Whom ties, nor human, nor divine can bind, 300 Alien from God, and foe to all mankind; Who spares no character; whose every word, Bitter as gall, and sharper than the sword, Cuts to the quick; whose thoughts with rancour swell; Whose tongue, on earth, performs the work of hell? If there be such a monster, the Reviews Shall find him holding forth against abuse: Attack profession!--'tis a deadly breach! The Christian laws another lesson teach:-- Unto the end shall Charity endure, 310 And Candour hide those faults it cannot cure. Thus Candour's maxims flow from Rancour's throat, As devils, to serve their purpose, Scripture quote. The Muse's office was by Heaven design'd To please, improve, instruct, reform mankind; To make dejected Virtue nobly rise Above the towering pitch of splendid Vice; To make pale Vice, abash'd, her head hang down, And, trembling, crouch at Virtue's awful frown. Now arm'd with wrath, she bids eternal shame, 320 With strictest justice, brand the villain's name; Now in the milder garb of ridicule She sports, and pleases while she wounds the fool. Her shape is often varied; but her aim, To prop the cause of Virtue, still the same. In praise of Mercy let the guilty bawl; When Vice and Folly for correction call, Silence the mark of weakness justly bears, And is partaker of the crimes it spares. But if the Muse, too cruel in her mirth, 330 With harsh reflections wounds the man of worth; If wantonly she deviates from her plan, And quits the actor to expose the man;[91] Ashamed, she marks that passage with a blot, And hates the line where candour was forgot. But what is candour, what is humour's vein, Though judgment join to consecrate the strain, If curious numbers will not aid afford, Nor choicest music play in every word? Verses must run, to charm a modern ear, 340 From all harsh, rugged interruptions clear. Soft let them breathe, as Zephyr's balmy breeze, Smooth let their current flow, as summer seas; Perfect then only deem'd when they dispense A happy tuneful vacancy of sense. Italian fathers thus, with barbarous rage, Fit helpless infants for the squeaking stage; Deaf to the calls of pity, Nature wound, And mangle vigour for the sake of sound. Henceforth farewell, then, feverish thirst of fame; 350 Farewell the longings for a poet's name; Perish my Muse--a wish 'bove all severe To him who ever held the Muses dear-- If e'er her labours weaken to refine The generous roughness of a nervous line. Others affect the stiff and swelling phrase; Their Muse must walk in stilts, and strut in stays; The sense they murder, and the words transpose, Lest poetry approach too near to prose. See tortured Reason how they pare and trim, 360 And, like Procrustes, stretch, or lop the limb. Waller! whose praise succeeding bards rehearse, Parent of harmony in English verse,