ODE TO KING WILLIAM,

ON HIS SUCCESSES IN IRELAND.

[The recovery of this Ode was owing to the exertions of Mr Nichol. (See his Select Collection of Poems, 1778.) In its structure of verse, and turn of thought, there is an obvious imitation of Dryden's Eulogy upon Oliver Cromwell. This, among other circumstances, shows, that the taste of Swift's youth was formed not upon the better compositions of the end of the seventeenth century, but upon those which had been fashionable in the beginning of Charles II.'s reign. This he probably owed to his residence with Temple.]

To purchase kingdoms and to buy renown,
Are arts peculiar to dissembling France;
You, mighty monarch, nobler actions crown,
And solid virtue does your name advance.

Your matchless courage with your prudence joins,
The glorious structure of your fame to raise;
With its own light your dazzling glory shines,
And into adoration turns our praise.

Had you by dull succession gain'd your crown
(Cowards are monarchs by that title made,)
Part of your merit Chance would call her own,
And half your virtues had been lost in shade.

But now your worth its just rewards shall have : What trophies and what triumphs are your due! Who could so well a dying nation save,

At once deserve a crown, and gain it too!

You saw how near we were to ruin brought,
You saw th' impetuous torrent rolling on;
And timely on the coming danger thought,
Which we could neither obviate nor shun.

Britannia stripp'd of her sole guard, the laws,
Ready to fall Rome's bloody sacrifice;

You straight stepp'd in, and from the monster's jaws
Did bravely snatch the lovely, helpless prize.

Nor this is all; as glorious is the care

To preserve conquests, as at first to gain : In this your virtue claims a double share, Which, what is bravely won, does well maintain.

Your arm has now your rightful title show'd,
An arm on which all Europe's hopes depend,
To which they look as to some guardian God,
That must their doubtful liberty defend.

Amaz'd, thy action at the Boyne we see!
When Schomberg started at the vast design:
The boundless glory all redounds to thee,
Th' impulse, the fight, th' event, were wholly thine.

The brave attempt does all our foes disarm;
You need but now give orders and command,
Your name shall the remaining work perform,
And spare the labour of your conquering hand.

France does in vain her feeble arts apply,
To interrupt the fortune of your course:
Your influence does the vain attacks defy
Of secret malice, or of open force.

Boldly we hence the brave commencement date
Of glorious deeds, that must all tongues employ;
William's the pledge and earnest given by fate,
Of England's glory, and her lasting joy.

ODE TO THE ATHENIAN SOCIETY.

Moor Park, Feb. 14, 1691.

[The noted John Dunton, an author and bookseller, who often afterwards encountered the edge of Swift's ridicule, about the year 1690-1, set forth a literary plan, or project, as he called it, for an association of wits, to be entitled, The Athenian Society. According to his own account, the body, thus formed, was only second to the Royal Society, which led him justly to express his admiration, why the "great Sprat did not oblige the age with a second best history of the second best institution for the promotion of learning and removing epidemic ignorance." If the knowledge of this second best institution was at all inferior to that of their great prototype, their readiness of communication made some amends; for they proposed not only to answer curious queries in divinity, physic, law, phi

"I have been told, that Dryden having perused these verses, said, Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet;' and that this denunciation was the motive of Swift's perpetual malevolence to Dryden."-JOHNSON.

losophy, history, poetry, mathematics, trade, and all other questions proposed by either sex, or in any language, but also to give a complete review of all new publications; and, in case they were favoured with the communication of any curious experiment, to insert it in their Mercury, with a demonstration which the sender could not adhibit to it. This promising annunciation instantly produced a volley of queries, some grave, some gay, some in mockery, and some in sad ear. nest; all which the society answered in their Weekly Mercu ries, with more learning, and with as much dulness as might have been expected from their assurance. The Athenian Mercuries extended at length to twenty volumes, from which were selected three octavo volumes, 1706, and a supplement in 1710, entitled the Athenian Oracle, and professing to contain an entire collection of what was valuable in the publications of the society. That Swift should have looked up with admiration to this "O. racle, this wooden God," can only be pardoned by those who have known in what extraordinary and disproportionate respect an author who has attained, however unworthily, the attention of the public, is regarded by a young man whose instinctive talents for literature lead him to estimate the labours of such a person, less by their intrinsic merit, than by their having attained the reward of public notice, to which his own secret feelings induce him to aspire. It cannot, however, be disguised, that Swift, though he might regret having offered incense at so unworthy a shrine, had no cause to lament the value of the tribute. In point of poetical merit, the Athenian Society did not merit a more valuable eulogy than the following ode; and assuredly it does not exceed even their deserts.]

I.

As when the deluge first began to fall,
That mighty ebb never to flow again,
When this huge body's moisture was so great,
It quite o'ercame the vital heat;

That mountain which was highest first of all,
Appear'd above the universal main,

To bless the primitive sailor's weary sight!
And 'twas perhaps Parnassus, if in height

It be as great as 'tis in fame,

And nigh to Heaven as is its name;

So, after the inundation of a war,

When Learning's little household did embark,
With her world's fruitful system, in her sacred ark,
At the first ebb of noise and fear,

Philosophy's exalted head appears;

And the Dove-Muse will now no longer stay,
But plumes her silver wings, and flies away;
And now a laurel wreath she brings from far,
To crown the happy conqueror,

To shew the flood begins to cease,

And brings the dear reward of victory and peace.

II.

The eager Muse took wing upon the waves' decline.
When war her cloudy aspect just withdrew,
When the bright sun of peace began to shine,
And for a while in heavenly contemplation sat,
On the high top of peaceful Ararat :

And pluck'd a laurel branch (for laurel was the first that grew,

The first of plants after the thunder-storm and rain)
And thence, with joyful nimble wing,
Flew dutifully back again,

And made an humble chaplet for the king.
And the Dove-Muse is fled once more,

*

(Glad of the victory, yet frighten'd at the war) And now discovers from afar

A peaceful and a flourishing shore:

No sooner did she land

On the delightful strand,

* The Ode I writ to the king in Ireland.-SWIFT.-See this in

p. 21.