SANCTI DOMINICI PALLIUM; A DIALOGUE BETWEEN POET AND FRIEND, FOUND WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAF AT THE BEGINNING OF BUTLER'S BOOK OF THE CHURCH. POET. I NOTE the moods and feelings men betray, These best reveal the smooth man's inward creed! made up of impudence and trick, With cloven tongue prepared to hiss and lick, FRIEND. Enough of! we're agreed, Who now defends would then have done the deed. POET. (aside) (Rome's smooth go-between!) FRIEND. Laments the advice that sour'd a milky queen(For "bloody" all enlighten'd men confess An antiquated error of the press :) Who rapt by zeal beyond her sex's bounds, With actual cautery staunch'd the Church's wounds! Yet blames them both-and thinks the Pope might err! What think you now? Boots it with spear and shield Against such gentle foes to take the field Whose beck'ning hands the mild Caduceus wield ? POET. What think I now? Ev'n what I thought before ;What boasts tho' may deplore, Still I repeat, words lead me not astray When the shown feeling points a different way. can say grace at slander's feast, Smooth And bless each haut-gout cook'd by monk or priest; So much for you, my Friend! who own a Church, Disclaimant of his uncaught grandsire's mood, I see a tiger lapping kitten's food: And who shall blame him that he purs applause, Yet not the less, for modern lights unapt, LINES SUGGESTED BY THE LAST WORDS OF BERENGARIUS, No more 'twixt conscience staggering and the Pope By him to be condemned, as I fear.— REFLECTION ON THE ABOVE. Lynx amid moles! had I stood by thy bed, All are not strong alike through storms to steer death And dungeon torture made thy hand and breath That truth, from which, through fear, thou twice didst start, Fear haply told thee, was a learned strife, And myriads had reached Heaven, who never knew Ye, who secure 'mid trophies not your own, Like the weak worm that gems the starless night, And was it strange if he withdrew the ray The ascending day-star with a bolder eye Hath lit each dew-drop on our trimmer lawn! Yet not for this, if wise, shall we decry The spots and struggles of the timid dawn; Lest so we tempt th' approaching noon to scorn The mists and painted vapours of our morn. NOT AT HOME. THAT Jealousy may rule a mind She has a strange cast in her ee, : Ask for her and she'll be denied :- WORK WITHOUT HOPE. LINES COMPOSED 21ST FEBRUARY, 1827. ALL Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair- Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing. |