Epigram On The Busts[1] In Richmond Hermitage. 1732

    "Sic siti laetantur docti."


With honour thus by Carolina placed,
How are these venerable bustoes graced!
O queen, with more than regal title crown'd,
For love of arts and piety renown'd!
How do the friends of virtue joy to see
Her darling sons exalted thus by thee!
Nought to their fame can now be added more,
Revered by her whom all mankind adore.[2]

Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift was an Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer, poet and cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin. Swift is remembered for works such as "A Tale of a Tub" (1704), "An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity" (1712), and "Gulliver's Travels" (1726). Swift originally published all of his works under pseudonyms—such as Lemuel Gulliver, Isaac Bickerstaff, Drapier's Letters as MB Drapier—and works were sometimes attributed to Anonymous.

Jonathan Swift

A New Song On Wood's Halfpence

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

On The Same (On The Upright Judge, Who Condemned The Drapier's Printer) The Judge Speaks

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

Strephon And Chloe

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

Another (Epigrams On Windows)

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

English

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Another (Epigram On The Busts)

Louis the living learned fed,
And raised the scientific head;
Our frugal queen, to save her meat,
Exalts the heads that cannot eat.

Jonathan Swift

A Conclusion, Drawn From The Epigrams, Epigram On The Busts, And Sent To The Drapier

Since Anna, whose bounty thy merits had fed,
Ere her own was laid low, had exalted thy head:
And since our good queen to the wise is so just,
To raise heads for such as are humbled in dust,
I wonder, good man, that you are not envaulted;
Prithee go, and be dead, and be doubly exalted.

Jonathan Swift

Dr. Swift's Answer (Epigram On The Busts)

Her majesty never shall be my exalter;
And yet she would raise me, I know, by a halter!

Jonathan Swift

Epitaph

BY THE SAME (DR. DELANY)

Hoc tumulata jacet proles Lenaea sepulchro,
Immortale genus, nee peritura jacet;
Quin oritura iterum, matris concreditur alvo:
Bis natum referunt te quoque, Bacche Pater.

Jonathan Swift

To His Grace The Archbishop Of Dublin; A Poem

    Serus in coelum redeas, diuque
    Laetus intersis populo. - HOR., Carm. I, ii, 45.


Great, good, and just, was once applied
To one who for his country died;[l]
To one who lives in its defence,
We speak it in a happier sense.
O may the fates thy life prolong!
Our country then can dread no wrong:
In thy great care we place our trust,
Because thou'rt great, and good, and just:
Thy breast unshaken can oppose
Our private and our public foes:
The latent wiles, and tricks of state,
Your wisdom can with ease defeat.
When power in all its pomp appears,
It falls before thy rev'rend years,
And willingly resigns its place
To something nobler in thy face.
When once the fierce pursuing Gaul
Had drawn his sword for Marius' fall,
The...

Jonathan Swift

Apollo's Edict Occasioned By "News From Parnassus"

Ireland is now our royal care,
We lately fix'd our viceroy there.
How near was she to be undone,
Till pious love inspired her son!
What cannot our vicegerent do,
As poet and as patriot too?
Let his success our subjects sway,
Our inspirations to obey,
And follow where he leads the way:
Then study to correct your taste;
Nor beaten paths be longer traced.
    No simile shall be begun,
With rising or with setting sun;
And let the secret head of Nile
Be ever banish'd from your isle.
    When wretched lovers live on air,
I beg you'll the chameleon spare;
And when you'd make a hero grander,
Forget he's like a salamander.[1]
    No son of mine shall dare to say,
Aurora usher'd in the day,
Or ever name the milky-way.
You all agree, I make ...

Jonathan Swift