The treasure spent,
  Again in secret service went. 
  His honour too again was pledged,
  To satisfy the charge alleged.
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     When thus, with panic shame possessed,
  An auditor his friends addressed: 
     ’What are we?  Ministerial tools. 
  We little knaves are greater fools. 
  At last this secret is explored;
  ’Tis our corruption thins the hoard. 
  For every grain we touched, at least
  A thousand his own heaps increased. 
  Then for his kin, and favourite spies,
  A hundred hardly could suffice.
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  Thus, for a paltry sneaking bribe,
  We cheat ourselves, and all the tribe;
  For all the magazine contains,
  Grows from our annual toil and pains.’ 
     They vote the account shall be inspected;
  The cunning plunderer is detected;
  The fraud is sentenced; and his hoard,
  As due, to public use restored.

* * * * *

  FABLE V.

  THE BEAR IN A BOAT.

  TO A COXCOMB.

  That man must daily wiser grow,
  Whose search is bent himself to know;
  Impartially he weighs his scope,
  And on firm reason founds his hope;
  He tries his strength before the race,
  And never seeks his own disgrace;
  He knows the compass, sail, and oar,
  Or never launches from the shore;
  Before he builds, computes the cost;
  And in no proud pursuit is lost: 
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  He learns the bounds of human sense,
  And safely walks within the fence. 
  Thus, conscious of his own defect,
  Are pride and self-importance check’d. 
     If then, self-knowledge to pursue,
  Direct our life in every view,
  Of all the fools that pride can boast,
  A coxcomb claims distinction most. 
     Coxcombs are of all ranks and kind: 
  They’re not to sex or age confined,
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  Or rich, or poor, or great, or small;
  And vanity besets them all. 
  By ignorance is pride increased: 
  Those most assume who know the least;
  Their own false balance gives them weight,
  But every other finds them light. 
     Not that all coxcombs’ follies strike,
  And draw our ridicule alike;
  To different merits each pretends. 
  This in love-vanity transcends;
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  That smitten with his face and shape,
  By dress distinguishes the ape;
  T’other with learning crams his shelf,
  Knows books, and all things but himself. 
     All these are fools of low condition,
  Compared with coxcombs of ambition. 
  For those, puffed up with flattery, dare
  Assume a nation’s various care. 
  They ne’er the grossest praise mistrust,
  Their sycophants seem hardly just;
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  For these, in part alone, attest
  The flattery their own thoughts suggest. 
  In this wide sphere a coxcomb’s shown
  In other realms beside his own: 
  The self-deemed Machiavel at large