Shall clamorous youth alone our lyres engage ?
Go, look at Brice and learn the charms of age !
What though thy vigour slumbers in thy years ?
What though thy brow a trace of ruin wears ?
...
Goodness, Friendship, Wit, and Mirth,
All lie buried in this earth.
Sussex bore him, Cambridge bred,
Steeple Ashton holds him dead.
...
SOME countries are famed for their wines or their women,
And some for what has been, and some for what's coming ;
But old Ireland's a place that can boast, I'm a thinking,
Of things even finer than lasses or drinking ;
...
A hungry eagle, wishing to be fed,
Let fall a tortoise on a poet's head,
And Athens mourned her noblest singer dead.
Oh had the bird our bald tormentor known,
...
A jail-bird's our member, 'tis true ;
Good folk, you've no reason to rail :
'Tis a comfort for me and for you
To know that our member's in jail.
...
'Pluto, that dog confound!' a donkey brayed,
He's got the manger that for me was made.
I cannot lift my nose to smell the feast,
All for that snarling and unwholesome beast.
...
The slave that found the noble Gracchus' head,
To gain more gold replaced the brains with lead;
Should B 's ever in such scales be thrown,
Finder, be wise, and leave the brains alone.
...
Mortals, whosoe'er ye be,
Know the consecrated tree :
Tender virgins, bow before it;
Wanton bachelors, adore it.
...
The bloom is fading from the heather,
The gorse has scattered half its gold,
And, presaging a ruder weather,
September's winds blow keen and cold.
...