The Duke's Answer

BY DR. SWIFT (Dean Smedley's Petition To The Duke Of Grafton)


Dear Smed, I read thy brilliant lines,
Where wit in all its glory shines;
Where compliments, with all their pride,
Are by their numbers dignified:
I hope to make you yet as clean
As that same Viz, St. Patrick's dean.
I'll give thee surplice, verge, and stall,
And may be something else withal;
And, were you not so good a writer,
I should present you with a mitre.
Write worse, then, if you can - be wise-
Believe me, 'tis the way to rise.
Talk not of making of thy nest:
Ah! never lay thy head to rest!
That head so well with wisdom fraught,
That writes without the toil of thought!
While others rack their busy brains,
You are not in the least at pains.
Down to your dean'ry now repair,
And build a castle in the air.
I'm sure a man of your fine sense
Can do it with a small expense.
There your dear spouse and you together
May breathe your bellies full of ether,
When Lady Luna[1] is your neighbour,
She'll help your wife when she's in labour,
Well skill'd in midwife artifices,
For she herself oft falls in pieces.
There you shall see a raree show
Will make you scorn this world below,
When you behold the milky-way,
As white as snow, as bright as day;
The glittering constellations roll
About the grinding arctic pole;
The lovely tingling in your ears,
Wrought by the music of the spheres -
Your spouse shall then no longer hector,
You need not fear a curtain-lecture;
Nor shall she think that she is undone
For quitting her beloved London.
When she's exalted in the skies,
She'll never think of mutton-pies;
When you're advanced above Dean Viz,
You'll never think of Goody Griz;
But ever, ever live at ease,
And strive, and strive your wife to please;
In her you'll centre all your joys,
And get ten thousand girls and boys;
Ten thousand girls and boys you'll get,
And they like stars shall rise and set.
While you and spouse, transform'd, shall soon
Be a new sun and a new moon:
Nor shall you strive your horns to hide,
For then your horns shall be your pride.

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

On The Great Buried Bottle

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

Verses On The Revival Of The Order Of The Bath,[1]

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

A Pastoral Dialogue

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

Judas.

Jonathan Swift, Simple Poetry

English

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My Lady's[1] Lamentation And Complaint Against The Dean

JULY 28, 1728

Sure never did man see
A wretch like poor Nancy,
So teazed day and night
By a Dean and a Knight.
To punish my sins,
Sir Arthur begins,
And gives me a wipe,
With Skinny and Snipe:[2],
His malice is plain,
Hallooing the Dean.

The Dean never stops,
When he opens his chops;
I'm quite overrun
With rebus and pun.
    Before he came here,
To spunge for good cheer,
I sat with delight,
From morning till night,
With two bony thumbs
Could rub my old gums,
Or scratching my nose
And jogging my toes;
But at present, forsooth,
I must not rub a tooth.
When my elbows he sees
Held up by my knees,
My arms, like two props,
Supporting my chops,
And just as I handle 'em
Moving all like a...

Jonathan Swift

Dean Smedley's Petition To The Duke Of Grafton[1]

Non domus et fundus, non aeris acervus et auri. - HOR.
Epist., I, ii, 47.

It was, my lord, the dexterous shift
Of t'other Jonathan, viz. Swift,
But now St. Patrick's saucy dean,
With silver verge, and surplice clean,
Of Oxford, or of Ormond's grace,
In looser rhyme to beg a place.
A place he got, yclept a stall,
And eke a thousand pounds withal;
And were he less a witty writer,
He might as well have got a mitre.
    Thus I, the Jonathan of Clogher,
In humble lays my thanks to offer,
Approach your grace with grateful heart,
My thanks and verse both void of art,
Content with what your bounty gave,
No larger income do I crave:
Rejoicing that, in better times,
Grafton requires my loyal lines.
Proud! while my patron is polite,
...

Jonathan Swift

Imitation Of Part Of The Sixth Satire Of The Second Book Of Horace.[1]

I often wish'd that I had clear,
For life, six hundred pounds a-year,
A handsome house to lodge a friend,
A river at my garden's end,
A terrace walk, and half a rood
Of land, set out to plant a wood.
    Well, now I have all this and more,
I ask not to increase my store;[2]
But should be perfectly content,
Could I but live on this side Trent;[3]
Nor cross the channel twice a-year,
To spend six months with statesmen here.
    I must by all means come to town,
'Tis for the service of the crown.
"Lewis, the Dean will be of use;
Send for him up, take no excuse."
The toil, the danger of the seas,
Great ministers ne'er think of these;
Or let it cost a hundred pound,
No matter where the money's found,
It is but so much more in debt,
And that ...

Jonathan Swift

The Progress Of Marriage[1]

AETATIS SUAE fifty-two,
A reverend Dean began to woo[2]
A handsome, young, imperious girl,
Nearly related to an earl.[3]
Her parents and her friends consent;
The couple to the temple went:
They first invite the Cyprian queen;
'Twas answer'd, "She would not be seen;"
But Cupid in disdain could scarce
Forbear to bid them kiss his    -    -
The Graces next, and all the Muses,
Were bid in form, but sent excuses.
Juno attended at the porch,
With farthing candle for a torch;
While mistress Iris held her train,
The faded bow bedropt with rain.
Then Hebe came, and took her place,
But show'd no more than half her face.
    Whate'er these dire forebodings meant,
In joy the marriage-day was spent;
The marriage-day, you take me right,
I promise no...

Jonathan Swift

An Epistle Upon An Epistle

FROM A CERTAIN DOCTOR TO A CERTAIN GREAT LORD. BEING A CHRISTMAS-BOX FOR DR. DELANY


As Jove will not attend on less,
When things of more importance press:
You can't, grave sir, believe it hard,
That you, a low Hibernian bard,
Should cool your heels a while, and wait
Unanswer'd at your patron's gate;
And would my lord vouchsafe to grant
This one poor humble boon I want,
Free leave to play his secretary,
As Falstaff acted old king Harry;[1]
I'd tell of yours in rhyme and print,
Folks shrug, and cry, "There's nothing in't."
And, after several readings over,
It shines most in the marble cover.
    How could so fine a taste dispense
With mean degrees of wit and sense?
Nor will my lord so far beguile
The wise and learned of our isle;
To ma...

Jonathan Swift

Dr. Sheridan's Reply To The Dean

Don't think these few lines which I send, a reproach,
From my Muse in a car, to your Muse in a coach.
The great god of poems delights in a car,
Which makes him so bright that we see him from far;
For, were he mew'd up in a coach, 'tis allow'd
We'd see him no more than we see through a cloud.
    You know to apply this - I do not disparage
Your lines, but I say they're the worse for the carriage.
    Now first you deny that a woman's a sieve;
I say that she is: What reason d'ye give?
Because she lets out more than she takes in.
Is't that you advance for't? you are still to begin.
Your major and minor I both can refute,
I'll teach you hereafter with whom to dispute.
A sieve keeps in half, deny't if you can.
D. "Adzucks, I mistook it, who thought of the bran?"
I ...

Jonathan Swift