University of Virginia Library

SATYR 2.

Hel and damnation! what Imposture's this?
A She white linnen Saint without, yet is
Incarnate Devil: i'st not that same Fiend
Was found besieg'd by her Apostle friend
In Antlin's porch the other morn? before
The Sexton rose they 'ad knocking forc't the door,
Had not the grave disturber of dead bones
And bels, there stumbled o'r them both at once.
Out you unhallow'd whore! is this the way
To enter heav'n at thy streight gate I pray?
D'you sanctifie your Cuckold dormant? must
Your mother Church be bawd to goatish lust?
Yet goes she in and sitting prays and hears
With as observing eies, attentive ears
The Lecture, as the holiest Matron there:
As though her cleanstarcht handkerchieve was ne'r
With close embraces rumpled. Oh what front
Of impudence that sex can put upon't!
As shee'd suck in nothing that day but grace,
Mark how she eies the Preacher in the face!
Able to stare suspicion thence! as I
Have seen hoarse ranting Gape with stedfast eie,
Boldly out-face a petty lurie, when
The Iudge was after dinner sleeping. Then
She having glean'd in her spruce table book
Such crums of comfort as the Caiaphas took
First upon trust, with the next Sisterhood
'Mongst marrow bones and other lustie food,
She scatters them for breakfast, where must be
The moyling Priest (for 'tis not fit that he
Should spend his lungs, oyl, labour too in vain:)
Great pleasures justly do attend great pain.
Their bellies fill'd like windstuft bagpipes, so
Their squeaking Organs must be going too:
Such strange disputes here controverted be
Would puzzle a Scotch-lay-Presbyterie.
Whether that Bigamie been't as lawful now
As 'twas 'tofore? Speak Sister Ruth! we know
You have two husbands now, besides that one
Who next stands fairly in election.
Truly and verily, I professe you may,
How should the Church be built up else, I pray?
Her doctrine Hannah did approve, and doubt
Whether not in the Church as wel as out
Women might speak? the Priest resolv'd they should
Speak out as much and often as they would,
But never in. A Female Synod is
Resolv'd on to convene: the way was this;
Each truth-inspired She forthwith to meet
Either in Marklane or near Criplegate,
In Eutichus the Taylours chamber, there
Each Monday 'bout Religion to conferre.
Th'Assembly meets and sits: a pretty sight
Fair smooth chin'd Gospellers in aprons white:
Cathedral lawn not half so learned is.
No Prolocutour here was made, I wis:
They were all speakers. First grave Abigail
The Sempstresse having first pronounc'd them all
A holy Convent: damned in one word
Arminians with their books to fire and sword.
Such Tyrants women are: when they in stead
Of distaffs scepters take, they'l rule their head.
Peace! Peace! said busie Martha, we not know
Nor the She-Burgers in Geneva how
These Schollards tenets to confute: let's talk
Of things we better understand, and balk
Their Heathnish Problems! I had rather know
Whether the world in ninty seav'n or no,
(As Hoord affirms) shal be dissolv'd? for this
More fit and to be known more easie is.
My husband's now about some land to buy
And I'd not have him throw't away said she;
By no means let him do't, said Sarah, no:
But rather in Reversion let him 'stow
His money at that fatal period, when
The world for certein must dissolve, for then
Th'earth for a thousand years shal leased be
To us the Saints for little, saied She.
To quit this was a learned Quære made,
By a thin antiquated Chambermaid,
Run mad with reading Dod and Broughton, where
She scruples whether Aarons Ephod were
Of the skie colour of seawater green;
The dyers all of Amsterdam have been
Long in dispute about the question.
Next the point of Prædestination
Was startled to perplex the more: in haste
From this to Freewil these Heav'n drivers past,
And Squirrel-like as nimbly leapt from this
As o'r one bog to another wild Irish:
Like th'dogs that lapt at Nilus seav'nfold stream
They lick the flouds now they have troubled them;
Or as young Scepticks in Philosophie
From Air to Water, Fire to Earth wil flie,
Peripateticks in Divinitie
O'r all its Elements thus they likewise hie,
As nimbly with their tongues, as standing stil
O'r th'world a man in a map travel wil,
With's eie in one short minute, yet not know
Where the Moguls rich country stands, or how
His own is rul'd. In every doubt at last
All unresolv'd each to their homes do haste,
With their boss'd Bibles truss'd beneath their arms,
Thumb'd in the Revelation and the Psalms.
Bodie O death! who should they meet at door
But Grace the waitingmaid that saltchin'd whore?
Who before shethe Pædagogue had wed
Took all preventives, and when e'r she sped
Toucht Sowbread, Gladdon us'd, and Savin, food
To slink her spurious and abortive brood,
Procur'd for her dear Madams daughters, taught
Them to leap oft, soon as their wombs were fraught:
Yet with her cloak as holy face now wears
Where little hair much Sanctitie appears.
Lord! how she sighs in direful accents, that
Private affairs had made her come so late!
What matter ist? How d'ee; her quondam friend
Her Ladies gentle Go-before doth find
Her there, renews acquaintance, and thence brings
Her to his Laundresse private house and flings
Her down on the refreshing mat: the bed
Being ta'ne away and nothing but the sted
There left to hold the sport up, since the poor
Old Bawd her bedcloaths found too fast were wore.
Each met their comforters before they went
To their tup Cuckolds: so the day was spent.
But I am no Sir Pandarus of Troy,
To sent each City stop or close dequoy:
I am no Pimp or Constable; if more
Sinners you'd find, search Bridewel! there be store,
Who though they been't all sanctifi'd alike,
Yet are as right for the cause Catholick.