REBELLION is my theme all day; I only wish 'twould come
(As who knows but perhaps it may ?) A little nearer home.
Yon roaring boys, who rave and fight On t' other side th' Atlantic,
I always held them in the right, But most so when most frantic.
When lawless mobs insult the court, That man shall be my toast, If breaking windows be the sport, Who bravely breaks the most.
But oh! for him my fancy culls The choicest flowers she bears,
Who constitutionally pulls
Your house about your ears.
Such civil broils are my delight, Though some folks can't endure them, Who say the mob are mad outright, And that a rope must cure them.
A rope! I wish we patriots had Such strings for all who need 'em--- What! hang a man for going mad? Then farewell British freedom.
SOME NAMES OF LITTLE NOTE
RECORDED IN THE BIOGRAPHIA BRITANNICA.
ОH, fond attempt to give a deathless lot To names ignoble, born to be forgot! In vain, recorded in historic page, They court the notice of a future age: Those twinkling tiny lustres of the land Drop one by one from Fame's neglecting hand; Lethæan gulfs receive them as they fall, And dark oblivion soon absorbs them all.
So when a child, as playful children use, Has burnt to tinder a stale last year's news, The flame extinct, he views the roving fire--- There goes my lady, and there goes the squire, There goes the parson, oh! illustrious spark, And there, scarce less illustrious, goes the clerk!
OF AN ADJUDGED CASE NOT TO BE FOUND IN ANY
BETWEEN Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose, The spectacles set them unhappily wrong; The point in dispute was, as all the world knows, To which the said spectacles ought to belong.
So Tongue was the lawyer, and argued the cause With a great deal of skill, and a wig full of learning; While chief baron Ear sat to balance the laws, So famed for his talent in nicely discerning.
In behalf of the Nose it will quickly appear,
And your lordship, he said, will undoubtedly find That the Nose has had spectacles always in wear, Which amounts to possession time out of mind.
Then holding the spectacles up to the court--- Your lordship observes they are made with a straddle As wide as the ridge of the Nose is; in short, Designed to sit close to it, just like a saddle.
Again, would your lordship a moment suppose ('Tis a case that has happened, and may be again) That the visage or countenance had not a Nose,
Pray who would, or who could, wear spectacles then?
On the whole it appears, and my argument shows With a reasoning the court will never condemn, That the spectacles plainly were made for the Nose, And the Nose was as plainly intended for them.
Then shifting his side, (as a lawyer knows how) He pleaded again in behalf of the Eyes; But what were his arguments few people know, For the court did not think they were equally wise.
So his lordship decreed, with a grave solemn tone, Decisive and clear, without one IF or BUT- That, whenever the Nose put his spectacles on, By daylight or candlelight-Eyes should be shut!
LORD MANSFIELD's LIBRARY,
TOGETHER WITH HIS MSS. BY THE MOB IN THE MONTH OF JUNE, 1780.
So then--the Vandals of our isle, Sworn foes to sense and law, Have burnt to dust a nobler pile Than ever Roman saw.
And Murray sighs o'er Pope and Swift, And many a treasure more,
The well-judged purchase and the gift, That graced his lettered store.
Their pages mangled, burnt, and torn, Their loss was his alone;
But ages yet to come shall mourn The burning of his own.
WHEN wit and genius meet their doom In all-devouring flame, They tell us of the fate of Rome,
And bid us fear the same.
O'er Murray's loss the muses wept, They felt the rude alarm,
Yet bless'd the guardian care, that kept His sacred head from harm.
182 LOVE OF THE WORLD REPROVED. There memory, like the bee, that's fed From Flora's balmy store,
The quintessence of all he read,
Had treasured up before.
The lawless herd, with fury blind, Have done him cruel wrong ; The flowers are gone-but still we find The honey on his tongue.
LOVE OF THE WORLD REPROVED.
THUS says the prophet of the Turk, Good Mussulman, abstain from Pork; There is a part in every swine No friend or follower of mine May taste, whate'er his inclination, On pain of excommunication. Such Mahomet's mysterious charge, And thus he left the point at large. Had he the sinful part expressed, They might with safety eat the rest; But for one piece they thought it hard From the whole hog to be debarred; And set their wit at work to find What joint the prophet had in mind. Much controversy straight arose, These choose the back, the belly those; By some 'tis confidently said
He meant not to forbid the head; While others at that doctrine rail,
And piously prefer the tail.
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