He had fuch plenty, as fuffic'd
To make fome think him circumcis'd;
And truly fo, perhaps, he was,
'Tis many a pious Chriftian's cafe.
He was in Logic a great critic,
Profoundly skill'd in Analytic;
He could diftinguifh, and divide
A hair 'twixt fouth, and fouth-weft fide;
On either fide he would difpute,
Confute, change hands, and still confute;
He'd undertake to prove, by force
Of argument, a man's no horse;
prove a buzzard is no fowl,
And that a Lord may be an owl;
A calf an Alderman, a goose a Justice,
And rooks Committee-Men, or Trustees.
He'd run in debt by disputation,
And pay with ratiocination.
All this by fyllogism true,
In mood and figure, he would do.
For Rhetoric, he could not ope
His mouth, but out there flew a trope:
And when he happen'd to break off
I' th' middle of his fpeech, or cough,
H' had hard words, ready to fhew why,
And tell what rules he did it by.
Elfe, when with greatest art he spoke,
You'd think he talk'd like other folk.
For all a Rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.
His ordinary rate of speech
In loftiness of found was rich;
A Babylonish dialect,
Which learned pedants much affect ;
It was a parti-colour'd dress
Of patch'd and piebald languages:
'Twas English cut on Greek and Latin,
Like fuftian heretofore on fatin.
It had an odd promiscuous tone,
As if h'had talk'd three parts in one;
Which made fome think, when he did gabble,
Th' had heard three labourers of Babel;
Or Cerberus himself pronounce
A leafh of languages at once.
This he as volubly would vent,
As if his stock would ne'er be fpent:
And truly, to fupport that charge,
He had fupplies as vast and large.
For he could coin, or counterfeit
New words, with little or no wit;
Words fo debas'd and hard, no ftone
Was hard enough to touch them on;
And when with hasty noise he spoke 'em,
The ignorant for current took 'em.
That had the orator, who once
Did fill his mouth with pebble ftones
When he harangu'd, but known his phrase,
He would have us'd no other ways.
In Mathematics he was greater
Than Tycho Brahe, or Erra Pater :
For he, by geometric scale,
Could take the fize of pots of ale;
Refolve, by fines and tangents straight,
If bread or butter wanted weight;
And wifely tell what hour o' th' day
The clock does strike, by Algebra.
Befide, he was a fhrewd Philosopher, And had read ev'ry text and gloss over: Whate'er the crabbed'ft author hath,
He understood b’implicit faith :
Whatever Sceptic could enquire for;
For every WHY he had a WHEREfore:
Knew more than forty of them do,
As far as words and terms could go.
All which he understood by rote,
And, as occafion ferv'd, would quote ;
No matter whether right or wrong,
They might be either faid or fung.
His notions fitted things fo well,
That which was which he could not tell; 140
But oftentimes miftook the one
For th'other, as great clerks have done.
He could reduce all things to acts,
And knew their natures by abstracts;
Where entity and quiddity,
The ghost of defunct bodies fly;
Where Truth in person does appear,
Like words congeal'd in northern air.
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