A fig for Momus Containing Pleasant varietie, included in Satyres, Eclogues, and Epistles, by T. L. [i.e. Thomas Lodge] |
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Ad Momum.
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 | A fig for Momus |  |
Ad Momum.
Epistle. 1.
Sir, laugh no more at Plinie, and the rest,Who in their publique writings doe protest
And motions) iudge of subsequent effects:
For I will proue, that creatures being dombe,
Haue some foreknowledge of euents to come.
How proue you that I heare some Momus crie?
Thus (gentle sir) by good Philosophie.
First brutish beastes, who are possest of nought
But fantasie, to ordinate their thought.
And wanting reasons light, (which men alone
Pertake to helpe imagination)
It followeth that their fantasies doe moue,
And imitate Impressions from aboue:
And therefore often by the motion
Of birds and beasts, some certaine things are knowne:
Hereon the Stragerite (with Iudgment deepe)
Discourseth in his booke of watch and sleepe;
That some imprudent, are most prouident,
He meaneth beastes, in reason indigent,
Where naitholes their intellectiue parts
(Nothing affected with care-killing harts,
But desert as it were and void of all)
Seeme with their moouers halfe conaturall.
For proofe, the bitter stinges of fleas, and flies,
The slime-bred frogges, their harsh reports and cries
Foresignifie and proue a following raine:
Why thus dull duncd: The moyst and stormie time
Fitting the frogges that dwell in wette and slime,
Makes them by a naturall instinct to croke,
Because ensuing raines the spleene prouoke:
And so the fleas, and flies in their degree,
By their attracted moyst humiditie,
Drawne from a certaine vertue elatiue,
Whence raine his generation doth deriue:
Seeke more than their accustom'd nutriment.
So cocks in season inconuenient
That often crowe, and asses that doe rub
And chafe their hanging eares against a shrub;
A following raine doe truelie prophecie,
And this the reason in Philosophie:
The cock, whose drienes by the heate was fed,
By moysture feeles the same extinguished:
The asse with vapours caused by the raine,
The humors then abounding in his braine:
Ingendereth an itching in his head:
What neede I more, he that hath Virgil read,
(Were he as Cato crooked and precise)
Would graunt that birds, and beasts were wether wise:
But if some misbeleeuing lad there bee
This paine I doe inioyne him for his sinnes:
When porpose, beare the sea with eger sinnes,
And beastes, more greedily doe chaw their cud,
And cormorants, seeke shore, and flie the floud;
And birds doe bowse them in the pleasant springs,
And crowes doe ceaslesse crie, and beate their wings:
That cloakles, in a champion he were set
Till to the skinne he thorowlie be wet,
| A fig for Momus | |