e,
Hibernia was my favourite isle;
Now his--for he succeeds to me,
Two angels cannot more agree.
His joy is, to relieve the poor;
Behold them weekly at his door!
His knowledge too, in brightest rays,
He like the sun to all conveys,
Shows wisdom in a single page,
And in one hour instructs an age
When ruin lately stood around
Th'enclosures of my sacred ground,
He gloriously did interpose,
And saved it from invading foes;
For this I claim immortal Swift
As my own son, and Heaven's best gift.
The Caledonian saint, enraged,
Now closer in dispute engaged.
Essays to prove, by transmigration,
The Dean is of the Scottish nation;
And, to confirm the truth, he chose
The loyal soul of great Montrose;
"Montrose and he are both the same,
They only differ in the name:
Both heroes in a righteous cause,
Assert their liberties and laws;
He's now the same Montrose was then,
But that the sword is turn'd a pen,
A pen of so great power, each word
Defends beyond the hero's sword."
Now words grew high--we can't suppose
Immortals ever come to blows,
But lest unruly passion should
Degrade them into flesh and blood,
An angel quick from Heaven descends,
And he at once the contest ends:
"Ye reverend pair, from discord cease,
Ye both mistake the present case;
One kingdom cannot have pretence
To so much virtue! so much sense!
Search Heaven's record; and there you'll find
That he was born for all mankind."
AN EPISTLE TO ROBERT NUGENT, ESQ.[1]
WITH A PICTURE OF DR. SWIFT. BY WILLIAM DUNKIN, D.D.
To gratify thy long desire,
(So love and piety require,)
From Bindon's colours you may trace
The patriot's venerable face.
The last, O Nugent! which his art
Shall ever to the world impart;
For know, the prime of mortal men,
That matchless monarch of the pen,
(Whose labours, like the genial sun,
Shall through revolving ages run,
Yet never, like the sun, decline,
But in their full meridian shine,)
That ever honour'd, envied sage,
So long the wonder of the age,
Who charm'd us with his golden strain,
Is not the shadow of the Dean:
He only breathes Boeotian air--
"O! what a falling off was there!"
Hibernia's Helicon is dry,
Invention, Wit, and Humour die;
And what remains against the storm
Of Malice but an empty form?
The nodding ruins of a pile,
That stood the bulwark of this isle?
In which the sisterhood was fix'd
Of candid Honour, Truth unmix'd,
Imperial Reason, Thought profound,
And Charity, diffusing round
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