The Poetical Works of the Ingenious and Learned William Meston ::

I sing the man; read it who list,
A hero true as ever pist,
From Rome, who to Geneva travel'd,
Through dub and mire where he was gravel'd,
Much toss'd and toil'd ere he came at her,
And suffered much by land and water,
Bearing his luggage and his lumber,
Which did his shoulders sadly cumber,
In a pockmanteau or a wallet,
I think a knapsack we may call it,
Which was made of an otter's skin,
And was stuff'd with odd things within:
Because the otter is a creature,
You know, of an amphibious nature.
This made him choose her fur, to bear
In it his heterogeneous geer:
How afterward he came to Britain,
In Canto second we shall treat on,
And tell you how his roving roysters,
Demolish'd many kirks and cloysters,
Where nought but ruins now appears,
Of what was built in many years.

When to this city he had come,
First he clapp'd down upon his bum;
And lifting up his hands he said,
O Jove, thou know'st, that I am glad
That I have got safe o'er the Ferry,
Why should I not be blyth and merry
To see this place; for, God be thanked!
Here I shall lye in a clean blanket,
Free from the Babylonish vermin;
For so my lucky stars determine,

And end my toiling and my drudging;
Then he possess'd his land-lord's lodging,
And out of doors he turn'd his mess-ship,
Because forsooth he was a bishop;
For you must know, our valiant Knight,
'Gainst bishops bore a deadly spight;
That limbs of Antichrist they are,
Is taught by Sir John Presbyter.
This is our mighty hero's name,
Recorded in the books of fame;
Yet tho' we call him Jack or John,
Or sometimes Presbyter alone,
It is no matter; for I ween
The reader will know whom we mean,
Let him be Presbyter or Jack,
Or John to make our verse to clack,
Lately when all things he confounded,
He justly got the name of Roundhead;
Because he wore no hair nor wig,
And sometimes he is called Whig.

Now since you have our hero's name,
Our epick poem should be lame,
Unless his pedigree we trace,
And tell whence he derives his race;
Without the help of divination,
'Tis hard to tell his generation;
For as it happens in old states,
Which have outliv'd our common dates,
The longer time they have endured,
Their origin is more obscured,
And if you trace their births and æras,
You'll meet with nothing but chimæras.
Yea some of them have been so vain,
As all ancestors to disdain,
Except our common mother Earth,
To which alone they ow'd their birth,

As if like mushroms they had sprung,
From heaps of rotten earth and dung;
For trace the old and young, you'll still
Find, that they meet on the dunghill.
So some alledge our doughty Knight
Was come of chaos and old night,
Proving that he came from that border;
Because he hates all form and order.

And some who do not much admire him,
Say he's descended from Abiram,
So like in body and in mind,
That none but fools can doubt his kind.

Cou'd we believe himself, he'll tell us,
He is one of th' Apostles fellows,
With whom he did sit cheek for jowl,
And voted when they made their Poll,
As member of their first Assembly,
Which makes him be with them so homely.
He'll not call any of them Saint,
Unless they'd take the Covenant;
But this is what few will allow him,
For the Apostles never knew him.
Then (as some say), Dutch dames bring forth
A child, and monster at one birth,
Some think he is by generation,
The Souterkin of Reformation,
And that he had thir nurses three,
Sedition, Pride, Hypocrisie.

It is believ'd the fatal sisters,
Who of the threed of life are twisters,
Gave him this weird, that he should be
A constant foe to Monarchie,
And should engage the stubborn saints,
By solemn Leagues and Covenants,
To carry on their reformation,
With fire, and sword, and desolation;

And to a block their Monarch bring,
To make him there a glorious King;
And well you know, that this prediction
Did prove a true one, and no fiction.

A warrior he was full wight,
A rambling, randy, errant Knight,
Inur'd to tumults, mobs, and maulings,
To fighting, blood, and wounds, and brawlings,
Which pleas'd him, so his very life
And health depended upon strife.

As bravest soldiers are seen,
In time of war to look most keen,
Who hang their head and droop their snout,
When peace comes in, and war goes out;
Or as some herbs that love the shade,
But in the sun-shine die or fade;
Or as the owl that hates the light,
And only seems to live in night:
Just so, Sir John in time of war,
Appeared like a blazing star,
But languished with sore disease,
And droop'd in times of peace and ease.
No wonder then, if still he hates
All peaceful and well order'd states;
For to his glory, or his shame,
He cannot live but in a flame.
He's still resolv'd, whate'er betide him,
That none shall live in peace beside him.

To fighting being so inclin'd,
Ere we descend to view his mind;
'Tis not amiss, that first we scan,
The scabbard of his outward man,
And briefly let our reader see,
How he was armed cap-a-pee.

He had no head-piece, this I grant;
But his thick skull supplied the want;

So fortified in every part,
I mean by nature, not by art,
It would have cost a world of pains,
For any man to reach his brains:
On it you might thresh wheat or barley,
Or tread the grape ere he cry'd parley,
Or Culross girdles on it hammer,
Before you made him reel or stammer.
Yet had it crevises and chinks,
As wisest of our criticks thinks,
Occasion'd by the heat within,
Which almost rent the outward skin;
Upon the sides of it he bears
Two centry boxes called ears,
Which furnish'd him with information
Of scandals, plots and fornication;
Beneath the frontispiece there lies,
A pair of very watchful spies,
Who can discover at a distance,
When subjects ought to make resistance
Against their princes, and foretel
The proper minute to rebel.
When Presbyter should sound th'alarm;
Against the church and state to arm;
And watch-word give with sough and tone;
The sword of the Lord and Gideon.

In his broad hat, instead of feather,
The league and covenant together
He tied, and under hat-band sticked,
And wore them like a burgess-ticket.

A vizard mask he wore of brass;
Which from his foes preserv'd his face;
He had a doublet made of buff,
Was cudgel, sword, and reason proof;
A waste-coat under this, within,
Lin'd with a salamander's skin:

And then he had for a surtout,
Because he was as wise as stout,
A long gray cloak well lin'd with freeze,
That hang down lower than his knees;
Perhaps by guessing you'll discover,
The thing that cloaks do use to cover.

A pair of gauntlet gloves he had,
For boxing, and for preaching made,
With which he dealt his deadly blows,
And thump'd the pulpit and his foes;
Well vers'd he was in both these trades,
Of handling texts and rusty blades;
In both he had such matchless skill,
With either he could wound or kill,
And many a head had got contusions,
By both these weapons in confusions;
For when he kill'd not with the word,
He did it with the powerful sword,
And made his enemies perplex'd,
Either with awful sword or text.
He was content to fight his foes,
Either with paraphrase or blows;
And if the one did not succeed,
The other knock'd them in the head.
But far less vict'ry he had got
By texts, than blows and musket-shot;
For, like the wight with the tame pidgeon,
He cudgel'd men into religion,
Altho' all virtue ought to be,
Of choice, and not necessitie;
For proselytes brought o'er by force,
Instead of better, still turn worse;
And 'tis in vain, to think oppression
Can converts make, save in possession.
For there is something in our mind,
Which can with reason be inclin'd,

And gentle means; but open force,
Will make it stiffer still, and worse.

'Tis proper now, that we should come,
To casket of our hero's bum;
And with elaborated speeches,
Endeavour to describe his breeches.

Breeches you know, for antient race,
Of all our clothing take the place,
As being first in Eden made,
The prentice-sey of taylor trade:
Good reason then we have to put on
Our breeches first, before we button
Our upper clothes, for as you see
They justly claim precedency.

It is a Catholic opinion,
That they're the emblem of dominion,
Which frequently occasions strife
Betwixt the husband and the wife,
Who, when she scratches, scolds and skrieks,
'Tis still that she may wear the breeks;
Tho' breeches first, we must confess,
Were made to screen our nakedness,
And were design'd to hide our shame,
And cover what I will not name:
Yet after-ages have discover'd,
That honour's by our breeches cover'd,
Honour that nice and ticklish thing,
Which in a hero's breast should reign,
Like a comptroller, or dictator,
Or, if you please, a moderator,
And scorns to lie in any bed,
That is not warmed with blood-shed;
Yet all our modern authors jump
In this, That she dwells in the rump;
For kick a man but in the breech,
His honour there you're sure to reach,

And wound the same with more disgrace,
Than when you knock him on the face;
Hence we observe, that she does dwell
Near the Os sacrum in a cell.
So shame from honour lives not far,
You see these two dear neighbours are,
And when you miss the one, be sure
You're not far from the other's door;
And as at Rome, for an example,
No man could enter Honour's temple,
Who past not first through Virtue's church,
So they must still lie in the lurch,
Who seek for Honour's house and Fame,
And pass not by the gates of Shame.
If Honour's house you leave behind,
The manor-house of Shame you'll find;
Then to the everlasting fame
Of breeches, as they hide our shame,
And fence and fortify the dock,
So Honour wears them for a frock;
In these, since so much virtue lies,
No male or female will despise
Our learned and our pointed speeches,
Upon the worth and praise of breeches,
Which lodge, to their great reputation,
Fit members for our generation.

Our Knight did use them long and wide,
Because he had much shame to hide,
But had been so oft on his a---e,
And soundly jerked, one could scarce
Discern one hand-breadth of the thatching
Of's buttocks that was free of patching,
So clouted o'er with black and blue,
And rags of every other hue;
That by his breeches you'd mistake him,
And for a Merry Andrew take him.

The proverb says, that he should speak
Few words who has a riven breek,
If so, our Knight should still be dumb
When he thinks on the slough of rum.

Above his hose he wore gramashes,
Because thro' thick and thin he plashes;
And for a crampet to his stumps,
He wore a pair of hobnail'd pumps,
Which were contriv'd and nicely made,
On crown'd and mitr'd heads to tread.

Many who use the riding trade,
One spur, you know, have only had,
Which was the case of Hudibras;
But when our Knight does mount his ass,
Semblie, I think, the beast they call;
'Tis known he wears no spur at all,
I mean on heel; nor is there need,
Because he has them in his head;
And all our readers know right well,
One spur in head's worth two on heel.

Two swords he had of metal keen,
Which at bones breaking oft had been;
He was a bully and a bragger,
And therefore fought with sword and dagger;
One was a little sp'ritual dudgeon,
Which many a time had left its lodging,
When he inclin'd to deal his blows,
Among all those he thought his foes.
It was a very bloody blade,
And not long since two edges had;
When one of these did slap the Spirit,
The other still did disinherit.
With this he slash'd both soul and fortune,
A pastime which our Knight did sport in;
But lately our wise men and sages,
Thought fit to blunt one of its edges,

Knowing that fools will play their tricks,
If you allow them chopping sticks:
Therefore they did with great sagacity,
Deprive the blade of one capacity;
And since that time few think this sword
Of Presbyter is worth a turd;
For all the dints of this blade are but
Feckless, since blunted by Lord Tarbat,
Which makes him rather chuse to run
T'his carnal weapons, sword and gun,
Which serve him more in time of need,
Than this dull rusty thing of lead.

Fire arms he had in such great plenty,
With one discharge he could kill twenty;
Yea, some affirm that he had got
The famous circulary shot.
Of trumpets, drums, and eke hautboys,
And every thing that raises noise,
Great store he had; 'tis said by some,
He turn'd the pulpit to a drum,
I mean a “drum ecclesiastick,
‘Beat with his fist instead of a stick.”

Thus was he armed and accoutr'd,
So well equipt as to the outward
Appearance, that, from top to toe,
He seem'd a very dreadful foe.

Then next in order we must garnish,
His mind with all the proper harness,
And briefly lay down in a plan,
The fabrick of his inward man.

Of learning and of wit he had
Just so much as did suit his trade;
With more he would not fash his head,
Nor stuff't with what he did not need;
He was contented with his share,
It serv'd himself, he'd none to spare;

And as of outward wealth 'tis kent,
They have enough who are content;
So had our Knight of inward store
Enough, for he desir'd no more.

Head knowledge is acquir'd with pain,
And toilsome labour of the brain;
And learning is a tender seed,
That will not thrive in ev'ry head:
It needs such care and toil to plant it,
Our Knight did rather chuse to want it,
Than put himself to so much trouble,
To purchase what he thought a bubble;
And therefore he made other shifts
To serve himself with cheaper gifts.

These gifts, as he receiv'd them freely,
So, good or bad, he priz'd them highly,
Tho' miserably crack'd and broken,
Yet since he got them in a token,
He had more manners than to view them
With nicety, but he would shew them
To other men; for he was loth
To look a giv'n horse in the mouth.

For languages, it is well known,
That if you but except his own,
All others equally he knew,
As well the antient as the new,
And could with as great promptness speak
The Hebrew as the vulgar Greek,
The Syriac and the Chaldaic,
And all that's spoke by priest or laick;
Chinese, Arabick, and Sclavonick,
And dialects of the Teutonick;
The Hieroglyphicks and the Gothick,
And Czar of Musco's Bibliotheck,
He could explain with as great ease
And promptness as the Japanese,

And all the other tongues of Babel,
With equal knowledge he could gabble.

To Latin he bore no good will,
And therefore had of it small skill;
Latin, the language of the beast,
That's mumbl'd o'er by popish priest,
When he's intent upon his masses,
And which is taught by pedant asses,
Who tie our tongues to rule and sense,
And with syntax will not dispense,
Which none can know unless he study
The classick authors which are muddy,
These corrupt, Heath'nish, Pagan fountains,
That run among the rugged mountains,
Where learning lies in drumbled water,
So deep, our Knight could ne'er come at her.
Tho' drumbled water's best to fish in,
Yet since these streams are kept by Priscian,
To whom he is a spiteful foe,
He scorns in them to dip his toe;
In these our Hero only looks
For Latin names to English books.

An enemy he is to Grammar,
The forge in which our speech we hammer,
And dress and furbish up our words,
And polish them like blades of swords,
In which the critics blow the bellows,
A set of supercilious fellows,
Whose only talent lies in prying,
And every little blemish spying,
In finding fault with that or this,
And something that is still amiss.
Tho' these ill-natur'd fairy elves,
Have never made a line themselves,

Yet they drive on a scurvy trade,
Of censuring what others made:
They love to snarl, and bite and worry,
And authors hides like tanners curry,
And then expect they should be thanked,
For picking holes in every blanket.
These men were hated by the Knight,
Some think that he was in the right.

He was a profound Politician,
A most accomplish'd Rhetorician,
A haberdasher of cramp words,
That hack'd and hew'd like rusty swords,
And batter'd all his hearers brains,
To understand his lofty strains;
Yea even vex'd them at the heart,
'Ere they could reach his terms of art;
For every sentence he would prop,
With some metonymie or trope,
And would find in the plainest story,
Some strange surprising allegory;
And where his author nought proposes,
But plain sense he'd find a Meiosis,
Sometimes a Parasiopesis,
Skulking beneath a simple thesis.

Well could he piece a long oration,
And shape it in the newest fashion,
Which is not valued for the strength
Of argument, but for the length.
Full well he knew the long ear'd croud,
Is pleased most with long and loud,
Whose judgment is not so profound,
As to dive deeper than the sound:
Give them the sough, they can dispense,
With either scant or want of sense.

Our Knight, whenever he did need them,
Had got the way how forth to lead them,

Not like to horses by the nose
And mouth, as some folk do suppose;
But he could make them turn or veer,
And hap or wynd them by the ear,
And with some well wal'd interjections,
Could stir them up to insurrections,
Whenever he beat on the drum,
Of ear with skilful Hah and Hum,
Or sounded in his rusty throat,
Like trumpeter, a warlike note,
Attended with a doleful groan,
Not much unlike the bag-pipe's dron,
The mob to arms he out could call
With,—To your tents, O Israel!

Another trick he had to catch them,
For which the world cannot match him,
By cutting out, and shaping faces,
Adapted to all times and places;
For never man could put his Phyz-
iognomy in shapes like his.

In logick he knew every trick,
That has been taught by Burgersdick,
And was well vers'd in all the stories,
Of Aristotle's categories;
And all the other useful chat,
Of subject and of predicat:
All kinds of arguments he knew,
And reason he could well construe,
By Enthymeme, or Syllogism,
Sorites, or Paralogism,
Or by dilemma or induction,
Of all he knew the right construction,
And could with nicety and rigour,
Reduce them all to mode and figure,
And then would bring the very cardo,
Controversiæ to Bocardo;

For his Conclusion never misses,
Tho' not contained in Præmissis,
As they can overlook delusions
In premisses, who love conclusions,
So, tho' his Major had some fault,
And Minor very oft did halt,
( For minors are but minors still,
And may revock and change their will);
From these, tho' one or both did err,
What pleas'd himself he could infer;
'Twas for his interest, and therefore
'Twas best; for that he's bound to care for;
And would promote the good old cause,
Which gives to sense and reason laws.

By demonstration he could shew,
Each proposition false or true,
And what is true, will keep its quarter,
And never turn a base deserter,
And slink o'er to the other side,
Or 'twixt the two itself divide.
Truth is an atom or a point
Which never man could yet disjoint,
And make two contradictions share it;
For if your try to eik or pare it,
Or to dissect it, or dispose it,
'Twixt contradictions you will lose it;
For tho' this little thing we know,
Can either lodge in yea or no:
Yet 'twixt these two it will not vary,
Whenever they are found contrary,

Nor like a trimmer take it's post,
With either side that rules the roast:
It dwells not with these luke-warm sinners,
Who, for no side, will lose their dinners,
But shift about, and chuse the upper-
Side, where they get the better supper.

He would make out this paradox
By logick, that his friend John Knox
And Andrew Melvil, could invent
A better scheme of Government
Ecclesiastic, and far meeter
For us, than either Paul or Peter.
He many a nice distinction knew,
Betwixt the old kirk and the new,
And could shew in constituenda
Ecclesia, there might be some menda,
Which after may be turned out,
How soon the kirk is constitute,
Which serves him in good stead, when he
With ancient church cannot agree:
As when St. Paul writes to the Romans,
That all their peers as well as commons

Should subject be to supreme powers,
That was for their times, not for ours,
In substance poor, in numbers few,
A maughtless and unarmed crew,
These Christians were, Sir John would tell,
Who were not ripe yet to rebell;
Were Paul alive now he would tell us
Another tale; Go to, brave fellows!
You're men enough, out with your swords,
And cut your King's and Prince's cords
In pieces; b reak their bonds asunder,
And them of crowns and scepters plunder.
So tho' our hero contradicts
Both law and gospel with his tricks,
No matter; for you see that this is
A fine distinction that ne'er misses,
When 'tis applied by the Knight,
To prove that he's still in the right.

In metaphysick quiddities,
He was as learned as De Vries,
A subtle cobweb he could spin,
And make a metaphysick gin,
To catch the smallest entity,
Tho' Ens Rationis it should be;
And keep it prisoner at will,
Until our Knight, by profound skill,

Had view'd the poor Elf thro' and thro',
And all its properties did know,
Its parts, affections and dimensions,
Relations, uses and intentions,
Its rank and order, and its cause,
Its acts and habits, cracks and flaws.

In Ethicks he had so great skill,
He prov'd no action good nor ill
In its own nature; but because
It jumps or jumps not with his laws.
Self-love and profit he foresaw,
Was prima morum regula;
And therefore, that was always best,
Which most advanc'd his interest.

He much admir'd the Stoick fate,
But did their other doctrines hate,
As antiquat, and out of fashion,
That meddled with his darling passion:
He thought them all a pack of fools,
Who taught a story in their schools,
That virtue is its own reward:
Our Knight for no such virtue car'd:
For Godliness is best with gain,
Without that virtue is but vain,
Tho' Socrates and divine Plato,
He could converse with, or staunch Cato;
Yet those who know him best assure us,
He loves to dine with Epicurus.

Lying he thinks no sin, because
It is the life of the old cause,
Except when other men practise it;
For fain would he monopolize it,
And had he not both lied and cheated,
All his designs had been defeated:

For when he fought against his Prince,
He swore it was in his defence,
And still maintain'd this arrant lie,
Until he made his Sovereign die.

And not long since, in his distresses,
You know to whom he sent addresses,
Lying and swearing that he lik'd him;
You know how after that he trick'd him.

Nor thinks he drinking a great evil,
Because it comes not from the devil.
For you will grant this is a truth,
The devil drinks not to his drouth:
He ne'er was drunk in all his life,
'Bout this there's no debate nor strife;
Conform to best divines opinions,
Liquor is scarce in his dominions.
Our Knight can drink like other men,
Provided Tories do not ken;
And at this trade he's turn'd so keen,
He cares not much by whom he's seen.

He can pull off a glass of brandy,
When sweetned well with sugar-candy,
Which makes our Knight with pleasure take it,
And nicely to the bottom shake it.
Before he want it, our Sir John
Will take the brandy-wine alone;
A glass or two of forty-nine,
He can pull off before he dine;
At night, before he disoblige you,
A round half dozen he will pledge you;
Yea, he can drink a good sack-posset,
And glibly down his throat can toss it.
Tho' claret's what he seldom uses,
Yet when it comes he ne'er refuses,
If burnt with cinnamon and sugar,
To quaff't about in hugger mugger.

Of late, for want of better liquor,
Of well made punch he'll take a sneaker;
And if all other liquor fail,
Before he want he will drink ale
Or beer, of which he'll take a bicker,
Well mull'd with eggs to make it thicker.

To take the name of God in vain
He thinks is sin. But then for gain
To swear, when he makes something of it,
Is no sin, for it brings him profit.
His own interest to secure,
And good old Cause, he can perjure,
And frankly swallow down all oaths,
That bring him either food or cloaths.

The Covenant he made and took it,
Since then you know how oft he's broke it;
By this he is oblig'd to purge
The English Church, and with his scourge,
Drive out her grave and learned prelates,
And plant her with his head-strong zealots,
And banish thence her Liturgie;
Yet he thinks better let her be.

Justice he hated; for he knew
If ev'ry man should get his due,
He'd get the devil to his thanks,
For playing all his knavish pranks.

For mercy, we can say, our Hero
Was not inferior to Nero;
For it was sore against his will,
To save men's lives when he could kill.
When scaffolds reek'd with blood, Sir John
Still said, The work went bonn'ly on,

And to advance the good old Cause,
He murdered men against the laws
Of arms, after giving quarter,
Which ne'er was done by Turk or Tartar.

Long since, before the procreation
Of men by modern generation,
'Twixt male and female was invented,
With which we now must be contented;
There was a time, so says our Knight,
And swears that he is in the right,
When things were in the state of nature ,
And mother Earth, that pregnant creature,
Brought forth in ditches, fens and bogs,
Great swarms of men as thick as frogs:
Equally aged, strong and wise,
Exactly of the self-same size,
Right sturdy louts, untoward clowns,
Who us'd to knock each others crowns,
Still jangling, wrangling, scolding, huffing,
Wrestling, boxing, kicking, cuffing,
Just like that crop of murdering fellows,
Who certainly deserv'd the gallows,
For knocks and blood, and wounds and death,
That sprung up from the dragon's teeth,
Which Cadmus had sown in the fields,
And grew ripe men with spears and shields,
Helmets and launces, boots and spurs,
From these well plough'd and fruitful furs
As thick, and in the self-same manner,
As fir-trees grow up in Glen-tanner;
And any person at first sight wou'd
Acknowledge, that they were a wight wood
Of warlike plants, as e'er was seen
To grow since that day on the green.
But weary of such strife and hatred,
Resolv'd to get of nature's state rid,

And in a trice, (who could have thought it?)
But wit is best when men have bought it,
They all agree to chuse a Rector,
A hoggan-moggan Lord Protector.
'Tis strange to think how they did jump so,
Who did but 'erst each other thump so.
But then, they made a stipulation,
Before they came to his creation,
On which it was not safe to venture,
Before they had made this indenture.

“To all and sundry be it kent,
‘By virtue of this instrument,
‘Imprimis. That we all agree,
‘That henceforth Noll our King shall be,
‘Who, from our foes is to defend us,
‘And with a watchful eye attend us,
‘And keep us free from pit and gallows,
‘And all mischief that may befal us,
‘From foreigners and roaring ruffians,
‘And wand'ring sturdy ragamuffians,
‘That travel up and down among us,
‘And would by theft or robb'ry wrong us,
‘And lay their gins and traps and trains out,
‘To catch us first, then beat our brains out,
‘Or thrust their swords into our paunches,
‘And play at old game with our wenches,
‘Our wives, our daughters, or our doxies,
‘And so endanger us with poxes.
‘Item. It is agreed and ended,
‘And by thir presents condescended,
‘That he shall put in execution,
‘(Or else they are not worth a snishen);
‘Such statutes, acts and laws, as we
‘Shall make for our securitie,
‘Which, if he do, then we oblige us,
‘To be his true and faithful lieges,

‘And to stand by him, and assist him,
‘Against all those who shall resist him,
‘And rig him out to fight our battles,
‘With our estates, and lands, and chattles;
‘Yea, even venture life and limb,
‘When he's for us, to fight for him;
‘But when we find that he has wrong'd us;
‘Or meddled with what did belong t'us:
‘We'll run back to the State of Nature,
‘And make him know he is our creature.
‘Originally, since all power is
‘In us the people, which most sure is,
‘We'll reassume our nat'ral right,
‘And kick him out by slight or might.
‘This is by mutual consent,
‘The origin of government,
‘By which 'tis plain, all Princes barter
‘For crowns, and hold them by this charter.
‘For among us the sons of earth,
‘No one could be a King by birth:
‘All independent were and free,
‘In Presbyterian parity:
‘For wit or valour, no one brother
‘Was preferable to another;
‘All had to all things equal right,
‘There was no law but slight or might.
‘By these first principles, self-love
‘And interest, all things then did move:
‘But then, (because, as wise men say,
‘Where all command, none can obey;)
‘We yielded our true power inherent
‘Of government, to our vicegerent
‘The King, who still is answerable,
‘To th'origin of power, the Rabble;
‘And being our repository
‘Of power, when we find him miscarry

‘In government, then we can leave him,
‘And strip him of that power we gave him,
‘And in some better hand can lodge it,
‘And make him shorter, if he grudge it,
‘By all the head, since he abus'd it,
‘And to it's owners then refus'd it.”

“Hereditary right, revera,
‘To scepters is a mere chimæra,
‘Invented first by fools or knaves,
‘Or flatterers, to make men slaves,
‘But none of us so little sense has,
‘To think our creatures the first Princes,
‘Neglecting men of worth and merit,
‘Could make their num-skull sons inherit
‘Their crowns by right, and so exclude,
‘The more deserving multitude:
‘Our ancestors, without consent,
‘Could not set up such government;
‘Nor can we think they were so dull,
‘Our nat'ral rights thus to annul,
‘To make their children miserable,
‘And to one race enslave the rabble.”

Thus did our causuist and divine,
Reason this point in forty-nine,
In which brave days he made a figure;
His arguments well pleas'd M'Gregor,
A certain wight and witty robber,
Some think he was a true stock-jobber,
Who made a shirt to make a living,
By what some men accounted thieving;
Tho', honest man! he'd have it known,
He took not all that was his own.

In faith! Sir, you are in the right,
Said brave M'Gregor to the Knight,
Your arguments are good and true,
And make as much for me as you;

All have to all things equal right,
My blessing on you, honest Knight!
Rich men are but depositories
Of our true wealth, and he who carries.
About too much, or does abuse it,
To those who want must not refuse it;
Your reasoning indeed exact is,
And fully justifies my practice:
Your ancestors (I ne'er denied it),
And mine, the goods of earth divided
By just consent, but you will grant,
Mine never mean't that I should want.
Now, this original contract
Is violated by a pack
Of avaritious wealthy rogues,
Who have seiz'd all like greedy dogs,
And left me nought; so, worthy Knight,
I take me to my natural right,
And whatsoe'er I can command,
Either by force or slight of hand,
From any other richer creature,
Is mine by all the rights of nature.
Hereditary right to crowns,
Which is maintain'd by slavish clowns,
At best is Tory stuff: and what else
Is heritage of lands and chattles,
And other things, but a mere bauble,
That was not known by the first rabble
In purest state of nature's æra,
And is at best a wild chimera?
That their first owners should transmit
Them to their children, is not fit;
For then, Adieu to wit and merit!
If num-skull sons do still inherit
Their father's lands, and so exclude
The more deserving multitude.

Our ancestors, without consent,
Could never make such settlement:
Nor can we think they were so dull,
Our nat'ral rights thus to annul;
Nor did they, by their distribution,
Intend that any constitution
Should make their children miserable,
A naked, poor, and starving rabble;
That on our public good, some twenty
Or thirty rogues might live in plenty.

Now since those magistrates and kings
You've mention'd, are unnat'ral things,
Who have usurp'd, by slight and might,
My nat'ral and inherent right,
And would restrain a free-born creature,
From seizing what's his own by nature:
I am confirmed by your logic,
Still to pursue my lawful project,
And ease all those of loads who carry
More goods than what are necessary;
In nature there's no reason why
They should have more of these than I.

And now, brave patriot of mine
And nature's rights, you'll not repine,
If of your burden I do ease you;
In reason it cannot displease you;
Because I find, Sir, that you bear
About so much superfluous Gear;
You cannot think that he has wrong'd you,
Who takes but what does not belong t'you,
But to my comerades and me,
Whom you have brought to misery,
And left us nought to live upon,
Except our nat'ral right alone.
You are a champion, most zealous
For nature's rights; so are my fellows

And I; We use the self-same reason:
Produce your purse; it is no treason
To take it from you. Do not dally,
Musing and mumbling, Shill I Shall I.

The Knight, whom Gregor put so hard to,
Was fairly now in a bocardo,
Casting about for some evasion,
To save his purse on this occasion.
Quoth he; But you must understand,
Laws are establish'd in the land,
By which we may have just possession
Of goods, by paction or succession,
Or honest labour of each kind,
Either of body or of mind.

Tush! quoth Mac-Gregor, Never flinch
From principles, nor spurn, nor winch:
Ne'er talk of laws 'gainst nature's right;
You know far better things, good Knight:
These cobwebs you have all swept down,
By sweeping off your Sov'reign's crown.
Adieu, Sir, to your good old cause;
Had you allow'd him to plead laws,
Succession, labour, covenants,
All these were laugh'd at by your saints,
Because they made for him. And thou art
No better man than was Charles Stuart;
Nor can from law or nature bring
One argument, but what the King
Could have advanc'd in his defence,
With far more reason and good sense
Than you, Sir Knight, (who art a curse
To these poor lands) to save thy purse.
Produce it, Sir, or you shall know,
I'll make a state of nature's blow,
As cleanly cut off all your treasure,
As you cut off the head of Cæsar.

Hold! hold! Mac-Gregor, cry'd the Knight,
There is a providential right,
Maintain'd by our Apostle Knox,
Who was most sound and orthodox:
His arguments are very pretty,
Which he advanc'd to good Queen Betty.

“ Madam, Altho' your right, quoth he,
‘With nature's laws can ne'er agree,
‘Nor with God's perfect ordinances,
‘Which is the truth my book advances;
‘For I'm oblig'd to say, in conscience,
‘The people's consent is pure nonsense.
‘And I could make a rotten rag of
‘Your birth and title, which you brag of,
‘And clearly prove that all your laws
‘And power are full of cracks and flaws;
‘And that your throne hath no foundation,
‘But an uncommon dispensation,
‘Which, maugre the just course of nature,
‘Hath set the crown on such a creature.
‘Yet, Madam, you have one credential
‘To reign, that's a right providential,
‘Which makes that lawful now to you,
‘Which law and nature disallow.
‘To this alone if you pretend,
‘Here is my hand I'll be your friend;
‘With tongue and pen I shall be ready,
‘Still to maintain your right, my Lady;
‘But if this title you shall slight,
‘And go about to prove your right
‘To government, hereditary,
‘I tell you, Bess, you will miscarry.

‘With might and main I will oppose you,
‘And teach your subjects to depose you;
‘Such indefeasable pretences,
‘Will pass with none who common sense has.”

Now, by this providential right,
This purse is mine, said learned Knight,
And I cannot with it dispense,
Without injuring providence.

I understand you, quoth M'Gregor,
But I shall prove by mode and figure
(Snatching his purse) that it is mine,
And that by providence divine;
And if you offer once to grumble,
I'll make you topsy-turvy tumble:
For when you come to reason thus,
Know Major vis est majus jus.

Jack finding things turn'd worse and worse,
As well by logick as by force,
Was even oblig'd to yield his pelf,
And from worse usage save himself.
M'Gregor gloried in this project,
Of robbing him, by his own logick.

He had read both the text and gloss over,
Of every old and new philosopher,
And understood the whole gimcracks,
That are found in the Lipsick acts.
He could transmit to demonstration,
His tenets by inoculation,
And could infuse, with little pains,
Whig blood in Tory childrens veins,
And graft his doctrines orthodox,
As doctors now do the small-pox.

A fine Air-pump he did invent,
Most useful for his Government,
Which with one turn about, would suck,
And from his conscience cleanly pluck,

All his preceeding obligations,
Of vows and oaths and protestations,
And leav't so empty and well squeez'd,
That he might fill't with what he pleas'd.

A burning Glass he has, whose focus
Plays tricks that look like Hocus-pocus,
With which he kindles fire and flames,
As far's from Firth of Forth to Thames.

A Microscope he made to see,
The smallest cracks of Monarchy,
Which makes a midge appear in bulk,
And size like Royal Sovereign's hulk,
With which he sees the circulation,
Of Statesmens blood in every nation.

A Weather-glass he's got of late,
Which falls and rises with the state,
By which our Knight exactly knows,
How publick credit ebbs and flows.

He had a geometrick Scale,
To gage men's heads like casks of ale,
And calculate all their dimensions,
Capacities, plots and intentions.

A Chrysostatick. Balance he,
Contriv'd with utmost nicety,
For weighing consciences with gold,
To know for what they might be sold.

Our Knight had also got a Besom,
Which did to admiration please him,
To sweep the kirk and cleanse the causey,
Of Tories and Episcopacy.

He had a Bed like old Procrustes,
Which both for breadth and length so just is,
That every journeyman he had
Into the bed of proof was laid;
And if too short, or if too small,
He rax'd them till they fill'd it all,

Thus he Tom Thumb would rax and draw,
And cut from Garagantua,
Until he had them shap'd and siz'd,
As directory bed advis'd.
When all their lessons he had taught them,
And with his nostrums fully fraught them,
He sent them out to cry his ware,
In ev'ry parish, town and fare,
And sell them, with this intimation,
They're of the newest reformation;
Well cut and fashion'd, and much tighter
Than all before them, and much lighter:
Which was a very quaint device;
Because, old springs will give no price.

Here is a Cloak; wear it about you,
Do what you please, no man will doubt you:
This cloak will cover all below it,
Be what it will no man can know it.

Here is a pair of Shoes; come buy 'em;
Pay nothing for them till you try 'em:
Ev'n put them on, see how they fit you,
For I design not to out-wit you:
They're made of trusty well-tann'd leather,
And fit for any kind of weather;
Travel with these thro' thick and thin,
Your feet will still be dry within.

And here is Gyges his fine Ring,
Which is a very useful thing
For Statesmen, mountebanks and jugglers,
Intelligencers, spies and smugglers.

Here is a very pretty Touch-stone,
No man e'er saw another such stone,
For trying doctrines that are sound,
And creeds where no alloy is found,
And ev'ry thing that's Sterling fine,
Conform to standart forty-nine.

Here is a Hook will stipends fish up;
And here is Ars'nic for a Bishop.
Here is a Spade, and other tools,
For planting colleges and schools,
And rooting out the bishop-weed,
And sowing covenanted seed.

Here's Hood and Bells for Tory fool;
And here is a Repentance-stool.

Here I have burning red hot Zeal,
And for malignants, here's a Flail.

Here is a pack of pleasant Toys,
For doating fools and childish boys.
In fine, there's nothing you can lack,
Which I cannot find in my pack.

First matter was to him well known,
He catch'd her' ere she had put on
One rag of form, when she was naked,
And every quod and quale lacked;
And still he loves this fairy elf,
Because she is so like himself;
For he can prove by sympathie,
That like things always best agree.

He thinks, that forma substantialie
Est res fictitia, non realis;
And that his purest reformation,
By consequence must be privation:
Forms are but useless baggage; Quare,
To throw them off est deformare,
Which, by an easy transmutation
Of letters, makes a reformation;
If matter can subsist without them,
Why should he fash his head about them!

Well vers'd he was in all the hist'ries
Of nature, and her profound myst'ries,
And by some occult quality,
Her hardest knots he cou'd untye,

Or like the Macedonian wight,
Dissolve the same by slight or might.

He knew Entelecheia Ontos,
And thought, that it no small affront is,
To any man of his promotion,
If he knew not the laws of motion;
By practice he knew these as well,
As Leibnitz, Drs Clerk or Keil;
And, put him to't, he would dispute on
This point with great Sir Isaac Newton;
For when he charg'd with foot or horse,
He mov'd by centripetal force;
And when he fled; he always saw
The cause was vis centrifuga,
And vis inertiæ was the bridle,
That sometimes keep'd our hero idle.

Attractive force he could explain,
In amber, magnet, gold or gain,
And had found out the secret cause,
Why amber only sucks up straws
And chaff; why load-stone draws the steel,
And turns the compass like a wheel,
When more attractive gold can draw,
Wise Judges, and great men of law;
And make the most of mortals veer,
And by it's sole direction steer.

Why beauty should attract men's eyes,
As candle-light does butter-flies,
And better stipend draws Mass John,
By act of transportation,
To leave his own kirk for a fatter ,
And labour hard till he be at her.

What makes the sea to ebb and flow,
Well as Des Cartes he did know;
That south-sea lately flow'd so high,
It seem'd almost to reach the sky;
Then ebb'd so very low and soon,
He proves, was owing to the moon,
That giddy planet, which dispenses,
On sea and land, her influences,
When round this glob of earth she ranges,
And seems to sport and play with changes;
Five hundred times she'll change, that's plain,
Before she raise't so high again.

Matter's Divisibility,
He proves by possibility,
Is infinite; for as Queen Dido,
(You know her tale as well as I do),
A cunning gipsy, by a trick,
Which she had learned from Old Nick,
Bought as much ground as a bull's hide
Would compass round on every side,
Which in small thongs she nicely cutted,
By which the Seller was outwitted,
And for ten merks got as much ground,
As was well worth ten thousand pound,
Where she did settle with her people,
And built a pretty town and steeple.

So might a louse' lug be divided,
(Although our Knight had never try'd it),
In shreeds so thin, that it would cover
Great Britain, Ireland, and Hanover,
And all the King of Spain's dominions,
Conform to learned men's opinions;

And after that, what yet behind is,
Would serve to cover both the Indies,
All Poland, Muscovy, and Russia,
With Flanders, Germany and Prussia.

One of her teeth, were it but splitted
As thin as matter would admit it,
Our Knight, by demonstration, offers
To prove, that were it made in coffers,
They would contain all Britain's gold,
And more, by twenty thousand fold,
Than e'er was in our Island found,
Before it was in South-sea drown'd.

Besides all this, our hero knew
The very cement, or the glue,
That keeps a body's parts united
So closs, it takes some pains to split it.

He knew the bodies elateric,
As well as any Neoteric.
Our Knight himself was so elastick,
That tho' you cudgell'd him with a stick
And beat him into any shape,
Of ass, or sheep, or lamb, or ape;
Such was his stiffness and his rigour,
He still recover'd his own figure.

He was a learned alchymist,
And had read Boyle and Trismegist,
Van-Helmont too, and Paracelsus,
And all the authors, as he tells us,
Who treat of sulphur or of salt,
And can draw spirits out of malt:
He could make gold of glass or lumber
As well as any of their number.

And in the Rosicrucian trade,
He knew all has been writ or said,
And might for an adeptus pass,
As most men think indeed he was.

Well vers'd he was in all the fancies
Of hydro-pyre-geo-mancies,
And many learned things could tell
Of knots and charms, and the night spell,
Which makes the devil stand as warden,
To watch a deer-park or a garden.

He could find out who stole his gear,
By turning of the sieve and sheer;
And could teach browster-wives a charm,
Which they might use without all harm,
To make their drink go off the better,
To put more malt in, and less water.

A charm for masons and for slaters,
That should be writ in golden letters,
He had, which, when they us'd their calling,
Would keep them from all harm by falling;
In coming down make no more haste,
Than going up, probatum est.

He made a sympathetic plaister,
Which (if you meet with a disaster),
Rightly applied to the blade,
Will surely cure the wound it made.

For oracles he never slip't one,
From Delphos down to mother Shipton,
From which he had not pull'd the meaning
So close, he had not left a gleaning
For after-ages, when he's gone,
To exercise their wit upon.

With ease he could discuss the libels
Of Casaubon against the Sybils;
And was superlatively famous
In explicating Nostradamus,
And all the prophecies of Merlin,
Which some think are not fully Sterling.
Thomas the Rhymer he had read,
And understood each word he said;

His prophecies he could unriddle,
As easily as string a fiddle:
On these he had made explications,
Like Jurieu's on the Revelations;
From which good reasons he could bring,
To shew how long the beast should reign
With horned head, and lawless power,
That fornicator of the whore;
That Antichrist, that man of sin,
In blood of saints drench'd to the chin;
Who has usurp'd another's throne,
And wrought great desolation.
But after some Platonic years,
He says, most clearly it appears,
The Covenant shall batter Rome,
Or burn him without law or doom:
For he's content then to be fry'd
Alive, if you find that he's ly'd.
Most clearly also he does see,
All clergymen will ne'er agree,
But always, some ill-natur'd brother
Will persecute and damn another:
That Britain always shall have war,
Against the Germans, French or Czar,
Or Spain, or some one of her princes,
With arguments he can convince us:
So long as kingdoms try their metal,
The balance of her pow'r to settle;
Which is indeed a thing so kittle,
One scale will still weigh down a little.
Or, were't in æquilibrio,
The balance up and down must go,
So soon as any active state
Shall be found to preponderate.
And this, our hero does contend,
Will be ev'n to the world's end.

Quite out of sight, like wat'ring spaniel,
Sometimes, to find the sense of Daniel ,
He dives; and then, when he appears,
Shaking the water from his ears,
He throws the dirt so thick about him,
The crowd he makes to fear and doubt him.

Sometimes, like turn-spit cur, he reels,
Sweating in his mysterious wheels;
And by his motion, tho' he fancies
That higher up he still advances,
Yet, press'd down with his nat'ral weight,
After much toiling, still the Knight
Is found to be in the same place
Where first he did begin his race;
And has done less, for all his boasting,
Than turn-spit dog the goose when roasting.

For Palmestry, he seldom miss'd
To bear his Fortune in his fist.
By phisiognomy he knew
A tory face from a true blue.
By horoscopes he could foretell
As well as any Sydrophel,
The fate of those he mean't to murder;
In this his art could go no further.

He knew Beelzebub's whole commanders,
Imps, satyrs, sylphs and salamanders,
Familiars, brownies, water-kelpies,
And all the other hellish whelpies;
Hobgoblins, ghosts, and fairy legions,
That wander in the airy regions;
And sometimes take a trip among us,
When they intend to rob or wrong us,
And drink our wine out, or our beer,
Or feast upon our richest chear,

Of which, when they've th'effusion got,
Their latter meat's not with a groat.

And he can prove, that in the air is
A palace, built for king of fairies;
Tho' many think, that the foundation
Of that tower is imagination,

It is not so; for the Lord Duffus
(Which of the fairies a good proof is),
In one night travel'd with their train
Ev'n to Bourdeaux, and back again,
There drank good wine, and then put up
In his gown-sleeve a silver cup;
Our Knight has seen it, and believes
The Lord and Fairies were the thieve
Who drank the honest man's burgundy
And claret; they'll pay for it one day;
And then into the hogshead piss'd,
To fill it up; believ't who list;
The story's true, the liquor stinked,
As they can tell you who did drink it;
Then stole off without paying for it,
And kept the cup, nor will restore it.

Meg Mulloch, and the second sight,
Elf torches glimmering in the night,
And ignes fatui, these fires
That lead men into bogs and mires,
The willo' wisps, and fairy darts
That shoot our cattle thro' the hearts:
All which have tortur'd some men's brains
To understand, our Knight explains,
With all the hocus-pocus tricks,
Of witches riding on broom-sticbs,

To meet the devil, when he calls
Them to attend his masques and balls;
Or when in shells of eggs they float,
For want of better ferry-boat;
And dread no billows, storms, or blasts,
Tho' they have neither sails nor masts.

But he can teach you a rare trick,
By which you may outwit Old Nick.
If, when you eat your eggs, you break
The shells, he cannot stop the lake:
This he can prove by demonstration,
Will mar the Devil's navigation.

He knew the stories of night-mares,
And old wives, turn'd to cats and hares,
Skipping and dancing o'er the plains,
And raising storms and hurricanes,
(which some think he could do himself,
As well as any imp or elf,
Because we still have stormy weather,
When's Janizaries meet together),
And Lapland witches, who can muster
All kinds of winds that blow or bluster,
And then expose the same to sale,
As we do bottl'd beer or ale,
Which when uncork'd, as sailors tell us,
Will puff and blow like a smith's bellows.
All this, and more our hero knew,
As well as Mass John Petticrew;
And like a spaniel, by the smell,
Would find out where the witches dwell;
Then up and down our Knight would prick them,
Or by much waking he would trick them,
By which devices, tho' they're cruel,
He knew old wives that made best fewel,

And who were dry, and sit to burn,

As well as priest of Toryburn.
Some think our Knight, if he were try'd
For witchcraft, might be burnt or fry'd;
For as a witch, tho' you should roast her,
Will never say the Pater Noster,
(As some affirm); so Jack, 'tis clear,
Has not said it for many a year.

To mathematick demonstration,
Our Knight had no great inclination,
The Analyticks, and the Fluxions,
And geometrical constructions,
With all the crabbed conick sections,
And orthographical projections,
And all that's taught by Archimedes,
At best, he thought a toilsome trade is,
Which costs a man much time and pains
To purchase, and brings slender gains.
Tho some affirm, that he could make,
In time of need, an almanack,
'Tis false; give him the Golden number,
His head with more he will not cumber.
The moon he studies, and can guess,
When there's ill weather in her face,
And he will prove it, if you please,
That she is not made of green cheese:
But is a globe of land and water,
Whatever idle fools may chatter;
And that the man who is seen in her,
Is no malignant Tory sinner
Nor drunken cavalier, nor ranter,
But a stout trusty Covenanter.

He thinks the Comets and Eclipses,
Are certain fortune-telling gypsies.

He makes no doubt but Mr. Whiston,
For all his skill is not to trust in,
Nor are his arguments found good,
That Comet's tail brought on the flood;
The same that now and then appears,
Within a certain space of years;
And will perhaps at last return
This lower globe of earth to burn,
Which may be true or false; tho' John
And Whiston reason pro and con.

For all Copernicus can say,
He'll not believe, that, every day,
The earth can round its axis reel,
Like whirlegig or spinning-wheel,
Or, in the space of one whole year,
Her course through the ecliptic steer.

But his Religion to descrive,
Would nonplus any man alive.
Yet the quintessence of it lies
In perverse, stiff antipathies,
To get the farther off from Rome,
He ran quite out of Christendom;
But in a hurry coming off,
Pack'd up some of her coarsest stuff;
He wore his conscience in his face,
Because the most conspicuous place,
Which made his countenance look muddy,
Like Winter night, all storm and cloudy;
When Boreas is in a huff,
And at both ends begins to puff,
Blowing as loudly through his fewel,
As if he blew to cool his gruel,

And squirting snow and hail among us,
When he untrusses to bedung us:
Just so his Phiz' did lout and lowr,
With aspect sullen, stern and sour.
If wisdom makes the face to shine,
According to a great divine,
What store of it the Knight possest,
May by his gloomy looks be guess'd.

The force of his Devotion lies
In sough, grimace, and white of eyes,
When he in homely terms expresses
His indigested raw addresses,
Which once made a malignant say,
That Hogan hero still did pray,
With words that ought not to be printed,
And faces that should not be painted.

Once when the Knight had screw'd his face,
Writhing his mouth to say his grace,
And turning up the white of eye,
A French-man who by chance stood by,
Fetching a bottle, clap'd a dose,
Of Hung'ry water to his nose,
Then felt his pulse; I find, quoth he,
There is no fear, Courage, Monsieur!

He drove a kind of tinkling trade
In clouting kirks; but then he made
(Like's brethren of that occupation),
A rugged sort of Reformation:
For, like the Tinkler with the kettle,
As oft as Knight did try his metal,
To stop a hole, or rather hide it,
He made a greater hole beside it;
When he could find no hole he laid on
Hard with his hammer, till he made one.
Thus did he clout his Kirk, and patch her,
Till all the world could not match her,

And of his work there is no ending,
For he must evermore be mending.

With every thing he is displeased,
That other honest men practised,
Especially if Bishops did it,
For then he surely did forbid it:
Because he found, they us'd prostration
When they put up their supplication
To Heaven, upon their bended knees,
That posture did our Knight displease:
And therefore, he thought fit to teach
His followers to sit on breech,
Or, if they please, to lean their heads
Upon their neighbour's shoulder-blades,
Or lolling lye upon their haunches,
With head on hand in the kirk-benches,
Which postures are less superstitious,
He says, Than kneeling, which is vitious.

Because they stand when they sing praises,
To Heaven, our hero never raises
Himself from bum; he thinks that sitting,
And singing is by far more fitting.

To stand up when we bless our table,
Or give thanks, is abominable;
And therefore, it was no great wonder,
That his host fell into a blunder.

For chancing with a Lord to dine,
Who ate good meat, and drank good wine;
When Jack had fully cram'd his paunches,
With muir-foul, partridge and fat haunches
Of venison, and pyes and custard,
After good powd'red beef and mustard,
And hen and capon, and good mutton,
Which he had ate up like a glutton:
(For good fare with his heart he lov'd),
How soon the table was remov'd,

Sitting on bum, he made a face,
And thus began to say his grace.

“O! thou'rt a good and gracious Lord,
‘Who does to us such store afford,
‘With bounteous liberalitie,
‘What thanks shall we return to thee?”

Mean time this Lord who did mistake him,
And for a complimenter take him,
Thinking that all these thanks were given
To his good Lordship, not to Heaven,
Said, “Let your compliments alone,
‘You're kindly welcome, Master John.”

Our heads in churches to uncover,
Is Antichristian all over,
Our Knight affirms rank prelacy,
And downright vile idolatry;
For, since the most part of his fellows,
Dares not put hat on in an ale-house
Before their betters, he thinks fit,
In church that they should cover'd sit,
As if that place were to protect
Ill manners, and all disrespect.

No sanctity at all he tells,
Is found within a church's walls;
For there our Knight will preach and pray,
And thresh and beat his lint next day,
And set up there his rocks and reels,
His rippling-combs and spinning-wheels
To show how little he did honour
The Kirk, he used to piss upon her,
And troopers horses he would stable,
Where he had his Communion table;

Which is his practice in our nation,
In times of purest reformation.

It was, he said, Prelatick leaven,
In church to lift up hearts to Heaven,
With some devout ejaculation,
When men meet in a congregation;
For there 'tis fitter we should come
In rudely, and clap down on bum.

If you should say, when hero sneez'd,
“God save you, Sir,” he was displeas'd,
Because he said it was profane,
To take that sacred name in vain.

So on a time when he was walking,
With a grave man he fell a-talking,
With whose discourse he was well pleas'd;
But when by chance the Knight had sneez'd,
With hat pull'd off a bow he made,
And gravely, “Sir, God save you said.”
At which expression hero started,
And what, said he, if I had farted
Would you have said? The other curs'd him,
And swore he would have said “De'il burst him.”

Because all priests in every nation,
And under every dispensation,
Have by their robes distinguish'd been,
That when by other men they're seen,
They may be known, and eke respected,
And from all injuries protected,
(For he would be worse than a beast,
That would affront or harm a priest),
Our Knight, who is than these far stouter,
Is just so cloathed as a sutor,
Betwixt the two 'tis hard to choose,
Which mends our lives, and which our shoes.

Our Knight will neither preach nor pray,
Nor sing a psalm on Christmas day,

When all the Heavenly Choir shall string
Their harps, and halelujahs sing;
Nor will he feast nor shew his mirth;
But he observes George Heriot's birth,
For reasons best known to himself;
Some think it is for worldly pelf.

His true and trusty adjutant,
And great Apostle Andrew Cant,
Who neither wanted zeal nor cunning,
And was profoundly skill'd in punning,
And in the pulpit many times,
Instead of reason vented rhimes,
When preaching up his Reformation,
By preaching down the observation,
Of all the solemn fasts and feasts
Of Christian church, by scurvy jests,
Did ridicule this great festival,
In which he was not over civil.

Quoth he, “You call it good old Yool-day,
‘But I say, it is good old Fool-day,
‘O! But you say, 'tis a brave halie day,
‘I tell you, Sirs, 'tis a brave belly day.”
Thus did this prattler play at crambo,
With's hearers, sic fuerunt ambo,
Hinc inde male feriati,
Et supra modum reformati.

At Jesus name he will not bow,
Which makes some think he is a Jew,
Nor will our stubborn hero pray,
What he commanded him to say,

Altho' the laird of Calder press'd him,
And with good arguments address'd him,

(Who was his friend) to use that form,
And told him of that dreadful storm,
That justly scatter'd the assembly
Of the Scots kirk, on which the blame lay,
Of turning out the Pater noster,
When Noll chastis'd the kirk, and toss'd her
Assembly men all out of door,
And drove them to the Burrow-moor,
Where he commanded these grave fellows,
When he had march'd them round the gallows,
By Colonel Lilburn, on the pain
Of hanging, not meet again.

To use that form, he says, is foppery,
Will worship, black and downright Popery.
He laughs at all these silly asses
Who frankly can forgive trespasses,
And thinks that man but little sense has,
Or mem'ry, who forgets offences.

One of his Janizaries said,
The Pater noster was not made,
For the wise clergy of the nation,
Who had got college-education;
But for a parcel of poor scullers
Who fish'd for cod, and were not scholars,
Because, poor men! they knew not better:
For they could scarcely read a letter.

Another point of his theology,
Is never to sing the Doxology,
Nor any gospel hymn, nor read,
Nor sing nor say th'Apostle's creed,
Lest he offend the modern Arians,
And the Socinian sectarians.
He thinks it is a great transgression,
For christians to make confession,
In public, of their faith; he knew,
That this might disoblige a Jew,

A Turk, a Pagan, or dissenter,
Into our churches should they enter,
Who value gospels, and epistles,
And creeds, no more than childrens whistles
With want of these he can dispense,
Rather than give these folks offence.
He reads no scripture but his text,
Which oft he renders so perplex'd,

With paraphrases, and strange glosses,
Of Orleans, the sense he loses.

And yet the Knight is much displeas'd,
If any think him circumcis'd,
Especially his female hearers,
Who of his gifts are great admirers,
To whom he proves by demonstration,
He's free of that abomination.

To prove he is no Jew, he eats
Indifferently all kind of meats,
Swine's flesh, and pudding staff'd with blood.
Which he thinks strong and warlike food,
And a fat capon, or a pullet,
Tho' they were strangled by the gullet.

Nor is there any man can think
He is a Turk, who sees him drink;
For set before him sack and claret,
Or Malaga, he will not spare it;
For Mahomet and his tame pidgeon,
And hotch-potch mixture of religion,
And liquor boil'd in coffee-pot,
Our hero would not give one groat:
So many women, and no wine,
Can never please a good divine;
If Mahomet had both united,
More people he had proselyted.

He favour'd Egypt's old opinions,
Who worship'd crocodiles and onions;
Strange Gods indeed! yet in these latter
Days, we have got some little better;
For most of all his idols are like
Old Egypt's onion and her garlick.

Like other Knights, he had a Squire,
Compounded of the earth and fire,
Where one did with the other jar,
And kept up a continual war;
A most advent'rous son of Mars,
Who scorned still to turn his a**e,
Except to bishops, which he did,
For sear of bidding them God speed.
An ignis fatuus kind of preacher,
Who led his kirk, where few could reach her,
Thro' dub and mire, and bogs and mosses,
And edify'd her with his glosses,
In her affliction and distresses,
On mountain sides and wildernesses.
For wit and learning, such another
As Knight: some think he was his brother;
Which may be true, tho' Jack and he
At all times do not well agree;
Malignants of these two aver,
They are like oil and vinegar,
Which never can be join'd in one
Till soundly beat, and then 'tis done;
But if you let them stand and settle,
You'll find these blades of different mettle,
From one another soon will wander,
And mutually each other slander:
Now Dick affirms Jack is raogue,
A silly fawning and dumb dog,

Who has betray'd the good old cause,
By truckling under human laws,
And giving up the power, of late,
Of mother Zion, to the state,
Who cannot in Assembly sit,
But when and where a King thinks fit,
Who never took the covenant,
As Presbyter himself must grant,
And keeping fasts by state ordain'd,
Tho' to the kirk it appertain'd,
To set a-part the days of fasting,
When people must forbear from tasting
All food, except some liquidum,
Quod non solvit jejunium,
Either on Tuesday or on Monday,
But best of all, if it be Sunday;
Because the Knight will prove the said day
Is fitter for a fast than Friday;
For then we toil not, and 'tis meet,
That they who work not should not eat.

And now he's ta'en the Abjuration,
Which plainly stops the reformation

Of English church, as all must grant,
And contradicts the covenant:
By which he does homologate
The absolute power of the state:
Which is more than enough to prove,
He has fall'n off from his first love.
All oaths are acts of adoration,
And of most solemn invocation:
Wherefore the kirk should only coin them.
Or else the state cannot enjoin them.

To all these things the Knight replies,
'Tis best we merry be and wise:
There is a time to talk or mumble,
To bawl out loudly, or to grumble:
And there's a time to be quite dumb,
And silent sit upon our bum;
Which clear is from th'Ecclesiastes,
And so his argument still fast is:
Which makes it plain, that his late practice
Both scriptural and most exact is.

Besides, the Squire, he had a sister,
Who serv'd him when he was in mister,
In more capacities than ten:
She was worth twenty serving men;
A gadding, whining, sighing saint,
Whose whole devotion lay in cant,
And turning up the white of eyes,
'Gainst Bishops when she bawls and cries.
After she's got her Jimrie-cosie
Of well-mull'd sack, till she be tosie,
And of good brandy a full dose,
She sings, now my cup overflows!
And cries, away with Pater-nosters!
As loud as some cry cauller oysters.
For her religion, it appears,
To go no further than her ears
And tongue; which I can tell you truly,
Is still a member most unruly:
Tho' not the only one about her;
Let these ev'n dacker her who doubt her.
She was his laundress, nurse and cook,
And heard him when he read his book;
She darn'd his stockings, clean'd his shoes,
And told him the tea-table news.
She mull'd his sack, and made his bed,
And warm'd it too sometimes, 'tis said.

To meet with a well-gifted brother,
She would ev'n steal off from her mother,
And make a thousand feints and shifts,
To know his strong in-bearing gifts;
For there was nothing that could please
Her, so well as long exercise.

To see a cassock, or a gown,
Would make the sighing sister swoon;
She fainted, if she chanc'd to look
Upon the common-prayer book:
And rav'd out Popery and the mass,
When she was roused with a glass
Of citron-water, which is better
Than usquebaugh: then reads a letter
In Rutherford; and never misses
To pitch on these which mention kisses.

He had a strange amphibious wight,
A lay, or ruling-elder heght,
Who was his valet, groom and drayman,
But neither clergyman nor layman;
A sort of kirk-hermophrodite,
In whom two genders did so meet,
He seem'd to have them both, or rather,
In their perfection he had neither:
For many years, the reformation
Of old shoes was his occupation,
Schismatic foal and upper-leather,
With lingel to unite-together:
But frankly leaves his trade and his shop,
To clout the kirk, and cry, no bishop!
And still continues a fantastic
Cobler, and botcher ecclesiastic,
Sitting and plotting with the Knight,
And voting he's still in the right.

Tho' he can scarcely write or read,
He has strange whim-whams in his head,

About election, reprobation,
And Presbyterian ordination,
The solemn leagues and covenants,
And privileges of the saints,
The certain signs and marks of grace
Decypher'd in a true-blue face,
And which may in the dark be found,
By edifying sough and sound.

The bishops and their deans he scorns,
And thinks the Pope of Rome has horns:
A strange conceit! for in his life,
That bishop never had a wife:
Nor can the wearing of that crest
Be thought a true mark of the beast.
Some saints, as all men must acknowledge,
Have had them, tho' without their knowledge
And some perhaps have had them too,
Who knew what on their foreheads grew:
So no man ought to mock and flout them,
Since there are beasts with and without them;
And since they are the common lot
Of sinners and of saints devout.
With these the Grecians did destroy
The celebrated town of Troy:
For had not some of the Greek skulls,
Been fortified like rams and bulls,
That famous town, we may conjecture,
Had longer stood; and valiant Hector
Had longer liv'd (I think that I am
Not wrong in this), and so had Priam.

This Bearing heaven's shield adorns.
The ram, the goat and bull have horns;
Since heaven bears them in her' scutcheon,
They are a thing should be thought much on;
For it must be for great designs,
That heaven takes them for her signs.

Old Cynthia, that stale chaste goddess,
Has horns, which a thing right odd is;
And Amalthea has her horn
Well stuff'd with silver, gold and corn,
And wine and oil, and all things pleasant,
Or useful for a prince or peasant.
We all know that the unicorn,
Our arms supporter, has a horn.
The lion has them not, I grant,
But tusks and paws supply that want.

The earth, conform to the Alcor'n,
Is founded on a big cow's horn,
And when her head this cow but shakes,
Then she produces strange earthquakes:
And this alone's enough to shew,
What mighty feats a crest can do,
The devil hath horns and a tail,
As painters say; so hath a snail.
Let any man look up and down,
And view the country and the town,
He'll find, surveying all about him,
More things with horns than without them;
And these who take them for the mark
Of Antichrist, are in the dark.

False prophets, I must grant, have had them.
We read that Zedekiah made them,
Who did his logger-head environ
With large broad horns made of iron.
But then, I think, we must allow,
Prophets may have them that are true.

Now, gentle-reader, for your pleasure,
(I doubt not but you are at leisure,
From end to end to read my story,
Or else, I'm sure, I should be sorry),

I must divert you with a scuffle,
Which went right near the kirk to ruffle,
And by the ears to set the godly;
Begun at first, and manag'd oddly
By valiant Knight, who, as I've said,
Was pleas'd so with the noisome trade
Of strife and fighting, that for lake
Of Tory foe to hew or hack,
To keep his hand in use, our soldier
Began to bang his lackie Roger,
And by his new found ouertures,
Almost to kick him out of doors.

Sirrah, quoth Knight, I'll have you know,
You must not speak, when I say no:
From this time forth, we'll not agree,
If you take word about with me.
I will be Pope in my kirk-session;
And if you fall in this transgression,
To vote or speak against my nego,
I'll cudgel you into an ague,
And make you quack like poplar leaf:
Remember this; for to be brief,
If you forget what I have said,
You must go to your cobling trade,
And work or curry with the tanners,
Till you have learned better manners.

With this speech Roger was not pleas'd,
He took a snuff, and then he sneez'd,
Thrice shook his head to raise his wit,
Thrice gravely cough'd, as oft did spit,
Thrice humm'd; at last his silence broke,
Opened his mouth and then he spoke;
For you will grant this is a truth,
No man can speak with a closs mouth.
This is, quoth he, the desolation
Foretold us in the Revelation,
Where every one the text who reads,
May know the beast with many heads.
Was it for this the godly zealots,
Turn'd out of doors the fourteen prelates,
That in their place we now might cherish
And feed a Pope in every parish?
Is this the only reformation,
We've got by selling of our nation?
Or was't for this we were united
To England, that we might be cheated
Out of out rights, and see the seed
Of Bishop-weed come o'er the Tweed,
And on the banks of Clyde take root,
And even in Glasgow spring and sprout,
The purest city of the nation?
Lord keep us from th'abomination!
The saints, I'm sure, it must astonish,
To see that place so Babylonish;
And, for my part, I will be hang'd,
Before I be thus beat or bang'd:
Therefore, Sir Knight, I'll have you know,
My yea is as good as your no.

Thou art, said he, a saucy elf,
And does not understand thy self;
For tho' I am for paritie,
I'll ne'er allow't 'twixt me and thee.

Forbear to cope then with thy betters,
And know I am a man of letters.
I have read Calvin's institutions,
And studied all our constitutions;
I'm well acquainted with each word
That has been wrote by Rutherfoord,
Buchanan, Calderwood and Knox,
And all our fathers orthodox,
The Hynd let loose, or Naphthali
With Lex Rex and jus Populi;
The book that's call'd of Comfort a crum
And that profound piece Schema sacrum.
Yea my extensive knowledge reaches
The points that tie belivers breeches,
And I have read our modern Marrow,
Which I prefer to Isaac Barrow,
To Dr Bull and Gib of Sarum,
Tho' it hath rais'd a strange alarum,
And almost rent our kirk asunder,
Which fills me with surprise and wonder,
And sorrow too, to see the godly
Ev'n scold and bite, and scratch so oddly,
And pull each other by the noses,
About the ten commands of Moses,
When all our martyrs and confessors
Know it was only for trangressors
That law was made, and not for saints
Who took the league and covenants.
Yea I have cast right many a glimpse on
Our Webster, and our famous Simson,
Who rais'd no little dust and pother,
When stoutly pelting one another,
Tho' many thought they both were scribblers,
And only metaphysick quibblers;
And wilt thou, Numskull! dare to vote,
And speak again, when I say not?

When all thy reading, I dare say,
Is ty'd to Mr Andrew Gray.

I grant you have more authors read
Than I, no thanks; it is your trade,
And that you may be better gifted,
Quoth Roger, and with anger rifted:
(For anger makes the wind ascend,
Fear drives it to the nether end,
Where, when it struggles to get vent,
It comes out with no pleasant scent);
But all your sham and great pretences,
shall never make me lose my senses.
Nor yet implicitely believe,
That you should have a negative.
Our loss of carnal food and cloathing
By south-sea, would to this be nothing;
That only left us empty purses,
Which we confess a heavy curse is,
But light to men of our profession,
Compar'd with robbing our kirk-session.
Of our lay-elders and our deacons,
These Ant'-episcopalian beacons,
That watch us like sharp sighted eagles,
Or well train'd Presbyterian beagles,
And can so nicely smell a rat,
And hunt out Bablyonish brat;
And give us notice by their barking,
When Antichrist and Rome are working.
And therefore you may save your pains;
For tho' you should beat out my brains,
Yet my consent I'll never give,
That your vote should be negative;
So long as I can sing or whistle,
Or point a shoe-threed with a bristle,
And patch a hole up with a clout,
Know, Sir, I will have word about.

And is thy loggerhead so dull,
Replied the Knight, or thy thick scull
So empty, that thou must be thinking,
Because a club of coblers drinking,
'Mongst whom there's no subordination,
Do frankly talk o'er their collation,
Where every man has power to vote,
Who of the reck'ning pays his shot;
Thou must have word about with me,
Who was ordain'd by Presbyterie,
And made, by solemn imposition
Of their hands, a kirk rhetorician?
Or think'st thou, that thy yea or no,
As far as mine can ever go?

Softly, quoth Roger; for I dread,
You make more haste, Sir, than good speed;
I will not now dispute your orders,
If you confine them to their borders:
But if, because you have a mission,
Lay-elders you design to piss on,
And to unhinge our constitution,
And sap what since the revolution
We have been building, I must tell you,
At best, you're a prelatic fellow,
Who seeks to turn us out of door,
And to make room for Babel's whore.

For, Sir, you know that George Bachanan,
Altho' book-learn'd, yet was no man in
Holy orders, more than we are,
For he was neither priest nor friar,
Nor presbyter; yet Honest Geordie
In our Assembly sat as Lordie,
In fifteen hundred sixty seven,
And was a moderator, even
As good as any in the nation,
With Presbyterian ordination.

Would you allow your self to look,
But once upon our standard book

Of discipline, there you would find,
That elders are another kind
Of animals, than you suppose,
Who think to lead us by the nose.
That book (if I do not mistake it)
Means not that we should be tongue-tacked;
For we have power, Sir, to admonish
Yourself, if you turn Babylonish:
Yea, there we can produce our right,
To punish or depose the Knight;
Which powers we never can believe
Consistent with your negative.
'Tho' laymen, Sir, we will not tamely
With close mouth sit in kirk Assembly,
Nor at your back stand, like dumb pages:
We understand our privileges.
In pulpit preach till you are weary,
And we shall silent sit and hear ye,
And never offer, when you pray,
So much as once Amen to say;
But lolling sit upon our hips,
And never move our tongue or lips.

We know all public worship lies
In hearing what our preacher says;
Except some singing and grave humming,
Which we do think far more becoming,
Than when the people make responses,
And join with what the priest pronounces.

But in kirk-session when we sit,
We'll let you know we have more wit,
And will express some more concernment
For Presbyterial government,
Than to be dumb, like unstring'd fiddle,
And with the good old cause ne'er meddle;
But hear you talk like a dictator,
Or whore of Babel's fornicator;
For, maugre all your ostentation
Of learning, wit, and ordination,
With confidence we can aver,
Th'Assembly held at Westminster,
The glory of our reformation,
Conveen'd 'gainst royal proclamation,
Which we ne'er thought was a transgression;
The same that made our faith's confession:
In which the saints themselves do wonder,
To find they did so grossy blunder,
As to advance such sensless things
About allegiance due to Kings,
Tho' they be infidels or popish,
Which is but tory stuff and foppish,
And should have undergone castration,
'Ere we impos'd it on the nation;
For we disown it by our practice,
No argument like matter of fact is.

Altho' you call them learned, grave,
And wise divines; yet, by your leave,
There sate two Henry Vanes, and Pym,
And twenty more divines like him.

Nor had you, with your ordination,
The power or trust of nomination.
You know by whom they were elected,
And how your worship was neglected:
In case of diff'rence or dissension,
Which might fall out in this convention,
Our faith, you know, lay at the mercy
Of the last judge of controversy;
I mean, the lower House and upper,
Who might decide as they thought proper,
And cut or carve, and chap or chuse,
To make us Pagans, Turks, or Jews,
Or Christians, or any thing,
Save loyal subjects to the King;
Which we must grant they had no mind to,
No more then we ourselves inclin'd to.
In this they did with us agree,
Because he was for prelacy:
Which was a reason good enough,
In these brave days, to cut him off,
And vindicate us for the pains,
We took to bind our King in chains,
And all our Princes to environ
With weighty fetters made of iron:

Tho' some would rob us of the glory
Of this unprecedented story,

And give it to our independent
Associates, who got th'ascendant
Of us; 'tis sure we did unking him:
They only to a block did bring him.
Let any man say what he can,
We kill'd the King, they kill'd the man.
To shew that we approve the fact,
We ridicule a standing act
And law; nor will we fast nor pray,
Nor mourn on the most happy day.
On it we rather chuse to feast
On a calf's head, with mirth and jest.
And why should we lament the fall
Of one that was episcopal?
Or keep a day for a dead King,
Which is a superstitious thing?
For should St Peter, or St Paul,
(As superstitious fools them call,
Tho we, the true saints, think it meeter,
Plainly to call them Paul, or Peter),
St George, St Patrick, or St Andrew,
Preach up to us that we' should stand true
To any Princes, Kings or laws,
That are not for the good old cause;
We'll let them know we're no such fools,
For we were taught at better schools:
And both by birth-right, and by merit,
We know we should the earth inherit.

Nor will we ever loose a pin,
To introduce the man of sin.

And set your worship in the place
Of Innocent or Boniface,
Of Pius, Clement, or of Greg'ry,
Which would at once demolish Whigg'ry,
And topsie-turvy turn the people,
And set the kirk above the steeple.

We're officers, you can't deny it,
In kirk, tho' we make nothing by it:
Tho' by this trade we never put on
The pot with either beef or mutton,
Or pork and pease, or hen and capon;
Yet for our tongue, that trusty weapon,
It is our own, and we will use it.
And for your nego, we refuse it.

The Knight, who all this time stood muddy,
And musing in a dark-brown study,
Biting his nails, fretting and poring,
Much vex'd that Roger's tongue should so ring;
His cloudy face (it was no wonder)
Produc'd at last this clap of thunder.

Long since I learned in the schools
Of Solomon, to answer fools;
So will I answer thy bravadoes,
Thou fool, with lusty bastinadoes.

Nay, nay, quoth Roger, hold your hand, Sir,
Or you may come to understand, Sir,
If you resolve to answer so,
That I can give you quod pro quo.
Hands off (as Will Moncur did say
T'the devil) is, you know, fair play:
Therefore stand off, and keep your distance,
For I am not for non-resistance:
Or if you come to box and strip,
Just as you sow so shall you reap.

You saucy blockhead! said the soldier,
You huffie Knight, replied Roger;

You are, said Jack, mad and fanatic,
And you, quoth Roger, are prelatic.
You're worse, said Knight, than Sancho Pancha;
And you, than Quixotte de le Mancha,
Quoth Groom. You silly sot, said hero;
Quoth Roger, you're another Nero.
Such impudence! who can endure it?
Said Knight. Quoth Groom, See how you'll cure it.

Thus did these two together clutter,
And made such din as dogs do utter
When they are snarling, in lewd fashion,
For bitch of evil conversation,
And might perhaps have come to slaughter,
Had not malignants rais'd a laughter.
At this Achilles and Thersites,
Then chanc'd to cry out, crescant lites,
When knaves fall out, sometimes 'tis known,
That honest men have got their own;
By which the duel was diverted,
And Knight and Groom sans blood-shed parted.
Hence we observe, that a small trifle
The passions of great men will ruffle.
And mischief's mother, tho' a thing
No bigger than a midge's wing,
Will sometimes set friends by the ears,
As by the Knight and Groom appears:
And then, as small an accident
Will loss of life or limb prevent.

Rotia sacra, Schemæ sacrum, &c.

This is a Pun, and so is that of Augustus, Vectius cum exarasset monumentum patris, dixit Augustus, Hoc vere est monumentum patris colere. Which is enough to prove that Punning is classical.

St. Paul, writing to the Romans, faith, Let every soul be subject to the higher Powers, &c. St. Paul wrote this in the infancy of the church: there were but few Christians then, not many of them rich, or of ability, so as they were not ripe for such a purpose; as if a man should write to such Christians as are under the Tunk, in substance poor, in courage feeble, in strength unarmed, in numbers few, and generally subject to all kind of injuries, would he not write as St. Paul did? So that the Apostle did respect the men he wrote to, and his words are not to be extended to the body or people of a common-wealth or whole city, If St. Paul were alive, and saw wicked Kings reigning in Christian common-wealths, St. Paul would say, That he accounted no such for Kings; he would forbid all men speaking to them, and keeping them company; he would leave them to their subjects to be punished: neither would be blame them if they accounted none such longer for their Kings. Buchananus de jure regni. P. 50, 56, 57.

See Bp Burnet's Exposition of the 39 Articles.

At Glasgow they caused to be executed at the Market Cross, upon October 28. 1645, Sir Philip Nisbet, and Alexander Ogilvie of Inverquharity, (whereof the first was but lately come home from foreign parts, and the last was but a boy of scarce 18 years of age, lately come from the schools). And upon that occasion it was, that Mr David Dick said, The work goes bonnily on; which passed afterwards into a proverb. Guthrie's Mem. page 166.

After the defeat of Montrose's army at Philiphaugh by David Lesly, Monstrose's foot drew to a little hold; which they maintained, until Stuart the adjutant procured quarter for them from David Lesly; whereupon they delivered up their arms, and came forth to a plain field as they were directed. But then did the Kirk-men quarrel, that quarter should be given to such wretches as they; and declared it to be an act of most sinful impiety to spare them; on which the army was let loose upon them, and cut them all into pieces. Guthrie's Mem. page 162.

Some of these who fled, falling into the hands of the country people, were basely murdered by them. Others who escaped them, and found some pity in them that had so little, being gathered together, were, by order of the rebel Lords, thrown headlong from a high bridge, and the men, together with their wives and children, drowned in the river beneath; and if any chanced to swim towards the side, they were beaten off with sticks and staves, and thrust down again into the water. See Montrose's History, Chap. 17.

See Hobbe's State of Nature: Also his tract de Cive.

See Knox's History, P. 231, 232. and his letter to Cecil.

Aristotle's definition of motion.

Sir Isaac Newton's Principles.

Geneva.

Scotland.

These are the necessary consequences of the infinite divisibility of matter, and our Knight seems to be very well acquainted with division.

See Calvin's comment. on Daniel.

This is a famous story, generally talked of, and much believed in that country.

Meg Mulloch, is a famous familiar, that haunts the house of Grant of Tulligoram.

The preacher at Toryburn is famous for discovering witches by smelling and pricking.

See Mr Whiston's treatise on Comets.

This was lately done in the College kirk of Old Aberdeen; and at Aberbuthnot and Kinness.

See Sir Hugh Campbell of Calder's essay on the Lord's Prayer.

See the Presbyterian Eloquence.

See Mr Webster's reasons for not taking the abjuration.

See Alcoran, Chap. Of the cow.

The overture about the negative, lately was like to have made a rent in the kirk of Scotland; the sum of which was this: A very strong party set up for taking the power of voting in kirk-sessions from the lay-elders and deacons, and giving an absolute negative to the minister. No less than five ministers in Glasgow went into it: But the true-blues exclaim'd against it as downright Babylonish.

The elders ought also to take heed to the life, manners, diligence, and study of their minster; and if he be worthy of admonition, they must admonish him; if of correction, they must correct him; and if he be worthy of deposition, they, with the consent of the church and superintendant, may depose him. This is a pretty full charter for lay-elders. See Spottiswood, P. 167.

The Independents were indeed the finishers of this horrid villainy; but the Presbyterians had the glory (if there be any glory in such execrable facts) of beginning it and carrying it on; and they had made such progress in it, as did not leave it hard for others to complete it. See Salmasius's defensio regia. P. 216, 217. He compares the Presbyterians to highwaymen, who disarm a traveller and tie him to a tree; and the Independents, to wild beasts who come and devour him.

University of Virginia Library

The KNIGHT.