Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, TO A FRIEND WHO HAD BEEN MUCH ABUSED..MANY INVETERATE LIBELS, by JONATHAN SWIFT


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TO A FRIEND WHO HAD BEEN MUCH ABUSED..MANY INVETERATE LIBELS, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: The greatest monarch may be stabbed by night
Last Line: And buy distinction at the dearest rate?
Subject(s): Defamation; Slander; Libel


The greatest monarch may be stabbed by night,
And fortune help the murderer in his flight;
The vilest ruffian may commit a rape,
Yet safe from injured innocence escape:
And calumny, by working underground,
Can, unrevenged, the greatest merit wound.
What's to be done? shall wit and learning choose,
To live obscure, and have no fame to lose?
By censure frighted out of honour's road,
Nor dare to use the gifts by heaven bestowed;
Or fearless enter in through virtue's gate,
And buy distinction at the dearest rate?






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