So---Satire is no more---I feel it die--

No Gazetteer more innocent than I--

And let, a God's name! ev'ry fool and knave
Be grac'd thro' life, and flatter'd in his grave.
F. Why so? if Satire knows its time and place,
You still may lash the greatest---in disgrace:

For merit will by turns forsake them all;

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Would you know when? exactly when they fall." go
But let all satiré in all changes spare
Immortal S---k, and grave De.--re.

Silent and soft, as saints rémov'd to heav'n,
All ties dissolv'd, and ev'ry sin forgiv❜n,
These may some gentle ministerial wing
Receive, and place for ever near a king!

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There, where no passion, pride, or shame, transport, Lull'd with the sweet nepenthe of a court,

There, where no father's, brother's, friend's, disgrace Once break their rest, or stir them from their place; But past the sense of human miseries,

All tears are wip'd for ever from all eyes;

No cheek is known to blush, no heart to throb,

FOI

Save when they lose a question, or a job. [glory,

P. Good Heaven forbid, that I should blast their Who know how like Whig ministers to Tory,

106 And when three sov'reigns dy'd, could scarce be vext, Consid'ring what a gracious prince was next. Have I, in silent wonder, seen such things As pride in slaves, and avarice in kings? And at a peer, or peeress, shall I fret, Who starves a sister, or forswears a debt?

Virtue, I grant you, is an empty boast;

But shall the dignity of vice be lost?

Ye Gods! shall Cibber's son, without rebuke,
Swear like a lord, or Rich outwhore a duke?

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A fav'rite's porter, with his master vie,

Be brib'd as often, and as often lie?

Shall Ward draw contracts with a statesman's skill?

Or Japhet pocket, like his Grace, a will?

It is for Bond or Peter (paltry things)

To pay their debts, or keep their faith, like kings?
If Blount, dispatch'd himself, he play'd the man,
And so may'st thou, illustrious Passeran!
But shall a printer, weary of his life,

Learn from their books to hang himself and wife?
This, this, my friend, I cannot, must not, bear;
Vice thus abus'd, demands a nation's care;
This calls the church to deprecate our sin,

And hurls the thunder of the laws on gin.
Let modest Foster, if he will, excel
Ten metropolitans in preaching well;
A simple Quaker, or a Quaker's wife,
Outdo Landaffe in doctrine---yea in life;
Let humble Allen, with an awkward shame,
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
Virtue may chuse the high or low degree,
'Tis just alike to Virtue, and to me;
Dwell in a monk, or light upon a king,

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125

130

135

She's still the same belov'd contented thing.

140

Vice is undone, if she forgets her birth,
And stoops from angels to the dregs of earth.

But 'tis the fall degrades her to a whore;

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Let greatness own her, and she's mean no more:
Her birth, her beauty, crowds and courts confess, 145
Chaste matrons praise her, and grave bishops bless;
In golden chains the willing world she draws,
And her's the gospel is, and her's the laws;
Mounts the tribunal, lifts her scarlet head,
And sees pale Virtue carted in her stead.
Lo! at the wheels of her triumphal car
Old England's Genius, rough with many a scar,
Dragg'd in the dust! his arms hang idly round,
His flag inverted trails along the ground!
Our youth, all liv'ry'd o'er with foreign gold,
Before her dance; behind her crawl the old!
See thronging millions to the pagod run,
And offer country, parent, wife, or son!

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Hear her black trumpet thro' the land proclaim,

In soldier, churchman, patriot, man in pow'r,

'Tis av'rice all, ambition is no more!

See, all our nobles begging to be slaves!

See, all our fools aspiring to be knaves!

The wit of cheats, the courage of a whore,

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Are what ten thousand envy and adore :

All, all look up, with reverential awe,

At crimes that 'scape, or triumph o'er the law: While truth, worth, wisdom, daily they decry--"Nothing is sacred now but villany."

Yet may this verse (if such a verse remain) Show there was one who held it in disdain.

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DIALOGUE II.

[may;

F.'Tis all a libel---Paxton, Sir, will say.
P. Not yet, my Friend! to-morrow, 'faith it
And for that very cause I print to-day.
How should I fret to mangle ev'ry line
In rev'rence to the sons of Thirty-nine?
Vice with such giant strides comes on amain,
Invention strives to be before in vain;
Feign what I will, and paint it e'er so strong,
Some rising genius sins up to my song.

F. Yet none but you by name the guilty lash;
Ev'n Guthry saves half Newgate by a dash,
Spare then the person, and expose the vice.

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10

15

P. How, Sir! not damn the sharper, but the dice? Come on then, Satire! gen'ral, unconfin'd, Spread thy broad wing, and souse on all the kind. Ye Statesmen, Priests, of one religion all! Ye Tradesmen, vile in army, court, or hall! Yerev'rend Atheists. F. Scandal! name them, who? P. Why that's the thing you bid me not to do. Who starv'd a sister, who forswore a debt, I never nam'd; the Town's inquiring yet. The pois'ning dame---F. You mean--P. I don't.--F. You do.

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P. See, now I keep the secret, and not you! The bribing statesman---F. Hold, too high you go. P. The brib'd elector--F. There you stoop too low,

P. I fain would please you if I knew with what; Tell me which knave is lawful game, which not? 27 Must great offenders, once escap'd the Crown, Like royal harts, be never more run down? Admit your law to spare the knight requires, As beasts of nature may we hunt the squires? Suppose I censure---you know what I mean--To save a Bishop may I naine a Dean?

F. A dean, Sir? no: his fortune is not made ; You hurt a man that's rising in the trade.

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35

P. If not the tradesman who set up to-day,
Much less the 'prentice who to-morrow may.
Down, Down, proud Satire! tho' a realm be spoil'd,
Arraign no mightier thief than wretched Wild;
Or, if a court or country's made a job,

Go drench a pickpocket, and join the mob.
But, Sir, I beg you (for the love of vice!)

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The matter's weighty, pray consider twice:
Have you less pity for the needy cheat,

The poor and friendless villain, than the great?
Alas! the small discredit of a bribe

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Scarce hurts the lawyer, but undoes the scribe.

Then better sure it charity becomes

To tax directors, who (thank God!) have plums;
Still better ministers, or if the thing

May pinch ev'n there---Why, lay it on a king.
F. Stop! stop!

P. Must Satire then nor rise nor fall?

Speak out, and bid me blaine no rogues at all.

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