| Alexander Pope (1688–1744). Complete Poetical Works. 1903. | | | | Poems: 1713–17 | | The Looking-Glass |
| | | | On Mrs. Pulteney |
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| Mrs. Pulteney was a daughter of one John Gumley, who had made a fortune by a glass manufactory. |
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WITH scornful mien, and various toss of air, | |
| Fantastic, vain, and insolently fair, | |
| Grandeur intoxicastes her giddy brain, | |
| She looks ambition, and she moves disdain. | |
| Far other carriage graced her virgin life, | 5 |
| But charming Gumley’s lost in Pulteney’s wife. | |
| Not greater arrogance in him we find, | |
| And this conjunction swells at least her mind. | |
| O could the sire, renown’d in glass, produce | |
| One faithful mirror for his daughter’s use! | 10 |
| Wherein she might her haughty errors trace, | |
| And by reflection learn to mend her face: | |
| The wonted sweetness to her form restore, | |
| Be what she was, and charm mankind once more. | | | |
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