Classic Poem

LIB. 6.

SAT. I.

Semel insaniuimus.

Labeo reserues a long nayle for the nonce
To wound my Margent through ten leaues at once,
Much worse than Aristarcus his blacke Pile
That pierc'd olde Homers side;
And makes such faces that mee seames I see
Some foule Megaera in the Tragedie,
Threatning her twined snakes at Tantales Ghost;
Or the grim visage of some frowning post
The crab-tree Porter of the Guild-Hall gates
While he his frightful Beetle eleuates;
His angry eyne looke all so glaring bright,
Like th'hunted Badger in a moonelesse night,
Or like a painted staring Saracin ;
His cheeks change hew like th'ayre-fed vermins skin
Now red, now pale, and swolne aboue his eyes
Like to the old Colossian imageries:
But when he doth of my recanting heare;
Away ye angrie fires, and frostes of feare,
Giue place vnto his hopefull tempered thought
That yeelds to peace, ere euer peace be sought:
Then let me now repent mee of my rage,
For writing Satyres in so righteous age:
Whereas I should haue strok't her towardly head,
And cry'd Euaee in my Satyres stead,
Sith now not one of thousand does amisse,
Was neuer age I weene so pure as this:
As pure as olde Labulla from the Baynes,
As pure as through-fare Channels when it raynes,
As pure as is a Black-moores face by night,
As dung-clad skin of dying Heraclite .
Seeke ouer all the world, and tell mee where
Thou find'st a proud man, or a flatterer:
A thiefe, a drunkard, or a parricide,
A lechor, lyer, or what vice beside?
Merchants are no whit couetous of late,
Nor make no mart of Time, gaine of Deceipt.
Patrons are honest now, ore they of olde,
Can now no benefice be bought nor sold,
Giue him a gelding, or some two-yeares tythe,
For he all bribes and Simony defi'th.
Is not one Pick-thanke stirring in the Court,
That seld was free till now by all report,
But some one, like a clawbacke parasite,
Pick't mothes from his masters Cloake in sight,
Whiles he could picke out both his eyes for need,
Mought they but stand him in some better steed.
Nor now no more smell-feast Vitellio
Smiles on his master for a meale or two;
And loues him in his maw, loaths in his heart,
Yet soothes, and yeas, and nayes on eyther part.
Tattelius the new-come traueller,
With his disguised cote, and ringed eare,
Trampling the Burses Marble twise a day,
Tels nothing but starke trueths I dare well say,
Nor would he haue them knowne for any thing,
Tho all the vault of his loud murmur ring.
Not one man tels a lye of all the yeare
Except the Almanacke or the Chronicler .
But not a man of all the damned crue
For hils of Gold would sweare the thing vntrue.
Pansophus now though all in the cold swat
Dares venture through the feared Castle-gate,
Albee the faithfull Oracles haue forsayne,
The wisest Senator shall there be slaine:
That made him long keepe home as well it might,
Till now he hopeth of some wiser wight.
The vale of Stand-gate, or the Suters hill,
Or westerne plaine are free from feared ill.
Let him that hath nought, feare nought I areed:
But he that hath ought; hy him; and God speed;
Nor drunken Dennis doth by breake of day
Stumble into blind Tauerns by the way,
And reele me homeward at the Euening starre,
Or ride more easely in his neighbours chayre.
Well might these checks haue fitted former times
And shouldred angry Skeltons breath-lesse rimes:
Ere Chrysalus had bar'd the common boxe,
Which earst he pick't to store his priuate stocks;
But now hath all with vantage paid againe;
And locks and plates what doth behind remaine;
When earst our dry-soul'd Syres so lauish were,
To charge whole boots-full to their friends wel-fare;
Now shalt thou neuer see the shalt beset
With a big-bellied gallon Flagonet.
Of an ebbe Cruce must thirsty Silen sip,
That's all forestalled by his vpper lip;
Somewhat it was that made his paunch so peare,
His girdle fell ten ynches in a yeare.
Or when old gouty bed-rid Euclio
To his officious factor fayre could show,
His name in margent of some olde cast byll
And say; Lo whom I named in my will:
Whiles hee beleeues and looking for the share,
Tendeth his cumbrous charge with busy care;
For but a while; For now he sure will die,
By his strange qualme of liberalitie:
Great thanks he giues: but God him sheild & saue
From euer gayning by his masters graue;
Onely liue long, and he is well repaide,
And weats his forced cheeks whiles thus he said,
Some strong-smeld Onion shall stirre his eyes
Rather than no salt teares shall then arise.
So lookes he like a Marble toward rayne,
And wrings and snites, and weeps, & wipes againe,
Then turnes his backe and smiles & lookes askance,
Seasoning againe his sowred countenance,
Whiles yet he wearyes heauen with daily cryes,
And backward Death with deuout sacrifice,
That they would now his tedious ghost bereauen,
And wishes well, that wish't no worse than heauen.
When Zoylus was sicke, he knew not where
Saue his wrought night-cap, and laune Pillow-bere:
Kind fooles; they made him sicke that made him fine
Take those away, and thers his medicine:
Or Gellia wore a veluet Mastick-patch
Vpon her temples when no tooth did ach,
When Beauty was her Reume I soone espide,
Nor could her plaister cure her of her pride.
These vices were, but now they ceas'd off long:
Then why did I a righteous age that wrong,
I would repent mee were it not too late,
Were not the angry world preiudicate:
If all the seuens penetentiall
Or thousand white wands might me ought auaile,
If Trent or Thames could scoure my foule offence
And set me in my former innocence,
I would at last repent me of my rage:
Now; beare my wrong, I thine, O righteous age.
As for fine wits an hundreth thousand fold
Passeth our age what euer times of olde.
For in that Puis-ne world, our syres of long
Could hardly wagge their too-vnweldy tongue
As pined Crowes and parats can doe now,
When hoary age did bend their wrincled brow:
And now of late did many a learned man
Serue thirtie yeares Prenti-ship with Priscian ,
But now can euery Nouice speake with ease
The far-fetch'd language of th'- Antipodes .
Would'st thou the tongues that earst were learned hight
Tho our wise age hath wipt them of their right;
Would'st thou the Courtly Three in most request,
Or the two barbarous neighbours of the west?
Bibinus selfe can haue ten tongues in one,
Tho in all Ten not one good tongue alone.
And can deepe skill lye smothering within
Whiles neither smoke nor flame discerned bin?
Shall it not be a wild-fig in a wall
Or fired Brimstone in a Minerall?
Doe thou disdaine, O ouer-learned age,
The tongue-ty'de silence of that Samian sage;
Forth ye fine wits, and rush into the presse,
And for the cloyed world your workes addresse.
Is not a Gnat, nor Fly, nor seely Ant,
But a fine wit can make an Elephant;
Should Bandels Throstle die without a song,
Or Adamantius my Dog be laid along,
Downe in some ditch without his Exequies,
Or Epitaphs, or mournfull Elegies?
Folly it selfe, and baldnes may be praised,
And sweet conceits from filthy obiects raised;
What doe not fine wits dare to vndertake?
What dare not fine wits doe for honours sake?
But why doth Balbus his dead-doing quill
Parch in his rustie scabbard all the while,
His golden Fleece ore-growne with moldy hore
As tho he had his witty workes forswore?
Belike of late now Balbus hath no need,
Nor now belike his shrinking shoulders dread
The Catch-poles fist. The Presse may still remaine
And breath, till Balbus be in debt againe.
Soone may that bee; so I had silent beene,
And not thus rak't vp quiet crimes vnseene.
Silence is safe, when saying stirreth sore
And makes the stirred puddle stinke the more.
Shall the controller of proud Nemesis
In lawlesse rage vpbraid ech others vice,
While no man seeketh to reflect the wrong
And curb the raunge of his mis-ruly tongue?
By the two crownes of Pernasse euer-greene,
And by the clouen head of Hippocrene
As I true Poet am, I here auow
(So solemnly kist he his Laurell bow)
If that bold Satyre vnreuenged be
For this so saucy and foule iniurie.
So Labeo weens it my eternall shame
To proue I neuer earnd a Poets name.
But would I be a Poet if I might,
To rub my browes three daies, & wake three nights,
And bite my nayles, and scrat my dullard head,
And curse the backward Muses on my bed
About one peeuish syllable: which out-sought
I take vp Thales ioy, saue for fore-thought
How it shall please ech Ale-knights censuring eye,
And hang'd my head for feare they deeme awry;
Whiles thred-bare Martiall turnes his merry note
To beg of Rufus a cast winter cote;
Whiles hungry Marot leapeth at a Beane
And dieth like a staru'd Cappucien ;
Go Ariost , and gape for what may fall
From Trencher of a flattering Cardinall,
And if thou gettest but a Pedants fee
Thy bed, thy board, and courser liuerie,
O honour farre beyond a brazen shrine
To sit with Tarleton on an Ale posts signe!
Who had but liued in Augustus daies
T'had beene some honour to be crown'd with Bayes
When Lucan streaked on his Marble-bed
To thinke of Caesar , and great Pompeys deed;
Or when Archelaus shau'd his mourning head
Soone as he heard Stesichorus was dead.
At least would some good body of the rest,
Set a Gold-pen on their bay-wreathed Crest.
Or would their face in stamped coyne expresse,
As did the Mytelens their Poetesse.
Now as it is, beshrew him if he might,
That would his browes with Caesars Laurell dight:
Tho what ayl'd mee, I might not well as they
Rake vp some forworne tales that smothered lay
In chimny corners smok'd with winter-fires,
To read and rocke asleepe our drouzy Syres.
No man his threshold better knowes, than I
Brutes first ariuall, and first victory,
Saint Georges Sorrell, or his crosse of blood,
Arthurs round Board, or Caledonian wood,
Or holy battels of bold Charlemaine ,
What were his knights did Salems siege maintaine;
How the mad Riuall of fayre Angelice
Was Phisick't from the new-found Paradice;
High stories they; which with their swelling straine
Haue riuen Frontoes broad Rehearsall Plaine,
But so to fill vp bookes both backe and side
What needs it? Are there not enow beside?
O age well thriuen and well fortunate,
When ech man hath a Muse appropriate,
And she like to some seruile eare-boar'd slaue
Must play and sing when, and what he would haue!
Would that were all: small fault in number lies,
Were not the feare from whence it should arise
But can it be ought but a spurious seede,
That growes so rife in such vnlikely speed?
Sith Pontian left his barren wife at home,
And spent two years at Venice and at Rome ,
Returned, heares his blessing askt of three,
Cries out, O Iulian law, Adulterie?
Tho Labeo reaches right: (who can deny?)
The true straynes of Heroicke Poesie:
For he can tell how fury reft his sense
And Phaebus fild him with intelligence,
He can implore the heathen deities
To guide his bold and busie enterprise;
Or filch whole Pages at a clap for need
From honest Petrarch , clad in English weed;
While bigge But ohs ech stranzae can begin,
Whose trunke and tayle sluttish and hartlesse bin;
He knows the grace of that new elegance,
Which sweet Philisides fetch't of late from France ,
That well beseem'd his high-stil'd Arcady ,
Tho others marre it with much liberty,
In Epithets to ioyne two wordes in one,
Forsooth for Adiectiues cannot stand alone;
As a great Poet could of Bacchus say,
That he was Semele-femori-gena .
Lastly he names the spirit of Astrophel :
Now hath not Labeo done wondrous well?
But ere his Muse her weapon learne to weild,
Or dance a sober Pirrhicke in the field,
Or marching wade in blood vp to the knees,
Her Arma Viram goes by two degrees,
The sheepe-cote first hath beene her nursery
Where she hath worne her ydle infancy,
And in hy startups walk't the pastur'd plaines
To tend her tasked herd that there remaines,
And winded still a pipe of Ote or Brere
Striuing for wages who the praise shall beare;
As did whilere the homely Carmelite
Following Virgil , and he Theocrite ;
Or else hath beene in Venus Chamber train'd
To play with Cupid , till shee had attain'd
To comment well vpon a beauteous face,
Then was she fit for an Heroicke place;
As wittie Pontan in great earnest said
His Mistres brests were like two weights of lead,
Another thinks her teeth might likened bee
To two fayre rankes of pales of yuory,
To fence in sure the wild beast of her tongue,
From eyther going farre, or going wrong;
Her grinders like two Chalk-stones in a mill,
Which shall with time and wearing waxe as ill
As old Catillaes , which wont euery night
Lay vp her holly pegs till next day-light,
And with them grinds soft-simpring all the day,
When least her laughter should her gums bewray
Her hands must hide her mouth if she but smile;
Fayne would she seeme all frixe and frolicke still.
Her forehead fayre is like a brazen hill
Whose wrincled furrows which her age doth breed
Are dawbed full of Venice chalke for need.
Her eyes like siluer saucers fayre beset
With shining Amber and with shady Iet
Her lids like Cupids -bowcase where he hides
The weapons which doth wound the wanton-eyde:
Her chin like Pindus or Pernassus hill
Where down descends th'oreflowing stream doth fil
The well of her fayre mouth. Ech hath his praise.
Who would not but wed Poets now a daies!