Should whet my memory, though once forgot,
To make him an appendix of my plot.

His zeal to Heaven made him his prince despise,
And load his person with indignities:
But zeal peculiar privilege affords,
Indulging latitude to deeds and words;
And Corah might for Agag's murder call,
In terms as coarse as Samuel used to Saul.
What others in his evidence did join,
(The best that could be had for love or coin)
In Corah's own predicament will fall,
For Witness is a common name to all.
Surrounded thus with friends of every sort,
Deluded Absalom forsakes the Court,
Impatient of high hopes, urged with renown,
And fired with near possession of a crown.
The' admiring crowd are dazzled with surprise,
And on his goodly person feed their eyes.
His joy conceal'd, he sets himself to show,
On each side bowing popularly low:

His looks, his gestures, and his words he frames,
And with familiar ease repeats their names.
Thus form'd by nature, furnish'd out with arts,
He glides unfelt into their secret hearts :
Then with a kind compassionating look,
And sighs, bespeaking pity ere he spoke,
Few words he said; but easy those and fit,
More slow than Hybla drops, and far more sweet.

I mourn, my Countrymen, your lost estate,
Though far unable to prevent your fate:
Behold a banish'd man, for your dear cause
Exposed a prey to arbitrary laws!
Yet, oh! that I alone could be undone,
Cut off from empire, and no more a son!

Now all your liberties a spoil are made,
Egypt and Tyrus intercept your trade,
And Jebusites your sacred rites invade.
My father, whom with reverence yet I name,
Charm'd into ease, is careless of his fame,
And, bribed with petty sums of foreign gold,
Is grown in Bathsheba's embraces old;
Exalts his enemies, his friends destroys,
And all his power against himself employs.
He gives, and let him give, my right away;
But why should he his own and yours betray?
He, only he, can make the nation bleed,
And he alone from my revenge is freed.

Take then my tears, (with that he wiped his eyes)
'Tis all the aid my present power supplies:
No court-informer can these arms accuse;
These arms may sons against their fathers use;
And 'tis my wish, the next successor's reign
May make no other Israelite complain.'

Youth, beauty, graceful action, seldom fail :
But common interest always will prevail:
And pity never ceases to be shown

To him who makes the people's wrongs his own.
The crowd, that still believe their kings oppress,
With lifted hands their young Messiah bless;
Who now begins his progress to ordain
With chariots, horsemen, and a numerous train
From east to west his glories he displays,
And, like the sun, the Promised Land surveys.
Fame runs before him as the morning-star,
And shouts of joy salute him from afar :
Each house receives him as a guardian god,
And consecrates the place of his abode.
But hospitable treats did most commend
Wise Issachar, his wealthy western friend,

This moving court, that caught the peoples' eyes,
And seem❜d but pomp, did other ends disguise:
Achitophel had form'd it, with intent

To sound the depths, and fathom, where it went,
The people's hearts; distinguish friends from foes;
And try their strength before they came to blows.
Yet all was colour'd with a smooth pretence
Of specious love, and duty to their prince.
Religion, and redress of grievances,

Two names that always cheat and always please,
Are often urged; and good King David's life
Endanger'd by a brother and a wife.
Thus in a pageant-show a plot is made,
And peace itself is war in masquerade.
Oh foolish Israel! never warn'd by ill!
Still the same bait, and circumvented still!
Did ever men forsake their present ease,
In midst of health imagine a disease;
Take pains contingent mischiefs to foresee,
Make heirs for Monarchs, and for God decree!
What shall we think? can people give away,
Both for themselves and sons, their native sway?
Then they are left defenceless to the sword
Of each unbounded arbitrary lord;
And laws are vain, by which we right enjoy,
If kings unquestion'd can those laws destroy.
Yet if the crowd be judge of fit and just,
And kings are only officers in trust,
Then this resuming covenant was declared
When kings were made; or is for ever barr'd.
If those who gave the sceptre could not tie
By their own deed their own posterity,
How then could Adam bind his future race?
How could his forfeit on mankind take place?

Or how could heavenly justice damn us all,
Who ne'er consented to our father's fall?
Then kings are slaves to those whom they command,
And tenants to their people's pleasure stand;
Add, that the power for property allow'd,
Is mischievously seated in the crowd;
For who can be secure of private right,

If sovereign sway may be dissolved by might?
Nor is the people's judgment always true;
The most may err as grossly as the few;
And faultless kings run down by common cry,
For vice, oppression, and for tyranny.
What standard is there in a fickle rout,
Which, flowing to the mark, runs faster out?
Not only crowds, but sanhedrims may be
Infected with this public lunacy,

And share the madness of rebellious times,
To murder monarchs for imagined crimes.
If they may give and take whene'er they please,
Not kings alone, the Godhead's images,
But government itself at length must fall
To Nature's state, where all have right to all.
Yet, grant our lords, the people, kings can make,
What prudent men a settled throne would shake?
For whatsoe'er their sufferings were before,
That change they covet makes them suffer more.
All other errors but disturb a state,

But innovation is the blow of Fate.

If ancient fabrics nod, and threat to fall,
To patch their flaws, and buttress up the wall,
Thus far 'tis duty: but here fix the mark ;
For all beyond it is to touch the ark.

To change foundations, cast the frame anew,
Is work for rebels, who base ends

pursue;

At once divine and human laws control,
And mend the parts by ruin of the whole.
The tampering world is subject to this curse,
To physic their disease into a worse.

Now what relief can righteous David bring? How fatal 'tis to be too good a king!

Friends he has few, so high the madness grows;
Who dare be such must be the people's foes.
Yet some there were, e'en in the worst of days;
Some let me name, and naming is to praise.
In this short file Barzillai first appears,
Barzillai! crown'd with honour and with years.
Long since, the rising rebels he withstood
In regions waste beyond the Jordan's flood;
Unfortunately brave, to buoy the state,
But sinking underneath his master's fate:
In exile with his godlike prince he mourn'd,
For him he suffer'd, and with him return'd.
The court he practised, not the courtier's art,
Large was his wealth, but larger was his heart,
Which well the noblest objects knew to choose,
The fighting warrior, and recording muse.
His bed could once a fruitful issue boast;
Now more than half a father's name is lost.
His eldest hope, with every grace adorn'd,
By me (so Heaven will have it) always mourn'd,
And always honour'd, snatch'd in manhood's prime
By' unequal fates, and Providence's crime;
Yet not before the goal of honour won,
All parts fulfill'd of subject and of son;
Swift was the race, but short the time to run.
Oh narrow circle, but of power divine,
Scanted in space, but perfect in thy line!
By sea, by land, thy matchless worth was known,
Arms thy delight, and war was all thy own: