W[esley] beset, assail’d on every side
By his own Sons become the Sons of Pride,
By every argument and every plea
Of Scottish craft, and Irish Flattery,
T’ immortalize his name by noblest deeds
By laying hands on their hot giddy heads;
Firm on the Church’s ground, and unsubdued
Against their growing multitude he stood,
And nicely managing their hopes and fears,
Held out a siege of more than forty years,
“To found a Church, his modesty declines
“His strength unequal to such vast designs,
“To found a Church a life of care demands,
“And wisdom more than mine, and abler hands:
“The Plan shoud be to full perfection brought
“By deeper skill, and more extensive thought:
“Be patient then, my sons, that you and I
“May in the Church of England live and die.”
He spake: when lo! the man appears unsought
“Of deeper skill, and more extensive thought,”
Of wisdom to secure the ablest friends
And properest means for compassing his ends;
Resolv’d to reach the top of fortune’s wheel,
But skilful his ambition to conceal;
Bold without fear, or shame, or self-mistrust;
Whate’er his point, it shall be done, and must
By one who runs, and flies, and creeps, and licks the dust.
Nor reason’s aid, nor conscience’s he needs
To plant the cabbage with inverted heads,
Implicit, ready at his Patron’s call
To pull the Temple down, or burn the Capitol.
Who coud so choice an instrument refuse
So versatile, and fit for every ruse,
So forward with his tongue, and feet, and hands
And close-shut eyes, to execute commands:
His merit must be by his foes confest
His total worth—th’ Obedience of a beast!

No marvel he shoud soon mislead his Guide
And circumvent him on the weaker side.
Who coud resist the servile flatterer’s skill,
Practis’d on Age, which loves to have its will?
But giving Age its will, and pressing on
The servile flatterer obtain’d his own.
Glory invites, a Mitre is the Prize!
He all his arts, all his manouvres tries;
Argues, and urges him his power to show,
Sooths, and intreats, and will not let him go.

The Sum of all his importunity [48]
“Ordain yourself, and then lay hands on me!”

Feeble, and self-betray’d, the Prophet hears
The voice of Satan and his messengers;
He faints; he strives against the stream no more,
Lays on his hands (with neither right nor power)
And yields himself at last their Captive at Fourscore!