Page:Poetical Works of John Oldham.djvu/126

116 Will soon prove soft, and pliant to your use, As strumpets on the carnival let loose. Credit experience; I have tried them all, And never found the unerring methods fail Not Ovid, though 'twere his chief mastery, Had greater skill in these intrigues than I; Nor Nero's learnèd pimp, to whom we owe What choice records of lust are extant now. This heretofore, when youth and sprightly blood Ran in my veins, I tasted, and enjoyed: Ah those blest days!'—(here the old lecher smiled, With sweet remembrance of past pleasures filled) ’But they are gone! Wishes alone remain, And dreams of joy, ne'er to be felt again: To abler youth I now the practice leave, To whom this counsel and advice I give. 'But the dear mention of my gayer days Has made me farther, than I would, digress. 'Tis time we now should in due place expound, How guilt is after shrift to be atoned: Enjoin no sour repentance, tear, and grief; Eyes weep no cash, and you no profit give: Sins, though of the first rate, must punished be, Not by their own, but the actor's quality: The poor, whose purse cannot the penance bear, Let whipping serve, bare feet, and shirts of hair: The richer fools to Compostella send, To Rome, Montserrat, or the Holy Land; Let pardons, and the indulgence office drain Their coffers, and enrich the Pope's with gain, Make 'em build churches, monasteries found, And dear-bought masses for their crimes compound. 'Let law and gospel rigid precepts set, And make the paths to bliss rugged and strait;