On that decision let it stand or fall.
Now for my converts, who, you say, unfed
Have followed me for miracles of bread.
Judge not by hearsay, but observe at least,
If since their change their loaves have been increast.
The Lion buys no converts; if he did,
Beasts would be sold as fast as he could bid.
Tax those of interest who conform for gain
Or stay the market of another reign:
Your broad-way sons would never be too nice
To close with Calvin, if he paid their price;
But, raised three steeples higher, would change their note,
And quit the cassock for the canting-coat.
Now, if you damn this censure as too bold,
Judge by your selves, and think not others sold. 'Meantime my sons accused by fame's report
Pay small attendance at the Lion's court,
Nor rise with early crowds, nor flatter late,
(For silently they beg who daily wait.)
Preferment is bestowed that comes unsought;
Attendance is a bribe, and then 'tis bought.
How they should speed, their fortune is untried;
For not to ask is not to be denied.
For what they have their God and King they bless,
And hope they should not murmur had they less.
But if reduced subsistence to implore,
In common prudence they would pass your door.
Unpitied Hudibras, your champion friend,
Has shown how far your charities extend.
This lasting verse shall on his tomb be read,
He shamed you living, and upbraids you dead.
'With odious atheist names you load your foes;
Your liberal clergy why did I expose?
It never fails in charities like those.
In climes where true religion is professed,
That imputation were no laughing jest ;
But Imprimatur, with a chaplain's name,
Is here sufficient licence to defame.
What wonder is't that black detraction thrives;
The homicide of names is less than lives,
And yet the perjured murderer survives.'
This said, she paused a little, and suppressed
The boiling indignation of her breast.
She knew the virtue of her blade, nor would
Pollute her satire with ignoble blood;
Her panting foes she saw before her lie,
And back she drew the shining weapon dry.
So when the generous Lion has in sight
His equal match, he rouses for the fight;
But when his foe lies prostrate on the plain,
He sheathes his paws, uncurls his angry mane,
And, pleased with bloodless honours of the day,
Walks over and disdains the inglorious prey.
So James, if great with less we may compare,
Arrests his rolling thunder-bolts in air;
And grants ungrateful friends a lengthened space
To implore the remnants of long-suffering grace.
This breathing-time the matron took; and then
Resumed the thrid of her discourse again.
'Be vengeance wholly left to powers divine,
And let Heaven judge betwixt your sons and mine:
If joys hereafter must be purchased here
With loss of all that mortals hold so dear,
Then welcome infamy and public shame,
And last, a long farewell to worldly fame.
'Tis said with ease, but oh, how hardly tried
By haughty souls to human honour tied!
O sharp convulsive pangs of agonizing pride!
Down then, thou rebel, never more to rise;
And what thou didst and dost so dearly prize,
That fame, that darling fame, make that thy sacrifice. 290 'Tis nothing thou hast given; then add thy tears
For a long race of unrepenting years:
'Tis nothing yet, yet all thou hast to give:
Then add those may-be years thou hast to live:
Yet nothing still: then poor and naked come,
Thy Father will receive his unthrift home,
And thy blest Saviour's blood discharge the mighty sum.'
Thus,' she pursued, 'I discipline a son,
Whose unchecked fury to revenge would run;
He champs the bit, impatient of his loss,
And starts aside and flounders at the Cross.
Instruct him better, gracious God, to know
As Thine is vengeance, so forgiveness too;
Than what his Sovereign bears and what his Saviour bore.
That, suffering from ill tongues, he bears no more
'It now remains for you to school your child,
And ask why God's anointed he reviled;
A King and Princess dead! did Shimei worse?
The curser's punishment should fright the curse;
Your son was warned, and wisely gave it o'er,
But he who counselled him has paid the score;
The heavy malice could no higher tend,
But woe to him on whom the weights descend.
So to permitted ills the dæmon flies;
His rage is aimed at him who rules the skies:
Constrained to quit his cause, no succour found,
The foe discharges every tire around,
In clouds of smoke abandoning the fight;
But his own thundering peals proclaim his flight.
'In Henry's change his charge as ill succeeds;
To that long story little answer needs:
Confront but Henry's words with Henry's deeds.
Were space allowed, with ease it might be proved,
What springs his blessed reformation moved.
The dire effects appeared in open sight,
Which from the cause he calls a distant flight,
And yet no larger leap than from the sun to light. 'Now last, your sons a double pæan sound,
A Treatise of Humility is found.
'Tis found, but better had it ne'er been sought
Than thus in Protestant procession brought.
The famed original through Spain is known,
Rodriguez' work, my celebrated son,
Which yours by ill-translating made his own;
Concealed its author, and usurped the name,
The basest and ignoblest theft of fame.
My altars kindled first that living coal;
Restore, or practise better what you stole ;
That virtue could this humble verse inspire,
'Tis all the restitution I require.'
Glad was the Panther that the charge was closed,
And none of all her favourite sons exposed;
For laws of arms permit each injured man
To make himself a saver where he can.
Perhaps the plundered merchant cannot tell
The names of pirates in whose hands he fell;
But at the den of thieves he justly flies,
And every Algerine is lawful prize.
No private person in the foe's estate
Can plead exemption from the public fate.
Yet Christian laws allow not such redress;
Then let the greater supersede the less:
But let the abettors of the Panther's crime
Learn to make fairer wars another time.
Some characters may sure be found to write
Among her sons; for 'tis no common sight,
A spotted dam, and all her offspring white.
The savage, though she saw her plea controlled,
Yet would not wholly seem to quit her hold,
But offered fairly to compound the strife
And judge conversion by the convert's life.
"'Tis true,' she said, 'I think it somewhat strange
So few should follow profitable change;
For present joys are more to flesh and blood
Than a dull prospect of a distant good.
'Twas well alluded by a son of mine,
(I hope to quote him is not to purloin,)
Two magnets, heaven and earth, allure to bliss;
The larger loadstone that, the nearer this:
The weak attraction of the greater fails;
We nod awhile, but neighbourhood prevails;
But when the greater proves the nearer too,
I wonder more your converts come so slow.
Methinks in those who firm with me remain,
It shows a nobler principle than gain.'
'Your inference would be strong,' the Hind replied,
'If yours were in effect the suffering side;
Your clergy-sons their own in peace possess,
Nor are their prospects in reversion less.
My proselytes are struck with awful dread,
Your bloody comet-laws hang blazing o'er their head;
The respite they enjoy but only lent,
Which motives, yours or mine, will turn the scale.
While pride and pomp allure, and plenteous ease,
That is, till man's predominant passions cease,
Admire no longer at my slow increase.
The best they have to hope, protracted punishment.
Be judge your self, if interest may prevail,
'By education most have been misled;
So they believe, because they so were bred.
The priest continues what the nurse began,
And thus the child imposes on the man.
The rest I named before, nor need repeat;
But interest is the most prevailing cheat,
The sly seducer both of age and youth;
They study that, and think they study truth.
When interest fortifies an argument,
Weak reason serves to gain the will's assent;
For souls already warped receive an easy bent. 'Add long prescription of established laws,
And pique of honour to maintain a cause,
And shame of change, and fear of future ill,
And zeal, the blind conductor of the will;
And chief among the still-mistaking crowd,
The fame of teachers obstinate and proud;
And, more than all, the private judge allowed;
Disdain of Fathers which the dance began,
And last, uncertain whose the narrower span,
The clown unread and half-read gentleman.'
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