And so may we, if w' have but sense
To use the necessary means; 1310
And not your usual stratagems
On one another, Lights and Dreams
To stand on terms as positive,
As if we did not take, but give:
Set up the Covenant on crutches, 1315
'Gainst those who have us in their clutches,
And dream of pulling churches down,
Before w' are sure to prop our own:
Your constant method of proceeding,
Without the carnal mans of heeding; 1320
Who 'twixt your inward sense and outward,
Are worse, than if y' had none, accoutred.
I grant, all courses are in vain,
Unless we can get in again;
The only way that's left us now; 1325
But all the difficulty's, How?
'Tis true, w' have money, th' only pow 'r
That all mankind falls down before;
Money, that, like the swords of kings,
Is the last reason of all things; 1330
And therefore need not doubt our play
Has all advantages that way;
As long as men have faith to sell,
And meet with those that can pay well;
Whose half-starv'd pride, and avarice, 1335
One Church and State will not suffice
T' expose to sale, beside the wages
Of storing plagues to after-ages.
Nor is our money less our own,
Than 'twas before we laid it down; 1340
For 'twill return, and turn t' account,
If we are brought, in play upon't:
Or but, by casting knaves, get in,
What pow 'r can hinder us to win?
We know the arts we us'd before, 1345
In peace and war, and something more;
And by th' unfortunate events,
Can mend our next experiments:
For when w' are taken into trust,
How easy are the wisest choust? 1350
Who see but th' outsides of our feats,
And not their secret springs and weights;
And while they're busy at their ease,
Can carry what designs we please.
How easy is it to serve for agents, 1355
To prosecute our old engagements?
To keep the Good Old Cause on foot,
And present power from taking root?
Inflame them both with false alarms
Of plots and parties taking arms; 1360
To keep the Nation's wounds too wide
From healing up of side to side;
Profess the passionat'st concerns
For both their interests by turns;
The only way to improve our own, 1365
By dealing faithfully with none;
(As bowls run true, by being made
On purpose false, and to be sway'd:)
For if we should be true to either,
'Twould turn us out of both together; 1370
And therefore have no other means
To stand upon our own defence,
But keeping up our ancient party
In vigour, confident and hearty:
To reconcile our late dissenters, 1375
Our brethren, though by other venters;
Unite them, and their different maggots,
As long and short sticks are in faggots,
And make them join again as close
As when they first began t' espouse; 1380
Erect them into separate
New Jewish tribes, in Church and State;
To join in marriage and commerce,
And only among themselves converse;
And all that are not of their mind, 1385
Make enemies to all mankind:
Take all religions in and stickle
From Conclave down to Conventicle;
Agreeing still, or disagreeing,
According to the Light in being. 1390
Sometimes for liberty of conscience,
And spiritual mis-rule, in one sense;
But in another quite contrary,
As dispensations chance to vary;
And stand for, as the times will bear it, 1395
All contradictions of the Spirit:
Protect their emissaries, empower'd
To preach sedition and the word;
And when they're hamper'd by the laws,
Release the lab'rers for the Cause, 1400
And turn the persecution back
On those that made the first attack;
To keep them equally in awe,
From breaking or maintaining law:
And when they have their fits too soon, 1405
Before the full-tides of the moon,
Put off their zeal t' a fitter season
For sowing faction in and treason;
And keep them hooded, and their Churches,
Like hawks from baiting on their perches, 1410
That, when the blessed time shall come
Of quitting BABYLON and ROME,
They may be ready to restore
Their own Fifth Monarchy once more.
Meanwhile be better arm'd to fence 1415
Against revolts of Providence.
By watching narrowly, and snapping
All blind sides of it, they happen
For if success could make us Saints,
Or ruin turn'd us miscreants: 1420
A scandal that wou'd fall too hard
Upon a few, and. unprepar'd.
These are the courses we must run,
Spight of our hearts, or be undone;
And not to stand on terms and freaks, 1425
Before we have secur'd our necks;
But do our work, as out of sight,
As stars by day, and suns by night;
All licence of the people own,
In opposition to the Crown; 1430
And for the Crown as fiercely side,
The head and body to divide;
The end of all we first design'd,
And all that yet remains behind
Be sure to spare no publick rapine, 1435
On all emergencies, that happen;
For 'tis as easy to supplant
Authority as men in want;
As some of us, in trusts, have made
The one hand with the other trade; 1440
Gain'd vastly by their joint endeavour;
The right a thief; the left receiver;
And what the one, by tricks, forestall'd,
The other, by as sly, retail'd.
For gain has wonderful effects 1445
T' improve the Factory of Sects;
The rule of faith in all professions.
And great DIANA of the EPHESIANS;
Whence turning of Religion's made
The means to turn and wind a trade: 1450
And though some change it for the worse,
They put themselves into a course;
And draw in store of customers,
To thrive the better in commerce:
For all Religions flock together, 1455
Like tame and wild fowl of a feather;
To nab the itches of their sects,
As jades do one another's necks.
Hence 'tis, Hypocrisy as well
Will serve t' improve a Church as ZEAL: 1460
As Persecution or Promotion,
Do equally advance Devotion.
Let business, like ill watches, go
Sometime too fast, sometime too slow;
For things in order are put out 1465
So easy, Ease itself will do't;
But when the feat's design'd and meant,
What miracle can bar th' event?
For 'tis more easy to betray,
Than ruin any other way. 1470
All possible occasions start
The weighty'st matters to divert;
Obstruct, perplex, distract, intangle,
And lay perpetual trains to wrangle.
But in affairs of less import, 1475
That neither do us good nor hurt,
And they receive as little by,
Out-fawn as much, and out-comply;
And seem as scrupulously just,
To bait our hooks for greater trust; 1480
But still be careful to cry down
All publick actions, though our own:
The least miscarriage aggravate,
And charge it all upon the Sate;
Express the horrid'st detestation, 1485
And pity the distracted nation
Tell stories scandalous and false,
I' th' proper language of cabals,
Where all a subtle statesman says,
Is half in words, and half in face; 1490
(As Spaniards talk in dialogues
Of heads and shoulders, nods and shrugs:)
Entrust it under solemn vows
Of mum, and silence, and the rose,
To be retail'd again in whispers, 1495
For th' easy credulous to disperse.
Thus far the Statesman — When a shout,
Heard at a distance, put him out;
And straight another, all aghast,
Rush'd in with equal fear and haste; 1500
Who star'd about, as pale as death,
And, for a while, as out of breath;
Till having gather'd up his wits,
He thus began his tale by fits.
That <k> beastly rabble — that came down 1505
From all the garrets — in the town,
And stalls, and shop-boards — in vast swarms,
With new-chalk'd bills — and rusty arms,
To cry the Cause — up, heretofore,
And bawl the BISHOPS — out of door, 1510
Are now drawn up — in greater shoals,
To roast — and broil us on the coals,
And all the Grandees — of our Members
Are carbonading — on the embers;
Knights, Citizens, and Burgesses — 1515
Held forth by Rumps — of Pigs and Geese,
That serve for Characters — and Badges.
To represent their Personages:
Each bonfire is a funeral pile,
In which they roast, and scorch, and broil, 1520
And ev'ry representative
Have vow'd to roast — and broil alive:
And 'tis a miracle, we are not
Already sacrific' d incarnate.
For while we wrangle here, and jar, 1525
W' are grilly'd all at TEMPLE-BAR:
Some on the sign-post of an ale-house,
Hang in effigy, on the gallows;
Made up of rags, to personate
Respective Officers of State; 1530
That henceforth they may stand reputed,
Proscrib'd in law, and executed;
And while the Work is carrying on
Be ready listed under <l> DON,
That worthy patriot, once the bellows, 1535
And tinder-box, of all his fellows;
The activ'st Member of the Five,
As well as the most primitive;
Who, for his faithful service then
Is chosen for a Fifth agen: 1540
(For since the State has made a Quint
Of Generals, he's listed in't.)
This worthy, as the world will say,
Is paid in specie, his own way;
For, moulded to the life in clouts, 1545
Th' have pick'd from dung-hills hereabouts,
He's mounted on a hazel bavin,
A cropp'd malignant baker gave 'm;
And to the largest bone-fire riding,
They've roasted <m> COOK already and PRIDE in; 1550
On whom in equipage and state,
His scarecrow fellow-members wait,
And march in order, two and two,
As at thanksgivings th' us'd to do;
Each in a tatter'd talisman, 1555
Like vermin in effigie slain.
But (what's more dreadful than the rest)
Those Rumps are but the tail o' th' Beast,
Set up by Popish engineers,
As by the crackers plainly appears; 1560
For none but Jesuits have a mission
To preach the faith with ammunition,
And propagate the Church with powder:
Their founder was a blown-up <n> Soldier.
These spiritual pioneers o' th' Whore's, 1565
That have the charge of all her stores,
Since first they fail'd in their designs,
To take in Heav'n by springing mines,
And with unanswerable barrels
Of gunpowder dispute their quarrels, 1570
Now take a course more practicable,
By laying trains to fire the rabble,
And blow us up in th' open streets,
Disguis'd in Rumps, like Sambenites;
More like to ruin, and confound, 1575
Than all the doctrines under ground.
Nor have they chosen Rumps amiss
For symbols of State-mysteries;
Though some suppose 'twas but to shew
How much they scorn'd the Saints, the few; 1580
Who, 'cause they're wasted to the stumps,
Are represented best by Rumps.
But Jesuits have deeper reaches
In all their politick far-fetches,
And from the Coptick Priest, <o> Kircherus, 1585
Found out this mystick way to jeer us.
For, as th' <p> Egyptians us'd by bees
T' express their antick PTOLOMIES;
And by their stings, the swords they wore,
Held forth authority and power; 1590
Because these subtil animals
Bear all their int'rests in their tails;
And when they're once impar'd in that,
Are banish'd their well-order'd state;
They thought all governments were best 1595
By Hieroglyphick Rumps exprest.
For, as in bodies natural,
The rump's the fundament of all;
So, in a commonwealth, or realm,
The government is call'd the helm; 1600
With which, like vessels under sail,
They're turn'd and winded by the tail;
The tail, which birds and fishes steer
Their courses with through sea and air;
To whom the rudder of the rump is 1605
The same thing with the stern and compass.
This shews how perfectly the Rump
And Commonwealth in nature jump.
For as a fly, that goes to bed,
Rests with his tail above his head, 1610
So in this mungrel state of ours;
The rabble are the supreme powers;
That hors'd us on their backs, to show us
A jadish trick at last, and throw us.