ODEL (TO HIMSELF.) OME leave the loathed stage, And the more loathsome age; Where pride and impudence, in faction knit, Usurp the chair of wit! Indicting and arraigning every day, Something they call a play. Let their fastidious, vain Commission of the brain Run on and rage, sweat, censure and condemn; Say that thou pour'st them wheat, 'Twere simple fury still thyself to waste To offer them a surfeit of pure bread, No, give them grains their fill, If they love lees, and leave the lusty wine, No doubt some mouldy tale, 1 This Ode is prefaced with the following explanatory notice: "The just indignation the author took at the vulgar censure of his play, by some malicious spectators, begat this following Ode to himself." As the shrieve's crusts, and nasty as his fish- Thrown forth, and raked into the common tub, There, sweepings do as well For who the relish of these guests will fit, And much good do't you then : Can feed on orts; and, safe in your stage-clothes, The stagers and the stage-wrights too, your peers, With their foul comic socks, Which if they are torn, and turn'd, and patch'd enough, The gamesters share your gilt, and you their stuff. Leave things so prostitute, And take the Alcaic lute; Or thine own Horace, or Anacreon's lyre; And though thy nerves be shrunk, and blood be cold Strike that disdainful heat, As curious fools, and envious of thy strain, But when they hear thee sing His zeal to God, and his just awe o'er men: Feel such a flesh-quake to possess their powers In sound of peace or wars, No harp e'er hit the stars, In tuning forth the acts of his sweet reign; 2 This "strain of defiance," which is both vigorous and poetical, was not heard without impatience by some of the minor critics of the day, who took offence at its "arrogance," and retorted on the poet with more justice (it must be said) than humanity. The only piece on the subject, which is come down to us, is a kind of parody of the style and measure of the ode, by Owen Feltham, the author of the Resolves. Several of the first scholars of the time amused themselves with putting this ode into Latin verse. There is a translation by Randolph; and another by W. Strode, whom Oldys, in his MS. notes to Langbaine, calls, how correctly I know not, "the University Orator of Cambridge," is now before me, in the hand-writing of sir Kenelm Digby. The reader may take the two last stanzas as specimens of its latinity. Hæc conamina prostituta mitte, Alcaumque manu resume plectrum, Anacreonta, tuum Flaccum, simul igne calescas Contractusque licet nervis, et sanguine lentus, Indignante lyrå cie calorem: Sic tenta modulos ubique Victor, At quando audierint lyra accinentem Sanguine stent quassi, carnis tremor occupet artus, Seu pacem resonat, vel arma clangat, Quando gesta legent Caroli, currumque videbunt AN ANSWER TO THE ODE, Come leave the loathed Stage, &c. (BY OWEN FELTHAM.) OME leave this saucy way Dear for the sight of your declining wit : That a sale poet, just contempt once thrown, I wonder by what dower, Or patent, you had power From all to rape a judgment. Let 't suffice, As a Translator: But when things require Not kindled heretofore by others pains; And art to strike the white, As you have levell'd right: Yet if men vouch not things apocryphal, Jug, Pierce, Peck, Fly, and all Your jests so nominal, Are things so far beneath an able brain, As they do throw a stain Through all th' unlikely plot, and do displease As deep as Pericles, Where, yet, there is not laid Before a chambermaid Discourse so weigh'd as might have serv'd of old ledge, there are in plush who scorn to drudge Not only poets looser lines, but wits, A gift as rich, as high Is noble poesie : Yet though in sport it be for kings a play, Nor loose Anacreon Ere taught so bold assuming of the bays, To rail men into approbation, Is new to yours alone; And prospers not: for know, Fame is as coy, as you Can be disdainful; and who dares to prove And this more humorous strain, Where self-conceit, and choler of the blood Then if you please those raptures high to touch, Whereof you boast so much; And but forbear your crown, Till the world puts it on: No doubt from all you may amazement draw, 3 Whalley speaks somewhat slightly of Feltham: but his parody appears to me to have a considerable degree of merit, and its good sense and pertinacity cannot be denied. A little more mercy to the sick and sorrowful state of the declining poet would not have |