The way to win the restiff world to God
Was to lay by the disciplining rod,
Unnatural fasts, and foreign forms of prayer,
Religion frights us with a mien severe;
'Tis prudence to reform her into ease,
And put her in undress to make her please:
A lively faith will bear aloft the mind,
And leave the luggage of good works behind.
'Such doctrine's in the Pigeon-house were taught;
You need not ask how wondrously they wrought;
But sure the common cry was all for these
Whose life and precepts both encouraged ease:
Yet fearing those alluring baits might fail,
And holy deeds o'er all their arts prevail,
(For Vice, though frontless, and of harden'd face,
Is daunted at the sight of awful grace)
An hideous figure of their foes they drew,
Nor lines, nor looks, nor shades, nor colours true;
And this grotesque design exposed to public view.
One would have thought it some Egyptian piece,
With garden-gods, and barking deities,
More thick than Ptolemy has stuck the skies.
All so perverse a draught, so far unlike,
It was no libel where it meant to strike:
Yet still the daubing pleased, and great and small
To view the monster crowded Pigeon-hall:
Their Chanticleer was drawn upon his knees,
Adoring shrines, and stocks of sainted trees;
And by him a misshapen, ugly race;

The curse of God was seen on every face:
No Holland emblem could that malice mend,

But still the worse the look, the fitter for a fiend.

6

The master of the farm, displeased to find

So much of rancour in so mild a kind,

Inquired into the cause, and came to know
The passive church had struck the foremost blow,
With groundless fears, and jealousies possess'd,
As if this troublesome intruding guest

Would drive the birds of Venus from their nest;
A deed his inborn equity abhorred

But Interest will not trust, though God should plight his word.

'A law, the source of many future harms, Had banish'd all the poultry from the farms, With loss of life, if any should be found To crow or peck on this forbidden ground. That bloody statute chiefly was design'd For Chanticleer the white, of clergy kind; But after-malice did not long forget The lay that wore the robe and coronet. For them, for their inferiors and allies, Their foes a deadly Shibboleth devise ; By which unrighteously it was decreed, That none to trust or profit should succeed, Who would not swallow first a poisonous wicked weed;

Or that to which old Socrates was curse,

Or henbane-juice, to swell them till they burst.

The patron, as in reason, thought it hard

To see this inquisition in his yard,

[barr'd. By which the sovereign was of subjects' use deAll gentle means he tried, which might withdraw The effects of so unnatural a law;

But still the Dove-house obstinately stood
Deaf to their own and to their neighbours' good;
And, which was worse, if any worse could be,
Repented of their boasted loyalty:

Now made the champions of a cruel cause,
And drunk with fumes of popular applause;
For those whom God to ruin has design'd,
He fits for fate, and first destroys their mind.
'New doubts, indeed, they daily strove to raise,
Suggested dangers, interposed delays,
And emissary Pigeons had in store,

Such as the Meccan Prophet used of yore,
To whisper counsels in their patron's ear,
And veil'd their false advice with zealous fear.
The master smiled to see them work in vain
To wear him out, and make an idle reign ;
He saw, but suffer'd their protractive arts,
And strove by mildness to reduce their hearts;
But they abused that grace to make allies,
And fondly closed with former enemies; [wise.
For fools are doubly fools, endeavouring to be
'After a grave consult what course were best,
One, more mature in folly than the rest,
Stood up, and told them, with his head aside,
"That desperate cures must be to desperate ills
applied;

And, therefore, since their main impending fear
Was from the' increasing race of Chanticleer,
Some potent bird of prey they ought to find,
A foe profess'd to him and all his kind;
Some haggard Hawk, who had her eyry nigh,
Well pounced to fasten, and well wing'd to fly;
One they might trust, their common wrongs to
wreak ;

The Musquet and the Coystrel were too weak,
Too fierce the Falcon; but, above the rest,
The noble Buzzard ever pleased me best;

Of small renown, 'tis true, for, not to lie,
We call him but a Hawk by courtesy:
I know he hates the Pigeon-house and farm,
And more, in time of war has done us harm;
But all his hate on trivial points depends;
Give up our forms, and we shall soon be friends:
For Pigeons' flesh he seems not much to care,
Cramm'd chickens are a more delicious fare.
On this high potentate, without delay,
I wish you would confer the sovereign sway;
Petition him to' accept the government,
And let a splendid embassy be sent."

This pithy speech prevail'd, and all agreed,
Old enmities forgot, the Buzzard should succeed.
'Their welcome suit was granted, soon as heard,
His lodgings furnish'd, and a train prepared,
With B.'s upon their breast, appointed for his guard.
He came, and, crown'd with great solemnity,
"God save King Buzzard," was the general cry.
A portly prince, and goodly to the sight,
He seem'd a son of Anak for his height;
Like those whom stature did to crowns prefer,
Black-brow'd, and bluff, like Homer's Jupiter:
Broad-back'd, and brawny-built, for love's delight,
A prophet form'd to make a female proselyte.
A theologue more by need, than genial bent;
By breeding sharp, by nature confident.
Interest in all his actions was discern'd;
More learn'd than honest, more a wit than learn'd.
Or forced by fear, or by his profit led,
Or both conjoin'd, his native clime he fled;
But brought the virtues of his heaven along,
A fair behaviour, and a fluent tongue.

And yet with all his arts he could not thrive;
The most unlucky parasite alive.

Loud praises to prepare his paths he sent,
And then himself pursued his compliment;
But, by reverse of fortune, chased away,
His gifts no longer than their author stay:
He shakes the dust against the' ungrateful race,
And leaves the stench of ordures in the place.
Oft has he flatter'd and blasphemed the same;
For, in his rage, he spares no sovereign's name:
The hero and the tyrant change their style
By the same measure that they frown or smile.
When well received by hospitable foes,
The kindness he returns is to expose:

For courtesies, though undeserved and great,
No gratitude in felon minds beget;

As tribute to his wit the churl receives the treat.
His praise of foes is venomously nice;

So touch'd, it turns a virtue to a vice:

"A Greek, and bountiful, forewarns us twice."
Seven sacraments he wisely does disown,
Because he knows confession stands for one;
Where sins to sacred silence are convey'd,
And not for fear, or love, to be betray'd:
But he, uncall'd, his patron to control,
Divulged the secret whispers of his soul;
Stood forth the' accusing Satan of his crimes,
And offer'd to the Moloch of the times.
Prompt to assail, and careless of defence,
Invulnerable in his impudence,

He dares the world; and, eager of a name,
He thrusts about, and justles into fame.
Frontless, and satire-proof, he scowers the streets,

And runs an Indian-muck at all he meets :