Commend the times, your thoughts correct,
And follow the prevailing sect;
Assert that Hyde,[2] in writing story,
Shows all the malice of a Tory;
While Burnet,[3] in his deathless page,
Discovers freedom without rage.
To Woolston[4] recommend our youth,
For learning, probity, and truth;
That noble genius, who unbinds
The chains which fetter freeborn minds;
Redeems us from the slavish fears
Which lasted near two thousand years;
He can alone the priesthood humble,
Make gilded spires and altars tumble.
DR. SWIFT
Must I commend against my conscience,
Such stupid blasphemy and nonsense;
To such a subject tune my lyre,
And sing like one of Milton's choir,
Where devils to a vale retreat,
And call the laws of Wisdom, Fate;
Lament upon their hapless fall,
That Force free Virtue should enthrall?
Or shall the charms of Wealth and Power
Make me pollute the Muses' bower?
LAWYER
As from the tripod of Apollo,
Hear from my desk the words that follow:
"Some, by philosophers misled,
Must honour you alive and dead;
And such as know what Greece has writ,
Must taste your irony and wit;
While most that are, or would be great,
Must dread your pen, your person hate;
And you on Drapier's hill[5] must lie,
And there without a mitre die.
Pages:
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242