If ever I’ve a son, I promise him

He shall find me an easy father; fit

To know, and apt to pardon his offenses!

Not such as mine, who, speaking of another,

Shows how he’d act in such a case himself:

Yet when he takes a cup or two too much,

Oh, what mad pranks he tells me of his own:

But warns me now “to draw from others’ faults

A profitable lesson for myself.”

Cunning old gentleman! he little knows,