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Swift, Jonathan, 1667-1745

"The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 2"


We know your morning hours you pass
To cull and gather out a face;
Is this the way you take your glass?
Forbear it:
Those loads of paint upon your toilet
Will never mend your face, but spoil it,
It looks as if you did parboil it:
Drink claret.
Your cheeks, by sleeking, are so lean,
That they're like Cynthia in the wane,
Or breast of goose when 'tis pick'd clean,
or pullet:
See what by drinking you have done:
You've made your phiz a skeleton,
From the long distance of your crown,
t' your gullet.

A REJOINDER BY THE DEAN IN JACKSON'S NAME
Wearied with saying grace and prayer,
I hasten'd down to country air,
To read your answer, and prepare
reply to't:
But your fair lines so grossly flatter,
Pray do they praise me or bespatter?
I must suspect you mean the latter--
Ah! slyboot!
It must be so! what else, alas!
Can mean by culling of a face,
And all that stuff of toilet, glass,
and box-comb?
But be't as 'twill, this you must grant,
That you're a daub, whilst I but paint;
Then which of us two is the quaint-
er coxcomb?
I value not your jokes of noose,
Your gibes and all your foul abuse,
More than the dirt beneath my shoes,
nor fear it.


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