Import their flow'rs of elocution

From Gallic soil of Revolution;

And make our Youth of all conditions
Turn democratic rhetoricians,

And prove in politics as knowing

As those who set their tongues a going?
Lo! where, pot-valiant, they attack
The Minister behind his back,

Who, they'll be sworn, usurp'd the helm
On purpose to undo the realm;

In John Bull's cushion planted thorns,
And took him roundly by the horns-
(Was ever Beast serv'd such a trick!)
When he was prancing to Old Nick:
Who clapp'd a padlock on his muzzle,
Maugre F*x, L**d**d*le, and R****1,
When, seiz'd like other horned cits

With revolutionary fits,

Amidst his disaffected swarm

He bellow'd treason at Chalk Farm!

But to return from whence we started:Though knowledge by old books imparted

In th' estimate is mouldy grown

Of those who have too much o' their own:

(Just as the sun's illustrious splendour's
An eye-sore to our candle-venders

For each dark spot upon his face
Who'd plant a thousand in its place,
With long succession of eclipses
Bronze his complexion like a gypsy's,
And bid in fogs his beams lie fallow
So 'twould but raise the price of Tallow :)
Still he who patiently explores

Old erudition's classic stores,

Whose steps from fashion's heights decline
To trace the depths of learning's mine,
Tho' cart-loads of black-letter'd lumber
Its tracts voluminous encumber,
Some text may light on, or narration
That's pregnant with edification.
As in old miser's cabinet,

With cobwebs fring'd, by worms half eat,
Bright guineas lurk, or gems that sparkle
Within its private draw'r or dark hole.
Thus, while the feats of those tall fellows
He reads, the offspring of dame Tellus,

Who brav'd the ruler of the sky,

Th' observer sees, with half an eye,

The fabling seers anticipate

Philosophy of modern date,

Who by profession's bound, and calling
Authority to combat all in;

Whose giant-appetite devours
Thrones, principalities, and powers,
Establishments delights in munching;
Takes a cathedral for its luncheon,
And kindly condescends to sate
It's hunger on communion plate,
Chalice, or consecrated flagon
Like Wantley's sacrilegious Dragon.
A true philosopher and sound,
Who ravag'd all the country round,
Effecting its regeneration

By Gallic modes of desolation.

* Houses and churches

Were to him geese and turkies,
He ate all and left none behind:

&c.

Dragon of Wantley.

See Pills to Purge Melancholy.

Let then Refinement's seminaries,

From tales of cocks and bulls and fairies

Revert to that abandon'd page,

Whence arch-rebellion's pristine rage

Our democratic youths enlightens,

And bids them emulate the Titans:
For these, like FAYETTE, the perfection
Of duty plac'd in Insurrection,*
And (while the fervours Sieyes felt +
Glow'd underneath each giant's belt)

To sweep down all distinctions strove
And make a citizen of Jove

For Majesty, whom, while a child,
Sceptres and globes and crowns beguil'd,

Disdain'd, since he of age was grown,
His gilded cradle of a throne;

And had from thence transferr'd his state

To ev'ry ragamuffin pate,

*"Le plus Saint Devoir de l'homme est L'INSURRECTION."

La Fayette.

+ "As soon as I began to divest myself of the prejudices with which my education had been infected, I felt the holy spirit of insurrection kindle in my heart."

M. l'Abbé Sieyes to the Convention.

Wherein, if any brains be found,

He turn'd 'em round and round and round,

Till, (as the legion-spirit stirr'd

To ecstacy the infuriate herd,)

He drove them headlong to the sea

Of overwhelming anarchy.

They swore it was a monstrous thing

The thund'rer should be call'd Heav'n's King!
The Imprescriptive Rights of giants

They knew:-so bade him bold defiance;

Vow'd his supremacy to level

And with his gods to play the devil:

+ Intrinsic sov'reignty, they said, Exists but in the governed,

* Imprescriptive Rights" Droits imprescriptibles," a favourite expression of French philosophers.Rights paramount to all the antiquated prejudices respecting equity, property, integrity, honour, charity, and religion.

See Topsy Turvy, page 14.

Such a latitude of audacity did these primæval Republicans allow themselves that they made no more ceremony of assaulting the great synod of the Gods than of anticipating the sentiments of the great enlighteners of mankind.-For Brissot, in one of his letters, declares; "We, the French, must set fire to the four corners of Europe." Camille