WRITTEN AT THE Request of a young Divine, TO BE SENT To his MISTRESS, with the Beggar's Opera. Mary Jones 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. T115196 Jones, Mary, d. 1778. Miscellanies in Prose and Verse. By Mary Jones. Oxford Printed; and delivered by Mr. Dodsley in Pall-Mall, Mr. Clements in Oxford, and Mr. Frederick in Bath, MDCCL. 1750 pp. 47-48. vi,[1],xlv,[1],405p.

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WRITTEN AT THE Request of a young Divine , TO BE SENT To his MISTRESS , with the Beggar's Opera . In matters of important faith , You rev'rence what the Parson saith ; With equal gravity peruse The dictates of the Parson's Muse . But , ere I tune my artless lays , To sing your wit , and beauty's praise ; Let me in grateful notes renew My thanks for obligations due . And who indebted would not stand For favours from so fair a hand ? Whose sprightly wit can always charm , Whose beauty never fails to warm ; Virtue and innocence your guide , Your sex's pattern , and their pride . Adorn'd with all these charms , beware How you exert your pow'r too far ; Mould into smiles each pretty feature , And act the tyrant with good-nature . For see ! this Op'ra will reveal How great a crime it is to steal ! What laws invented to keep under People inclin'd to theft and plunder . What pity 'tis we cannot boast Of laws to regulate a Toast ! For if a wretch , who steals a horse , Or civilly demands your purse , Deserves poor Mackbeath's threaten'd fate ; And for example swings in state ; What shall we do with those , I pray , Who steal poor people's Hearts away ?