False counsellors (concealers of the law) Turncoat attorneys that with both hands draw; Sly pettifoggers, wranglers at the bar, Proud purse-leeches, harpies of Westminster, With feigned-chiding, and foul jarring noise, Break not his brain, nor interrupt his joys; But cheerful birds chirping him sweet good-morrows With nature's music do beguile his sorrows; Teaching the fragrant forests day by day The diapason of their heavenly lay. His wandering vessel, reeling to and fro On th' ireful ocean (as the winds do blow) With sudden tempest is not overwhurled, To seek his sad death in another world: But leading all his life at home in peace, Always in sight of his own smoke, no seas No other seas he knows, no other torrent, Than that which waters with its silver current His native meadows: and that very earth Shall give him burial which first gave him birth. To summon timely sleep, he doth not need Æthiop's cold rush, nor drowsy poppy-seed; Nor keep in consort (as Mecænas did) Luxurious Villains—(Viols I should have said); But on green carpets thrum'd with mossy bever, Fringing the round skirts of his winding river, The streams mild murmur, as it gently gushes, His healthy limbs in quiet slumber hushes. Drum fife and trumpet, with their loud alarms, Make him not start out of his sleep, to arms; Nor dear respect of some great General, Him from his bed unto the block doth call. The crested cock sings “_Hunt-is-up_” to him, Limits his rest, and makes him stir betime, To walk the mountains and the flow'ry meads Impearl'd with tears which great Aurora sheds. Never gross air poisoned in stinking streets, To choke his spirit, his tender nostril meets; But th'open sky where at full breath he lives, Still keeps him sound, and still new stomach gives. And Death, dread Serjeant of the Eternal Judge, Comes very late to his sole-seated lodge. CHAPTER VII. P. I. RUSTIC PHILOSOPHY. AN EXPERIMENT UPON MOONSHINE. _Quien comienza en juventud A bien obrar, Señal es de no errar En senetud._ PROVERBIOS DEL MARQUES DE SANTILLA. It is not however for man to rest in absolute contentment. He is born to hopes and aspirations as the sparks fly upward, unless he has brutified his nature and quenched the spirit of immortality which is his portion. Having nothing to desire for himself, Daniel's ambition had taken a natural direction and fixed upon his son. He was resolved that the boy should be made a scholar; not with the prospect of advancing him in the world, but in the hope that he might become a philosopher, and take as much delight in the books which he would inherit as his father had done before him. Riches and rank and power appeared in his judgement to be nothing when compared to philosophy; and herein he was as true a philosopher as if he had studied in the Porch, or walked the groves of Academus.