Where it should all be mere chit-chat, Lively, good-humour'd, and all that; Where honest Satire, in disgrace, Should not so much as show her face, The shrew, o'erleaping all due bounds, Breaks into Laughter's sacred grounds, 860 And, in contempt, plays o'er her tricks In science, trade, and politics. By why should the distemper'd scold Attempt to blacken men enroll'd In Power's dread book, whose mighty skill Can twist an empire to their will; Whose voice is fate, and on their tongue Law, liberty, and life are hung; Whom, on inquiry, Truth shall find With Stuarts link'd, time out of mind, 870 Superior to their country's laws, Defenders of a tyrant's cause; Men, who the same damn'd maxims hold Darkly, which they avow'd of old; Who, though by different means, pursue The end which they had first in view, And, force found vain, now play their part With much less honour, much more art? Why, at the corners of the streets, To every patriot drudge she meets, 880 Known or unknown, with furious cry Should she wild clamours vent? or why, The minds of groundlings to inflame, A Dashwood, Bute, and Wyndham name? Why, having not, to our surprise, The fear of death before her eyes, Bearing, and that but now and then, No other weapon but her pen, Should she an argument afford For blood to men who wear a sword? 890 Men, who can nicely trim and pare A point of honour to a hair-- (Honour!--a word of nice import, A pretty trinket in a court, Which my lord, quite in rapture, feels Dangling and rattling with his seals-- Honour!--a word which all the Nine Would be much puzzled to define-- Honour!--a word which torture mocks, And might confound a thousand Lockes-- 900 Which--for I leave to wiser heads, Who fields of death prefer to beds Of down, to find out, if they can, What honour is, on their wild plan-- Is not, to take it in their way, And this we sure may dare to say Without incurring an offence, Courage, law, honesty, or sense): Men, who, all spirit, life, and soul Neat butchers of a button-hole, 910 Having more skill, believe it true That they must have more courage too: Men who, without a place or name, Their fortunes speechless as their fame, Would by the sword new fortunes carve, And rather die in fight than starve At coronations, a vast field, Which food of every kind might yield; Of good sound food, at once most fit For purposes of health and wit, 920 Could not ambitious Satire rest, Content with what she might digest? Could she not feast on things of course, A champion, or a champion's horse? A champion's horse--no, better say, Though better figured on that day,[261] A horse, which might appear to us, Who deal in rhyme, a Pegasus; A rider, who, when once got on, Might pass for a Bellerophon, 930