Alike all ages: dames of ancient days

Have led their children through the mirthful maze;

And the gay grandsire, skill’d in gestic lore,

Has frisk’d beneath the burden of threescore.

So bless’d a life these thoughtless realms display;

Thus idly busy rolls their world away.

Theirs are those arts that mind to mind endear,

For honour forms the social temper here:

Honour, that praise which real merit gains,

Or even imaginary worth obtains,

Here passes current—paid from hand to hand,

It shifts, in splendid traffic, round the land;

From courts to camps, to cottages it strays,

And all are taught an avarice of praise—

praise—

They please, are pleas’d, they give to get esteem,

Till, seeming bless’d, they grow to what they seem.

But while this softer art their bliss supplies,

It gives their follies also room to rise;

For praise too dearly lov’d, or warmly sought,

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