University of Virginia Library

I. SATIRES. 1593–1602.

SATIRE VI. TO SR NICHOLAS SMYTH.

Sleep, next Society and true friendship,
Man's best contentment, doth securely slip
His passions, and the world's troubles; rock me,
O sleep, wean'd from my dear friend's company,
In a cradle free from dreams or thoughts, there
Where poor men ly, for Kings asleep do fear.
Here sleep, and howsed by famous Ariosto,
By silver-tongu'd Ovid, and many moe,
Perhaps by gold-mouth'd Spencer too pardie
(Which builded was two dozen Stories high),
I had repair'd, but that it was so rotten,
As sleep awak'd by Ratts from them was gotten:
And I will build no new, for by my Will,
Thy father's house shall be the fairest still
In Excester. Yet, methinks, for all their Wit,
Those wits that say nothing, best describe it.
Without it there is no Sense, only in this
Sleep is unlike a long Parenthesis.
Not to save charges, but would I had slept
The time I spent in London, when I kept
Fighting and untrust gallants Company,
In which Natta, the new Knight, seized on me,
And offered me the experience he had bought
With great Expence. I found him throughly taught
In curing Burnes. His thing had had more scars
Then T--- himself; like Epps it often wars,
And still is hurt. For his Body and State
The Physick and Councel (which came too late
'Gainst Whores and Dice) he now on me bestows:
Most superficially he speaks of those.
I found by him, least sound him who most knows.
He swears well, speakes ill, but best of Clothes,
What fits Summer, what Winter, what the Spring
He had Living, but now these waies comein[ge]
His whole Revenew; Where his Whore now dwells,
And hath dwelt since his father's death, he tells.
Yea he tells most cunningly each hid cause
Why Whores forsake their Bawds: To these, some Laws
He knows of the Duel, and touch his Skill
The least Jot in that or these, he quarrel will
Though sober, but he 'as never fought. I know
What made his Valour undubd Windmill go
Within a Pint at most! yet for all this
(Which is most strange) Natta thinks no man is
More honest than himself. Thus men may want
Conscience, whilst being brought up ignorant,
They use themselves to vice. And besides those
Illiberal Arts forenam'd, no Vicar knows,
Nor other Captain less then he; His Schools
Are Ordinaries, where civil men seem fools,
Or are for being there; His best bookes, Plaies,
Where, meeting godly Scenes, perhaps he praies.
His first set prayer was for his father ill
And sick,—that he might dye: That had, until
The Lands were gone, he troubled God no more:
And then ask'd him but his Right, That the whore
Whom he had kept, might now keep him: She, spent,
They left each other on even terms; she went
To Bridewel, he unto the Wars, where want
Hath made him valiant, and a Lieutenant
He is become: Where, as they pass apace,
He steps aside, and for his Captain's place
He praies again: Tells God, he will confess
His sins, swear, drink, dice, and whore thenceforth less,
On this Condition, that his Captain dye
And he succeed; But his Prayer did not; they
Both cashir'd came home, and he is braver now
Than his captain: all men wonder, few know how:
Can he rob? No. Cheat? No. Or doth he spend
His own? No. Fidus, he is thy dear friend,
That keeps him up. I would thou wert thine own,
Or hadst as good a friend as thou art one.
No present Want nor future hope made me,
Desire (as once I did) thy friend to be:
But he had cruelly possest thee then,
And as our Neighbours the Low-Country men,
Being (whilst they were Loyal, with Tyranny
Opprest) broke loose, have since refus'd to be
Subject to good Kings, I found even so,
Wert thou well rid of him, thou't have no moe.
Could'st thou but chuse as well as love, to none
Thou should'st be second: Turtle and Damon
Should give thee place in songs, and Lovers sick
Should make thee only Love's Hieroglyphick:
Thy Impress should be the loving Elm and Vine,
Where now an ancient Oak with Ivy twine,
Destroy'd, thy Symbole is. O dire Mischance!
And, O vile verse! And yet our Abraham France
Writes thus, and jests not. Good Fidus for this
Must pardon me, Satyre's Bite when they kiss.
But as for Natta, we have since faln out:
Here on his knees, he pray'd, else we had fought.
And because God would not he should be winner,
Nor yet would have the Death of such a sinner,
At his seeking, our Quarrel is deferr'd,
I'l leave him at his Prayers, and as I heard,
His last: and, Fidus, you and I do know,
I was his friend, and durst have been his foe,
And would be either yet; But he dares be
Neither: Sleep blots him out and takes in thee.
‘The mind, you know, is like a Table-book,
The old, unwipt, new writing never took.’
Hear how the Huishers, Checques, Cupbord, and Fire
I pass'd: (by which Degrees young men aspire
In Court): And how that idle and she-state
(When as my judgment cleer'd) my soul did hate,
How I found there (if that my trifling Pen
Durst take so hard a Task) Kings were but men,
And by their Place more noted, if they erre;
How they and their Lords unworthy men prefer;
And, as unthrifts, had rather give away
Great Summs to flatterers, than small debts pay;
So they their greatness hide, and greatness show
By giving them that which to worth they owe:
What Treason is, and what did Essex kill,
Not true Treason, but Treason handled ill:
And which of them stood for their Countrie's good,
Or what might be the Cause of so much Blood;
He said she stunck, and men might not have said
That she was old before that she was dead.
His Case was hard, to do or suffer; loth
To do, he made it harder, and did both.
Too much preparing lost them all their Lives,
Like some in Plagues kill'd with preservatives.
Friends, like land-souldiers in a storm at Sea,
Not knowing what to do, for him did pray.
They told it all the world: where was their wit?
Cuff's putting on a sword, might have told it.
And Princes must fear Favorites more then Foes,
For still beyond Revenge Ambition goes.
How since Her death, with Sumpter-horse that Scot
Hath rid, who, at his coming up, had not
A Sumpter-dog. But till that I can write
Things worth thy Tenth reading (dear Nick) good night.