Classic Poem

Spoken by two young Ladies

Child! we must quit these visionary scenes,
And end our follies when we end our teens;
These bagatelles we must relinquish now,
And good matronic gentlewomen grow:
Fancy no more on airy wings shall rise,
We now must scold the maids, and make the pies;
Verse is a folly — we must get above it,
And yet I know not how it is — I love it.
Though we should still the rhyming trade pursue,
The men will shun us — and the women too:
The men, poor souls! of scholars are afraid,
We should not, did they govern, learn to read,
At least, in no abstruser volume look
Than the learned records — of a cookery-book;
The ladies too their well-meant censure give:
" What! — does she write? A slattern, as I live.
I wish she'd leave her books, and mend her clothes.
I thank my stars I know not verse from prose;
How well so'er these learned ladies write,
They seldom act the virtues they recite;
No useful qualities adorn their lives,
They make sad mothers, and still sadder wives."

I grant this satire just in former days,
When Sapphos and Corinnas tuned their lays,
But in our chaster times 'tis no offence,
When female virtue joins with female sense;
When moral Carter breathes the strain divine,
And Aikin's life flows faultless as her line;
When all-accomplished Montagu can spread
Fresh-gathered laurels round her Shakespeare's head;
When wit and worth in polished Brooke unite,
And fair Macaulay claims a Livy's right.

Thus far, to clear her from the sin of rhyme,
Our author bade me trespass on your time,
To show that, if she dares aspire to letters,
She only sins in common with her betters;
She bids me add — though Learning's cause I plead,
One virtuous sentiment, one generous deed,
Affords more genuine transport to the heart
Than genius, wit, or science can impart;
For these shall flourish, fearless of decay,
When wit shall fail, and science fade away.