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Youth, beauty, graceful action feldom fail; But common interest always will prevail:

And pity never ceases to be shown

To him who makes the people's wrongs his own.
The croud that still believe their kings oppress,
With lifted hands their young Meffiah blefs:
Who now begins his progrefs to ordain
With chariots, horfemen, and a num'rous train:
From east to weft his glories he displays,
And, like the fun, the promis'd land furveys.
Fame runs before him as the morning-star,
And shouts of joy falute him from afar:
Each house receives him as a guardian god,
And confecrates the place of his abode.
But hofpitable treats did most commend
Wife Iffachar, his wealthy weftern friend.
This moving court that caught the people's eyes,
And feem'd but pomp, did other ends difguife:
Achitophel had form'd it, with intent

To found the depths, and fathom where it went,
The people's hearts, diftinguifh friends from foes;
And try their strength before they came to blows.
Yet all was colour'd with a smooth pretence
Of fpecious love, and duty to their prince.
Religion, and redrefs of grievances,

Two names that always cheat, and always pleafe,
Are often urg'd; and good king David's life
Endanger'd by a brother and a wife.
Thus in a pageant fhew a plot is made;
And peace itfelf is war in mafquerade,
Oh foolish Ifrael! never warn'd by ill!
Still the fame bait, and circumvented ftill!
Did ever men forfake their present ease,
In midst of health imagine a disease ;
Take pains contingent mischiefs to foresee,
Make heirs for monarchs, and for God decree?

What

What fhall we think? Can people give away,

Both for themselves and fons, their native sway?
Then they are left defenceless to the fword
Of each unbounded, arbitrary lord:
And laws are vain, by which we right enjoy,
If kings unqueftion'd can those laws deftroy.
Yet if the croud be judge of fit and juft,
And kings are only officers in truft,
Then this refuming covenant was declar'd
When kings were made, or is for ever barr'd.
If those who gave the scepter could not tie
By their own deed their own pofterity,
How then cou'd Adam bind his future race?
How cou'd his forfeit on mankind take place?
Or how cou'd heavenly juftice damn us all,
Who ne'er confented to our father's fall?
Then kings are flaves to those whom they command,
And tenants to their people's pleasure stand.
Add, that the pow'r for property allow'd
Is mifchievously feated in the croud:
For who can be secure of private right,
If fovereign fway may be diffolv'd by might?
Nor is the people's judgment always true:
The most may err as grofly as the few?
And faultless kings run down by common cry,
For vice, oppreffion, and for tyranny.
What standard is there in a fickle rout,
Which, flowing to the mark, runs fafter out?
Nor only crouds but fanhedrims may be
Infected with this publick lunacy,

And fhare the madness of rebellious times,
To murder monarchs for imagin'd crimes.
If they may give and take whene'er they please,
Not kings alone, the Godhead's images,
But government itself at length must fall
To nature's ftate, where all have right to all.

Yet,

Yet, grant our lords the people kings can make, What prudent men a fettled throne would shake? For whatfoe'er their fufferings were before,

That change they covet makes them suffer more. All other errors but difturb a state;

But innovation is the blow of fate.

If ancient fabricks nod, and threat to fall,
To patch their flaws, and buttress up the wall,
Thus far 'tis duty: but here fix the mark;
For all beyond it is to touch the ark.

To change foundations, caft the frame anew,
Is work for rebels, who bafe ends pursue;
At once divine and human laws controul,
And mend the parts by ruin of the whole.
The tamp'ring world is fubject to this curfe,
To phyfick their disease into a worse.

Now what relief can righteous David bring? How fatal 'tis to be too good a king!

Friends he has few, fo high the madness grows;
Who dare be fuch must be the people's foes.
Yet fome there were, e'en in the worst of days;
Some let me name, and naming is to praife.
In this fhort file Barzillai first appears;
Barzillai, crown'd with honour and with years.
Long fince, the rifing rebels he withftood
In regions wafte beyond the Jordan's flood;
Unfortunately brave to buoy the ftate;
But finking underneath his master's fate:
In exile with his godlike prince he mourn'd;
For him he fuffer'd, and with him return'd.
The court he practis'd, not the courtier's art:
Large was his wealth, but larger was his heart,
Which well the noblest objects knew to choose,
The fighting warrior, and recording mufe.
His bed could once a fruitful iffue boaft;
Now more than half a father's name is loft.

His eldest hope, with every grace adorn'd,

By me, fo heaven will have it, always mourn'd,
And always honour'd, fnatch'd in manhood's prime
By unequal fates, and providence's crime:
Yet not before the goal of honour won,
All parts fulfill'd of fubject and of fon:
Swift was the race, but short the time to run.
Oh narrow circle, but of pow'r divine,
Scanted in space, but perfect in thy line!

}

By fea, by land, thy matchlefs worth was known,
Arms thy delight, and war was all thy own:
Thy force infus'd the fainting Tyrians prop'd;
And haughty Pharaoh found his fortune ftop'd.
Oh ancient honour! Oh unconquer'd hand,
Whom foes unpunish'd never cou'd withstand!
But Ifrael was unworthy of his name:
Short is the date of all immoderate fame.
It looks as heaven our ruin had defign'd,
And durft not truft thy fortune and thy mind.
Now, free from earth, thy difencumber'd foul
Mounts up, and leaves behind the clouds and ftarry pole:
From thence thy kindred legions mayst thou bring,
To aid the guardian angel of thy King.

Here ftop, my mufe, here ceafe thy painful flight:
No pinions can purfue immortal height :
Tell good Barzillai thou canft fing no more,
And tell thy foul fhe should have fled before:
Or fled the with his life, and left this verse
To hang on her departed patron's hearse?
Now take thy fteepy flight from heav'n, and fee
If thou canst find on earth another he:

Another he would be too hard to find;

See then whom thou canft fee not far behind.

Zadoc the priest, whom, fhunning pow'r and place, His lowly mind advanc'd to David's grace.

With him the Sagan of Jerufalem,

Of hofpitable foul, and noble ftem;

Him of the western dome, whose weighty sense
Flows in fit words and heavenly eloquence.
The prophets fons, by fuch example led,
To learning and to loyalty were bred :
For colleges on bounteous kings depend,
And never rebel was to arts a friend.
To these fucceed the pillars of the laws;
Who beft can plead, and best can judge a cause.
Next them a train of loyal peers afcend;
Sharp-judging Adriel, the mufes friend,
Himself a mufe: in fanhedrims debate
True to his prince, but not a flave of ftate:
Whom David's love with honours did adorn,
That from his difobedient fon were torn.
Jotham of piercing wit, and pregnant thought;
Endued by nature, and by learning taught,
To move affemblies, who but only try'd
The worse a-while, then chofe the better fide;
Nor chofe alone, but turn'd the balance too;
So much the weight of one brave man can do.
Hufhai, the friend of David in diftrefs ;
In publick ftorms of manly fted faftness :
By foreign treaties he inform'd his youth,
And join'd experience to his native truth.
His frugal care fupply'd the wanting throne;
Frugal for that, but bounteous of his own:
'Tis cafy conduct when exchequers flow;
But hard the task to manage well the low:
For fovereign power is too deprefs'd or high,
When Kings are forc'd to fell, or crouds to buy.

In

1 Dr. Dolben, Bishop of Rochester, and Dean of Weftminster, an eafy, good-natured, mcdeft, fpirited, eloquent, and learned man. 1683 he was raised to the fee of York: he bore arms against the parliament in King Charles the Ift's reign, who made him a major, When that monarch's affairs were ruined, he returned to Oxford, purfued his ftudies, and entered into orders.

Indulge

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