Were forc’d to own to him their obligation. 
  He that cou’d once have half a kingdom bought,
In half a minute is not worth a groat. 
His coffers from the coffin could not save,
Nor all his int’rest keep him from the grave. 
A golden monument would not be right,
Because we wish the earth upon him light. 
  Oh London Tavern![2] thou hast lost a friend,
Tho’ in thy walls he ne’er did farthing spend;
He touch’d the pence when others touch’d the pot;
The hand that sign’d the mortgage paid the shot. 
  Old as he was, no vulgar known disease
On him could ever boast a pow’r to seize;
“[3]But as the gold he weigh’d, grim death in spight
Cast in his dart, which made three moidores light;
And, as he saw his darling money fail,
Blew his last breath to sink the lighter scale.” 
He who so long was current, ’twould be strange
If he should now be cry’d down since his change. 
  The sexton shall green sods on thee bestow;
Alas, the sexton is thy banker now! 
A dismal banker must that banker be,
Who gives no bills but of mortality!

[Footnote 1:  The subject was John Demar, a great merchant in Dublin who died 6th July, 1720.  Swift, with some of his usual party, happened to be in Mr. Sheridan’s, in Capel Street, when the news of Demar’s death was brought to them; and the elegy was the joint composition of the company.—­C.  Walker.]

[Footnote 2:  A tavern in Dublin, where Demar kept his office.—­F.]

[Footnote 3:  These four lines were written by Stella.—­F.]

EPITAPH ON THE SAME

Beneath this verdant hillock lies
Demar, the wealthy and the wise,
His heirs,[1] that he might safely rest,
Have put his carcass in a chest;
The very chest in which, they say,
His other self, his money, lay. 
And, if his heirs continue kind
To that dear self he left behind,
I dare believe, that four in five
Will think his better self alive.

[Footnote 1: 
  “His heirs for winding sheet bestow’d
  His money bags together sew’d
  And that he might securely rest,”
Variation—­From the Chetwode MS.—­W.  E. B.]

TO MRS. HOUGHTON OF BOURMONT, ON PRAISING HER HUSBAND TO DR. SWIFT

You always are making a god of your spouse;
But this neither Reason nor Conscience allows;
Perhaps you will say, ’tis in gratitude due,
And you adore him, because he adores you. 
Your argument’s weak, and so you will find;
For you, by this rule, must adore all mankind.

VERSES WRITTEN ON A WINDOW, AT THE DEANERY HOUSE, ST. PATRICK’S