Classic Poem

H EAV'N save ye, gallants, and this hopeful age!
Y' are welcome to the downfall of the stage:
The fools have labor'd long in their vocation;
And vice (the manufacture of the nation)
O'erstocks the town so much, and thrives so well,
That fops and knaves grow drugs and will not sell.
In vain our wares on theaters are shown,
When each has a plantation of his own.
His cruse ne'er fails: for whatsoe'er he spends,
There 's still God's plenty for himself and friends.
Should men be rated by poetic rules,
Lord, what a poll would there be rais'd from fools!
Meantime poor wit prohibited must lie,
As if 't were made some French commodity.
Fools you will have, and rais'd at vast expense;
And yet, as soon as seen, they give offense.
Time was, when none would cry: " That oaf was me! "
But now you strive about your pedigree:
Bauble and cap no sooner are thrown down,
But there 's a muss of more than half the town.
Each one will challenge a child's part at least,
A sign the family is well increas'd.
Of foreign cattle there 's no longer need,
When w' are supplied so fast with English breed.
Well! flourish, countrymen; drink, swear, and roar;
Let every freeborn subject keep his whore;
And, wand'ring in the wilderness about,
At end of forty years not wear her out.
But when you see these pictures, let none dare
To own beyond a limb or single share;
For where the punk is common, he 's a sot
Who needs will father what the parish got.