Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 4.djvu/23

Rh What! all our ſex in one ſad hour undone? Loſt are our arts, our learning, our renown Since nature’s tide of wit came rolling down. Keen were your eyes we knew, and ſure their darts; Fire to our ſoul they ſend, and paſſion to our heart! Needleſs was an addition to ſuch arms, When all mankind were vaſſals to your charms: That hand but ſeen, gives wonder and deſire, Snow to the ſight, but with its touches fire! Who ſees thy yielding Queen, and would not be On any terms, the beſt, the happy he; Entranced we fancy all is extaſy. Quote Ovid, now no more ye am’rous ſwains, Delia, than Ovid has more moving ſtrains. Nature in her alone exceeds all art, And nature ſure does neareſt touch the heart. Oh! might I call the bright diſcoverer mine, The whole fair ſex unenvied I’d reſign; Give all my happy hours to Delia’s charms, She who by writing thus our wiſhes warms, What worlds of love muſt circle in her arms?

They who had a regard for Mrs. Manley could not but obſerve with concern, that her conduct was ſuch, as would ſoon iſſue in her ruin. No language but flattery approached her ear; the Beaux told her, that a woman of her wit, was not to be confined to the dull formalities of her own ſex, but had a right to aſſume the unreſerved freedom of the male, ſince all things were pardonable to a lady, who knew to give laws to others, yet was not obliged to keep them herſelf. General Tidcomb, who ſeems to have been her ſincereſt friend, took the privilege of an old acquaintance to correct her ill taſte, and the wrong turn ſhe gave her judgment, in admitting adulation from ſuch wretches, whoſe