Juftice must be from violence exempt,
But fraud 's her only object of contempt.
Fraud in the fox, force in the lion dwells ;
But justice both from human hearts expels ;
But he 's the greatest monster (without doubt)
Who is a wolf within, a fheep without.
Nor only ill injurious actions are,
But evil words and flanders bear their share.
Truth justice loves, and truth injustice fears,
Truth above all things a just man reveres :
Though not by oaths we God to witness call,
He fees and hears, and still remembers all;
And yet our atteftations we may wreft,
Sometimes to make the truth more manifeft;
If by a lye a man preferve his faith,
He pardon, leave, and abfolution hath;
Or if I break my promife, which to thee
Would bring no good, but prejudice to me.
All things committed to thy trust conceal,
Nor what 's forbid by any means reveal.
Exprefs thyfelf in plain, not doubtful words,
That ground for quarrels or disputes affords :
Unless thou find occafion, hold thy tongue ;
Thyfelf or others, careless talk may wrong.
When thou art called into public power,
And when a crowd of fuitors throng thy door,
Be fure no great offenders 'scape their dooms;
Small praise from lenity and remiffness comes:
Crimes pardon'd, others to those crimes invite,
Whilft lookers-on fevere examples fright:
When by a pardon'd murderer blood is spilt,
The judge that pardon'd hath the greatest guilt;
Who accufe rigour, make a grofs mistake,
One criminal pardon'd, may an hundred make;
When justice on offenders is not done,
Law, government, and commerce, are o'erthrown;
As befieg'd traitors with the foe conspire,
T' unlock the gates, and fet the town on fire.
Yet left the punishment th' offence exceed,
Juftice with weight and measure must proceed :
Yet when pronouncing fentence, feem not glad,
Such fpectacles, though they are just, are sad;
Though what thou dost, thou ought'st not to repent,
Yet human bowels cannot but relent :
Rather than all must suffer, fome must die;
Yet nature must condole their misery.
And yet, if many equal guilt involve,
Thou may'ft not these condemn, and thofe abfolve.
Justice, when equal fcales fhe holds, is blind,
Nor cruelty, nor mercy, change her mind;
When fome escape for that which others die,
Mercy to those, to thefe is cruelty.
A fine and flender net the spider weaves,
Which little and light animals receives;
And if the catch a common bee or fly,
They with a piteous groan and murmur die;
But if a wafp or hornet she entrap,
They tear her cords like Sampfon, and escape;
So like a fly the poor offender dies;
But, like the wafp, the rich escapes and flies.
Do not, if one but lightly thee offend,
The punishment beyond the crime extend ;
Or after warning the offence forget;
So God himself our failings doth remit.
Expect not more from fervants than is juft,
Reward them well, if they obferve their truft;
Nor them with cruelty or pride invade,
Since God and nature them our brothers made;
If his offence be great, let that fuffice;
If light, forgive, for no man's always wife.
THE PROGRESS OF LEARNING,
My early Mistress, now my antient Muse,
That ftrong Circæan liquor cease t' infuse,
Wherewith thou didst intoxicate my youth,
Now ftoop with dif-inchanted wings to truth;
As the dove's flight did guide Æneas, now
May thine conduct me to the golden bough;
Tell (like a tall old oak) how learning fhoots
To heaven her branches, and to hell her roots.
THEN God from earth form'd Adam in the east, He his own image on the clay impreft; As fubjects then the whole creation came, And from their natures Adam them did name; Not from experience (for the world was new), He only from their cause their natures knew. Had memory been loft with innocence, We had not known the sentence, nor th' offence; "Twas his chief punishment to keep in store The fad remembrance what he was before; And though th' offending part felt mortal pain, Th' immortal part its knowledge did retain. After the flood, arts to Chaldæa fell, The father of the faithful there did dwell, Who both their parent and instructor was ; From thence did learning into Ægypt pass:
Mofes in all th' Ægyptian arts was skill'd,
When heavenly power that chofen vessel fill'd;
And we to his high inspiration owe,
That what was done before the flood, we know.
From Ægypt, arts their progress made to Greece,
Wrapt in the fable of the golden fleece.
Mufæus first, then Orpheus, civilize
Mankind, and gave the world their deities;
To many gods they taught devotion,
Which were the diftinct faculties of one;
Th' eternal caufe, in their immortal lines,
Was taught, and poets were the first divines :
God Mofes firft, then David did infpire,
To compofe anthems for his heavenly quire;
To th' one the style of friend he did impart,
On th' other stamp the likeness of his heart:
And Mofes, in the old original,
Even God the poet of the world doth call.
Next those old Greeks, Pythagoras did rife,
Then Socrates, whom th' oracle call'd wife;
The divine Plato moral virtue fhews,
Then his difciple Aristotle rose,
Who nature's fecrets to the world did teach,
Yet that great foul our novelifts impeach;
Too much manuring fill'd that field with weeds,
While fects, like locufts, did destroy the feeds;
The tree of knowledge, blafted by disputes,
Produces faplefs leaves inftead of fruits;
Proud Greece all nations elfe barbarians held,
Boafting her learning all the world excell'd.
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