————————————- Ecce Iterum Crispinus.—- ————————————-
WELL! SIDROPHEL, though 'tis in vain
To tamper with your crazy brain,
Without trepanning of your skull
As often as the moon's at full
'Tis not amiss, e're y' are giv'n o'er, 5
To try one desp'rate med'cine more
For where your case can be no worse,
The desp'rat'st is the wisest course.
Is't possible that you, whose ears
Are of the tribe of Issachar's, 10
And might (with equal reason) either,
For merit, or extent of leather,
With WILLIAM PRYN'S, before they were
Retrench'd and crucify'd, compare,
Shou'd yet be deaf against a noise 15
So roaring as the publick voice
That speaks your virtues free, and loud,
And openly, in ev'ry crowd,
As, loud as one that sings his part
T' a wheel-barrow or turnip-cart, 20
Or your new nick-nam'd old invention
To cry green-hastings with an engine;
(As if the vehemence had stunn'd,
And turn your drum-heads with the sound;)
And 'cause your folly's now no news, 25
But overgrown, and out of use,
Persuade yourself there's no such matter,
But that 'tis vanish'd out of nature;
When folly, as it grows in years,
The more extravagant appears; 30
For who but you could be possest
With so much ignorance, and beast,
That neither all mens' scorn and hate,
Nor being laugh'd and pointed at,
Nor bray'd so often in a mortar, 35
Can teach you wholesome sense and nurture;
But (like a reprobate) what course
Soever's us'd, grow worse and worse
Can no transfusion of the blood,
That makes fools cattle, do you good? 40
Nor putting pigs t' a bitch to nurse,
To turn 'em into mungrel-curs,
Put you into a way, at least,
To make yourself a better beast?
Can all your critical intrigues 45
Of trying sound from rotten eggs;
Your several new-found remedies
Of curing wounds and scabs in trees;
Your arts of flexing them for claps,
And purging their infected saps; 50
Recov'ring shankers, crystallines,
And nodes and botches in their rinds,
Have no effect to operate
Upon that duller block, your pate?
But still it must be lewdly bent 55
To tempt your own due punishment;
And, like your whymsy'd chariots, draw,
The boys to course you without law;
As if the art you have so long
Profess'd, of making old dogs young, 60
In you had virtue to renew
Not only youth, but childhood too.
Can you that understand all books,
By judging only with your looks,
Resolve all problems with your face, 65
As others do with B's and A's;
Unriddle all that mankind knows
With solid bending of your brows;
All arts and sciences advance,
With screwing of your countenance, 70
And, with a penetrating eye,
Into th' abstrusest learning pry?
Know more of any trade b' a hint;
Than those that have been bred up in't;
And yet have no art, true or false, 75
To help your own bad naturals;
But still, the more you strive t' appear,
Are found to be the wretcheder
For fools are known by looking wise,
As men find woodcocks by their eyes. 80
Hence 'tis that 'cause y' have gain'd o' th' college
A quarter share (at most) of knowledge,
And brought in none, but spent repute,
Y' assume a pow'r as absolute
To judge, and censure, and controll, 85
As if you were the sole Sir Poll;
And saucily pretend to know
More than your dividend comes to.
You'll find the thing will not be done
With ignorance and face alone 90
No, though y' have purchas'd to your name,
In history, so great a fame;
That now your talents, so well
For having all belief out-grown,
That ev'ry strange prodigious tale 95
Is measur'd by your German scale;
By which the virtuosi try
The magnitude of ev'ry lye,
Cast up to what it does amount,
And place the bigg'st to your account? 100
That all those stories that are laid
Too truly to you, and those made,
Are now still charg'd upon your score,
And lesser authors nam'd no more.
Alas! that faculty betrays 105
Those soonest it designs to raise;
And all your vain renown will spoil,
As guns o'ercharg'd the more recoil.
Though he that has but impudence,
To all things has a fair pretence; 110
And put among his wants but shame,
To all the world may lay his claim:
Though you have try'd that nothing's borne
With greater ease than public scorn,
That all affronts do still give place 115
To your impenetrable face,
That makes your way through all affairs,
As pigs through hedges creep with theirs;
Yet as 'tis counterfeit, and brass,
You must not think 'twill always pass; 120
For all impostors, when they're known,
Are past their labour, and undone.
And all the best that can befal
An artificial natural,
Is that which madmen find as soon 125
As once they're broke loose from the moon,
And, proof against her influence,
Relapse to e'er so little sense,
To turn stark fools, and subjects fit
For sport of boys, and rabble-wit. 130
PART III.
CANTO I.
THE ARGUMENT.
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The Knight and Squire resolve, at once,
The one the other to renounce.
They both approach the Lady's Bower;
The Squire t'inform, the Knight to woo her.
She treats them with a Masquerade,
By Furies and Hobgoblins made;
From which the Squire conveys the Knight,
And steals him from himself, by Night.
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'Tis true, no lover has that pow'r
T' enforce a desperate amour,
As he that has two strings t' his bow,
And burns for love and money too;
For then he's brave and resolute, 5
Disdains to render in his suit,
Has all his flames and raptures double,
And hangs or drowns with half the trouble,
While those who sillily pursue,
The simple, downright way, and true, 10
Make as unlucky applications,
And steer against the stream their passions.
Some forge their mistresses of stars,
And when the ladies prove averse,
And <a> more untoward to be won 15
Than by CALIGULA the Moon,
Cry out upon the stars, for doing
Ill offices to cross their wooing;
When only by themselves they're hindred,
For trusting those they made her kindred; 20
And still, the harsher and hide-bounder
The damsels prove, become the fonder.
For what mad lover ever dy'd
To gain a soft and gentle bride?
Or for a lady tender-hearted, 25
In purling streams or hemp departed?
Leap'd headlong int' Elysium,
Through th' windows of a dazzling room?
But for some cross, ill-natur'd dame,
The am'rous fly burnt in his flame. 30
This to the Knight could be no news,
With all mankind so much in use;
Who therefore took the wiser course,
To make the most of his amours,
Resolv'd to try all sorts of ways, 35
As follows in due time and place
No sooner was the bloody fight,
Between the Wizard, and the Knight,
With all th' appurtenances, over,
But he relaps'd again t' a lover; 40
As he was always wont to do,
When h' had discomfited a foe
And us'd the only antique <b> philters,
Deriv'd from old heroic tilters.
But now triumphant, and victorious, 45
He held th' atchievement was too glorious
For such a conqueror to meddle
With petty constable or beadle,
Or fly for refuge to the Hostess
Of th' Inns of Court and Chancery, Justice,
Who might, perhaps reduce his cause 50
To th' <c>ordeal trial of the laws,
Where none escape, but such as branded
With red-hot irons have past bare-handed;
And, if they cannot read one verse
I' th' Psalms, must sing it, and that's worse. 55
He therefore judging it below him,
To tempt a shame the Devil might owe him,
Resolv'd to leave the Squire for bail
And mainprize for him to the gaol,
To answer, with his vessel, all, 60
That might disastrously befall;
And thought it now the fittest juncture
To give the Lady a rencounter,
T' acquaint her 'with his expedition, 65
And conquest o'er the fierce Magician;
Describe the manner of the fray,
And show the spoils he brought away,
His bloody scourging aggravate,
The number of his blows, and weight, 70
All which might probably succeed,
And gain belief h' had done the deed,
Which he resolv'd t' enforce, and spare
No pawning of his soul to swear,
But, rather than produce his back, 75
To set his conscience on the rack,
And in pursuance of his urging
Of articles perform'd and scourging,
And all things else, his part,
Demand deliv'ry of her heart, 80
Her goods, and chattels, and good graces,
And person up to his embraces.
Thought he, the ancient errant knights
Won all their ladies hearts in fights;
And cut whole giants into fritters, 85
To put them into amorous twitters
Whose stubborn bowels scorn'd to yield
Until their gallants were half kill'd
But when their bones were drub'd so sore
They durst not woo one combat more, 90
The ladies hearts began to melt,
Subdu'd by blows their lovers felt.
So <d> Spanish heroes, with their lances,
At once wound bulls and ladies' fancies;
And he acquires the noblest spouse 95
That widows greatest herds of cows:
Then what may I expect to do,
Wh' have quell'd so vast a buffalo?
Mean while, the Squire was on his way
The Knight's late orders to obey; 100
Who sent him for a strong detachment
Of beadles, constables, and watchmen,
T' attack the cunning-man fur plunder,
Committed falsely on his lumber;
When he, who had so lately sack'd 105
The enemy, had done the fact;
Had rifled all his pokes and fobs
Of gimcracks, whims, and jiggumbobs,
When he, by hook or crook, had gather'd,
And for his own inventions father'd 110
And when they should, at gaol delivery,
Unriddle one another's thievery,
Both might have evidence enough,
To render neither halter proof.
He thought it desperate to tarry, 115
And venture to be accessary
But rather wisely slip his fetters,
And leave them for the Knight, his betters.
He call'd to mind th' unjust, foul play
He wou'd have offer'd him that day, 120
To make him curry his own hide,
Which no beast ever did beside,
Without all possible evasion,
But of the riding dispensation;
And therefore much about the hour 125
The Knight (for reasons told before)
Resolv'd to leave them to the fury
Of Justice, and an unpack'd Jury,
The Squire concurr'd t' abandon him,
And serve him in the self-same trim; 130
T' acquaint the Lady what h' had done,
And what he meant to carry on;
What project 'twas he went about,
When SIDROPHEL and he fell out;
His firm and stedfast Resolution, 135
To swear her to an execution;
To pawn his <e> inward ears to marry her,
And bribe the Devil himself to carry her;
In which both dealt, as if they meant
Their Party-Saints to represent, 140
Who never fail'd upon their sharing
In any prosperous arms-bearing
To lay themselves out to supplant
Each other Cousin-German Saint.
But, ere the Knight could do his part, 145
The Squire had got so much the start,
H' had to the Lady done his errand,
And told her all his tricks afore-hand.
Just as he finish'd his report,
The Knight alighted in the court; 150
And having ty'd his beast t' a pale,
And taking time for both to stale,
He put his band and beard in order,
The sprucer to accost and board her;
And now began t' approach the door, 155
When she, wh' had spy'd him out before
Convey'd th' informer out of sight,
And went to entertain the Knight
With whom encount'ring, after longees
Of humble and submissive congees, 160
And all due ceremonies paid,
He strok'd his beard, and thus he said:
Madam, I do, as is my duty,
Honour the shadow of your shoe-tye;
And now am come to bring your ear 165
A present you'll be glad to hear:
At least I hope so: the thing's done,
Or may I never see the sun;
For which I humbly now demand
Performance at your gentle hand 170
And that you'd please to do your part,
As I have done mine, to my smart.