On the Mutability of Things—1798
The time is approaching, deny it who may,
The days are not very remote,
When the pageant that glitter'd for many a day,
On the stream of oblivion will float.
The times are advancing when matters will turn,
And some, who are now in the shade,
And pelted by malice, or treated with scorn,
Will pay, in the coin that was paid:
The time it will be, when the people aroused,
For better arrangements prepare,
And firm to the cause, that of old they espoused,
Their steady attachment declare:
When tyrants will shrink from the face of the day,
Or, if they presume to remain,
To the tune of peccavi, a solo will play,
And lower the royalty strain:
When government favors to flattery's press
Will halt on their way from afar,
And people will laugh at the comical dress
Of the knights of the garter and star:
When a monarch, new fangled, with lawyer and scribe,
In junto will cease to convene,
Or take from old England a pitiful bribe,
To pamper his "highness serene;"
When virtue and merit will have a fair chance
The loaves and the fishes to share,
And Jefferson, you to your station advance,
The man for the president's chair:
When honesty, honor, experience, approved,
No more in disgrace will retire;
When fops from the places of trust are removed
And the leaders of faction retire.