Take courage, dear comrades, and be not afraid,
Nor slip this occasion to follow your trade;
My conscience is clear, and my spirits are calm,
And thus I go off, without prayer-book or psalm;
Then follow the practice of clever Tom Clinch,
Who hung like a hero, and never would flinch.
[Footnote 1: A cant word for confessing at the gallows.--_F._]
[Footnote 2: The noted thief-catcher, under-keeper of Newgate, who was
the head of a gang of thieves, and was at last hanged as a receiver of
stolen goods. See Fielding's "Life of Jonathan Wild."--_W. E. B._]
DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE, WHILE HE WAS WRITING THE "DUNCIAD"
1727
POPE has the talent well to speak,
But not to reach the ear;
His loudest voice is low and weak,
The Dean too deaf to hear.
Awhile they on each other look,
Then different studies choose;
The Dean sits plodding on a book;
Pope walks, and courts the Muse.
Now backs of letters, though design'd
For those who more will need 'em,
Are fill'd with hints, and interlined,
Himself can hardly read 'em.
Each atom by some other struck,
All turns and motions tries;
Till in a lump together stuck,
Behold a poem rise:
Yet to the Dean his share allot;
He claims it by a canon;
That without which a thing is not,
Is _causa sine qua non_.
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