Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 046.djvu/787

Speak against time, and, innocent of sense,
Indulge in all the freaks of eloquence;
And, with an equal happiness, dilate
On money matters, and affairs of state.
Howe'er he did mismanage and abuse
His office and the public revenues,
He was with so much worldly wisdom blest
As to take care to feather his own nest;
And for his younglings, with paternal pride
As natural, he did no less provide.
In his own praise he spouted much and long,
Neither his taxes nor his costs were wrong;
And turning e'en defeat into a boast,
He praised his colleagues, praised himself the most;
And to the last, with place and pay content,
He never knew what public virtue meant,
Till, when he was worn out, but still elate,
A title crown'd his service in debate.

Then came Macario, bless'd with arts that win
Titles and pelf, of Gallic origin;
His sire had traded where the Niger flows,
And with his years his heap of treasure rose;
Wealth he amass'd with all a miser's love,
Yet his affections set on things above;
At once hugg'd earth and heavenward turn'd his eye,
And died in odour sweet of sanctity.
His son Macario to state-craft was bred,
And was a time-server in heart and head;
His party loved, for his especial gain,
Too wise to work for nothing and complain:
So he took care to be beforehand paid,
And like his father drove a thriving trade;
Ready of speech and pen he work'd his way
From life's inglorious gloom to the upper day,
Became a counsellor and man of note,
And from the palace his despatches wrote.

The next was he that had the most to do,
And did with honesty his course pursue,
Industrious, early at his post and late,
A hack in office and the slave of state.
He had no sort of misgiving or fear,
But play'd historian, playwright, pamphleteer;
He mended laws political, and broke
The laws of grammar when he wrote, or spoke.
He was self-confident to that degree,
Nothing beyond his powers he thought could be.
He would have led an army to the field,
And as a warrior had been last to yield;
E'en against Tully would have tried to speak,
Or write a better Iliad than the Greek.
The winds, like Æolus, he'd disenchain,
As though with power to shut them up again;
But ah! no like success his efforts crown'd,
The storm-promoter was no storm-king found.
His heart was honest, but his mind perverse,
And what he tried to mend he made much worse;
To quench a spark he fann'd it into fire,
Gave the steed rein that did the curb require;
Did greatest evil with the best intent,
And all his zeal for right in error spent.