University of Virginia Library


103

THE TWELFTH SATYRE. [OF EXCESSE.]

Phyloxenus lookes lanke with abstinence:
Poore man I pittie him, I thinke he's sicke;
No, this his seeming is a false pretence,
The greedie Cormorant will each thing licke:
Whose drum-stretch'd case can scarce his guts containe
Since he hath got the gullet of a Crane.
Thou thinkes there is no pleasure but in feeding,
Making thy selfe,

Like those unsatiable gluttons Uitellius and Appius to which Cormorants neither land, water nor aire might be sufficient. And Cambletes the gluttonous king of Lydia deuoured in a dreame his wife while she lay sleeping together in the same bed and finding her hand betweene his teeth when be awaked, he slue himselfe, fearing dishonour.

slaue to thy appetite;

Yet whilest thou crams thy selfe, thy soule is bleeding,
And Turtle-like mournes, that thou shouldst delight,
In such excesse as causeth infamie,
Starues soule, spoiles health, and ends with beggarie.
Remember (thou besott'd) for I must talke,
And that with serious passion, thou that tasts
The choycest wines, and doest to Tauernes walke,
Where thou consumes the night in late repasts.
Confusion now, drawes neare thee where thou kneeles,
Drinking deepe healthes, but no contrition feeles.
It may be, He that teacheth may be taught,
And Socrates of Softenes may learne,
Euen He, that for thy good these precepts brought,
To publicke light, may in himselfe discerne
Something blameworthie, true, and heauen he could,
Reforme his errors rightly as He would.

56

But harder is't by much for to performe,
Then to prescribe, where many seeme to vrge,
The present times abuse, but n'ere reforme
Those crimes in them which they in others scourge:
But where the Author makes vse of his paines,
As well as Reader, there's a double gaines.
And these are th' gaines which I do sue to haue,
Seeking no lesse thy benefit herein,
Then my peculiar good: where all I craue,
Is but thy prayer to purge me of my sinne.
I do not write, as I my paines would sell,
To euery Broker, vse them and farewell.