Sir! you've obliged the British nation more Than all their bards could ever do before, And, at your own charge, monuments as hard As brass or marble to your fame have rear'd; For, as all warlike nations take delight To hear how their brave ancestors could fight, You have advanced to wonder their renown, 7 And no less virtuously improved your own; That 'twill be doubtful whether you do write, Or they have acted, at a nobler height. You of your ancient princes, have retrieved More than the ages knew in which they lived; Explain'd their customs and their rights anew, Better than all their Druids ever knew; Unriddled those dark oracles as well As those that made them could themselves foretell. For as the Britons long have hoped, in vain, Arthur would come to govern them again, You have fulfill'd that prophecy alone, And in your poem placed him on his throne. 20 Such magic power has your prodigious pen To raise the dead, and give new life to men, Make rival princes meet in arms and love, Whom distant ages did so far remove; For as eternity has neither past Nor future, authors say, nor first nor last, But is all instant, your eternal Muse All ages can to any one reduce. Then why should you, whose miracles of art Can life at pleasure to the dead impart, 30 Trouble in vain your better-busied head, T'observe what times they lived in, or were dead? For since you have such arbitrary power, It were defect in judgment to go lower, Or stoop to things so pitifully lewd, As use to take the vulgar latitude; For no man's fit to read what you have writ, That holds not some proportion with your wit; As light can no way but by light appear, He must bring sense that understands it here. 40 [1] 'The British Princes': an heroic poem, by the Hon. Edward Howard, was universally laughed at. See our edition of 'Butler.' TO A FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR, A PERSON OF HONOUR, WHO LATELY WRIT A RELIGIOUS BOOK, ENTITLED, 'HISTORICAL APPLICATIONS, AND OCCASIONAL MEDITATIONS, UPON SEVERAL SUBJECTS.'[1] Bold is the man that dares engage For piety in such an age! Who can presume to find a guard From scorn, when Heaven's so little spared? Divines are pardon'd; they defend Altars on which their lives depend; But the profane impatient are, When nobler pens make this their care; For why should these let in a beam Of divine light to trouble them, 10 And call in doubt their pleasing thought, That none believes what we are taught? High birth and fortune warrant give That such men write what they believe; And, feeling first what they indite, New credit give to ancient light. Amongst these few, our author brings His well-known pedigree from kings.[2] This book, the image of his mind, Will make his name not hard to find; 20 I wish the throng of great and good Made it less eas'ly understood!