T.  Yet many a wretch in Bedlam knows
How to distinguish friends from foes;
And though perhaps among the rout
He wildly flings his filth about,
He still has gratitude and sap’ence,
To spare the folks that give him ha’pence;
Nor in their eyes at random pisses,
But turns aside, like mad Ulysses;
While Traulus all his ordure scatters
To foul the man he chiefly flatters. 
Whence comes these inconsistent fits?

R.  Why, Tom, the man has lost his wits.

T, Agreed:  and yet, when Towzer snaps
At people’s heels, with frothy chaps,
Hangs down his head, and drops his tail,
To say he’s mad will not avail;
The neighbours all cry, “Shoot him dead,
Hang, drown, or knock him on the head.” 
So Traulus, when he first harangued,
I wonder why he was not hang’d;
For of the two, without dispute,
Towzer’s the less offensive brute.

R, Tom, you mistake the matter quite;
Your barking curs will seldom bite
And though you hear him stut-tut-tut-ter,
He barks as fast as he can utter. 
He prates in spite of all impediment,
While none believes that what he said he meant;
Puts in his finger and his thumb
To grope for words, and out they come. 
He calls you rogue; there’s nothing in it,
He fawns upon you in a minute: 
“Begs leave to rail, but, d—­n his blood! 
He only meant it for your good: 
His friendship was exactly timed,
He shot before your foes were primed: 
By this contrivance, Mr. Dean,
By G—!  I’ll bring you off as clean—­“[3]
Then let him use you e’er so rough,
“’Twas all for love,” and that’s enough. 
But, though he sputter through a session,
It never makes the least impression: 
Whate’er he speaks for madness goes,
With no effect on friends or foes.

T.  The scrubbiest cur in all the pack
Can set the mastiff on your back. 
I own, his madness is a jest,
If that were all.  But he’s possest
Incarnate with a thousand imps,
To work whose ends his madness pimps;
Who o’er each string and wire preside,
Fill every pipe, each motion guide;
Directing every vice we find
In Scripture to the devil assign’d;
Sent from the dark infernal region,
In him they lodge, and make him legion. 
Of brethren he’s a false accuser;
A slanderer, traitor, and seducer;
A fawning, base, trepanning liar;
The marks peculiar of his sire. 
Or, grant him but a drone at best;
A drone can raise a hornet’s nest. 
The Dean had felt their stings before;
And must their malice ne’er give o’er? 
Still swarm and buzz about his nose? 
But Ireland’s friends ne’er wanted foes. 
A patriot is a dangerous post,
When wanted by his country most;
Perversely comes in evil times,
Where virtues are imputed crimes. 
His guilt is clear, the proofs are pregnant;
A traitor to the vices regnant. 
  What spirit, since the world began,
Could always bear to strive with man? 
Which God pronounced he never would,
And soon convinced them by a flood. 
Yet still the Dean on freedom raves;
His spirit always strives with slaves. 
’Tis time at last to spare his ink,
And let them rot, or hang, or sink.