The task: a poem, in six books. By William Cowper, ... To which are added, by the same author, An epistle to Joseph Hill, Esq. ... To which are added, ... an epistle ... and the history of John Gilpin.

ARGUMENT of the SECOND BOOK.

Which opens with reflections suggested by the conclusion of the former.—Peace among the nations recommended on the ground of their common fellowship in sorrow.— Prodigies enumerated.—Sicilian earthquakes—Man rendered obnoxious to these calamities by sin.—God the agent in them.—The philosophy that stops at se|condary causes, reproved.—Our own late miscarriages accounted for.—Satyrical notice taken of our trips to Fontainbleau—But the pulpit, not satire, the proper engine of reformation.—The Reverend Advertiser of engraved sermons.—Petit maitre parson.—The good preacher.—Picture of a theatrical clerical coxcomb.— Story-tellers and jesters in the pulpit reproved.—Apo|strophé to popular applause.—Retailers of ancient philosophy expostulated with.—Sum of the whole mat|ter.—Effects of sacerdotal mismanagement on the laity.—Their folly and extravagance.—The mischiefs of profusion.—Profusion itself, with all its consequent evils, ascribed as to its principal cause, to the want of discipline in the Universities.

BOOK II.

THE TIME-PIECE.

OH for a lodge in some vast wilderness, Some boundless continguity of shade, Where rumour of oppression and deceit, Of unsuccessful or successful war Might never reach me more. My ear is pain'd, My soul is sick with ev'ry day's report Of wrong and outrage with which earth is fill'd. There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart, It does not feel for man. The nat'ral bond Of brotherhood is sever'd as the flax That falls asunder at the touch of fire.

He finds his fellow guilty of a skin Not colour'd like his own, and having pow'r T' inforce the wrong, sor such a worthy cause Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey. Lands intersected by a narrow frith Abhor each other. Mountains interposed, Make enemies of nations who had else Like kindred drops been mingled into one. Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys; And worse than all, and most to be deplored As human nature's broadest, foulest blot, Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat With stripes, that mercy with a bleeding heart Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast. Then what is man? And what man seeing this, And having human feelings, does not blush And hang his head, to think himself a man? I would not have a slave to till my ground, To carry me, to fan me while I sleep, And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth That sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.

No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart's Just estimation priz'd above all price, I had much rather be myself the slave And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him. We have no slaves at home.—Then why abroad? And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave That parts us, are emancipate and loos'd. Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs Receive our air, that moment they are free, They touch our country and their shackles fall. That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then, And let it circulate through ev'ry vein Of all your empire. That where Britain's power Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.

Sure there is need of social intercourse, Benevolence and peace and mutual aid Between the nations, in a world that seems To toll the death-bell of its own decease,

And by the voice of all its elements To preach the gen'ral doom.* 1.1 When were the winds Let slip with such a warrant to destroy, When did the waves so haughtily o'erleap Their ancient barriers, deluging the dry? Fires from beneath, and meteors * 1.2 from above Portentous, unexampled, unexplained, Have kindled beacons in the skies, and th' old And crazy earth has had her shaking fits More frequent, and foregone her usual rest. Is it a time to wrangle, when the props And pillars of our planet seem to fail, And Nature * 1.3 with a dim and sickly eye To wait the close of all? But grant her end More distant, and that prophecy demands A longer respite, unaccomplished yet;

Still they are frowning signals, and bespeak Displeasure in his breast who smites the earth Or heals it, makes it languish or rejoice. And 'tis but seemly, that where all deserve And stand exposed by common peccancy To what no few have felt, there should be peace, And brethren in calamity should love.

Alas for Sicily! rude fragments now Lie scatter'd where the shapely column stood. Her palaces are dust. In all her streets The voice of singing and the sprightly chord Are silent. Revelry and dance and show Suffer a syncope and solemn pause, While God performs upon the trembling stage Of his own works, his dreadful part alone. How does the earth receive him?—With what signs Of gratulation and delight, her king? Pours she not all her choicest fruits abroad, Her sweetest flow'rs, her aromatic gums,

Disclosing paradise where'er he treads? She quakes at his approach. Her hollow womb Conceiving thunders, through a thousand deeps And fiery caverns roars beneath his foot. The hills move lightly and the mountains smoke, For he has touch'd them. From th' extremest point Of elevation down into th' abyss, His wrath is busy and his frown is felt. The rocks fall headlong and the vallies rise, The rivers die into offensive pools, And charged with putrid verdure, breathe a gross And mortal nuisance into all the air. What solid was, by transformation strange Grows fluid, and the fixt and rooted earth Tormented into billows heaves and swells, Or with vortiginous and hideous whirl Sucks down its prey insatiable. Immense The tumult and the overthrow, the pangs And agonies of human and of brute Multitudes, fugitive on ev'ry side,

And fugitive in vain. The sylvan scene Migrates uplifted, and with all its soil Alighting in far distant fields, finds out A new possessor, and survives the change. Ocean has caught the frenzy, and upwrought To an enormous and o'erbearing height, Not by a mighty wind, but by that voice Which winds and waves obey, invades the shore Resistless. Never such a sudden flood, Upridged so high, and sent on such a charge, Possess'd an inland scene. Where now the throng That press'd the beach and hasty to depart Look'd to the sea for safety? They are gone, Gone with the refluent wave into the deep, A prince with half his people. Ancient tow'rs, And roofs embattled high, the gloomy scenes Where beauty oft and letter'd worth consume Life in the unproductive shades of death, Fall prone; the pale inhabitants come forth, And happy in their unforeseen release

From all the rigors of restraint, enjoy The terrors of the day that sets them free. Who then that has thee, would not hold thee fast Freedom! whom they that lose thee, so regret, That ev'n a judgment making way for thee, Seems in their eyes, a mercy, for thy sake.

Such evil sin hath wrought; and such a flame Kindled in heaven, that it burns down to earth, And in the furious inquest that it makes On God's behalf, lays waste his fairest works. The very elements, though each be meant The minister of man, to serve his wants, Conspire against him. With his breath, he draws A plague into his blood. And cannot use Life's necessary means, but he must die. Storms rise t' o'erwhelm him: or if stormy winds Rise not, the waters of the deep shall rise, And needing none assistance of the storm, Shall roll themselves ashore, and reach him there.

The earth shall shake him out of all his holds, Or make his house his grave. Nor so content, Shall counterfeit the motions of the flood, And drown him in her dry and dusty gulphs. What then—were they the wicked above all, And we the righteous, whose fast-anchor'd isle Moved not, while their's was rock'd like a light skiff, The sport of ev'ry wave? No: none are clear, And none than we more guilty. But where all Stand chargeable with guilt, and to the shafts Of wrath obnoxious, God may chuse his mark. May punish, if he please, the less, to warn The more malignant. If he spar'd not them, Tremble and be amazed at thine escape Far guiltier England, lest he spare not thee.

Happy the man who sees a God employed In all the good and ill that checquer life! Resolving all events with their effects And manifold results, into the will

And arbitration wise of the Supreme. Did not his eye rule all things, and intend The least of our concerns (since from the least The greatest oft originate) could chance Find place in his dominion, or dispose One lawless particle to thwart his plan, Then God might be surprized, and unforeseen Contingence might alarm him, and disturb The smooth and equal course of his affairs. This truth, philosophy, though eagle-eyed In nature's tendencies, oft overlooks, And having found his instrument, forgets Or disregards, or more presumptuous still Denies the pow'r that wields it. God proclaims His hot displeasure against foolish men That live an atheist life. Involves the heav'n In tempests, quits his grasp upon the winds And gives them all their fury. Bids a plague Kindle a fiery boil upon the skin, And putrify the breath of blooming health.

He calls for famine, and the meagre fiend Blows mildew from between his shrivel'd lips, And taints the golden ear. He springs his mines, And desolates a nation at a blast. Forth steps the spruce philosopher, and tells Of homogeneal and discordant springs And principles; of causes how they work By necessary laws their sure effects, Of action and re-action. He has found The source of the disease that nature feels, And bids the world take heart and banish fear. Thou fool! will thy discov'ry of the cause Suspend th' effect or heal it? Has not God Still wrought by means since first he made the world, And did he not of old employ his means To drown it? What is his creation less Than a capacious reservoir of means Form'd for his use, and ready at his will? Go, dress thine eyes with eye-salve, ask of him,

Or ask of whomsoever he has taught, And learn, though late, the genuine cause of all.

England, with all thy faults, I love thee still My country! and while yet a nook is left Where English minds and manners may be found, Shall be constrain'd to love thee. Though thy clime Be fickle, and thy year, most part, deform'd With dripping rains, or wither'd by a frost, I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies And fields without a flower, for warmer France With all her vines; nor for Ausonias groves Of golden fruitage and her myrtle bow'rs. To shake thy senate, and from heights sublime Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire Upon thy foes, was never meant my task; But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake Thy joys and sorrows with as true a heart As any thund'rer there. And I can feel Thy follies too, and with a just disdain

Frown at effeminates, whose very looks Reflect dishonor on the land I love. How, in the name of soldiership and sense, Should England prosper, when such things, as smooth And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er With odors, and as profligate as sweet, Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath, And love when they should fight; when such as these Presume to lay their hand upon the ark Of her magnificent and awful cause? Time was when it was praise and boast enough In ev'ry clime, and travel where we might, That we were born her children. Praise enough To fill th' ambition of a private man, That Chatham's language was his mother tongue, And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his own. Farewell those honors, and farewell with them The hope of such hereafter. They have fall'n Each in his field of glory: One in arms, And one in council. Wolfe upon the lap

Of smiling victory that moment won, And Chatham, heart-sick of his country's shame. They made us many soldiers. Chatham still Consulting England's happiness at home, Secured it by an unforgiving frown If any wrong'd her. Wolf, where'er he fought, Put so much of his heart into his act, That his example had a magnet's force, And all were swift to follow whom all loved. Those suns are set. Oh rise some other such! Or all that we have left, is empty talk Of old atchievements, and despair of new.

Now hoist the sail, and let the streamers float Upon the wanton breezes. Strew the deck With lavender, and sprinkle liquid sweets, That no rude savour maritime invade The nose of nice nobility. Breathe soft Ye clarionets, and softer still ye flutes, That winds and waters lull'd by magic sounds

May bear us smoothly to the Gallic shore. True, we have lost an empire—let it pass. True, we may thank the perfidy of France That pick'd the jewel out of England's crown, With all the cunning of an envious shrew. And let that pass—'twas but a trick of state. A brave man knows no malice, but at once Forgets in peace, the injuries of war, And gives his direst foe a friend's embrace. And shamed as we have been, to th' very beard Braved and defied, and in our own sea proved Too weak for those decisive blows, that once Insured us mast'ry there, we yet retain Some small pre-eminence, we justly boast At least superior jockeyship, and claim The honors of the turf as all our own. Go then, well worthy of the praise ye seek, And show the shame ye might conceal at home, In foreign eyes!—be grooms, and win the plate, Where once your nobler fathers won a crown!—

'Tis gen'rous to communicate your skill To those that need it. Folly is soon learn'd. And under such preceptors, who can fail.

There is a pleasure in poetic pains Which only poets know. The shifts and turns, Th' expedients and inventions multiform To which the mind resorts, in chace of terms Though apt, yet coy, and difficult to win— T' arrest the fleeting images that fill The mirror of the mind, and hold them fast, And force them sit, 'till he has pencil'd off A faithful likeness of the forms he views; Then to dispofe his copies with such art That each may find its most propitious light, And shine by situation, hardly less, Than by the labor and the skill it cost, Are occupations of the poet's mind So pleasing, and that steal away the thought With such address, from themes of sad import,

That lost in his own musings, happy man! He feels th' anxieties of life, denied Their wonted entertainment, all retire. Such joys has he that sings. But ah! not such, Or seldom such, the hearers of his song. Fastidious, or else listless, or perhaps Aware of nothing arduous in a task They never undertook, they little note His dangers or escapes, and haply find There least amusement where he found the most. But is amusement all? studious of song, And yet ambitious not to sing in vain, I would not trifle merely, though the world Be loudest in their praise who do no more. Yet what can satire, whether grave or gay? It may correct a foible, may chastise The freaks of fashion, regulate the dress, Retrench a sword-blade, or displace a patch; But where are its sublimer trophies found? What vice has it subdued? whose heart reclaim'd

By rigour, or whom laugh'd into reform? Alas! Leviathan is not so tamed. Laugh'd at, he laughs again; and stricken hard, Turns to the stroke his adamantine scales, That fear no discipline of human hands.

The pulpit therefore (and I name it, fill'd With solemn awe, that bids me well beware With what intent I touch that holy thing) The pulpit (when the sat'rist has at last, Strutting and vap'ring in an empty school, Spent all his force and made no proselyte) I say the pulpit (in the sober use Of its legitimate peculiar pow'rs) Must stand acknowledg'd, while the world shall stand, The most important and effectual guard, Support and ornament of virtue's cause. There stands the messenger of truth. There stands The legate of the skies. His theme divine, His office sacred, his credentials clear.

By him, the violated law speaks out Its thunders, and by him, in strains as sweet As angels use, the gospel whispers peace. He stablishes the strong, restores the weak, Reclaims the wand'rer, binds the broken heart, And arm'd himself in panoply complete Of heav'nly temper, furnishes with arms Bright as his own, and trains by ev'ry rule Of holy discipline, to glorious war, The sacramental host of God's elect. Are all such teachers? would to heav'n all were! But hark—the Doctor's voice—fast wedg'd between Two empirics he stands, and with swoln cheeks Inspires the news, his trumpet. Keener far Than all invective is his bold harrangue, While through that public organ of report He hails the clergy; and defying shame, Announces to the world his own and theirs. He teaches those to read, whom schools dismiss'd, And colleges untaught; sells accent, tone,

And emphasis in score, and gives to pray'r Th' adagio and andante it demands. He grinds divinity of other days Down into modern use; transforms old print To zig-zag manuscript, and cheats the eyes Of gall'ry critics by a thousand arts.— Are there who purchase of the Doctor's ware! Oh name it not in Gath!—it cannot be, That grave and learned Clerks should need such aid. He doubtless is in sport, and does but droll, Assuming thus a rank unknown before, Grand caterer and dry-nurse of the church.

I venerate the man, whose heart is warm, Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life Coincident, exhibit lucid proof That he is honest in the sacred cause. To such I render more than mere respect, Whose actions say that they respect themselves. But loose in morals, and in manners vain,

In conversation frivolous, in dress Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse, Frequent in park, with lady at his side, Ambling and prattling scandal as he goes, But rare at home, and never at his books Or with his pen, save when he scrawls a card; Constant at routs, familiar with a round Of ladyships, a stranger to the poor; Ambitious of preferment for its gold, And well prepared by ignorance and sloth, By infidelity and love o' th' world To make God's work a sinecure; a slave To his own pleasures and his patron's pride.— From such apostles, Oh ye mitred heads Preserve the church! and lay not careless hands On sculls that cannot teach, and will not learn.

Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own, Paul should himself direct me. I would trace

His master-strokes, and draw from his design. I would express him simple, grave, sincere; In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain; And plain in manner. Decent, solemn, chaste, And natural in gesture. Much impress'd Himself, as conscious of his awful charge, And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds May feel it too. Affectionate in look, And tender in address, as well becomes A messenger of grace to guilty men. Behold the picture!—Is it like?—Like whom? The things that mount the rostrum with a skip And then skip down again. Pronounce a text, Cry, hem; and reading what they never wrote Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work, And with a well bred whisper close the scene.

In man or woman, but far most in man, And most of all in man that ministers And serves the altar, in my soul I loath

All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn; Object of my implacable disgust. What!—will a man play tricks; will he indulge A silly fond conceit of his fair form And just proportion, fashionable mien And pretty face in presence of his God? Or will he seek to dazzle me with tropes, As with the di'mond on his lily hand, And play his brilliant parts before my eyes When I am hungry for the bread of life? He mocks his Maker, prostitutes and shames His noble office, and instead of truth Displaying his own beauty, starves his flock. Therefore avaunt! all attitude and stare And start theatric, practised at the glass. I seek divine simplicity in him Who handles things divine; and all beside, Though learn'd with labor, and though much admir'd By curious eyes and judgments ill-inform'd, To me is odious as the nasal twang

At conventicle heard, where worthy men Misled by custom, strain celestial themes Through the prest nostril, spectacle-bestrid. Some, decent in demeanor while they preach, That task perform'd, relapse into themselves, And having spoken wisely, at the close Grow wanton, and give proof to ev'ry eye— Whoe'er was edified, themselves were not. Forth comes the pocket mirror. First we stroke An eye-brow; next, compose a straggling lock; Then with an air, most gracefully perform'd, Fall back into our seat; extend an arm And lay it at its ease with gentle care, With handkerchief in hand, depending low. The better hand more busy, gives the nose Its bergamot, or aids th' indebted eye With op'ra glass to watch the moving scene, And recognize the slow-retiring fair. Now this is fulsome; and offends me more Than in a churchman slovenly neglect

And rustic coarseness would. An heav'nly mind May be indiff'rent to her house of clay, And slight the hovel as beneath her care; But how a body so fantastic, trim, And queint in its deportment and attire, Can lodge an heav'nly mind—demands a doubt.

He that negotiates between God and man, As God's ambassador, the grand concerns Of judgment and of mercy, should beware Of lightness in his speech. 'Tis pitiful To court a grin, when you should wooe a soul; To break a jest, when pity would inspire Pathetic exhortation; and t' address The skittish fancy with facetious tales, When sent with God's commission to the heart. So did not Paul. Direct me to a quip Or merry turn in all he ever wrote, And I consent you take it for your text, Your only one, till sides and benches fail.

No: he was serious in a serious cause, And understood too well the weighty terms That he had ta'en in charge. He would not stoop To conquer those by jocular exploits, Whom truth and soberness assail'd in vain.

Oh, popular applause! what heart of man Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms? The wisest and the best feel urgent need Of all their caution in thy gentlest gales; But swell'd into a gust—who then, alas! With all his canvass set, and inexpert And therefore heedless, can withstand thy power? Praise from the rivel'd lips of toothless, bald Decrepitude; and in the looks of lean And craving poverty; and in the bow Respectful of the smutch'd artificer Is oft too welcome, and may much disturb The bias of the purpose. How much more Pour'd forth by beauty splendid and polite,

In language soft as adoration breathes? Ah spare your idol! think him human still. Charms he may have, but he has frailties too, Doat not too much, nor spoil what ye admire.

All truth is from the sempiternal source Of light divine. But Egypt, Greece, and Rome Drew from the stream below. More favor'd we Drink, when we chuse it, at the fountain head. To them it flow'd much mingled and defiled With hurtful error, prejudice, and dreams Illusive of philosophy, so call'd, But falsely. Sages after sages strove In vain, to filter off a chrystal draught Pure from the lees, which often more enhanced The thirst than slaked it, and not seldom bred Intoxication and delirium wild. In vain they push'd enquiry to the birth And spring-time of the world, ask'd, whence is man? Why form'd at all? And wherefore as he is?

Where must he find his Maker? With what rites Adore him? Will he hear, accept, and bless? Or does he sit regardless of his works? Has man within him an immortal seed? Or does the tomb take all? If he survive His ashes, where? and in what weal or woe? Knots worthy of solution, which alone A Deity could solve. Their answers vague And all at random, fabulous and dark, Left them as dark themselves. Their rules of life Defective and unsanction'd, proved too weak To bind the roving appetite, and lead Blind nature to a God not yet reveal'd. 'Tis Revelation satisfies all doubts, Explains all mysteries, except her own, And so illuminates the path of life, That fools discover it, and stray no more. Now tell me, dignified and sapient sir, My man of morals, nurtur'd in the shades

Of Academus, is this false or true? Is Christ the abler teacher, or the schools? If Christ, then why resort at ev'ry turn To Athens or to Rome, for wisdom short Of man's occasions, when in him reside Grace, knowledge, comfort, an unfathom'd store? How oft when Paul has serv'd us with a text, Has Epictetus, Plato, Tully preach'd! Men that if now alive, would sit content And humble learners of a Saviour's worth, Preach it who might. Such was their love of truth, Their thirst of knowledge, and their candour too.

And thus it is. The pastor, either vain By nature, or by flatt'ry made so, taught To gaze at his own splendor, and t' exalt Absurdly, not his office, but himself; Or unenlighten'd, and too proud to learn, Or vicious, and not therefore apt to teach, Perverting often by the stress of lewd

And loose example, whom he should instruct, Exposes and holds up to broad disgrace The noblest function, and discredits much The brightest truths that man has ever seen. For ghostly counsel, if it either fall Below the exigence, or be not back'd With show of love, at least with hopeful proof Of some sincerity on the giver's part; Or be dishonor'd in th' exterior form And mode of its conveyance, by such tricks As move derision, or by foppish airs And histrionic mumm'ry, that let down The pulpit to the level of the stage, Drops from the lips a disregarded thing. The weak perhaps are moved, but are not taught; While prejudice in men of stronger minds Takes deeper root, confirm'd by what they see. A relaxation of religions hold Upon the roving and untutor'd heart Soon follows, and the curb of conscience snapt,

The laity run wild.—But do they now? Note their extravagance, and be convinced.

As nations ignorant of God, contrive A wooden one, so we, no longer taught By monitors that mother church supplies, Now make our own. Posterity will ask (If e'er posterity see verse of mine) Some fifty or an hundred lustrums hence, What was a monitor in George's days? My very gentle reader, yet unborn, Of whom I needs must augur better things, Since heav'n would sure grow weary of a world Productive only of a race like us, A monitor is wood. Plank shaven thin. We wear it at our backs. There closely braced And neatly fitted, it compresses hard The prominent and most unsightly bones, And binds the shoulders flat. We prove its use Sov'reign and most effectual to secure

A form not now gymnastic as of yore, From rickets and distortion, else, our lot. But thus admonish'd we can walk erect, One proof at least of manhood; while the friend Sticks close, a Mentor worthy of his charge. Our habits costlier than Lucullus wore, And by caprice as multiplied as his, Just please us while the fashion is at full, But change with ev'ry moon. The sycophant That waits to dress us, arbitrates their date, Surveys his fair reversion with keen eye; Finds one ill made, another obsolete, This fits not nicely, that is ill conceived, And making prize of all that he condemns, With our expenditure defrays his own. Variety's the very spice of life That gives it all its flavor. We have run Through ev'ry change that fancy at the loom Exhausted, has had genius to supply, And studious of mutation still, discard

A real elegance a little used For monstrous novelty and strange disguise. We sacrifice to dress, till houshold joys And comforts cease. Dress drains our cellar dry, And keeps our larder lean. Puts out our fires, And introduces hunger, frost, and woe, Where peace and hospitality might reign. What man that lives and that knows how to live, Would fail t' exhibit at the public shows A form as splendid as the proudest there, Though appetite raise outcries at the cost? A man o' th' town dines late, but soon enough With reasonable forecast and dispatch, T' insure a side-box station at half price. You think perhaps, so delicate his dress, His daily fare as delicate. Alas! He picks clean teeth, and busy as he seems With an old tavern quill, is hungry yet. The rout is folly's circle which she draws With magic wand. So potent is the spell,

That none decoy'd into that fatal ring, Unless by heaven's peculiar grace, escape. There we grow early grey, but never wise. There form connexions, and acquire no friend. Solicit pleasure hopeless of success; Waste youth in occupations only fit For second childhood, and devote old age To sports which only childhood could excuse. There they are happiest who dissemble best Their weariness; and they the most polite Who squander time and treasure with a smile Though at their own destruction. She that asks Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all, And hates their coming. They, what can they less? Make just reprisals, and with cringe and shrug And bow obsequious, hide their hate of her. All catch the frenzy, downward from her Grace Whose flambeaux flash against the morning skies, And gild our chamber cielings as they pass, To her who frugal only that her thrift.

May feed excesses she can ill afford, Is hackney'd home unlacquey'd. Who in haste Alighting, turns the key in her own door, And at the watchman's lantern borrowing light, Finds a cold bed her only comfort left. Wives beggar husbands, husbands starve their wives, On fortune's velvet altar off'ring up Their last poor pittance. Fortune most severe Of goddesses yet known, and costlier far Than all that held their routs in heathen heav'n— So fare we in this prison-house the world. And 'tis a fearful spectacle to see So many maniacs dancing in their chains. They gaze upon the links that hold them fast With eyes of anguish, execrate their lot, Then shake them in despair, and dance again.

Now basket up the family of plagues That waste our vitals. Peculation, sale Of honor, perjury, corruption, frauds

By forgery, by subterfuge of law, By tricks and lies as num'rous and as keen As the necessities their authors feel; Then cast them closely bundled, ev'ry brat At the right door. Profusion is its sire. Profusion unrestrain'd, with all that's base In character, has litter'd all the land, And bred within the mem'ry of no few A priesthood such as Baal's was of old, A people such as never was 'till now. It is a hungry vice:—it eats up all That gives society its beauty, strength, Convenience, and security, and use. Makes men mere vermin, worthy to be trapp'd And gibbetted as fast as catchpole claws Can seize the slipp'ry prey. Unties the knot Of union, and converts the sacred band That holds mankind together, to a scourge. Profusion deluging a state with lusts Of grossest nature and of worst effects,

Prepares it for its ruin. Hardens, blinds, And warps the consciences of public men Till they can laugh at virtue; mock the fools That trust them; and in th' end, disclose a face That would have shock'd credulity herself Unmask'd, vouchsafing this their sole excuse, Since all alike are selfish—why not they? This does Profusion, and th' accursed cause Of such deep mischief, has itself a cause.

In colleges and halls, in ancient days, When learning, virtue, piety and truth Were precious, and inculcated with care, There dwelt a sage call'd Discipline. His head Not yet by time completely silver'd o'er, Bespoke him past the bounds of freakish youth, But strong for service still, and unimpair'd. His eye was meek and gentle, and a smile Play'd on his lips, and in his speech was heard Paternal sweetness, dignity, and love.

The occupation dearest to his heart Was to encourage goodness. He would stroke The head of modest and ingenuous worth That blush'd at its own praise, and press the youth Close to his side that pleas'd him. Learning grew Beneath his care, a thriving vig'rous plant; The mind was well inform'd, the passions held Subordinate, and diligence was choice. If e'er it chanced, as sometimes chance it must, That one among so many overleap'd The limits of controul, his gentle eye Grew stern, and darted a severe rebuke; His frown was full of terror, and his voice Shook the delinquent with such fits of awe As left him not, till penitence had won Lost favor back again, and closed the breach. But discipline, a faithful servant long, Declined at length into the vale of years; A palsy struck his arm, his sparkling eye Was quench'd in rheums of age, his voice unstrung

Grew tremulous, and moved derision more Than rev'rence, in perverse rebellious youth. So colleges and halls neglected much Their good old friend, and Discipline at length O'erlook'd and unemploy'd, fell sick and died. Then study languish'd, emulation slept, And virtue fled. The schools became a scene Of solemn farce, where ignorance in stilts, His cap well lined with logic not his own, With parrot tongue perform'd the scholar's part, Proceeding soon a graduated dunce. Then compromise had place, and scrutiny Became stone-blind, precedence went in truck, And he was competent whose purse was so. A dissolution of all bonds ensued, The curbs invented for the muleish mouth Of head-strong youth were broken; bars and bolts Grew rusty by disuse, and massy gates Forgot their office, op'ning with a touch; 'Till gowns at length are found mere masquerade;

The tassell'd cap and the spruce band a jest, A mock'ry of the world. What need of these For gamesters, jockies, brothellers impure, Spendthrifts and booted sportsmen, oft'ner seen With belted waist and pointers at their heels, Than in the bounds of duty? what was learn'd, If aught was learn'd in childhood, is forgot, And such expence as pinches parents blue, And mortifies the lib'ral hand of love, Is squander'd in pursuit of idle sports And vicious pleasures. Buys the boy a name, That sits a stigma on his father's house, And cleaves through life inseparably close To him that wears it. What can atter-games Of riper joys, and commerce with the world, The lewd vain world that must receive him soon, Add to such erudition thus acquir'd Where science and where virtue are profess'd? They may confirm his habits, rivet fast His folly, but to spoil him is a task

That bids defiance to th' united pow'rs Of fashion, dissipation, taverns, stews. Now, blame we most the nurselings or the nurse? The children crook'd and twisted and deform'd Through want of care, or her whose winking eye And slumb'ring oscitancy marrs the brood? The nurse no doubt. Regardless of her charge She needs herself correction. Needs to learn That it is dang'rous sporting with the world, With things so sacred as a nation's trust, The nurture of her youth, her dearest pledge.

All are not such. I had a brother once.— Peace to the mem'ry of a man of worth; A man of letters, and of manners too. Of manners sweet as virtue always wears, When gay good-nature dresses her in smiles. He graced a college * 1.4 in which order yet

Was sacred, and was honor'd, lov'd and wept By more than one, themselves conspicuous there. Some minds are temper'd happily, and mixt With such ingredients of good sense and taste Of what is excellent in man, they thirst With such a zeal to be what they approve, That no restraints can circumscribe them more, Than they themselves by choice, for wisdom's sake. Nor can example hurt them. What they see Of vice in others but enhancing more The charms of virtue in their just esteem. If such escape contagion, and emerge Pure, from so foul a pool, to shine abroad, And give the world their talents and themselves, Small thanks to those whose negligence or sloth Exposed their inexperience to the snare, And left them to an undirected choice.

See then! the quiver broken and decay'd In which are kept our arrows. Rusting there

In wild disorder and unfit for use, What wonder if discharged into the world They shame their shooters with a random flight, Their points obtuse, and feathers drunk with wine. Well may the church wage unsuccessful war With such artill'ry arm'd. Vice parries wide Th' undreaded volley with a sword of straw, And stands an impudent and fearless mark.

Have we not track'd the felon home, and found His birth-place and his dam? the country mourns, Mourns, because ev'ry plague that can infest Society, and that saps and worms the base Of th' edifice that policy has raised, Swarms in all quarters; meets the eye, the ear, And suffocates the breath at ev'ry turn. Profusion breeds them. And the cause itself Of that calamitous mischief has been found. Found too where most offensive, in the skirts Of the robed paedagogue. Else, let the arraign'd

Stand up unconscious and refute the charge. So when the Jewish Leader stretched his arm And waved his rod divine, a race obscene Spawn'd in the muddy beds of Nile, came forth Polluting Aegypt. Gardens, fields, and plains Were cover'd with the pest. The streets were fill'd; The croaking nuisance lurk'd in ev'ry nook, Nor palaces nor even chambers 'scaped, And the land stank, so num'rous was the fry.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Alluding to the late calamities at Jamaica.
• * 1.2

  August 18, 1783.
• * 1.3

  Alluding to the fog that covered both Europe and Asia during the whole summer of 1783.
• * 1.4

  Ben'et Coll. Cambridge.