from Satire V: On Women

Edward Young

Man’s rich with little, were his judgment true,
Nature is frugal, and her wants are few;
Those few wants answer’d, bring sincere delights,
But fools create themselves new appetites:
Fancy and pride seek things at vast expence,
Which relish not to reason nor to sense.
When surfeit, or unthankfulness, destroys,
In nature's narrow sphere, our solid joys,
In fancy's airy land of noise and show,
Where nought but dreams, no real pleasures grow;
Like cats in air-pumps, to subsist we strive
On joys too thin to keep the soul alive.