And thus undoubtedly 'twill fare
With what unhappy men shall dare
To be successors to these great unknown,
On learning's high-establish'd throne.
Censure, and Pedantry, and Pride,
Numberless nations, stretching far and wide,
Shall (I foresee it) soon with Gothic swarms come forth
From Ignorance's universal North,
And with blind rage break all this peaceful government:
Yet shall the traces of your wit remain,
Like a just map, to tell the vast extent
Of conquest in your short and happy reign:
And to all future mankind shew
How strange a paradox is true,
That men who lived and died without a name
Are the chief heroes in the sacred lists of fame.
[Footnote 1: "I have been told, that Dryden having perused these verses,
said, 'Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet;' and that this
denunciation was the motive of Swift's perpetual malevolence to
Dryden."--Johnson in his "Life of Swift."--_W. E. B._
In Malone's "Life of Dryden," p. 241, it is stated that John Dunton,
the original projector of the Athenian Society, in his "Life and
Errours," 1705, mentions this Ode, "which being an ingenious poem, was
prefixed to the fifth Supplement of the Athenian Mercury."--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 2: The Ode I writ to the king in Ireland.--_Swift_.]
[Footnote 3: The floating island, which, by order of Neptune, became
fixed for the use of Latona, who there brought forth Apollo and Diana.
See Ovid, "Metam.," vi, 191, etc.--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 4: Gyges, who, thanks to the possession of a golden ring, which
made him invisible, put Candaules to death, married his widow, and
mounted the throne, 716 B.C. See the story in Cicero, "De Off.," iii,
9.--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 5: Proteus. See Ovid, "Fasti," lib. i.--_W. E. B._]