Epigrams
I do not please all my readers?—But see,——
Is it every reader that pleases me?——
The tolling of church-bells, O Doctor Ismenus,—dost find it a bore?
Write no more prescriptions, O Doctor, and then they will toll no more!
Here lies a cardinal
Who did more ill than good.
The good he did badly,
The ill as well as he could.
A monk to a dying sinner said, “Beware!
Just now, as I was coming up the stair,
I saw the devil come for you——” “But stay,—
What shape had he?” “An ass.” “Good father, nay!—
It was your shadow frightened you to-day!”
Professor Ardei’s ashes in this urn
Repose. Dame Nature intended him to teach——
So he was never able aught to learn.
Gian Maria’s ill-conditioned wife
Was bitten by a viper yester-eve.
“Then, I suppose, she’s yielded up her life?”
“No, sir—that ’twas the viper died, I grieve!”
“The abbey has been struck by lightning.” “Where?”
“’Twas in the library.” “Thank heaven’s care!——
The friars, holy men!—uninjured are!”——