This is another poem by Anne Finch. It is the ninth of ten poems in a series found in Steele's 1714 Poetical Miscellanies which are under consideration here. For full listing of set see "Grown old in rhyme . . .". See also An Annotated Bibliography: Primary and Secondary Sources for all Finch's translations (paraphrases), imitations and adaptations.

See Annotated Chronology No. 166. This one a salacious heightening of what lays flatly (and seemingly unconsciously) on the page in Mlle Le Fevre's paraphrase from Anacreon; again an emphasis on clarity, point, ingenuity, amusing narrative of Venus and her child (as in "L'Amour and la Folie" into "Cupid and Folly"; this one another less acceptable part of narrative developed in her "Lines on the Marriag of Edw. and Eliz. Herbert," "Cupid one day ask'd his Mother," the former printed the year before separately in 1713 Miscellany). Reynolds concurs, p. lxxxviii.

The Forty-Fifth Ode of Anacreon, pp. 48-49

When Mars the Lemnian Darts survey'd,
Which Vulcan forg'd for Cupid's Bow;
What foolish toys are these, he said,
How brittle and how slight they show?

Fit Play-things for a Child! when strait
The little God did one prepare;
Here try, said he, if this one wants Weight;
And gave it to the God of War.

He took the Dart, its Weight he try'd,
While Venus smil'd to see him caught;
Here take it back again, he cry'd,
'Tis much more weighty than I thought.

The little Archer, wanton grown
To find the God of War shew Fear,
Keep it, said he, and henceforth own
My Dart wounds deeper than your Spear.