The king commanded me to help reform ye, And how I'll do't, Miss ---- shall inform ye. I keep the best seraglio in the nation, And hope in time to bring it into fashion; No brimstone whore need fear the lash from me, That part I'll leave to Brother Jefferey: Our gallants need not go abroad to Rome, I'll keep a whoring jubilee at home; Whoring's the darling of my inclination; An't I a magistrate for reformation? For this my praise is sung by ev'ry bard, For which Bridewell wou'd be a just reward. In print my panegyric fills the street, And hired gaol-birds their huzzas repeat; Some charities contriv'd to make a show, Have taught the needy rabble to do so; Whose empty noise is a mechanic fame, Since for Sir Beelzebub they'd do the same. [Footnote A: The Devil.] THE CONCLUSION. Then let us boast of ancestors no more, Or deeds of heroes done in days of yore, In latent records of the ages past, Behind the rear of time, in long oblivion plac'd; For if our virtues must in lines descend, The merit with the families would end, And intermixtures would most fatal grow; For vice would be hereditary too; The tainted blood would of necessity, Involuntary wickedness convey. Vice, like ill-nature, for an age or two, May seem a generation to pursue; But virtue seldom does regard the breed, Fools do the wise, and wise men fools succeed. What is't to us, what ancestors we had? If good, what better? or what worse, if bad? Examples are for imitation set, Yet all men follow virtue with regret. Could but our ancestors retrieve their fate, And see their offspring thus degenerate; How we contend for birth and names unknown, And build on their past actions, not our own; They'd cancel records, and their tombs deface, And openly disown the vile degenerate race: For fame of families is all a cheat, It's personal virtue only makes us great. THE END. End of Project Gutenberg's The True-Born Englishman, by Daniel Defoe