The ATHEIST and the ACORN. Anne Finch (née Kingsmill), countess of Winchilsea Alexander Huber Editor Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford
Broad Street Oxford OX1 3BG UK
Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive
Taylor Institution Library St Giles' Oxford OX1 3NA UK info@eighteenthcenturypoetry.org https://www.eighteenthcenturypoetry.org/
Oxford This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. T94539 pp. 274-5 K076314.000 Winchilsea, Anne Kingsmill Finch, Countess of, 1661-1720. Miscellany poems, on several occasions: Written by the Right Honble Anne, Countess of Winchilsea. London printed for J. B. and sold by Benj. Tooke, William Taylor, and James Round 1713 pp. 202-204. [8],390p. ; 8⁰.

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The ATHEIST and the ACORN . MEthinks this World is oddly made , And ev'ry thing's amiss , A dull presuming Atheist said , As stretch'd he lay beneath a Shade ; And instanced in this : Behold , quoth he , that mighty thing , A Pumpkin , large and round , Is held but by a little String , Which upwards cannot make it spring , Or bear it from the Ground . Whilst on this Oak , a Fruit so small , So disproportion'd , grows ; That , who with Sence surveys this All , This universal Casual Ball , Its ill Contrivance knows . My better Judgment wou'd have hung That Weight upon a Tree , And left this Mast , thus slightly strung , 'Mongst things which on the Surface sprung , And small and feeble be . No more the Caviller cou'd say , Nor farther Faults descry ; For , as he upwards gazing lay , An Acorn , loosen'd from the Stay , Fell down upon his Eye . Th' offended Part with Tears ran o'er , As punish'd for the Sin : Fool ! had that Bough a Pumpkin bore , Thy Whimseys must have work'd no more , Nor Scull had kept them in .