THE PACIFICATOR. A POEM.  
LONDON: Printed, and are to be Sold by I. Nutt, near Stationers-Hall. 1700.   

The Pacificator.  

WHAT English Man, without Concern, can see  
The Approach of Bleeding Britain's Destiny?  
That Glorious Land which Justly did Preside,  
For Wit and Wealth, o'er all the World beside?  
In vain Victorious NASSAV did Advance  
His Conquering Arms against the Power of France,  
Since from those Conquests he is hardly come,  
But here's a Civil War broke out at Home:  
Britannia's Warlike Sons disturb the Isle,  
Delighting one another to Dispoil,  
Enured to Discord, Envy, and Debate,  
Hereditary Frenzies of the State.  
The Fruits of Ten Years War they now prevent,  
By Civil Feuds, and Private Discontent.  
The Peace We Gained! Does it so Cheap appear,  
To Prize so Low, what We have bought so Dear?  
The Blood, the Treasure, which has been Destroyed!  
Methinks We should with War and Wounds be Cloyed,  
But 'twill not be, We cannot hope to find  
That in the Birth which is not in the Kind:  
For Pride, and Strife, are Natives of our Soil,  
Freeholders born, and have Possessed the Isle  
Long before julius Caesar Landed here,  
Or Picts, or Painted Britons did appear,  
A stubborn People, Barbarous and Rude;  
Who, like the Kentish Men, were ne'er Subdued.   

Fierce English Men, in Blood and Wounds delight,  
For want of Wars, with one another fight:  
Nothing's so dangerous to them as Peace,  
To feed the Flame, and nourish the Disease;  
No Laws can this Contentious humour Curb,  
Their Charter's such, they will themselves Disturb.  
O julian, julian, who begun the Cry  
Against our Safety, for our Liberty,  
Who would no Mercenary Troops allow,  
Would you Disband our Standing Army now?  
Behold a Civil War is just at hand,  
I'th' very bowels of your Native Land;  
The strong Contention's grown to such a height,  
The Pen's already drawn, and has begun the fight.  
The Pen's the certain Herald of a War,  
And Points it out like any Blazing Star:  
Men Quarrel first, and Skirmish with ill Words,  
And when they're heated than they draw their Swords;  
As little Bawling Curs begin to Bark,  
And bring the Mastive on you in the Dark.  
We had some Jealousies of this last Year,  
Both sides raised Forces, both in Arms appear;  
But some Sage Doctors did them both Advise,  
To make it up without Hostilities:  
But the deep Quarrel's now of such a Nature,  
As Magna Charta fights with Alma Mater;  
The Doctor's fight, and who shall heal the Matter?  
The Dreadful Armies are Drawn out to fight,  
Encamped at large in one another's fight;  
Their Standards are the Red Rose and the White.  
Nothing but dire Destruction does Impend,  
And who knows where the fatal Strife will end?  
The Men of Sense against the Men of Wit,  
Eternal fight must determine it.  
Great Nokor does the Men of Sense Command,  
Prince Arthur Trails a Pike at his Right Hand;  
Heroic Nokor made the first Attack,  
And threw Dramatic Wit upon its Back;  
Sixteen Battalions of Old Britons stand,  
Enriched with Conquest from the Neustrian Strand,  
Ready to Charge when he the Signal makes;  
And thus the Bloody Combat undertakes.  
His Sense was good, but see what Fate Decrees!  
His hasty Talon threw him on his Knees,  
A Storm of Words the Hero overtook,  
Disordered all his Lines, and all his Squadrons broke.  
The adverse Troops poured in their Light Dragoons,  
Charged him with Forty thousand Armed Lampoons;  
The Shock surprised him into a Retreat,  
And Wits Gazette Proclaimed a huge Defeat;  
Printed a List of Wounded and of Slain,  
And bragged he ne'er could Rally up again.   

But Nokor, like a Prudent General,  
Resumed new Courage from a seeming Foil,  
The same Campagne again in Arms appeared,  
And what the Prince had lost, the King repaired;  
Apollo Knighted him upon the spot,  
With other Royal Bounties I've forgot.  
The Wits Commanders tho' they did retreat,  
Will not allow it to be a Defeat;  
Their Troops, they say, soon made a stand again,  
Besides they lost but Thirteen thousand Men.   

C— r came next in order to the Charge,  
His Squadrons thin, altho' his Front was large,  
A modest Soldier, resolute and stout,  
Armed with a Coat of Sense from head to foot;  
No more than need, for he was hard put to't.  
He Charged the strongest Troops of all the Foes,  
And gave them several signal Overthrows,  
But overpowered by multitudes of Wits,  
By Number, not by Force oppressed, retreats;  
So Sense, to Noise and Nonsense, oft submits.  
C —r's a calm and steady Combatant,  
And pushed the forward Troops with brave Intent,  
Modest, a Fault not known among his Tribe,  
And honest too, too honest for a Bribe:  
The Wits would fain ha' bought his fury off,  
And proffered him Applause, and Gold enough,  
But 'twould not do, he boldly Charged again,  
And by Ten thousand Wounds at last was slain.  
Some say he was by his own Men betrayed,  
And basely left alive among the Dead,  
But I cannot understand how that can be,  
For how can Treachery and Sense agree?  
In Honour's Truckle-Bed the Hero lies,  
Till Sense again, the Lord knows when, shall rise.   

M—n, a Renegade from Wit, came on  
And made a false Attack, and next to none;  
The Hypocrite, in Sense, could not conceal  
What Pride, and want of Brains, obliged him to reveal.  
In him the Critics ruined by the Poet,  
And Virgil gives his Testimony to it;  
The Troops of Wit were so enraged to see,  
This Priest Invade his own Fraternity,  
They sent a Party out, by Silence led,  
And without Answer shot the Turncoat Dead.  
The Priest, the Rake, the Wit, strove all in vain,  
For there, alas, he lies among the slain,  
Memento Mori; see the Consequence,  
When Rakes and Wits set up for Men of Sense.   

But Sense still suffered, and the shock was rude,  
For what can Valour do to Multitude?  
The General sent for help both far and near,  
To Cowley, Milton, Ratcliff, Rochester,  
Waller, Roscommon, Howard, and to Bhen,  
The Doubtful Fight the better to maintain;  
Giants these were of Wit and Sense together,  
But they were dead and gone the Lord knows whether.  
The swift Express he then Commands to fly,  
To D—, M—, and N—,  
To send their Aid, and save him from Defeat,  
But their United Council was Retreat,  
Reserve your Fortunes for a better Day;  
So Sailors, when the Ship's a sinking, Pray.  
These are the Sages who Preside o'er Sense,  
And Laws to all the Commonwealth Dispense,  
But Wealth and Ease anticipates our fate,  
And makes our Heroes all degenerate,  
The Muse's high Preferments they possess,  
And now their Pays so great their Pains decrease;  
So R— fought, so H— too fell on,  
Till Lords of O— made and T—.   

And now the Wits their Victory Proclaim,  
Loaden with Spoils of Sense, and swelled with Fame;  
Their Plunder first they carefully bestow,  
And then to spread their Conquest farther, go,  
Their Troops divide, their Terror to extend,  
And God knows where their Ravages will end.   

D—s Commanded the Forlorn of Wit,  
A stiff Politish Critic, very fit  
The open Country to overrun,  
And find out all men's Errors but his own;  
His Stony-Stratford Mistress read his Fate,  
A Sloven's Fancy, and an Empty Pate.  
But now Commission'd by the Jingling Train,  
He has his Thousands, and Ten Thousands slain:  
He, like the Tartars, who forerun the Turks,  
Easie to be distinguished by his Works,  
With equal Havoc, and destructive Hate,  
Leaves all the Land he treads on Desolate;  
He roots up Sense, and sows the Weeds of Wit,  
And Fops and Rakes, ten thousand strong, submit.   

C—e and D—n, H—s and M—x,  
D—y, and everlasting Fops, and Beaus,  
Led up the Battle Fifty thousand strong,  
Armed with Burlesque, Bombast, and Bawdy-Song;  
Fleshed with Great C—'s Slaughter they led on,  
Shouting Victoria, the Day's their own.  
No Bounds to their Licentious Arms they know,  
But Plunder all the Country as they go,  
Kill, Ravish, Burn, Destroy, do what they please!  
The French at Swamerdam were Fools to these.  
The Cruelties they Exercised were such,  
Amboyna's nothing, they've outdone the Dutch;  
Never such Devastation sure was known,  
A Man of Sense could not be seen in Town.  
T—n, even Hackney T—n, would not Print,  
A Book without Wits Imprimatur in't;  
And as in Revolutions of the State,  
Men strive the present things to imitate,  
So when the Wits, and Fops, had got the best,  
Men Acquiesced, and took the Oaths and Test:  
Few would be Martyrs for their Understanding,  
But all went over at the Prince's Landing;  
So Story tells, in Crook-backed Richard's Time,  
Foulkes wore false Humps to make them look like him.   

News, hasty News, the Post is just come in.  
Nokor has Rallied all his Troops again;  
In a Pitched Field he met the haughty Foe,  
And gave them there a total Overthrow,  
The Slaughter's great, the Soldiers still pursue▪  
For they give Quarter but to very few;  
Wits Routed, all the Beaus are quite undone,  
Their General's slain, their Army's fled and gone.  
See the uncertain fate of humane Things!  
Change lays its fickle hands on States and Kings;  
This bloody Battle has undone us all,  
Wit from its Glorious blazing Throne will fall,  
For all the Flower of Gallantry, and Wit,  
Was listed here, and overthrown in it.   

The Florid G—h was General of Horse,  
And lost his Life and Fame too, which was worse;  
The Credit of this new Commander brought,  
With hopes of Plunder, many a Coward out,  
Who hitherto had very wisely chose,  
The Name of Wits, but had declined the blows.  
'Twas dismal to behold the Field of War,  
What Desolation Wit has suffered there,  
Whole Squadrons of Epic Horse appears,  
Trod down by his Heroic Curassiers,  
G—h lost his Darling Satiric Dragoons,  
And two Brigades of Light Horse, called Lampoons,  
Old Soldiers all, well beaten to the Wars,  
Known by their Roughness, ugliness, and Scars;  
Fellows, the like were never heard nor read of,  
" Would by't sometimes, enough to by't one's Head off,  
Nor could their swiftness their Escape procure,  
For Nokor's Fury nothing could endure:  
Enraged with former Losses he fell on,  
Resolved to Conquer, or be quite undone,  
Whole Wings of Foreign Troops he overthrew,  
Whom G—h from France to Wit's assistance drew,  
Something the Matter was those Troops betrayed 'em,  
He ill Procured them, or he had not Paid 'em;  
'Twas a dull fancy in him to think fit,  
To polish English Sense with Foreign Wit..   

Among the Foot the Battle was severe,  
For Wits best Troops were wisely planted there,  
Led up by old Experienced Commanders,  
As D—n, C—e, A—n and S—s—  
The Granadiers were known by their Blue Bonnets,  
For they had been in Scotland making Sonnets;  
Pun-Master-General D—y led them on,  
And with his Chattering Tunes the fight began.  
His Orders were to Charge, and then retire,  
And give the Body liberty to fire;  
Ten Regiments of Plays stood on the Right,  
Led on by General D—n to the Fight;  
The Tragedies had made some small pretence  
To Mutiny, and so Revolt to Sense.  
For D—n had some Sense, till he thought fit  
To Dote, and lately Deviate into Wit;  
The Reason's plain, and he has found it true,  
He followed Wit which did too fast pursue.   

The Left was formed of seven large Brigades,  
Of Farces, Operas, and Masquerades,  
With several little Bands of Doggerel Wit,  
To Scour the Ways, and Line the Hedges fit.   

Between these mighty Wings was ranged in sight,  
A solid Phalanx of Compounded Wit;  
Ten thousand Lyric Foot, all Gallant Beaus,  
Armed with soft Sighs, with Songs, and Billet-Doux.  
There was Eight thousand Elegiac Foot,  
By Briny Tears and Sullen Grief made stout;  
Five Pastoral Bands, lately bred up in Arms,  
By Chanting Gloriana's Mighty Charms,  
And Thundering out King WILLIAM's loud Alarms.  
Pindaric Legions, seven I think appeared  
Like Brandenburghers, with the Enchanted Beard,  
For Lion's Skins, and Whisker's late so feared.  
These were led up by able old Commanders,  
As C—e, H—s, Soldiers Bred in Flanders,  
With D—s, D—y, T—n, Dull M—x,  
B—r, W—y, P—s, Fops and Beaus,  
Dull T—e, and Pious B—y, Old T—e,  
G-n, Tom B—n, and many a Subaltern;  
Some Flying Troops were placed in Ambuscade,  
Mock-Wits, Beau-Wits, and Wits in Masquerade,  
Some Amazonian Troops of Female Wit,  
For Ostentation, not for Combat fit;  
The Witty D— t appeared there too,  
Whose Wit's in Prose, but all Incognito.  
There was one Caledonian Voluntier,  
With some Hibernian Wits brought up the Rear;  
The whole, as by the Musters may be seen,  
Was Ninety seven thousand Fight Men.   

All these drawn up, and ready to Engage,  
Old General D— n, with a Pious Rage,  
That the Great Work might with success go on,  
First Sacrificed to the Emperor o' th' Moon;  
The Poet and the Priest alike in Fame,  
" For Priests of all Religions are the same.   

When Nokor's Conquering Troops began t' appear,  
They found a very warm Reception here,  
He had Invoked the Gods of Wit before,  
And vowed to make their Altars smoke once more,  
With Bloody Hecatombs of Witty Gore.  
Swifter than Lightning at their Host he flew,  
His Word was D—, D—, M—,  
His Squadrons in Poetic Terror shone,  
And whispered Death to Wit as they came on:  
The strong Brigades of his Heroic Horse,  
Dreadful for Sense, for Pointed satire worse,  
Winged with Revenge, in fiery Raptures flew,  
And dipped in Poisoned Gall the Darts they threw;  
Nothing could Nokors furious Troops withstand,  
Nor could he check them with his own Command.  
The Troops of Wit, Disordered, and O'r-run,  
Are Slain, Dispersed, Disgraced, and Overthrown;  
The Shouts of Triumph reach the distant Sky,  
And Nokor lies Encamped in the Field of Victory.   

These are the doubtful dark Events of War,  
But who Britannia's Losses shall Repair?  
For as when States in Civil Wars Engage,  
Their Private Feuds and Passions to assuage,  
The Public suffers, harmless Subjects bear  
The Plagues, and Famines, which attend the War.  
So if we this Destructive War permit,  
Britain will find the Consequence of it,  
A Dearth of Sense, or else a Plague of Wit;  
For Wit, by these Misfortunes desperate,  
Gins to arm at an unusual rate,  
Levies new Forces, giveth Commissions out,  
For several Regiments of Horse and Foot,  
Recruits from every side come in amain,  
From Oxford, Cambridge, Will's, and Warwick-lane.  
The scattered Troops too, from the last Defeat,  
Begin to Halt, and check their swift Retreat:  
In numerous Parties Wit appears again,  
Talks of another Battle this Campagne,  
Their strong Detachments o'er Parnassus range,  
And meditate on nothing but Revenge.   

To whom shall we Apply, what Powers Invoke,  
To deprecate the near impending stroke?  
Ye Gods of Wit and Arts, their Minds inspire  
With Thoughts of Peace, from your Pacifick Fire;  
Engage some Neighbouring Powers to undertake  
To Mediate Peace, for Dear Britannia's sake;  
Pity the Mother rifled of her Charms,  
And make her Sons lay down Intestine Arms.  
Preliminary Treaties first begin,  
And may short Truce a lasting Peace let in,  
Limits to Wits Unbounded Ocean place,  
To which it may, and may no farther pass;  
Fathom the unknown Depths of sullen Sense,  
And Purge it from its Pride, and Insolence,  
Your secret Influences interpose,  
And make them all dispatch their Plenipo's;  
Appoint Parnassus for a Place to meet,  
Where all the Potentates of Wit may Treat,  
Around the Hill let Troops of Muses stand,  
To keep the Peace, and Guard the Sacred Land;  
There let the high Pretensions be discussed,  
And Heaven the fatal Differences adjust.   

Let either side abate of their Demands,  
And both submit to Reason's high Commands,  
For which way ere the Conquest shall incline,  
The loss Britannia will at last be thine.   

Wit, like a hasty Flood, may overrun us,  
And too much Sense has oftentimes undone us:  
Wit is a Flux, a Looseness of the Brain,  
And Sense-abstract has too much Pride to Reign:  
Wit-unconcoct is the Extreme of Sloth,  
And too much Sense is the Extreme of both▪  
Abstracted-wit 'tis owned is a Disease,  
But Sense-abstracted has no Power to please:  
For Sense like Water is but Wit condense,  
And Wit like Air is rarified from Sense:  
Mere Sense is sullen, stiff, and unpolite,  
Mere Wit is apoplectic, thin, and light:  
Wit is a King without a Parliament,  
And Sense a Democratick Government:  
Wit, like the French, where e'er it reigns Destroys,  
And Sense advanced is apt to Tyrannize:  
Wit without Sense is like the Laughing-Evil,  
And Sense unmixed with Fancy is the D— l.  
Wit is a Standing Army Government,  
And Sense a sullen stubborn P— t:  
Wit by its haste anticipates its Fate,  
And so does Sense by being obstinate:  
Wit without Sense in Verse is all but Farce,  
Sense without Wit in Verse is all mine A—.  
Wit, like the French, Performs before it Thinks,  
And Thoughtful Sense without Performance sinks:  
Sense without Wit is phlegmatic and pale,  
And is all Head, forsooth, without a Tail:  
Wit without Sense is choleric and red,  
Has Tail enough indeed, but has not Head.  
Wit, like the Jangling Chimes, Rings all in One,  
Till Sense, the Artist, sets them into Tune:  
Wit, like the Belly, if it be not Fed,  
Will starve the Members, and distract the Head▪  
Wit is the Fruitful Womb where Thoughts Conceive,  
Sense is the Vital Heat which Life and Form must give:  
Wit is the Teeming Mother brings them forth,  
Sense is the Active Father gives them worth.  
United: Wit and Sense, makes Science thrive,  
Divided: neither Wit nor Sense can live;  
For while the Parties eagerly contend,  
The Mortal Strife must in their Mutual Ruin end.   

Listen, ye Powers, to Lost Britannia's Prayer,  
And either side to yielding Terms Prepare;  
And if their Cases long Debates admit,  
As how much Condescension shall be fit,  
How far Wit's Jurisdiction shall extend,  
And where the stated Bounds of Sense shall end,  
Let them to some known Head that strife submit,  
Some Judge Infallible, some Pope in Wit,  
His Triple Seat place on Parnassus' Hill,  
And from his Sentence suffer no Appeal:  
Let the Great Balance in his Censure be,  
And of the Treaty make him Guarantee,  
Let him be the Director of the State,  
And what he says, let both sides take for Fate:  
Apollo's Pastoral Charge to him commit,  
And make him Grand Inquisitor of Wit,  
Let him to each his proper Talon show,  
And tell them what they can, or cannot do,  
That each may choose the Part he can do well,  
And let the Strife be only to Excel:  
To their own Province let him all confine,  
Doctors to Heal, to Preaching the Divine;  
D— n to Tragedy, let C—h Translate,  
D D —y make Ballads, Psalms and Hymns for T— e:  
Let P— r Flatter Kings in Panegyric,  
R—ff Burlesque, and W W —y be Lyric:  
Let C— e writ the Comic, F— e Lampoon,  
W—ly the Banter, M— n the Buffoon,  
And the Transgressing Muse receive the Fate  
Of Contumacy, Excommunicate.   

Such as with Railing Spirits are possessed,  
The Muse's Frenzy, let them be suppressed,  
Allow no Satyrs which receive their Date  
From Juno's Academy, Billingsgate;  
No Banters, no Invective lines admit,  
Where want of Manners, makes up want of Wit▪  
Such as are hardened in Poetic Crimes,  
Let him give up to their own foolish Rhimes;  
Let those Eternal Poets be Condemned,  
To be Eternal Poets to the end:  
Let D— s still continue unpolite,  
And no Man read what Dull M— c shall write,  
Reduce him to his Letter-Case and Whore,  
Let all Men eat him as they did before.  
Let M— n talk for what he can't Defend,  
And Banter Virgil which he ne'er could Mend;  
Let all the little Fry of Wit-Profaners  
Rest as they are, with neither Sense, nor Manners,  
Forsaken of Apollo's Influence,  
With want of Language, and with want of Pence▪  
What Fools Indite, let none but Blockheads Read,  
And may they write in vain, who writ for Bread:  
No Banters on the Sacred Text admit,  
Nor Bawdy Lines, that Blasphemy of Wit:  
To Standard Rules of Government Confine,  
The Rate of every Bard, and Worth of every Line,  
And let the Rays of their Ambition burn,  
Those Phaeton-Wits who this Subjection scorn:  
If they aspire to Invade the Government,  
Bring them before the Muse's Parliament,  
No Universal Monarchy admit,  
A Commonwealth's the Government for Wit..   
FINIS.