Persisting else his senates to dissolve,
In equal hazard shall his reign involve.
Our tribes, whom Pharaoh's pow'r so much alarms,
Shall rise without their prince t' oppose his arms;
Nor boots it on what cause at first they join,
Their troops once up, are tools for our designs:
At least such subtle cov'nants 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 diff'ring in their creed,
I' th' point of treason yet were well agreed.
'Mongst these extorting Ishban first appears,
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 us'rer ever made:
Yet Maminon 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:
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. 31c
"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,
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 gate 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 Is'rel'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 e'en 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 think she raises dust,
Can dry bones live? or skelelons produce
The vital warmth of cuckoldizing juice?
Slim Phaleg could, and, at the table fed,
Return'd the grateful product to the bed.
A waiting-man to trav'lling nobles chose,
He his own laws would saucily impose
Till bastinado'd, back again he went,
To learn those manners he to teach was sent.
Chastis'd, he ought to have retreated home,
But he read politics to Absalom;
For never Hebronite, though kick'd and scorn'd,
To his own country willingly return'd,
But leaving famish'd Phaleg to be fed,
And to talk treason for his daily bread,
Let Hebron, nay, let Hell produce a man,
So made for mischief as Ben Jochanan.
A Jew of humble parentage was he,
By trade a Levite, though of low degree:
His pride no higher than the desk aspir'd,
But for the drudgery of priests was hir'd
To read and pray in linen ephod brave,
And pick up single shekels from the grave.
Married at last, but finding charge come faster,
He could not live by God. but chang'd his master; Inspir'd by want, was made a factious tool: They got a villain, and we lost a fool, Still violent, whatever cause he took, But most against the party he forsook: For renegadoes, who ne'er turn by halves, Are bound in conscience to be double knaves. So this prose-prophet took most monstrous pains To let his master see he earn'd his gains; But as the dev'l owes all his imps a shame, He chose th' apostate for his proper theme; With little pains he made the picture true, And from reflection took the rogue he drew:
A wondrous work, to prove the Jewish nation
In ev'ry age a murm'ring generation;
To trace 'em from their infancy of sinning,
And shew 'em factious from their first beginning;
To prove they could rebel, and rail, and mock,
Much to the credit of the chosen flock;
A strong authority, which must convince
That saints own no allegiance to their prince;
As 'tis a leading card to make a whore,
To prove her mother had turn'd up before.
But, tell me, did the drunken patriarch bless
The son that shew'd his father's nakedness?
Such thanks the present church thy pen will give,
Which proves rebellion was so primitive.
Must ancient failings be examples made?
Then murderers from Cain may learn their trade.
As thou the Heathen and the saint hast drawn,
Methinks th' apostate was the better man;
And thy hot father, waving my respect,
Not of a mother-church, but of a sect:
And such he needs must be of thy inditing,
This comes of drinking asses' milk, and writing,
If Balak should be call'd to leave his place,
As profit is the loudest call of grace,
His temple, dispossess'd of one, would be
Replenish'd with seven devils more by thee:
Levi, thou art a load, I'll lay thee down,
And shew Rebellion bare without a gown;
Volume II.
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