"Here lies honest William, whose heart was a mint, / While the owner ne'er knew half the good that was in't."
— Goldsmith, Oliver (1728?-1774)
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
G. Kearsley
Date
1774
Metaphor
"Here lies honest William, whose heart was a mint, / While the owner ne'er knew half the good that was in't."
Metaphor in Context
Here lies honest William, whose heart was a mint,
While the owner ne'er knew half the good that was in't;
The pupil of impulse, it forced him along,
His conduct still right, with his argument wrong;
Still aiming at honour, yet fearing to roam,
The coachman was tipsy, the chariot drove home;
Would you ask for his merits? alas! he had none,
What was good was spontaneous, his faults were his own.
(pp. 8-9. ll. 43-50, p. 750 in Lonsdale)
While the owner ne'er knew half the good that was in't;
The pupil of impulse, it forced him along,
His conduct still right, with his argument wrong;
Still aiming at honour, yet fearing to roam,
The coachman was tipsy, the chariot drove home;
Would you ask for his merits? alas! he had none,
What was good was spontaneous, his faults were his own.
(pp. 8-9. ll. 43-50, p. 750 in Lonsdale)
Categories
Provenance
Found again searching "mint" and heart" in HDIS (Poetry)
Citation
At least 14 entries in ESTC (1774, 1776, 1777). [Unfinished at Goldsmith's death (April 4, 1774), the poem breaks off in the middle of an epitaph for Reynolds. Lonsdale believes the poem was begun in January with some of it written in March 1774, when Goldsmith was in the country.]
See Oliver Goldsmith, Retaliation: a Poem. By Doctor Goldsmith. Including Epitaphs on the Most Distinguished Wits of this Metropolis (London: G. Kearsley, 1774). <Link to ECCO> <Link to RPO>
See Roger Lonsdale's The Poems of Thomas Gray, William Collins, and Oliver Goldsmith (London and New York: Longman and Norton: 1972), 741-59.
See Oliver Goldsmith, Retaliation: a Poem. By Doctor Goldsmith. Including Epitaphs on the Most Distinguished Wits of this Metropolis (London: G. Kearsley, 1774). <Link to ECCO> <Link to RPO>
See Roger Lonsdale's The Poems of Thomas Gray, William Collins, and Oliver Goldsmith (London and New York: Longman and Norton: 1972), 741-59.
Date of Entry
11/27/2003
Date of Review
04/11/2012
