and little robbers--
Rhymesters--pamphleteers--stock-jobbers-- 190
Men of glory in the wars,--

10.
Things whose trade is, over ladies
To lean, and flirt, and stare, and simper,
Till all that is divine in woman
Grows cruel, courteous, smooth, inhuman, 195
Crucified 'twixt a smile and whimper.

11.
Thrusting, toiling, wailing, moiling,
Frowning, preaching--such a riot!
Each with never-ceasing labour,
Whilst he thinks he cheats his neighbour, 200
Cheating his own heart of quiet.

12.
And all these meet at levees;--
Dinners convivial and political;--
Suppers of epic poets;--teas,
Where small talk dies in agonies;-- 205
Breakfasts professional and critical;

13.
Lunches and snacks so aldermanic
That one would furnish forth ten dinners,
Where reigns a Cretan-tongued panic,
Lest news Russ, Dutch, or Alemannic 210
Should make some losers, and some winners--

45.
At conversazioni--balls--
Conventicles--and drawing-rooms--
Courts of law--committees--calls
Of a morning--clubs--book-stalls-- 215
Churches--masquerades--and tombs.

15.
And this is Hell--and in this smother
All are damnable and damned;
Each one damning, damns the other;
They are damned by one another, 220
By none other are they damned.

16.
'Tis a lie to say, 'God damns'!
Where was Heaven's Attorney General
When they first gave out such flams?
Let there be an end of shams, 225
They are mines of poisonous mineral.

17.
Statesmen damn themselves to be
Cursed; and lawyers damn their souls
To the auction of a fee;
Churchmen damn themselves to see 230
God's sweet love in burning coals.

18.
The rich are damned, beyond all cure,
To taunt, and starve, and trample on
The weak and wretched; and the poor
Damn their broken hearts to endure 235
Stripe on stripe, with groan on groan.

19.
Sometimes the poor are damned indeed
To take,--not means for being blessed,--
But Cobbett's snuff, revenge; that weed
From which the worms that it doth feed 240
Squeeze less than they before possessed.

20.
And some few, like we know who,
Damned--but God alone knows why--
To believe their min