Truth in Fiction Or, Morality in Masquerade. A Collection of Two hundred twenty five Select Fables of Aesop, and other Authors. Done into English Verse. By Edmund Arwaker |
I. |
II. |
III. |
IV. |
Truth in Fiction | ||
The MORAL.
‘Religion, Villany's successful Stale,‘Do's with its Name, to cheat Mankind, prevail:
‘And a Pretence to Goodness, tho unjust,
‘Extorts Belief, and rarely meets Distrust.
‘Where such dissembl'd Sanctity appears,
‘The chous'd Admirer no Delusion fears;
‘But those, who most deceive him, most do's love,
‘And thinks them honestest, who falsest prove.
‘Hence 'tis that Knaves, for Irreligion's sake,
‘Too often the Religious Habit take;
323
‘And, undetected, Sin in that Disguise:
‘So, unsuspected in the Rev'rend Gown,
‘Blood gain'd admittance to, and stole the Crown.
Truth in Fiction | ||