Designed to be spoken in “The Beaux-Stratagem.”
Let its expiring author pity find:
Survey his mournful case with melting eyes,
Nor let the bard be damn’d before he dies.
Forbear, you fair, on his last scene to frown,
But his true exit with a plaudit crown;
Then shall the dying poet cease to fear
The dreadful knell, while your applause he hear.
At Leuctra so the conquering Theban died,
Claim’d his friends’ praises, but their tears denied:
Pleased in the pangs of death he greatly thought
Conquest with loss of life but cheaply bought.
The difference this, the Greek was one would fight,
As brave, though not so gay, as Serjeant Kite;
Ye sons of Will’s, what’s that to those who write?
To Thebes alone the Grecian owed his bays,
You may the bard above the hero raise,
Since yours is greater than Athenian praise.
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