[Page 81]

MODERN MANNERS.

1 Or modern Manners let me sing,
2 The gay Flirtilla cries —
3 Manners, my dear! there's no such thing —
4 Her grandmamma replies.
5 You say, cries Miss, in days of yore
6 People were highly bred;
7 But, thank my stars, those days are o'er,
8 Those people all are dead.
9 The world is now at ease and gay,
10 Improv'd in every art,
11 Fraught with diversions night and day
12 To charm and fire the heart.
[Page 82]
13 To live in these enlighten'd days
14 Is surely life indeed;
15 Long may they last, Flirtilla prays,
16 And joy to joy succeed!
17 The mind, left free and uncontroul'd,
18 Makes pleasure all it's aim;
19 Youth will not now by age be told —
20 My dear, you are to blame.
21 Such Gothic parents, thanks to Heaven,
22 Are now but rarely found;
23 Those, whom the fates to me have given,
24 Live but in Pleasure's round.
25 No tedious hours at home they pass
26 In dull domestic care;
27 To think, they say, would soon, alas!
28 Bring wrinkles and grey hair.
[Page 83]
29 Oft have I heard them jeer and joke
30 At wedlock's galling chain;
31 Then cry, Thank Heaven, 'tis now no yoke,
32 We wed to part again.
33 In former times indeed 'twas said,
34 That hearts were join'd above,
35 That women to their husbands paid
36 Obedience, truth and love.
37 But title, pin-money and dower
38 Now join our hands for life,
39 No other ties than these have power
40 To couple man and wife.
41 To these alone my thoughts aspire,
42 On these I fix my heart;
43 A wealthy husband I require —
44 I care not when we part.

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Title (in Source Edition): MODERN MANNERS.
Author: Mary Alcock (née Cumberland)
Themes:
Genres: dialogue

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Alcock [née Cumberland], Mary, 1741?–1798. Poems, &c. &c. by the Late Mrs. Mary Alcock [poems only]. London: Printed for C. Dilly, Poultry, 1799, pp. 81-83. vii,[25],183,[1]p. (ESTC T86344) (Page images digitized by University of Michigan Library.)

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Typography, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation have been cautiously modernized. The source of the text is given and all significant editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. This ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.

Other works by Mary Alcock (née Cumberland)