Page:Essays - Abraham Cowley (1886).djvu/39



Freedom with virtue takes her seat; Her proper place, her only scene,
 * Is in the golden mean,

She lives not with the poor, nor with the great: The wings of those, Necessity has clipped,
 * And they're in Fortune's Bridewell whipped,
 * To the laborious task of bread;

These are by various tyrants captive led. Now wild Ambition with imperious force Rides, reins, and spurs them like th' unruly horse;
 * And servile Avarice yokes them now
 * Like toilsome oxen to the plough;

And sometimes Lust, like the misguiding light, Draws them through all the labyrinths of night. If any few among the great there be
 * From the insulting passions free,