Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, RIVINGTON'S CONFESSIONS ADDRESSED TO THE WHIGS OF NEW YORK, by PHILIP FRENEAU


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

RIVINGTON'S CONFESSIONS ADDRESSED TO THE WHIGS OF NEW YORK, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Long life and low spirits were never my choice
Last Line: And he'll turn a true blue-skin, or just what you will. --
Subject(s): American Revolution; Confessions; Rivington, James (1724-1803)


I.

LONG life and low spirits were never my choice,
As long as I live I intend to rejoice;
When life is worn out, and no wine's to be had,
'Tis time enough then to be serious and sad.

'Tis time enough then to reflect and repent
When our liquor is gone; and our money is spent,
But I cannot endure what is practised by some
This anticipating of mischiefs to come;

A debt must be paid, I am sorry to say,
Alike, in their turns, by the grave and the gay.
And due to a despot that none can deceive
Who grants us no respite and signs no reprieve.

Thrice happy is he that from care can retreat,
And its plagues and vexations put under his feet;
Blow the storm as it may, he is always in trim,
And the sun's in the zenith forever to him.

Since the world then, in earnest, is nothing but care,
(And the world will allow I have also my share)
Yet, tossed as I am in the stormy expanse,
The best way, I find, is to leave it to chance.

Look round, if you please, and survey the wide ball
And CHANCE, you will find, has direction of all:
'Twas owing to chance that I first saw the light,
And chance may destroy me before it is night!

'Twas a chance, a mere chance, that your arms gained the day,
'Twas a chance that the Britons so soon went away,
To chance by their leaders the nation is cast
And chance to perdition will send them at last.

Now because I remain when the puppies are gone
You would willingly see me hanged, quartered, and drawn,
Though I think I have logic sufficient to prove
That the chance of my stay -- is a proof of my love.

For deeds of destruction some hundreds are ripe,
But the worst of my foes are your lads of the type:
Because they have nothing to put on their shelves
They are striving to make me as poor as themselves.

There's LOUDON, and KOLLOCK, those strong bulls of Bashan,
Are striving to hook me away from my station,
And HOLT, all at once, is as wonderful great
As if none but himself was to print for the STATE.

Ye all are convinced Ied a right to expect
That a sinner returning you would not reject --
Quite sick of the scarlet and slaves of the throne,
'Tis now at your option to make me your own.

Suppose I had gone with the Tories and rabble,
To starve or be drowned on the shoals of cape Sable,
I had suffered, 'tis true -- but I'll have you to know,
You nothing had gained by my trouble and woe.

You say that with grief and dejection of heart
I packed up my awls, with a view to depart,
That my shelves were dismantled, my cellars unstored,
My boxes afloat, and my hampers on board:

And hence you infer (I am sure without reason)
That a right you possess to entangle my weazon --
Yet your barns I ne'er burnt, nor your blood have I spilt,
And my terror alone was no proof of my guilt.

The charge may be true -- for I found it in vain
To lean on a staff that was broken in twain,
And ere I had gone at Port Roseway to fix,
I had chose to sell drams on the south side of Styx

I confess, that, with shame and contrition opprest,
I signed an agreement to go with the rest,
But ere they weighed anchor to sail their last trip,
I saw they were vermin, and gave them the slip:

Now, why you should call me the worst man alive,
On the word of a convert, I cannot contrive,
Though turned a plain honest republican, still
You own me no proselyte, do what I will.

My paper is altered -- good people, don't fret;
I call it no longer the ROYAL GAZETTE;
To me a great monarch has lost all his charms,
I have pulled down his LION, and trampled his ARMS.

While fate was propitious, I thought they might stand,
(You know I was zealous for George's command)
But since he disgraced it, and left us behind,
If I thought him an angel -- I've altered my mind.

On the very same day that his army went hence
I ceased to tell lies for the sake of his pence;
And what was the reason? -- the true one is best --
I worship no suns when they hang to the west:

In this I resemble a Turk or a Moor,
Bright Phoebus ascending, I prostrate adore;
And, therefore, excuse me for printing some lays,
An ode or a sonnet in Washington's praise.

His prudence, and caution has saved your dominions,
This chief of all chiefs, and the pride of Virginians!
And when he is gone -- I pronounce it with pain --
We scarcely shall meet with his equal again.

The gods for that hero did trouble prepare,
But gave him a mind that could feed upon care,
They gave him a spirit, serene but severe,
Above all disorder, confusion, and fear;
In him it was fortune where others would fail:
He was born for the tempest, and weathered the gale.

Old Plato asserted that life is a dream
And man but a shadow, a cloud, or a stream;
By which it is plain he intended to say
That man, like a shadow, must vanish away:

If this be the fact, in relation to man,
And if each one is striving to get what he can,
I hope, while I live, you will all think it best,
To allow me to bustle along with the rest.

A view of my life, though some parts might be solemn,
Would make, on the whole, a ridiculous volume;
In the life that's hereafter (to speak with submission)
I hope I shall publish a better edition:

Even swine you permit to subsist in the street; --
You pity a dog that lies down to be beat --
Then forget what is past, for the year's at a close --
And men of my age have some need of repose.



II.

BUT as to the Tories that yet may remain,
They scarcely need give you a moment of pain:
What dare they attempt when their masters are fled; --
When the soul is departed, who wars with the dead?

On the waves of the Styx had they rode quarantine,
They could not have looked more infernally lean
Than the day, when repenting, dismayed and distrest,
Like the doves to their windows, they stuck to their nest.

Poor souls! for the love of the king and his nation
They have had their full quota of mortification;
Wherever they fought, or whatever they won
The dream's at an end -- the delusion is done.

The TEMPLE you raised was so wonderful large
Not one of them thought you could answer the charge,
It seemed a mere castle constructed of vapour,
Surrounded with gibbets, and founded on PAPER.

On the basis of freedom you built it too strong!
And CARLETON confessed, when you held it so long,
That if any thing human the fabric could shatter,
The ROYAL GAZETTE must accomplish the matter.

An engine like that, in such hands as my own
Had shaken king CUDJOE himself from his throne,
In another rebellion had ruined the Scot,
While the Pope and Pretender had both gone to pot.

If you stood my attacks, I have nothing to say --
I fought, like the Swiss, for the Sake of my pay;
But while I was proving your fabric unsound
Our vessel missed stay, and we all went aground.

Thus ended in ruin what madness begun,
And thus was our nation disgraced and undone,
Renowned as we were, and the lords of the deep,
If our outset was folly, our exit was sleep.

A dominion like THIS, that some millions had cost! --
The king might have wept when he Saw it was lost;
This jewel -- whose value I cannot describe;
This pearl -- that was richer than all his Dutch tribe.

When the war came upon us, you very well knew
My income was small and my riches were few --
If your money was Scarce, and your prospects were bad,
Why hinder me printing for people that had?

'Twoued have pleased you, no doubt, had I gone with a few setts
Of books, to exist in your cold Massachusetts;
Or to wander at Newark, like ill fated HUGH,
Not a shirt to my back, or a soal to my shoe:

Now, if we mistook (as we did, it is plain)
Our error was owing to wicked HUGH GAINE,
For he gave such accounts of your starving and strife
As proved that his pictures were drawn from the life.

The part that I acted, by some men of sense
Was wrongfully held to be malice propense,
When to all the world else it was perfectly plain,
One principle ruled me -- a passion for gain.

You pretend I have suffered no loss in the cause,
And have, therefore, no right to partake of your laws: --
Some people love talking -- I find to my cost,
I too am a loser -- my PENSION is lost!

Nay, did not your printers repeatedly stoop
To descant and reflect on my PORTABLE SOUP?
At me have your porcupines darted the quill,
You have plundered my Office and published my Will.

Resolved upon mischief, you held it no crime
To steal my Reflections, and print them in rhyme,
When all the town knew (and a number confessed)
That papers, like these, were no cause of arrest.

You never considered my struggles and strife;
That my lot is to toil and to worry through life;
My windows you broke -- not a pane did you spare --
And my house you have made a mere old man of war.

And still you insist I've no right to complain! --
Indeed if I do, I'm afraid it's in vain --
Yet am willing to hope you're too learnedly read
To hang up a printer for being misled.

If this be your aim, I must think of a flight --
In less than a month I must bid you good night,
And hurry away to that whelp-ridden shore
Where CLINTON and CARLETON retreated before.

From signs in the sky, and from tokens on land
I'm inclined to suspect my departure's at hand:
Old Argo the ship, -- in a peep at her star,
I found they were scraping her bottom for TAR:

For many nights past, as the house can attest,
A boy with a feather-bed troubled my rest:
My shop, the last evening, seemed all in a blaze,
And a HEN crowed at midnight, my waiting man says;

Even then, as I lay with strange whims in my head,
A ghost hove in sight, not a yard from my bed,
It seemed General ROBERTSON, brawly arrayed,
But I grasped at the substance, and found him a shade!

He appeared as of old, when head of the throng,
And loaded with laurels, he waddled along --
He seemed at the foot of my bedstead to stand
And cryed -- "Jamie Rivington, reach me your hand,

"And Jamie, (said he) I am sorry to find
"Some demon advised you to loiter behind;
"The country is hostile -- you had better get off it,
"Here's nothing but squabbles, all plague, and no profit!

"Since the day that Sir William came here with his throng
"He managed things so, that they always went wrong;
"And tho' for his knighthood, he kept MESCHIANZA,
"I think he was nothing but mere Sancho Panza:

"That famous conductor of moon-light retreats,
"Sir HARRY, came next with his armies and fleets,
"But, finding ' the Rebels were dying and dead,'
"He grounded his arms and retreated -- to bed.

"Other luck we had once at the battle of Boyne!
"But here they have ruined Earl Charles and Burgoyne,
"Here brave Colonel Monckton was thrown on his back,
"And here lies poor Andre! the best of the pack."

So saying, he flitted away in a trice,
Just adding, "he hoped I would take his advice" --
Which I surely shall do, if you push me too hard --
And so I remain, with eternal regard,

JAMES RIVINGTON, Printer, of late to the king,
But now a republican, under your wing --
Let him stand where he is -- don't push him down hill,
And he'll turn a true Blue-Skin, or just what you will. --





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