sometimes runs to heresy): This monstrous tale had probably its source (For such exaggerations here and there I see) In writing ‘Courser’ by mistake for ‘Courier:’ I wish the case could come before a jury here. But to resume,—should there be (what may not Be in these days?) some infidels, who don’t, Because they can’t find out the very spot Of that same Babel, or because they won’t (Though Claudius Rich, Esquire, some bricks has got, And written lately two memoirs upon’t), Believe the Jews, those unbelievers, who Must be believed, though they believe not you, Yet let them think that Horace has exprest Shortly and sweetly the masonic folly Of those, forgetting the great place of rest, Who give themselves to architecture wholly; We know where things and men must end at best: A moral (like all morals) melancholy, And ‘Et sepulchri immemor struis domos’ Shows that we build when we should but entomb us. At last they reach’d a quarter most retired, Where echo woke as if from a long slumber; Though full of all things which could be desired, One wonder’d what to do with such a number Of articles which nobody required; Here wealth had done its utmost to encumber With furniture an exquisite apartment, Which puzzled Nature much to know what Art meant. It seem’d, however, but to open on A range or suite of further chambers, which Might lead to heaven knows where; but in this one The movables were prodigally rich: Sofas ’twas half a sin to sit upon, So costly were they; carpets every stitch Of workmanship so rare, they made you wish You could glide o’er them like a golden fish. The black, however, without hardly deigning A glance at that which wrapt the slaves in wonder, Trampled what they scarce trod for fear of staining, As if the milky way their feet was under With all its stars; and with a stretch attaining A certain press or cupboard niched in yonder— In that remote recess which you may see— Or if you don’t the fault is not in me,—