SATIRES.

I cannot show in strange proportion,
Changing my hue like a cameleon;
But you all-canning[347] wits, hold water out,
Ye vizarded-bifronted-Janian rout.
Tell me, brown Ruscus, hast thou Gyges’ ring,
That thou presumest as if thou wert unseen?
If not, why in thy wits half capreal
Lett’st thou a superscribèd letter fall?
And from thyself unto thyself dost send,
And in the same thyself thyself commend?    10
For shame! leave running to some satrapas,
Leave glavering[348] on him in the peopled press;
Holding him on as he through Paul’s doth walk,
With nods and legs[349] and odd superfluous talk;
Making men think thee gracious in his sight,
When he esteems thee but a parasite.
For shame! unmask; leave for to cloke intent,
And show thou art vain-glorious, impudent.
Come, Briscus, by the soul of compliment,
I’ll not endure that with thine instrument    20
(Thy gambo-viol placed betwixt thy thighs,
Wherein the best part of thy courtship lies)
Thou entertain the time, thy mistress by.
Come, now let’s hear thy mounting Mercury.
What! mum? Give him his fiddle once again,
Or he’s more mute than a Pythagoran.
But oh! the absolute Castilio,[350]—
He that can all the points of courtship show;
He that can trot a courser, break a rush,
And arm’d in proof, dare dure a straw’s strong push;    30
He, who on his glorious scutcheon
Can quaintly show wit’s new invention,
Advancing forth some thirsty Tantalus,
Or else the vulture on Prometheus,
With some short motto of a dozen lines;
He that can purpose it in dainty rhymes,
Can set his face, and with his eye can speak,
Can dally with his mistress’ dangling feak,[351]
And wish that he were it, to kiss her eye
And flare about her beauty’s deity:—    40
Tut! he is famous for his revelling,
For fine set speeches, and for sonnetting;
He scorns the viol and the scraping stick,
And yet’s but broker of another’s wit.
Certes, if all things were well known and view’d,
He doth but champ that which another chew’d.
Come, come, Castilion, skim thy posset curd,
Show thy queer substance, worthless, most absurd.
Take ceremonious compliment from thee!
Alas! I see Castilio’s beggary.    50
O if Democritus were now alive,
How he would laugh to see this devil thrive!
And by an holy semblance blear men’s eyes,
When he intends some damnèd villanies.
Ixion makes fair weather unto Jove,
That he might make foul work with his fair love;
And is right sober in his outward semblance,
Demure, and modest in his countenance;
Applies himself to great Saturnus’ son,
Till Saturn’s daughter yields his motion.    60
Night-shining Phœbe knows what was begat—
A monstrous Centaur illegitimate.
Who would not chuck to see such pleasing sport—
To see such troops of gallants still resort
Unto Cornuto’s shop? What other cause
But chaste Brownetta,[352] Sporo thither draws?
Who now so long hath praised the chough’s white bill,
That he hath left her ne’er a flying quill:
His meaning gain, though outward semblance love,
So like a crabfish Sporo still doth move.    70
Laugh, laugh, to see the world, Democritus,
Cry like that strange transformèd Tereus.[353]
Now Sorbo, with a feignèd gravity,
Doth fish for honour and high dignity.
Nothing within, nor yet without, but beard,
Which thrice he strokes, before I ever heard
One wise grave word to bless my listening ear.
But mark how Good Opinion doth him rear:
See, he’s in office, on his foot-cloth placed;
Now each man caps, and strives for to be graced    80
With some rude nod of his majestic head,
Which all do wish in limbo harrièd.
But O I grieve that good men deign to be
Slaves unto him that’s slave to villany!
Now Sorbo swells with self-conceited sense,
Thinking that men do yield this reverence
Unto his virtues: fond credulity!
Ass, take[354] off Isis, no man honours thee.
Great Tubrio’s feather gallantly doth wave,
Full twenty falls[355] doth make him wondrous brave.    90
O golden jerkin! royal arming coat!
Like ship on sea, he on the land doth float.
He’s gone, he’s shipp’d, his resolution
Pricks him[356] (by Heaven) to this action.
The pox it doth! Not long since did I view
The man betake him to a common stew;
And there (I wis), like no quaint-stomach’d man,
Eats up his arms; and war’s munition,
His waving plume, falls in the broker’s chest.
Fie! that his ostrich stomach should disgest    100
His ostrich feather, eat up Venice lace!
Thou[357] that didst fear to eat poor-johns a space,
Lie close, ye slave, at beastly luxury!
Melt and consume in pleasure’s surquedry![358]
But now, thou that didst march with Spanish pike before,
Come with French pox out of that brothel door.
The fleet’s return’d. What news from Rodio?[359]
“Hot service, by the Lord,” cries Tubrio.
Why dost thou halt? “Why, six times through each thigh
Push’d with the pike of the hot enemy!    110
Hot service, hot, the Spaniard is a man;
I say no more, and as a gentleman
I served in his face. Farewell. Adieu.”
Welcome from Netherland, from steaming stew.
Ass to thy crib, doff that huge lion’s skin,
Or else the owl will hoot and drive thee in.
For shame, for shame! lewd-living Tubrio,
Presume not troop among that gallant crew
Of true heroic spirits; come, uncase,
Show us the true form of Dametas’[360] face.    120
Hence, hence, ye slave! dissemble not thy state,
But henceforth be a turncoat, runagate.
O hold my sides! that I may break my spleen
With laughter at the shadows I have seen!
Yet I can bear with Curio’s nimble feet,
Saluting me with capers in the street,
Although in open view and people’s face,
He fronts me with some spruce, neat, cinquepace;[361]
Or Tullus, though, whene’er he me espies,
Straight with loud mouth “A bandy, sir,“[362] he cries;    130
Or Robrus, who, addict to nimble fence,
Still greets me with stockado’s[363] violence.
These I do bear, because I too well know
They are the same they seem in outward show.
But all confusion sever from mine eye
This Janian bifront, Hypocrisy.

SATIRE II.

I, that even now lisp’d like an amorist,
Am turn’d into a snaphance[364] satirist.
O title, which my judgment doth adore!
But I, dull-sprited fat Bœotian[365] boor,
Do far off honour that censorian seat;
But if I could in milk-white robes entreat
Plebeians’ favour, I would show to be
Tribunus plebis, ’gainst the villany
Of these same Proteans, whose hypocrisy
Doth still abuse our fond credulity.    10
But since myself am not immaculate,
But many spots my mind doth vitiate,
I’ll leave the white robe and the biting rhymes
Unto our modern Satire’s sharpest lines,
Whose hungry fangs snarl at some secret sin,
And in such pitchy clouds enwrappèd been
His Sphinxian riddles, that old Œdipus
Would be amazed, and take it in foul snuffs
That such Cymmerian darkness should involve
A quaint conceit that he could not resolve.    20
O darkness palpable! Egypt’s black night!
My wit is stricken blind, hath lost his sight;
My shins are broke with groping for some sense,
To know to what his words have reference.
Certes, sunt but non videntur that I know;
Reach me some poets’ index that will show.
Imagines Deorum, Book of Epithets,
Natalis Comes,[366] thou I know recites,
And makest anatomy of poesy;
Help me to unmask the satire’s secrecy;    30
Delphic Apollo, aid me to unrip
These intricate deep oracles of wit—
These dark enigmas, and strange riddling sense,
Which pass my dullard brain’s intelligence.
Fie on my senseless pate! Now I can show
Thou writest that which I nor thou dost know.
Who would imagine that such squint-eyed sight
Could strike the world’s deformities so right?
But take heed, Pallas, lest thou aim awry;
Love nor yet Hate had e’er true-judging eye.    40
Who would once dream that that same elegy,
That fair-framed piece of sweetest poesy,
Which Muto put betwixt his mistress’ paps
(When he, quick-witted, call’d her Cruel Chaps,
And told her there he might his dolors read
Which she, O she! upon his heart had spread),
Was penn’d by Roscio the tragedian?
Yet Muto, like a good Vulcanian—
An honest cuckold—calls the bastard, son,
And brags of that which others for him done.    50
Satire, thou liest, for that same elegy
Is Muto’s own, his own dear poesy:
Why, ’tis his own, and dear, for he did pay
Ten crowns for it, as I heard Roscius say.—
Who would imagine yonder sober man,
That same devout meal-mouth’d precisian,
That cries “Good brother,” “Kind sister,” makes a duck
After the antique grace, can always pluck
A sacred book out of his civil hose,
And at th’ op’ning and at our stomach’s close,    60
Says with a turn’d-up eye a solemn grace
Of half an hour; then with silken face
Smiles on the holy crew, and then doth cry,
“O manners! O times of impurity!”
What that depaints[367] a church-reformed state,
The which the female tongues magnificate,
Because that Plato’s odd opinion
Of all things common hath strong motion
In their weak minds;—who thinks that this good man
Is a vile, sober, damned politician?    70
Not I, till with his bait of purity
He bit me sore in deepest usury.
No Jew, no Turk, would use a Christian
So inhumanely as this Puritan.
Diomedes’ jades were not so bestial
As this same seeming saint—vile cannibal!
Take heed, O world! take heed advisedly
Of these same damnèd anthropophagi.
I had rather be within a harpy’s claws
Than trust myself in their devouring jaws,    80
Who all confusion to the world would bring
Under the form of their new discipline.
O I could say, Briareus’ hundred hands
Were not so ready to bring Jove in bands,
As these to set endless contentious strife
Betwixt Jehovah and his sacred wife!
But see—who’s yonder? True Humility,
The perfect image of fair Courtesy;
See, he doth deign to be in servitude
Where he hath no promotion’s livelihood!    90
Mark, he doth courtesy, and salutes a block,
Will seem to wonder at a weathercock;
Trenchmore[368] with apes, play music to an owl,
Bless his sweet honour’s running brasil[369] bowl;
Cries “Bravely broke!” when that his lordship miss’d,
And is of all the throngèd[370] scaffold hiss’d;
O is not this a courteous-minded man?
No fool, no; a damn’d Machiavelian;
Holds candle to the devil for a while,
That he the better may the world beguile,    100
That’s fed with shows. He hopes, though some repine,
When sun is set the lesser stars will shine;
He is within a haughty malcontent,
Though he do use such humble blandishment.
But, bold-faced Satire, strain not over-high,
But laugh and chuck at meaner gullery.
In faith, yon is a well-faced gentleman;
See how he paceth like a Cyprian!
Fair amber tresses of the fairest hair
That ere were wavèd by our London air;    110
Rich lacèd suit, all spruce, all neat, in truth.
Ho, Lynceus! what’s yonder brisk neat youth
’Bout whom yon troop of gallants flocken so,
And now together to Brown’s Common go?
Thou know’st, I am sure; for thou canst cast thine eye
Through nine mud walls, or else old poets lie.
“’Tis loose-legg’d Lais, that same common drab
For whom good Tubrio took the mortal stab.”[371]
Ha, ha! Nay, then, I’ll never rail at those
That wear a codpis,[372] thereby to disclose    120
What sex they are, since strumpets breeches use,
And all men’s eyes save Lynceus can abuse.
Nay, stead of shadow, lay the substance out,
Or else, fair Briscus, I shall stand in doubt
What sex thou art, since such hermaphrodites,
Such Protean shadows so delude our sights.
Look, look, with what a discontented grace
Bruto the traveller doth sadly[373] pace
’Long Westminster! O civil-seeming shade,
Mark his sad colours!—how demurely clad!    130
Staidness itself, and Nestor’s gravity,
Are but the shade of his civility.
And now he sighs: “O thou corrupted age,
Which slight regard’st men of sound carriage!
Virtue, knowledge, fly to heaven again;
Deign not ’mong these ungrateful sots remain!
Well, some tongues I know, some countries I have seen,
And yet these oily snails respectless been
Of my good parts.” O worthless puffy slave!
Didst thou to Venice go ought[374] else to have,    140
But buy a lute and use a courtesan,[375]
And there to live like a Cyllenian?[376]
And now from thence what hither dost thou bring,
But surphulings,[377] new paints, and poisoning,[378]
Aretine’s[379] pictures, some strange luxury,
And new-found use of Venice venery?
What art thou but black clothes? Sad Bruto, say,
Art anything but only sad[380] array?
Which I am sure is all thou brought’st from France,
Save Naples pox and Frenchmen’s dalliance;    150
From haughty Spain, what brought’st thou else beside
But lofty looks and their Lucifrian pride?
From Belgia, what but their deep bezeling,[381]
Their boot-carouse[382] and their beer-buttering?
Well, then, exclaim not on our age, good man,
But hence, polluted Neapolitan.
Now, Satire, cease to rub our gallèd skins,
And to unmask the world’s detested sins;
Thou shalt as soon draw Nilus river dry
As cleanse the world from foul impiety.    160

SATIRE III.

Now, grim Reproof, swell in my rough-hued rhyme,
That thou mayst vex the guilty of our time.
Yon is a youth whom how can I o’er-slip,
Since he so jump doth in my meshes hit?
He hath been longer in preparing him
Than Terence wench; and now behold he’s seen.
Now, after two years’ fast and earnest prayer
The fashion change not (lest he should despair
Of ever hoarding up more fair gay clothes),
Behold at length in London street he shows.    10
His ruff did eat more time in neatest setting
Than Woodstock’s[383] work in painful perfecting;
It hath more doubles far than Ajax’ shield
When he ’gainst Troy did furious battle wield.
Nay, he doth wear an emblem ’bout his neck;
For under that fair ruff so sprucely set,
Appears a fall, a falling-band forsooth.
O dapper, rare, complete, sweet nitty[384] youth!
Jesu Maria! How his clothes appear
Cross’d and recross’d with lace, sure for some fear    20
Lest that some spirit with a tippet mace[385]
Should with a ghastly show affright his face.
His hat, himself, small crown and huge great brim,
Fair outward show, and little wit within.
And all the band with feathers he doth fill,
Which is a sign of a fantastic still.
Why, so[386] he is, his clothes do sympathise
And with his inward spirit humorise,
As sure as (some do tell me) evermore
A goat doth stand before a brothel door.    30
His clothes perfumed, his fusty mouth is aired,
His chin new swept, his very cheeks are glaired.[387]
But ho! what Ganymede is that doth grace
The gallant’s heels? One who for two days’ space
Is closely hired. Now who dares not call
This Æsop’s crow—fond, mad, fantastical?
An open ass, that is not yet so wise
As his derided fondness to disguise.
Why, thou art Bedlam mad, stark lunatic,
And glori’st to be counted a fantastic;    40
Thou neither art, nor yet will seem to be,
Heir to some virtuous praisèd quality.
O frantic man! that thinks all villany
The complete honours of nobility!
When some damn’d vice, some strange misshapen suit,
Make youths esteem themselves in high repute.
O age! in which our gallants boast to be
Slaves unto riot and rude luxury!
Nay, when they blush, and think an honest act
Doth their supposèd virtues maculate!    50
Bedlam, Frenzy, Madness, Lunacy,
I challenge all your moody empery
Once to produce a more distracted man
Than is inamorato Lucian.
For when my ears received a fearful sound
That he was sick, I went, and there I found
Him laid of love, and newly brought to bed
Of monstrous folly and a frantic head.
His chamber hang’d about with elegies,
With sad complaints of his love’s miseries;    60
His windows strew’d with sonnets, and the glass
Drawn full of love-knots. I approach’d the ass,
And straight he weeps, and sighs some sonnet out
To his fair love! And then he goes about
For to perfume her rare perfection
With some sweet-smelling pink epitheton;
Then with a melting look he writhes his head,
And straight in passion riseth in his bed;
And having kiss’d his hand, stroke up his hair,
Made a French conge, cries, “O cruel fear!”    70
To the antic bedpost. I laugh’d amain,
That down my cheeks the mirthful drops did rain.
Well, he’s no Janus, but substantial,
In show and essence a good natural;
When as thou hear’st me ask spruce Duceus
From whence he comes; and he straight answers us,
From Lady Lilla; and is going straight
To the Countess of (——), for she doth wait
His coming, and will surely send her coach,
Unless he make the speedier approach:    80
Art not thou ready for to break thy spleen
At laughing at the fondness thou hast seen
In this vain-glorious fool, when thou dost know
He never durst unto these ladies show
His pippin face? Well, he’s no accident,
But real, real, shameless, impudent;
And yet he boasts, and wonders that each man
Can call him by his name, sweet Ducean;
And is right proud that thus his name is known.
Ay, Duceus, ay, thy name is too far blown:    90
The world too much, thyself too little know’st,
Thy private self. Why, then, should Duceus boast?
But, humble Satire, wilt thou deign display
These open nags, which purblind eyes bewray?
Come, come, and snarl more dark at secret sin,
Which in such labyrinths enwrappèd bin,
That, Ariadne, I must crave thy aid
To help me find where this foul monster’s laid;
Then will I drive the Minotaur from us,
And seem to be a second Theseus.    100