No more majestic Virgil's heights,
Nor tow'ring Milton's loftier flights,
Nor courtly Flaccus's rebukes,
Who banters vice with friendly jokes,
Nor Congreve's life, nor Cowley's fire,
Nor all the beauties that conspire
To place the greenest bays upon
Th' immortal brows of Addison;
Prior's inimitable ease,
Nor Pope's harmonious numbers please;
Homer indeed (for critics shew it)
Was both philosopher, and poet,
But tedious philosophic chapters
Quite stifle my poetic raptures,
And I to Phoebus bade adieu
When first I took my leave of you.
Now algebra, geometry,
Arithmetic, astronomy,
Optics, chronology, and statics,
All tiresome parts of mathematics;
With twenty harder names than these
Disturb my brain, and break my peace.
All seeming inconsistencies
Are nicely solv'd by a's, and b's;
Our eye-sight is disprov'd by prisms,
Our arguments by syllogisms.
If I shou'd confidently write
This ink is black, this paper white,
Or, to express myself yet fuller,
Shou'd say that black, or white's a colour;
They'd contradict it, and perplex one
With motion, rays, and their reflexion,
And solve th' apparent falsehood by
The curious texture of the eye.
Shou'd I the poker want, and take it,
When't looks as hot, as fire can make it,
And burn my finger, and my coat,
They'd flatly tell me, 'tis not hot;
The fire, say they, has in't, 'tis true,
The pow'r of causing heat in you;
But no more heat's in fire that heats you,
Than there is pain in stick that beats you.