When up a dangerous faction starts[1],
With wrath and vengeance in their hearts;
By solemn league and covenant bound,
To ruin, slaughter, and confound;
To turn religion to a fable,
And make the government a Babel;
Pervert the laws, disgrace the gown,
Corrupt the senate, rob the crown;
To sacrifice Old England's glory,
And make her infamous in story:
When such a tempest shook the land,
How could unguarded Virtue stand!
With horrour, grief, despair, the dean
Beheld the dire destructive scene:
His friends in exile, or the Tower,
Himself[2] within the frown of power;
Pursu'd by base envenom'd pens,
Far to the land of saints and fens;
A servile race in folly nurs'd,
Who truckle most, when treated worst.
"By innocence and resolution,
He bore continual persecution;
While numbers to preferment rose,
Whose merits were, to be his foes;
- ↑ On the queen's demise the whigs were restored to power, which they exercised with the utmost rage and revenge; impeached and banished the chief leaders of the church party, and stripped all their adherents of what employments they had.
- ↑ Upon the queen's death, the dean returned to Dublin: yet numberless libels were written against him in England; he was insulted in the street, and at night was forced to be attended by his servants armed.
