allow'd,
They're something noisy, and a little proud.

An Englishman is gentlest in command,
Obedience is a stranger in the land:
Hardly subjected to the magistrate;
For Englishmen do all subjection hate.
Humblest when rich, but peevish when they're poor,
And think whate'er they have, they merit more.

The meanest English plowman studies law,
And keeps thereby the magistrates in awe,
Will boldly tell them what they ought to do,
And sometimes punish their omissions too.

Their liberty and property's so dear,
They scorn their laws or governors to fear;
So bugbear'd with the name of slavery,
They can't submit to their own liberty.
Restraint from ill is freedom to the wise!
But Englishmen do all restraint despise.
Slaves to the liquor, drudges to the pots;
The mob are statesmen, and their statesmen sots.

Their governors, they count such dang'rous things,
That 'tis their custom to affront their kings:
So jealous of the power their kings possess'd,
They suffer neither power nor kings to rest.
The bad with force they eagerly subdue;
The good with constant clamours they pursue,
And did King Jesus reign, they'd murmur too.
A discontented nation, and by far
Harder to rule in times of peace than war:
Easily set together by the ears,
And full of causeless jealousies and fears:
Apt to revolt, and willing to rebel,
And never are contented when they're well.
No government could ever please them long,
Could tie their hands, or rectify their tongue.
In this, to ancient Israel well compared,
Eternal murmurs are among them heard.

It was but lately, that they were oppress'd,
Their rights invaded, and their laws suppress'd:
When nicely tender of their liberty,
Lord! what a noise they made of slavery.
In daily tumults show'd their discontent,
Lampoon'd their king, and mock'd his government.
And if in arms they did not first appear,
'Twas want of force, and not for want of fear.
In humbler tone than English used to do,
At foreign hands for foreign aid they sue.

William, the great successor of Nassau,
Their prayers heard, and their oppressions saw;
He saw and saved them: God and him they praised
To this their thanks, to that their trophies raised.
But glutted with their own felicities,
They soon their new deliverer despise;
Say all their prayers back, their joy disown,
Unsing their thanks, and pull their trophies down;
Their harps of praise are on the willows hung;
For Englishmen are ne'er contented long.

The reverend clergy too, and who'd ha' thought
That they who had such non-resistance taught,
Should e'er to arms against their prince be brought
Who up to heav'n did regal power advance;
Subjecting English laws to modes of France
Twisting religion so with loyalty,
As one could never live, and t'other die;
And yet no sooner did their prince design
Their glebes and perquisites to undermine,
But all their passive doctrines laid aside,
The clergy their own principles denied;
Unpreach'd their non-resisting cant, and pray'd
To heav'n for help, and to the Dutch for aid;
The church chimed all her doctrines back again,
And pulpit-champions did the cause maintain;
Flew in the face of all their former zeal,
And non-resistance did at once repeal.

The Rabbi's say it would be too prolix,
To tie religion up to politics,
The churches' safety is suprema lex:
And so by a new figure of their own,
Their former doctrines all at once disown;
As laws post facto in the parliament,
In urgent cases have attained assent;
But are as dangerous precedents laid by,
Made lawful only by necessity.

The rev'rend fathers then in arms appear,
And men of God became the men of war:
The nation, fired by them, to arms apply,
Assault their antichristian monarchy;
To their due channel all our laws restore,
And made things what they should have been before.
But when they came to fill the vacant throne,
And the pale priests look'd back on what they'd done,
How England liberty began to thrive,
And Church of England loyality outlive;
How all their persecuting days were done,
And their deliv'rer placed upon the throne:
The priests, as priests are wont to do, turn'd tail,
They're Englishmen, and nature will prevail;
Now they deplore their ruins they have made,
And murmur for the master they betray'd;
Excuse those crimes they could not make him mend,
And suffer for the cause they can't defend;
Pretend they'd not have carried things so high,
And proto-martyrs make for popery.

Had the prince done as they design'd the thing,
High set the clergy up to rule the king:
Taken a donative for coming hither,
And so have left their king and them together;
We had, say they, been now a happy nation;
No doubt we had seen a blessed reformation:
For wise men say 'tis as dangerous a thing,
A ruling priesthood, as a priest-rid king;
And of all plagues with which mankind are curst,
Ecclesiastic tyranny's the worst.

If all our former grievances were feign'd,
King James has been abused, and we trepann'd;
Bugbear'd with popery and power despotic,
Tyrannic government, and leagues exotic;
The revolution's a fanatic plot,
William's a tyrant, King James was not;
A factious army and a poison'd nation,
Unjustly forced King James's abdication.

But if he did the subjects' rights invade,
Then he was punish'd only, not betrayed;
And punishing of kings is no such crime,
But Englishmen have done it many a time.

When kings the sword of justice first lay down,
They are no kings, though they possess the crown.
Titles are shadows, crowns are empty things,
The good of subjects is the end of kings;
To guide in war, and to protect in peace,
Where tyrants once commence the kings do cease;
For arbitrary power's so strange a thing,
It makes the tyrant and unmakes the king:
If kings by foreign priests and armies reign,
And lawless power against their oaths maintain,
Then subjects must have reason to complain:
If oaths must bind us when our kings do ill,
To call in foreign aid is to rebel:
By force to circumscribe our lawful prince,
Is wilful treason in the largest sense:
And they who once rebel, must certainly
Their God, and king, and former oaths defy;
If ye allow no mal-administration
Could cancel the allegiance of the nation,
Let all our learned sons of Levi try,
This ecclesiastic riddle to untie;
How they could make a step to call the prince,
And yet pretend the oath and innocence.

By th' first address they made beyond the seas,
They're perjur'd in the most intense degrees;
And without scruple for the time to come,
May swear to all the kings in Christendom:
Nay, truly did our kings consider all,
They'd never let the clergy swear at all,
Their politic allegiance they'd refuse,
For whores and