But this new Jehu fpurs the hot-mouth'd horfe
Inftructs the beast to know his native force;
To take the bit between his teeth and fly
To the next headlong fteep of anarchy.
Too happy England, if our good we knew,
Would we poffefs the freedom we pursue;
The lavish government can give no more:
Yet we repine, and plenty makes us poor.
God try'd us once; our rebel-father's fought,
He glutted them with all the pow'r they fought:
Till mafter'd by their own ufurping brave,
The free-born fubject funk into a slave,

We loath our manna, and we long for quails;
Ah, what is man when his own with prevails!
How rafh, how swift to plunge himself in ill?
Proud of his power, and boundless in his will!
That Kings can do no wrong we must believe;
None can they do, and muft they all receive?
Help heaven! or fadly we fhall fee an hour,
When neither wrong nor right are in their power!
Already they have loft their best defence,
The benefit of laws which they difpenfe.
No juftice to their righteous cause allow'd;
But baffled by an arbitrary croud.

And medals grav'd their conqueft to record,
The ftamp and coin of their adopted lord.

The man who laugh'd but once to see an afs
Mumbling to make the cross-grain'd thistles pass
Might laugh again to fee a jury chew
The prickles of unpalatable law.

The witneffes, that leech like liv'd on blood,
Sucking for them was med'cinally good;
But when they fasten'd on their fester'd fore,
Then juftice and religion they 'forfwore;
Their maiden oaths debauch'd into a whore.
Thus men are rais'd by factions, and decry'd;
And rogue and faint diftinguifh'd by their fide.

They rack even fcripture to confefs their caufe,
And plead a call to preach in fpight of laws.
But that's no news to the poor injur'd page,
It has been us'd as ill in every age:
And is constrain'd with patience all to take,
For what defence can Greek and Hebrew make?
Happy who can this talking trumpet feize;
They make it fpeak whatever fenfe they please!
'Twas fram'd at firft our oracle to enquire;

But fince our fects in prophecy grow higher, infpire.}

London, thou great emporium of our ifle,
O thou too bounteous, thou too fruitful Nile!
How fhall I praise or curfe to thy desert?
Or feparate thy found from thy corrupted part ?
I call'd thee Nile; the parallel will stand:
Thy tides of wealth o'erflow the fatten'd land;
Yet monfters from thy large increase we find,
Engender'd on the flime thou leav'st behind.
Sedition has not wholly feiz'd on thee,
Thy nobler parts are from infection free.
Of Ifrael's tribes thou haft a numerous band,
But ftill the Canaanite is in the land.
Thy military chiefs are brave and true;
Nor are thy difenchanted burghers few.
The 2 head is loyal which thy heart commands,
But what's a head with two fuch gouty
hands?
The wife and wealthy love the surest way,
And are content to thrive and to obey.
But wifdom is to floth too great a flave;
None are fo bufy as the fool and knave.

2 The brad is loyal, which the beart commands ;
But what's a bead with two fuch gouty hands.

Alluding to the lord-mayor and the two fheriffs: the former Si: John Moor, being a Tory; the latter Shute, and Pilkington, Fanatics and Whigs.

Those let me curfe; what vengeance will they urge,
Whofe ordures neither plague nor fire can purge?
Nor fharp experience can to duty bring,
Nor angry heaven, nor a forgiving King!
In gofpel-phrafe their chapmen they betray;
Their fhops are dens, the buyer is their prey,
The knack of trades is living on the spoil;
They boaft even when each other they beguile.
Cuftoms to fteal is fuch a trivial thing,
That 'tis their charter to defraud their King.
All hands unite of every jarring fe&t;

They cheat the country firft, and then infect.
They for God's cause their monarchs dare dethrone,
And they'll be fure to make his cause their own.
Whether the plotting jefuit, lay'd the plan
Of murdering Kings, or the French puritan,
Our facrilegious fects their guides outgo,
And Kings and kingly power would murder too.
What means their traiterous combination lefs,
Too plain to evade, too fhameful to confefs.
But treafon is not own'd when 'tis descry'd;
Successful crimes alone are juftify'd.

The men who no confpiracy would find
Who doubts? but had it taken, they had join'd,
Join'd in a mutual covenant of defence;
At first without, at last against their prince.
If fovereign right by fovereign power they fcan.
The fame bold maxim holds in God and man:
God were not fafe, his thunder could they fhun
He fhould be forc'd to crown another fon.
Thus when the heir was from the vineyard thrown,
The rich poffeffion was the murderer's own.
In vain to fophiftry they have recourfe :

By proving their's no plot, they prove 'tis worse;
Unmask'd rebellion, and audacious force:
Which tho' not actual, yet all eyes may fee

'Tis working in the immediate power to be;

}

For from pretended grievances they rife,
First to diflike, and after to despise.
Then cyclop-like in human flefh to deal,
Chop up a minifter at every meal :
Perhaps not wholly to melt down the King;
But clip his regal rights within the ring.

From thence to affume the power of peace and war;
And eafe him by degrees of public care.
Yet to confult his dignity and fame,

He should have leave, to exercise the name;

And hold the cards while commons play'd the game.
For what can power give more than food and drink,
To live at ease, and not be bound to think?
These are the cooler methods of their crime,
But their hot zealots think 'tis lofs of time;
On utmost bounds of loyalty they ftand,
And grin and whet like a Croatian band;
That waits impatient for the last command.
Thus outlaws open villainy maintain,

They steal not, but in squadrons scour the plain :
And if their power the paffengers fubdue,
The moft have right, the wrong is in the few.
Such impious axioms foolishly they show,
For in fome foils republics will not grow:
Our temperate ifle will no extremes fuftain,
Of popular fway or arbitrary reign:

But flides between them both into the beft,
Secure in freedom, in a monarch bleft,
And tho' the climate vex'd with various winds,
Works thro' our yielding bodies on our minds,
The wholesome tempeft purges what it breeds,
To recommend the calmnefs that fucceeds.

But thou, the pander of the people's hearts,
O crooked foul, and ferpentine in arts,
Whose blandishments a loyal land have whor'd,
And broke the bonds fhe plighted to her lord;
0 4

}

}

What

What curfes on thy blafted name will fall !
Which age to age their legacy fhall call ;

For all muft curfe the woes that must descend on all.
Religion thou haft none: thy Mercury

Has pafs'd thro' every fect, or theirs through thee.
But what thou givest, that venom ftill remains;
And the pox'd nation feels thee in their brains.
What else inspires the tongues and swells the breafts
Of all thy bellowing renegado priests,

That preach up thee for God; difpenfe thy laws;
And with thy ftum ferment their fainting cause ?
Fresh fumes of madness raise; and toil and sweat
To make the formidable cripple great.

Yet should thy crimes fucceed, should lawless power
Compass thofe ends thy greedy hopes devour,
Thy canting friends thy mortal foes would be,
Thy God and theirs will never long agree;
For thine, if thou haft any, must be one
That lets the world and human-kind alone:
A jolly god, that paffes hours too well
To promife heaven, or threaten us with hell.
That unconcern'd can at rebellion fit,

And wink at crimes he did himself commit.
A tyrant theirs; the heaven their priesthood paints
A conventicle of gloomy fullen faints;

A heaven like Bedlam, flovenly and fad;
Fore-doom'd for fouls, with falfe religion, mad.
Without a vision poets can forefhow

What all but fools by common fense may know :
If true fucceffion from our ifle fhould fail,
And crouds profane with impious arms prevail.
Not thou, nor those thy factious arts engage
Shall reap that harvest of rebellious rage,
With which thou flattereft thy decrepid age.
The fwelling poifon of the feveral fects,
Which wanting vent, the nation's health infects,

}

}

Shall