Fevers, fo hot that one would fay

Thou might'ft as foon hell-fires allay
(The damn'd scarce more incurable than they)
Thou dost so temper, that we find,

Like gold, the body but refin'd,
No unhealthful drofs behind.

The subtle Ague, that for fureness' fake
Takes its own times th' affault to make,

And at each battery the whole fort does shake,
When thy ftrong guards, and works, it spies,
Trembles for itself, and flies.

The cruel Stone, that restless pain,

That's fometimes roll'd away in vain,

But ftill, like Syfiphus's ftone, returns again,
Thou break'st and meltest by learn'd juices' force
(A greater work, though short the way appear,
Than Hannibal's by vinegar!)

Oppreffed Nature's neceflary courfe

It stops in vain; like Mofes, thou Strik'ft but the rock, and strait the waters freely flow.

The Indian fon of Luft (that foul disease

Which did on this his new-found world but lately feize,

Yet fince a tyranny has planted here,

As wide and cruel as the Spaniard there)

Is fo quite rooted-out by thee,

That thy patients feem to be

Reftor'd not to health only, but virginity.

The

The Plague itself, that proud imperial ill,
Which deftroys towns, and does whole armies kill,
If thou but fuccour the befieged heart,
Calls all its poisons forth, and does depart,

As if it fear'd no less thy art,

Than Aaron's incenfe, or than Phineas' dart.
What need there here repeated be by me
The vast and barbarous lexicon

Of man's infirmity?

At thy ftrong charms it must be gone Though a disease, as well as devil, were called Legion.

From creeping mofs to foaring cedar thou
Doft all the powers and several portions know,
Which father-Sun, and mother-Earth below,
On their green infants here beftow :

Canft all those magic virtues from them draw,
That keep Disease and Death in awe;

Who, whilst thy wondrous skill in plants they see,
Fear left the tree of life should be found out by thee.
And thy well-travel'd knowledge, too, does give
No lefs account of th' empire fenfitive;
Chiefly of man, whose body is

That active soul's metropolis.

As the great artist in his sphere of glass
Saw the whole fcene of heavenly motions pafs;
o chou know'ft all fo well that 's done within,
As if fome living crystal man thou 'dft seen.

Nor does this fcience make thy crown alone,
But whole Apollo is thine own;
His gentler arts, belov'd in vain by me,
Are wedded and enjoy'd by thee.
Thou 'rt by this noble mixture free
From the phyficians' frequent malady,

Fantaftic incivility:

There are who all their patients' chagrin have,
As if they took each níorn worse potions than they gave,

And this great race of learning thou haft run,

Ere that of life be half yet done;

Thou fee'ft thyself still fresh and strong,
And like t' enjoy thy conquefts long.
The first fam'd aphorifm thy great master spoke,
Did he live now he would revoke,

And better things of man report ;

For thou doft make Life long, and Art but short.
Ah, learned friend! it grieves me, when I think
That thou with all thy art must die,

As certainly as I;

And all thy noble reparations fink

Into the fure-wrought mine of treacherous mortality.
Like Archimedes, honourably in vain,

Thou hold 'ft out towns that must at laft be ta'en,
And thou thyself, their great defender, flain.
Let's e'en compound, and for the prefent live,

'Tis all the ready-money Fate can give ;

Unbend

Unbend sometimes thy reftlefs care,
And let thy friends so happy be

T' enjoy at once their health and thee:
Some hours, at leaft, to thine own pleasures spare:
Since the whole ftock may foon exhaufted be,

Beftow 't not all in charity.

Let Nature and let Art do what they please,
When all 's done, Life is an incurable disease.

LIFE AND FAME.

OH, Life! thou Nothing's younger brother!

So like, that one might take one for the other
What's fomebody, or nobody?

In all the cobwebs of the fchoolmen's trade,
We no fuch nice diftinction woven fee,
As 'tis "to be," or "not to be."

Dream of a fhadow! a reflection made
From the falfe glories of the gay reflected bow,
Is a more folid thing than thou.

Vain, weak-built ifthmus, which doft proudly rife

Up betwixt two eternities !

Yet canft nor waye nor wind fuftain,

But, broken and o'erwhelm'd, the endlefs oceans meet

again.

And with what rare inventions do we strive

Ourselves then to survive?

Wife, fubtle arts, and such as well befit
That Nothing Man's no wit!-

Some with vast coftly tombs would purchase it,
And by the proofs of death pretend to live.

"Here lies the great"-false marble! where ?
Nothing but small and fordid duft lies there.—
Some build enormous mountain-palaces,
The fools and architects to please ;
A lafting life in well-hewn ftone they rear:
So he, who on th' Egyptian fhore

Was flain fo many hundred years before,
Lives still (oh Life! moft happy and most dear!
Oh Life! that epicures envy to hear!)

Lives in the dropping ruins of his amphitheatre.

His father-in-law an higher place does claim
In the feraphic entity of fame;

He, fince that toy his death,

Does fill all mouths, and breathes in all men's breath. 'Tis true, the two immortal fyllables remain;

But oh, ye learned men! explain

What effence, what existence, this,

What fubftance, what fubfiftence, what hypoftafis,

In six poor letters is!

In those alone does the great Cæfar live,

'Tis all the conquer'd world could give.
We Poets, madder yet than all,

With a refin'd fantastic vanity,

Think we not only have, but give, eternity,
Fain would I fee that prodigal,

Who