To Timon & Lysander
Timon required the faults of man to be enumerated, at the same time stating them to be few.
1
Mistaken youth to dare assert
Thy sex’s faults are slight and few
The ladies’ faults may numerous prove
But man I fear has more to rue
2
Though ignorance bound our minds in chains
So long, by your unjust command
(Forbade our fame to free from stains)
The pen alone adorn’d your hand
3
Yet now in George’s golden days
And now in Britain’s happy isle
On either sex, with equal grace
The lovely Muses deign to smile
4
And as (when for a while restrained)
More fierce the torrent holds its course
So dread our freedom now regain’d
Lest we retort with triple force
5
Yet no, our gentler minds delight
With love and praise the air to fill
Like honey sweet our numbers flow
Clear as Pieria’s crystal rill
6
Yet pursuant now to your request
I seize the martial lance and shield
And now to lower your haughty crest
The pointed darts of Satyr wield
7
Man is ambitions, jealous, proud
For base ingratitude renown’d
Be faults alone to us allow’d
In man the blacker crimes abound
8
Though fabling bards our sex may name
“The wavering race of woman kind”
Your sex deserves no brighter fame
For man we more inconstant find
9
Or if our blackened fame has spread
Renown’d for art and crafty wiles
Say dwells less cunning in your head
Lurks poison lip beneath your smiles
10
If woman kind should envious prove
Say does in man less envy dwell
If cruelty our sex may love
Say is not man more fierce more fell
11
And if as wintry torrents loud
The eloquence of woman kind
Fierce as the bursting thunder cloud
The stormy tongues of man we find
12
If of their charms our sex were vain
Take to yourselves alone the shame
Your envious soul your selfish mind
And your tyrannic conduct blame
13
For (though this truth may bitter prove)
Know that to us by bounteous heaven
Of whom alike we share the love
An equal soul with yours was given
14
Save gentler far our minds were made
By that our weaker frames to suit
In us the softer passions more
In man the ruder have their root
15
Thus formed alike, companions meet
While joys alone their time engage
They lived a while a life so sweet
It since was called, “The Golden Age”
16
But soon unblest oppression rose
With brazen brow and iron hand
Strait to the stronger sex he goes
And bids usurp unjust command
17
There tyrant man inflamed by pride
(As still in barbarous climes we find)
To our sad sex a soul denied
And said that woman had no mind
18
But like the insects of a day
When this their mortal race was o’er
The flame that animates their clay
Expired alas to rise no more
19
And thence they strove not to improve
A mind whose being they denied
To woman inward light refused
Her outward charms were all her pride
20
Then our unhappy sex became
Giddy coquettish proud and vain
’Till true religion’s sacred beam
To us restored our souls again
21
And hence tho’ fairest of the fair
The British dames lip vain we find
None with their outward charms compare
None with the beauties of their mind
Camilla