<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=354703" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Gotham - Book I</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Far off (no matter whether east or west,<br>A real country, or one made in jest,<br>Nor yet by modern Mandevilles disgraced,<br>Nor by map-jobbers wretchedly misplaced)<br>There lies an island, neither great nor small,<br>Which, for distinction sake, I Gotham call.<br>The man who finds an unknown country out,<br>By giving it a name, acquires, no doubt,<br>A Gospel title, though the people there<br>The pious Christian thinks not worth his care <br>Bar this pretence, and into air is hurl'd<br>The claim of Europe to the Western world.<br>Cast by a tempest on the savage coast,<br>Some roving buccaneer set up a post;<br>A beam, in proper form transversely laid,<br>Of his Redeemer's cross the figure made--<br>Of that Redeemer, with whose laws his life,<br>From first to last, had been one scene of strife;<br>His royal master's name thereon engraved,<br>Without more process the whole race enslaved, <br>Cut off that charter they from Nature drew,<br>And made them slaves to men they never knew.<br>Search ancient histories, consult records,<br>Under this title the most Christian lords<br>Hold (thanks to conscience) more than half the ball;<br>O'erthrow this title, they have none at all;<br>For never yet might any monarch dare,<br>Who lived to Truth, and breathed a Christian air,<br>Pretend that Christ, (who came, we all agree,<br>To bless his people, and to set them free) <br>To make a convert, ever one law gave<br>By which converters made him first a slave.<br>Spite of the glosses of a canting priest,<br>Who talks of charity, but means a feast;<br>Who recommends it (whilst he seems to feel<br>The holy glowings of a real zeal)<br>To all his hearers as a deed of worth,<br>To give them heaven whom they have robb'd of earth;<br>Never shall one, one truly honest man,<br>Who, bless'd with Liberty, reveres her plan, <br>Allow one moment that a savage sire<br>Could from his wretched race, for childish hire,<br>By a wild grant, their all, their freedom pass,<br>And sell his country for a bit of glass.<br>Or grant this barbarous right, let Spain and France,<br>In slavery bred, as purchasers advance;<br>Let them, whilst Conscience is at distance hurl'd,<br>With some gay bauble buy a golden world:<br>An Englishman, in charter'd freedom born,<br>Shall spurn the slavish merchandise, shall scorn <br>To take from others, through base private views,<br>What he himself would rather die, than lose.<br>Happy the savage of those early times,<br>Ere Europe's sons were known, and Europe's crimes!<br>Gold, cursed gold! slept in the womb of earth,<br>Unfelt its mischiefs, as unknown its worth;<br>In full content he found the truest wealth,<br>In toil he found diversion, food, and health;<br>Stranger to ease and luxury of courts,<br>His sports were labours, and his labours sports; <br>His youth was hardy, and his old age green;<br>Life's morn was vigorous, and her eve serene;<br>No rules he held, but what were made for use,<br>No arts he learn'd, nor ills which arts produce;<br>False lights he follow'd, but believed them true;<br>He knew not much, but lived to what he knew.<br>Happy, thrice happy now the savage race,<br>Since Europe took their gold, and gave them grace!<br>Pastors she sends to help them in their need,<br>Some who can't write; with others who can't read; <br>And on sure grounds the gospel pile to rear,<br>Sends missionary felons every year;<br>Our vices, with more zeal than holy prayers,<br>She teaches them, and in return takes theirs.<br>Her rank oppressions give them cause to rise,<br>Her want of prudence, means and arms supplies,<br>Whilst her brave rage, not satisfied with life,<br>Rising in blood, adopts the scalping-knife.<br>Knowledge she gives, enough to make them know<br>How abject is their state, how deep their woe; <br>The worth of freedom strongly she explains,<br>Whilst she bows down, and loads their necks with chains.<br>Faith, too, she plants, for her own ends impress'd,<br>To make them bear the worst, and hope the best;<br>And whilst she teaches, on vile Interest's plan,<br>As laws of God, the wild decrees of man,<br>Like Pharisees, of whom the Scriptures tell,<br>She makes them ten times more the sons of Hell.<br>But whither do these grave reflections tend?<br>Are they design'd for any, or no end? <br>Briefly but this--to prove, that by no act<br>Which Nature made, that by no equal pact<br>'Twixt man and man, which might, if Justice heard,<br>Stand good; that by no benefits conferr'd,<br>Or purchase made, Europe in chains can hold<br>The sons of India, and her mines of gold.<br>Chance led her there in an accursed hour;<br>She saw, and made the country hers by power;<br>Nor, drawn by virtue's love from love of fame,<br>Shall my rash folly controvert the claim, <br>Or wish in thought that title overthrown<br>Which coincides with and involves my own.<br>Europe discover'd India first; I found<br>My right to Gotham on the self-same ground;<br>I first discover'd it, nor shall that plea<br>To her be granted, and denied to me;<br>I plead possession, and, till one more bold<br>Shall drive me out, will that possession hold.<br>With Europe's rights my kindred rights I twine;<br>Hers be the Western world, be Gotham mine. <br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>As on a day, a high and holy day,<br>Let every instrument of music play,<br>Ancient and modern; those which drew their birth<br>(Punctilios laid aside) from Pagan earth, <br>As well as those by Christian made and Jew;<br>Those known to many, and those known to few;<br>Those which in whim and frolic lightly float,<br>And those which swell the slow and solemn note;<br>Those which (whilst Reason stands in wonder by)<br>Make some complexions laugh, and others cry;<br>Those which, by some strange faculty of sound,<br>Can build walls up, and raze them to the ground;<br>Those which can tear up forests by the roots,<br>And make brutes dance like men, and men like brutes; <br>Those which, whilst Ridicule leads up the dance,<br>Make clowns of Monmouth ape the fops of France;<br>Those which, where Lady Dulness with Lord Mayors<br>Presides, disdaining light and trifling airs,<br>Hallow the feast with psalmody; and those<br>Which, planted in our churches to dispose<br>And lift the mind to Heaven, are disgraced<br>With what a foppish organist calls Taste:<br>All, from the fiddle (on which every fool,<br>The pert son of dull sire, discharged from school, <br>Serves an apprenticeship in college ease,<br>And rises through the gamut to degrees)<br>To those which (though less common, not less sweet)<br>From famed Saint Giles's, and more famed Vine Street,<br>(Where Heaven, the utmost wish of man to grant,<br>Gave me an old house, and an older aunt)<br>Thornton, whilst Humour pointed out the road<br>To her arch cub, hath hitch'd into an ode;--<br>All instruments (attend, ye listening spheres!<br>Attend, ye sons of men! and hear with ears), <br>All instruments (nor shall they seek one hand<br>Impress'd from modern Music's coxcomb band),<br>All instruments, self-acted, at my name<br>Shall pour forth harmony, and loud proclaim,<br>Loud but yet sweet, to the according globe,<br>My praises; whilst gay Nature, in a robe,<br>A coxcomb doctor's robe, to the full sound<br>Keeps time, like Boyce, and the world dances round.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice, <br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>Infancy, straining backward from the breast,<br>Tetchy and wayward, what he loveth best<br>Refusing in his fits, whilst all the while<br>The mother eyes the wrangler with a smile,<br>And the fond father sits on t' other side,<br>Laughs at his moods, and views his spleen with pride, <br>Shall murmur forth my name, whilst at his hand<br>Nurse stands interpreter, through Gotham's land.<br>Childhood, who like an April morn appears,<br>Sunshine and rain, hopes clouded o'er with fears,<br>Pleased and displeased by starts, in passion warm,<br>In reason weak; who, wrought into a storm,<br>Like to the fretful billows of the deep,<br>Soon spends his rage, and cries himself asleep;<br>Who, with a feverish appetite oppress'd,<br>For trifles sighs, but hates them when possess'd; <br>His trembling lash suspended in the air,<br>Half-bent, and stroking back his long lank hair,<br>Shall to his mates look up with eager glee,<br>And let his top go down to prate of me.<br>Youth, who, fierce, fickle, insolent, and vain,<br>Impatient urges on to Manhood's reign,<br>Impatient urges on, yet with a cast<br>Of dear regard looks back on Childhood past,<br>In the mid-chase, when the hot blood runs high,<br>And the quick spirits mount into his eye; <br>When pleasure, which he deems his greatest wealth,<br>Beats in his heart, and paints his cheeks with health;<br>When the chafed steed tugs proudly at the rein,<br>And, ere he starts, hath run o'er half the plain;<br>When, wing'd with fear, the stag flies full in view,<br>And in full cry the eager hounds pursue,<br>Shall shout my praise to hills which shout again,<br>And e'en the huntsman stop to cry, Amen.<br>Manhood, of form erect, who would not bow<br>Though worlds should crack around him; on his brow <br>Wisdom serene, to passion giving law,<br>Bespeaking love, and yet commanding awe;<br>Dignity into grace by mildness wrought;<br>Courage attemper'd and refined by thought;<br>Virtue supreme enthroned; within his breast<br>The image of his Maker deep impress'd;<br>Lord of this earth, which trembles at his nod,<br>With reason bless'd, and only less than God;<br>Manhood, though weeping Beauty kneels for aid,<br>Though Honour calls, in Danger's form array'd, <br>Though clothed with sackloth, Justice in the gates,<br>By wicked elders chain'd, Redemption waits,<br>Manhood shall steal an hour, a little hour,<br>(Is't not a little one?) to hail my power.<br>Old Age, a second child, by Nature cursed<br>With more and greater evils than the first;<br>Weak, sickly, full of pains, in every breath<br>Railing at life, and yet afraid of death;<br>Putting things off, with sage and solemn air,<br>From day to day, without one day to spare; <br>Without enjoyment, covetous of pelf,<br>Tiresome to friends, and tiresome to himself;<br>His faculties impair'd, his temper sour'd,<br>His memory of recent things devour'd<br>E'en with the acting, on his shatter'd brain<br>Though the false registers of youth remain;<br>From morn to evening babbling forth vain praise<br>Of those rare men, who lived in those rare days,<br>When he, the hero of his tale, was young;<br>Dull repetitions faltering on his tongue; <br>Praising gray hairs, sure mark of Wisdom's sway,<br>E'en whilst he curses Time, which made him gray;<br>Scoffing at youth, e'en whilst he would afford<br>All but his gold to have his youth restored,<br>Shall for a moment, from himself set free,<br>Lean on his crutch, and pipe forth praise to me.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung, <br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>Things without life shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>The snowdrop, who, in habit white and plain,<br>Comes on, the herald of fair Flora's train;<br>The coxcomb crocus, flower of simple note,<br>Who by her side struts in a herald's coat;<br>The tulip, idly glaring to the view,<br>Who, though no clown, his birth from Holland drew; <br>Who, once full dress'd, fears from his place to stir,<br>The fop of flowers, the More of a parterre;<br>The woodbine, who her elm in marriage meets,<br>And brings her dowry in surrounding sweets;<br>The lily, silver mistress of the vale;<br>The rose of Sharon, which perfumes the gale;<br>The jessamine, with which the queen of flowers,<br>To charm her god, adorns his favourite bowers,<br>Which brides, by the plain hand of Neatness dress'd,<br>Unenvied rival, wear upon their breast, <br>Sweet as the incense of the morn, and chaste<br>As the pure zone which circles Dian's waist;<br>All flowers, of various names, and various forms,<br>Which the sun into strength and beauty warms,<br>From the dwarf daisy, which, like infants, clings,<br>And fears to leave the earth from whence it springs,<br>To the proud giant of the garden race,<br>Who, madly rushing to the sun's embrace,<br>O'ertops her fellows with aspiring aim,<br>Demands his wedded love, and bears his name; <br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>Forming a gloom, through which, to spleen-struck minds,<br>Religion, horror-stamp'd, a passage finds, <br>The ivy crawling o'er the hallow'd cell<br>Where some old hermit's wont his beads to tell<br>By day, by night; the myrtle ever green,<br>Beneath whose shade Love holds his rites unseen;<br>The willow, weeping o'er the fatal wave<br>Where many a lover finds a watery grave;<br>The cypress, sacred held, when lovers mourn<br>Their true love snatch'd away; the laurel worn<br>By poets in old time, but destined now,<br>In grief, to wither on a Whitehead's brow; <br>The fig, which, large as what in India grows,<br>Itself a grove, gave our first parents clothes;<br>The vine, which, like a blushing new-made bride,<br>Clustering, empurples all the mountain's side;<br>The yew, which, in the place of sculptured stone,<br>Marks out the resting-place of men unknown;<br>The hedge-row elm; the pine, of mountain race;<br>The fir, the Scotch fir, never out of place;<br>The cedar, whose top mates the highest cloud,<br>Whilst his old father Lebanon grows proud <br>Of such a child, and his vast body laid<br>Out many a mile, enjoys the filial shade;<br>The oak, when living, monarch of the wood;<br>The English oak, which, dead, commands the flood;<br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung, <br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>The showers, which make the young hills, like young lambs,<br>Bound and rebound; the old hills, like old rams,<br>Unwieldy, jump for joy; the streams which glide,<br>Whilst Plenty marches smiling by their side,<br>And from their bosom rising Commerce springs;<br>The winds, which rise with healing on their wings,<br>Before whose cleansing breath Contagion flies;<br>The sun, who, travelling in eastern skies, <br>Fresh, full of strength, just risen from his bed,<br>Though in Jove's pastures they were born and bred,<br>With voice and whip can scarce make his steeds stir,<br>Step by step, up the perpendicular;<br>Who, at the hour of eve, panting for rest,<br>Rolls on amain, and gallops down the west<br>As fast as Jehu, oil'd for Ahab's sin,<br>Drove for a crown, or postboys for an inn;<br>The moon, who holds o'er night her silver reign,<br>Regent of tides, and mistress of the brain, <br>Who to her sons, those sons who own her power,<br>And do her homage at the midnight hour,<br>Gives madness as a blessing, but dispenses<br>Wisdom to fools, and damns them with their senses;<br>The stars, who, by I know not what strange right,<br>Preside o'er mortals in their own despite,<br>Who, without reason, govern those who most<br>(How truly, judge from thence!) of reason boast,<br>And, by some mighty magic yet unknown,<br>Our actions guide, yet cannot guide their own; <br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>The moment, minute, hour, day, week, month, year,<br>Morning and eve, as they in turn appear; <br>Moments and minutes, which, without a crime,<br>Can't be omitted in accounts of time,<br>Or, if omitted, (proof we might afford)<br>Worthy by parliaments to be restored;<br>The hours, which, dress'd by turns in black and white,<br>Ordain'd as handmaids, wait on Day and Night;<br>The day, those hours, I mean, when light presides,<br>And Business in a cart with Prudence rides;<br>The night, those hours, I mean, with darkness hung,<br>When Sense speaks free, and Folly holds her tongue; <br>The morn, when Nature, rousing from her strife<br>With death-like sleep, awakes to second life;<br>The eve, when, as unequal to the task,<br>She mercy from her foe descends to ask;<br>The week, in which six days are kindly given<br>To think of earth, and one to think of heaven;<br>The months, twelve sisters, all of different hue,<br>Though there appears in all a likeness too;<br>Not such a likeness as, through Hayman's works,<br>Dull mannerist! in Christians, Jews, and Turks, <br>Cloys with a sameness in each female face,<br>But a strange something, born of Art and Grace,<br>Which speaks them all, to vary and adorn,<br>At different times of the same parents born;<br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung, <br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>Frore January, leader of the year,<br>Minced-pies in van, and calves' heads in the rear;<br>Dull February, in whose leaden reign<br>My mother bore a bard without a brain;<br>March, various, fierce, and wild, with wind-crack'd cheeks,<br>By wilder Welshmen led, and crown'd with leeks;<br>April, with fools, and May, with bastards bless'd;<br>June, with White Roses on her rebel breast; <br>July, to whom, the Dog-star in her train,<br>Saint James gives oysters, and Saint Swithin rain;<br>August, who, banish'd from her Smithfield stand,<br>To Chelsea flies, with Doggett in her hand;<br>September, when by custom (right divine)<br>Geese are ordain'd to bleed at Michael's shrine,<br>Whilst the priest, not so full of grace as wit,<br>Falls to, unbless'd, nor gives the saint a bit;<br>October, who the cause of Freedom join'd,<br>And gave a second George to bless mankind; <br>November, who, at once to grace our earth,<br>Saint Andrew boasts, and our Augusta's birth;<br>December, last of months, but best, who gave<br>A Christ to man, a Saviour to the slave,<br>Whilst, falsely grateful, man, at the full feast,<br>To do God honour makes himself a beast;<br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice, <br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>The seasons as they roll; Spring, by her side<br>Lechery and Lent, lay-folly and church-pride,<br>By a rank monk to copulation led,<br>A tub of sainted salt-fish on her head;<br>Summer, in light transparent gauze array'd,<br>Like maids of honour at a masquerade, <br>In bawdry gauze, for which our daughters leave<br>The fig, more modest, first brought up by Eve,<br>Panting for breath, inflamed with lustful fires,<br>Yet wanting strength to perfect her desires,<br>Leaning on Sloth, who, fainting with the heat,<br>Stops at each step, and slumbers on his feet;<br>Autumn, when Nature, who with sorrow feels<br>Her dread foe Winter treading on her heels,<br>Makes up in value what she wants in length,<br>Exerts her powers, and puts forth all her strength, <br>Bids corn and fruits in full perfection rise,<br>Corn fairly tax'd, and fruits without excise;<br>Winter, benumb'd with cold, no longer known<br>By robes of fur, since furs became our own;<br>A hag, who, loathing all, by all is loathed,<br>With weekly, daily, hourly, libels clothed,<br>Vile Faction at her heels, who, mighty grown,<br>Would rule the ruler, and foreclose the throne,<br>Would turn all state affairs into a trade,<br>Make laws one day, the next to be unmade, <br>Beggar at home, a people fear'd abroad,<br>And, force defeated, make them slaves by fraud;<br>All, one and all, shall in this chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing? <br>The year, grand circle! in whose ample round<br>The seasons regular and fix'd are bound,<br>(Who, in his course repeated o'er and o'er,<br>Sees the same things which he had seen before;<br>The same stars keep their watch, and the same sun<br>Runs in the track where he from first hath run;<br>The same moon rules the night; tides ebb and flow;<br>Man is a puppet, and this world a show;<br>Their old dull follies, old dull fools pursue,<br>And vice in nothing, but in mode, is new; <br>He ---- a lord (now fair befall that pride,<br>He lived a villain, but a lord he died)<br>Dashwood is pious, Berkeley fix'd as Fate,<br>Sandwich (thank Heaven!) first minister of state;<br>And, though by fools despised, by saints unbless'd,<br>By friends neglected, and by foes oppress'd,<br>Scorning the servile arts of each court elf,<br>Founded on honour, Wilkes is still himself)<br>The year, encircled with the various train<br>Which waits, and fills the glories of his reign, <br>Shall, taking up this theme, in chorus join,<br>And, dumb to others' praise, be loud in mine.<br>Rejoice, ye happy Gothamites! rejoice;<br>Lift up your voice on high, a mighty voice,<br>The voice of gladness; and on every tongue,<br>In strains of gratitude, be praises hung,<br>The praises of so great and good a king:<br>Shall Churchill reign, and shall not Gotham sing?<br>Thus far in sport--nor let our critics hence,<br>Who sell out monthly trash, and call it sense, <br>Too lightly of our present labours deem,<br>Or judge at random of so high a theme:<br>High is our theme, and worthy are the men<br>To feel the sharpest stroke of Satire's pen;<br>But when kind Time a proper season brings,<br>In serious mood to treat of serious things,<br>Then shall they find, disdaining idle play,<br>That I can be as grave and dull as they.<br>Thus far in sport--nor let half patriots, those<br>Who shrink from every blast of Power which blows, <br>Who, with tame cowardice familiar grown,<br>Would hear my thoughts, but fear to speak their own;<br>Who (lest bold truths, to do sage Prudence spite,<br>Should burst the portals of their lips by night,<br>Tremble to trust themselves one hour in sleep)<br>Condemn our course, and hold our caution cheap;<br>When brave Occasion bids, for some great end,<br>When Honour calls the poet as a friend,<br>Then shall they find that, e'en on Danger's brink,<br>He dares to speak what they scarce dare to think.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Charles+Churchill">Charles Churchill</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=354703" data-title="Gotham - Book I de Charles Churchill" data-description="Far off (no matter whether east or west, A real country, or one made in jest, Nor yet by modern Mandevilles disgraced, Nor by map-jobbers wretchedly misplaced) There lies an island, neither great nor small, Which, for distinction sake, I Gotham ca..."></div> </div> </div>

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