The mild correction which my Father gave, Has spoil'd the people he design'd to save; You murmur'd then, but had you thus been used, You'd ne'er his easy clemency abused!" The injured people, treated with disdain, Found their Petitions and Addresses vain! Long had they made submissions to the crown, And long the love of Liberty had known; The kings they ask'd of God had let them see, What God himself foretold of tyranny. The father had exhausted all their stores, With costlyhouses, and more costly whores; But doubly robb'd by his encroaching son, They rather chose to die, than be undone; And, thus resolving, by a single stroke, Ten tribes revolted, and their bondage broke! The tyrant, in his sceptred bloated pride, Believing God and blood upon his side; To the high altar in a rage repairs, And rather tells his tale, than makes his prayers: * * The author has taken a poetical licence here. For scripture does not say that Rehoboam prayed to the Lord. "Behold!" says he, "the slaves, o'er whom I reign, Have made the pow'r I had from Thee in vain; From thy diviner rule they separate, And make large schisms both in Church and State; My just intentions are, with all my force, To check rebellion in its earliest course; Revenge th' affronts of my insulted throne, And save thy injured honour, and my own; And as thy counsels did my fathers bless, He claims thy help, who does their crown possess!" {170} Listen ye kings, ye people all rejoice, And hear the answer of th' Almighty voice: Tremble, ye tyrants, read the high commands, In sacred writ the sacred sentence stands! "_Stir not afoot!_ thy new-rais'd troops disband!" Says the Eternal;--"it is my command! I raised thy fathers to the Hebrew throne, I set it up, but you yourselves pull down! For when to them I Israel's sceptre gave, 'Twas not my chosen people to enslave. My first command no such commission brings, I made no tyrants, though I made you kings; But you my people vilely have opprest, And misapplied the powers which you possest. 'Tis Nature's laws the people now direct, When Nature speaks, I never contradict. Draw not the sword, thy brethren to destroy, The liberty they have, they may enjoy; I ever purposed, and I yet intend, That what they may enjoy, they may defend; They have deserted from a misused throne, "The thing's from Me"--the crime is all thy own!"*