Classic Poem

In Ireland's wild, uncultivated plains,
Where torpid sloth, and foggy dulness reigns,
Full many a fen infests the putrid shore,
And many a gulph the melancholy moor.
Let not the stranger in these regions stray,
Dark is the sky, and perilous the way;
Beneath his foot-steps shakes the trembling ground,
Dense fogs and exhalations hover round,
And with black clouds the tender turf is crown'd.

Here shou'd'st thou rove, by Fate's severe command,
And safely reach the center of the land;
Thine eyes shall view, with horror and surprize,
The fane of Dulness, of enormous size,
Emerging from the sable cloud arise
A leaden tow'r upheaves its heavy head,
Vast leaden arches press the slimy bed,
The soft soil swells beneath the load of lead.
Old Matter here erected this abode,
At Folly's impulse, to the Slothful God.
And here the drone lethargic loves to stay,
Slumb'ring the dull, inactive hours away;
For still, unless by foreign force imprest,
The languid Goddess holds her state of rest.

Their habitation here those monsters keep,
Whom Matter father'd on the God of Sleep:
Here Zoilus, with cank'ring envy pale,
Here Maevius bids his brother Bavius, hail;
Spinoza, Epicure, and all those mobs
Of wicked wits, from Pyrrho down to Hobbes
How can the Muse recount the numerous crew
Of frequent fools that crowd upon the view?
Nor can learn'd Albion's sun that burns so clear,
Disperse the dulness that involves them here.
Baeotia thus remain'd, in days of yore,
Senseless and stupid, tho' the neighb'ring shore
Afforded salutary hellebore:
No cure exhal'd from Zephyr's buxom breeze,
That gently brush'd the bosom of the seas,
As oft to Lesbian fields he wing'd his way,
Fanning fair Flora, and in airy play
Breath'd balmy sighs, that melt the soul away

Behold that portico! how vast, how wide!
The pillars Gothic, wrought with barb'rous pride:
Four monstrous shapes before the portal wait,
Of horrid aspect, centry to the gate:
Lo! in the entrance, with disdainful eye,
In Logick's dark disguise, stands Sophistry:
Her very front would common sense confound,
Encompass'd with ten categories round:
She from Old Matter, the great mother, came,
By birth the eldest — and how like the dame!
Her shrivel'd skin, small eyes, prodigious pate,
Denote her shrewd, and subtle in debate:
This hand a net, and that sustains a club,
I' entangle her antagonist, or drub.
The spider's toils, all o'er her garment spread,
Imply the mazy errors of her head.
Behold her marching with funereal pace,
Slow as old Saturn rolls thro' boundless space,
Slow as the mighty mountains mov'd along,
When Orpheus rais'd the lyre-attended song:
Or, as at Oxford, on some Gaudy day,
Fat Beadles, in magnificent array,
With big round bellies bear the pond'rous treat,
And heavily lag on, with the vast load of meat

The next, mad Mathesis; her feet all bare,
Ungirt, untrim'd, with dissoluted hair:
No foreign object can her thoughts disjoint;
Reclin'd she sits, and ponders o'er a point.
Before her, lo! inscrib'd upon the ground,
Strange diagrams th' astonish'd sight confound,
Right lines and curves, with figures square and round.
With these the monster, arrogant and vain,
Boasts that she can all mysteries explain,
And treats the sacred Sisters with disdain.
She, when great Newton sought his kindred skies,
Sprung high in air, and strove with him to rise,
In vain — the mathematic mob restrains
Her flight, indignant, and on earth detains;
E'er since the captive wretch her brains employs
On trifling trinkets, and on gewgaw toys.

Microphile is station'd next in place,
The spurious issue of celestial race;
From heav'nly Physice she took her birth,
Her sire a madman of the sons of earth;
On flies she pores with keen, unwearied sight,
And moths and butterflies, her dear delight;
Mushrooms and flow'rs, collected on a string,
Around her neck, around her temples cling,
With all the strange production of the spring.
With greedy eyes she'll search the world to find
Rare, uncouth animals of every kind;
Whether along the humble ground they stray,
Or nimbly sportive in the waters play,
Or thro' the light expanse of aether fly,
And with fleet pinions cleave the liquid sky.
Ye gales, that gently breathe upon our shore,
O! let the Polypus be wafted o'er;
How will the hollow dome of Dulness ring,
With what loud joy receive the wond'rous thing?
Applause will rend the skies, and all around
The quivering quagmires bellow back the sound;
How will Microphile her joy attest,
And glow with warmer raptures than the rest?
This will the curious crocodile excell,
The weaving worm, and silver-shining shell;
No object e'er will wake her wonder thus
As Polypus, her darling Polypus
Lo! by the wounds of her creating knife,
New Polypusses wriggle into life,
Fast as they rise, she feeds with ample store
Of once rare flies, but now esteem'd no more.

The fourth dire shape from mother Matter came,
Dulness her sire, and Atheism is her name;
In her no glimpse of sacred Sense appears,
Depriv'd of eyes, and destitute of ears:
And yet she brandishes a thousand tongues,
And blasts the world with air-infecting lungs.
Curs'd by her sire, her very words are wounds,
No grove re-ecchoes the detested sounds.
Whate'er she speaks all nature proves a lye,
The earth, the heav'ns, the starry-spangled sky
Proclaim the wise, eternal Deity:
The congregated waves in mountains driven
Roar in grand chorus to the Lord of Heaven;
Thro' skies serene the glorious thunders roll,
Loudly pronounce the God, and shake the sounding Pole.

A river, murmuring from Lethaean source,
Full to the fane directs its sleepy course;
The Pow'r of Dulness, leaning on the brink,
Here calls the multitude of fools to drink.
Swarming they crowd to stupify the skull,
With frequent cups contending to be dull.
Me, let me taste the sacred stream, I cry'd,
With out-stretch'd arm — the Muse my boon deny'd,
And sav'd me from the sense-intoxicating tide.