character of Shimei, and of his behaviour to David, is hardly that,
perhaps, of a competent historical critic, and in treating of the
Benjamite's insults to the King of Israel he appears to take no
account of the blood-feud between the house of David and the clan
to which the railer belonged; just as in commenting on Shimei's
subsequent and most abject submission to the victorious monarch,
Sterne lays altogether too much stress upon conduct which is
indicative, not so much of any exceptional meanness of disposition,
as of the ordinary suppleness of the Oriental put in fear of his life.
However, it makes a more piquant and dramatic picture to represent
Shimei as a type of the wretch of insolence and servility compact,
with a tongue ever ready to be loosed against the unfortunate, and a
knee ever ready to be bent to the strong. And thus he moralizes on his
conception:

[Footnote 1: Mr. Fitzgerald, indeed, asserts as a fact that some
at least of these sermons were actually composed in the capacity
of _littérateur_ and not of divine--for the press and not for the
pulpit.]

"There is not a character in the world which has so bad an influence
upon it as this of Shimei. While power meets with honest
checks, and the evils of life with honest refuge, the world will never
be undone; but thou, Shimei, hast sapped it at both extremes: for
thou corruptest prosperity, and 'tis thou who hast broken the heart
of poverty. And so long as worthless spirits can be ambitious ones
'tis a character we never shall want. Oh! it infests the court, the
camp, the cabinet; it infests the Church. Go where you will, in
every quarter, in every profession, you see a Shimei following the
wheels of the fortunate through thick mire and clay. Haste, Shimei,