Volume Viii Part 6 (2/2)

For, as in Ireland and in Denmark both, Witches for gold will sell a man a wind[105]

Which, in the corner of a napkin wrapp'd, Shall blow him safe unto what coast he will; So make ill-servants sale of their lord's wind Which, wrapp'd up in a piece of parchment, Blows many a knave forth danger of the law.

SUM. Enough of this: let me go make my will.

Ah! it is made, although I hold my peace: These two will share betwixt them what I have.

The surest way to get my will perform'd Is to make my executor my heir; And he, if all be given him, and none else, Unfallibly will see it well-perform'd.

Lions will feed though none bid them go to.

Ill-grows the tree affordeth ne'er a graft: Had I some issue to sit on my throne, My grief would die, death should not hear me groan; But when, perforce, these must enjoy my wealth, Which thank me not, but enter't as a prey, Bequeath'd it is not, but clean cast away.

Autumn, be thou successor to my seat: Hold, take my crown:--look, how he grasps for it!

Thou shalt not have it yet--but hold it, too; Why should I keep what needs I must forego?

WIN. Then, duty laid aside, you do me wrong.

I am more worthy of it far than he: He hath no skill nor courage for to rule.

A weatherbeaten, bankrupt a.s.s it is That scatters and consumeth all he hath: Each one do pluck from him without control.

He is not hot nor cold; a silly soul, That fain would please each part[106], if so he might.

He and the Spring are scholars' favourites: What scholars are, what thriftless kind of men, Yourself be judge; and judge of him by them.

When Cerberus was headlong drawn from h.e.l.l, He voided a black poison from his mouth, Call'd _Aconitum_, whereof ink was made: That ink, with reeds first laid on dried barks, Serv'd me awhile to make rude works withal, Till Hermes, secretary to the G.o.ds, Or Hermes Trismegistus, as some will, Weary with graving in blind characters And figures of familiar beasts and plants, Invented letters to write lies withal.

In them he penn'd the fables of the G.o.ds, The giants' war, and thousand tales besides.

After each nation got these toys in use[107]

There grew up certain drunken parasites, Term'd poets, which, for a meal's meat or two.

Would promise monarchs immortality.

They vomited in verse all that they knew; Feign'd causes and beginnings of the world; Fetch'd pedigrees of mountains and of floods From men and women whom the G.o.ds transform'd.

If any town or city they pa.s.s'd by Had in compa.s.sion (thinking them madmen) Forborne to whip them, or imprison them, That city was not built by human hands; 'Twas rais'd by music, like Megara walls: Apollo, poets' patron, founded it, Because they found one fitting favour there.

Musaeus, Linus, Homer, Orpheus, Were of this trade, and thereby won their fame.

WILL SUM. _Fama malum, quo non [aliud] velocius ullum_[108].

WIN. Next them a company of ragged knaves, Sun-bathing beggars, lazy hedge-creepers, Sleeping face upwards in the fields all night, Dream'd strange devices of the sun and moon; And they, like gipsies, wandering up and down, Told fortunes, juggled, nicknam'd all the stars, And were of idiots term'd philosophers.

Such was Pythagoras the silencer; Prometheus, Thales, Milesius, Who would all things of water should be made: Anaximander, Anaxamines, That positively said the air was G.o.d: Zenocrates, that said there were eight G.o.ds; And Cratoniates and Alcmaeon too, Who thought the sun and moon and stars were G.o.ds.

The poorer sort of them, that could get nought, Profess'd, like beggarly Franciscan friars, And the strict order of the Capuchins, A voluntary, wretched poverty, Contempt of gold, thin fare, and lying hard.

Yet he that was most vehement in these, Diogenes, the cynic and the dog, Was taken coining money in his cell.

WILL SUM. What an old a.s.s was that. Methinks he should have coined carrot-roots rather; for, as for money, he had no use for['t], except it were to melt, and solder up holes in his tub withal.

WIN. It were a whole Olympiad's work to tell How many devilish, _ergo_, armed arts, Sprung all as vices of this idleness: For even as soldiers not employ'd in wars, But living loosely in a quiet state-- Not having wherewithal to maintain pride, Nay, scarce to find their bellies any food-- Nought but walk melancholy, and devise, How they may cozen merchants, fleece young heirs, Creep into favour by betraying men, Rob churches, beg waste toys, court city dames, Who shall undo their husbands for their sakes; The baser rabble how to cheat and steal, And yet be free from penalty of death:[109]

So these word-warriors, lazy star-gazers, Us'd to no labour but to louse themselves, Had their heads fill'd with cozening fantasies.

They plotted how to make their poverty Better esteem'd of than high sovereignty.

They thought how they might plant a heaven on earth, Whereof they would be princ.i.p.al low-G.o.ds;[110]

That heaven they called Contemplation: As much to say as a most pleasant sloth, Which better I cannot compare than this, That if a fellow, licensed to beg, Should all his lifetime go from fair to fair And buy gape-seed, having no business else.

That contemplation, like an aged weed, Engender'd thousand sects, and all those sects Were but as these times, cunning shrouded rogues.

Grammarians some, and wherein differ they From beggars that profess the pedlar's French?[111]

The poets next, slovenly, tatter'd slaves, That wander and sell ballads in the streets.

Historiographers others there be, And they, like lazars, lie[112] by the highway-side, That for a penny or a halfpenny Will call each knave a good-fac'd gentleman, Give honour unto tinkers for good ale, Prefer a cobbler 'fore the black prince far, If he bestow but blacking on their shoes: And as it is the spittle-houses' guise Over their gate to write their founders' names, Or on the outside of their walls at least, In hope by their example others mov'd Will be more bountiful and liberal; So in the forefront of their chronicles, Or _peroratione operis_, They learning's benefactors reckon up, Who built this college, who gave that free school, What king or queen advanced scholars most, And in their times what writers flourished.

Rich men and magistrates, whilst yet they live, They flatter palpably, in hope of gain.

Smooth-tongued orators, the fourth in place-- Lawyers our commonwealth ent.i.tles them-- Mere swash-bucklers and ruffianly mates, That will for twelvepence make a doughty fray, Set men for straws together by the ears.

Sky-measuring mathematicians, Gold-breathing alchemists also we have, Both which are subtle-witted humourists, That get their meals by telling miracles, Which they have seen in travelling the skies.

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