Classic Poem

Those realmes right happy are, where princes raigne,
That measure out by vertue all their deedes,
Abhorring with their vassals blood to staine
Their sacred hands, and gore their kingly weedes:
The subiects there with willing harts obay,
And Peeres be safe from fall and foule decay.

But (out alas) where awfull Tyrants hold
In haughtie cruell hands the royall powre,
And mischiefe runnes by office vncontrolde,
There aye the great the lesser sort deuoure:
By daylie proofe ech one may daily sec,
That such as rulers are, such subiects be.

Vnlesse the law forbid the lewde to sinne,
Vnlesse the Prince by rigor vices quell,
Disorders will by sufferance soone rush in:
Who striues not then in mischiefe to excell?
By nature man vnto the worst is bent,
If holesome statutes stay not his entent.

A hungrie wight is hardly barde from food,
The kindled straw is seldome when put out,
A Tyrant that hath tasted once of blood.
With much adoe forbeares the sillie rout:
So sweete is sinne, as once from vertue fall,
And thou art lightly lost for good and all.

No looking backe, no bending foote about,
No feare of fall for many a mischiefes past,
No ill reuokt, no dread of any doubt,
Till God by heapes powre downe his plagues at last:
As by this verse is plainly set to view,
No matter fainde, but auncient storie true.

Who would by might haue maintained Luzios lust,
That slewe the childe before the fathers face?
What king would wincke at matter so vniust?
Or fauour Russian in so soule a case?
The fact was vile, and dreadfull vengeance dewe
Vnto a Prince, that such disorder knewe.

To bolster vice in others is a blame,
For such as may by power suppresse the deed:
But crowned Kings incurre the greatest shame
When they themselues on Subiects flesh do seede:
For Lions take no pleasure in the blood
Of any beast vnlesse they be withstood.

And when such states so fouly doe offend,
Not they alone doo bide the bitter scurge,
But subiects are for rulers vices shend:
As when the Sea doth yeeld to great a surge,
The lesser brookes doe swell aboue their boundes,
And ouerflow like floods the lower grounds.

Lyacon lewde, that fed on strangers blood,
Although himselfe were he that God forgate,
Yet causer was that Ioue with sodaine flood
Drownde all the world, saue Pyrrha and her mate:
Thus one ill yeere may worke ten thousands woe,
God hates yll kings, and doth detest them so.

As heere we see this vgly Tyrants wife,
And giltlesse broode that neuer did offend,
Raunsomde the fathers faultes by losse of life,
And he himselfe was brought to wretched end:
Wherefore let Peeres and states vprightly stand,
Least they and theirs be toucht by Gods owne hande.

For he that guydes the golden globe aloft,
Beholdes from hie, and markes the deedes of man,
And hath reuengo for euery wicked thought,
Though he forbeare through mercy now and than:
He suffereth long, but sharpely payes at last,
If we correct not our misdoings past.

He spares no more the Monarcho than the Page,
No more the Keysars than the countrie Clownes,
He fauours not the auncient for their age,
He cuts off Kings, for all their costly Crownes:
No royall roabcs, no scepter, no deuice,
Can raunsome those that fauour fylthy vice.