Works

St. Patrick's Dean, your country's pride,
My early and my only guide,
Let me among the rest attend,
Your pupil and your humble friend,
To celebrate in female strains...

Of Chloe all the town has rung,
By ev'ry size of poets sung:
So beautiful a nymph appears
But once in twenty thousand years;
By Nature form'd with nicest care,
And faultless to a single hair....

Sir,

I thank you for your comedies.
I'll stay and read 'em now at home a-days,
Because Parcus wrote but sorrily
Thy notes, I'll read Lambinus thoroughly;
And then I shall be stoutly set a-gog...

Lindsay mistakes the matter quite,
And honest Paulus judges right.
Then, why these quarrels to the sun,
Without whose aid you're all undone?
Did Paulus e'er complain of sweat?...

The wise pretend to make it clear,
'Tis no great loss to lose an ear.
Why are we then so fond of two,
When by experience one would do?
'Tis true, say they, cut off the head,...

A few of the first lines were wanting in the copy sent us by a friend of the Author's from London. - Dublin Edition.

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PREFACE
...

Inscribed To Lord Carteret[1] (Verses Written During Lord Carteret's Administration Of Ireland)
1724

Gratior et pulcro veniens in corpore virtus. - VIRG., Aen., v, 344.
...

PART OF A SUMMER SPENT AT GAULSTOWN HOUSE,
THE SEAT OF GEORGE ROCHFORT, ESQ.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

The Baron, Lord Chief Baron Rochfort.
George, his eldest son....

With a whirl of thought oppress'd,
I sunk from reverie to rest.
An horrid vision seized my head;
I saw the graves give up their dead!
Jove, arm'd with terrors, bursts the skies,...

James Brydges[1]and the Dean had long been friends;
James is beduked; of course their friendship ends:
But sure the Dean deserves a sharp rebuke,
For knowing James, to boast he knows the duke....

TO THOMAS SHERIDAN

SIR,
I cannot but think that we live in a bad age,
O tempora, O mores! as 'tis in the adage.
My foot was but just set out from my cathedral,...

The nymph who wrote this in an amorous fit,
I cannot but envy the pride of her wit,
Which thus she will venture profusely to throw
On so mean a design, and a subject so low....

DOCTOR. Deaf, giddy, helpless, left alone.
ANSWER. Except the first, the fault's your own.
DOCTOR. To all my friends a burden grown.
ANSWER. Because to few you will be shewn....

On rainy days alone I dine
Upon a chick and pint of wine.
On rainy days I dine alone,
And pick my chicken to the bone;
But this my servants much enrages,
No scraps remain to save board-wages....

I will not build on yonder mount;
And, should you call me to account,
Consulting with myself, I find
It was no levity of mind.
Whate'er I promised or intended,
No fault of mine, the scheme is ended;...

Given by O'Rourke, a powerful chieftain of Ulster in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, previously to his making a visit to her court. A song was composed upon the tradition of the feast, the fame of which having reached Swift, he w...

From Pliny, "Hist. Nat.," lib. x, 67; lib. xxix.

As mastiff dogs, in modern phrase, are
Call'd Pompey, Scipio, and Caesar;
As pies and daws are often styl'd
With Christian nicknames, like a child;...

When wise Lord Berkeley first came here,[1]
Statesmen and mob expected wonders,
Nor thought to find so great a peer
Ere a week past committing blunders.
Till on a day cut out by fate,...

Quoth the thief to the dog, let me into your door
And I'll give you these delicate bits.
Quoth the dog, I shall then be more villain than you're,
And besides must be out of my wits.
...