Catch'd, like the plague, or love, the Lord knows how,
But that the cure is starving, all allow.
Yet like the Papist's is the poet's state,
Poor and disarm'd, and hardly worth your hate!
Here a lean bard, whose wit could never give
Himself a dinner, makes an actor live:
The thief condemn'd, in law already dead,
So prompts, and saves, a rogue who cannot read.
Thus as the pipes of some carv'd organ move,
The gilded puppets dance, and mount above,
Heav'd by the breath th' inspiring bellows blow;
Th' inspiring bellows lie and pant below.
One sings the fair: but songs no longer move; No rat is rhym'd to death, nor maid to love :
Though, like the pestilence, and old-fashion'd love,
Ridlingly it catch men, and doth remove
Never, till it be starv'd out; yet their state
Is poor, disarm'd, like Papists, not worth hate.
One (like a wretch, which at bar judg’d as dead,
Yet prompts him which stands next, and cannot read,
And saves his life) gives idiot actors means,
(Starving himself) to live by's labor'd scenes.
As in some organs puppets dance above,
And bellows pant below which them do move,
One would move love by rhymes; but witchcraft's
charms
Bring not now their old fears, nor their old harms.
In love's, in Nature's, spite the siege they hold,
And scorn the flesh, the devil, and all but gold.
These write to lords, some mean reward to get,
As needy beggars sing at doors for meat:
Those write, because all write, and so have still
Excuse for writing, and for writing ill.
Wretched, indeed! but far more wretched yet
Is he who makes his meal on other's wit:
'Tis chang'd, no doubt, from what it was before;
His rank digestion makes it wit no more:
Sense pass'd through him no longer is the same;
For food digested takes another name.
I pass o'er all those confessors and martyrs Who live like S-tt-n, or who die like Chartres, Out.cant old Esdras, or out-drink his heir, Out-usure Jews, or Irishmen out-swear;
Rams and slings now are silly battery;
Pistolets are the best artillery:
And they who write to lords rewards to get,
Are they not like singers at doors for meat?
And they who write, because all write, have still
Th' excuse for writing, and for writing ill.
But he is worst who (beggarly) doth chaw
Others' wits' fruits, and his ravenous maw
Rankly digested, doth those things out-spue
As his own things; and they're his own, 'tis true:
For if one eat my meat, though it be known
The meat was mine, th' excrement is his own.
But these do me no harm, nor they which use
out-usure Jews,
Wicked as pages, who in early years
Act sins which Prisca's confessor scarce hears.
Ev'n those I pardon, for whose sinful sake
Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make;
Of whose strange crimes no canonist can tell,
In what commandment's large contents they dwell.
One, one man only breeds my just offence,
Whom crimes gave wealth, and wealth gave impu.
Time, that at last matures a clap to pox, [dence:
Whose gentle progress makes a calf an ox,
And brings all natural events to pass,
Hath made him an Attorney of an Ass.
No young divine, new benefic'd, can be
More pert, more proud, more positive, than he.
T'out-drink the sea, t' out-swear the Litany,
Who with sins of all kinds as familiar be
As confessors, and for whose sinful sake
Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make ;
Whose strange sins canonists could hardly tell,
In which commandment's large receipt they dwell.
But these punish themselves. The insolence
Of Coscus only breeds my just offence,
Whom time (which rots all, and makes botches pox,
And plodding on, must make a calf, an ox)
Hath made a lawyer; which, (alas!) of late;
But scarce a poet, jollier of this state,
Than are new-benefic'd ministers; he throws,
Like nets, or lime-twigs, wheresoe'er he goes,
What further could I wish the fop to do
But turn a wit, and scribble verses too ?
Pierce the soft lab'rinth of a lady's ear
With rhymes of this per cent. and that per year.
Or court a wife, spread out his wily parts,
Like nets, or lime-twigs, for rich widows' hearts;
Calls himself barrister to ev'ry wench,
And woos in language of the Pleas and Bench?
Language which Boreas might to Auster hold,
More rough than forty Germans when they scold.
Curs'd be the wretch, so venal, and so vain,
Paltry and proud as drabs in Drury-Lane.
"Tis such a bounty as was never known,
If Peter deigns to help you to your own:
What thanks, what praise, if Peter but supplies!-
And what a solemn face, if he denies !
His title of Barrister on ev'ry wench,
And woos in language of the Pleas and Bench.**
Words, words which would tear
The tender labyrinth of a maid's soft ear
More, more than ten Sclavonians scolding, more
Than when winds in our ruin'd abbeys roar.
Then sick with poetry, and possess'd with Muse
Thou wast, and mad, I hop'd ; but men which chuse
Law-practice for mere gain, bold souls repute
Worse than imbrothell'd strumpets prostitute.
Now, like an owl-like watchman, he must walk,
His hand still at a bill; now he must talk
Grave, as when pris'ners shake the head, and swear
'Twas only suretyship that brought 'em there.
His office keeps your parchment fates entire,
He starves with cold to save them from the fire;
For you he walks the streets, through rain, or dust,
For not in chariots Peter puts his trust;
For you he sweats and labors at the laws,
Takes God to witness he affects your cause,
And lies to ev'ry lord, in ev'ry thing,
Like a king's favorite-or like a king.
These are the talents that adorn them all,
From wicked Waters ev'n to godly**
Not more of Simony beneath black gowns,
Not more of bastardy in heirs to crowns.
In shillings, and in pence, at first they deal,
And steal so little, few perceive they steal ;
Till like the sea, they compass all the land,
From Scots to Wight, from Mount to Dover Strand:
Idly, like prisoners, which whole months will swear,
That only suretyship hath brought them there,
And to every suitor lie in ev'ry thing,
Like a king's favorite, or like a king:
Like a wedge in a block-wring to the bar,
Bearing like asses, and more shameless far
Than carted whores, lye to the grave judge; for
Bastardy abounds not in kings' titles, nor
Simony and Sodomy in churchmen's lives,
As these things do in him; by these he thrives,
Shortly (as th' sea) he'll compass all the land,
From Scots to Wight, from Mount to Dover Strand:
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