Charles Churchill

Charles Churchill
spring humor hands
Great use they have, when in the hands Of one like me, who understands, Who understands the time and place, The person, manner, and the grace, Which fools neglect; so that we find, If all the requisites are join'd, From whence a perfect joke must spring, A joke's a very serious thing.
spring hands rose
The virtuous to those mansions go Where pleasures unembitter'd flow, Where, leading up a jocund band, Vigor and Youth dance hand in hand, Whilst Zephyr, with harmonious gales, Pipes softest music through the vales, And Spring and Flora, gaily crown'd, With velvet carpet spread the ground; With livelier blush where roses bloom, And every shrub expires perfume.
empty loud
So loud each tongue, so empty was each head, / So much they talked, so very little said.
humor serious serious-things
A joke's a very serious thing.
fashion use may
Fashion--a word which knaves and fools may use, Their knavery and folly to excuse.
fool dunces folly
Fool beckons fool, and dunce awakens dunce.
haste speed worst
The more haste, ever the worst speed.
son men justice
Amongst the sons of men how few are known Who dare be just to merit not their own.
land knaves fool
Knaves starve not in the land of fools.
mind attention blank
Constant attention wears the active mind, Blots out our pow'rs, and leaves a blank behind.
woods flood command
The oak, when living, monarch of the wood; The English oak, which, dead, commands the flood.
poet rapture prose
Who all in raptures their own works rehearse, And drawl out measur'd prose, which they call verse.
religion saint mercy
The rigid saint, by whom no mercy's shown To saints whose lives are better than his own.
reputation
And reputation bleeds in ev'ry word.