108
PAPERS ON LITERATURE AND ART.
elected Cardinals, and of a purer church; and it shall be ere long remembered as dream and fable, that the representative of “my Cid” could not rest in consecrated ground.
| As if they saw their dangers, and their glories, |
| And did partake with them in their rewards, |
| All that have any spark of Roman in them, |
| The slothful arts laid by, contend to be |
| Like those they see presented. |
| Second Senator. He has put |
| The consuls to their whisper. |
| Paris. But ’tis urged |
| That we corrupt youth, and traduce superiors. |
| When do we bring a vice upon the stage, |
| That does go off unpunished? Do we teach, |
| By the success of wicked undertakings, |
| Others to tread in their forbidden steps? |
| We show no arts of Lydian panderism, |
| Corinthian poisons, Persian flatteries, |
| But mulcted so in the conclusion, that |
| Even those spectators, that were so inclined, |
| Go home changed men. And for traducing such |
| That are above us, publishing to the world |
| Their secret crimes, we are as innocent |
| As such as are born dumb. When we present |
| An heir, that does conspire against the life |
| Of his dear parent, numbering every hour |
| He lives, as tedious to him; if there be |
| Among the auditors one, whose conscience tells him |
| He is of the same mould,—We cannot help it. |
| Or, bringing on the stage a loose adulteress, |
| That does maintain the riotous expense |
| Of her licentious paramour, yet suffers |
| The lawful pledges of a former bed |
| To starve the while for hunger; if a matron, |
| However great in fortune, birth, or titles, |
| Cry out, ’Tis writ for me!—We cannot help it. |
| Or, when a covetous man’s expressed, whose wealth |
