their enemies. So Jacob and Johnfon, instead of mending by criticifm, called it envy, and because Dryden and Pope were cenfured, they compared themselves to Dryden and Pope.

But to return. The weapon chiefly used in the prefent controverfy is epigram, and certainly never was a keener made ufe of. They have difcovered furprising fharpness on both fides. The firft that cante out upon this occafion was a kind of new compofition in this way, and might more properly be called an epigrammatic thefis, than an epigram. It confifts, firft, of an argument in profe; next follows a motto from Rofcommon; then comes the epigram; and laftly notes ferving to explain the epigram. But you fhall have it with all its decorations.

An EPIGRAM.

Addreffed to the Gentlemen reflected on in the ROSCIAD, a Poem, by the Author.

Worry'd with debts and paft all hopes of bail,
His pen he profiitutes t' avoid a gaol.

"Let not the hungry Bavius' angry stroke
"Awake refentment, or your rage provoke;
"But pitying his diftrefs, let virtue* thine,
"And giving each your bounty †, let him dine;
"For thus retain'd, as learned council can,
"Each cafe, however bad, he'll new-japan :
"And by a quick tranfition plainly thew
"'Twas no defect of your's, but pocket low,
"That cauf'd his putrid kennel to o'erflow."

The laft lines are certainly executed in a very masterly manner. It is of that fpecies of argumentation, called the perplexing. It effectually flings

* Charity.

+ Settled at one fhilling, the price of the poem.

the

the antagonist into a mift; there is no answering it: the laugh is raised against him, while he is endeavouring to find out the jeft. At once he fhews, that the author has a kennel, and that this kennel is putrid, and that this putrid kennel overflows. But why does it overflow? It overflows, because the author happens to have low pockets!

There was alfo another new attempt in this way; a profaic epigram which came out upon this occafion. This is fo full of matter, that a critic might fplit it into fifteen epigrams, each properly fitted with its fting. You fhall fee it.

To G. C. and R. L.

""Twas you, or I, or he, or all together,

""Twas one, both, three of them, they know not whether. "This I believe, between us great or small,

You, I, he, wrote it not-'twas Churchill's all."

There, there is a perplex! I could have wifhed, to make it quite perfect, the author, as in the cafe before, had added notes. Almost every word admits a fcholium, and a long one too. I, YOU, HE! Suppofe a ftranger fhould afk, and who are you? Here are three obfcure perfons spoken of, that may in a fhort time be utterly forgotten. Their names fhould have confequently been mentioned in notes at the bottom. But when the reader comes to the words great and small, the maze is inextricable. Here the stranger may dive for a myftery, without ever reaching the bottom. Let him know then that fmall is a word purely introduced to make good rhyme, and great was a very proper word to keep Small company.

Yet by being thus a fpectator of others dangers, I must own I begin to tremble in this literary con

teft for my own. I begin to fear that my challenge to Doctor Rock was unadvised, and has procured me more antagonists than I had at firft expected. I have received private letters from feveral of the literati here, that fill my foul with apprehenfion. I may fafely aver, that I never gave any creature in this good city offence, except only my rival Doctor Rock, yet by the letters I every day receive, and by fome I have feen printed, I am arraigned at one time as being a dull fellow, at another as being pert; I am here petulant, there I am heavy; by the head of my ancestors, they treat me with more inhumanity than a flying fish. If I dive and run my nose to the bottom, there a devouring shark is ready to swallow me up; if I skim the furface, a pack of dolphins are at my tail to fnap me; but when I take wing and attempt to escape them by flight, I become a prey to every ravenous bird that winnows the bosom of the deep. Adieu.

LETTER CXIII.

TO THE SAME.

THE formalities, delays and disappointments that precede a treaty of marriage here, are ufually as numerous as thofe previous to a treaty of peace. The laws of this country are finely calculated to promote all commerce, but the commerce between the fexes. Their encouragements for propagating hemp, madder and tobacco, are indeed admirable! Marriages are the only commodity that meet with none.

Yet

Yet from the vernal foftnefs of the air, the verdure of the fields, the tranfparency of the ftreams; and the beauty of the women, I know few countries more proper to invite to courtship. Here love might fport among painted lawns and warbling groves, and revel upon gales, wafting at once both fragrance and harmony. Yet it feems he has forfaken the ifland; and when a couple are now to be married, mutual love or an union of minds is the laft and moft trifling confideration. If their goods and chattels can be brought to unite, their fympathetic fouls are ever ready to guarantee the treaty. The gentleman's mortgaged lawn becomes enamoured of the lady's marriagable grove; the match is ftruck up, and both parties are piously in love— according to act of parliament.

Thus they, who have fortune, are poffeffed at leaft of fomething that is lovely; but I actually pity those that have none. I am told there was a time, when ladies with no other merit but youth, virtue and beauty, had a chance for hufbands, at leaft, among the minifters of the church, or the officers of the army. The blush and innocence of fixteen was faid to have a powerful influence over thefe two profeffions. But of late, all the little traffic of blushing, ogling, dimpling, and fmiling has been forbidden by an act, in that cafe wifely made and provided. A lady's whole cargo of fmiles, fighs and whifpers is declared utterly contraband, till fhe arrives in the warm latitudes of twenty-two, where commodities of this nature are too often found to decay. She is then permitted to dimple and fmile, when the dimples and fimiles begin to forfake her; and when perhaps grown ugly, is charitably entrusted with an unlimited use of her charms. Her lovers, however, by this time have forfaken her; the captain has changed for another miftrefs;

the priest himself leaves her in folitude, to bewail her virginity, and the dies even without benefit of clergy.

Thus you find the Europeans difcouraging love with as much earneftnefs as the rudeft favage of Sofala. The Genius is furely now no more. In every region I find enemies in arms to opprefs him. Avarice in Europe, jealoufy in Perfia, ceremony in China, poverty among the Tartars, and luft in Circaffia, are all prepared to oppofe his power. The Genius is certainly banished from earth, though once adored under fuch a variety of forms. He is no where to be found; and all that the ladies of each country can produce, are but a few trifling reliques as inftances of his former refidence and favour.

The Genius of Love, fays the Eaftern Apologue, had long refided in the happy plains of Abra, where every breeze was health, and every found produced tranquillity. His temple at firft was crowded, but every age leffened the number of his votaries, or cooled their devotion. Perceiving, therefore, his altars at length quite deferted, he was refolved to remove to fome more propitious region, and he apprized the fair fex of every country, where he could hope for a proper reception, to affert their right to his prefence among them. In return to this proclamation, embaflies were fent from the ladies of every part of the world to invite him, and to difplay the fuperiority of their claims.

And firft the beauties of China appeared. No country could compare with them for modefty, either of look, drefs, or behaviour; their eyes were never lifted from the ground; their robes of the moft beautiful filk hid their hands, bosom and neck, while their faces only were left uncovered. They indulged no airs that might exprefs loofe de