Farewel.
From Hugh Peters to Daniel Burgess in Rogue-lane.
Most Reverend Brother in iniquity,
IF you don’t remember of your own knowledge, you can’t but have heard from some of our grisly historians, that in the late times of confusion, when the pious scoundrels of England arose with their arses uppermost, I was not a man inferior in my function to your learned and most eloquent self, or any other fanatick cackler of the holy law, by the corruption of which (thro’ the spirit of nonsense, and grace of blasphemy) our party has always supported the worst of causes in the best of times; and be it known to you, brother doctor, for so I presume to greet you, that I had not only the practical knack of moistning the eyes of my congregation with the dreadful doctrine of predestination, but could also dry up their tears with a spunge of comfort, and make ’em laugh as heartily whenever I pleas’d, as a city-audience at a Smithfield-comedy; in which most excellent and renown’d faculties, you are the only modern chatterist, that I hear has since succeeded me, for which reason, I am very desirous of corresponding with you after this manner, till fate shall give us your good company in these territories, to which (if our subterranean governor changes not his opinion) you need not doubt of being heartily welcome.
I am sensible news from another world to a man of curiosity, cannot but be acceptable: I shall therefore proceed to give you some account how our party (who are very numerous) fare in these sultry dominions, towards which I hope in a little time, you will set forward on your journey.
My quondam master Oliver Cromwell, of ever famous memory, to whom upon earth, you must know, I was not only chaplain in ordinary, but as well jester to his excellency, an honour which I hear most noblemen confer upon the black robe, now good old house-keeping, and the party-colour’d coat are quite thrown out of fashion: My master, I say, who in honour to his exit, was fetch’d away out of the upper world in a whirlwind, and conducted into these parts with all the solemnities of an usurper, was establish’d in a notable post at his first admittance into Pluto’s court, in which eminent employment (that like a faithful servant follow’d him) I found him, to my great satisfaction. Alecto, one of the furies, having taken a surfeit with over-flogging Guido Vaux (which is a ceremony perform’d here in publick every fifth of November) for discovering the Gun-Powder-Treason-Plot, and defeating that notable design, which by the indefatigable industry of the most skilful politicians on this side Acheron, was so hopefully projected: and fearing some disorders should arise in our infernal common-wealth for want of strict discipline, my old master Oliver was pitch’d on to be deputy-firker to the sick beldam, and a scorpion-rod was accordingly presented him, with all the usual ceremonies of so grand an instalment. This news of his advancement was so terrible a conflict to the cavalier part, who dreading the severity of his correction, petition’d Pluto to remove him, but to no purpose; which insolence so inflam’d my cholerick master, that his nose swell’d as big at the end as an apple-dumpling, and look’d as fiery red (to the terror of those that came under his lash) as if his magnificent gigg had been a living salamander, so that wherever he met with a cavalier, he did so firk and jirk him, that Busby was never a greater terror to a blockhead, or the Bridewell flog-master to a night-walking strumpet, than he at this day to a high-flyer or a Jacobite. Great regard has been shewn by his infernal majesty, to all that in forty eight were members of the high court of justice; some are made master and wardens of the devil’s mint, for the coining of new sins; some commissioners of the temptation-office; others, barons of the diabolical stinkports; and particularly sollicitor-general Cook is made lord-keeper of hell’s punishments; and Bradshaw and Ireton, two of his imperial smuttiness’s privy-counsellors: So that all the posts of honour and preferment in these lower regions are in the hands of our party, hoping those of the same kidney who live over our heads, enjoy the like advantages, as we have heard below by a certain courier from Amsterdam, you are all pretty firmly possess’d of.
There lately arriv’d in these parts a certain woolen-draper out of Covent-Garden parish, who being touch’d with a deep sense of ingratitude, could not rest quietly in his whigwam, till he had made a publick confession of a great indignity he had put upon Mrs. Meg’s chaplain, by which he gave us to understand you were the worthy gentleman he had most sordidly affronted; the manner of which he declared with as much sorrow and concern for the action, as ever was beheld in the face of a dying penitent, between the severity of a halter, and decency of a night-cap, the substance of his report being to this purpose; after he had fetch’d two or three deep sighs, as loud as the puffs of a smith’s bellows: alas! says he, to you I speak, good people, that are here about me, I was bless’d with a wife of such singular piety in the other world, who rather than not hear that reverend teacher of the gospel D. B. twice every Sunday, she would cackle for a whole week, far worse than an old hen that has drop’d a benefit to her owner; whilst I, like a true profligate suburbian, us’d to confound her zeal, stop the current of her devotion, and damn her hypocrisy; but the good woman was too strict a protestant to be thus seduc’d, and still persever’d in spight of all restriction in her accustomary righteousness, till at last I bethought myself the best way to reclaim her from this disagreeable purity (for so I thought it) and bring her over, like me her husband, to be a good sociable sinner, was to keep a close guard over my pocket, and another over my till, well considering, that if the flock could not live without spiritual consolation, the shepherd could not spend his lungs without temporal subsistence: After I had try’d this experiment for about a fortnight before the time of contribution, when the hearts of the hearers are usually as open as their teacher’s conscience, I found my wife’s extraordinary zeal had stirr’d up a tumultuous spirit within her, so that nothing would pacify her stubborn disposition, but ten times the price of a fat pig, to gratify the great benefits she had often receiv’d from her soul-saving physician; but I, looking into the merits of the cause, and finding other mens wives us’d to be sav’d, (or at least made believe so) at a much cheaper rate, and therefore for good reasons best known to myself, would by no means comply with her religious generosity; upon which the good woman my wife, lest she should be thought an ungrateful reprobate by her deserving guide, convey’d a present to the worthy doctor of a whole piece of black cloth, without my knowledge, and like a true lover of peace and quietness, conjured my apprentice to keep it secret; but my man’s honesty being equal to my wife’s religion, in a little time after, he inform’d me of the matter, upon which (forgive me good people) I waited upon the doctor with a bill, and without any tenderness to his piety, or regard to his function, gave him such a tallyman’s dun, that he swore thro’ divinity, and deny’d the matter of fact as sturdily as if he had been bred a citizen; yet at last, upon positive proof thereof, paid the money like an honest gentleman, but huff’d away as if the passion of envy had overcome the patience of the priest. But since I find (most worthy gentlemen) that fate has doom’d me to these sulphurous mansions, where the devil rules the roast, and presbytery flourishes; I here, before the protector of this commonwealth, and all his infernal host, submit myself to the present government in hell establish’d, and heartily declare a penitential sorrow for the indignity offer’d upon earth to that famous and most spiritual kid-napper, who I cannot but acknowledge has contributed more toward the peopling of these dominions, than the states of Holland have ever done towards the peopling your neighbouring country the East-Indies.
But now, brother doctor, to make you sensible of the interest you have in these parts, the audience (notwithstanding the offender’s submission) were so highly inflam’d that so disgraceful an affront should be put upon so worthy a benefactor to the good old cause, that some cry’d out with a true spirit of dissention, Flay, flay the rogue, flay him for a cavalier, what abuse the Doctor! Others, Scald him, scald him, he’s a Church Papist: Others, Geld him, geld him, he’s certainly a Priest: But the women were against the last sentence, and cry’d the devil had no law for that severity. So a great hurliburly arose about the manner of his punishment; but at last the crowd hurry’d him away as the rabble in your world do a pickpocket, to a pump, or a horse-pond, and what became of him afterwards I have not yet heard.
We have abundance of souls flock hither daily, that bring us in very comfortable tidings from Mincing-lane, Salters-hall, Bishopsgate-street, Jewen-street, Moorfields, Bartholomew-close, Fetter-lane, Stepney, Hackney, Bednal-green, &c. but more particularly from Covent-Garden; among whom, to your credit it be it spoken, I have always pick’d out the most agreeable conversation: for you must know, a little before I absented myself from the pleasures of the upper world, ’twas my fortune to be haul’d before a dozen of damn’d crabbed cavaliers, revengeful fellows, who look’d as if they would lose a dinner to hang an honest round-head at any time; and as three or four tun-belly’d lumps of gravity, in blushing formalities, lin’d with coney-skins, and those twelve unlucky disciples order’d the matter (to show they were all fire and tow) they told me a dreadful story of hanging and burning at Charing-Cross, in sight of that old palace we before had plunder’d. About which ugly sort of business, when I came to find they were in good earnest, I began to grow as, dizzy in my brains, as a hog troubled with the megrims, and could no more endure the thoughts on’t than I could of Popery; on my dying day, I strove all I could to make it easy, but I protest it was in vain, for it prov’d still as hateful to me, as castration to a priest, or barrenness to a young woman: in short, at last it made me think of nothing but rattling of chains, and picking of straws, insomuch that when they fagotted up my thumbs together, and tumbled me into a hell-cart well litter’d with straw, but the devil a wheel to’t, I did but just shut my eyes, and fancy’d myself to be in a dark room in Bedlam. In this manner they rumbled me thro’ a long lane of spectators, who star’d at me as if I had been a rhinoceros with a Bantam queen upon my back; at last they dragg’d me into an ill-favour’d piece of timber, in the shape of a welch sign-post, where they tuck’d me up to a beam, and made me keck a little, as if something had gone the wrong way; upon which I fell into a kind of a hag-ridden slubber for a quarter of an hour, dreaming I sunk a thousand leagues into the bowels of the earth, and no sooner awak’d, but found myself, as I told you before, in company with my old master: my sleep prov’d much too short for the recovery of my senses, and tho’ I saw several of my old friends about me, the pain of my neck, and terror of my fall, made me rave worse than a narrow-scutted punk under the hands of a mad-midwife; till by the advice of a consult of physicians, who are here as numerous as crocodiles in the land of Egypt; a vesicatory of devil’s-dung was apply’d to my costern, which restor’d me to my wits in a few minutes, which in the time of adversity, like ungovernable rebels, had abdicated their master. But that which most troubled me when I found myself compos mentis, was the circular impression the hempen collar had left about my gullet, by which the fellow-subjects discover’d I swung into hell the back way, for which reason some prodigal jack-a-dandies refus’d to keep me company, despising me as much as a butcher does a bull-dog, that instead of running fair at the head, catches hold of the tail, and hangs at the arse of his enemy; for you must know, doctor, the most reputable way of entring into this sub-terrestial country, is to come in at the fore-door, thro’ which none are admitted but such as spend their full time in wickedness in the upper world without flinching: nay be as proud of a notorious sin, as a jockey is of his riding that has won a horse-race, and glory more in the invention of a new vice, than a coward does of a victory, till at last, by the effects of his debaucheries, pox, gout and rheumatism, he is lifted out of your world into ours, without one thought of repentance. These are highly rewarded here for the glorious examples they have left behind them; but he that comes hither like a dog, with the print of a collar about his neck, is no more respected than a prophet in his own country; the reason is, because they who pass gallows-way into these shades, generally at their exit, show a sorrow for their sins; so that if heaven did not take their contrition for a kind of death-bed repentance the devil would be a great loser; besides, they soften the hearts of sinners by their sniveling and howling, and deter others from the like wickedness. These considerations occasion the tyburnians to be very much slighted by other company: but I, thro’ good fortune, by that time I had been here a fortnight, met with a good honest shoemaker, who had cut his throat in a garret in Russel-street, upon the point of Predestination, which he had heard you handling of for three hours together the very same afternoon, before he could find in his heart to perform the decent execution. Upon serious examination, I found the fellow talk’d very notably of religion; nay, much better than he did of a shoe-soal, or an upper-leather; he had such an assurance of his parts, as to challenge Bunyan the tinker to chop logick with him; and Naylor the quaker, who was of a principle between both, was thought the best qualify’d person in all hell for an impartial moderator; but your nimble chopp’d pupil was as much too cunning for the Pilgrim author, as a fox is for a badger, that at last the shoemaker got his ends, and left the poor tinker without one argument in his budget. By the assistance of this honest cordwainer, (who hearing I had been a minister of the gospel in the other world, was mighty respectful to me) I got acquainted with several others, who had been of your congregation; some old women, who had hang’d themselves in their garters, thro’ fear the lord had not elected them: others, who had waited for a call to heaven till their last dram of patience, as well as their patrimony, were quite exhausted, the first in religious exercises, and the last in holy offerings to you their teacher; and finding very little come of either, they resolv’d the king shou’d lose a poor subject, and yourself a pious communicant; and so by the judicious application of either knife or halter, convey’d themselves thro’ death to these infernal shades, which they always liv’d in dread of, but not finding the climate so terribly hot on this side Styx, as you have often represented it, they rest well satisfy’d in their conditions, and all heartily present their humble service to you, hoping with myself, you will always stick close to your old doctrine, and labour hard to support and infuse into your followers, the true enthusiastick principles of Fanaticism, and you need not question but to wallow in the pleasures of human life whilst above board, and be doubly damn’d hereafter among us for the signal services you have done to the sable protector of these populous territories, which can never want recruits, whilst there is a Burgess in the upper world, and a Lucifer in the lower one.
Hugh Peters.