Authority + 

“Authority, authority!” they shout + 

Whose minds, not large enough to hold a doubt, + 

Some chance opinion ever entertain, + 

By dogma billeted upon their brain. + 

“Ha!” they exclaim with choreatic glee, + 

“Here’s Dabster if you won’t give in to me⁠— + 

Dabster, sir, Dabster, to whom all men look + 

With reverence!” The fellow wrote a book. + 

It matters not that many another wight + 

Has thought more deeply, could more wisely write + 

On t’ other side⁠—that you yourself possess + 

Knowledge where Dabster did not badly guess. + 

God help you if ambitious to persuade + 

The fools who take opinion ready-made + 

And “recognize authorities.” Be sure + 

No tittle of their folly they’ll abjure + 

For all that you can say. But write it down, + 

Publish and die and get a great renown⁠— + 

Faith! how they’ll snap it up, misread, misquote, + 

Swear that they had a hand in all you wrote, + 

And ride your fame like monkeys on a goat! + 