The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) Volume I.Cibber, Theophilus
General
The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) Volume I.
Cibber, Theophilus
Poets, English -- Biography -- Early works to 1800; Poets, Irish -- Biography -- Early works to 1800
The seventh and last of this book is a very just and humorous satire
against judicial astrology, which was probably in as high credit then,
as witchcraft was in the succeeding reign.
The first satire of the third book is a strong contrast of the
temperance and simplicity of former ages, with the luxury and
effeminacy of his own tines, which a reflecting reader would be apt to
think no better than the present. We find the good bishop supposes our
ancestors as poorly fed as Virgil's and Horace's rustics. He says,
with sufficient energy,
Thy grandsire's words favour'd of thrifty leekes,
Or manly garlicke; but thy furnace reekes
Hot steams of wine; and can a-loose descrie
The drunken draughts of sweet autumnitie.
The second is a short satire on erecting stately monuments to
worthless men. The following advice is nobly moral, the subsequent
sarcasm just and well expressed.
Thy monument make thou thy living deeds;
No other tomb than that true virtue needs.
What! had he nought whereby he might be knowne
But costly pilements of some curious stone?
The matter nature's, and the workman's frame;
His purse's cost: where then is Osmond's name?
Deserv'dst thou ill? well were thy name and thee,
Wert thou inditched in great secrecie.
The third gives an account of a citizen's feast, to which he was
invited, as he says,
With hollow words, and [2] overly request.
and whom he disappointed by accepting his invitation at once, and not
Maydening it; no insignificant term as he applies it: for, as he says,
Who looks for double biddings to a feast,
May dine at home for an importune guest.
After a sumptuous bill of fare, our author compares the great plenty
of it to our present notion of a miser's feast--saying,
Come there no more; for so meant all that cost;
Never hence take me for thy second host.
The fourth is levelled at Ostentation in devotion, or in dress. The
fifth represents the sad plight of a courtier, whose Perewinke, as
he terms it, the wind had blown off by unbonnetting in a salute, and
exposed his waxen crown or scalp. 'Tis probable this might be about
the time of their introduction into dress here. The sixth, which is a
fragment, contains a hyperbolical relation of a thirsty foul, called
Gullion, who drunk Acheron dry in his passage over it, and grounded
Charon's boat, but floated it again, by as liberal a stream of urine.
It concludes with the following sarcastical, yet wholesome irony.
Drinke on drie foule, and pledge Sir Gullion:
Drinke to all healths, but drink not to thyne owne.
The seventh and last is a humorous description of a famished beau, who
had dined only with duke Humfrey, and who was strangely adorned with
exotic dress.
To these three satires he adds the following conclusion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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