Proserpine.
Grub Street! thy fall should men and gods conspire,
Thy stage shall stand, insure it but from fire.
Another AEschylus appears! prepare
For new abortions, all ye pregnant fair!
In flames like Semele's, be brought to bed,
While op'ning hell spouts wildfire at your head.
"Now, Bavius, take the poppy from thy brow,
And place it here! here, all ye heroes, bow!
"This, this is he, foretold by ancient rhymes:
Th' Augustus born to bring Saturnian times.
Signs following signs lead on the mighty year!
See! the dull stars roll round, and reappear.
See, see, our own true Phoebus wears the bays!
Our Midas sit Lord Chancellor of plays!
On poets' tombs see Benson's titles writ!
Lo! Ambrose Philips is preferr'd for wit!
See under Ripley rise a new Whitehall,
While Jones' and Boyle's united labours fall:
While Wren with sorrow to the grave descends,
Gay dies unpension'd, with a hundred friends;
Hibernian politics, O Swift! thy fate;
And Pope's, ten years to comment and translate.
"Proceed, great days! 'till Learning fly the shore,
Till Birch shall blush with noble blood no more;
Till Thames see Eton's sons for ever play,
Till Westminster's whole year be holiday;
Till Isis' elders reel, their pupils' sport,
And Alma Mater lie dissolv'd in Port!
"Enough! enough! the raptur'd Monarch cries!
And through the iv'ry gate the vision flies."

In Book Fourth the goddess occupies her throne. All the rebellious and
hostile powers--wit, logic, rhetoric, morality, the muses--lie bound;
and diverse votaries of Dulness successively move into presence. The
first is OPERA, who puts Handel to flight. Then flow in a crowd of all
sorts. A part have been described:--

"Nor absent they, no members of her state,
Who pay her homage in her sons, the great;
Who false to Phoebus, bow the knee to Baal,
Or impious, preach his word without a call.
Patrons, who sneak from living worth to dead,
Withhold the pension, and set up the head;
Or vest dull Flattery in the sacred gown,
Or give from fool to fool the laurel crown;
And (last and worst) with all the cant of wit,
Without the soul, the Muse's hypocrite.
"There march'd the bard and blockhead side by side,
Who rhym'd for hire, and patroniz'd for pride.
Narcissus, prais'd with all a parson's power,
Look'd a white lily sunk beneath a shower.
There mov'd Montalto with superior air:
His stretc