Vulgar words in Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes (Page 1)

This book at a glance

blockhead x 2
make love x 1
pimp x 2
whore x 4
            

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~   ~   ~   Sentence 244   ~   ~   ~

Slaves that with serious impudence beguile, And lie without a blush, without a smile, Exalt each trifle, every vice adore, Your taste in snuff, your judgment in a whore, Can Balbo's eloquence applaud, and swear 150 He gropes his breeches with a monarch's air.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 248   ~   ~   ~

Of all the griefs that harass the distress'd, Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest; Fate never wounds more deep the generous heart, Than when a blockhead's insult points the dart.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 315   ~   ~   ~

From meaner minds though smaller fines content, The plunder'd palace, or sequester'd rent, 170 Mark'd out by dangerous parts he meets the shock, And fatal Learning leads him to the block: Around his tomb let Art and Genius weep, But hear his death, ye blockheads!

~   ~   ~   Sentence 369   ~   ~   ~

Yet bards like these aspired to lasting praise, And proudly hoped to pimp in future days.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 918   ~   ~   ~

2 The god near Cupid drew his chair, Near Comus, Jocus placed; For wine makes Love forget its care, And Mirth exalts a feast.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,032   ~   ~   ~

The ambitious drudge preferr'd, postilion rides, Advanced again, the chair benighted guides; Here doom'd, if Nature strung his sinewy frame, The slave, perhaps, of some insatiate dame; But if, exempted from the Herculean toil, A fairer field awaits him, rich with spoil, There shall he shine, with mingling honours bright, His master's pathic, pimp, and parasite; 80 Then strut a captain, if his wish be war, And grasp, in hope, a truncheon and a star: Or if the sweets of peace his soul allure, Bask at his ease, in some warm sinecure; His fate in consul, clerk, or agent vary, Or cross the seas, an envoy's secretary; Composed of falsehood, ignorance, and pride, A prostrate sycophant shall rise a Lloyd; And, won from kennels to the impure embrace, Accomplish'd Warren triumph o'er disgrace.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,044   ~   ~   ~

If Bubo keeps a catamite or whore, His bounty feeds the beggar at his door: And though no mortal credits Curio's word, A score of lacqueys fatten at his board: 120 To Christian meekness sacrifice thy spleen, And strive thy neighbour's weaknesses to screen.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,184   ~   ~   ~

Behold the leering belle, caress'd by all, Adorn each private feast and public ball, 140 Where peers attentive listen and adore, And not one matron shuns the titled whore.

~   ~   ~   Sentence 2,189   ~   ~   ~

Fraught with the spirit of a Gothic monk, Let Rich, with dulness and devotion drunk, Enjoy the peal so barbarous and loud, While his brain spews new monsters to the crowd; 170 I see with joy the vaticide deplore A hell-denouncing priest and ... whore; Let every polish'd dame and genial lord, Employ the social chair and venal board; Debauch'd from sense, let doubtful meanings run, The vague conundrum, and the prurient pun, While the vain fop, with apish grin, regards The giggling minx half-choked behind her cards: These, and a thousand idle pranks, I deem The motley spawn of Ignorance and Whim.

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