A Vicar liv’d on this side Trent,
Religious, learn’d, benevolent,
Pure was his life in deed, word, thought,
A comment on the truths he taught;
His parish large, his income small,
Yet seldom wanted wherewithal,
For against every merry tide
Madam would carefully provide.
A painful pastor, but his sheep,
Alas! within no bounds would keep;
A scabby flock, that every day
Ran riot, and would go astray.
He thump’d his cushion, fretted, vext,
Thumb’d o’er again each useful text;
Rebuk’d, exhorted, all in vain,
His parish was the more profane:
The scrubs would have their wicked will,
And cunning Satan triumph’d still.
At last, when each expedient fail’d,
And serious measures nought avail’d,
It came into his head to try
The force of wit and raillery.
The good man was by nature gay,
Could jibe and joke as well as pray;
Not like some hide-bound folk, who chase
Each merry smile from their dull face,
And think pride zeal, ill-nature grace.
At christenings and each jovial feast
He singled out the sinful beast;
Let all his pointed arrows fly,
Told this and that, look’d very sly,
And left my masters to apply.
His tales were humorous, often true,
And now and then set off to view
With lucky fictions and sheer wit,
That pierc’d where truth could never hit.
The laugh was always on his side,
While passive fools by turns deride;
And, giggling thus at one another,
Each jeering lout reform’d his brother,
Till the whole parish was with ease
Sham’d into virtue by degrees:
Then be advis’d, and try a Tale,
When Chrysostom and Austin fail.
—————
The End
And that’s the End of the Poem
© Poetry Monster, 2021.
Poetry Monster — the ultimate repository of world poetry.
Poetry Monster — the multilingual library of poetic works. Here you’ll find original poems, poetry translations, ancient verses, ballads and even folk tales.
Poetry Monster (or even The Poetry Monster) — is also an international multilingual community of poets and poetry connoisseurs. Join us:
Some external links: The Bat’s Poetry Cave. — Fledermaus’s poetry site. Talking Writing Monster. — the irreverent and irrelevant chatter on subjects both serious and not quite. A free for all board. You can scribble anything on it without registration (but it doesn’t let spammers in). You can even post your poems. Qwant.com. — a search engine from France. It’s an alternative because there are a few alternatives, like Bing, Duckduckgo, and Ecosia. And there is Yandex, the ultimate language-oriented search engine for the Russophone world. Commercial Links: Russian Commerce – the foreign trade assistance agency Other links: Poems and poetry in Russian (if you are reading this in English, as you obviously are, then you’d have to switch the language, the language switch is on the menu. More on languages)
