And pride of empire, sour’d his balmy blood. 
  Then, first rebelling, his own stamp he coins;
  The murderer Cain was latent in his loins: 
  And blood began its first and loudest cry, 280
  For differing worship of the Deity. 
  Thus persecution rose, and further space
  Produced the mighty hunter of his race[103]. 
  Not so the blessed Pan his flock increased,
  Content to fold them from the famish’d beast: 
  Mild were his laws; the Sheep and harmless Hind 286
  Were never of the persecuting kind. 
  Such pity now the pious pastor shows,
  Such mercy from the British Lion flows,
  That both provide protection from their foes.

     O happy regions, Italy and Spain,
  Which never did those monsters entertain! 
  The Wolf, the Bear, the Boar, can there advance
  No native claim of just inheritance. 
  And self-preserving laws, severe in show,
  May guard their fences from the invading foe. 
  Where birth has placed them, let them safely share
  The common benefit of vital air. 
  Themselves unharmful, let them live unharm’d;
  Their jaws disabled, and their claws disarm’d:  300
  Here, only in nocturnal howlings bold,
  They dare not seize the hind, nor leap the fold. 
  More powerful, and as vigilant as they,
  The Lion awfully forbids the prey. 
  Their rage repress’d, though pinch’d with famine sore,
  They stand aloof, and tremble at his roar: 
  Much is their hunger, but their fear is more. 
  These are the chief:  to number o’er the rest,
  And stand, like Adam, naming every beast,
  Were weary work; nor will the muse describe 310
  A slimy-born and sun-begotten tribe;
  Who far from steeples and their sacred sound,
  In fields their sullen conventicles found. 
  These gross, half-animated lumps I leave;
  Nor can I think what thoughts they can conceive. 
  But if they think at all, ’tis sure no higher
  Than matter, put in motion, may aspire: 
  Souls that can scarce ferment their mass of clay;
  So drossy, so divisible are they,
  As would but serve pure bodies for allay:  320
  Such souls as shards produce, such beetle things
  As only buzz to heaven with evening wings;
  Strike in the dark, offending but by chance,
  Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance. 
  They know not beings, and but hate a name;
  To them the Hind and Panther are the same.

    The Panther[104] sure the noblest, next the Hind,
  And fairest creature of the spotted kind;
  Oh, could her inborn stains be wash’d away,
  She were too good to be a beast of prey! 330
  How can I praise, or blame, and not offend,
  Or how divide the frailty from the friend? 
  Her faults and virtues lie so mix’d,