FABLE I.

THE DOG AND THE FOX.

TO A LAWYER.

I know you lawyers can with ease
Twist words and meanings as you please;
That language, by your skill made pliant,
Will bend to favour every client;
That 'tis the fee directs the sense,
To make out either side's pretence.
When you peruse the clearest case,
You see it with a double face:
For scepticism's your profession;
You hold there's doubt in all expression.
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Hence is the bar with fees supplied,
Hence eloquence takes either side.
Your hand would have but paltry gleaning
Could every man express his meaning.
Who dares presume to pen a deed.
Unless you previously are fee'd?
'Tis drawn; and, to augment the cost,
In dull prolixity engrossed.
And now we're well secured by law,
Till the next brother find a flaw.
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Read o'er a will. Was't ever known,
But you could make the will your own;
For when you read,'tis with intent
To find out meanings never meant.
Since things are thus, _se defendendo_,
I bar fallacious innuendo.
Sagacious Porta's[6] skill could trace
Some beast or bird in every face.
The head, the eye, the nose's shape,
Proved this an owl, and that an ape.
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When, in the sketches thus designed,
Resemblance brings some friend to mind,
You show the piece, and give the hint,
And find each feature in the print:
So monstrous like the portrait's found,
All know it, and the laugh goes round.
Like him I draw from general nature;
Is't I or you then fix the satire?
So, sir, I beg you spare your pains
In making comments on my strains.
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All private slander I detest,
I judge not of my neighbour's breast:
Party and prejudice I hate,
And write no libels on the state.
Shall not my fable censure vice,
Because a knave is over-nice?
And, lest the guilty hear and dread,
Shall not the decalogue be read?
If I lash vice in general fiction,
Is't I apply, or self-conviction?
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Brutes are my theme. Am I to blame,
If men in morals are the same?
I no man call an ape or ass:
Tis his own conscience holds the glass;
Thus void of all offence I write;
Who claims the fable, knows his right.
A shepherd's dog unskilled in sports,
Picked up acquaintance of all sorts:
Among the rest, a fox he knew;
By frequent chat their friendship grew.
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Says Reynard--' 'Tis a cruel case,
That man should stigmatise our race,
No do