The Virginia Gazette

A SATIRE on the TIMES.

J'appelle un chat un chat, et Rolet un fripon.
Boileau:

I call a cat a cat, and Rolet a knave.
Quarles.

When Judas lavish'd laud on honest Wayles,
Men, laughing, thought they heard
Ver Milo's tales:
To him should gratitude
like praise return,
Mankind would swear all language was forsworn——
That wisdom meant mere folly, folly sense,
High airs observance, meekness insolence,
Applauses satire, and invective praise,
Happy for blundering Ben would be such days;
Ben would be thought a sage, meant blockhead wise,
And fond of truth, were truth deign'd by Lies.
Against him Virtue would renounce her rage,
And read with patience his flagitious page;
The blameless Nelsons unreviled live,
And he just tribute to fair virtue give.
Ben seldom deign'd such tribute heretofore,
But wonders may result from W—'s transform-
ing power.
O say, THALIA (when that Season comes,
Which weighty Johnson to the grocer dooms,
And lying Bailey to the seat of sighs)
What further miracles on earth shall rise?
Hard is the task. Mere-seeming, disarray'd,
Oft in its opposite will be display'd;
And BAKER shake, with laughter, to behold
The vilest dross, where seem'd the purest gold.
All praise unmerited will lose its close,
And the sad sober incense breathe a joke;
Each worthless fowl, in borrow'd plumage gay,
Stripp'd of false ornaments, detect the fay;
And vast pretences to...the Lord knows what-
Swell into Nothing, like a beau's chit chat.
Munificence will then desert HIM DEAD,
And grave Imposture tremble in her stead.
Yon interlauding couple raving find
Their fancied talents scatter'd in the wind,
The Buckskin's flowers but thistles to display,
And Metriot's Ready Pen turn Ready
Bray.
Good Pastime's counsel, in a bad affair,
With saucer eyes will on his conscience glare;
The populace he scorn'd to entertain,
Become a body of fine Gentlemen:
And he (the Proteus) dropping all his pride,
Salute them, where ne'er lips have been apply'd.
Janus, who plead, for breach of faith, that he
Had promis'd (pretty gloss!) thro' levity,
Will grieve to find in all levity in making
A kind assurance, but enough— in breaking.
Janus, who sat (but where I shall not tell)
An archon grave (like Aeacus in hell)
And told his PANEL—Sirs, this factious brain—
This wretch presum'd your birthright to maintain.
"To plead (was e'er such arrogance?) the cause
Of tottering liberty and slighted laws,
"And vow (in all their vigour) these should be
Your country's bulwark, his Security:"
Therefore, Messieurs, let vengeance take her course,
His limbs incarcerate, exhaust his purse,
Til mighty sufferings expiate the offence!
Why he'll seem lost to justice, as to sense.
Respectful W—'s evasion of a charge
Will be confession of the wrong, at large
His Hon— officious counsel seem a snare
To engage in measures strange B—, T—, —
His plaintive charge of innocence, oppress'd
By hateful calumny, disclose a jest:
Th' oppress'd, th' oppressor vanish, in the air
And leave stern verities, he hates to hear.
Yet, We, I mean not to decrease your fine,
Never shall my just satire brand a name
That glows with virtue; or, if some defect,
Her nicer scrutiny, perchance inspect;
:n ij .. ..s... : Rimd,Set.
A Bit of a compliment, ironical I believe, from Metriot
to the Buckskin. Rind, Asg. agib
Rind
Pxrdh
AugyA 3
If, charg'd with slander, she'll the charge deny,
And tho' provok'd, with coolness will reply;
The painting's fairer side shall also shine——
I love desert, and freely bow to thine:
Without a vice, with genius, science, stor'd.
You want but Fortitude to be ador'd;
Nor can cold Caution the defect supply,
It lives alone in downright Honesty.
True Fortitude sublime, self-bolster'd, bears
Her open front, unmov'd, by little fears;
Attains the meed, with glory, while—O base!
Behind pants CAUTION, sinking in the race.
What Caution need the just? The sole crime
Too nice attention, to the world, implies
A fault self-punish'd. Oft the traitress leads
Her shuddering devotee, to what he dreads;
Striving t' avoid offence, he blame incurs;
And Firmness smiles, while Caution treads on
burs.
But, O my deviate muse, your flight restrain,
Forgiveness ask the cause may pardon gain.
If Nelson (blest in doughty Flestrin's rage)
Can, blameless, quit his way to succour age,
To feed the hungry and the virtuous poor;
To paint desert, thou may'st forsake it sure.
That debt discharg'd, return, admire, with me,
How truths might issue—e'en from perjury.
Yes truths might spring, O miracle! from
As from fell vipers, the most beauteous scales.
But as, unwilling, they their coats resign——
(Their pride and glory while so monstrous fine)
And (vex'd at themselves in each foul brother)
Vibrate their tongue with hisses, other;
an will ntadfen, if in ede lees
Pair Truth an offspring of o at of his.
Th- (his fellow
courier of the post)
Will grieve his vigilance, in falsehood, lost——
Ensue reproaches, answers, and replies,
Thick Billinggate in fierce rejoinder rise,
And dread contention rumble thro' the skies:
While Mammon, viewing his belov'd with moans
(Like old Jocasta's, o'er her warring sons)
Will curse the want of confidence, he sees
Th' eternal plague of his best votaries.
The love of knaves on interest depends;
That tie dissolv'd, the short liv'd friendship ends:
As each his fellow's villainy discerns,
The transient union to dissention turns.
But candid hearts, at variance, as they owe
The tribute of esteem, with joy bestow.
Thus worthy THORNTON claims my best applause;
I grieve that THORNTON e'er mistook the laws.
I blam'd the act, am sure he blam'd it too;
And thence disdain'd that measure to pursue.
Then triumph'd Virtue! nor in him alone——
Be it, my muse, to latest ages known,
That venerable BLAIR (whose length of years
Had roll'd through private virtues, public cares)
Greatly, like him, refus'd t' apply his hand
To close the lips of Freedom in the land.
When err the good, then Nature is to blame;
To own the wrong deserves eternal fame.
But curses blast the wretch, who, for his ends,
Abuses the warm confidence of friends;
Who passions (foreign to their souls) imparts,
And pours his own black venom in their hearts.
Hail powerful a., and "s's power o'er truth,
Distinguish'd, to gray hairs, from early youth!
'Twas him, 'twas that, which, painting right as
wrong,
Loos'd, to obscene reproach, good COLLINS's tongue.
(Collins, 'twas ill, howe'er, to be so way'd)
And all his ire in BAJAZET display'd.
For soot H, his infamy (too great to bear)
He ought, with friends (he merits not) to share
And, as their nobler height he could not gain,
T' abuse them meanly to his abject plain,
So patients, in the plague, disperse, with joy,
The dire disease, which must themselves destroy.
So cruel youths delude the yielding fair
(Love all the pretext) to the worst despair.
Those who from too nice an attention to what the French
call Les petits egards, lose sight of that which is really proper
and honest, may be said to act with an ill judged caution. To
aim at the strictly right is a single pursuit, and easily attainable;
but caution having a thousand views must be frequently disap-
pointed. Such is the caution, or cunning, the author censures.
Hail se* again, and *o.*s's power o'er truth
Long signaliz'd, to age, from earliest youth.
You, great magician, can alone attain
This victory over language, ought in vain
By Ben, Metriotes, and Buckskin, long
Condemn'd (by poignant BURKE) to weep, in song
O bring, O bring th' event to pass, with speed
And TWO LONG EARS shall GRACE th' ACHIEVER'S HEAD.
CURTIUS