Advice, that ruin to whole tribes procur'd,
But secret kept till your own banks secur❜d. 225
Recount with this the triple covenant broke,
And Israel fitted for a foreign yoke ;
Nor here your counsels fatal progress staid,
But sent our levied powers to Pharaoh's aid.
Hence Tyre and Israel, low in ruins laid,
And Egypt, once their scorn, their common terror
E'en yet of such a season can we dream,
When royal rights you made your darling theme.
For power unlimited could reasons draw,
And place prerogative above the law;
Which, on your fall from office, grew unjust,
The laws made king, the king a slave in trust:
Whom with state-craft, to interest only true,
You now accuse of ills contriv'd by you.
To this Hell's agent - Royal youth, fix here,
Let interest be the star by which I steer.
Hence to repose your trust in me was wise,
Whose interest most in your advancement lies,
A tie so firm as always will avail,
When friendship, nature, and religion fail;
On ours the safety of the crowd depends,
Secure the crowd, and we obtain our ends,
Whom I will cause so far our guilt to share,
Till they are made our champions by their fear.
again in their proper channel, though it was a stretch of power not easily forgotten or digested. D.
What opposition can your rival bring,
While Sanhedrims are jealous of the King?
His strength as yet in David's friendship lies,
And what can David's self without supplies?
Who with exclusive bills must now dispense,
Debar the heir, or starve in his defence.
Conditions which our elders ne'er will quit,
And David's justice never can admit.
Or forc'd by wants his brother to betray,
To
your ambition next he clears the way;
For if succession once to nought they bring,
Their next advance removes the present king:
Persisting else his senates to dissolve,
In equal hazard shall his reign involve.
Our tribes, whom Pharaoh's power so much alarms,
Shall rise without their prince to oppose his arms:
Nor boots it on what cause at first they join,
Their troops, once up, are tools for our design.
At least such subtle covenants shall be made,
Till peace itself is war in masquerade.
Associations of mysterious sense,
Against, but seeming for, the king's defence:
E'en on their courts of justice fetters draw,
And from our agents muzzle up their law.
By which a conquest if we fail to make,
'Tis a drawn game at worst, and we secure our stake.
He said, and for the dire success depends
On various sects, by common guilt made friends,
Whose heads, though ne'er so differing in their creed,
I' th' point of treason yet were well agreed.
'Mongst these, extorting Ishban first appears, 280 Pursu❜d by a meagre troop of bankrupt heirs. Blest times, when Ishban, he whose occupation So long has been to cheat, reforms the nation! Ishban of conscience suited to his trade,
As good a saint as usurer ever made.
Yet Mammon has not so engross'd him quite,
But Belial lays as large a claim of spite;
Who, for those pardons from his prince he draws,
Returns reproaches, and cries up the cause.
That year in which the city he did sway,
He left rebellion in a hopeful way.
Yet his ambition once was found so bold,
To offer talents of extorted gold;
Could David's wants have so been brib'd, to shame
And scandalize our peerage with his name;
For which, his dear sedition he'd forswear,
And e'en turn loyal to be made a peer.
Next him, let railing Rabsheka have place,
So full of zeal he has no need of grace;
A saint that can both flesh and spirit use,
Alike haunt conventicles and the stews:
extorting Ishban first appears,
Pursu'd by a meagre troop of bankrupt heirs] Sir Robert Clayton, an alderman of the city, and one of its members, who remarkably opposed the court. Though he was very avaricious, he had offered a large sum to be made a peer; and those who consider the king's wants will believe with me, he was sorry the alderman's money was not tangible. D.
V. 301. conventicles] He accents the word again on the
Of whom the question difficult appears,
If most i' th' preachers' or the bawds' arrears.
What caution could appear too much in him
That keeps the treasure of Jerusalem !"
Let David's brother but approach the town,
Double our guards, he cries, we are undone.
Protesting that he dares not sleep in 's bed,
Lest he should rise next morn without his head.
Next these, a troop of busy spirits press,
Of little fortunes, and of conscience less ;
With them the tribe, whose luxury had drain'd
Their banks, in former sequestrations gain'd;
Who rich and great by past rebellions grew,
And long to fish the troubled streams anew.
Some future hopes, some present payment draws,
To sell their conscience and espouse the cause.
Such stipends those vile hirelings best befit,
Priests without grace, and poets without wit.
Shall that false Hebronite escape our curse,
third syllable in the Medal, line 285. Thus, in a collection of Loyal Songs, written between 1639 and 1661, vol. ii. p. 16.
V. 320. Shall that false Hebronite escape our curse] Robert Ferguson, a Scotch independent preacher, subtle, plausible, bold, and daring, had for many years preached and writ against the government with great animosity; had weight among the Whigs in the city, and was a very proper instrument to stir up sedition. Shaftesbury knew his excellencies, made use of
Judas, that keeps the rebels' pension-purse;
Judas, that pays the treason-writer's fee,
Judas, that well deserves his namesake's tree;
Who at Jerusalem's own gates erects
His college for a nursery of sects;
Young prophets with an early care secures,
And with the dung of his own arts manures!
What have the men of Hebron here to do?
What part in Israel's promis'd land have you?
Here Phaleg, the lay Hebronite, is come,
'Cause like the rest he could not live at home;
Who from his own possessions could not drain
An omer, even of Hebronitish grain,
Here struts it like a patriot, and talks high
Of injur'd subjects, alter'd property;
An emblem of that buzzing insect just,
That mounts the wheel, and thinks she raises dust.
Can dry bones live? or skeletons produce
The vital warmth of cuckoldizing juice?
Slim Phaleg could, and at the table fed,
them by confiding in him, and he contributed much to the success of his designs.
Robert Ferguson, here meant, says Mr. Granger, was a great dealer in plots, and a prostitute political writer for different parties, and particularly for the Earl of Shaftesbury. He approached nearer to a parallel character with Oates than any of his contemporaries; and was rewarded with a place in the reign of William. though it was well known he merited a halter. Dr. J. W.
Who at Jerusalem's own gates erects His college for a nursery of sects] Ferguson had a chapel near Moorfields. D.
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