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And naught in folly's brain creates such terror, As to proclaim aloud its favourite error.

Yet tho' condemn'd by most part of mankind, As censor public-Critic most unkind ;

;

I shall not shrink, nor from the truth abstain, For wounds when prob'd must give the patient

pain:

Therefore I'll publish-naught the clamour heeding",

Lavish'd by fools †, while they my theme are reading.

his ideas to paper;" yet, while those wondrous disccveries are making, the fools will carefully withhold from the mention of their own fooleries, howsoever well their heads may be adapted for the cap which has been made for them.

*This is certainly very contemptuous of the poet, who might have used the words of our bard, to convey his idea of the effect produced upon his labours by the slander of fools.

For haply slander,

Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter,

As level as the cannon to his blank

Transports his poison'd shot, may miss our name,
And hit the woundless air.

I make no doubt, but that numerous fools, on the pe

Some minds there are, not so much zany's tools,

As with deaf ears to greet my Ship of Fools; To such, tho' few†, I dedicate my lays,

2

My muse well recompens'd by their just praise;

rusal of this little book, would be heartily glad to realize the Italian proverb, which saith,

Se la lingua fosse una lancia farebbe più male, che dieci altra.

The poet has ventured a great deal in this line; grant that his affirmation may be verified by experience. I must certainly say, that if there are any such, who refuse the meed of approbation, I shall at once pronounce, that they were not possessed of a single grain of gratitude, which is the worst that can be said of human nature, for, Ingratum si dixeris omnia dicis,

Or, to use the words of Young:

He that's ungrateful has no crime but one,
All other vices may pass for virtues in him.

In this third line, the bard has checked himself with the word few, a very lucky circumstance truly, for to find him tripping in judgment, after censuring all the world, (his few excepted) would indeed have subjected him even to the ridicule of folly, which would have been warranted in its full extent, while the scoffers, in arraying him in their own bells, cap, and ladle, and calling him fool, would have said with Horace,

But as for countless numbers that refuse 'em, They are but fools, and therefore I excuse 'em*.

THE POET'S CHORUS TO FOOLS.

Come, trim the boat, row on each Rara Avis, Crowds flock to man my Stultifera Navis.

Quid vetat?

-Ridentem dicere verum

* And doubtless will repay their neglect as Jaques did the moralizing of the fool, who saith,

When I did hear

The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools should be so deep contemplative :
And I did laugh, sans intermission,
An hour by his dial. O! noble fool,
A worthy fool-motley's the only wear!

SECTION LXVI.

THE AUTHOR A FOOL.

A fool, a fool! I met a fool i'the forest;
A motley fool-a miserable world-
As I do live by food, I met a fool.

Good morrow, fool, quoth I.—No, Sir; quoth he:
Call me not fool, till Heav'n hath sent me fortune.

As I've judg❜d others, by that very rule,
Must I alike condemn myself for fool*:

Heyday! What have we here? A very pretty confession, indeed! So, after all, I have only been annotating the sections of a fool: a glorious recompense, truly, for all my toil.-Yet, soft; let us not condemn too rashly: for, perhaps, the two next lines may be tantamount to the unsaying what hath been before said: therefore, by your leaves, gentle fools.

For who, that was not oaf, would take such

pains,

To store a world of empty skulls * with brains? Then, row on, fools; my vessel's ably mann'd, Well freighted, sense and virtue to withstand. Vain are opponents: wisdom naught can do, While this great globe's the ship—mankind the crew.

* Ho! Ho! That's your meaning, is it, Mr. Poet? I now comprehend the text perfectly: ay, and must coincide with you in opinion, by calling you a most consummate fool. Why, as I live, there will not, perhaps, be one zany found, who will think fit to requite the bard, by even honouring his labours with a perusal; or, if any such should appear, what will avail all this exposition of folly, and the advice to fools? Why, it is but scattering chaff before the wind, or strewing pearls in the way of swine; and then, what are to become of all my notes, truly; and who is to repay me for the time I have expended, which might have been so much more profitably employed under the directions of a Minerva? Zounds and death! Why, I shall starve! Pens, ink, and paper too, as I live, all gone to pot! I have no remedy left but to publish, if I can get credit, that is to say. Therefore, imperial fools, noble fools, reverend fools, nay, fools all, do read me: and I was going to promise you a second volume in Praise of Folly; but another and a wiser man hath given it you before me.

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