Here Cumberland lies, having acted his parts,
The Terence of England, the mender of hearts;
A flattering painter, who made it his care

To draw men as they ought to be, not as they are.
His gallants are all faultless, his women divine,
And comedy wonders at being so fine;
Like a tragedy queen he has dizen'd her out,
Or rather like tragedy giving a rout.

His fools have their follies so lost in a crowd
Of virtues and feelings, that folly grows proud;
And coxcombs, alike in their failings alone,
Adopting his portraits, are pleas'd with their own.
Say, where has our poet this malady caught,
Or, wherefore his characters thus without fault?
Say, was it that vainly directing his view
To find out men's virtues, and finding them few,
Quite sick of pursuing each troublesome elf,
He grew lazy at last, and drew from himself?

Here Douglas (1) retires from his toils to relax,
The scourge of impostors, the terror of quacks:
Come all ye quack bards, and ye quacking divines,
Come, and dance on the spot where your tyrant reclines :
When satire and censure encircled his throne,

I fear'd for your safety, I fear'd for my own;
But now he is gone, and we want a detector,

Our Dodds shall be pious, our Kenricks (3) shall lecture;
Macpherson (write bombast, and call it a style,
Our Townshend make speeches, and I shall compile;

(1) Vide page 99. (2) The Rev. Dr. William Dodd. (3) Dr. Kenrick, who read lectures at the Devil Tavern, under the title of" The School of Shakspeare." [For an account of whom, see Life, ch. viii.] (4) James Macpherson, Esq., who lately from the mere force of his style, wrote down the first poet of all antiquity. [This alludes to his prose translation of Homer, which has been wholly and deservedly neglected.]

New Lauders and Bowers the Tweed shall cross over,
No countryman living their tricks to discover;

Detection her taper shall quench to a spark,

And Scotchman meet Scotchman, and cheat in the dark.

Here lies David Garrick, describe me who can,

An abridgment of all that was pleasant in man;
As an actor, confest without rival to shine;
As a wit, if not first, in the very first line:
Yet, with talents like these, and an excellent heart,
The man had his failings, a dupe to his art.
Like an ill-judging beauty, his colours he spread,
And beplaster'd with rouge his own natural red.
On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting;
'Twas only that when he was off, he was acting.
With no reason on earth to go out of his way,
He turn'd and he varied full ten times a-day :
Though secure of our hearts, yet confoundedly sick,
If they were not his own by finessing and trick:
He cast off his friends, as a huntsman his pack,

For he knew when he pleas'd he could whistle them back.
Of praise a mere glutton, he swallow'd what came,
And the puff of a dunce, he mistook it for fame;
'Till his relish grown callous, almost to disease,
Who pepper'd the highest was surest to please.
But let us be candid, and speak out our mind,
If dunces applauded, he paid them in kind.
Ye Kenricks, ye Kellys, and Woodfalls (2) so grave,
What a commerce was yours, while
you got and
you gave!
How did Grub-street re-echo the shouts that you rais'd,
While he was be-Roscius'd, and you were be-prais'd!

(1) Mr. Hugh Kelly, author of False Delicacy, Word to the Wise, Clementina, School for Wives, &c. &c.

(2) Mr. William Woodfall, printer of the Morning Chronicle.

But peace to his spirit, wherever it flies,

To act as an angel and mix with the skies :
Those poets, who owe their best fame to his skill,
Shall still be his flatterers, go where he will,

Old Shakspeare receive him with praise and with love,
And Beaumonts and Bens be his Kellys above.

Here Hickey(1) reclines, a most blunt pleasant creature,
And slander itself must allow him good nature;
He cherish'd his friend, and he relish'd a bumper ;
Yet one fault he had, and that one was a thumper !
Perhaps you may ask if the man was a miser?

I answer no, no, for he always was wiser :
Too courteous, perhaps, or obligingly flat?
His very
worst foe can't accuse him of that.

Perhaps he confided in men as they go,

And so was too foolishly honest? ah, no!

Then what was his failing? come tell it, and, burn ye;

He was, could he help it ?—a special attorney.

Here Reynolds is laid, and to tell you my mind,

He has not left a wiser or better behind;

His pencil was striking, resistless, and grand;
His manners were gentle, complying, and bland; (9)
Still born to improve us in every part,

His pencil our faces, his manners our heart :

(1) [See Life, vol. ii. p.

295.]

(2) ["To his gentle and happy composure of mind, our common friend Goldsmith alludes, when, in describing Sir Joshua Reynolds, he employed the epithet bland—a word eminently happy, and characteristic of his easy and placid manner; but, taking into our consideration at once the soundness of his understanding, and the mildness and suavity of his deportment, perhaps Horace's description of the amiable friend of the younger Scipiothemitis sapientia Læli,'—may convey to posterity a more perfect idea of our illustrious painter, than the unfinished delineation of his poetical friend." -MALONE, Life of Sir Joshua Reynolds.]

To coxcombs averse, yet most civilly steering,

When they judg'd without skill, he was still hard of hearing: When they talk'd of their Raphaels, Correggios, and stuff, He shifted his trumpet, (") and only took snuff. (2)

POSTSCRIPT.

After the fourth edition of this Poem was printed, the publisher received the following epitaph on Mr. Whitefoord, () from a friend of the late Dr. Goldsmith.

man:

HERE Whitefoord reclines, and deny it who can,
Though he merrily liv'd, he is now a grave (4)
Rare compound of oddity, frolic, and fun!
Who relish'd a joke, and rejoic'd in a pun;
Whose temper was generous, open, sincere ;
A stranger to flatt'ry, a stranger to fear;
Who scatter'd around wit and humour at will;
Whose daily bons mots half a column might fill:
A Scotchman, from pride and from prejudice free;
A scholar, yet surely no pedant was he.

What pity, alas! that so lib'ral a mind Should so long be to newspaper essays confin'd!

(1) Sir Joshua Reynolds was so remarkably deaf, as to be under the necessity of using an ear-trumpet in company.

(2) ["These were the last lines Goldsmith ever wrote. He had written half a line more of this character, when he was seized with the fever which carried him in a few days to the grave. He intended to have concluded with his own character."- - MALONE.]

(3) Mr. Caleb Whitefoord, author of many humorous essays.

(4) Mr. Whitefoord was so notorious a punster, that Dr. Goldsmith used to say it was impossible to keep him company, without being infected with the itch of punning.

Who perhaps to the summit of science could soar,
Yet content "if the table be set in a roar;"
Whose talents to fill station were fit,
any
Yet happy if Woodfall () confess'd him a wit.

Ye newspaper witlings! ye pert scribbling folks! Who copied his squibs, and re-echo'd his jokes; Ye tame imitators, ye servile herd, come, Still follow your master, and visit his tomb: To deck it, bring with you festoons of the vine, And copious libations bestow on his shrine; Then strew all around it (you can do no less) Cross-readings, Ship-news, and Mistakes of the Press. (2)

Merry Whitefoord, farewell! for thy sake I admit That a Scot may have humour, I had almost said wit. This debt to thy mem'ry I cannot refuse,

"Thou best-humour'd man with the worst-humour'd "Muse." (3)

(1) Mr. H. S. Woodfall, printer of the Public Advertiser.

(2) Mr. Whitefoord has frequently indulged the town with humorous pieces under those titles in the Public Advertiser.

(3) [The wit of Goldsmith in this poem produced, as such things frequently do, an effusion of wit from other men. Garrick, who had a turn for epigram, was the first in the field: led by the skill and keenness with which his own character had been analyzed, but unprepared for reply, his first feeling seems to have been one of mere discontent, which he expressed in the following

"JEU D'ESPRIT,

ON DR. GOLDSMITH'S CHARACTERISTICAL COOKERY.
"Are these the choice dishes the Doctor has sent us?
Is this the great poet whose works so content us?
This Goldsinith's fine feast, who has written fine books?
Heaven sends us good meat, but the Devil sends cooks."

Further reflection convinced Garrick of the enduring nature of the satire; and he soon found that it was thought by others to contain much truth. This prompted a more laboured effusion in the form of attack on his assailant; for the idea and point of which, however, he is indebted to Swift. It was not printed, and probably not written, before 1776.