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Book: English Satires

V >> Various >> English Satires

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21





VIII. THE DOMESTIC TUTOR'S POSITION.

This satire forms the Sixth of Book II. of the _Virgidemiarum_, and
is regarded as one of Bishop Hall's best. See the _Return from
Parnassus_ and Parrot's _Springes for Woodcocks_ (1613) for
analogous references to those occurring in this piece.


A gentle squire would gladly entertain
Into his house some trencher chapelain;
Some willing man that might instruct his sons,
And that would stand to good conditions.
First, that he lie upon the truckle-bed
Whiles his young master lieth o'er his head.
Second that he do on no default
Ever presume to sit above the salt.
Third that he never change his trencher twice.
Fourth that he use all common courtesies:
Sit bare at meals and one half rise and wait.
Last, that he never his young master beat,
But he must ask his mother to define,
How many jerks she would his breech should line.
All these observed, he could contented be,
To give five marks and winter livery.



IX. THE IMPECUNIOUS FOP.

This satire constitutes Satire Seven of Book III. The phrase of
dining with Duke Humphrey, which is still occasionally heard,
originated in the following manner:--In the body of old St. Paul's
was a huge and conspicuous monument of Sir John Beauchamp, buried
in 1358, son of Guy, and brother of Thomas, Earl of Warwick. This
by vulgar mistake was called the tomb of Humphrey, Duke of
Gloucester, who was really buried at St. Alban's. The middle aisle
of St. Paul's was therefore called "The Duke's Gallery". In
Dekker's _Dead Terme_ we have the phrase used and a full
explanation of it given; also in Sam Speed's _Legend of His Grace
Humphrey, Duke of St. Paul's Cathedral Walk_ (1674).


See'st thou how gaily my young master goes,
Vaunting himself upon his rising toes;
And pranks his hand upon his dagger's side;
And picks his glutted teeth since late noon-tide?
'Tis Ruffio: Trow'st thou where he dined to-day?
In sooth I saw him sit with Duke Humphrey.
Many good welcomes, and much gratis cheer,
Keeps he for every straggling cavalier;
An open house, haunted with great resort;
Long service mixt with musical disport.
Many fair younker with a feathered crest,
Chooses much rather be his shot-free guest,
To fare so freely with so little cost,
Than stake his twelvepence to a meaner host.
Hadst thou not told me, I should surely say
He touched no meat of all this livelong day;
For sure methought, yet that was but a guess,
His eyes seemed sunk for very hollowness,
But could he have--as I did it mistake--
So little in his purse, so much upon his back?
So nothing in his maw? yet seemeth by his belt
That his gaunt gut no too much stuffing felt.
See'st thou how side[163] it hangs beneath his hip?
Hunger and heavy iron makes girdles slip.
Yet for all that, how stiffly struts he by,
All trapped in the new-found bravery.
The nuns of new-won Calais his bonnet lent,
In lieu of their so kind a conquerment.
What needed he fetch that from farthest Spain,
His grandame could have lent with lesser pain?
Though he perhaps ne'er passed the English shore,
Yet fain would counted be a conqueror.
His hair, French-like, stares on his frighted head,
One lock[164] Amazon-like dishevelled,
As if he meant to wear a native cord,
If chance his fates should him that bane afford.
All British bare upon the bristled skin,
Close notched is his beard, both lip and chin;
His linen collar labyrinthian set,
Whose thousand double turnings never met:
His sleeves half hid with elbow pinionings,
As if he meant to fly with linen wings.
But when I look, and cast mine eyes below,
What monster meets mine eyes in human show?
So slender waist with such an abbot's loin,
Did never sober nature sure conjoin.
Lik'st a strawn scarecrow in a new-sown field,
Reared on some stick, the tender corn to shield,
Or, if that semblance suit not every deal,
Like a broad shake-fork with a slender steel.
Despised nature suit them once aright,
Their body to their coat both now disdight.
Their body to their clothes might shapen be,
That will their clothes shape to their bodie.
Meanwhile I wonder at so proud a back,
Whiles the empty guts loud rumblen for long lack.

[Footnote 163: long.]

[Footnote 164: the love-locks which were so condemned by the Puritan
Prynne. Cf. Lyly's _Midas_ and Sir John Davies' Epigram 22, _In
Ciprum_.]




GEORGE CHAPMAN.

(1559-1634.)


X. AN INVECTIVE WRITTEN BY MR. GEORGE CHAPMAN AGAINST MR. BEN JONSON.

This satire was discovered in a "Common-place Book" belonging to
Chapman, preserved among the Ashmole MSS. in the Bodleian Library,
Oxford.


Great, learned, witty Ben, be pleased to light
The world with that three-forked fire; nor fright
All us, thy sublearned, with luciferous boast
That thou art most great, most learn'd, witty most
Of all the kingdom, nay of all the earth;
As being a thing betwixt a human birth
And an infernal; no humanity
Of the divine soul shewing man in thee.

* * * * *

Though thy play genius hang his broken wings
Full of sick feathers, and with forced things,
Imp thy scenes, labour'd and unnatural,
And nothing good comes with thy thrice-vex'd call,
Comest thou not yet, nor yet? O no, nor yet;
Yet are thy learn'd admirers so deep set
In thy preferment above all that cite
The sun in challenge for the heat and light
Of heaven's influences which of you two knew
And have most power in them; Great Ben, 'tis you.
Examine him, some truly-judging spirit,
That pride nor fortune hath to blind his merit,
He match'd with all book-fires, he ever read
His dusk poor candle-rents; his own fat head
With all the learn'd world's, Alexander's flame
That Caesar's conquest cow'd, and stript his fame,
He shames not to give reckoning in with his;
As if the king pardoning his petulancies
Should pay his huge loss too in such a score
As all earth's learned fires he gather'd for.
What think'st thou, just friend? equall'd not this pride
All yet that ever Hell or Heaven defied?
And yet for all this, this club will inflict
His faultful pain, and him enough convict
He only reading show'd; learning, nor wit;
Only Dame Gilian's fire his desk will fit.
But for his shift by fire to save the loss
Of his vast learning, this may prove it gross:
True Muses ever vent breaths mixt with fire
Which, form'd in numbers, they in flames expire
Not only flames kindled with their own bless'd breath
That gave th' unborn life, and eternize death.
Great Ben, I know that this is in thy hand
And how thou fix'd in heaven's fix'd star dost stand
In all men's admirations and command;
For all that can be scribbled 'gainst the sorter
Of thy dead repercussions and reporter.
The kingdom yields not such another man;
Wonder of men he is; the player can
And bookseller prove true, if they could know
Only one drop, that drives in such a flow.
Are they not learned beasts, the better far
Their drossy exhalations a star
Their brainless admirations may render;
For learning in the wise sort is but lender
Of men's prime notion's doctrine; their own way
Of all skills' perceptible forms a key
Forging to wealth, and honour-soothed sense,
Never exploring truth or consequence,
Informing any virtue or good life;
And therefore Player, Bookseller, or Wife
Of either, (needing no such curious key)
All men and things, may know their own rude way.
Imagination and our appetite
Forming our speech no easier than they light
All letterless companions; t' all they know
Here or hereafter that like earth's sons plough
All under-worlds and ever downwards grow,
Nor let your learning think, egregious Ben,
These letterless companions are not men
With all the arts and sciences indued,
If of man's true and worthiest knowledge rude,
Which is to know and be one complete man,
And that not all the swelling ocean
Of arts and sciences, can pour both in:
If that brave skill then when thou didst begin
To study letters, thy great wit had plied,
Freely and only thy disease of pride
In vulgar praise had never bound thy [hide].




JOHN DONNE.

(1573-1631.)


XI. THE CHARACTER OF THE BORE.

From Donne's _Satires_, No. IV.; first published in the quarto
edition of the "Poems" in 1633. See Dr. Grosart's interesting Essay
on the Life and Writings of Donne, prefixed to Vol. II. of that
scholar's excellent edition.


Well; I may now receive and die. My sin
Indeed is great, but yet I have been in
A purgatory, such as fear'd hell is
A recreation, and scant map of this.
My mind neither with pride's itch, nor yet hath been
Poison'd with love to see or to be seen.
I had no suit there, nor new suit to shew,
Yet went to court: but as Glare, which did go
To mass in jest, catch'd, was fain to disburse
The hundred marks, which is the statute's curse,
Before he 'scap'd; so't pleas'd my Destiny
(Guilty of my sin of going) to think me
As prone to all ill, and of good as forget-
Ful, as proud, lustful, and as much in debt,
As vain, as witless, and as false as they
Which dwell in court, for once going that way,
Therefore I suffer'd this: Towards me did run
A thing more strange than on Nile's slime the sun
E'er bred, or all which into Noah's ark came;
A thing which would have pos'd Adam to name:
Stranger than seven antiquaries' studies,
Than Afric's monsters, Guiana's rarities;
Stranger than strangers; one who for a Dane
In the Danes' massacre had sure been slain,
If he had liv'd then, and without help dies
When next the 'prentices 'gainst strangers rise;
One whom the watch at noon lets scarce go by;
One t' whom th' examining justice sure would cry,
Sir, by your priesthood, tell me what you are.
His clothes were strange, though coarse, and black, though bare;
Sleeveless his jerkin was, and it had been
Velvet, but 'twas now (so much ground was seen)
Become tufftaffaty; and our children shall
See it plain rash a while, then nought at all.
The thing hath travail'd, and, faith, speaks all tongues,
And only knoweth what t' all states belongs.
Made of th' accents and best phrase of all these,
He speaks one language. If strange meats displease,
Art can deceive, or hunger force my taste;
But pedant's motley tongue, soldier's bombast,
Mountebank's drug-tongue, nor the terms of law,
Are strong enough preparatives to draw
Me to hear this, yet I must be content
With his tongue, in his tongue call'd Compliment;
In which he can win widows, and pay scores,
Make men speak treason, cozen subtlest whores,
Outflatter favourites, or outlie either
Jovius or Surius, or both together.
He names me, and comes to me; I whisper, God!
How have I sinn'd, that thy wrath's furious rod,
This fellow, chooseth me? He saith, Sir,
I love your judgment; whom do you prefer
For the best linguist? and I sillily
Said, that I thought Calepine's Dictionary.
Nay, but of men? Most sweet Sir! Beza, then
Some Jesuits, and two reverend men
Of our two academies, I nam'd. Here
He stopt me, and said; Nay, your apostles were
Good pretty linguists; so Panurgus was,
Yet a poor gentleman; all these may pass
By travel. Then, as if he would have sold
His tongue, he prais'd it, and such wonders told,
That I was fain to say, If you had liv'd, Sir,
Time enough to have been interpreter
To Babel's bricklayers, sure the tower had stood.
He adds, If of court-life you knew the good,
You would leave loneness. I said, Not alone
My loneness is, but Spartan's fashion,
To teach by painting drunkards, doth not last
Now; Aretine's pictures have made few chaste;
No more can princes' courts, though there be few
Better pictures of vice, teach me virtue.
He, like to a high-stretch'd lute-string, squeakt, O, Sir!
'Tis sweet to talk of kings! At Westminster,
Said I, the man that keeps the Abbey-tombs,
And for his price doth, with who ever comes,
Of all our Harrys and our Edwards talk,
From king to king, and all their kin can walk:
Your ears shall hear naught but kings; your eyes meet
Kings only; the way to it is King's street.
He smack'd, and cry'd, He's base, mechanic coarse;
So're all our Englishmen in their discourse.
Are not your Frenchmen neat? Mine, eyes you see,
I have but one, Sir; look, he follows me.
Certes, they're neatly cloth'd. I of this mind am,
Your only wearing is your grogaram.
Not so, Sir; I have more. Under this pitch
He would not fly. I chaf'd him; but as itch
Scratch'd into smart, and as blunt iron ground
Into an edge, hurts worse; so I (fool!) found
Crossing hurt me. To fit my sullenness,
He to another key his style doth dress,
And asks, What news? I tell him of new plays:
He takes my hand, and, as a still which stays
A semibrief 'twixt each drop, he niggardly
As loth to enrich me, so tells many a lie,
More than ten Hollensheads, or Halls, or Stows,
Of trivial household trash he knows. He knows
When the queen frown'd or smil'd; and he knows what
A subtile statesman may gather of that:
He knows who loves whom, and who by poison
Hastes to an office's reversion;
He knows who hath sold his land, and now doth beg
A license old iron, boots, shoes, and egg-
Shells to transport. Shortly boys shall not play
At span-counter, or blow-point, but shall play
Toll to some courtier; and, wiser than us all,
He knows what lady is not painted. Thus
He with home-meats cloys me. I belch, spue, spit,
Look pale and sickly, like a patient, yet
He thrusts on more; and as he had undertook
To say Gallo-Belgicus without book,
Speaks of all states and deeds that have been since
The Spaniards came to th' loss of Amyens.
Like a big wife, at sight of loathed meat,
Ready to travail, so I sigh and sweat
To hear this makaron[165] talk in vain; for yet,
Either my humour or his own to fit,
He, like a privileg'd spy, whom nothing can
Discredit, libels now 'gainst each great man:
He names a price for every office paid:
He saith, Our wars thrive ill, because delay'd;
That offices are entail'd, and that there are
Perpetuities of them lasting as far
As the last day; and that great officers
Do with the pirates share and Dunkirkers.
Who wastes in meat, in clothes, in horse, he notes;
Who loves whores, who boys, and who goats.
I, more amaz'd than Circe's prisoners, when
They felt themselves turn beasts, felt myself then
Becoming traitor, and methought I saw
One of our giant statues ope his jaw
To suck me in for hearing him: I found
That as burnt venomous leachers do grow sound
By giving others their sores, I might grow
Guilty, and be free; therefore I did show
All signs of loathing; but since I am in,
I must pay mine and my forefathers' sin
To the last farthing: therefore to my power
Toughly and stubbornly I bear this cross; but th' hour
Of mercy now was come: he tries to bring
Me to pay a fine to 'scape his torturing,
And says, Sir, can you spare me? I said, Willingly.
Nay, Sir, can you spare me a crown? Thankfully I
Gave it as ransom. But as fiddlers still,
Though they be paid to be gone, yet needs will
Thrust one more jigg upon you; so did he
With his long complimented thanks vex me.
But he is gone, thanks to his needy want,
And the prerogative of my crown. Scant
His thanks were ended when I (which did see
All the court fill'd with such strange things as he)
Ran from thence with such or more haste than one
Who fears more actions doth haste from prison.
At home in wholesome solitariness
My piteous soul began the wretchedness
Of suitors at court to mourn, and a trance
Like his who dreamt he saw hell did advance
Itself o'er me: such men as he saw there
I saw at court, and worse, and more. Low fear
Becomes the guilty, not th' accuser; then
Shall I, none's slave, of high born or rais'd men
Fear frowns, and my mistress, Truth! betray thee
To th' huffing braggart, puft nobility?
No, no; thou which since yesterday hast been
Almost about the whole world, hast thou seen,
O Sun! in all thy journey vanity
Such as swells the bladder of our court? I
Think he which made your waxen garden, and
Transported it from Italy, to stand
With us at London, flouts our courtiers; for
Just such gay painted things, which no sap nor
Taste have in them, ours are!

[Footnote 165: fop, early form of macaroni.]




BEN JONSON.

(1573-1637.)

These two pieces are taken from Jonson's _Epigrams_. The first of
them was exceedingly popular in the poet's own lifetime.


XII. THE NEW CRY.

Ere cherries ripe, and strawberries be gone;
Unto the cries of London I'll add one;
Ripe statesmen, ripe: they grow in ev'ry street;
At six-and-twenty, ripe. You shall 'em meet,
And have him yield no favour, but of state.
Ripe are their ruffs, their cuffs, their beards, their gate,
And grave as ripe, like mellow as their faces.
They know the states of Christendom, not the places:
Yet have they seen the maps, and bought 'em too,
And understand 'em, as most chapmen do.
The counsels, projects, practices they know,
And what each prince doth for intelligence owe,
And unto whom; they are the almanacks
For twelve years yet to come, what each state lacks.
They carry in their pockets Tacitus,
And the Gazetti, or Gallo-Belgicus:
And talk reserv'd, lock'd up, and full of fear;
Nay, ask you how the day goes, in your ear.
Keep a Star-chamber sentence close twelve days:
And whisper what a Proclamation says.
They meet in sixes, and at ev'ry mart,
Are sure to con the catalogue by heart;
Or ev'ry day, some one at Rimee's looks,
Or bills, and there he buys the name of books.
They all get Porta, for the sundry ways
To write in cypher, and the several keys,
To ope the character. They've found the slight
With juice of lemons, onions, piss, to write;
To break up seals and close 'em. And they know,
If the states make peace, how it will go
With England. All forbidden books they get,
And of the powder-plot, they will talk yet.
At naming the French king, their heads they shake,
And at the Pope, and Spain, slight faces make.
Or 'gainst the bishops, for the brethren rail
Much like those brethren; thinking to prevail
With ignorance on us, as they have done
On them: and therefore do not only shun
Others more modest, but contemn us too,
That know not so much state, wrong, as they do.



XIII. ON DON SURLY.

Don Surly to aspire the glorious name
Of a great man, and to be thought the same,
Makes serious use of all great trade he knows.
He speaks to men with a rhinocerote's nose,
Which he thinks great; and so reads verses too:
And that is done, as he saw great men do.
He has tympanies of business, in his face,
And can forget men's names, with a great grace.
He will both argue, and discourse in oaths,
Both which are great. And laugh at ill-made clothes;
That's greater yet: to cry his own up neat.
He doth, at meals, alone his pheasant eat,
Which is main greatness. And, at his still board,
He drinks to no man: that's, too, like a lord.
He keeps another's wife, which is a spice
Of solemn greatness. And he dares, at dice,
Blaspheme God greatly. Or some poor hind beat,
That breathes in his dog's way: and this is great.
Nay more, for greatness' sake, he will be one
May hear my epigrams, but like of none.
Surly, use other arts, these only can
Style thee a most great fool, but no great man.




SAMUEL BUTLER.

(1612-1680.)


XIV. THE CHARACTER OF HUDIBRAS.

This extract is taken from the first canto of Hudibras, and
contains the complete portrait of the Knight, Butler's aim in the
presentation of this character being to satirize those fanatics and
pretenders to religion who flourished during the Commonwealth.


When civil dudgeon first grew high,
And men fell out they knew not why;
When hard words, jealousies and fears,
Set folks together by the ears,
And made them fight like mad or drunk,
For Dame Religion as for punk:
Whose honesty they all durst swear for,
Though not a man of them knew wherefore:
When gospel-trumpeter surrounded
With long-ear'd rout to battle sounded,
And pulpit, drum ecclesiastic,
Was beat with fist, instead of a stick:
Then did Sir Knight abandon dwelling,
And out he rode a-colonelling,
A wight he was, whose very sight wou'd
Intitle him, _Mirrour of Knighthood_;
That never bow'd his stubborn knee
To any thing but chivalry;
Nor put up blow, but that which laid
Right Worshipful on shoulder-blade:
Chief of domestic knights and errant,
Either for chartel or for warrant:
Great in the bench, great in the saddle,
That could as well bind o'er as swaddle:
Mighty he was at both of these,
And styl'd of _war_, as well as _peace_,
(So some rats, of amphibious nature,
Are either for the land or water).
But here our authors make a doubt,
Whether he were more wise or stout.
Some hold the one, and some the other:
But howsoe'er they make a pother,
The diff'rence was so small his brain
Outweigh'd his rage but half a grain;
Which made some take him for a tool
That knaves do work with, call'd a _fool_.
For 't has been held by many, that
As Montaigne, playing with his cat,
Complains she thought him but an ass,
Much more she would Sir Hudibras,
(For that the name our valiant Knight
To all his challenges did write)
But they're mistaken very much,
'Tis plain enough he was no such.
We grant although he had much wit,
H' was very shy of using it;
As being loth to wear it out,
And therefore bore it not about
Unless on holidays, or so,
As men their best apparel do.
Besides, 'tis known he could speak Greek
As naturally as pigs squeak:
That Latin was no more difficile,
Than for a blackbird 'tis to whistle.
B'ing rich in both, he never scanted
His bounty unto such as wanted;
But much of either would afford
To many that had not one word.
For Hebrew roots, although they're found
To flourish most in barren ground,
He had such plenty as suffic'd
To make some think him circumcis'd:
And truly so he was, perhaps,
Not as a proselyte, but for claps,
He was in logic a great critic,
Profoundly skill'd in analytic;
He could distinguish, and divide
A hair 'twixt south and south west side;
On either which he could dispute,
Confute, change hands, and still confute;
He'd undertake to prove by force
Of argument, a man's no horse;
He'd prove a buzzard is no fowl,
And that a lord may be an owl;
A calf an alderman, a goose a justice,
And rooks committee-men and trustees,
He'd run in debt by disputation,
And pay with ratiocination:
All this by syllogism, true
In mood and figure, he would do.
For rhetoric, he could not ope
His mouth, but out there flew a trope;
And when he happened to break off
I' th' middle of his speech, or cough,
H' had hard words, ready to show why,
And tell what rules he did it by:
Else when with greatest art he spoke,
You'd think he talk'd like other folk,
For all a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.
But, when he pleas'd to show't his speech
In loftiness of sound was rich;
A Babylonish dialect,
Which learned pedants much affect:
It was a party-coloured dress
Of patch'd and pye-ball'd languages;
'Twas English cut on Greek and Latin,
Like fustian heretofore on satin.
It had an odd promiscuous tone,
As if h' had talk'd three parts in one;
Which made some think when he did gabble,
Th' had heard three labourers of Babel;
Or Cerberus himself pronounce
A leash of languages at once.
This he as volubly would vent
As if his stock would ne'er be spent;
And truly, to support that charge,
He had supplies as vast as large:
For he could coin or counterfeit
New words with little or no wit:
Words so debas'd and hard, no stone
Was hard enough to touch them on:
And when with hasty noise he spoke 'em,
The ignorant for current took 'em,
That had the orator who once
Did fill his mouth with pebble-stones
When he harangu'd but known his phrase,
He would have us'd no other ways.
In mathematics he was greater
Then Tycho Brahe, or Erra Pater:
For he, by geometric scale,
Could take the size of pots of ale;
Resolve by sines and tangents, straight,
If bread and butter wanted weight;
And wisely tell what hour o' th' day
The clock does strike by algebra.
Beside, he was a shrewd philosopher,
And had read ev'ry text and gloss over;
Whate'er the crabbed'st author hath,
He understood b' implicit faith:
Whatever sceptic could inquire for,
For every _why_ he had a _wherefore_,
Knew more than forty of them do,
As far as words and terms could go.
All which he understood by rote,
And as occasion serv'd, would quote:
No matter whether right or wrong,
They must be either said or sung.
His notions fitted things so well,
That which was which he could not tell;
But oftentimes mistook the one
For th' other, as great clerks have done.
He cou'd reduce all things to acts,
And knew their natures by abstracts;
Where entity and quiddity,
The ghosts of defunct bodies, fly;
Where Truth in persons does appear,
Like words congeal'd in northern air.
He knew what's what, and that's as high
As metaphysic wit can fly.
In school divinity as able,
As he that hight, Irrefragable;
A second Thomas, or at once
To name them all, another Duns:
Profound in all the Nominal
And Real ways beyond them all;
For he a rope of sand could twist
As tough as learned Sorbonist:
And weave fine cobwebs, fit for scull;
That's empty when the moon is full:
Such as lodgings in a head
That's to be let unfurnished.
He could raise scruples dark and nice,
And after solve 'em in a trice,
As if divinity had catch'd
The itch, on purpose to be scratch'd;
Or, like a mountebank, did wound
And stab herself with doubts profound,
Only to show with how small pain
The sores of faith are cur'd again;
Although by woful proof we find,
They always leave a scar behind.
He knew the seat of paradise,
Cou'd tell in what degree it lies;
And, as he was dispos'd could prove it,
Below the moon, or else above it.
What Adam dream'd of when his bride
Came from her closet in his side;
Whether the devil tempted her
By a High-Dutch interpreter;
If either of them had a navel;
Who first made music malleable;
Whether the serpent, at the fall,
Had cloven feet, or none at all;
All this without a gloss or comment,
He could unriddle in a moment,
In proper terms such as men smatter,
When they throw out and miss the matter.
For his religion it was fit
To match his learning and his wit;
'Twas Presbyterian true blue,
For he was of that stubborn crew
Of errant saints, whom all men grant
To be the true church militant:
Such as do build their faith upon
The holy text of pike and gun;
Decide all controversies by
Infallible artillery;
And prove their doctrine orthodox
By apostolic blows and knocks;
Call fire, and sword, and desolation,
A godly thorough reformation,
Which always must be carried on,
And still be doing, never done:
As if religion were intended
For nothing else but to be mended.
A sect whose chief devotion lies
In odd perverse antipathies:
In falling out with that or this,
And finding somewhat still amiss
More peevish, cross, and splenetic,
Than dog distract, or monkey sick
That with more care keep holiday
The wrong, than others the right way:
Compound for sins they are inclin'd to,
By damning those they have no mind to.
Still so perverse and opposite,
As if they worshipp'd God for spite.
The self-same thing they will abhor
One way, and long another for.
Free-will they one way disavow,
Another, nothing else allow.

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