Yet, if the goddess could be kind,
What endless raptures must he find!
And goddesses have now and then
Come down to visit mortal men;
To visit and to court them too:
A certain goddess, God knows who,
(As in a book he heard it read,)
Took Col'nel Peleus[6] to her bed.
But what if he should lose his life
By vent'ring on his heavenly wife!
(For Strephon could remember well,
That once he heard a school-boy tell,
How Semele,[7] of mortal race,
By thunder died in Jove's embrace.)
And what if daring Strephon dies
By lightning shot from Chloe's eyes!
While these reflections fill'd his head,
The bride was put in form to bed:
He follow'd, stript, and in he crept,
But awfully his distance kept.
Now, "ponder well, ye parents dear;"
Forbid your daughters guzzling beer;
And make them ev'ry afternoon
Forbear their tea, or drink it soon;
That, ere to bed they venture up,
They may discharge it ev'ry sup;
If not, they must in evil plight
Be often forc'd to rise at night.
Keep them to wholesome food confin'd,
Nor let them taste what causes wind:
'Tis this the sage of Samos means,
Forbidding his disciples beans.[8]
O! think what evils must ensue;
Miss Moll, the jade, will burn it blue;
And, when she once has got the art,
She cannot help it for her heart;
But out it flies, even when she meets
Her bridegroom in the wedding-sheets.
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