A patriot's for his country: thou art sad At thought of her forlorn and abject state, We travel far, 'tis true, but not for nought; But, though true worth and virtue in the mild And genial soil of cultivated life Thrive most, and may perhaps thrive only there, Yet not in cities oft: in proud and gay And gain-devoted cities. Thither flow, In cities vice is hidden with most ease, In which they flourish most; where, in the beams Of public note, they reach their perfect size. Such London is, by taste and wealth proclaim'd The fairest capital of all the world, By riot and incontinence the worst. There, touch'd by Reynolds, a dull blank becomes A lucid mirror, in which Nature sees All her reflected features. Bacon there Gives more than female beauty to a stone, The pow'rs of sculpture, but the style as much; With nice incision of her guided steel She ploughs a brazen field, and clothes a soil With which she gazes at yon burning disk Undazzled, and detects and counts his spots? Measures an atom, and now girds a world? In London. Where has commerce such a mart, So rich, so throng'd, so drain'd, and so supplied, As London-opulent, enlarg'd, and still Increasing, London? Babylon of old Not more the glory of the earth than she, She has her praise. Now mark a spot or two, That so much beauty would do well to purge; And show this queen of cities, that so fair May yet be foul; so witty, yet not wise. It is not seemly, nor of good report, That she is slack in discipline; more prompt T' avenge than to prevent the breach of law: That she is rigid in denouncing death On petty robbers, and indulges life And liberty, and oft-times honour too, To peculators of the public gold: That thieves at home must hang; but he, that puts Into his overgorg'd and bloated purse Advancing fashion to the post of truth, And customs of her own, till sabbath rites God made the country, and man made the town, What wonder then that health and virtue, gifts That can alone make sweet the bitter draught -That life holds out to all, should most abound And least be threaten'd in the fields and groves? Possess ye, therefore, ye, who, born about In chariots and sedans, know no fatigue |