Английская поэзия XIV–XX веков в современных русских переводах

The old Egyptians hid their wit

In hieroglyphic dress,

To give men pains to search for it,

And please themselves with guess.

Moderns, to tread the self same path

And exercise our parts,

Place figures in a room at Bath;

Forgive them, God of Arts!

Newton, if I can judge aright,

All wisdom doth express,

His knowledge gives mankind new light,

Adds to their happiness.

Pope is the emblem of true wit,

The sunshine of the mind;

Read o’er his works for proof of it,

You’ll endless pleasure find.

Nash represents man in the mass,

Made up of wrong and right;

Sometimes a knave, sometimes an ass,

Now blunt, and now polite.

The picture, plac’d the busts between,

Adds to the thought much strength,

Wisdom and Wit are little seen,

But Folly’s at full length.

Philotimus, if you’d approve

Yourself a faithful lover,

You must no more my anger move,

But in the mildest terms of love

Your passion still discover.

Though born to rule you must submit

To my commands with awe;

Nor think your sex can you acquit,

For Cupid’s empire won’t admit,

Nor own a salique law.

Cease, Damon, cease, I’ll hear no more;

Your fulsome flattery give o’er;

I scorn this mean fallacious art

By which you’d steal, not win, my heart:

In me it never can compassion move,

And sooner will aversion raise than love.

If you to love would me incline,

Assert the man, forbear to whine;

Let time and plain sincerity

And faithful love your pleaders be;

For trust me, Damon, if those fail,

These servile wheedling tricks will ne’er prevail.

…But should some snarling critic chance to view

These undigested lays designed for you,

The surly blade, methinks, would storm and fume:

“How dares this silly woman thus presume,

In her crude, injudicious lines, to name

Those ancient poets of immortal fame?

The women now, forsooth, are authors grown,

And write such stuff our sex would blush to own!”

That I am dull is what I own and know;

But why I mayn’t be privileged to show

That dullness to a private friend or two

(As to the world male writers often do),

I can’t conceive. Dullness alone’s my fault,

Guiltless of impious jest, or obscene thought!

None e’er can say that I have loosely writ,

Nor would at that dear rate be thought a wit.

Fair modesty was once our sex’s pride,

But some have thrown that bashful grace aside:

The Behns, the Manleys, head this motley train,

Politely lewd and wittily profane;

Their wit, their fluent style (which all must own)

Can never for their levity atone.

But Heaven still, its goodness to denote,

For every poison gives an antidote:

First, our Orinda, spotless in her fame,

As chaste in wit, rescued our sex from shame;

And now, when Heywood’s soft, seducing style

Might heedless youth and innocence beguile,

Angelic wit and purest thoughts agree

In tuneful Singer, and great Winchilsea.

For me, who never durst to more pretend

Than to amuse myself, and please my friend:

If she approves of my unskilful lays,

I dread no critic, and desire no praise.