Where hot and cold, and dry and wet,
Strive each the other's place to get;
And, with inceffant toil and ftrife,
Would keep poffeffion during life :
I could demonftrate every pore,
Where memory lays up all her store ;
And to an inch compute the ftation
"Twixt judgement and imagination :
O friend! I could display much learning,
At least to men of small difcerning.
The brain contains ten thousand cells:
In each fome active fancy dwells;
Which always is at work, and framing
The feveral follies I was naming.
As in a hive's vimineous dome
Ten thousand bees enjoy their home;
Each does her studious actions vary,
To go and come, to fetch and carry ::
Each ftill renews her little labour;
Nor juftles her affiduous neighbour ::
Each
- whilft this thefis I maintain,
I fancy, Dick, I know thy brain.
O, with the mighty theme affected,
Could I but fee thy head diffected!

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My head! quoth Dick, to ferve your whim!

Spare that, and take fome other limb.

Sir, in your nice affairs of fyftem,

Wife men propofe; but fools affist 'em..

:

Says Matthew Richard, keep thy head,. And hold thy peace; and I'll proceed..

185

Proceed!

Proceed! quoth Dick: Sir, I aver,
You have already gone to far.
When people once are in the wrong,
Each line they add is much too long.
Who fafteft walks, but walks aftray,
Is only furtheft from his way.
Blefs your conceits! muft I believe,
Howe'er abfurd, what you conceive :
And, for your friendship, live and die
A papift in philofophy?

I fay, whatever you maintain

Of Alma in the heart or brain;
The plaineft man alive may tell ye,
Her feat of empire is the belly:

From hence the fends out thofe fupplies,
Which makes us either ftout or wife;
The strength of every other member
Is founded on your belly-timber;
The qualms or raptures of your
Rife in proportion to your food;

blood

And, if you would improve your thought,
You must be fed, as well as taught.
Your ftomach makes your fabrick roll;
Juft as the bias rules the bowl.

That great Achilles might employ
The ftrength, defign'd to ruin Troy;
He din'd on lion's marrow, fpread
On toafts of ammunition-bread :
But, by his mother fent away,
Amongst the Thracian girls to play,

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210.

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Effe

Effeminate he fat, and quiet :

Strange product of a cheese-cake diet!

fair play,

Now give my argument
And take the thing the other way:
The youngster, who at nine and three
Drinks with his fifters milk and tea,

From breakfast reads till twelve o'clock,
Burnet and Heylin, Hobbes and Locke;
due vifits after noon

He pays

To coufin Alice and uncle John;

At ten from coffee-houfe or play
Returning, finishes the day.

But, give him port and potent fack,
From milkfop he starts up mohack;
Holds that the happy know no hours;

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So through the ftreet at midnight fcowers,

Breaks watchmen's heads, and chairmen's glaffes,

And thence proceeds to nicking fashes ;

Till, by fome tougher hand o'ercome,

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And first knock'd down, and then led home,

Upon the ftrength of water-gruel?

But who fhall ftand his rage and force,
If firft he rides, then eats his horfe?
Sallads, and eggs, and lighter fare,
Tune the Italian spark's guitar.

245

And,

And, if I take Dan Congreve right,
Pudding and beef make Britons fight.
Tokay and coffee caufe this work,
Between the German and the Turk;
And both, as they provifions want,

Chicane avoid, retire, and faint.

Hunger and thirft, or guns and fwords,
Give the fame death in different words.
To push this argument no further;
To starve a man, in law is murther.

As in a watch's fine machine,
Though many artful springs are seen ;
The added movements, which declare
How full the moon, how old the year,
Derive their fecondary power

From that which fimply points the hour.
For, though thofe gim-cracks were away,

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(Quare would not fwear, but Quare would fay) However more reduc'd and plain,

265

The watch would ftill a watch remain :

But, if the horal orbit ceases,

The whole ftands ftill, or breaks to pieces;

Is now no longer what it was;

And you may e'en go fell the cafe.

So, if unprejudic'd you scan

The goings of this clock-work, man,
You find a hundred movements made

By fine devices in his head;

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But 'tis the ftomach's folid ftroke

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That tells his being, what 's o' clock.

If

you take off this rhetoric trigger, He talks no more in mode and figure; Or, clog his mathematic-wheel,

His buildings fall, his fhip ftands ftill;
Or, laftly, break his politic-weight,
His voice no longer rules the state.

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Yet, if these finer whims were gone,

Your clock, though plain, would still go on,

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But fpoil the engine of digeftion;

And you entirely change the question.
Alma's affairs no power can mend ;
The jeft, alas is at an end :
Soon ceases all this worldly buftle;
And you confign the corpfe to Ruffel.

Now make your Alma come or go

From leg to hand, from top to toe,

Your fyftem, without my addition,
Is in a very fad condition.

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So Harlequin extoll'd his horse,

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Fit for the war, or road, or courfe ;

His mouth was foft; his eye was good;

His foot was fure as ever trod :

One fault he had (a fault indeed!);

And what was that? the horse was dead.

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Dick, from thefe inftances and fetches,

Thou mak'ft of horfes, clocks, and watches,

Quoth Mat, to me thou feem'ft to mean,

That Alma is a mere machine:

That, telling others what's o' clock,

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She knows not what herself has ftruck;

But