22

DON JUAN.

CANTO XV.

### XXXIV.

From these they will be careful to select,
For this an heiress, and for that a beauty;
For one a songstress who hath no defect,
For t'other one who promises much duty;
For this a lady no one can reject,
Whose sole accomplishments were quite a booty;
A second for her excellent connexions;
A third, because there can be no objections.

### XXXV.

When Rapp the Harmonist embargoed marriage (2)
In his harmonious settlement—(which flourishes
Strangely enough as yet without miscarriage,
Because it breeds no more mouths than it nourishes,
Without those sad expenses which disparage
What Nature naturally most encourages)—
Why call'd he “Harmony” a state sans wedlock?
Now here I have got the preacher at a dead lock.

CANTO XV.

DON JUAN.

23

### XXXVI.

Because he either meant to sneer at harmony
Or marriage, by divorcing them thus oddly.
But whether reverend Rapp learn'd this in Germany
Or no, 'tis said his sect is rich and godly,
Pious and pure, beyond what I can term any
Of ours, although they propagate more broadly.
My objection's to his title, not his ritual,
Although I wonder how it grew habitual.

### XXXVII.

But Rapp is the reverse of zealous matrons,
Who favour, malgré Malthus, generation—
Professors of that genial art, and patrons
Of all the modest part of propagation,
Which after all at such a desperate rate runs,
That half its produce tends to emigration,
That sad result of passions and potatoes—
Two weeds which pose our economic Catos.