The Demagogue

Bold is the attempt, in these licentious times,When with such towering strides sedition climbs,With sense or satire to confront her power,And charge her in the great decisive hour.Bold is the man, who, on her conquering day,Stands in the pass of fate to bar her way:Whose heart, by frowning arrogance unawed,Or the deep-lurking snares of specious fraud,The threats of giant-faction can deride,And stem with stubborn arm her roaring tide.For him unnumber'd brooding ills await,Scorn, malice, insolence, reproach, and hate:At him, who dares this legion to defy,A thousand mortal shafts in secret fly:Revenge, exulting with malignant joy,Pursues the incautious victim to destroy:And slander strives, with unrelenting aim,To spit her blasting venom on his name:Around him faction's harpies flap their wings,And rhyming vermin dart their feeble stings:In vain the wretch retreats, while in full cryFierce on his throat the hungry bloodhounds fly.Enclosed with perils, thus the conscious Muse,Alarm'd, though undismay'd, her danger views.Nor shall unmanly Terror now controlThe strong resentment struggling in her soul.While Indignation, with resistless strain,Pours her full deluge through each swelling vein;By the vile fear that chills the coward breast,By sordid caution is her voice suppress'd.While Arrogance, with big theatric rage,Audacious struts on power's imperial stage;While o'er our country, at her dread command,Black Discord, screaming, shakes her fatal brand;While, in defiance of maternal laws,The sacrilegious sword rebellion draws:Shall she at this important hour retire,And quench in Lethe's wave her genuine fire?Honour forbid! she fears no threat'ning foe,When conscious justice bids her bosom glow:And while she kindles the reluctant flame,Let not the prudent voice of friendship blame!She feels the sting of keen resentment goad,Though guiltless yet of satire's thorny road.Let other Quixotes, frantic with renown,Plant on their brows a tawdry paper crown!While fools adore, and vassal-bards obey,Let the great monarch ass through Gotham bray!Our poet brandishes no mimic sword,To rule a realm of dunces self-explored;No bleeding victims curse his iron sway;Nor murder'd reputation marks his way.True to herself, unarm'd, the fearless MuseThrough reason's path her steady course pursues:True to herself advances, undeterr'dBy the rude clamours of the savage herd.As some bold surgeon, with inserted steel,Probes deep the putrid sore, intent to heal;So the rank ulcers that our patriot load,Shall she with caustic's healing fires corrode.Yet ere from patient slumber satire wakes,And brandishes the avenging scourge of snakes;Yet ere her eyes, with lightning's vivid ray,The dark recesses of his heart display;Let candour own the undaunted pilot's power,Felt in severest danger's trying hour!Let truth consenting, with the trump of fame,His glory, in auspicious strains, proclaim!He bade the tempest of the battle roar,That thunder'd o'er the deep from shore to shore.How oft, amid the horrors of the war,Chain'd to the bloody wheels of danger's car,How oft my bosom at thy name has glow'd,And from my beating heart applause bestow'd;Applause, that, genuine as the blush of youthUnknown to guile, was sanctified by truth!How oft I blest the patriot's honest rage,That greatly dared to lash the guilty age;That, rapt with zeal, pathetic, bold, and strong,Roll'd the full tide of eloquence along;That power's big torrent braved with manly pride,And all corruption's venal arts defied!When from afar those penetrating eyesBeheld each secret hostile scheme arise;Watch'd every motion of the faithless foe,Each plot o'erturned, and baffled every blow:A fond enthusiast, kindling at thy name,I glow'd in secret with congenial flame;While my young bosom, to deceit unknown,Believed all real virtue thine alone.Such then he seem'd, and such indeed might be,If truth with error ever could agree!Sure satire never with a fairer handPortray'd the object she design'd to brand.Alas! that virtue should so soon decay,And faction's wild applause thy heart betray!The Muse with secret sympathy relents,And human failings, as a friend, laments:But when those dangerous errors, big with fate,Spread discord and distraction through the state,Reason should then exert her utmost powerTo guard our passions in that fatal hour.There was a time, ere yet his conscious heartDurst from the hardy path of truth depart;While yet with generous sentiment it glow'd,A stranger to corruption's slippery road;There was a time our patriot durst avowThose honest maxims he despises now.How did he then his country's wounds bewail,And at the insatiate German vulture rail!Whose cruel talons Albion's entrails tore,Whose hungry maw was glutted with her gore!The mists of error, that in darkness heldOur reason, like the sun, his voice dispell'd.And lo! exhausted, with no power to save,We view Britannia panting on the wave:Hung round her neck, a millstone's pond'rous weightDrags down the struggling victim to her fate!While horror at the thought our bosom feels,We bless the man this horror who reveals.But what alarming thoughts the heart amaze,When on this Janus' other face we gaze!For, lo, possess'd of power's imperial reins,Our chief those visionary ills disdains!Alas, how soon the steady patriot turns!In vain this change astonish'd England mourns!Her vital blood, that pour'd from every vein,So late, to fill the accursed Westphalian drain,Then ceased to flow; the vulture now no moreWith unrelenting rage her bowels tore.His magic rod transforms the bird of prey!The millstone feels the touch, and melts away!And, strange to tell, still stranger to believe,What eyes ne'er saw, and heart could ne'er conceive,At once, transplanted by the sorcerer's wand,Columbian hills in distant Austria stand!America, with pangs before unknown,Now with Westphalia utters groan for groan:By sympathy she fevers with her fires,Burns as she burns, and as she dies expires.From maxims long adopted thus he flew,For ever changing, yet for ever true:Swoln with success, and with applause imflamed,He scorn'd all caution, all advice disclaim'd:Arm'd with war's thunder, he embraced no moreThose patriot principles maintain'd before.Perverse, inconstant, obstinate, and proud,Drunk with ambition, turbulent and loud,He wrecks us headlong on that dreadful strandHe once devoted all his powers to brand!Our hapless country views with weeping eyes,On every side, o'erwhelming horrors rise;Drain'd of her wealth, exhausted of her power,And agonized as in the mortal hour;Her armies, wasted with incessant toils,Or doom'd to perish in contagious soils,To guard some needy royal plunderer's throne,And sent to fall in battles not their own.The enormous debt at home, though long o'ercharged,With grievous burdens annually enlarged:Crush'd with increasing taxes to the ground,That suck, like vampires, every bleeding wound:Ground with severe distress the industrious poorDriven by the ruthless landlord to the door.While thus our land her hapless fate bemoansIn secret, and with inward sorrow groans;Though deck'd with tinsel trophies of renown,All gash'd with sores, with anguish bending down;Can yet some impious parricide appear,Who strives to make this anguish more severe?Can one exist, so much his country's foe,To bid her wounds with fresh effusion flow?There can; to him in vain she lifts her eyes,His soul relentless hears her piercing sighs!Shameless of front, impatient of control,He spurs her onward to destruction's goal!Nor yet content on curst Westphalia's shoreWith mad profusion to exhaust her store,Still peace his pompous fulminations brand,As pirates tremble at the sight of land:Still to new wars the public eye he turns,Defies all peril, and at reason spurns;Till press'd with danger, by distress assail'd,That baffled courage, and o'er skill prevail'd;Till foundering in the storm himself had brew'd,He strives at last its horrors to elude.Some wretched shift must still protect his name,And to the guiltless head transfer his shame:Then hearing modest diffidence opposeHis rash advice, that golden time he chose;And while big surges threaten'd to o'erwhelmThe ship, ingloriously forsook the helm.But all the events collected to relate,Let us his actions recapitulate.He first assumed, by mean perfidious art,Those patriot tenets foreign to his heart:Next, by his country's fond applauses swell'd,Thrust himself forward into power, and heldThe reins on principles which he alone,Grown drunk and wanton with success, could own;Betray'd her interest and abused her trust;Then, deaf to prayers, forsook her in disgust;With tragic mummery, and most vile grimace,Rode through the city with a woful face,As in distress, a patriot out of place!Insults his generous prince, and in the dayOf trouble skulks, because he cannot sway!In foreign climes embroils him with allies,And bids at home the flames of discord rise!She comes! from hell the exulting fury springs,With grim destruction sailing on her wings!Around her scream a hundred harpies fell!A hundred demons shriek with hideous yell!From where, in mortal venom dipt on high,Full-drawn the deadliest shafts of satire fly;Where Churchill brandishes his clumsy club,And Wilkes unloads his excremental tub,Down to where Entick, awkward and unclean,Crawls on his native dust, a worm obscene!While with unnumber'd wings from van to rearMyriads of nameless buzzing drones appear:From their dark cells the angry insects swarm,And every little sting attempt to arm.Here Chaplains, Privileges, moulder round,And feeble Scourges, rot upon the ground:Here hungry Kenrick strives, with fruitless aim,With Grub-street slander to extend his name:At Bruin flies the slavering, snarling cur,But only fills his famish'd jaws with fur.Here Baldwin spreads the assassinating cloak,Where lurking rancour gives the secret stroke;While gorged with filth, around this senseless block,A swarm of spider-bards obsequious flock:While his demure Welch goat, with lifted hoof,In Poet's corner hangs each flimsy woof;And frisky grown, attempts, with awkward prance,On wit's gay theatre to bleat and dance.Here, seized with iliac passion, mouthing Leech,Too low, alas! for satire's whip to reach,From his black entrails, faction's common sewer,Disgorges all her excremental store.With equal pity and regret the MuseThe thundering storms that rage around her views;Impartial views the tides of discord blend,Where lordly rogues for power and place contend;Were not her patriot-heart with anguish torn,Would eye the opposing chiefs with equal scorn.Let freedom's deadliest foes for freedom bawl,Alike to her who govern or who fall!Aloof she stands, all unconcern'd and mute,While the rude rabble bellow, "Down with Bute!"While villany the scourge of justice bilks,Howl on, ye ruffians! "Liberty and Wilkes."Let some soft mummy of a peer, who stainsHis rank, some sodden lump of ass's brains,To that abandon'd wretch his sanction give;Support his slander, and his wants relieve!Let the great hydra roar aloud for Pitt,And power and wisdom all to him submit!Let proud ambition's sons, with hearts severe,Like parricides, their mother's bowels tear!Sedition her triumphant flag display,And in embodied ranks her troops array!While coward justice, trembling on her seat,Like a vile slave descends to lick her feet!Nor here let censure draw her awful blade,If from her theme the wayward Muse has stray'd!Sometimes the impetuous torrent, o'er its moundsRedundant bursting, swamps the adjacent grounds;But rapid, and impatient of delay,Through the deep channel still pursues its way.Our pilot now retired, no pleasure knows,But every man and measure to oppose;Like Æsop's cur, still snarling and perverse,Bloated with envy, to mankind a curse,No more at council his advice will lend,But with all others who advise contend:He bids distraction o'er his country blaze,Then, swelter'd with revenge, retreats to Hayes:Swallows the pension; but, aware of blame,Transfers the proffer'd peerage to his dame.The felon thus of old, his name to save,His pilfer'd mutton to a brother gave.But should some frantic wretch whom all men knowTo nature and humanity a foe,Deaf to the widow's moan and orphan's cry,And dead to shame and friendship's social tie;Should such a miscreant, at the hour of death,To thee his fortunes and domains bequeath;With cruel rancour wresting from his heirsWhat nature taught them to expect as theirs;Wouldst thou with this detested robber join,Their legal wealth to plunder and purloin?Forbid it, Heaven! thou canst not be so base,To blast thy name with infamous disgrace!The Muse who wakes, yet triumphs o'er thy hate,Dares not so black a thought anticipate:By Heaven, the Muse her ignorance betrays;For while a thousand eyes with wonder gaze,Though gorged and glutted with his country's store,The vulture pounces on the shining ore;In his strong talons gripes the golden prey,And from the weeping orphan bears away.The great, the alarming deed is yet to come,That, big with fate, strikes expectation dumb.Oh, patient, injured England, yet unveilThy eyes, and listen to the Muse's tale,That true as honour, unadorn'd with art,Thy wrongs in fair succession shall impart!Ere yet the desolating god of warHad crush'd pale Europe with his iron car,Had shook her shores with terrible alarms,And thunder'd o'er the trembling deep, "To arms!"In climes remote, beyond the setting sun,Beyond the Atlantic wave, his rage begun.Alas! poor country, how with pangs unknownTo Britain did thy filial bosom groan!What savage armies did thy realms invade,Unarm'd, and distant from maternal aid!Thy cottages with cruel flames consumed,And the sad owner to destruction doom'd;Mangled with wounds, with pungent anguish torn,Or left to perish naked and forlorn!What carnage reek'd upon thy ruin'd plain!What infants bled! what virgins shriek'd in vain!In every look distraction seem'd to glare,Each heart was rack'd with horror and despair.To Albion then, with groans and piercing cries,America lift up her dying eyes;To generous Albion pour'd forth all her pain,To whom the wretched never wept in vain.She heard, and instant to relieve her flew,Her arm the gleaming sword of vengeance drew;Far o'er the ocean wave her voice was known,That shook the deep abyss from zone to zone:She bade the thunder of the battle glow,And pour'd the storm of lightning on the foe;Nor ceased till, crown'd with victory complete,Pale Spain and France lay trembling at her feet.Her fears dispell'd, and all her foes removed,Her fertile grounds industriously improved,Her towns with trade, with fleets her harbours crown'd,And plenty smiling on her plains around:Thus blest with all that commerce could supply,America regards with jealous eye,And canker'd heart, the parent, who so lateHad snatch'd her gasping from the jaws of fate;Who now, with wars for her begun, relax'd,With grievous aggravated burthens tax'd,Her treasures wasted by a hungry broodOf cormorants, that suck her vital blood;Who now of her demands that tribute due,For whom alone the avenging sword she drew.Scarce had America the just requestReceived, when, kindling in her faithless breast,Resentment glows, enraged sedition burns,And, lo! the mandate of our laws she spurns!Her secret hate, incapable of shameOr gratitude, incenses to a flame,Derides our power, bids insurrection rise,Insults our honour, and our laws defies;O'er all her coasts is heard the audacious roar,"England shall rule America no more!"Soon as on Britain's shore the alarm was heard,Stern indignation in her look appear'd;Yet, both to punish, she her scourge withheldFrom her perfidious sons who thus rebell'd;Now stung with anguish, now with rage assail'd,Till pity in her soul at last prevail'd,Determined not to draw her penal steelTill fair persuasion made her last appeal.And now the great decisive hour drew nigh,She on her darling patriot cast her eye;His voice like thunder will support her cause,Enforce her dictates, and sustain her laws;Rich with her spoils, his sanction will dismay,And bid the insurgents tremble and obey.He comes!--but where, the amazing theme to hit,Discover language or ideas fit?Splay-footed words, that hector, bounce, and swagger,The sense to puzzle, and the brain to stagger?Our patriot comes! with frenzy fired, the MuseWith allegoric eye his figure views!Like the grim portress of hell-gate he stands,Bellona's scourge hangs trembling in his hands!Around him, fiercer than the ravenous shark,"A cry of hell-hounds' never-ceasing bark;"And lo! the enormous giant to bedeck,A golden millstone hangs upon his neck!On him ambition's vulture darts her claws,And with voracious rage his liver gnaws.Our patriot comes!--the buckles of whose shoesNot Cromwell's self was worthy to unloose.Repeat his name in thunder to the skies!Ye hills fall prostrate, and ye vales arise!Through faction's wilderness prepare the way!Prepare, ye listening senates, to obey!The idol of the mob, behold him stand,The Alpha and Omega of the land!Methinks I hear the bellowing demagogueDumb-sounding declamations disembogue,Expressions of immeasurable length,Where pompous jargon fills the place of strength;Where fulminating, rumbling eloquence,With loud theatric rage, bombards the sense;And words, deep rank'd in horrible array,Exasperated metaphors convey!With these auxiliaries, drawn up at large,He bids enraged sedition beat the charge:From England's sanguine hope his aid withdraws,And lists to guide in insurrection's cause.And lo! where, in her sacrilegious hand,The parricide lifts high her burning brand!Go, while she yet suspends her impious aim,With those infernal lungs arouse the flame!Though England merits not her least regard,Thy friendly voice gold boxes shall reward!Arise, embark! prepare thy martial car,To lead her armies and provoke the war!Rebellion wakes, impatient of delay,The signal her black ensigns to display.To thee, whose soul, all steadfast and serene,Beholds the tumults that distract our scene;And, in the calmer seats of wisdom placed,Enjoys the sweets of sentiment and taste:To thee, O Marius! whom no factions sway,The impartial Muse devotes her honest lay!In her fond breast no prostituted aim,Nor venal hope, assumes fair friendship's name:Sooner shall Churchill's feeble meteor-ray,That led our foundering demagogue astray,Darkling to grope and flounce in Error's night,Eclipse great Mansfield's strong meridian light,Than shall the change of fortune, time, or place,Thy generous friendship in my heart efface!Oh! whether wandering from thy country far,And plunged amid the murdering scenes of war;Or in the blest retreat of virtue laid,Where contemplation spreads her awful shade;If ever to forget thee I have power,May Heaven desert me at my latest hour!Still satire bids my bosom beat to arms,And throb with irresistible alarms.Like some full river charged with falling showers,Still o'er my breast her swelling deluge pours.But rest and silence now, who wait beside,With their strong flood-gates bar the impetuous tide.