CANTO II.]
HUDIBRAS.
381
And by th' unfortunate events,
Can mend our next experiments:
For when we 're taken into trust,
How easy are the wisest chous'd, 1350
Who see but th' outsides of our feats,
And not their secret springs and weights;
And while they 're busy, at their ease,
Can carry what designs we please?
How easy is 't to serve for Agents, 1355
To prosecute our old Engagements?
To keep the Good Old Cause on foot,
And present pow'r from taking root;[1]
Inflame them both with false alarms
Of plots, and parties taking arms; 1360
To keep the nation's wounds too wide
Prom healing up of side to side;
Profess the passionat'st Concerns
For both their interests by turns,
The only way t' improve our own, 1365
By dealing faithfully with none;
As bowls run true, by being made
On[2] purpose false, and to be sway'd,
For if we should be true to either,
'Twould turn us out of both together; 1370
And therefore have no other means
To stand upon our own defence,
But keeping up our ancient party
In vigour, confident and hearty:
To reconcile our late dissenters, 1375
Our brethren, though by other venters;
Unite them, and their different maggots,
As long and short sticks are in faggots,[3]
And make them join again as close,
As when they first began t' espouse; 1380
Can mend our next experiments:
For when we 're taken into trust,
How easy are the wisest chous'd, 1350
Who see but th' outsides of our feats,
And not their secret springs and weights;
And while they 're busy, at their ease,
Can carry what designs we please?
How easy is 't to serve for Agents, 1355
To prosecute our old Engagements?
To keep the Good Old Cause on foot,
And present pow'r from taking root;[1]
Inflame them both with false alarms
Of plots, and parties taking arms; 1360
To keep the nation's wounds too wide
Prom healing up of side to side;
Profess the passionat'st Concerns
For both their interests by turns,
The only way t' improve our own, 1365
By dealing faithfully with none;
As bowls run true, by being made
On[2] purpose false, and to be sway'd,
For if we should be true to either,
'Twould turn us out of both together; 1370
And therefore have no other means
To stand upon our own defence,
But keeping up our ancient party
In vigour, confident and hearty:
To reconcile our late dissenters, 1375
Our brethren, though by other venters;
Unite them, and their different maggots,
As long and short sticks are in faggots,[3]
And make them join again as close,
As when they first began t' espouse; 1380
- ↑ General Monk and his party, or the Committee of Safety: for we must understand the scene to be laid at the time when Monk bore the sway, or, as will appear by and by, at the roasting of the rumps, when Monk and the city of London united against the Rump Parliament.
- ↑ All the early editions have "of purpose."
- ↑ See Æsop's Fables, 171. Swift told this fable after the ancients, with exquisite humour, to reconcile Queen Anne's ministers.
