Whoever keeps an open ear
For tattlers, will be sure to hear
The trumpet of contention;
Aspersion is the babbler's trade,
To listen is to lend him aid,
And rush into dissention.
A Friendship, that in frequent fits
Of controversial rage emits
The sparks of disputation,
Like hand in hand insurance plates,
Most unavoidably creates
The thought of conflagration.
Some fickle creatures boast a soul
True as a needle to the pole,
Their humour yet so various-
They manifest their whole life through
The needle's deviations too,
Their love is so precarious.
The great and small but rarely meet
On terms of amity complete,
Plebeians must surrender,
And yield so much to noble folk,
It is combining fire with smoke,
Obscurity with splendour.
Some are so placid and serene
(As Irish bogs are always green)
They sleep secure from waking;
And are indeed a bog, that bears
Your unparticipated cares
Unmoved and without quaking.
Courtier and patriot cannot mix
Their heterogeneous politics
Without an effervescence,
Like that of salts with lemon juice,
Which does not yet like that produce
A friendly coalescence.
Religion should extinguish strife,
And make a calm of human life;
But friends that chance to differ
On points, which God has left at large,
How freely will they meet and charge,
No combatants are stiffer!
To prove at last my main intent
Needs no expense of argument,
No cutting and contriving-
Seeking a real friend we seem
To adopt the chymist's golden dream,
With still less hope of thriving.
Sometimes the fault is all our own,
Some blemish, in due time made known,
By trespass or omission;
Sometimes occasion brings to light
Our friend's defect, long hid from sight, And even from suspicion.
Then judge yourself, and prove your man As circumspectly as you can,
And having made election,
Beware no negligence of yours,
Such as a friend but ill endures,
Enfeeble his affection.
That secrets are a sacred trust,
That friends should be sincere and just,
That constancy befits them;
Are observations on the case,
That savour much of common-place,
And all the world admits them.
But 'tis not timber, lead, and stone,
An architect requires alone
To finish a fine building—
The palace were but half complete
If he could possibly forget
The carving and the gilding.
The man who hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves by thumps upon your back
How he esteems your merit,
Is such a friend, that one had need
Be very much his friend indeed
To pardon or to bear it.
As similarity of mind,
Or something not to be defined,
First fixes our attention;
So manners decent and polite
The same we practised at first sight
Must save it from declension.
Some act upon this prudent plan,
Say little and hear all you can.'
Safe policy, but hateful—
So barren lands imbibe the shower,
But render neither fruit nor flower,
Unpleasant and ungrateful.
The man I trust, if shy to me,
Shall find me as reserved as he,
No subterfuge or pleading
Shall win my confidence again,
I will by no means entertain
A spy on my proceeding.
These samples-for alas! at last
These are but samples, and a taste
Of evils yet unmentionedMay prove the task a task indeed, In which 'tis much if we succeed However well-intentioned.
Pursue the search, and you will find
Good sense and knowledge of mankind
To be at least expedient,
And after summing all the rest,
Religion ruling in the breast
A principal ingredient.
The noblest Friendship ever shown
The Saviour's history makes known,
Though some have turned and turned it ;'
And whether being crazed or blind,
Or seeking with a biassed mind,
Have not, it seems, discerned it.
Oh Friendship! if my soul forego
Thy dear delights while here below;
To mortify and grieve me,
May I myself at last appear
Unworthy, base, and insincere,
Or may my friend deceive me.
SUBJOINED TO THE YEARLY BILL OF MORTALITY OF THE PARISH OF ALL-SAINTS, NORTHAMPTON,
Pallida Mors aquo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas,
Regumque turres.
Pale death with equal foot strikes wide the door
Of royal halls, and hovels of the poor.
WHILE thirteen moons saw smoothly run
The Nen's barge-laden wave,
All these, life's rambling journey done,
Have found their home, the
Was man (frail always) made more frail
Than in foregoing years?
Did famine or did plague prevail,
That so much death appears?
No; these were vigorous as their sires,
Nor plague nor famine came;
This annual tribute death requires,
And never waves his claim.
Like crowded forest-trees we stand,
And some are marked to fall;
The axe shall smite at God's command,
And soon shall smite us all.
Green as the bay-tree, ever green,
With its new foliage on,
The gay, the thoughtless, I have seen-
I passed-and they were gone.
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