But chief let  the mighty City! speak
The full-exerted Genius of thy Reign.
Behold Her rise amid the lifeless Waste,
Expiring Nature all corrupted round;
While the lone  thro' the desart Shore,
Winds his waste stores, and sullen sweeps along.
Patch'd from my Fragments, in unsolid Pomp,
Mark how the Temple glares; and, artful drest,
Amusive draws the superstitious Train.
Mark how the Palace lifts a lying front,
Concealing often, in magnific Jail,
Proud Want, a deep unanimated Gloom!
And often joining to the drear abode
Of Misery, whose melancholy walls
Seem its voracious Grandeur to reproach.
Within the City Bounds, the Desart see.
See the rank Vine o'er subterranean roofs,
Indecent, spread; beneath whose fretted gold
It once exulting flow'd. The People mark,
Matchless, while fir'd by me; to Public Good
Inexorably firm, just, generous, brave,
Afraid of nothing but unworthy Life,
Elate with Glory, an Heroic Soul
Known to the Vulgar Breast: behold them now
A thin despairing Number, all subdu'd,
The Slaves of Slaves, by Superstition fool'd,
By Vice unman'd and a licentious Rule,
In Guile ingenious, and in Murder brave.
Such in one Land, beneath the same fair Clime,
Thy Sons, OPPRESSION, are; and such were MINE.