APPLICATION.
When men in power lose sight of justice and mercy, and cruelly and unjustly tyrannise over the people under their sway, they never will gain sincere reverence or respect from the rest of mankind. The injuries they inflict in the hey-day of their wicked career, will be remembered with detestation through life; and when age and impotence lay hold of them, they must not expect to meet with friends they never deserved; but may be certain of being treated with neglect and contempt, and the baser their enemies are, the more insolent and intolerable will be the affront. It will then be discovered, with bitter remorse, that the days have passed away, in which virtue and dignity ought to have laid the foundation of a reputation which would have been the solace of old age, and also extended a good name to posterity with feelings of veneration; instead of which the remembrance of past crimes will haunt the guilty mind, and the unjust man will at last be thrown into the grave with the common dust, amidst the whispers of “Let him go,” and he will be no more remembered than the animals on which he feasted, or the herbage which was cut down when he was a child.
