Devised by priests, and by none else believed,
E’er since great Hobbes the world has undeceived![1]
This might have passed with the plain simple race
Of our forefathers in King Arthur's days;
Ere mingling with corrupted foreign seed,
We learned their vice, and spoiled our native breed;
Ere yet blessed Albion, high in ancient fame,
With her first innocence resigned her name.
Fair dealing then, and downright honesty,
And plighted faith were good security;
No vast engrossments for estates were made,
Nor deeds, large as the lands which they conveyed;
To bind a trust there lacked no formal ties
Of paper, wax, and seals, and witnesses,
Nor ready coin, but sterling promises;
Each took the other's word, and that would go
For current then, and more than oaths do now;
None had recourse to Chancery for defence,
Where you forego your right with less expense;
Nor traps were yet set up for perjurers,
That catch men by the heads, and whip off ears.
Then knave, and villain, things unheard of were,
Scarce in a century did one appear,
And he more gazed at that a blazing star.
If a young stripling put not off his hat
In high respect to every beard he met,
Though a lord's son and heir, 'twas held a crime,
That scarce deserved its clergy in that time;
So venerable then was four years odds,
And grey old heads were reverenced as gods.
Now if a friend once in an age prove just,
If he miraculously keep his trust,
And without force of law deliver all
That's due, both interest and principal,
- ↑ Hobbes of Malmesbury, whose Leviathan brought down the censure of parliament and the special displeasure of the King, on account of its atheistical principles. Hobbes died in 1679, three years before the date of this Satire.
