Would steer too nigh the sands, to boast his wit. Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide; Else, why should he, with wealth and honour blest, Refuse his age the needful hours of rest? Punish a body which he could not please; Bankrupt of life, yet prodigal of ease? And all to leave what with his toil he won, To that unfeathered two-legged thing, a son;[239] Got, while his soul did huddled notions try; And born a shapeless lump, like anarchy. In friendship false, implacable in hate; Resolved to ruin, or to rule the state. To compass this the triple bond he broke; } The pillars of the public safety shook; } And fitted Israel for a foreign yoke;[240] } Then, seized with fear, yet still affecting fame, Usurped a patriot's all-atoning name.[241] So easy still it proves in factious times, With public zeal to cancel private crimes. How safe is treason, and how sacred ill, Where none can sin against the people's will? Where crowds can wink, and no offence be known, Since in another's guilt they find their own? Yet fame deserved no enemy can grudge; The statesman we abhor, but praise the judge. In Israel's courts ne'er sat an Abethdin[242] With more discerning eyes, or hands more clean, Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress; Swift of dispatch, and easy of access. Oh! had he been content to serve the crown, With virtue only proper to the gown; Or had the rankness of the soil been freed From cockle, that oppressed the noble seed; David for him his tuneful harp had strung, And heaven had wanted one immortal song. But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand, And fortune's ice prefers to virtue's land. Achitophel, grown weary to possess A lawful fame, and lazy happiness, Disdained the golden fruit to gather free, And lent the crowd his arm to shake the tree. Now, manifest of crimes contrived long since, He stood at bold defiance with his prince; Held up the buckler of the people's cause Against the crown, and skulked behind the laws.[243] The wished occasion of the plot he takes; Some circumstances finds, but more he makes; By buzzing emissaries, fills the ears Of listening crowds with jealousies and fears, Of arbitrary counsels brought to light, And proves the king himself a Jebusite. Weak arguments! which yet, he knew full well, Were strong with people easy to rebel. For, governed by the moon, the giddy Jews Tread the same track when she the prime renews; And once in twenty years their scribes record, By natural instinct they change their lord. Achitophel still wants a chief, and none Was found so fit as warlike Absalon. Not that he wished his greatness to create, For politicians neither love nor hate; But, for he knew his title not allowed,