Then talk with more authentic face Of unities, in time and place: Get scraps of Horace from your friends, And have them at your fingers' ends; Learn Aristotle's rules by rote, And at all hazards boldly quote; Judicious Rymer[10] oft review, Wise Dennis,[11] and profound Bossu.[12] Read all the prefaces of Dryden, For these our critics much confide in; Though merely writ at first for filling, To raise the volume's price a shilling. A forward critic often dupes us With sham quotations _peri hupsous_: And if we have not read Longinus, Will magisterially outshine us. Then, lest with Greek he overrun ye, Procure the book for love or money, Translated from Boileau's translation,[13] And quote quotation on quotation. At Will's you hear a poem read, Where Battus[14] from the table head, Reclining on his elbow-chair, Gives judgment with decisive air; To whom the tribe of circling wits As to an oracle submits. He gives directions to the town, To cry it up, or run it down; Like courtiers, when they send a note, Instructing members how to vote. He sets the stamp of bad and good, Though not a word be understood. Your lesson learn'd, you'll be secure To get the name of connoisseur: And, when your merits once are known, Procure disciples of your own. For poets (you can never want 'em) Spread through Augusta Trinobantum,[15] Computing by their pecks of coals, Amount to just nine thousand souls: These o'er their proper districts govern, Of wit and humour judges sovereign. In every street a city bard Rules, like an alderman, his ward; His undisputed rights extend Through all the lane, from end to end; The neighbours round admire his shrewdness For songs of loyalty and lewdness; Outdone by none in rhyming well, Although he never learn'd to spell. Two bordering wits contend for glory; And one is Whig, and one is Tory: And this, for epics claims the bays, And that, for elegiac lays: Some famed for numbers soft and smooth, By lovers spoke in Punch's booth; And some as justly fame extols For lofty lines in Smithfield drolls. Bavius[16] in Wapping gains renown, And Mævius[16] reigns o'er Kentish town: Tigellius[17] placed in Phooebus' car From Ludgate shines to Temple-bar: Harmonious Cibber entertains The court with annual birth-day strains; Whence Gay was banish'd in disgrace;[18] Where Pope will never show his face; Where Young must torture his invention To flatter knaves or lose his pension.[19] But these are not a thousandth part Of jobbers in the poet's art, Attending each his proper station, And all in due subordination, Through every alley to be found, In garrets high, or under ground; And when they join their pericranies, Out skips a book of miscellanies. Hobbes clearly proves, that every creature Lives in a state of war by nature.[20] The greater for the smaller watch, But meddle seldom with their match. A whale of moderate size will draw A shoal of herrings down his maw; A fox with geese his belly crams; A wolf destroys a thousand lambs;