Describes the shepherd’s dances, feasts, and bliss,
     And boasts from Phyllis to surprise a kiss,
     When gently she resists with feigned remorse,
     That what she grants may seem to be by force. 
     Her generous style at random oft will part,
     And by a brave disorder shows her art.

     Unlike those fearful poets whose cold rime
     In all their raptures keeps exactest time;
     That sing the illustrious hero’s mighty praise—­
     Lean writers!—­by the terms of weeks and days,
     And dare not from least circumstances part,
     But take all towns by strictest rules of art. 
     Apollo drives those fops from his abode;
     And some have said that once the humorous god,
     Resolving all such scribblers to confound,
     For the short Sonnet ordered this strict bound,
     Set rules for the just measure and the time,
     The easy-running and alternate rime;
     But above all, those licenses denied
     Which in these writings the lame sense supplied,
     Forbade a useless line should find a place,
     Or a repeated word appear with grace. 
     A faultless sonnet, finished thus, would be
     Worth tedious volumes of loose poetry. 
     A hundred scribbling authors, without ground,
     Believe they have this only phoenix found,
     When yet the exactest scarce have two or three,
     Among whole tomes, from faults and censure free;
     The rest, but little read, regarded less,
     Are shoveled to the pastry from the press. 
     Closing the sense within the measured time,
     ’Tis hard to fit the reason to the rime.

     The Epigram, with little art composed,
     Is one good sentence in a distich closed. 
     These points, that by Italians first were prized,
     Our ancient authors knew not, or despised;
     The vulgar, dazzled with their glaring light,
     To their false pleasures quickly they invite;
     But public favor so increased their pride,
     They overwhelmed Parnassus with their tide.

     The Madrigal at first was overcome,
     And the proud Sonnet fell by the same doom;
     With these grave Tragedy adorned her flights,
     And mournful Elegy her funeral rites,
     A hero never failed them on the stage: 
     Without his point a lover durst not rage;
     The amorous shepherds took more care to prove
     True to his point, than faithful to their love. 
     Each word, like Janus, had a double face,
     And prose, as well as verse, allowed it place;
     The lawyer with conceits adorned his speech,
     The parson without quibbling could not preach. 
     At last affronted reason looked about,
     And from all serious matters shut them out;
     Declared that none should use them without shame,
     Except a scattering, in the epigram—­
     Provided that by art,