And must ye fall with every ear of grain?
Why would you trouble Bonaparte's reign?
He was your great Triptolemus; his vices [prices;
Destroy'd but realms, and still maintain'd your
He amplified to every lord's content
The grand agrarian alchymy, hight rent.
Why did the tyrant stumble on the Tartars,
And lower wheat to such desponding quarters ?
Why did you chain him on yon isle so lone?
The man was worth much more upon his throne.
True, blood and treasure boundlessly were spilt;
But what of that? the Gaul may bear the guilt;
But bread was high, the farmer paid his way,
And acres told upon the appointed day.
But where is now the goodly audit ale?
The purseproud tenant, never known to fail?
The farm which never yet was left on hand?
The marsh reclaim'd to most improving land?
The impatient hope of the expiring lease?
The doubling rental? What an evil's peace!
In vain the prize excites the ploughman's skill,
In vain the Commons pass their patriot bill;
The landed interest-(you may understand
The phrase much better leaving out the land) —
The land self-interest groans from shore to shore,
For fear that plenty should attain the poor.
Up, up again, ye rents! exalt your notes, !
Or else the ministry will lose their votes,
And patriotism, so delicately nice,

Her loaves will lower to the market price;
For ah!"the loaves and fishes," once so high,
Are gone their oven closed, their ocean dry,
And nought remains of all the millions spent,
Excepting to grow moderate and content.
They who are not so, had their turn-and turn
About still flows from Fortune's equal urn;
Now let their virtue be its own reward,

Lo, Mother Church, while all religion writhes,
Like Niobe, weeps o'er her offspring, Tithes;
The prelates go to-where the saints have gone,
And proud pluralities subside to one;
Church, state, and faction wrestle in the dark,
Toss'd by the deluge in their common ark.
Shorn of her bishops, banks, and dividends,
Another Babel soars-but Britain ends.
And why? to pamper the self-seeking wants,
And prop the hill of these agrarian ants.
"Go to these ants, thou sluggard, and be wise;
Admire their patience through each sacrifice,
Till taught to feel the lesson of their pride,
The price of taxes and of homicide;
Admire their justice, which would fain deny
The debt of nations:-pray who made it high?

XV.

Or turn to sail between those shifting rocks,
The new Symplegades-the crushing Stocks,
Where Midas might again his wish behold
In real paper or imagined gold.
That magic palace of Alcina shows
More wealth than Britain ever had to lose,
Were all her atoms of unleaven'd ore,
And all her pebbles from Pactolus' shore.
There Fortune plays, while Rumor holds the stake,
And the world trembles to bid brokers break.
How rich is Britain! not indeed in mines,
Or peace or plenty, corn or oil, or wines;
No land of Canaan, full of milk and honey,
Nor (save in paper shekels) ready money:
But let us not to own the truth refuse,
Was ever Christian Jand so rich in Jews?
Those parted with their teeth to good King John,
And now, ye kings! they kindly draw your own;
All states, all things, all sovereigns they control,

And share the blessing which themselves prepared. And waft a loan "from Indus to the pole."

See these inglorious Cincinnati swarm,
Farmers of war, dictators of the farm;

Their ploughshare was the sword in hireling hands,
Their fields manured by gore of other lands;
Safe in their barns, these Sabine tillers sent
Their brethren out to battle-why? for rent!
Year after year they voted cent. per cent.,

Blood, sweat, and tear-wrung millions-why? for

rent!

They roar'd, they dined, they drank, they swore
they meant

To die for England-why then live? for rent!
The peace has made one general malecontent
Of these high-market patriots; war was rent!
Their love of country, millions all misspent,
How reconcile? by reconciling rent!
And will they not repay the treasures lent?
No: down with every thing, and up with rent!
Their good, ill, health, wealth, joy, or discontent,
Being, end, aim, religion-rent, rent, rent!
Thou sold'st thy birthright, Esau! for a mess;
Thou should'st have gotten more, or eaten less;
Now thou hast swill'd thy pottage, thy demands
Are idle; Israel says the bargain stands.
Such, landlords! was your appetite for war,
And, gorged with blood, you grumble at a scar!
What! would they spread their earthquake even

o'er cash?

And when land crumbles, bid firm paper crash?
So rent may rise, bid bank and nation fall,
And found on 'Change a Fundling Hospital?

The banker-broker-baron-brethren, speed
Nor these alone: Columbia feels no less
To aid these bankrupt tyrants in their need.
Fresh speculations follow each success;
And philanthropic Israel deigns to drain
Her mild percentage from exhausted Spain.
Not without Abraham's seed can Russia march;

Tis gold, not steel, that rears the conqueror's arch.

Two Jews, a chosen people, can command

In
every realm their scripture-promised land:--
Two Jews keep down the Romans, and uphold
The accursed Hun, more brutal than of old ·
Two Jews-but not Samaritan's-direct
The world, with all the spirit of their sect.
What is the happiness of earth to them?
A congress forms their "New Jerusalem,"
Where baronies and orders both invite-
Oh, holy Abraham! dost thou see the sight?
Thy followers mingling with these royal swine,
Who spit not "on their Jewish gaberdine,"
But honor them as portion of the show-
(Where now, oh pope! is thy forsaken toe?

Could it not favor Judah with some kicks?
Or has it ceased to "kick against the pricks?"
On Shylock's shore behold them stand afresh,
To cut from nations' hearts their "pound of flesh.'

XVI.

Strange sight this Congress! destined to unite
All that's incongruous, all that's opposite.

THE VISION OF JUDGMENT.

BY QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS.

SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO ENTITLED BY THE AUTHOR OF "WAT TYLER.'

"A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word."

PREFACE.

Ir Aath been wisely said, that "One fool makes many;" and it hath been poetically observed,

"That fools rush in where angels fear to tread."-Pope.

3dly. Was he not entitled by William Smith, in full parliament, "a rancorous renegado?" 4thly. Is he not poet laureate, with his own lines on Martin the regicide staring him in the face?

And 5thly. Putting the four preceding items together, with what conscience dare he call the attention of the laws to the publication of others, be they what they may?

If Mr. Southey had not rushed in where he had no business, and where he never was before, and never will be again, the following poem would not I say nothing of the cowardice of such a proceedhave been written. It is not impossible that it may ing; its meanness speaks for itself; but I wish to be as good as his own, seeing that it cannot, by any touch upon the motive, which is neither more nor species of stupidity, natural or acquired, be worse. less than that Mr. S. has been laughed at a little in The gross flattery, the dull impudence, the renegado some recent publications, as he was of yore in the intolerance, and impious cant of the poem by the" Anti-jacobin" by his present patrons. Hence all author of Wat Tyler, are something so stupendous this "skimble-scamble stuff” about “Satanic,” and as to form the sublime of himself-containing the so forth. However, it is worthy of him—“ Qualis quintessence of his own attributes. ab incepto." If there is any thing obnoxious to the political

So much for his poem-a word on his preface. In

this preface it has pleased the magnanimous laureate opinions of a portion of the public in the following to draw the picture of a supposed "Satanic School," poem, they may thank Mr. Southey. He might the which he doth recommend to the notice of the have written hexameters, as he has written every legislature; thereby adding to his other laurels the thing else, for aught that the writer cared-had ambition of those of an informer. If there exists any they been upon another subject. But to attempt to where, excepting in his imagination, such a school, canonize a monarch, who, whatever were his houseis he not sufficiently armed against it by his own hold virtues, was neither a successful nor a patriot intense vanity? The truth is, that there are certain king-inasmuch as several years of his reign passed writers whom Mr. S. imagines, like Scrub, to have in war with America and Ireland, to say nothing of "talked of him; for they laughed consumedly." the aggressions upon France,-like all other exag

I think I know enough of most of the writers to geration, necessarily begets opposition. In whatwhom he is supposed to allude, to assert, that they, ever manner he may be spoken of in this new in their individual capacities, have done more good "Vision," his public career will not be more favorin the charities of life to their fellow-creatures in ably transmitted by history. Of his private virtues any one year, than Mr. Southey has done harm to (although a little expensive to the nation) there can himself by his absurdities in his whole life; and be no doubt. this is saying a great deal. But I have a few questions to ask.

1stly. Is Mr. Southey the author of Wat Tyler? 2dly. Was he not refused a remedy at law by the highest judge of his beloved England, because it was a blasphemous and seditious publication?

With regard to the supernatural personages treated of, I can only say, that I know as much about them, and (as an honest man) have a better right to talk of them than Robert Southey. I have also treated them more tolerantly. The way in which that poor insane creature, the laureate, deals about

is judgment in the next world, is like his own

I.

udgment in this. If it was not completely ludi- SAINT PETER sat by the celestial gate;
erous, it would be something worse I don't think
that there is much more to say at present.

QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS.

His keys were rusty, and the lock was dull,
So little trouble had been given of late;
Not that the place by any means was full,
But since the Gallic era "eighty-eight"、
The devils had ta'en a longer, stronger pull,
And "a pull altogether," as they say

P. S.-It is possible that some readers may object, in these objectionable times, to the freedom with which saints, angels, and spiritual persons discourse At sea-which drew most souls another way. in this "Vision." But for precedents upon such points I must refer him to Fielding's

Journey

II.

from this World to the Next," and to the Visions The angels all were singing out of tune,
of myself, the said Quevedo, in Spanish or trans- And hoarse with having little else to do,
lated. The reader is also requested to observe, Excepting to wind up the sun and moon,
that no doctrinal tenets are insisted upon or dis-
Or curb a runaway young star or two,

cussed; that the person of the Deity is carefully Or wild colt of a comet, which too soon
withheld from sight, which is more than can be said Broke out of bounds o'er the ethereal blue,
for the laureate, who hath thought proper to make Splitting some planet with its playful tail,
him talk, not "like a school divine," but like the As boats are sometimes by a wanton whale.
unscholarlike Mr. Southey. The whole action,
passes on the outside of heaven; and Chaucer's
Wife of Bath, Pulci's Morgante Maggiore, Swift's

Tale of a Tub, and the other works above referred
to, are cases in point of the freedom with which
saints, &c., may be permitted to converse in works
not intended to be serious.
Q. R.

Mr. Southey, being, as he says, a good

Christian and vindictive, threatens, I understand, a reply to this our answer. It is to be hoped that his visionary faculties will in the meantime have acquired a little more judgment, properly so called: otherwise he will get himself into new dilemmas. These apostate jacobins furnish rich rejoinders. Let him take a specimen. Mr. Southey laudeth grievously "one Mr. Landor," who cultivates much private renown in the shape of Latin verses; and not long ago, the poet laureate dedicated to him, it appeareth, one of his fugitive lyrics, upon the strength of a poem called Gebir. Who could suppose that in this same Gebir the aforesaid Savage Landor (for such is his grim cognomen) putteth into the infernal regions no less a person than the hero of his friend Mr. Southey's heaven,-yea, even George the Third! See also how personal Savage becometh, when he hath a mind. The following is his portrait of our late gracious sovereign:

(Prince Gebir having descended into the infernal regions, the shades
of his royal ancestors are, at his request, called up to his view, and
he exclaims to his ghostly guide)-

"Aroar, what wretch that nearest us? what wretch
Is that with eyebrows white and slanting brow?
Listen! him yonder, who, bound down supine,
Shrinks yelling from that sword there, engine-hung.
He too among my ancestors! I hate
The despot, but the dastard I despise.
Was he our countryman?"

"Alas, O king!

Iberia bore him, but the breed accurat
Inclement winds blew blighting from northeast."
"He was a warrior then, nor fear'd the gods?"
Gebir, he fear'd the demons, not the gods,
Though them indeed his daily face adored;
And was no warrior, yet the thousand lives
Squander'd, as stones to exercise a sling,
And the tame cruelty and cold caprice-

Oh madness of mankind ! address'd, adored!"-Gebir, p. 28.

I omit noticing some edifying Ithyphallics of

III.

The guardian seraphs had retired on higa,
Finding their charges past all care below;
Terrestrial business fill'd nought in the sky
Save the recording angel's black bureau;
Who found, indeed, the facts to multiply
With such rapidity of vice and wo,
And yet was in arrear of human ills.
That he had stripp'd off both his wings in quills,

IV.

His business so augmented of late years,

That he was forced, against his will, no doubt,
(Just like those cherubs, earthly ministers,)
And claim the help of his celestial peers,
For some resource to turn himself about,

To aid him ere he should be quite worn out
By the increased demand for his remarks:
Six angels and twelve saints were named his clerks.

V.

This was a handsome board-at least for heaven,

And yet they had even then enough to do,
So many conquerors' cars were daily driven,

So many kingdoms fitted up anew;
Each day too slew its thousands six or seven,
Till at the crowning carnage, Waterloo,
They threw their pens down in divine disgust-
The page was so besmear'd with blood and dust.

VI.

This by the way; 'tis not mine to record

What angels shrink from: even the very devil
On this occasion his own work abhorr'd,
So surfeited with the infernal revel;
Though he himself had sharpen'd every sword,
It almost quench'd his innate thirst of evil.
(Here Satan's sole good work deserves insertion-
Tis, that he hath both generals in reversion.)

VII.

Let's skip a few short years of hollow peace,
Which peopled earth no better, hell as wont,
And heaven none-they form'd the tyrant's lease,
With nothing but new names subscrib'd upon't;

Savagius, wishing to keep the proper veil over 'Twill one day finish: meantime they increase,

them, if his grave but somewhat indiscreet worshipper will suffer it; but certainly these teachers of "great moral lessons are apt to be found in strange company.

"With seven heads and ten horns," and all in

front,

Like Saint John's foretold beast; but ours are born
Less formidable in the head than horn.