THE
WORLD TOST AT TENNIS.

A Courtly Masque: The Deuice called, The World tost at Tennis. As it hath beene diuers times Presented to the Contentment of many Noble and Worthy Spectators: By the Prince his Seruants.

Inuented and set
downe, By bracket Tho: Middleton
&
William Rowley bracket Gent.

London printed by George Purslowe, and are to be sold at Christ ——. 4to.

In all the copies of this Masque which I have seen, a portion of the letter-press has been cut off from the bottom of the title-page by the binder. Langbaine (Acc. of Engl. Dram. Poets, p. 374) gives to it the date 1620: and so the Biographia Dramatica, which adds that it was entered on the book of the Stationers’ Company July 4, in that year.

THE EPISTLE DEDICATORY.

TO THE TRULY NOBLE
CHARLES LORD HOWARD, Baron of Effingham,
AND TO HIS VIRTUOUS AND WORTHY LADY
The Right Honourable MARY LADY EFFINGHAM,

Eldest Daughter of the truly generous and judicious Sir William Cockaine, Knight, Lord Mayor of this City, and Lord General of the Military Forces.

To whom more properly may art prefer
Works of this nature, which are high and rare,
Fit to delight a prince’s eye and ear,
Than to the hands of such a worthy pair?
Imagine this—mix’d with delight and state,
Being then an entertainment for the best—
Your noble nuptials comes to celebrate;
And though it fall short of the day and feast
Of your most sacred and united loves,
Let none say therefore it untimely moves:
It can, I hope, come out of season never
To find your joys new—as at first, for ever.
Most respectfully devoted
To both your Honours,
Tho. Middleton.
To the well-wishing, well-reading Understander,
well-understanding Reader,
Simplicity S.P.D.

After most hearty commendations, my kind and unknown friends, trusting in Phœbus your understandings are all in as good health as Simplicity’s was at the writing hereof; this is to certify you further, that this short and small treatise that follows, called a Masque, the device further intituled The World tost at Tennis—how it will be now tossed in the world, I know not—a toy brought to the press rather by the printer than the poet, who requested an epistle for his pass, to satisfy his perusers how hitherto he hath behaved himself. First, for his conception, he was begot in Brainford,[217] born on the bank-side of Helicon, brought up amongst noble gentle commons and good scholars of all sorts, where, for his time, he did good and honest service beyond the small seas: he was fair-spoken, never accused of scurrilous or obscene language, a virtue not ever found in scenes of the like condition; of as honest meaning reputed, as his words reported; neither too bitterly taxing, nor too soothingly telling, the world’s broad abuses; moderately merry, as sententiously serious; never condemned but for his brevity in speech, ever wishing his tale longer, to be assured he would continue to so good a purpose. Having all these handsome qualities simply, and no other compounded with knavery, there is great hope he shall pass still by the fair way of good report, persevering in those honest courses which may become the son of Simplicity, who, though he be now in a masque, yet is his face apparent enough. And so, loving cousins, having no news to send you at this time, but that Deceit is entering upon you, whom I pray you have a care to avoid; and this notice I can give you of him,—there are some six or eight pages before him, the Lawyer and the Devil behind him. In this care I leave you, not leaving to be

Your kind and loving kinsman,
Simplicity.

PROLOGUE.

This our device we do not call a play,
Because we break the stage’s laws to-day
Of acts and scenes: sometimes a comic strain
Hath hit delight home in the master-vein,
Thalia’s prize; Melpomene’s sad style
Hath shook the tragic hand another while;
The Muse of History hath caught your eyes,
And she [that] chaunts the pastoral psalteries:
We now lay claim to none, yet all present,
Seeking out pleasure to find your content.
You shall perceive, by what comes first in sight,
It was intended for a royal night:
There’s one hour’s words, the rest in songs and dances;
Lauds no man’s own, no man himself advances,
No man is lifted but by other hands;
Say he could leap, he lights but where he stands:
Such is our fate; if good, much good may’t do you!
If not, sorry we’ll lose our labours wi’ you.

THE FIGURES AND PERSONS

PROPERLY RAISED FOR EMPLOYMENT THROUGH THE
WHOLE MASQUE.
First, three ancient and princely Receptacles, Richmond, St. James’s, and Denmark-House.
A Scholar. Pallas.
A Soldier. Jupiter.
The Nine Worthies [the Nine Muses.]
The first Song and first Dance.
Time, a plaintiff, but his grievances delivered courteously.
The five Starches, White, Blue, Yellow, Green, and Red.
The second Dance.
 
Simplicity. The Intermeddler.
Deceit. The Disguiser.
 
The second Song.
 
A King. A Sea-Captain.
A Land-Captain. Mariners.
 
The third Song and third Dance.
 
The Flamen. The Lawyer.
 
The fourth and last Dance, the Devil an intermixer.
THE
WORLD TOST AT TENNIS.
An Induction to the Masque prepared for his Majesty’s
Entertainment at Denmark-House.
Enter Richmond and St. James’s.
St. Jam. Why, Richmond, Richmond, why art so
heavy?
Rich. I have reason enough for that, good,
sainted sister; am I not built with stone—fair,
large, and free stone—some part covered with lead
too?
St. Jam. All this is but a light-headed understanding
now; I mean, why so melancholy? thou
lookest mustily, methinks.
Rich. Do I so? and yet I dwell in sweeter air
than you, sweet St. James: how three days warming
has spirited you! you have sometimes your vacations
as other of your friends have, if you call
yourself to mind.
St. Jam. Thou never sawest my new gallery and
my tennis-court, Richmond.
Rich. No, but I heard of it, and from whence it
came too.
St. Jam. Why, from whence came it?
Rich. Nay, lawfully derived, from the brick-kilns,
as thou didst thyself.
St. Jam. Thou breedest crickets, I think, and that
will serve for the anagram to a critic. Come, I know thy grief;
Thou fear’st that our late rival, Denmark-House,
Will take from our regard, and we shall want
The noble presence of our princely master
In his so frequent visitation,
Which we were wont so fully to enjoy.
Rich. And is not that a cause of sorrow then?
St. Jam. Rather a cause of joy, that we enjoy
So fair a fellowship. Denmark! why, she’s
A stately palace and majestical,
Ever of courtly breeding, but of late
Built up unto a royal height of state,
Rounded with noble prospects; by her side
The silver-footed Thamesis doth slide,
As, though more faintly, Richmond, does by thee,
Which I, denied to touch, can only see.
Enter Denmark-House.
Rich. Who’s this?
St. Jam. ’Tis she herself, i’faith; comes with
A courteous brow.
Den.-H. Ye’re welcome, most nobly welcome!
St. Jam. Hark you now, Richmond; did not I tell thee ’twas
A royal house?
Den.-H. Why, was there any doubt
Of our kind gratulation? I am proud
Only to be in fellowship with you,
Co-mate and servant to so great a master.
St. Jam. That’s Richmond’s fear thou’lt rob us
both, thou hast such an enticing face of thine own.
Den.-H. O let not that be any difference!
When we do serve, let us be ready for’t,
And call’d at his great pleasure; the round year
In her circumferent arms will fold us all,
And give us all employment seasonable.
I am for colder hours, when the bleak air
Bites with an icy tooth: when summer has sear’d,
And autumn all discolour’d, laid all fallow,
Pleasure taken house and dwells within doors,
Then shall my towers smoke and comely shew:
But when again the fresher morn appears,
And the soft spring renews her velvet head,
St. James’s take my blest inhabitants,
For she can better entertain them then,
In larger grounds,[218] in park, sports, and delights:
Yet a third season,[219] with the western oars,
Calls up to Richmond, when the high-heated year
Is in her solsticy; then she affords
More sweeter-breathing air, more bounds, more pleasures;
The hounds’ loud music to the flying stag,
The feather’d talenter[220] to the falling bird,
The bowman’s twelve-score prick[221] even at the door,
And to these I could add a hundred more.
Then let not us strive which shall be his homes,
But strive to give him welcome when he comes.
Rich. By my troth, he shall be welcome to Richmond whensoever he comes.
St. Jam. And to St. James’s, i’faith, at midnight.
Den.-H. Meantime ’tis fit I give him welcome hither;—
But first to you, my royal, royal’st guest,[222]
And I could wish your banquet were a feast;
Howe’er, your welcome is most bounteous,
Which, I beseech you, take as gracious.—
To you, my owner, master, and my lord,
Let me the second unto you afford,
And then from you to all; for it is you
That gives indeed what I but seem to do.
I was from ruin rais’d by a fair hand,
A royal hand; in that state let me stand
For ever now: to bounty I was bred,
My cups full-brimm’d and my free tables spread
To hundreds daily, even without my door;
I had an open hand unto the poor,
I know I shall so still; then shall their prayers
Pass by the porter’s keys, climb up each stairs,
And knit and joint my new re-edified frames,
That I shall able be to keep your names
Unto eternity: Denmark-House shall keep
Her high name now till Time doth fall asleep
And be no more. Meantime, welcome, welcome,
Heartily welcome! but chiefly you, great sir;
Whate’er lies in my power, command me all,
As freely as you were at your Whitehall. [Exeunt.
A COURTLY MASQUE, &c.
Enter a Soldier and a Scholar.

Scho. Soldier, ta-ra-ra-ra-ra! how is’t? thou lookest as if thou hadst lost a field to-day.

Sol. No, but I have lost a day i’ the field: if you take me a maunding[223] but where I am commanding, let ’em shew me the House of Correction.

Scho. Why, thou wert not maunding, wert thou? there’s martial danger in that, believe it.

Sol. No, sir; but I was bold to shew myself to some of my old and familiar acquaintance, but being disguised with my wants, there’s nobody knew me.

Scho. Faith, and that’s the worst disguise a man can walk in; thou wert better have appeared drunk in good clothes, much better: there’s no superfluities shame a man,—as to be over-brave,[224] over-bold, over-swearing, over-lying, over-whoring; these add still to his repute: ’tis the poor indigence, the want, the lank deficiency,—as when a man cannot be brave, dares not be bold, is afraid to swear, wants maintenance for a lie, and money to give a whore a supper; this is pauper cujus modicum non satis est: nay, he shall never be rich with begging neither, which is another wonder, because many beggars are rich.

Sol. O canina facundia! this dog-eloquence of thine will make thee somewhat one day, scholar: couldst thou turn but this prose into rhyme, there were a pitiful living to be picked out of it.

Scho. I could make ballads for a need.

Sol. Very well, sir, and I’ll warrant thee thou shalt never want subject to write of: one hangs himself to-day, another drowns himself to-morrow, a sergeant stabbed next day; here a pettifogger a’ the pillory, a bawd in the cart’s nose, and a pander in the tail; hic mulier, hæc vir, fashions, fictions, felonies, fooleries;—a hundred havens has the balladmonger to traffic at, and new ones still daily discovered.

Scho. Prithee, soldier, no further this way; I participate more of Heraclitus than Democritus; I could rather weep the sins of the people than sing ’em.

Sol. Shall I set thee down a course to live?

Scho. Faith, a coarse living, I think, must serve my turn; but why hast thou not found out thine own yet?

Sol. Tush, that’s resolv’d on, beg; when there’s use for me
I shall be brave again, hugg’d and belov’d:
We are like winter-garments, in the height
And [the] hot blood of summer, put off, thrown by
For moths’ meat, never so much as thought on;
Till the drum strikes up storms again, and then,
Come, my well-linèd soldier, (with valour,
Not valure,)[225] keep me warm; O, I love thee!
We shall be trimm’d and very well brush’d then;
If we be fac’d with fur ’tis tolerable,
For we may pillage then and steal our prey,
And not be hang’d for’t; when the least fingering
In peaceful summer chokes us. A soldier,
At the best, is even but the forlorn hope
Unto his country, sent desperately out,
And never more expected; if he come,
Peace’s war, perhaps, the law, providently
Has provided for him some house or lands,
May be suspens’d in wrangling controversy,
And he be hir’d to keep possession,
For there may be swords drawn; he may become
The abject second to some stinking baily:
O, let him serve the pox first, and die a gentleman!
Come, I know my ends, but would fain provide for thee;
Canst thou make——
Scho. What? I have no handicraft, man.
Sol. Cuckolds, make cuckolds; ’tis a pretty trade
In a peaceful city; ’tis women’s work, man,
And they’re good paymasters.
Scho. I dare not; ’tis a work
Of supererogation, and the church
Forbids it.
Sol. Prithee, what is Latin for
A cuckold, scholar? I could never learn yet.
Scho. Faith, the Latins have no proper word for it
That ever I read; homo, I take it, is the best,
Because it is a common name to all men.
Sol. You’re mad fellows you scholars; I’m persuaded,
Were I a scholar now, I could not want.
Scho. Every man’s most capable of his own grief:
A scholar said you? why, there are none now-a-days;
Were you a scholar, you’d be a singular fellow.
Sol. How, no scholars? what’s become of ’em all?
Scho. I’ll make it proof from your experience:
A commander’s a commander, captain captain;
But having no soldiers, where’s the command?
Such are we, all doctors, no disciples now;
Every man’s his own teacher, none learns of others.
You have not heard of our mechanic rabbies,
That shall dispute in their own tongues backward and forward
With all the learnèd fathers of the Jews?
Sol. Mechanic rabbies? what might those be?
Scho. I’ll shew you, sir—
And they are men are daily to be seen—
There’s rabbi Job a venerable silk-weaver,
Jehu a throwster[226] dwelling i’ the Spitalfields,
There’s rabbi Abimelech a learnèd cobbler,
Rabbi Lazarus a superstichious[227] tailor;
These shall hold up their shuttles, needles, awls,
Against the gravest Levite of the land,
And give no ground neither.
Sol. That I believe;
They have no ground for any thing they do.
Scho. You understand right; and these men, by practique,
Have got the theory of all the arts
At their fingers’ ends, and in that they’ll live;
Howe’er they’ll die I know not, for they change daily.
Sol. This is strange; how come they to attain this knowledge?
Scho. As boys learn arithmetic,—practice with counters,
To reckon sums of silver; so, with their tools,
They come to grammar, logic, rhetoric,
And all the sciences; as, for example,
The devout weaver sits within his loom,
And thus he makes a learnèd syllogism,—
His woof the major and his warp the minor,
His shuttle then the brain and firm conclusion,
Makes him a piece of stuff that Aristotle,
Ramus, nor all the logicians can take a’ pieces.
Sol. This has some likelihood.
Scho. So likewise, by
His deep instructive and his mystic tools,
The tailor comes to be rhetorical:
First, on the spread velvet, satin, stuff, or cloth,
He chalks out a circumferent periphrase,[228]
That goes about the bush where the thief stands;
Then comes his shears in shape of an eclipsis,
And takes away the other’s[229] too long tail;
By his needle he understands ironia,
That with one eye looks two ways at once;
Metonymia ever at his fingers’ ends;
Some call his pickadill[230] synecdoche,
But I think rather that should be his yard,
Being but pars pro toto; and by metaphor
All know the cellaridge under the shop-board
He calls his hell, not that it is a place
Of spirits’ abode, but that from that abyss
Is no recovery or redemption
To any owner’s hand, whatever falls.
I could run further, were’t not tedious,
And place the stiff-toed cobbler in his form:
But let them mend themselves, for yet all’s naught,
They now learn only never to be taught.
Sol. Let them alone; how shall we learn to live?
Scho. Without book is most perfect, for with ’em
We shall hardly: thou may’st keep a fence-school,
’Tis a noble science.
Sol. I had rather be i’ the crown-office:
Thou mayest keep school too, and do good service,
To bring up children for the next age better.
Scho. ’Tis a poor living that’s pick’d out of boys’ buttocks.
Sol. ’Tis somewhat better than the night-farmer yet. [Music.
Hark, what sounds are these?
Pallas descends.
Scho. Ha! there’s somewhat more;
There is in sight a presence glorious,[231]
A presence more than human.
Sol. An amazing one!
Scholar, if ever thou couldst conjure, speak now.
Scho. In name of all the deities, what art thou?
Thy shine is more than sub-celestial,
’Tis at the least heavenly-angelical.
Pal. A patroness unto ye both, ye ignorant
And undeserving favourites of my fame.—
You are a soldier?
Sol. Since these arms could wield arms,
I have profess’d it, brightest deity.
Pal. To thee I am Bellona.—You are a scholar?
Scho. In that poor pilgrimage, since I could go,
I hitherto have walk’d.
Pal. To thee I am Minerva;
Pallas to both, goddess of arts and arms,
Of arms and arts, for neither have precedence,
For he’s the complete man partakes of both,
The soul of arts join’d with the flesh of valour,
And he alone participates with me:
Thou art no soldier unless a scholar,
Nor thou a scholar unless a soldier.
Ye’ve noble breedings both, worthy foundations,
And will ye build up rotten battlements
On such fair groundsels? that will ruin all.
Lay wisdom on thy valour, on thy wisdom valour,
For these are mutual co-incidents.—
What seeks the soldier?
Sol. My maintenance.
Pal. Lay by thine arms and take the city then,
There’s the full cup and cap of maintenance.—
And your grief is want too?
Scho. I want all but grief.
Pal. No, you want most what most you do profess:
Where read you to be rich was happiest?
He had no bay from Phœbus, nor from me,
That ever wrote so, no Minerva in him;
My priests have taught that poverty is safe,
Sweet and secure, for nature gives man nothing
At his birth; when life and earth are wedded,
There’s neither basin held nor dowry given;
At parting nor is any garner stor’d,
Wardrobe or warehouse kept, for their return:
Wherefore shall, then, man count his myriads
Of gold and silver idols, since thrifty nature
Will nothing lend but she will have’t again,
And life and labour for her interest?
My priests do teach,—seek thou thyself within,
Make thy mind wealthy, thy conscience knowing,[232]
And those shall keep thee company from hence.
Or would you wish to emulate the gods,
Live, as you may imagine, careless and free,
With joys and pleasures crown’d, and those eternal?
This were to far exceed ’em; for while earth lasts,
The deities themselves abate their fulness,
Troubled with cries of ne’er-contented man;
Man then to seek and find it; all that hope
Fled when Pandora’s fatal box flew ope.
Sol. Lady divine,[233] there’s yet a competence
Which we come short of.
Pal. That may as well be caus’d
From your own negligence as our slow blessings;
But I’ll prefer you to a greater power,
Even Jupiter himself,[234] father and king of gods,
With whom I may well join in just complaint.
These latter ages have despoil’d my fame;
Minerva’s altars are all ruin’d now:
I had a long-ador’d Palladium,
Offerings and incense fuming on my shrine;
Rome held me dear, and old Troy gave me worship,
All Greece renown’d me, till the Ida-prize
Join’d me with wrathful Juno to destroy ’em,
For we are better ruin’d than profan’d:
Now let the latter ages count the gains
They got by wanton Venus’ sacrifice;
But I’ll invoke great Jupiter.
Scho. Do, goddess,
And re-erect the ruins of thy fame,
For poesy can do it.
Pal. Altitonant,[235]
Imperial-crown’d, and thunder-armèd Jove,
Unfold thy fiery veil, the flaming robe
And superficies of thy better brightness;
Descend from thine orbicular chariot,
Listen the plaints of thy poor votaries!
’Tis Pallas calls, thy daughter, Jupiter,
Ta’en from thee by the Lemnian Mulciber,
A midwife-god to the delivery
Of thy most sacred, fertile, teeming brain.—[Music.
Hark!
These sounds proclaim his willing sweet descent;
If not full blessings, expect some content.
Jupiter descends.
Jup. What would our daughter?
Pal. Just-judging Jove,
Y-meditate[236] the suit of humble mortals,
By whose large sceptre all their fates are sway’d,
Adverse or auspicious.
Jup. ’Tis more than Jupiter
Can do to please ’em: unsatisfied man
Has in his ends no end; not hell’s abyss
Is deeper-gulf’d than greedy avarice;
Ambition finds no mountain high enough
For his aspiring foot to stand upon:
One drinks out all his blessings into surfeits,
Another throws ’em out as all were his,
And the gods bound for prodigal supply:
What is he lives content in any kind?
That long-incensèd nature is now ready
To turn all back into the fruitless chaos.
Pal. These are two noble virtues, my dread sire,
Both arts and arms, well-wishers unto Pallas.
Jup. How can it be but they have both abus’d,
And would, for their ills, make our justice guilty?
Shew them their shames, Minerva; what the young world,
In her unstable youth, did then produce;
She should grow graver now, more sage, more wise,
Know concord and the harmony of goodness;
But if her old age strike with harsher notes,
We may then think she is too old, and dotes.
Strike, by white art, a theomantic power,
Magic divine—not the devil’s horror,
But the delicious music of the spheres—
The thrice-three Worthies summon back to life;
There let ’em see what arts and arms commixt—
For they had both—did in the world’s broad face;
Those that did propagate and beget their fames,
And for posterity left lasting names.
Pal. I shall, great Jupiter.

[Music, and this Song as an invocation to the Nine Muses, who, in the time, are discovered, with the Nine Worthies, on the upper-stage:[237] toward the conclusion they descend, each Worthy led by a Muse, the most proper and pertinent to the person of the Worthy, as Terpsichore with David, Urania with Joshua, &c.

The First Song.
Muses, usher in those states,[238]
And amongst ’em choose your mates;
There wants not one, nor one to spare,
For thrice three both your numbers are:
Learning’s mistress fair Calliope,
Loud Euterpe, sweet Terpsichore,
Soft Thalia, sad Melpomene,
Pleasant Clio, large Erato,
High aspiring-ey’d Urania,
Honey-lingued[239] Polyhymnia,
Leave awhile your Thespian springs,
And usher in those more than kings;
We call them Worthies, ’tis their due,
Though long time dead, still live by you.

[Enter at the three several doors the Nine Worthies, three after three, whom, as they enter, Pallas describes.

Pal. These three were Hebrews;
This noble duke[240] was he at whose command
Hyperion rein’d his fiery coursers in,
And fixèd stood over Mount Gilboa;
This Mattathias’ son,[241] the Maccabee,
Under whose arm no less than worthies fell;
This the most sweet and sacred psalmograph:[242]
These, of another sort, of much less knowledge,
Little less valour, a Macedonian born,[243]
Whom afterwards the world could scarcely bear
For his great weight in conquest; this Troy’s best soldier,[244]
This Rome’s first Cæsar: these three, of latter times,
And to the present more familiar,
Great Charles of France[245] and the brave Bulloin duke;[246]
And this is Britain’s glory,[247] king’d thirteen times.—
Ye’ve fair aspècts: more to express Jove’s power,
Shew you have motion for a jovial hour.