Yet know Apollo’s quiver is not spent,
But can abate your daring hardiment.
Python is slain, yet his accursèd race
Dare look divine Astrea in the face; 10
Chaos return, and with confusion
Involve the world with strange disunion;
For Pluto sits in that adorèd chair
Which doth belong unto Minerva’s heir.
O hecatombe! O catastrophe![402]
From Midas’ pomp to Irus’ beggary!
Prometheus, who celestial fire
Did steal from heaven, therewith to inspire
Our earthly bodies with a senseful mind,
Whereby we might the depth of nature find, 20
Is ding’d[403] to hell, and vulture eats his heart,
Which did such deep philosophy impart
To mortal men; when thieving Mercury,
That even in his new-born infancy
Stole fair Apollo’s quiver and Jove’s mace,
And would have filch’d the lightning from his place,
But that he fear’d he should have burnt his wing
And sing’d his downy feathers’ new-come spring;
He that in ghastly shade of night doth lead
Our souls unto the empire of the dead; 30
When he that better doth deserve a rope
Is a fair planet in our horoscope,
And now hath Caduceus in his hand,
Of life and death that hath the sole command.
Thus petty thefts are paid and soundly whipt,
But greater crimes are slightly overslipt;
Nay, he’s a god that can do villany
With a good grace and glib facility.
The harmless hunter, with a ventrous eye,
When unawares he did Diana spy 40
Nak’d in the fountain, he became straightway
Unto his greedy hounds a wishèd prey,
His own delights taking away his breath,
And all ungrateful forced his fatal death
(And ever since hounds eat their masters clean,
For so Diana curst them in the stream).
When strong-back’d Hercules, in one poor night,
With great, great ease, and wond[e]rous delight,
In strength of lust and Venus’ surquedry,
Robb’d fifty wenches of virginity— 50
Far more than lusty Laurence[404]—yet, poor soul,
He with Actæon drinks of Nemis’[405] bowl:
When Hercules’ lewd act is registered,
And for his fruitful labour deified,
And had a place in heaven him assigned,
When he the world unto the world resigned.
Thus little scapes are deeply punishèd,
But mighty villains are for gods adored.
Jove brought his sister to a nuptial bed,
And hath an Hebe and a Ganymede, 60
A Leda, and a thousand more beside
His chaste Alcmena and his sister-bride,
Who ’fore his face was odiously defil’d,
And by Ixion grossly got with child:
This thunderer, that right vertuously
Thrust forth his father from his empery,
Is now the great monarcho of the earth,
Whose awful nod, whose all-commanding breath,
Shakes Europe’s ground-work; and his title makes[406]
As dread a noise as when a cannon shakes 70
The subtile air. Thus hell-bred villany
Is still rewarded with high dignity,
When Sisyphus, that did but once reveal
That this incestuous villain had to deal
In isle Phliunte with Ægina fair,[407]
Is damn’d to hell, in endless black despair
Ever to rear his tumbling stone upright
Upon the steepy mountain’s lofty height;
His stone will never now get greenish moss,
Since he hath thus incurred so great a loss 80
As Jove’s high favour. But it needs must be
Whilst Jove doth rule and sway the empery.
And poor Astrea’s fled into an isle,
And lives a poor and banishèd exile,
And there penn’d up, sighs in her sad lament,
Wearing away in pining languishment.
If that Silenus’ ass do chance to bray,
And so the satyrs’ lewdness doth bewray,
Let him for ever be a sacrifice;
Prick, spur, beat, load, for ever tyrannise 90
Over the fool. But let some Cerberus
Keep back the wife of sweet-tongued Orpheus,
Gnato[408] applauds the hound. Let that same child
Of night and sleep (which hath the world defiled
With odious railing) bark ’gainst all the work
Of all the gods, and find some error lurk
In all the graces; let his laver[409] lip
Speak in reproach of Nature’s workmanship;
Let him upbraid fair Venus, if he list,
For her short heel; let him with rage insist 100
To snarl at Vulcan’s man, because he was
Not made with windows of transparent glass,
That all might see the passions of his mind;
Let his all-blasting tongue great errors find
In Pallas’ house, because if next should burn,
It could not from the sudden peril turn;
Let him upbraid great Jove with luxury,
Condemn the heaven’s queen of jealousy:
Yet this same Stygian Momus must be praised,
And to some godhead at the least be raised. 110
But if poor Orpheus sing melodiously,
And strive with music’s sweetest symphony
To praise the gods, and unadvisedly
Do but o’er-slip one drunken deity,
Forthwith the bouzing Bacchus out doth send
His furious Bacchides, to be revenged;
And straight they tear the sweet musician,
And leave him to the dogs’ division.
Hebrus, bear witness of their cruelty,
For thou didst view poor Orpheus’ tragedy. 120
Thus slight neglects are deepest villany,
But blasting mouths deserve a deity.
Since Gallus slept, when he was set to watch
Lest Sol or Vulcan should Mavortius catch
In using Venus; since the boy did nap,
Whereby bright Phœbus did great Mars intrap,
Poor Gallus now (whilom to Mars so dear)
Is turnèd to a crowing chaunticlere;
And ever since, ’fore that the sun doth shine
(Lest Phœbus should with his all-piercing eyne 130
Descry some Vulcan), he doth crow full shrill,
That all the air with echoes he doth fill;
Whilst Mars, though all the gods do see his sin,
And know in what lewd vice he liveth in,
Yet is adored still, and magnified,
And with all honours duly worshipped.
Euge! Small faults to mountains straight are raised;
Slight scapes are whipt, but damnèd deeds are praised.
Fie, fie! I am deceived all this while,
A mist of errors doth my sense beguile; 140
I have been long of all my wits bereaven;
Heaven for hell taking, taking hell for heaven;
Virtue for vice, and vice for virtue still;
Sour for sweet, and good for passing ill.
If not, would vice and odious villany
Be still rewarded with high dignity?
Would damned Jovians be of all men praised,
And with high honours unto heaven raised?
’Tis so, ’tis so; riot and luxury
Are virtuous, meritorious chastity: 150
That which I thought to be damn’d hell-born pride,
Is humble modesty, and nought beside;
That which I deemèd Bacchus’ surquedry,
Is grave and staid, civil sobriety.
O then, thrice holy age, thrice sacred men,
’Mong whom no vice a satire can discern,
Since lust is turnèd into chastity,
And riot unto sad sobriety,
Nothing but goodness reigneth in our age,
And virtues all are join’d in marriage! 160
Here is no dwelling for impiety,
No habitation for base villany;
Here are no subject for reproof’s sharp vein;
Then hence, rude satire, make away amain,
And seek a seat where more impurity
Doth lie and lurk in still security!
Now doth my satire stagger in a doubt,
Whether to cease or else to write it out.
The subject is too sharp for my dull quill;
Some son of Maia, show thy riper skill; 170
For I’ll go turn my tub against the sun,
And wistly mark how higher planets run,
Contemplating their hidden motion.
Then on some Latmos with Endymion,
I’ll slumber out my time in discontent,
And never wake to be malevolent,
A beadle to the world’s impurity.
But ever sleep in still security.
If this displease the world’s wrong-judging sight,
It glads my soul, and in some better sprite 180
I’ll write again. But if that this do please,
Hence, hence, satiric Muse, take endless ease,
Hush now, ye band-dogs, bark no more at me,
But let me slide away in secrecy.
EPICTETUS.[410]
[401] In Topsel’s Hist. of Four-footed Beasts (ed. 1658, pp. 352-5) there is an interesting chapter “of the Lamia.”
[402] “Huc usque Xylinum.”—Marginal note in old ed. The meaning is “Bombast—balderdash—up to this point.” Marston lets the reader know that the high-sounding lines at the beginning of this satire are to be taken in jest. See more on p. 342. (Lat. xylinum, Gr. ξύλινον = cotton, bombast.)