To the Right Hon. HENRY PELHAM, Efq;

HE humble Petition of the worshipful company of Poets and News-writers,

SHEWETH,

THAT your honour's petitioners (dealers in rhymes, And writers of fcandal, for mending the times) By loffes in bus'nefs, and England's well-doing, Are funk in their credit, and verging on ruin.

That these, their misfortunes, they humbly conceive, Arise not from dulnefs, as fome folks believe,

But from rubs in their way, that your honour has laid, And want of materials to carry on trade.

That they always had form'd high conceits of their use,
And meant their last breath shou'd go out in abuse ;
But now (and they speak it with forrow and tears)
Since your honour has fate at the helm of affairs,
No party will join 'em, no faction invite

To heed what they say, or to read what they write;
Sedition, and Tumult, and Discord are fled,
And Slander fcarce ventures to lift up her head
In fhort, publick bus'nefs is fo carry'd on,
That their country is fav'd, and the patriots undone.

Το

To perplex 'em ftill more, and fure famine to bring (Now fatire has loft both its truth and its sting)

If, in spite of their natures, they bungle at praise,
Your honour regards not, and nobody pays.

YOUR Petitioners therefore most humbly entreat
(As the times will allow, and your honour thinks meet)
That measures be chang'd, and some cause of complaint
Be immediately furnish'd, to end their restraint;
Their credit thereby, and their trade to retrieve,
That again they may rail, and the nation believe.
Or elfe (if your wisdom fhall deem it all one)
Now the parliament's rifing, and bus'ness is done,
That your honour would please, at this dangerous crifis,
To take to your bofom a few private vices,

By which your petitioners, haply, might thrive,
And keep both themselves and contention alive.
In compaffion, good Sir! give 'em fomething to say,
And your honour's petitioners ever shall pray.

An

An O DE

Performed in the

Senate-House at Cambridge July 1, 1749,

At the Installation of his Grace

THOMAS HOLLES Duke of NEWCASTLE, CHANCELLOR of the University.

canit errantem Permeji ad flumina Gallum

Aonas in Montes ut duxerit una fororum
Utque viro Phabi chorus affurrexerit omnis.

VIRGIL.

By Mr. MASON, Fellow of Pembroke-Hall.

Set to Mufic by Mr. Boyce, Composer to his Majefty.

H

I.

ERE all thy active fires diffuse,
Thou genuin British Muse;

Hither defcend from yonder orient sky,

Cloth'd in thy heav'n-wove robe of harmony.

Recitative.

Come,

Air I.

Come, imperial queen of fong;
Come with all that free-born grace,
Which lifts thee from the fervile throng,
Who meanly mimic thy majestic pace;
That glance of dignity divine,

Which speaks thee of celeftial line;
Proclaims thee inmate of the sky,

Daughter of Jove and Liberty.
II.

Recitative. The elevated foul, who feels
Thy awful impulfe, walks the fragrant ways
Of honest unpolluted praise :

He with impartial justice deals

The blooming chaplets of immortal lays :
He flies above ambition's low carreer;

And nobly thron'd in Truth's meridian sphere,

Thence, with a bold and heav'n-directed aim, Full on fair Virtue's fhrine he pours the rays of fame. III.

Air II.

Goddess! thy piercing eye explores
The radiant range of Beauty's ftores,
The steep afcent of pine-clad hills,
The filver flope of falling rills,
Catches each lively-colour'd grace,
The crimson of the wood-nymph's face,
The verdure of the velvet lawn,

The purple in the eastern dawn,

Or all thofe tints, which rang'd in vivid glow
Mark the bold fweep of the celeftial bow.

IV.

But chief fhe lifts her tuneful transports high, Recitative.

When to her intellectual eye

The mental beauties rife in moral dignity:

The facred zeal for Freedom's cause,

That fires the glowing Patriot's breast;

The honest pride, that plumes the Hero's creft,
When for his country's aid the steel he draws;
Or that, the calm yet active heat,

With which mild Genius warms the fages heart,
To lift fair Science to a loftier seat,

Or ftretch to ampler bounds the wide domain of art.
These, the best blossoms of the virtuous mind, Air I.
She culls with taste refin'd;

From their ambrofial bloom

With bee-like skill she draws the rich perfume,
And blends the sweets they all convey,

In the foft balm of her mellifluous lay,

V.

Is there a clime, where all these beauties rife Recitative.

In one collected radiance to her eyes?

Is there a plain, whofe genial foil inhales

Glory's invigorating gales,

Her brightest beams where Emulation spreads,

Her kindlieft dews where Science fheds,

Where ev'ry stream of Genius flows,

Where ev'ry flower of Virtue glows?

Thither the Mufe exulting flies,
There the loudly cries-