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Title: The Monkey Who Had Seen The World
Author: John Gay [
More Titles by Gay]
A monkey, to reform the times,
Resolved to visit foreign climes;
For therefore toilsomely we roam
To bring politer manners home.
Misfortunes serve to make us wise:
Poor pug was caught, and made a prize;
Sold was he, and by happy doom
Bought to cheer up a lady's gloom.
Proud as a lover of his chains
His way he wins, his post maintains--
He twirled her knots and cracked her fan,
Like any other gentleman.
When jests grew dull he showed his wit,
And many a lounger hit with it.
When he had fully stored his mind--
As Orpheus once for human kind,--
So he away would homewards steal,
To civilize the monkey weal.
The hirsute sylvans round him pressed,
Astonished to behold him dressed.
They praise his sleeve and coat, and hail
His dapper periwig and tail;
His powdered back, like snow, admired,
And all his shoulder-knot desired.
"Now mark and learn: from foreign skies
I come, to make a people wise.
Weigh your own worth, assert your place,--
The next in rank to human race.
In cities long I passed my days,
Conversed with man and learnt his ways;
Their dress and courtly manners see--
Reform your state and be like me.
"Ye who to thrive in flattery deal,
Must learn your passions to conceal;
And likewise to regard your friends
As creatures sent to serve your ends.
Be prompt to lie: there is no wit
In telling truth, to lose by it.
And knock down worth, bespatter merit:
Don't stint--all will your scandal credit.
Be bumptious, bully, swear, and fight--
And all will own the man polite."
He grinned and bowed. With muttering jaws
His pugnosed brothers grinned applause,
And, fond to copy human ways,
Practise new mischiefs all their days.
Thus the dull lad too big to rule,
With travel finishes his school;
Soars to the heights of foreign vices,
And copies--reckless what their price is.
[The end]
John Gay's poem: Monkey Who Had Seen The World
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