Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/243

Rh But fifty guineas for a punk—good hap! The peer's well used, and comes off wondrous cheap; A poet would be dear, and out o’ th' way, Should he expect above a coachman's pay! For this will any dedicate, and lie, And daub the gaudy ass with flattery? For this will any prostitute his sense To coxcombs void of bounty as of brains? Yet such is the hard fate of writers now, They're forced for alms to each great name to bow; Fawn, like her lap-dog, on her tawdry Grace, Commend her beauty, and belie her glass, By which she every morning primes her face; Sneak to his Honour, call him witty, brave, And just, though a known coward, fool, or knave; And praise his lineage and nobility, Whose arms at first came from the Company. 'Tis so, 'twas ever so, since heretofore The blind old bard, with dog and bell before, Was fain to sing for bread from door to door: The needy muses all turned gipsies then, And of the begging trade e'er since have been. Should mighty Sappho in these days revive, And hope upon her stock of wit to live, She must to Creswell's trudge to mend her gains, And let her tail to hire, as well as brains. What poet ever fined for sheriff] or who By wit and sense did ever Lord Mayor grow? 'My own hard usage here I need not press, Where you have every day before your face Plenty of fresh resembling instances. Great Cowley's muse the same ill treatment had, Whose verse shall live for ever to upbraid The ungrateful world, that left such worth unpaid. Waller himself may thank inheritance For what he else had never got by sense.