But all are not alike. Thy warning voice Yet make their progeny their dearest care, reach Their offspring, left upon so wild a beach) Το you, then, tenants of life's middle state, Securely plac'd between the small and great, Whose character, yet undebauch'd, retains Two thirds of all the virtue that remains, Who, wise yourselves, desire your sons should learn Your wisdom and your ways-to you See what contempt is fall'n on human kind; See wealth abus'd, and dignities misplac'd, Long lines of ancestry, renown'd of old, ploy Is odious, and their wages all their joy, Civeted fellows, smelt ere they are seen, Else coarse and rude in manners, and their tongue On fire with curses, and with nonsense hung, Now flush'd with drunk'ness, now with whoredom pale, Their breath a sample of last night's regale; See volunteers in all the vilest arts, Men well endow'd, of honourable parts, Design'd by nature wise, but self-made fools; All these, and more like these, were bred at schools! And, if it chance, as sometimes chance it will, That, though school-bred, the boy be virtuous still; Must find a colder soil and bleaker air, And trust for safety to a stranger's care; From constant converse with I know not whom; Who there will court thy friendship, with what views, And, artless as thou art, whom thou wilt choose; Though much depends on what thy choice shall be, Is all chance medley, and unknown to me.Can'st thou, the tear just trembling on thy lids, And while the dreadful risque foreseen forbids; Free, too, and under no constraining force, Unless the sway of custom warp thy course; Lay such a stake upon the losing side, Merely to gratify so blind a guide? Thou can'st not! Nature, pulling at thine heart, Condemns th' unfatherly, th' imprudent part. Thou would'st not, deaf to Nature's tend'rest plea, Turn him adrift upon a rolling sea, Nor say, Go thither, conscious that there lay Then, only govern'd by the self-same rule No-guard him better. Is he not thine own, To compass that good end, forecast the means. If thou desert thy charge, and throw it wide, |