The Gamblers, a Poem; with Notes Critical and Explanatory. 4to. 35. Hooper.

A fevere, but we fear an ineffectual, fatire on the fashionable phrenzy of gaming. The poet, after defcribing the principal iceres and characters devoted to it, proceeds to the latt act of the finished gamefter, whofe ill-luck at hazard reduces him to despair, and puts an end to his miferable being.

720

Amid the Club*, adventurous flood the King, [* Jockey-Club.]
And loudly dar'd the boldest to the Ring.
The chiefs advance, and Harpax burns to try,
With mighty Kings, the fortune of the dye.
But who with Kings contends, his forfeit life
The fine fhall pay, and curfe th' unequal ftrife.

The work of Dice begins, and "Seven the Main;"
"Eleven the Nick"-dear labyrinths of Gain!
'Tis Hedging, Fleecing, Loading, Cogging, Betting,
Long-Odds, Long-Gallery, Cheating, Swearing, Setting
But foon fad Harpax mourns the lucklefs Main,
And Nicks advance their conquering aid in vain.
The Doctors fail.-And now, in mad defpair,
The furious man, blafpheming, rends his hair:
Now moodiul grown, a gloomy calm fucceeds,
The lips of blafphemy repreft by deeds:
To cheat his God, Omnipotence to flee,
Impious, he meditates the Grande Sortie;
That welcome, dreadful, cordial of the Sad!
The Fool's refort, the refuge of the Mad!
The Lover's cure, the Tyrant's fureft friend,
The Coward's triumph, and the Gamefter's end!

725

730

735

And now the moon-itruck man for death prepares,

740

And, launching, vainly hopes to end his cares.
The felf-fame God, all-powerful, and all-wife,
That chaften'd here, hereafter can chastise.
His palm the univerfe futtains: -fhall Man
Confine Infinitude, or God trepan?

"Away, vain Doubt!" the defperate Hero cry'd,

Then grafp'd the welcome Death, with dreadtul pride!
The Flint he fix'd, and well the Cock survey'd,
With trembling joy the Trigger next effay'd;

V. 719.

745

The Ring.] Not the Ring in Hyde-Park, where the

boldest are often dared; but the Ring at Hazard, where adventurers depofit

their money.

V. 735.

or Suicide's descent.

Grande Sortie.] The Grand Leap, V. 148. The Flint he fix'd, &c.] In allufion to Homer's beautiful defeription of the Bow of Pandurus, IL. 4.

Ελκε αμε γλυφίδας 11 λαβων, και νευρα βοεία
Νευρην μεν μαζω πελασεν, τόξω δε σίδηρον
Αυλας έπειδε κυκλοτερες μεγα τοξον ελεινε.
Διγξε βιος νευρη δε μεγ' ιακεν, αλλά δ' οίσιος
Οξιβολής, καθ' όμιλον επιπλεσθαι μενεαίνων.

The

The Barrel ftrait unfcrew'd, and lodg'd with care
The Leaden Death, and Nitrous Vengeance, there.
Then, to his ear the thundering Tube applies.-
Fate fign'd; and Death's impatient Warrant flies.
Thus, when Ambition on some distant shore
Lets flip the dogs of blood, and thirfts for more,
The Die of War for dear dominion thrown,
Relentless Ammon bids the Nations groan;
And now to fleece, and now to load, he tries,
And for the Tyrant's crimes the Subject dies.

But loving Souls in virtuous leagues allied,
Nor force can rend, nor conquering Death divide.
How oft, dear Youth! obfervant didit thou blend
Th' experienc'd Groom, th' unmercenary Friend!
And oft thine Heel provok'd th' equeftrian strife,
And oft thou'it brav'd the precipice of life,

750

755

760

755

In Friendship's caufeoft taught the generous Steed
Well-manag'd fury, and mechanic fpeed:

For, Jockey-fame, and Knowledge were thine own,
And foremost in the roll of Grooms you fhone.
Yet mark! fequacious of thy much-lov'd Ghost,
Bellario feeks the dark Cimmerian coaft;

And mindful of thine end, and friendship's rites,
In Death partakes, and fhade with fhade unites.
One hour divides, one facred urn contains
His honour'd afhes, and thy lov'd remains:
For, near that walk, where thousands every day,
Pimps, Courtiers, Coxcombs, faunter life away;
Where mix the Bankrupt and the broken Wit,
The forward Bully, and the fneaking Cit;

770

775

Where

V. 752. Then to his ear the thundering Tube applies.] Why thundering? Could Harpax hear the report? I am credibly informed he could not: for that the application of a loaded tube to the auditory nerves, effectually deftroys all fenfe of hearing. I would therefore reduce the Line to the level of common fenfe.

Then to his ear the levell'd tube applies.

All tubes must be levell'd in a certain direction, before their contents can be lodged with due execution. WARB.

V. 756. The die of War.] Facia eft Alea: if we don't kill them, they will kill us."- -The noble language of a noble Lord. V. 759. And for the Tyrant's crimes the Subject dies.]

κολέκοντο δε λαοί,

Ούνεκα τον χρυσην ητιμησ' αρητήρα
Argans. IL. i.

Quicquid delirant reges, plecuntur Achivi.

V. 765. And oft thouft brav'd the precipice of life,

HOR.

In Friendfbig's caufe.] Rifquing his neck by riding matches for

his friend Bellario, when the fidelity of Grooms and Jockeys could not be depended on.

V. 771.

Cimmerian coaft.] Cimmeria was a country near Baie and

the Lake Avernus, the fabulous defcent into Hell.

Cimmerian

Where Demi-reps and Demi-heroes throng,
And empty Poets warble empty foug;
Where Cheapfide Cuckolds, in their Beft, repair
On fabbaths, with their Dears, to take the air;
Where elms o'erfhade; and, grateful to the kies,
In fragrant fleams Augéan odours rise-
A patlage leads to Cleveland's courtly Row,
And well that paffage Kings, and Chairmen know.
There, to the right, a goodly ftructure stands,
Whose fouthern aspect Mall and Park commands.
Here Beauty's chafte Vice-gerent holds her drum,
And Peers of eafy confcience, nightly, come:
Here Princes knock, Ambaffadors refort,
And Maids of Honour drive the Sunday Sport;
Cards all their joy, and Pleature all their aim,
And thefe a Fortune lofe, and those a Name.
With different views a different game they fpring;
One fteals an Affignation, one a Ring.
Dear scene, at once, of Sharping and Delight!
Where Love, and Plunder, rule by turns the Night.
Her Virtue here, when Fortune turns the scale,
My Lady, nothing backward, fets to fale:
A Debt of Honour is a facred thing;

This Centries know, nor Centries fables fing.
'Twas here, what time adventurous Harpax fell,
And left the Shadow for the Subftance, HELL,
As by fome powerful fympathy poffett,
Death's fecret hand Bellario's breath fuppreff.

780

785

790

795

800

805

TIBUL.

Cimmerion etiam obscuras accessit ad arces, Queis nunquam candente dies apparuit ortu, Sive fupra terras Phœbus, feu curreret infra. V. 785. Augéan odours.] The fragrance of a Stable-yard. V. 803. This Centries know, &c.] Fame reports, that once upon a time, about the folemn hour of midnight, when all was wrapt in fleep, fave the ever-wakeful Eyes of Sentinels, watchful over the actions of mortal men and women-a fleepless guardian of the night, ftationed within the atmofphere of Augéan odours, darting his unflumbering eyes around, witneffed, through the brown fhades of night, a Debt of Honour difcharged in the fafh ionable mode. The gallant creditor (a mighty Colonel, it is faid) with uncommon generofity of Soul, prefenting the honeft Sentinel with a whole Shilling, the ftory had the misfortune, by ten o'clock the next morning,, to be bruited through the whole three regiments of Foot-guards.

V. So5. And left the fhadow for the fubfiance, Hell.] Hell, the Gebenna of the Dainn'd, adumbrated in the earthly Type, defcribed above, pasjim

V. 806. As by fome powerful fympathy poffeft. It was an antient opinion, that there fubfiffed a certain Sympathy between near and tender relations, fond lovers and their miftreffes, true and fincere friends, &c. &c. either party feeling itfelf touched and affected with whatever concerned the other, howfoever diftant and feparated they might be. Were it neceflary, many undoubted inftances of these sympathies might be adduced. Agreeable to the above doctrine, Bellario feels the mortal Sympathy of fiffening frofis, and unnerving damps, which the Death of his friend Harpax is fuppofed to

communicate,

Thofe

Thofe joints that well advanc'd the rattling trade,
Unnerving damps, and ftiffening frofts invade:
His pale lips quiver at th'approaching blaft,
And Hazard, Hell, and Harpax, was his last!

810

The Hiftory of the Flagellants, or the Advantages of Difcipline; Being a Paraphrafe and Commentary on the Hiftoria Flagellantium of the Abbé Boileau, Doctor of the Sorbonne, Canon of the Holy Chapel, &c. By Somebody who is not Doctor of the Sorbonne. 4to. 11. Is. Hingefton.

"The Abbé Boileau, the Author of the Hifloria Flagellantium, was elder brother to the celebrated Poet of that name. He filled, feveral years, the place of Dean of the Metropolitan Church of Sens, and was thence promoted to the office of one of the Canons of the Holy Chapel, in Paris, which is looked upon as a great dignity among the French Clergy.

"While he was in that Office, about the year 1700, he wrote, among other Books, that which is the fubject of this Work *. This Book, in which the Public expected, from the title of it, to find an History of the particular Sect of Hereticks called Flagellants, only contained an aggregation of facts and quotations on the fubject of feltdifciplines and flagellations in general among Chriftians (which, if the Book had been well done, would have been no lefs interesting), and a mixture of alternate commendation, and blame, of that practice.

"The Theologians of that time, however, took offence at the Book. They judged that the Author had been guilty in it, of several heretical affertious, for inftance in faying, as he does in two or three places, that Jefus Chrift had fuffered flagellation against his will; and they particularly blamed the cenfures which, amidit his commendations of it, he had paffed upon a practice which fo many Saints had adopted, fo many Pontiffs and Bishops had advised, and so many Ecclefiaitical Writers had commended.

"In the fecond place, they objected to feveral facts which the Author had inferted in his Book, as well as to the fingular freedom of expreffion he had fometimes indulged; and they said that such facts, and fuch manner of expreffioh, ought not to be met with in a Book written by a good Chriftian, and much lefs by a Dean of the Metropolitan Church of Sens, a Canon of the Holy Chapel, and in fhort by a Man invested with a great dignity in the Church; in which latter respect they were perhaps right †.

The title of the Book is Hifloria Flagellantium, de recto & perverso flagrorum ufu apud Chriftianos. 12mo. Parifiis, apud J. Aniifon, Typographiæ Regiæ Præfectum, MDCC.

+ Our Author, who was rather fingular in the choice of his fubjects, had written another Treatife De talibus impudicis prohibendis, and another on the drefs of Clergymen, wherein he attempted to prove that they might as well wear it short as long.

VOL. V.

Pp

« Among

"Among the Critics of our Author's Book, were the Jefuits of Trevoux; the then conductors of a periodical Review, called the Journal de Trevoux. The Poet Boileau, taking the part of his Brother, anfwered their criticifms by the following epigram,

Non, le livre des Flagellans

N'a jamais condamné, lifez le bien mes Peres,
Ces rigidités falutaires
Que pour ravir le Ciel, faintement violens,
Exercent fur leurs corps tant de Chrétiens aufières,
Il blâme feulement cet abus odieux

D'étaler & d'offrir aux yeux

Ce que leur doit toujours cacher la bienséance,
Et combat vivement la fauffe piété,

Qui, fous couleur d'éteindre en nous la volupté,
Par l'austérité même & par la pénitence

Sait allumer le feu de la lubricité."

Such is the account given, of the Abbé Boileau's perfor mance, in the preface to the prefent hiftory: the writer of which, having lighted on a copy, judged that its fingularity and the nature of the facts it contains rendered it worthy to be laid before the public.-For our own part, we must confefs ourfelves to be of a very different opinion; for, though its fingularity may recommend it to the curious among the learned, the nature of the facts it contains is fuch as, we think, fhould have deterred, rather than encouraged, the writer in dreffing it, as he fays," in vulgar language," for the ufe of the unlearned. Indeed, unless the writer intended this work for an ironical fatire on hiftory in general, or the pretended philofophical Hiftorians of modern times in particular, we can see no good ufe, nor difcover any laudable defign, in its publication.The prefacer, it is true, hath enumerated its utility and advantages; but we can hardly conceive him to be ferious, when he infinuates that there is nothing contained in it inconfiftency with decency and religion. On the other hand, we cannot help regarding both the text and commentary, here presented us, as an affront both to religion and decency. The commentator, it must be owned, hath a recent precedent, in the fayourable reception of Triftram Shandy, how far even obfcenity may be made acceptable to the public, when artfully introduced beneath the mafk of amufement. And that this history is amufing we cannot deny, although we cannot but condemn fuch kind of amufement; noft of the pleafant ftories contained in it appearing to us more calculated, allumer le feu de la lubricité, than to answer any other purpole whatever; unless it be that of putting money into the tranflator's pocket *.-On the

*Books of this ftamp being too eagerly fought after, and the Abbé Boileau's work," a twelves book, printed on a very large type, being here dwelled into a majeftic quarto" price one guinea. Rev.

whole