"'Tis said, that woman prone to changing, Thro' all the rounds of folly ranging, On life's uncertain ocean riding, No reason, rule, nor rudder guiding, Is like the comet's wand'ring light, Eccentric, ominous, and bright; Tractless and shifting as the wind, A sea whose fathom none can find; A moon, still changing and revolving, A riddle, past all human solving; A bliss, a plague, a heav'n, a hell, A----something, that no man can tell. "Now learn a secret from a friend, But keep your counsel and attend: "Tho' in their tempers thought so distant, Nor with their sex, nor selves consistent, 'Tis but the diff'rence of a name, And ev'ry woman is the same. For as the world, however vary'd, And thro' unnumber'd changes carry'd, Of elemental modes and forms, Clouds, meteors, colours, calms, and storms; Tho' in a thousand suits array'd, Is of one subject matter made; So, sir, a woman's constitution, The world's enigma, finds solution. And let her form be what you will, I am the subject essence still. "With the first spark of female sense, The speck of being, I commence; Within the womb make fresh advances, And dictate future qualms and fancies; Thence in the growing form expand, With childhood travel hand in hand, And give a taste of all their joys, In gewgaws, rattles, pomp, and noise. "And now, familiar and unaw'd, I send the flutt'ring soul abroad; Prais'd for her shape, her air, her mien, The little goddess, and the queen, Takes at her infant shrine oblation, And drinks sweet draughts of adulation. "Now, blooming, tall, erect, and fair, To dress becomes her darling care; The realms of beauty then I bound, I swell the hoop's enchanted round; Shrink in the waist's descending size, Heav'd in the snowy bosom rise, High on the floating lappet sail, Or curl'd in tresses kiss the gale. Then to her glass I lead the fair, And shew the lovely idol there, Where, struck as by divine emotion, She bows with most sincere devotion; And numb'ring ev'ry beauty o'er, In secret bids the world adore. "Then all for parking and parading, Coqueting, dancing, masquerading; For balls, plays, courts, and crowds, what passion! And churches, sometimes, if the fashion: For woman's sense of right and wrong Is rul'd by the almighty throng; Still turns to each meander tame, And swims the straw of ev'ry stream. Her soul intrinsic worth rejects, Accomplish'd only in defects, Such excellence is her ambition, Folly her wisest acquisition; And ev'n from pity and disdain, She'll cull some reason to be vain. "Thus, sir, from ev'ry form and feature, The wealth and wants of female nature, And ev'n from vice, which you'd admire, I gather fuel to my fire, And on the very base of shame, Erect my monument of fame.