Here every rake exerts his art
T’ ensnare the unsuspecting heart. 
The prostitute, with faithless smiles,
Remorseless plays her tricks and wiles. 
Her gesture bold and ogling eye,
Obtrusive speech and pert reply,
And brazen front and stubborn tone,
Show all her native virtue’s flown. 
By her the thoughtless youth is ta’en,
Impoverished, disgraced, or slain: 
Through her the marriage vows are broke,
And Hymen proves a galling yoke. 
Diseases come, destruction’s dealt,
Where’er her poisonous breath is felt;
Whilst she, poor wretch, dies in the flame
That runs through her polluted frame.

Once she was gentle, fair, and kind,
To no seducing schemes inclined,
Would blush to hear a smutty tale,
Nor ever strolled o’er hill or dale,
But lived a sweet domestic maid,
To lend her aged parents aid—­
And oft they gazed and oft they smiled
On this their loved and only child: 
They thought they might in her be blest,
And she would see them laid at rest.

A blithesome youth of courtly mien
Oft called to see this rural queen: 
His oily tongue and wily art
Soon gained Maria’s yielding heart. 
The aged pair, too, liked the youth,
And thought him naught but love and truth. 
The village feast at length is come;
Maria by the youth’s undone: 
The youth is gone—­so is her fame;
And with it all her sense of shame: 
And now she practises the art
Which snared her unsuspecting heart;
And vice, with a progressive sway,
More hardened makes her every day. 
Averse to good and prone to ill,
And dexterous in seducing skill;
To look, as if her eyes would melt: 
T’ affect a love she never felt;
To half suppress the rising sigh;
Mechanically to weep and cry;
To vow eternal truth, and then
To break her vow, and vow again;
Her ways are darkness, death, and hell: 
Remorse and shame and passions fell,
And short-lived joy, with endless pain,
Pursues her in a gloomy train.

   O Britain fair, thou queen of isles! 
Nor hostile arms nor hostile wiles
Could ever shake thy solid throne
But for thy sins.  Thy sins alone
Can make thee stoop thy royal head,
And lay thee prostrate with the dead. 
In vain colossal England mows,
With ponderous strength, the yielding foes;
   In vain fair Scotia, by her side,
With courage flushed and Highland pride,
Whirls her keen blade with horrid whistle
And lops off heads like tops of thistle;
In vain brave Erin, famed afar,
The flaming thunderbolt of war,
Profuse of life, through blood does wade,
To lend her sister kingdom aid: 
Our conquering thunders vainly roar
Terrific round the Gallic shore;
Profoundest statesmen vainly scheme—­
’Tis all a vain, delusive dream,
If treacherously within our breast
We foster sin, the deadly pest.