Chapter VI: Preface

The nation is in too high a ferment, for me to expect either fair war, or even so much as fair quarter, from a reader of the opposite party. All men are engaged either on this side or that; and though conscience is the common word which is given by both, yet if a writer fall among enemies, and cannot give the marks of _their_ conscience, he is knocked down before the reasons of his own are heard. A preface, therefore, which is but a bespeaking of favour, is altogether useless. What I desire the reader should know concerning me, he will find in the body of the poem, if he have but the patience to peruse it. Only this advertisement let him take before-hand, which relates to the merits of the cause.

No general characters of parties (call them either sects or churches) can be so fully and exactly drawn, as to comprehend all the several members of them; at least all such as are received under that denomination. For example; there are some of the church by law established, who envy not liberty of conscience to dissenters; as being well satisfied that, according to their own principles, they ought not to persecute them. Yet these, by reason of their fewness, I could not distinguish from the numbers of the rest, with whom they are embodied in one common name. On the other side, there are many of our sects, and more indeed than I could reasonably have hoped, who have withdrawn themselves from the communion of the Panther, and embraced this gracious indulgence of his majesty in point of toleration. But neither to the one nor the other of these is this satire any way intended: it is aimed only at the refractory and disobedient on either side. For those, who are come over to the royal party, are consequently supposed to be out of gun-shot.[85] Our physicians have observed, that, in process of time, some diseases have abated of their virulence, and have in a manner worn out their malignity, so as to be no longer mortal; and why may not I suppose the same concerning some of those, who have formerly been enemies to kingly government, as well as Catholic religion? I hope they have now another notion of both, as having found, by comfortable experience, that the doctrine of persecution is far from being an article of our faith.[86]

It is not for any private man to censure the proceedings of a foreign prince:[87] but, without suspicion of flattery, I may praise our own, who has taken contrary measures, and those more suitable to the spirit of Christianity. Some of the dissenters, in their addresses to his majesty, have said, "That he has restored God to his empire over conscience."[88] I confess, I dare not stretch the figure to so great a boldness: but I may safely say, that conscience is the royalty and prerogative of every private man. He is absolute in his own breast, and accountable to no earthly power for that which passes only betwixt God and him. Those who are driven into the fold are, generally speaking, rather made hypocrites than converts.

This indulgence being granted to all the sects, it ought in reason to be expected, that they should both receive it, and receive it thankfully. For, at this time of day, to refuse the benefit, and adhere to those whom they have esteemed their persecutors, what is it else but publicly to own, that they suffered not before for conscience-sake, but only out of pride and obstinacy, to separate from a church for those impositions, which they now judge may be lawfully obeyed? After they have so long contended for their classical ordination (not to speak of rites and ceremonies) will they at length submit to an episcopal? If they can go so far, out of complaisance to their old enemies, methinks a little reason should persuade them to take another step, and see whither that will lead them.[89]

Of the receiving this toleration thankfully, I shall say no more, than that they ought, and I doubt not they will consider from what hand they received it. It is not from a Cyrus, a heathen prince, and a foreigner,[90] but from a christian king, their native sovereign; who expects a return in specie from them, that the kindness, which he has graciously shewn them, may be retaliated on those of his own persuasion.

As for the poem in general, I will only thus far satisfy the reader, that it was neither imposed on me, nor so much as the subject given me by any man. It was written during the last winter, and the beginning of this spring; though with long interruptions of ill health and other hindrances. About a fortnight before I had finished it, his majesty's Declaration for liberty of conscience came abroad; which, if I had so soon expected, I might have spared myself the labour of writing many things which are contained in the third part of it. But I was always in some hope, that the church of England might have been persuaded to have taken off the penal laws and the test, which was one design of the poem, when I proposed to myself the writing of it.

It is evident that some part of it was only occasional, and not first intended: I mean that defence of myself, to which every honest man is bound, when he is injuriously attacked in print; and I refer myself to the judgment of those, who have read the answer to the Defence of the late king's Papers, and that of the duchess, (in which last I was concerned) how charitably I have been represented there.[91] I am now informed both of the author and supervisors of this pamphlet, and will reply, when I think he can affront me: for I am of Socrates's opinion, that all creatures cannot. In the mean time let him consider whether he deserved not a more severe reprehension than I gave him formerly, for using so little respect to the memory of those, whom he pretended to answer; and, at his leisure, look out for some original treatise of humility, written by any Protestant in English; (I believe I may say in any other tongue:) for the magnified piece of Duncombe on that subject, which either he must mean, or none, and with which another of his fellows has upbraided me, was translated from the Spanish of Rodriguez; though with the omission of the seventeenth, the twenty-fourth, the twenty-fifth, and the last chapter, which will be found in comparing of the books.[92]

He would have insinuated to the world, that her late Highness died not a Roman Catholic. He declares himself to be now satisfied to the contrary, in which he has given up the cause: for matter of fact was the principal debate betwixt us. In the mean time, he would dispute the motives of her change; how preposterously, let all men judge, when he seemed to deny the subject of the controversy, the change itself.[93] And because I would not take up this ridiculous challenge, he tells the world I cannot argue: but he may as well infer, that a Catholic cannot fast, because he will not take up the cudgels against Mrs James,[94] to confute the Protestant religion.

I have but one word more to say concerning the poem as such, and abstracting from the matters, either religious or civil, which are handled in it. The First Part, consisting most in general characters and narration, I have endeavoured to raise, and give it the majestic turn of heroic poesy. The Second, being matter of dispute, and chiefly concerning church authority, I was obliged to make as plain and perspicuous as possibly I could; yet not wholly neglecting the numbers, though I had not frequent occasions for the magnificence of verse. The Third, which has more of the nature of domestic conversation, is, or ought to be, more free and familiar than the two former.

There are in it two episodes, or fables, which are interwoven with the main design; so that they are properly parts of it, though they are also distinct stories of themselves. In both of these I have made use of the common-places of satire, whether true or false, which are urged by the members of the one church against the other: at which I hope no reader of either party will be scandalized, because they are not of my invention, but as old, to my knowledge, as the times of Boccace and Chaucer on the one side, and as those of the Reformation on the other.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 85: The tumultuary joy of the sectaries, upon their first view of this triumph over the church of England, led them into all the extravagancies of loyalty, which used to be practised by their ancient enemies the Tories. Addresses teeming with affection, and foaming with bombast, were poured in upon King James from all corners of his dominions; Presbyterians, Anabaptists, Quakers, Sectaries of all sorts and persuasions, strove to be foremost in the race of gratitude. And when similar addresses came in from corporations, who had been formerly anxious to shew their loyalty on the subject of the Rye-house plot, the king's accession, and other occasions of triumph to the Tories, the tone of these bodies also was wonderfully changed; and, instead of raving against excluders, rebels, regicides, republicans, and fanatics, whose hellish contrivances endeavoured to destroy the safety of the kingdom, and the life of the king, these same gentlemen mention the Sectaries as their brethren and fellow-subjects, to whom the king, their common father, had been justly, liberally, royally pleased to grant freedom of conscience, for which the addressers offer their hearty and unfeigned thanks. These were the two classes of persons, whom Dryden, as they had closed with the measures of government, declares to be exempted from his satire. Those, therefore, against whom it is avowedly directed, are first, the Church of England, whose adherents saw her destruction aimed at through the pretence of toleration. 2dly, Those Sectaries, who distrusted the boon which the king presented, and feared that the consequences of this immediate indulgence at the hands of an ancient enemy, would be purchased by future persecution. These formed a body, small at first, but whose numbers daily increased.

Among the numerous addresses which were presented to the court on this occasion, there are two somewhat remarkable from the quality and condition of the persons in whose name they are offered. The one is from the persons engaged in the schemes of Shaftesbury and Monmouth, and who set out by acknowledging their lives and fortunes forfeited to King James; a singular instance of convicts offering their sentiments upon state affairs. The other is from no less a corporation than the company of London Cooks, which respectable persons declare their approbation of the indulgence, upon a principle recognized in their profession, "the difference of _men's gusto_, in religion, as in eatables;" and assure his majesty, that his declaration "somewhat resembles the Almighty's manna, which suited every man's palate." _History of Addresses_, pp. 106, 132.]

[Footnote 86: Most readers will, I think, acknowledge with me, the extreme awkwardness with which Dryden apologizes, for hoping well of those Sectaries, against whom he had so often discharged the utmost severity of his pen. Yet there is much real truth in the observation, though the compliment to the new allies of the Catholics is but a cold one. Many sects have distinguished themselves by faction, fanaticism, and furious excess at their rise, which, when their spirits have ceased to be agitated by novelty, and exasperated by persecution, have subsided into quiet orderly classes of citizens, only remarkable for some peculiarities of speculative doctrine.]

[Footnote 87: Alluding to the persecution of the Huguenots in France, after the recall of the edict of Nantes.]

[Footnote 88: This phrase occurs in the address of the Ministers of the Gospel in and about the city of London, commonly called Presbyterians: "Your majesty's princely wisdom," say these reverend sycophants, "now rescues us from our long sufferings, and by the same royal act restores God to the empire over conscience." This it is to be too eloquent; when people set no bounds to their rhetoric, it betrays them often into nonsense, and not seldom into blasphemy.--_History of Addresses_, p. 107.]

[Footnote 89: A gentle insinuation, that, if the sectaries could renounce the ordination by presbyteries or classes, in favour of the church of England, it would require but a step or two farther to bring them to a conformity with that of Rome.]

[Footnote 90: Who freed the Jews from their bondage, and gave them permission to rebuild their city and temple.--See the _Book of Esdras_.]

[Footnote 91: In his ardour for extending the Catholic religion, James II. had directed copies of the papers found in his brother's strongbox in favour of that communion, with the copy of a paper by his first duchess, giving the reasons for her conversion to that faith, to be printed, and circulated through the kingdom. These papers were answered by the learned Stillingfleet, then Dean of St Paul's. A Defence of the Papers was published "by command," of which it appears, from the passage in the text, that our author wrote the third part, which applies to the Duchess of York's paper. Stillingfleet published a vindication of his answer, in which he attacks our author with some severity. A full account of the controversy will be found attached to Dryden's part of the Defence, among his prose works.]

[Footnote 92: In the controversy between Dryden and Stillingfleet, the former had concluded his Defence of the Duchess of York's paper, by alleging, that "among all the volumes of divinity written by the Protestants, there is not one original treatise, at least that I have seen or heard of, which has handled distinctly, and by itself, the Christian virtue of humility." This Stillingfleet, in his reply, calls a "bare-faced assertion of a thing known to be false;" for, "with-in a few years, besides what has been printed formerly, such a book hath been published in London." Dryden, in the text, replies to this allegation, that Duncombe's treatise, which he supposes to be meant, is a translation from the Spanish of Rodriguez, therefore, not originally a Protestant work. Montague, in the preface to "The Hind and Panther Transversed" alleges, that Dryden has mistaken the name of the author of the treatise alluded to; which was not, he asserts, Duncombe, but Allen. See the matter more fully canvassed in a note on the original passage, in "The Duchess of York's Paper Defended."]

[Footnote 93: Dryden is not quite candid in his statement. In Stillingfleet's answer to the Duchess's paper, it is indeed called, the "paper _said_ to be written by a great lady;" but there is not another word upon the authority, which, indeed, considering it was published under the king's immediate inspection, could not be very decorously disputed. Dryden seizes upon this phrase in his defence, and, coupling with it some expressions of the Bishop of Winchester, he argues that it was the intention of these sons of the church of England, to give the lie to their sovereign. In this vindication of the answer, Stillingfleet thus expresses himself: "As to the main design of the third paper, I declared, that I considered it, as it was supposed to contain the reasons and motives of the conversion of so great a lady to the church of Rome.

"But this gentleman has now eased me of the necessity of farther considering it on that account. For he declares, that none of those motives or reasons are to be found in the paper of her highness. Which he repeats several times. 'She writ this paper, not as to the reasons she had herself for changing, &c.' 'As for her reasons, they were only betwixt God and her own soul, and the priest with whom she spoke at last.'

"And so my work is at an end as to her paper. For I never intended to ransack the private papers or secret narratives of great persons; and I do not in the least question the relation now given from so great authority, as that he mentions of the passages concerning her; and therefore I have nothing more to say as to what relates to the person of the duchess."

It is obvious that Dryden, probably finding the divine too hard for him on the controversial part of the subject, affects to consider the dispute as entirely limited to the authenticity of the paper, which it cannot be supposed Stillingfleet ever seriously intended to impeach.]

[Footnote 94: Eleanor James, a lady who was at this period pleased to stand up as a champion for the test, against the repeal which James had so deeply at heart. This female theologian is mentioned in the "Remarks from the country, upon the two Letters, relating to the convocation, and alterations in the liturgy." "It is a thousand pities, so instructive and so eloquent papers should ever fall under such an imputation, (of being too forward, and solemn impertinence,) and be ranked among the scribblings of Eleanor James, with this only advantage of having better language, whereas the woman counsellor is judged to have the better meaning." Although Mrs James's lucubrations were thus vilipended by the male disputants, one of her own sex thought it necessary to enter the lists in opposition to her. _See Elizabeth Rone's short Answer to Eleanor James's Long Preamble, or Vindication of the New Test_:

The book called Mistress James's Vindication,
Does seem to me but her great indignation;
Against the Romans and dissenters too,
She for the church of England makes adoe;
Calling her Christ's spouse, but she's mistaken,
Christ's spouse is she that is by her forsaken.

Mrs James's work was entitled, "A Vindication of the Church of England, in answer to a pamphlet, entitled, a New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty." She was herself the wife of a printer, who left many books to the library of Sion college. Mrs James's picture is preserved in the library, in the full dress of a citizen's wife of that period. She survived her husband many years, and carried on the printing business on her own account.--MALONE, Vol. III. p. 539.]

THE

HIND AND THE PANTHER.

A milk-white Hind,[95] immortal and unchanged,
Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged;
Without unspotted, innocent within,
She feared no danger, for she knew no sin.
Yet had she oft been chased with horns and hounds,
And Scythian shafts; and many winged wounds
Aimed at her heart; was often forced to fly,
And doomed to death, though fated not to die.[96]
Not so her young; for their unequal line
Was hero's make, half human, half divine.
Their earthly mould obnoxious was to fate,
The immortal part assumed immortal state.
Of these a slaughtered army lay in blood,[97]
Extended o'er the Caledonian wood,
Their native walk; whose vocal blood arose,
And cried for pardon on their perjured foes.
Their fate was fruitful, and the sanguine seed,
Endued with souls, increased the sacred breed.
So captive Israel multiplied in chains,
A numerous exile, and enjoyed her pains.
With grief and gladness mixed, the mother viewed
Her martyr'd offspring, and their race renewed;
Their corps to perish, but their kind to last,
So much the deathless plant the dying fruit surpassed.
Panting and pensive now she ranged alone,
And wandered in the kingdoms, once her own.
The common hunt, though from their rage restrained
By sovereign power, her company disdained,
Grinned as they passed, and with a glaring eye
Gave gloomy signs of secret enmity
'Tis true, she bounded by, and trip'd so light,
They had not time to take a steady sight;
For truth has such a face and such a mien,
As to be loved needs only to be seen.
The bloody Bear, an independent beast,
Unlicked to form, in groans her hate exprest.[98]
Among the timorous kind, the quaking Hare
Professed neutrality, but would not swear.[99]
Next her the buffoon Ape, as atheists use,
Mimicked all sects, and had his own to chuse;
Still when the Lion looked, his knees he bent,
And paid at church a courtier's compliment.[100]
The bristled baptist Boar, impure as he,[101]
But whitened with the foam of sanctity,
With fat pollutions filled the sacred place,}
And mountains levelled in his furious race; }
So first rebellion founded was in grace. }
But since the mighty ravage, which he made
In German forests, had his guilt betrayed,
With broken tusks, and with a borrowed name,
He shunned the vengeance, and concealed the shame;
So lurked in sects unseen. With greater guile
False Reynard fed on consecrated spoil;[102]
The graceless beast by Athanasius first
Was chased from Nice, then by Socinus nursed;
His impious race their blasphemy renewed,
And nature's king through nature's optics viewed.
Reversed, they viewed him lessened to their eye,
Nor in an infant could a God descry;
New swarming sects to this obliquely tend,
Hence they began, and here they all will end.
What weight of antient witness can prevail,
If private reason hold the public scale?
But, gracious God, how well dost thou provide
For erring judgments an unerring guide!
Thy throne is darkness in the abyss of light,
A blaze of glory that forbids the sight.
O teach me to believe thee, thus concealed,
And search no farther than thyself revealed;
But her alone for my director take,
Whom thou hast promised never to forsake!
My thoughtless youth was winged with vain desires;
My manhood, long misled by wandering fires,
Followed false lights; and, when their glimpse was gone,
My pride struck out new sparkles of her own.
Such was I, such by nature still I am;
Be thine the glory, and be mine the shame!
Good life be now my task; my doubts are done;[103]
What more could fright my faith, than three in one?
Can I believe eternal God could lie }
Disguised in mortal mould, and infancy? }
That the great Maker of the world could die?}
And after that trust my imperfect sense,
Which calls in question his omnipotence?
Can I my reason to my faith compel,
And shall my sight, and touch, and taste rebel?
Superior faculties are set aside;
Shall their subservient organs be my guide?
Then let the moon usurp the rule of day,
And winking tapers shew the sun his way;
For what my senses can themselves perceive,
I need no revelation to believe.
Can they, who say the host should be descried
By sense, define a body glorified?
Impassable, and penetrating parts?
Let them declare by what mysterious arts
He shot that body through the opposing might, }
Of bolts and bars impervious to the light, }
And stood before his train confessed in open sight.[104]}
For since thus wondrously he passed, 'tis plain,
One single place two bodies did contain;
And sure the same Omnipotence as well
Can make one body in more places dwell.
Let reason then at her own quarry fly,
But how can finite grasp infinity?
'Tis urged again, that faith did first commence
By miracles, which are appeals to sense,
And thence concluded, that our sense must be
The motive still of credibility;
For latter ages must on former wait,
And what began belief, must propagate.
But winnow well this thought, and you shall find
'Tis light as chaff that flies before the wind.
Were all those wonders wrought by power divine,
As means or ends of some more deep design?
Most sure as means, whose end was this alone,
To prove the Godhead of the Eternal Son.
God thus asserted, man is to believe
Beyond what sense and reason can conceive,
And, for mysterious things of faith, rely
On the proponent, heaven's authority.
If, then, our faith we for our guide admit,
Vain is the farther search of human wit;
As when the building gains a surer stay,
We take the unuseful scaffolding away.
Reason by sense no more can understand;
The game is played into another hand.
Why chuse we then like bilanders[105] to creep}
Along the coast, and land in view to keep, }
When safely we may launch into the deep? }
In the same vessel, which our Saviour bore, }
Himself the pilot, let us leave the shore, }
And with a better guide a better world explore.}
Could he his Godhead veil with flesh and blood,
And not veil these again to be our food?
His grace in both is equal in extent,
The first affords us life, the second nourishment.
And if he can, why all this frantic pain, }
To construe what his clearest words contain,}
And make a riddle what he made so plain? }
To take up half on trust, and half to try,
Name it not faith, but bungling bigotry;
Both knave and fool the merchant we may call, }
To pay great sums, and to compound the small; }
For who would break with heaven, and would not break for all?}
Rest then, my soul, from endless anguish freed;
Nor sciences thy guide, nor sense thy creed.
Faith is the best ensurer of thy bliss;
The bank above must fail, before the venture miss.
But heaven and heaven-born faith are far from thee,
Thou first apostate to divinity.
Unkennelled range in thy Polonian plains;
A fiercer foe the insatiate Wolf remains.
Too boastful Britain, please thyself no more,
That beasts of prey are banished from thy shore;
The bear, the boar, and every savage name,
Wild in effect, though in appearance tame,
Lay waste thy woods, destroy thy blissful bower,
And, muzzled though they seem, the mutes devour.
More haughty than the rest, the wolfish race}
Appears with belly gaunt, and famished face;}
Never was so deformed a beast of grace. }
His ragged tail betwixt his legs he wears, }
Close clap'd for shame; but his rough crest he rears,}
And pricks up his predestinating ears.[106] }
His wild disordered walk, his hagard eyes,
Did all the bestial citizens surprise.
Though feared and hated, yet he ruled a while,
As captain or companion of the spoil.
Full many a year his hateful head had been
For tribute paid, nor since in Cambria seen;
The last of all the litter 'scaped by chance,
And from Geneva first infested France.
Some authors thus his pedigree will trace,
But others write him of an upstart race;
Because of Wickliffe's brood no mark he brings,
But his innate antipathy to kings.
These last deduce him from the Helvetian kind,
Who near the Leman-lake his consort lined;
That fiery Zuinglius first the affection bred,
And meagre Calvin blest the nuptial bed.
In Israel some believe him whelped long since,
When the proud sanhedrim oppressed the prince;
Or, since he will be Jew, derive him higher,
When Corah with his brethren did conspire
From Moses' hand the sovereign sway to wrest,
And Aaron of his ephod to divest;
'Till opening earth made way for all to pass,
And could not bear the burden of a class.[107]
The Fox and he came shuffled in the dark,
If ever they were stowed in Noah's ark;
Perhaps not made; for all their barking train
The dog (a common species) will contain;
And some wild curs, who from their masters ran,}
Abhorring the supremacy of man, }
In woods and caves the rebel-race began. }
O happy pair, how well have you increased!
What ills in church and state have you redressed!
With teeth untried, and rudiments of claws,
Your first essay was on your native laws;
Those having torn with ease, and trampled down,}
Your fangs you fastened on the mitred crown, }
And freed from God and monarchy your town. }
What though your native kennel still be small,
Bounded betwixt a puddle and a wall;[108]
Yet your victorious colonies are sent
Where the north ocean girds the continent.
Quickened with fire below, your monsters breed
In fenny Holland, and in fruitful Tweed;
And, like the first, the last affects to be
Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.
As, where in fields the fairy rounds are seen,
A rank sour herbage rises on the green;
So, springing where those midnight elves advance,
Rebellion prints the footsteps of the dance.
Such are their doctrines, such contempt they show}
To heaven above, and to their prince below, }
As none but traitors and blasphemers know. }
God like the tyrant of the skies is placed,
And kings, like slaves, beneath the crowd debased.
So fulsome is their food, that flocks refuse
To bite, and only dogs for physic use.
As, where the lightning runs along the ground,
No husbandry can heal the blasting wound;
Nor bladed grass, nor bearded corn succeeds,
But scales of scurf and putrefaction breeds;
Such wars, such waste, such fiery tracks of dearth
Their zeal has left, and such a teemless earth.
But, as the poisons of the deadliest kind
Are to their own unhappy coasts confined;
As only Indian shades of sight deprive,
And magic plants will but in Colchos thrive;
So presbytery and pestilential zeal
Can only flourish in a commonweal.
From Celtic woods is chased the wolfish crew;[109]
But ah! some pity e'en to brutes is due;
Their native walks, methinks, they might enjoy,
Curbed of their native malice to destroy.
Of all the tyrannies on human-kind,
The worst is that which persecutes the mind.
Let us but weigh at what offence we strike;
'Tis but because we cannot think alike.
In punishing of this, we overthrow
The laws of nations and of nature too.
Beasts are the subjects of tyrannic sway,
Where still the stronger on the weaker prey;
Man only of a softer mould is made,
Not for his fellows' ruin, but their aid;
Created kind, beneficent and free,
The noble image of the Deity.
One portion of informing fire was given
To brutes, the inferior family of heaven.
The smith divine, as with a careless beat,
Struck out the mute creation at a heat;
But, when arrived at last to human race,
The Godhead took a deep considering space;
And, to distinguish man from all the rest,
Unlocked the sacred treasures of his breast;
And mercy mixt with reason did impart,
One to his head, the other to his heart;
Reason to rule, but mercy to forgive;
The first is law, the last prerogative.
And like his mind his outward form appeared, }
When, issuing naked to the wondering herd, }
He charmed their eyes; and, for they loved, they feared }
Not armed with horns of arbitrary might, }
Or claws to seize their furry spoils in fight, }
Or with increase of feet to o'ertake them in their flight; }
Of easy shape, and pliant every way, }
Confessing still the softness of his clay, }
And kind as kings upon their coronation day;[110]}
With open hands, and with extended space
Of arms, to satisfy a large embrace.
Thus kneaded up with milk, the new-made man
His kingdom o'er his kindred world began;
Till knowledge misapplied, misunderstood,
And pride of empire, soured his balmy blood.
Then, first rebelling, his own stamp he coins;
The murderer Cain was latent in his loins;
And blood began its first and loudest cry,
For differing worship of the Deity.
Thus persecution rose, and farther space
Produced the mighty hunter[111] of his race.
Not so the blessed Pan[112] his flock increased,
Content to fold them from the famished beast:
Mild were his laws; the sheep and harmless hind
Were never of the persecuting kind.
Such pity now the pious pastor shows, }
Such mercy from the British Lion flows,[113] }
That both provide protection from their foes. }
Oh happy regions, Italy and Spain,
Which never did those monsters entertain!
The Wolf, the Bear, the Boar, can there advance
No native claim of just inheritance;
And self-preserving laws, severe in show,
May guard their fences from the invading foe.
Where birth has placed them, let them safely share
The common benefit of vital air;
Themselves unharmful, let them live unharmed,
Their jaws disabled, and their claws disarmed;
Here, only in nocturnal howlings bold,
They dare not seize the Hind, nor leap the fold.
More powerful, and as vigilant as they,
The Lion awfully forbids the prey.
Their rage repressed, though pinched with famine sore, }
They stand aloof, and tremble at his roar; }
Much is their hunger, but their fear is more. }
These are the chief; to number o'er the rest,
And stand, like Adam, naming every beast,
Were weary work; nor will the muse describe
A slimy-born and sun-begotten tribe;
Who, far from steeples and their sacred sound,
In fields their sullen conventicles found.[114]
These gross, half-animated, lumps I leave;
Nor can I think what thoughts they can conceive.
But if they think at all, 'tis sure no higher
Than matter, put in motion, may aspire;
Souls that can scarce ferment their mass of clay; }
So drossy, so divisible are they, }
As would but serve pure bodies for allay; }
Such souls as shards produce, such beetle things
As only buz to heaven with evening wings;
Strike in the dark, offending but by chance,
Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance.
They know not beings, and but hate a name;
To them the Hind and Panther are the same.
The Panther, sure the noblest, next the Hind,
And fairest creature of the spotted kind;
Oh, could her in-born stains be washed away,
She were too good to be a beast of prey!
How can I praise, or blame, and not offend,
Or how divide the frailty from the friend?
Her faults and virtues lie so mixed, that she
Nor wholly stands condemned, nor wholly free.
Then, like her injured Lion, let me speak;
He cannot bend her, and he would not break.
Unkind already, and estranged in part,
The Wolf begins to share her wandering heart.
Though unpolluted yet with actual ill,
She half commits who sins but in her will.
If, as our dreaming platonists report,
There could be spirits of a middle sort,
Too black for heaven, and yet too white for hell,
Who just dropt half-way down, nor lower fell;[115]
So poised, so gently she descends from high,
It seems a soft dismission from the sky.
Her house not ancient, whatsoe'er pretence
Her clergy-heralds make in her defence;
A second century not half-way run,
Since the new honours of her blood begun.
A lion, old, obscene, and furious made
By lust, compressed her mother in a shade;
Then, by a left-hand marriage, weds the dame,
Covering adultery with a specious name;[116]
So schism begot; and sacrilege and she,
A well matched pair, got graceless heresy.
God's and kings' rebels have the same good cause,
To trample down divine and human laws;
Both would be called reformers, and their hate
Alike destructive both to church and state.
The fruit proclaims the plant; a lawless prince }
By luxury reformed incontinence; }
By ruins, charity; by riots, abstinence. }
Confessions, fasts, and penance set aside, }
Oh with what ease we follow such a guide, }
Where souls are starved, and senses gratified! }
Where marriage-pleasures midnight prayer supply, }
And mattin bells, a melancholy cry, }
Are tuned to merrier notes, Increase and multiply.[117] }
Religion shews a rosy-coloured face; }
Not hattered[118] out with drudging works of grace; }
A down-hill reformation rolls apace. }
What flesh and blood would crowd the narrow gate, }
Or, till they waste their pampered paunches, wait? }
All would be happy at the cheapest rate. }
Though our lean faith these rigid laws has given,
The full-fed Musselman goes fat to heaven;
For his Arabian prophet with delights
Of sense allured his eastern proselytes.
The jolly Luther, reading him, began
To interpret scriptures by his alcoran;
To grub the thorns beneath our tender feet,
And make the paths of paradise more sweet,
Bethought him of a wife, ere half way gone,
For 'twas uneasy travelling alone;
And, in this masquerade of mirth and love,
Mistook the bliss of heaven for Bacchanals above.
Sure he presumed of praise, who came to stock
The etherial pastures with so fair a flock,
Burnished, and battening on their food, to show
Their diligence of careful herds below.[119]
Our Panther, though like these she changed her head,
Yet, as the mistress of a monarch's bed,[120]
Her front erect with majesty she bore,
The crosier wielded, and the mitre wore.
Her upper part of decent discipline
Shewed affectation of an ancient line;
And fathers, councils, church and churches head,
Were on her reverend phylacteries[121] read.
But what disgraced and disavowed the rest,
Was Calvin's brand, that stigmatized the beast.
Thus, like a creature of a double kind,
In her own labyrinth she lives confined;
To foreign lands no sound of her is come,
Humbly content to be despised at home.
Such is her faith, where good cannot be had,
At least she leaves the refuse of the bad:
Nice in her choice of ill, though not of best,
And least deformed, because reformed the least.
In doubtful points betwixt her differing friends,
Where one for substance, one for sign contends,
Their contradicting terms she strives to join;[122]
Sign shall be substance, substance shall be sign.
A real presence all her sons allow, }
And yet 'tis flat idolatry to bow, }
Because the god-head's there they know not how.}
Her novices are taught, that bread and wine}
Are but the visible and outward sign, }
Received by those who in communion join; }
But the inward grace, or the thing signified,
His blood and body, who to save us died,[123]
The faithful this thing signified receive:
What is't those faithful then partake or leave?
For, what is signified and understood,
Is, by her own confession, flesh and blood.
Then, by the same acknowledgment, we know
They take the sign, and take the substance too.
The literal sense is hard to flesh and blood,
But nonsense never can be understood.
Her wild belief on every wave is tost;
But sure no church can better morals boast.
True to her king her principles are found;
Oh that her practice were but half so sound![124]
Stedfast in various turns of state she stood,
And sealed her vowed affection with her blood:[125]
Nor will I meanly tax her constancy, }
That interest or obligement made the tye,}
Bound to the fate of murdered monarchy. }
Before the sounding axe so falls the vine,
Whose tender branches round the poplar twine.
She chose her ruin, and resigned her life,
In death undaunted as an Indian wife:
A rare example! but some souls we see
Grow hard, and stiffen with adversity:
Yet these by fortune's favours are undone; }
Resolved,[126] into a baser form they run, }
And bore the wind, but cannot bear the sun.}
Let this be nature's frailty, or her fate,
Or Isgrim's counsel, her new-chosen mate,[127]
Still she's the fairest of the fallen crew;
No mother more indulgent, but the true.
Fierce to her foes, yet fears her force to try,
Because she wants innate authority;
For how can she constrain them to obey,
Who has herself cast off the lawful sway?
Rebellion equals all, and those, who toil
In common theft, will share the common spoil.
Let her produce the title and the right,
Against her old superiors first to fight;
If she reform by text, even that's as plain
For her own rebels to reform again.
As long as words a different sense will bear,
And each may be his own interpreter,
Our airy faith will no foundation find,
The word's a weathercock for every wind:
The bear, the fox, the wolf, by turns prevail;
The most in power supplies the present gale.
The wretched Panther cries aloud for aid
To church and councils, whom she first betrayed;
No help from fathers or tradition's train:
Those ancient guides she taught us to disdain,
And by that scripture, which she once abused
To reformation, stands herself accused.[128]
What bills for breach of laws can she prefer,
Expounding which she owns herself may err?
And, after all her winding ways are tried, }
If doubts arise, she slips herself aside, }
And leaves the private conscience for the guide.}
If, then, that conscience set the offender free,
It bars her claim to church authority.
How can she censure, or what crime pretend,
But scripture may be construed to defend?
Even those, whom for rebellion she transmits
To civil power, her doctrine first acquits;
Because no disobedience can ensue,
Where no submission to a judge is due;
Each judging for himself by her consent,
Whom, thus absolved, she sends to punishment.
Suppose the magistrate revenge her cause,
'Tis only for transgressing human laws.
How answering to its end a church is made,
Whose power is but to counsel and persuade?
O solid rock, on which secure she stands!
Eternal house, not built with mortal hands!
O sure defence against the infernal gate,
A patent during pleasure of the state!
Thus is the Panther neither loved nor feared,
A mere mock queen of a divided herd;
Whom soon by lawful power she might controul,
Herself a part submitted to the whole.
Then, as the moon who first receives the light
By which she makes our nether regions bright,
So might she shine, reflecting from afar
The rays she borrowed from a better star;
Big with the beams which from her mother flow,
And reigning o'er the rising tides below:[129]
Now, mixing with a savage crowd, she goes,
And meanly flatters her inveterate foes;
Ruled while she rules, and losing every hour
Her wretched remnants of precarious power.
One evening, while the cooler shade she sought,
Revolving many a melancholy thought,
Alone she walked, and looked around in vain,
With rueful visage, for her vanished train:
None of her sylvan subjects made their court;
Levées and couchées passed without resort.
So hardly can usurpers manage well
Those, whom they first instructed to rebel:
More liberty begets desire of more;
The hunger still increases with the store.
Without respect, they brushed along the wood, }
Each in his clan, and, filled with loathsome food,}
Asked no permission to the neighbouring flood. }
The Panther, full of inward discontent,
Since they would go, before them wisely went;
Supplying want of power by drinking first,
As if she gave them leave to quench their thirst.
Among the rest, the Hind, with fearful face,
Beheld from far the common watering place,
Nor durst approach; till with an awful roar
The sovereign Lion bade her fear no more.[130]
Encouraged thus, she brought her younglings nigh,
Watching the motions of her patron's eye,
And drank a sober draught; the rest, amazed,
Stood mutely still, and on the stranger gazed;
Surveyed her part by part, and sought to find}
The ten-horned monster in the harmless Hind, }
Such as the Wolf and Panther had designed.[131]}
They thought at first they dreamed; for 'twas offence
With them, to question certitude of sense,
Their guide in faith: but nearer when they drew,}
And had the faultless object full in view, }
Lord, how they all admired her heavenly hue! }
Some, who, before, her fellowship disdained, }
Scarce, and but scarce, from in-born rage restrained,}
Now frisked about her, and old kindred feigned. }
Whether for love or interest, every sect
Of all the savage nation shewed respect.
The viceroy Panther could not awe the herd;
The more the company, the less they feared.
The surly Wolf with secret envy burst, }
Yet could not howl; (the Hind had seen him first;)[132]}
But what he durst not speak, the Panther durst. }
For when the herd, sufficed, did late repair
To ferny heaths, and to their forest lair,
She made a mannerly excuse to stay,
Proffering the Hind to wait her half the way;
That, since the sky was clear, an hour of talk
Might help her to beguile the tedious walk.
With much good-will the motion was embraced,
To chat a while on their adventures passed;
Nor had the grateful Hind so soon forgot
Her friend and fellow-sufferer in the plot.[133]
Yet wondering how of late she grew estranged,
Her forehead cloudy, and her countenance changed,
She thought this hour the occasion would present,
To learn her secret cause of discontent;
Which well she hoped, might be with ease redressed,}
Considering her a well-bred civil beast, }
And more a gentlewoman than the rest. }
After some common talk what rumours ran,
The lady of the spotted muff began.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 95: The Roman Catholic church.]

[Footnote 96: Note I.]

[Footnote 97: The Roman Catholic priests executed in England, at different times since the Reformation, and regarded as martyrs and saints by those of their communion.]

[Footnote 98: The Independents. See Note II.]

[Footnote 99: The Quakers. See Note III.]

[Footnote 100: Free-thinkers. See Note IV.]

[Footnote 101: Anabaptists. See Note V.]

[Footnote 102: Unitarians. See Note VI.]

[Footnote 103: See Introductory remarks.]

[Footnote 104: Note VII.]

[Footnote 105: _Quasi_ By-land-er, an old word for a boat, used in coast navigation.]

[Footnote 106: Note VIII.]

[Footnote 107: Alluding to the classical ordination, which the Presbyterian church has adopted, instead of that by Bishops.]

[Footnote 108: Geneva, the cradle of Calvinism. The territories of the little republic, _dum Troja fuit_, were bounded by its ramparts and lake.]

[Footnote 109: Alluding to the recall of the Edict of Nantz, and persecution of the Huguenots. See Note IX.]

[Footnote 110: Which is usually distinguished by an act of grace, or general pardon.]

[Footnote 111: Nimrod.]

[Footnote 112: Jesus Christ.]

[Footnote 113: King James II.]

[Footnote 114: Note X.]

[Footnote 115: Our author recollected his own Philidel in "King Arthur:"

An airy shape, the tenderest of my kind,
The last seduced and least deformed of hell;
Half-white, and shuffled in the crowd I fell,
Desirous to repent and loath to sin,
Awkward in mischief, piteous of mankind;
My name is Philidel, my lot in air,
Where, next beneath the moon, and nearest heaven,
I soar, I have a glimpse to be received.

Vol. VIII. p. 135.
]

[Footnote 116: Henry the Eighth's passion for Anna Bullen led the way to the Reformation.]

[Footnote 117: The marriage of the clergy, licensed by the Reformation.]

[Footnote 118: Worn out, or become hagard.]

[Footnote 119: A Popish advocate, in the controversy with Tennison, tells us exultingly, "That Martin Luther himself, Dr T's excellent instrument, after he had eat a feasting supper, and drank _lutheranice_, as the German proverb has it, was called into another world at two o'clock in the night, February 18, 1546." This was one of the reasons why his adversaries alleged, that Martin Luther set sail for hell in the manner described by Sterne, in his tale from Slawkenbergius.]

[Footnote 120: The king being owned the head of the church of England, contrary to the doctrine of the other reformed churches.]

[Footnote 121: Phylacteries are little scrolls of parchment worn by the Jews on their foreheads and wrists, inscribed with sentences from the law. They are supposed, as is expressed by the phrase in the original, to have the virtue of preserving the wearer from danger and evil.]

[Footnote 122: The Lutherans adopt the doctrine of consubstantiation; that is to say, they believe, that, though the elements are not changed into the body and blood of Christ by consecration, which is the Roman faith, yet the participants, at the moment of communicating, do actually receive the real body and blood. The Calvinists utterly deny the real presence in the eucharist, and affirm, that the words of Christ were only symbolical. The church of England announces a doctrine somewhat between these. See Note XI.]

[Footnote 123: Note XI.]

[Footnote 124: Note XII.]

[Footnote 125: Alluding to the fate of the church and monarchy of England, which fell together in the great rebellion. See Note XI.]

[Footnote 126: _Resolved_, i.e. dissolved.]

[Footnote 127: The Wolf, or Presbytery.--See note XIII.]

[Footnote 128: Note XIV.]

[Footnote 129: That is, if the church of England would be reconciled to Rome, she should be gratified with a delegated portion of innate authority over the rival sectaries; instead of being obliged to depend upon the civil power for protection.]

[Footnote 130: Alluding to the exercise of the dispensing power, and the Declaration of Indulgence.]

[Footnote 131: The ten-horned monster, in the Revelations, was usually explained by the reformers as typical of the church of Rome.]

[Footnote 132: There was a classical superstition, that, if a wolf saw a man before he saw the wolf, the person lost his voice:

----_voxque Mærin
Jam fugit ipsa: lupi Mærin videre priores._

Dryden has adopted, in the text, the converse of this superstitious belief.]

[Footnote 133: Although the Roman Catholic plot was made the pretence of persecuting the Papists in the first instance, yet the high-flying party of the Church of England were also levelled at, and accused of being Tantivies, Papists in masquerade, &c. &c.]

NOTES

ON

THE HIND AND THE PANTHER.