On Gold

All-ruling tyrant of the earth,
To vilest slaves I owe my birth,
How is the greatest monarch blest,
When in my gaudy livery drest!
No haughty nymph has power to run
From me; or my embraces shun.
Stabb'd to the heart, condemn'd to flame,
My constancy is still the same.
The favourite messenger of Jove,
And Lemnian god, consulting strove
To make me glorious to the sight
Of mortals, and the gods' delight.
Soon would their altar's flame expire
If I refused to lend them fire.

    By fate exalted high in place,
    Lo, here I stand with double face:
    Superior none on earth I find;
    But see below me all mankind
    Yet, as it oft attends the great,
    I almost sink with my own weight.

At every motion undertook,
The vulgar all consult my look.
I sometimes give advice in writing,
But never of my own inditing.
    I am a courtier in my way;
For those who raised me, I betray;
And some give out that I entice
To lust, to luxury, and dice.
Who punishments on me inflict,
Because they find their pockets pickt.
    By riding post, I lose my health,
And only to get others wealth.

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 Poem On High Church

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

On Wood The Ironmonger.

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

On A Corkscrew

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

Verses Left With A Silver Standish On The Dean Of St. Patrick's Desk, On His Birth-Day. By Dr. Delany

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

English

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Pethox The Great.

From Venus born, thy beauty shows;
But who thy father, no man knows:
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The founder of thy ancient race;
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Discovers Vulcan for thy sire,
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Familiar in each leader's tent;
Or whether, as the learn'd contend,
You from the neighbouring Gaul descend;
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Jonathan Swift

On A Pen.

In youth exalted high in air,
Or bathing in the waters fair,
Nature to form me took delight,
And clad my body all in white.
My person tall, and slender waist,
On either side with fringes graced;
Till me that tyrant man espied,
And dragg'd me from my mother's side:
No wonder now I look so thin;
The tyrant stript me to the skin:
My skin he flay'd, my hair he cropt:
At head and foot my body lopt:
And then, with heart more hard than stone,
He pick'd my marrow from the bone.
To vex me more, he took a freak
To slit my tongue and make me speak:
But, that which wonderful appears,
I speak to eyes, and not to ears.
He oft employs me in disguise,
And makes me tell a thousand lies:
To me he chiefly gives in trust
To please his malice or his lust.<...

Jonathan Swift

A Libel, On The Reverend Dr. Delany, And His Excellency John, Lord Carteret

Deluded mortals, whom the great
Choose for companions tête-à-tête;
Who at their dinners, en famille,
Get leave to sit whene'er you will;
Then boasting tell us where you dined,
And how his lordship was so kind;
How many pleasant things he spoke;
And how you laugh'd at every joke:
Swear he's a most facetious man;
That you and he are cup and can;
You travel with a heavy load,
And quite mistake preferment's road.
    Suppose my lord and you alone;
Hint the least interest of your own,
His visage drops, he knits his brow,
He cannot talk of business now:
Or, mention but a vacant post,
He'll turn it off with "Name your toast:"
Nor could the nicest artist paint
A countenance with more constraint.
    For, as their appetites to quench,<...

Jonathan Swift

The Birth Of Manly Virtue

Inscribed To Lord Carteret[1] (Verses Written During Lord Carteret's Administration Of Ireland)
1724

Gratior et pulcro veniens in corpore virtus. - VIRG., Aen., v, 344.

Once on a time, a righteous sage,
Grieved with the vices of the age,
Applied to Jove with fervent prayer -
"O Jove, if Virtue be so fair
As it was deem'd in former days,
By Plato and by Socrates,
Whose beauties mortal eyes escape,
Only for want of outward shape;
Make then its real excellence,
For once the theme of human sense;
So shall the eye, by form confined,
Direct and fix the wandering mind,
And long-deluded mortals see,
With rapture, what they used to flee!"
    Jove grants the prayer, gives Virtue birth,
And bids him bless and mend the earth.
Behold him ...

Jonathan Swift

Bettesworth's Exultation

Upon Hearing That His Name Would Be Transmitted To Posterity In Dr. Swift's Works.
By William Dunkin


Well! now, since the heat of my passion's abated,
That the Dean hath lampoon'd me, my mind is elated: -
Lampoon'd did I call it? - No - what was it then?
What was it? - 'Twas fame to be lash'd by his pen:
For had he not pointed me out, I had slept till
E'en doomsday, a poor insignificant reptile;
Half lawyer, half actor, pert, dull, and inglorious,
Obscure, and unheard of - but now I'm notorious:
Fame has but two gates, a white and a black one;
The worst they can say is, I got in at the back one:
If the end be obtain'd 'tis equal what portal
I enter, since I'm to be render'd immortal:
So clysters applied to the anus, 'tis said,
By skilful physicians, giv...

Jonathan Swift

On A Candle

TO LADY CARTERET

Of all inhabitants on earth,
To man alone I owe my birth,
And yet the cow, the sheep, the bee,
Are all my parents more than he:
I, a virtue, strange and rare,
Make the fairest look more fair,
And myself, which yet is rarer,
Growing old, grow still the fairer.
Like sots, alone I'm dull enough,
When dosed with smoke, and smear'd with snuff;
But, in the midst of mirth and wine,
I with double lustre shine.
Emblem of the Fair am I,
Polish'd neck, and radiant eye;
In my eye my greatest grace,
Emblem of the Cyclops' race;
Metals I like them subdue,
Slave like them to Vulcan too;
Emblem of a monarch old,
Wise, and glorious to behold;
Wasted he appears, and pale,
Watching for the public weal:
Emblem of the bashf...

Jonathan Swift