Page:Satires, Epistles, Art of Poetry of Horace - Coningsby (1874).djvu/71

 Two hundred more, on rising from his cups? Like to Etruscan Cassius' stream of song, Which flowed, men say, so copious and so strong That, when he died, his kinsfolk simply laid His works in order, and his pyre was made. No; grant Lucilius arch, engaging, gay; Grant him the smoothest writer of his day; Lay stress upon the fact that he'd to seek In his own mind what others find in Greek; Grant all you please, in turn you must allow, Had fate postponed his life from then to now, He'd prune redundancies, apply the file To each excrescence that deforms his style, Oft in the pangs of labour scratch his head, And bite his nails, and bite them, till they bled. Oh yes! believe me, you must draw your pen Not once nor twice but o'er and o'er again Through what you've written, if you would entice The man that reads you once to read you twice, Not making popular applause your cue, But looking to fit audience, although few. Say, would you rather have the things you scrawl Doled out by pedants for their boys to drawl? Not I: like hissed Arbuscula, I slight Your hooting mobs, if I can please a knight.
 * Shall bug Pantilius vex me? shall I choke

Because Demetrius needs must have his joke Behind my back, and Fannius, when he dines With dear Tigellius, vilifies my lines? Mæcenas, Virgil, Varius, if I please