The Wellington Spa.

        "And drink oblivion to our woes."
        Anna Matilda.


Talk no more of your Cheltenham and Harrowgate springs,
    'Tis from Lethe we now our potations must draw;
Yon Lethe's a cure for--all possible things,
    And the doctors have named it the Wellington Spa.

Other physical waters but cure you in part;
    One cobbles your gout--t'other mends your digestion--
Some settle your stomach, but this--bless your heart!--
    It will settle for ever your Catholic Question.

Unlike too the potions in fashion at present,
    This Wellington nostrum, restoring by stealth,
So purges the memory of all that's unpleasant,
    That patients forget themselves into rude health.
For instance, the inventor--his having once said
    "He should think himself mad if at any one's call,
"He became what he is"--is so purged from his head
    That he now doesnt think he's a madman at all.
Of course, for your memories of very long standing--
    Old chronic diseases that date back undaunted
To Brian Boroo and Fitz-Stephens' first landing--
    A devil of a dose of the Lethe is wanted.

But even Irish patients can hardly regret
    An oblivion so much in their own native style,
So conveniently planned that, whate'er they forget,
    They may go on remembering it still all the while!

Thomas Moore

Thomas Moore was an Irish poet, singer, and songwriter, celebrated for his Irish Melodies, which are now considered a staple of Irish cultural heritage. Born on May 28, 1779, in Dublin, Ireland, Moore gained fame for his lyrical songs, many of which were set to traditional Irish tunes. Not only a poet, but he was also a staunch advocate of Irish nationalism, often incorporating themes of national identity and resistance into his work. Moore's influential collection 'Irish Melodies' became popular in both Ireland and Britain and helped to define the literary output of the era. He passed away on February 25, 1852, but his legacy in Irish literature and music endures.

Thomas Moore

The Tear.

Thomas Moore, Simple Poetry

A Vision. By The Author Of "Christabel."

Thomas Moore, Simple Poetry

The Minstrel-Boy.

Thomas Moore, Simple Poetry

Odes Of Anacreon - Ode XX.

Thomas Moore, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Drink Of This Cup.

Drink of this cup;--you'll find there's a spell in
    Its every drop 'gainst the ills of mortality;
Talk of the cordial that sparkled for Helen!
    Her cup was a fiction, but this is reality.
Would you forget the dark world we are in,
    Just taste of the bubble that gleams on the top of it;
But would you rise above earth, till akin
    To Immortals themselves, you must drain every drop of it;
Send round the cup--for oh there's a spell in
    Its every drop 'gainst the ills of mortality;
Talk of the cordial that sparkled for Helen!
    Her cup was a fiction, but this is reality.

Never was philter formed with such power
    To charm and bewilder as this we are quaffing;
Its magic began when, in Autumn's rich hour,
    A harvest of gold in the fields it stoo...

Thomas Moore

The Fudges In England. Letter VI. From Miss Biddy Fudge, To Mrs. Elizabeth ----.

How I grieve you're not with us!--pray, come, if you can,
Ere we're robbed of this dear, oratorical man,
Who combines in himself all the multiple glory
Of, Orangeman, Saint, quondam Papist and Tory;--
(Choice mixture! like that from which, duly confounded,
The best sort of brass was, in old times, compounded.)--
The sly and the saintly, the worldly and godly,
All fused down, in brogue so deliciously oddly!
In short, he's a dear--and such audiences draws,
Such loud peals of laughter and shouts of applause,
As can't but do good to the Protestant cause.

Poor dear Irish Church!--he today sketched a view
Of her history and prospect, to me at least new,
And which (if it takes as it ought) must arouse
The whole Christian w...

Thomas Moore

The Sceptic, A Philosophical Satire.

PREFACE.


The Sceptical Philosophy of the Ancients has been no less misrepresented than the Epicurean. Pyrrho may perhaps have carried it to rather an irrational excess;--but we must not believe with Beattie all the absurdities imputed to this philosopher; and it appears to me that the doctrines of the school, as explained by Sextus Empiricus, are far more suited to the wants and infirmities of human reason as well as more conducive to the mild virtues of humility and patience, than any of those systems of philosophy which preceded the introduction of Christianity. The Sceptics may be said to have held a middle path between the Dogmatists and Academicians; the former of whom boasted that they had attained the truth while the latter denied that any attainable truth existed. The Sceptics however, without either asserting or ...

Thomas Moore

Toland's Invitation To Dismal[1] To Dine With The Calves Head Club

Written A.D. 1712. - Stella.
Imitated from Horace, Lib. i, Epist. 5.

Toland, the Deist, distinguished himself as a party writer in behalf of the Whigs. He wrote a pamphlet on the demolition of Dunkirk, and another called "The Art of Reasoning," in which he directly charged Oxford with the purpose of bringing in the Pretender. The Earl of Nottingham, here, as elsewhere, called Dismal from his swarthy complexion, was bred a rigid High-Churchman, and was only induced to support the Whigs, in their resolutions against a peace, by their consenting to the bill against occasional conformity. He was so distinguished for regularity, as to be termed by Rowe
    "The sober Earl of Nottingham,
    Of sober sire descended." - HOR., Odes, ii, 4.
From these points of his character, we may estimate the severit...

Jonathan Swift

The "Medical Spring."

I.

Let tipplers all boast of the pleasure divine
That is found in old whisky, in beer and in wine--
But what are all those to a feller who knows
Where the "Medical Spring" in its purity flows,
And has knelt at its brink and just drank his fill
Of the clear, sparkling fluid, from Nature's own still?


II.

How often I've strayed on a hot Summer's day
Where it gurgles and gushes, then flows on its way
With a ripple as sweet as the music that died
When the tones of loved voices are to us denied,
And mirrored my face in the "Medical Spring,"
Where the beetling old cliffs their cool shadows fling!


III.

Not riches, nor honors, nor place do I crave,
Ere they lay me at last to rest in the grave,
But oh, let me hear its music...

George W. Doneghy

The Newcastle Apothecary.

A man, in many a country town, we know,
Professes openly with death to wrestle;
Ent'ring the field against the grimly foe,
Arm'd with a mortar and a pestle.

Yet, some affirm, no enemies they are;
But meet just like prize-fighters, in a Fair,
Who first shake hands before they box,
Then give each other plaguy knocks,
With all the love and kindness of a brother:
So (many a suff'ring Patient saith)
Tho' the Apothecary fights with Death,
Still they're sworn friends to one another.

A member of this Æsculapian line,
Lived at Newcastle upon Tyne:
No man could better gild a pill:
Or make a bill;
Or mix a draught, or bleed, or blister;
Or draw a tooth out of your head;
Or chatter scandal by your bed;
Or give a clyster.

Of occupation...

George Colman