Then, if good-nature shows some slender proof,
They never think they have reward enough,
But, like our modern Quakers of the town,
Expect your manners, and return you none.
Friendship, th’ abstracted union of the mind,
Which all men seek, but very few can find:
Of all the nations in the universe,
None talk on’t more, or understand it less;
For if it does their property annoy,
Their property their friendship will destroy.
As you discourse them, you shall hear them tell
All things in which they think they do excel.
No panegyric needs their praise record;
An Englishman ne’er wants his own good word.
His long discourses generally appear
Prologued with his own wond’rous character.
But first to illustrate his own good name,
He never fails his neighbour to defame;
And yet he really designs no wrong—
His malice goes no further than his tongue.
But pleased to tattle, he delights to rail,
To satisfy the lech’ry of a tale.
His own dear praises close the ample speech;
Tells you how wise he is—that is, how rich:
For wealth is wisdom; he that’s rich is wise;
And all men learned poverty despise.
His generosity comes next, and then
Concludes that he’s a true-born Englishman;
And they, ’tis known, are generous and free,
Forgetting and forgiving injury:
Which may be true, thus rightly understood,
Forgiving ill turns, and forgetting good.
Cheerful in labour when they’ve undertook it,
But out of humour when they’re out of pocket.
But if their belly and their pocket’s full,
They may be phlegmatic, but never dull:
And if a bottle does their brains refine,
It makes their wit as sparkling as their wine.
As for the general vices which we find
They’re guilty of, in common with mankind,
Satire, forbear, and silently endure;
We must conceal the crimes we cannot cure.
Nor shall my verse the brighter sex defame,
For English beauty will preserve her name,
Beyond dispute, agreeable and fair,
And modester than other nations are:
For where the vice prevails, the great temptation
Is want of money more than inclination.
In general, this only is allowed,
They’re something noisy, and a little proud.
An Englishman is gentlest in command,
Obedience is a stranger in the land:
Hardly subjected to the magistrate,
For Englishmen do all subjection hate;
Humblest when rich, but peevish when they’re poor,
And think, what e’er they have, they merit more.
The meanest English ploughman studies law,
And keeps thereby the magistrates in awe;
Will boldly tell them what they have to do,
And sometimes punish their omissions too.
Their liberty and property’s so dear,
They scorn their laws or governors to fear:
So bugbeared with the name of slavery,
They can’t submit to their own liberty.
Restraint from ill is freedom to the wise;
But Englishmen do all restraint despise.
Slaves to their liquor, drudges to the pots,
The mob are statesmen and their statesmen sots.
Their governors they count such dangerous things,
That ’tis their custom to affront their kings:
So jealous of the power their kings possest,
They suffer neither power nor king to rest.
The bad with force they easily subdue:
The good with constant clamours they pursue;
And did King Jesus reign, they’d murmur too.
A discontented nation, and by far
Harder to rule in times of peace than war:
Easily set together by the ears,
And full of causeless jealousies and fears:
Apt to revolt, and willing to rebel,
And never are contented when they’re well.
No Government could ever please them long,
Could tie their hands, or rectify their tongue:
In this to ancient Israel well compared,
Eternal murmurs are among them heard.
It was but lately that they were oppressed,
Their rights invaded, and their laws suppressed:
When nicely tender of their liberty,
Lord! what a noise they made of slavery.
In daily tumult showed their discontent,
Lampooned the King, and mocked his Government.
And if in arms they did not first appear,
’Twas want of force, and not for want of fear.
In humbler tone than English used to do,
At foreign hands for foreign aid they sue.