FullReads

What else? no part I take in party fray,
With troops from Billingsgate’s slang-whanging tartars,
I fear no Pope–and let great Ernest play
At Fox and Goose with Foxs’ Martyrs!
I own I laugh at over-righteous men,
I own I shake my sides at ranters,
And treat sham-Abr’am saints with wicked banters,
I even own, that there are times–but then
It’s when I’ve got my wine–I say d—-canters!

I’ve no ambition to enact the spy
On fellow souls, a Spiritual Pry–
‘Tis said that people ought to guard their noses,
Who thrust them into matters none of theirs;
And tho’ no delicacy discomposes
Your Saint, yet I consider faith and pray’rs
Amongst the privatest of men’s affairs.

I do not hash the Gospel in my books,
And thus upon the public mind intrude it,
As if I thought, like Otaheitan cooks,
No food was fit to eat till I had chewed it.

On Bible stilts I don’t affect to stalk;
Nor lard with Scripture my familiar talk,–
For man may pious texts repeat,
And yet religion have no inward seat;
‘Tis not so plain as the old Hill of Howth,
A man has got his belly full of meat
Because he talks with victuals in his mouth!

Mere verbiage,–it is not worth a carrot!
Why, Socrates–or Plato–where’s the odds?–
Once taught a jay to supplicate the Gods,
And made a Polly-theist of a Parrot!

A mere professor, spite of all his cant, is
Not a whit better than a Mantis,–
An insect, of what clime I can’t determine,
That lifts its paws most parson-like, and thence,
By simple savages–thro’ sheer pretence–
Is reckon’d quite a saint amongst the vermin.
But where’s the reverence, or where the nous,
To ride on one’s religion thro’ the lobby,
Whether a stalking-horse or hobby,
To show its pious paces to “the house”?

I honestly confess that I would hinder
The Scottish member’s legislative rigs,
That spiritual Pinder,
Who looks on erring souls as straying pigs,
That must be lash’d by law, wherever found,
And driv’n to church, as to the parish pound.
I do confess, without reserve or wheedle,
I view that grovelling idea as one
Worthy some parish clerk’s ambitious son,
A charity-boy, who longs to be a beadle.

On such a vital topic sure ’tis odd
How much a man can differ from his neighbor:
One wishes worship freely giv’n to God,
Another wants to make it statute-labor–
The broad distinction in a line to draw,
As means to lead us to the skies above,
You say–Sir Andrew and his love of law,
And I–the Saviour with his law of love.

Spontaneously to God should tend the soul,
Like the magnetic needle to the Pole;
But what were that intrinsic virtue worth,
Suppose some fellow, with more zeal than knowledge,
Fresh from St. Andrew’s College,
Should nail the conscious needle to the north?

I do confess that I abhor and shrink
From schemes, with a religious willy-nilly,
That frown upon St. Giles’s sins, but blink
The peccadilloes of all Piccadilly–
My soul revolts at such a bare hypocrisy,
And will not, dare not, fancy in accord
The Lord of Hosts with an Exclusive Lord
Of this world’s aristocracy.
It will not own a notion so unholy,
As thinking that the rich by easy trips
May go to heav’n, whereas the poor and lowly
Must work their passage, as they do in ships.

One place there is–beneath the burial sod,
Where all mankind are equalized by death;
Another place there is–the Fane of God,
Where all are equal, who draw living breath;–
Juggle who will elsewhere with his own soul,
Playing the Judas with a temporal dole–
He who can come beneath that awful cope,
In the dread presence of a Maker just,
Who metes to ev’ry pinch of human dust
One even measure of immortal hope–
He who can stand within that holy door,
With soul unbow’d by that pure spirit-level,
And frame unequal laws for rich and poor,–
Might sit for Hell and represent the Devil!