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The Complete Poems
The 2nd Earl of Rochester, John Wilmot, was an english libertine and close friend of King Charles II. Known as one of the greatest poets of the Restoration, he wrote and published popular satirical and bawdy poetry. This complete collection of his poetry presented in this paperback edition by Filiquarian Publishing, is a classic and should be read by those interested in the writings of John Wilmot, and satire writings throughout history. You can't go wrong with classic poems such as, "Signior Dildo," "By All Love's Soft, Yet Mighty Powers," and "A Satyre Against Mankind."
104 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1963
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About the author
John Wilmot
100 books70 followersSee John Wilmot Rochester for pseudonymous works by the Russian spiritualist V.I. Kryzhanovskaya.
John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester was an English libertine, a friend of King Charles II, and the writer of much satirical and bawdy poetry.
He was the toast of the Restoration court and a patron of the arts. He married an heiress, Elizabeth Malet, but had many mistresses, including the actress Elizabeth Barry and drank himself to death at the tender age of 33.
John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester was an English libertine, a friend of King Charles II, and the writer of much satirical and bawdy poetry.
He was the toast of the Restoration court and a patron of the arts. He married an heiress, Elizabeth Malet, but had many mistresses, including the actress Elizabeth Barry and drank himself to death at the tender age of 33.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
June 11, 2025
"In all I write, should sence, and Witt, and Rhyme
Faile me at once, Yet something soe Sublime
Shall Stamp my Poem, that the World may See
It could have beene produc’t by none but me
And that’s my end, for Man can wish noe more
Than soe to write as none ere writt before"
This bit reminds me a little of that Robert Frost quotation about how "the object in writing poetry is to make all poems sound as different as possible from each other."
*
I like a well-written list in poetry as much as anybody, and this is a great one:
"Ther’s not a thing on Earth, that I can name
Soe foolish and soe falce as Common fame
It calls the Courtier Knave the plaine Man Rude
Haughty the Grave, and the delightfull Lewd
Impertinent the Brisk, Morose the Sadd,
Meane the Familiar, the Reserv’d one Madd,
Poore helplesse Woman is not favoured more
She’s a Sly Hypocrite, or Publique Whore"
*
A handful of Rochester's songs and shorter lyrics are sublimely well-turned and beautiful ("Song: Love and Life" is, to me, a pack-it-up-and-go-home-because-this-here-is-a-perfect-poem poem), but what really sets Rochester apart is his intellectual sinewiness, rather akin to Donne's. For example, there's this passage where Rochester describes love as:
"That Cordiall dropp Heav’n in our Cup has throwne,
To make the nauseous draught of life goe downe,
On which one onely blessing God might rayse
In lands of Atheists Subsidyes of Prayse"
There are countless descriptions of love in the canon, but the viscerally precise word choice nauseous gives these lines a distinctive character and coloring, evoking a very specific flavor of experience that is jaded and sensitive and quintessentially Rochester-esque. On top of that, two lines down, we have the unusual word choice subsidies (not the only time Rochester uses this word in a poem, either), which idiosyncratically marries lyric love poetry to the diction of finance and economics (not to mention atheism). It's touches like these that really elevate these poems.
In addition to the highly personal diction, the other characteristic of these poems that I include in my umbrella term of "intellectual sinewiness" is their epigrammatic compactness. Consider how these gem-like couplets make quick work of oppositions and dichotomies:
To an exact perfection they have wrought
The Action Love, the Passion is forgott.
Their private wish obeys the publicke Voyce,
‘Twixt good and bad, Whimsey decides, not Choyce.
’tis a Meaner part of sence
To finde a fault, then taste an Excellence
[Note: Rochester could have chosen to say: 'tis a Meaner part of sence / To finde a fault, then finde an excellence. But he makes the parallelism even better by paralleling the verb find (a neutral verb, as well as one that alliterates with fault) with the verb taste (a more vivid verb, one that has connotations of epicureanism, of slowly savoring the delicate bouquet of flavors in a dish). I think it's brilliant.]
I’de fart just as I write, for my own Ease
Nor should you bee concern’d unlesse you please
Who rapture before nature does preferr
And now himself turn’d his own Imager
Twixt strifes of Love and war the difference Lies in this
When neither overcomes Loves triumph greater is.
This degree of compaction appears to me almost to exceed that of haiku -- it seems as if it would require a facility with nuclear physics to achieve, and the results are just as explosive.
Faile me at once, Yet something soe Sublime
Shall Stamp my Poem, that the World may See
It could have beene produc’t by none but me
And that’s my end, for Man can wish noe more
Than soe to write as none ere writt before"
This bit reminds me a little of that Robert Frost quotation about how "the object in writing poetry is to make all poems sound as different as possible from each other."
*
I like a well-written list in poetry as much as anybody, and this is a great one:
"Ther’s not a thing on Earth, that I can name
Soe foolish and soe falce as Common fame
It calls the Courtier Knave the plaine Man Rude
Haughty the Grave, and the delightfull Lewd
Impertinent the Brisk, Morose the Sadd,
Meane the Familiar, the Reserv’d one Madd,
Poore helplesse Woman is not favoured more
She’s a Sly Hypocrite, or Publique Whore"
*
A handful of Rochester's songs and shorter lyrics are sublimely well-turned and beautiful ("Song: Love and Life" is, to me, a pack-it-up-and-go-home-because-this-here-is-a-perfect-poem poem), but what really sets Rochester apart is his intellectual sinewiness, rather akin to Donne's. For example, there's this passage where Rochester describes love as:
"That Cordiall dropp Heav’n in our Cup has throwne,
To make the nauseous draught of life goe downe,
On which one onely blessing God might rayse
In lands of Atheists Subsidyes of Prayse"
There are countless descriptions of love in the canon, but the viscerally precise word choice nauseous gives these lines a distinctive character and coloring, evoking a very specific flavor of experience that is jaded and sensitive and quintessentially Rochester-esque. On top of that, two lines down, we have the unusual word choice subsidies (not the only time Rochester uses this word in a poem, either), which idiosyncratically marries lyric love poetry to the diction of finance and economics (not to mention atheism). It's touches like these that really elevate these poems.
In addition to the highly personal diction, the other characteristic of these poems that I include in my umbrella term of "intellectual sinewiness" is their epigrammatic compactness. Consider how these gem-like couplets make quick work of oppositions and dichotomies:
To an exact perfection they have wrought
The Action Love, the Passion is forgott.
Their private wish obeys the publicke Voyce,
‘Twixt good and bad, Whimsey decides, not Choyce.
’tis a Meaner part of sence
To finde a fault, then taste an Excellence
[Note: Rochester could have chosen to say: 'tis a Meaner part of sence / To finde a fault, then finde an excellence. But he makes the parallelism even better by paralleling the verb find (a neutral verb, as well as one that alliterates with fault) with the verb taste (a more vivid verb, one that has connotations of epicureanism, of slowly savoring the delicate bouquet of flavors in a dish). I think it's brilliant.]
I’de fart just as I write, for my own Ease
Nor should you bee concern’d unlesse you please
Who rapture before nature does preferr
And now himself turn’d his own Imager
Twixt strifes of Love and war the difference Lies in this
When neither overcomes Loves triumph greater is.
This degree of compaction appears to me almost to exceed that of haiku -- it seems as if it would require a facility with nuclear physics to achieve, and the results are just as explosive.
September 24, 2014
I can't understand why more people don't adore this.
Rochester was beautiful damaged womanising drunkard, in an era where this was a lifestyle choice. Yet he wrote such honest emotional poetry and some of the most brutally critical poetry I've ever read.
Strange to have a literary crush on a guy who died at 33, of the clap, but there you go.
He foresaw his own end:
So when my days of impotence approach,
And I'm by pox and wine's unlucky chance,
Driven from the pleasing billows of debauch,
On the dull shore of lazy temperance,
and was quite merciless:
The pattern of virtue, Her Grace of Cleveland,
Has swallowed more pricks than the ocean has sand;
But by rubbing and scrubbing so wide does it grow,
It is fit for just nothing but Signior Dildo.
Rochester was beautiful damaged womanising drunkard, in an era where this was a lifestyle choice. Yet he wrote such honest emotional poetry and some of the most brutally critical poetry I've ever read.
Strange to have a literary crush on a guy who died at 33, of the clap, but there you go.
He foresaw his own end:
So when my days of impotence approach,
And I'm by pox and wine's unlucky chance,
Driven from the pleasing billows of debauch,
On the dull shore of lazy temperance,
and was quite merciless:
The pattern of virtue, Her Grace of Cleveland,
Has swallowed more pricks than the ocean has sand;
But by rubbing and scrubbing so wide does it grow,
It is fit for just nothing but Signior Dildo.
Read
May 27, 2015Review brought to you courtesy of Reading Project 2015.
Kay.
So.
I’m gonna leave this one to Hazlitt.
On the subject of the Earl of Rochester, he wrote 'his verses cut and sparkle like diamonds' while 'his his contempt for everything that others respect almost amounts to sublimity'.
Rochester is my man. That is all.
I mean, he’s a construct of a semblance of a person who lived a ridiculously long time ago, composed of stories (many most likely apocryphal) and fragments of poetry and prose.
But he’s still my man.
This is my favourite story about him.
So, the Earl of Rochester was hammered one day, carousing with his mates through Whitehall, whereupon he (I nearly wrote ‘comes upon’ but one has to be careful with one’s language around Johnny Wilmot) spots this enormous, ornamental sundial. Now Charlie II (who we know was the King of Bling) was super into astronomy and cosmology – he collected clocks and astrolabes and the like, and this sundial-come-orrery thang he’d stuck in the Privy Garden was the most extravagant, most expensive piece of science-bling in Europe. It had been designed by some mathematics professor at Liege and it was ... to put it bluntly the shit.
And the King was crazy about it. He probably bored the hell out of his friends talking about it all the time.
Now, there aren’t many surviving records about the sundial – but it seems to have consisted of kind of spire, below which hung a set of large glass spheres.
Anyway, Rochester spots this monstrosity, this marvel, this paragon of time-keeping and just flips the fuck out. “Dost thou stand there to fuck time!” he roars, draws his sword and falls upon it like a wild beast.
Needless to say, it doesn’t survive.
His poems are variable, rough and merciless, occasionally tender, occasionally brilliant. I like them for their relative informality, their intertwining of sex and politics, their deconstructions of masculinity and gender, and for the fact they are full of naughty words.
Kay.
So.
I’m gonna leave this one to Hazlitt.
On the subject of the Earl of Rochester, he wrote 'his verses cut and sparkle like diamonds' while 'his his contempt for everything that others respect almost amounts to sublimity'.
Rochester is my man. That is all.
I mean, he’s a construct of a semblance of a person who lived a ridiculously long time ago, composed of stories (many most likely apocryphal) and fragments of poetry and prose.
But he’s still my man.
This is my favourite story about him.
So, the Earl of Rochester was hammered one day, carousing with his mates through Whitehall, whereupon he (I nearly wrote ‘comes upon’ but one has to be careful with one’s language around Johnny Wilmot) spots this enormous, ornamental sundial. Now Charlie II (who we know was the King of Bling) was super into astronomy and cosmology – he collected clocks and astrolabes and the like, and this sundial-come-orrery thang he’d stuck in the Privy Garden was the most extravagant, most expensive piece of science-bling in Europe. It had been designed by some mathematics professor at Liege and it was ... to put it bluntly the shit.
And the King was crazy about it. He probably bored the hell out of his friends talking about it all the time.
Now, there aren’t many surviving records about the sundial – but it seems to have consisted of kind of spire, below which hung a set of large glass spheres.
Anyway, Rochester spots this monstrosity, this marvel, this paragon of time-keeping and just flips the fuck out. “Dost thou stand there to fuck time!” he roars, draws his sword and falls upon it like a wild beast.
Needless to say, it doesn’t survive.
His poems are variable, rough and merciless, occasionally tender, occasionally brilliant. I like them for their relative informality, their intertwining of sex and politics, their deconstructions of masculinity and gender, and for the fact they are full of naughty words.
March 12, 2017
*bows* I'm completely in love with the author. I memorized all his poems, I even started translating them to Lithuanian. I love his writing style and I got inspired by his art, so I create my own poetry now in the similar style. He even inspired me in all of the ways.
July 18, 2007
Ah, Rochester. You'll earn me my Ph.D. one day.
It's hard to justify how I, a relatively straight-laced kid with vanilla tastes, fell upon Earl Rochester (cough) as My author. But it happened, and I shall be forever glad to the professor who turned me on to him. And the innuendo cough again.
It's hard to justify how I, a relatively straight-laced kid with vanilla tastes, fell upon Earl Rochester (cough) as My author. But it happened, and I shall be forever glad to the professor who turned me on to him. And the innuendo cough again.
March 10, 2025
Here’s some Rochester for y’all:
Oh what damned age do we live in
Since there is no Christian soul
But old Father Patrick and Griffin
Dare put their pricks in the right hole.
Oh why do we keep such a bustle
‘Bout putting a prick in an arse,
Since Harvey’s long-cunted muscle
Serves Stuart instead of a tarse.
Since fucking is not as ‘twas wont
The ladies have got a new trick:
As an arsehole serves for a cunt,
So a clitoris serves for a prick.
Besides, the damned tailors of France
To Great Britain’s defamation
Have made better pintles by chance
Than the gods of the English nation.
But now there’s nothing will do,
Their cunts are grown so wide,
Except with a French leather dildo
They get on each other and ride.
Oh what damned age do we live in
Since there is no Christian soul
But old Father Patrick and Griffin
Dare put their pricks in the right hole.
Oh why do we keep such a bustle
‘Bout putting a prick in an arse,
Since Harvey’s long-cunted muscle
Serves Stuart instead of a tarse.
Since fucking is not as ‘twas wont
The ladies have got a new trick:
As an arsehole serves for a cunt,
So a clitoris serves for a prick.
Besides, the damned tailors of France
To Great Britain’s defamation
Have made better pintles by chance
Than the gods of the English nation.
But now there’s nothing will do,
Their cunts are grown so wide,
Except with a French leather dildo
They get on each other and ride.
January 11, 2019
Obscene, John.
Scandalous. I liked it.
Scandalous. I liked it.
April 4, 2013
A poet/philosopher in the libertine/desperately sceptical tradition. Maybe less philosophical than others and filthier. Filthy verse to tell you about usages past, I mean language use and sexual uses. Autobiographical poetry, although put on, in the how-desperately-wicked-am-I tradition -- as per below:
'The Earl of Rochester's Conference with a Postboy'
Rochester. Son of a whore, God damn you! can you tell
A peerless peer the readiest way to Hell?
I've outswilled Bacchus, sworn of my own make
Oaths would fright Furies, and make Pluto quake;
I've swived more whores more ways than Sodom's walls
E'er knew, or the college of Rome's cardinals.
Witness heroic scars. Look here. Ne'er go!
Cerecloths and ulcers from the top to toe!
Frighted at my own mischiefs, I have fled
And bravely left my life's defender dead;
Broke houses to break chastity, and dyed
That floor with murder which my lust denied.
Pox on't! why do I speak of these poor things?
I have blasphemed my God, and libelled kings!
The readiest way to Hell, boy! Quick!
Boy. Ne'er stir,
The readiest way, My Lord, 's by Rochester.
'The Earl of Rochester's Conference with a Postboy'
Rochester. Son of a whore, God damn you! can you tell
A peerless peer the readiest way to Hell?
I've outswilled Bacchus, sworn of my own make
Oaths would fright Furies, and make Pluto quake;
I've swived more whores more ways than Sodom's walls
E'er knew, or the college of Rome's cardinals.
Witness heroic scars. Look here. Ne'er go!
Cerecloths and ulcers from the top to toe!
Frighted at my own mischiefs, I have fled
And bravely left my life's defender dead;
Broke houses to break chastity, and dyed
That floor with murder which my lust denied.
Pox on't! why do I speak of these poor things?
I have blasphemed my God, and libelled kings!
The readiest way to Hell, boy! Quick!
Boy. Ne'er stir,
The readiest way, My Lord, 's by Rochester.
November 6, 2011
Madder, Badder and probably more dangerous to know than Byron, who seems a bit of a kitten in comparison. Sexually explicit, gleefully obscene and unashamedly perverse, if the book were a cd it would have a warning label. The Bad Lord is still metrically fascinating and capable of writing memorable poems (to the post boy is a favourite) except when he's trying to be philosophical.
March 18, 2009
Belligerent, sexually perverse, and morally unrestrained. I love Rochester, of course.
June 21, 2016
There should be no denying the man's talent, but the man was pure filth. In a sense, this is glorious stuff. There is beauty here, of some kind ... and it is very depraved.
February 19, 2019
It's easy to confuse the poet with Jack Benny's sidekick. The Earl of Rochester was a better poet, but a lesser man. Eddie Anderson probably would not have written
Naked she lay, clasped in my longing arms,
I filled with love, and she all over charms;
Both equally inspired with eager fire,
Melting through kindness, flaming in desire[,]
but Wilmot would never have hung out with Jack or Don or Dennis.
Naked she lay, clasped in my longing arms,
I filled with love, and she all over charms;
Both equally inspired with eager fire,
Melting through kindness, flaming in desire[,]
but Wilmot would never have hung out with Jack or Don or Dennis.
November 5, 2022
logging this whole thing in lieu of only logging 'the imperfect enjoyment', literally one of the best poems i've ever read. THANK YOU english professor who read this out loud in a recorded lecture, you are my hero 🙏🏻🫶🏻
April 5, 2021
Only read imperfect enjoyment actually and uhhhhh weird. I feel like sure it’s cool to write poetry about sexy stuff but who wants to read about your failure to get an erection?
February 10, 2022
This is probably the nastiest and filthiest book I've ever read from someone in the 17th century - and it's great and you should read it.
June 30, 2022
he came to slay
Read
February 9, 2024lol!
Want to read
May 2, 2024Restoration Recommended Reading List as per Benjamin McEvoy in How to Get an Oxford English Education for Free: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1Q2J...
April 9, 2022
this man had a lot of sex and i’m here for it
September 25, 2010
In the words of my extremely enthusiastic and entirely underappreciated british literature professor, if you don't like Rochester, you're pretty much screwed.
It's dirty, it's shocking, and yes, it really is about what you think it's about.
Nothing is out of reach for Rochester: premature ejaculation in the court of Charles II? Why not? Calfskin condoms? Absolutely. Primitive dildos? Yes indeed. There is something delightful about reading such things from a man who ought, by all rights, to have been living a dignified life.
I have the deepest gratitude for Rochester's debauchery, considering what it produced, with only one regret: that his lifestyle took his life at age 33, due to the only thing worthy of bringing down Rochester himself - syphilis.
It's dirty, it's shocking, and yes, it really is about what you think it's about.
Nothing is out of reach for Rochester: premature ejaculation in the court of Charles II? Why not? Calfskin condoms? Absolutely. Primitive dildos? Yes indeed. There is something delightful about reading such things from a man who ought, by all rights, to have been living a dignified life.
I have the deepest gratitude for Rochester's debauchery, considering what it produced, with only one regret: that his lifestyle took his life at age 33, due to the only thing worthy of bringing down Rochester himself - syphilis.
January 24, 2013
After reading Marquis de Sade's Justine it would only make sense to read John Wilmot, of course.
Since I saw The Libertine I always had an excruciating curiosity for this man. I still want to read his plays and I think this was a great start. I liked it pretty much, especially the Satyr on Charles II, The Mistress or Signior Dildo. Actually this one is hilarious! I can imagine all those puritans reading this and blushing and saying this was a blasphemy ahhaah. This man was a genius and he sure knew how to enjoy himself.
Since I saw The Libertine I always had an excruciating curiosity for this man. I still want to read his plays and I think this was a great start. I liked it pretty much, especially the Satyr on Charles II, The Mistress or Signior Dildo. Actually this one is hilarious! I can imagine all those puritans reading this and blushing and saying this was a blasphemy ahhaah. This man was a genius and he sure knew how to enjoy himself.
purposely-partially-read
December 10, 2014Read: "Against Constancy," "The Disabled Debauchee," "Song ('Love a woman? You're an ass!')," "The Imperfect Enjoyment," "Upon Nothing," and -- my personal favorite -- "A Satyr Against Reason and Mankind"
June 21, 2007
hmmm. a true philandering wastrel, with writing ability. love the seventeenth century rakes.
Read
January 30, 2008A bit debaucherous. =)
June 29, 2008
A total lack of scholarship and a tendency for false attribution makes this a collection to avoid at all overbloated costs. Try the Penguin select instead.
January 10, 2011
some seriously lascivious and explicit sexual poetry in this one - very satiric guy
August 24, 2012
funny reading somewhat erotic poetry "The Imperfect Enjoyment" from 18th century literature haha
May 5, 2015
A true Libertine, Rochester writes what others dare not speak of: sex! I love his puns and metaphors! Bravo!
June 25, 2017
raunchy stuff
Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews