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The Works of Tobias Smollett: Miscellanies.
The Works of Tobias Smollett Miscellanies Author:Tobias George Smollett Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: REPROOF: A SATIRE POET, FRIEND Poet, Howe'er I turn, or wheresoe'er I tread, This giddy world still rattles round my head ! I pant for silence ev'n in this... more » retreat— Good Heav'n ! what daemon thunders at the gate ? Friend. In vain you strive in this sequester'd nook, To shroud you from an injur'd friend's rebuke. Poet. An injur'd friend! who challenges the name ? If you, what title justifies the claim ? Did e'er your heart o'er my affliction grieve, Your int'rest prop me, or your purse relieve ? 10 Or could my wants my soul so far subdue, That in distress she crawl'd for aid to you ? But let us grant th' indulgence e'er so strong; Display without reserve th' imagin'd wrong: Among your kindred have I kindled strife, Deflower'd your daughter, or debauch "d your wife ; Traduc'd your credit, bubbled you at game; Or soil'd with infamous reproach your name ? Friend. No: but your cynic vanity (you'll own) Expos'd my private counsel to the town. 20 Poet. Such fair advice 'twere pity sure to lose ; I grant I printed it for public use. Friend. Yes, season'd with your own remarks between, Inflam'd with so much virulence of spleen, That the mild town (to give the dev'l his due) Ascrib'd the whole performance to a Jew. Poet. Jews, Turks, or Pagans, hallowed be the mouth, That teems with moral zeal and dauntless truth ! Prove that my partial strain adopts one lye, No penitent more mortify'd than I; 30 Not ev'n the wretch in shackles doom'd to groan Beneath th' inhuman scoffs of Williamson. Friend. Hold—let us see this boasted self-denial— The vanquish'd knight has triumph'd in his trial. Poet. What then ? Friend. Your own sarcastic verse unsay, That brands him as a trembling runaway. Poet. With all my soul!—th' imputed charge rehearse: I'll own...« less