The Dean's Reasons For Not Building At Drapier's-Hill

I will not build on yonder mount;     And, should you call me to account,     Consulting with myself, I find     It was no levity of mind.     Whate'er I promised or intended,     No fault of mine, the scheme is ended;     Nor can you tax me as unsteady,     I have a hundred causes ready;     All risen since that flattering time,     When Drapier's-Hill appear'd in rhyme.         I am, as now too late I find,     The greatest cully of mankind;     The lowest boy in Martin's school     May turn and wind me like a fool.     How could I form so wild a vision,     To seek, in deserts, Fields Elysian?     To live in fear, suspicion, variance,     With thieves, fanatics, and barbarians?         But here my lady will object;     Your deanship ought to recollect,     That, near the knight of Gosford[1] placed,     Whom you allow a man of taste,     Your intervals of time to spend     With so conversable a friend,     It would not signify a pin     Whatever climate you were in.         'Tis true, but what advantage comes     To me from all a usurer's plums;     Though I should see him twice a-day,     And am his neighbour 'cross the way:     If all my rhetoric must fail     To strike him for a pot of ale?         Thus, when the learned and the wise     Conceal their talents from our eyes,     And from deserving friends withhold     Their gifts, as misers do their gold;     Their knowledge to themselves confined     Is the same avarice of mind;     Nor makes their conversation better,     Than if they never knew a letter.     Such is the fate of Gosford's knight,     Who keeps his wisdom out of sight;     Whose uncommunicative heart     Will scarce one precious word impart:     Still rapt in speculations deep,     His outward senses fast asleep;     Who, while I talk, a song will hum,     Or with his fingers beat the drum;     Beyond the skies transports his mind,     And leaves a lifeless corpse behind.         But, as for me, who ne'er could clamber high,     To understand Malebranche or Cambray;     Who send my mind (as I believe) less     Than others do, on errands sleeveless;     Can listen to a tale humdrum,     And with attention read Tom Thumb;     My spirits with my body progging,     Both hand in hand together jogging;     Sunk over head and ears in matter.     Nor can of metaphysics smatter;     Am more diverted with a quibble     Than dream of words intelligible;     And think all notions too abstracted     Are like the ravings of a crackt head;     What intercourse of minds can be     Betwixt the knight sublime and me,     If when I talk, as talk I must,     It is but prating to a bust?         Where friendship is by Fate design'd,     It forms a union in the mind:     But here I differ from the knight     In every point, like black and white:     For none can say that ever yet     We both in one opinion met:     Not in philosophy, or ale;     In state affairs, or planting kale;     In rhetoric, or picking straws;     In roasting larks, or making laws;     In public schemes, or catching flies;     In parliaments, or pudding pies.         The neighbours wonder why the knight     Should in a country life delight,     Who not one pleasure entertains     To cheer the solitary scenes:     His guests are few, his visits rare;     Nor uses time, nor time will spare;     Nor rides, nor walks, nor hunts, nor fowls,     Nor plays at cards, or dice, or bowls;     But seated in an easy-chair,     Despises exercise and air.     His rural walks he ne'er adorns;     Here poor Pomona sits on thorns:     And there neglected Flora settles     Her bum upon a bed of nettles.     Those thankless and officious cares     I used to take in friends' affairs,     From which I never could refrain,     And have been often chid in vain;     From these I am recover'd quite,     At least in what regards the knight.     Preserve his health, his store increase;     May nothing interrupt his peace!     But now let all his tenants round     First milk his cows, and after, pound;     Let every cottager conspire     To cut his hedges down for fire;     The naughty boys about the village     His crabs and sloes may freely pillage;     He still may keep a pack of knaves     To spoil his work, and work by halves;     His meadows may be dug by swine,     It shall be no concern of mine;     For why should I continue still     To serve a friend against his will?