WE

Ecce iterum Crifpinus.

ELL, Sidrophel, though 'tis in vain
To tamper with your crazy brain,
Without trepanning of your fcull,
As often as the moon 's at full,
'Tis not amifs, ere ye 're giv'n o'er,
To try one defperate medicine more;
For, where your cafe can be no worse,
The defperat'ft is the wifeft course.
Is 't poffible that you, whofe ears
Are of the tribe of Iffachar's,
And might (with equal reafon) either
For merit, or extent of leather,
With William Pryn's, before they were
Retrench'd and crucify'd, compare,

Or your new nick'd-nam'd old invention
To cry green-haftings with an engine;
(As if the vehemence had ftunn'd,

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And torn your drum-heads with the found)
And, 'caufe your folly 's now no news, 25
But overgrown, and out of ufe,
Perfuade vourself there's no fuch matter,
But that 'tis vanish'd out of Nature;
When Folly as it grows in years,
The more extravagant appears;
For who but you could be poffeft
With fo much ignorance and beast,

That neither all men's fcorn and hate,

Nor being laugh'd and pointed at,
Nor bray'd fo often in a mortar,

Can teach you wholesome fenfe and nurture;
But (like a reprobate) what course
Soever us'd, grow worse and worfe?
Can no transfufion of the blood,
That makes fools cattle, do you good?
Nor putting pigs t' a bitch to nurse,
To turn them into mongrel-curs,
Put you into a way, at least,
To make yourself a better beaft?
Can all your critical intrigues,
Of trying found from rotten eggs;
Your feveral new-found remedies,
Of curing wounds and fcabs in trees;
Your arts of fluxing them for claps,
And purging their infected faps;
Recovering fhankers, crystallines,
And nodes and botches in their rinds,
Have no effect to operate

Upon that duller block, your pate?

But ftill it must be lewdly bent

To tempt your own due punishment;
And, like your whimfy'd chariots, draw
The boys to curfe you without law;
As if the art you have fo long
Profefs'd, of making old dogs young,
In you had virtue to renew
Not only youth but childhood too,
Can you, that understand all books,
By judging only with your looks,
Refolve all problems with your face,
As others do with B's and A's;
Unriddle all that mankind knows

*This Epiftle was published ten years after the Third Canto of this Second Part, to which it is now annexed, namely, in the year 1674; and is faid, in a Key to a burlefque poem of Mr. Butler's, published 1-06, p. 13, to have been occafioned by Sir Paul Neal, a conceited virtuofo, and member of the Royal Society, who conftant-With folid bending of your brows; ly affirmed that Mr. Butler was not the Author of Hudibras, which gave rife to this Epiftle; and by fome he has been taken for the real Sidrophel of the Poem. This was the gentleman who, I am told, made a great difcovery of an elephant in the moon, which, upon examination, proved to be no other than a moufe which had mistaken its way, and got into his telefcope. See The Elephant in the Moon, in the fecond volume of Butler's Poems.

All arts and fciences advance,
With fcrewing of your countenance,
And with a penetrating eye
Into th' abftrusest learning pry;
Know more of any trade b'a hint,
Than thofe that have been bred up in 't,
And yet have no art, true or false,
To help your own bad naturals?
But ftill, the more you ftrive t' appear,
Are found to be the wretcheder:

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That all affronts do ftill give place

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To your impenetrable face;

For fools are known by looking wife,
As men find woodcocks by their eyes,
Hence 'tis that 'caufe ye 'ave gain'd of th' college
A quarter fhare (at moft) of knowledge,
And brought in none, but spent repute,
Y' affume a power as abfolute

To judge, and cenfure, and controul,
As if you were the fole Sir Poll,
And faucily pretend to know

More than your dividend comes to:

You'll find the thing will not be done

With ignorance and face alone:

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 pafs;

85 For all impoftors, when they 're known,
Are paft their labour, and undone :
And all the beft that can befal

An artificial natural,

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As once they're broke loose from the moon,

No, though ye 've purchas'd to your name,
In hiftory, fo great a fame;

That now your talent 's fo well known,

For having all belief outgrown,

That every itrange prodigious tale

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That all thofe ftories that are laid
Too truly to you, and thofe made,
Are now ftill charg'd upon your score,
And leffer authors nam'd no more.
Alas! that faculty betrays
Those fooneft it defigns to raife;
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;
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 eafe than public fcorn,

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Ver. 86.] Sir Politick Would-be, in "Volpone."

Ver. 91, 92.] These two lines, I think, plainly difcover that Lilly, and not Sir Paul Neal, was here lafhed under the name of Sidropbel; for Lilly's fame abroad was indifputable. Mr. Strickland, who was many years Agent for the Parliament in Holland, thus publishes it: "I "came purpofely into the Committee this day, "to fee the man who is fo famous in those parts "where I have fo long continued: I affure you, his name is famous all over Europe. "I came to do him juftice." Lilly is alfo careful to tell us, that the King of Sweden fent him a gold chain and medal worth about 50l. for making honourable mention of his Majefty in one of his almanacks; which, he says, was tranflated into the language spoke at Hamburgh, and print-wit and fatire. I dare fay the reader is not weary

of him; nor will he be fo at the conclufion of the Poem: and the reafon is evident, because this laft part is as fruitful of wit and humour as the for mer; and a poetic fire is equally diffused through

Ver. 105. Betrays.] Destroys, in all the editions the whole Poem, that burns every where clearly

I have feen.

and every where irresistibly.

3 [K] 2

Hlas all his flames and raptures double,

And hangs, or drowns, with half the trouble;

While thofe who fillily purfue

The fimple downright way, and true,

Make as unlucky applications,

And fteer against the ftream their paffions,
Some forge their miftreffes of ftars,

And, when the ladies prove averse,

Of th' inns of Court and Chancery, Juftice; 50
Who might, perhaps, reduce his caute
To th' ordeal trial of the laws,

Ver. 34. And us'd, &c.] And us'd as, in edit. 1678.

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Thou 'aft broke perfidioufly thy oath,
And not perform'd thy plighted troth,
But fpar'd thy renegado back,

Make lechers, and their punks, with dewtry,
Commit fantastical advowtry;

Bewitch Hermetic-men to run
Stark staring mad with manicon;
Believe mechanic virtuofi

Can raise them mountains in Potofi;
And, fillier than the antic fools,
Take treasure for a heap of coals;
265 Seek out for plants with fignatures,
To quack off univerfal cures ;
With figures ground on panes of glass,
Make people on their heads to pass:
And mighty heaps of coin increase,

Where thou 'adit fo great a prize at stake; 260
Which now the Fates have order'd me,
For penance and revenge, to flea,
Unless thou prefently make hafte;
Time is, time was: and there it ceaft.
With which, though ftartled, I confess,
Yet th' horror of the thing was lefs
Than th' other difnial apprehenfion
Of interruption or prevention ;
And therefore, fnatching up the rod,
I laid upon my back a load,
Refolv'd to fpare no ficth and blood,
To make my word and honour good;
Till tir'd, and taking truce at length,
For new recruits of breath and strength,
I felt the blows ftill ply'd as faft,
As if they 'ad been by lovers plac'd,
In raptures of Platonic lafhing,

And chafte contemplative bardashing;
When, facing haitily about,

To stand upon my guard and scout,
I found th' infernal cunning-man,
And th' under-witch, his Caliban,
With fcourges (like the Furies) arm'd,
That on my outward quarters ftorm'd.
In hafte I fnatch'd my weapon up,
And gave their hellish rage a stop;
Call'd thrice upon your name, and fell
Courageoufly on Sidrophel,

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280 The wretched caitiff underwent,
And held my drubbing of his bones
Too great an honour for pultrones;

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For knights are bound to feel no blows
From paltry and unequal foes,

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Who now, transform'd himself t' a bear,

I therefore ipar'd his flesh, and prest him
About the witch with many a question.

When I as furiously prefs'd on,

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My weapon down his throat to run,

Abus'd, as you have been, b' a witch,

Laid hold of him, but he broke loose,
And turn'd himself into a goofe,
Div'd under water in a pond,
To hide himself from being found.
In vain 1 fought him; but as foon
As I perceiv'd him fled and gone,
Prepar'd, with equal hafte and rage,
His under-forcerer to engage ;
But, bravely fcorning to defile
My fword with feeble blood, and vile,
I judg'd it better from a quick-
fet hedge to cut a knotted stick,
With which I furioufly laid on,
Till in a harth and doleful tone
It roar'd, O hold, for pity, Sir;
I am too great a fufferer,

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