Chapter 27

Waits at Court, as a dog does under a table, to catch what falls, or force it from his fellows if he can. When a man is in a fair way to be hanged that is richly worth it, or has hanged himself, he puts in to be his heir and succeed him, and pretends as much merit as another, as no doubt he has great reason to do if all things were rightly considered. He thinks it vain to deserve well of his Prince as long as he can do his business more easily by begging, for the same idle laziness possesses him that does the rest of his fraternity, that had rather take an alms than work for their livings, and therefore he accounts merit a more uncertain and tedious way of rising, and sometimes dangerous. He values himself and his place not upon the honour or allowances of it, but the convenient opportunity of begging, as King Clause's courtiers do when they have obtained of the superior powers a good station where three ways meet to exercise the function in. The more ignorant, foolish, and undeserving he is, provided he be but impudent enough, which all such seldom fail to be, the better he thrives in his calling, as others in the same way gain more by their sores and broken limbs than those that are sound and in health. He always undervalues what he gains, because he comes easily by it; and, how rich soever he proves, is resolved never to be satisfied, as being, like a Friar Minor, bound by his order to be always a beggar. He is, like King Agrippa, almost a Christian; for though he never begs anything of God, yet he does very much of his vicegerent the King, that is next Him. He spends lavishly what he gets, because it costs him so little pains to get more, but pays nothing; for if he should, his privilege would be of no use at all to him, and he does not care to part with anything of his right. He finds it his best way to be always craving, because he lights many times upon things that are disposed of or not beggable; but if one hit, it pays for twenty that miscarry; even as those virtuosos of his profession at large ask as well of those that give them nothing as those few that, out of charity, give them something. When he has passed almost all offices, as other beggars do from constable to constable, and after meets with a stop, it does but encourage him to be more industrious in watching the next opportunity, to repair the charge he has been at to no purpose. He has his emissaries, that are always hunting out for discoveries, and when they bring him in anything that he judges too heavy far his own interest to carry, he takes in others to join with him (like blind men and cripples that beg in consort), and if they prosper they share, and give the jackal some small snip for his pains in questing; that is, if he has any further use of him; otherwise he leaves him, like virtue, to reward himself; and because he deserves well, which he does by no means approve of, gives him, that which he believes to be the fittest recompense of all merit, just nothing. He believes that the King's restoration being upon his birthday, he is bound to observe it all the days of his life, and grant, as some other kings have done upon the same occasion, whatever is demanded of him, though it were the one-half of his kingdom.

A BUMPKIN OR COUNTRY SQUIRE

Is a clown of rank and degree. He is the growth of his own land, a kind of Autocthonus, like the Athenians that sprang out of their own ground, or barnacles that grow upon trees in Scotland. His homely education has rendered him a native only of his own soil and a foreigner to all other places, from which he differs in language, manner of living, and behaviour, which are as rugged as the coat of a colt that has been bred upon a common. The custom of being the best man in his own territories has made him the worst everywhere else. He assumes the upper end of the table at an ale-house as his birthright, receives the homage of his company, which are always subordinate, and dispenses ale and communication like a self-conforming teacher in a conventicle. The chief points he treats on are the memoirs of his dogs and horses, which he repeats as often as a holder-forth that has but two sermons, to which if he adds the history of his hawks and fishing he is very painful and laborious. He does his endeavour to appear a droll, but his wit being, like his estate, within the compass of a hedge, is so profound and obscure to a stranger that it requires a commentary, and is not to be understood without a perfect knowledge of all circumstances of persons and the particular idiom of the place. He has no ambition to appear a person of civil prudence or understanding more than in putting off a lame, infirm jade for sound wind and limb, to which purpose he brings his squirehood and groom to vouch, and, rather than fail, will outswear an affidavit-man. The top of his entertainment is horrible strong beer, which he pours into his guests (as the Dutch did water into our merchants when they tortured them at Amboyna) till they confess they can drink no more, and then he triumphs over them as subdued and vanquished, no less by the strength of his brain than his drink. When he salutes a man he lays violent hands upon him, and grips and shakes him like a fit of an ague; and when he accosts a lady he stamps with his foot, like a French fencer, and makes a lunge at her, in which he always misses his aim, too high or too low, and hits her on the nose or chin. He is never without some rough-handed flatterer, that rubs him, like a horse, with a curry-comb till he kicks and grunts with the pleasure of it. He has old family stories and jests, that fell to him with the estate, and have been left from heir to heir time out of mind. With these he entertains all comers over and over, and has added some of his own times, which he intends to transmit over to posterity. He has but one way of making all men welcome that come to his house, and that is by making himself and them drunk; while his servants take the same course with theirs, which he approves of as good and faithful service, and the rather because, if he has occasion to tell a strange, improbable story, they may be in a readiness to vouch with the more impudence, and make it a case of conscience to lie as well as drink for his credit. All the heroical glory he aspires to is but to be reputed a most potent and victorious stealer of deer and beater-up of parks, to which purpose he has compiled commentaries of his own great actions that treat of his dreadful adventures in the night, of giving battle in the dark, discomfiting of keepers, horsing the deer on his own back, and making off with equal resolution and success.

AN ANTIQUARY

Is one that has his being in this age, but his life and conversation is in the days of old. He despises the present age as an innovation and slights the future, but has a great value for that which is past and gone, like the madman that fell in love with Cleopatra. He is an old frippery-philosopher, that has so strange a natural affection to worm-eaten speculation that it is apparent he has a worm in his skull. He honours his forefathers and foremothers, but condemns his parents as too modern and no better than upstarts. He neglects himself because he was born in his own time and so far off antiquity, which he so much admires, and repines, like a younger brother, because he came so late into the world. He spends the one-half of his time in collecting old insignificant trifles, and the other in showing them, which he takes singular delight in, because the oftener he does it the farther they are from being new to him. All his curiosities take place of one another according to their seniority, and he values them not by their abilities, but their standing. He has a great veneration for words that are stricken in years, and are grown so aged that they have outlived their employments. These he uses with a respect agreeable to their antiquity and the good services they have done. He throws away his time in inquiring after that which is past and gone so many ages since, like one that shoots away an arrow to find out another that was lost before. He fetches things out of dust and ruins, like the fable of the chemical plant raised out of its own ashes. He values one old invention, that is lost and never to be recovered, before all the new ones in the world, though never so useful. The whole business of his life is the same with his that shows the tombs at Westminster, only the one does it for his pleasure, and the other for money. As every man has but one father, but two grandfathers and a world of ancestors, so he has a proportional value for things that are ancient, and the farther off the greater.

He is a great time-server, but it is of time out of mind to which he conforms exactly, but is wholly retired from the present. His days were spent and gone long before he came into the world, and since his only business is to collect what he can out of the ruins of them. He has so strong a natural affection to anything that is old, that he may truly say to dust and worms, "You are my father;" and to rottenness, "Thou art my mother." He has no providence nor foresight, for all his contemplations look backward upon the days of old; and his brains are turned with them, as if he walked backwards. He had rather interpret one obscure word in any old senseless discourse than be author of the most ingenious new one, and, with Scaliger, would sell the Empire of Germany (if it were in his power) for an old song. He devours an old manuscript with greater relish than worms and moths do, and, though there be nothing in it, values it above anything printed, which he accounts but a novelty. When he happens to cure a small botch in an old author, he is as proud of it as if he had got the philosopher's stone and could cure all the diseases of mankind. He values things wrongfully upon their antiquity, forgetting that the most modern are really the most ancient of all things in the world, like those that reckon their pounds before their shillings and pence of which they are made up. He esteems no customs but such as have outlived themselves and are long since out of use, as the Catholics allow of no saints but such as are dead, and the fanatics, in opposition, of none but the living.

A PROUD MAN

Is a fool in fermentation, that swells and boils over like a porridge-pot. He sets out his feathers like an owl, to swell and seem bigger than he is. He is troubled with a tumour and inflammation of self-conceit, that renders every part of him stiff and uneasy. He has given himself sympathetic love-powder, that works upon him to dotage and has transformed him into his own mistress. He is his own gallant, and makes most passionate addresses to his own dear perfections. He commits idolatry to himself, and worships his own image; though there is no soul living of his Church but himself, yet he believes as the Church believes, and maintains his faith with the obstinacy of a fanatic. He is his own favourite, and advances himself not only above his merit, but all mankind; is both Damon and Pythias to his own dear self, and values his crony above his soul. He gives place to no man but himself, and that with very great distance to all others, whom he esteems not worthy to approach him. He believes whatsoever he has receives a value in being his, as a horse in a nobleman's stable will bear a greater price than in a common market. He is so proud that he is as hard to be acquainted with himself as with others, for he is very apt to forget who he is, and knows himself only superficially; therefore he treats himself civilly as a stranger with ceremony and compliment, but admits of no privacy. He strives to look bigger than himself as well as others, and is no better than his own parasite and flatterer. A little flood will make a shallow torrent swell above its banks, and rage and foam and yield a roaring noise, while a deep, silent stream glides quietly on. So a vain-glorious, insolent, proud man swells with a little frail prosperity, grows big and loud, and overflows his bounds, and when he sinks, leaves mud and dirt behind him. His carriage is as glorious and haughty as if he were advanced upon men's shoulders or tumbled over their heads like knipperdolling. He fancies himself a Colosse, and so he is, for his head holds no proportion to his body, and his foundation is lesser than his upper storeys. We can naturally take no view of ourselves unless we look downwards, to teach us how humble admirers we ought to be of our own values. The slighter and less solid his materials are the more room they take up and make him swell the bigger, as feathers and cotton will stuff cushions better than things of more close and solid parts.

A SMALL POET

Is one that would fain make himself that which Nature never meant him, like a fanatic that inspires himself with his own whimsies. He sets up haberdasher of small poetry, with a very small stock and no credit. He believes it is invention enough to find out other men's wit, and whatsoever he lights upon, either in books or company, he makes bold with as his own. This he puts together so untowardly, that you may perceive his own wit has the rickets by the swelling disproportion of the joints. Imitation is the whole sum of him, and his vein is but an itch that he has catched of others, and his flame like that of charcoals that were burnt before. But as he wants judgment to understand what is best, he naturally takes the worst, as being most agreeable to his own talent. You may know his wit not to be natural, 'tis so unquiet and troublesome in him; for as those that have money but seldom are always shaking their pockets when they have it, so does he when he thinks he has got something that will make him appear. He is a perpetual talker, and you may know by the freedom of his discourse that he came lightly by it, as thieves spend freely what they get. He measures other men's wit by their modesty, and his own by his confidence. He makes nothing of writing plays, because he has not wit enough to understand the difficulty. This makes him venture to talk and scribble, as chouses do to play with cunning gamesters until they are cheated and laughed at. He is always talking of wit, as those that have bad voices are always singing out of tune, and those that cannot play delight to fumble on instruments. He grows the unwiser by other men's harms, for the worse others write, he finds the more encouragement to do so too. His greediness of praise is so eager that he swallows anything that comes in the likeness of it, how notorious and palpable soever, and is as shot-free against anything that may lessen his good opinion of himself. This renders him incurable, like diseases that grow insensible.

If you dislike him, it is at your own peril; he is sure to put in a caveat beforehand against your understanding, and, like a malefactor in wit, is always furnished with exceptions against his judges. This puts him upon perpetual apologies, excuses, and defences, but still by way of defiance, in a kind of whiffling strain, without regard of any man that stands in the way of his pageant. Where he thinks he may do it safely, he will confidently own other men's writings; and where he fears the truth may be discovered, he will, by feeble denials and feigned insinuations, give men occasion to suppose it.

If he understands Latin or Greek he ranks himself among the learned, despises the ignorant, talks criticisms out of Scaliger, and repeats Martial's bawdy epigrams, and sets up his rest wholly upon pedantry. But if he be not so well qualified, he cries down all learning as pedantic, disclaims study, and professes to write with as great facility as if his Muse was sliding down Parnassus. Whatsoever he hears well said he seizes upon by poetical license, and one way makes it his own; that is, by ill-repeating of it. This he believes to be no more theft than it is to take that which others throw away. By this means his writings are, like a tailor's cushion of mosaic work, made up of several scraps sewed together. He calls a slovenly, nasty description great Nature, and dull flatness strange easiness. He writes down all that comes in his head, and makes no choice, because he has nothing to do it with that is judgment. He is always repealing the old laws of comedy, and, like the Long Parliament, making ordinances in their stead, although they are perpetually thrown out of coffee-houses and come to nothing. He is like an Italian thief, that never robs but he murders, to prevent discovery; so sure is he to cry down the man from whom he purloins, that his petty larceny of wit may pass unsuspected. He is but a copier at best, and will never arrive to practise by the life; for bar him the imitation of something he has read, and he has no image in his thoughts. Observation and fancy, the matter and form of just wit, are above his philosophy. He appears so over-concerned in all men's wits as if they were but disparagements of his own, and cries down all they do as if they were encroachments upon him. He takes jests from the owners and breaks them, as justices do false weights and pots that want measure. When he meets with anything that is very good he changes it into small money, like three groats for a shilling, to serve several occasions. He disclaims study, pretends to take things in motion, and to shoot flying, which appears to be very true by his often missing of his mark. His wit is much troubled with obstructions, and he has fits as painful as those of the spleen. He fancies himself a dainty, spruce shepherd, with a flock and a fine silken shepherdess, that follow his pipe as rats did the conjurers in Germany.

As for epithets, he always avoids those that are near akin to the sense. Such matches are unlawful, and not fit to be made by a Christian poet, and therefore all his care is to choose out such as will serve, like a wooden leg, to piece out a maimed verse that wants a foot or two; and if they will but rhyme now and then into the bargain, or run upon a letter, it is a work of supererogation.

For similitudes, he likes the hardest and most obscure best; for as ladies wear black patches to make their complexions seem fairer than they are, so when an illustration is more obscure than the sense that went before it, it must of necessity make it appear clearer than it did, for contraries are best set off with contraries.

He has found out a way to save the expense of much wit and sense; for he will make less than some have prodigally laid out upon five or six words serve forty or fifty lines. This is a thrifty invention, and very easy, and, if it were commonly known, would much increase the trade of wit and maintain a multitude of small poets in constant employment. He has found out a new sort of poetical Georgics, a trick of sowing wit like clover-grass on barren subjects which would yield nothing before. This is very useful for the times, wherein, some men say, there is no room left for new invention. He will take three grains of wit like the elixir, and projecting it upon the iron age, turn it immediately into gold. All the business of mankind has presently vanished; the whole world has kept holiday; there have been no men but heroes and poets, no women but nymphs and shepherdesses; trees have borne fritters, and rivers flowed plum-porridge.

We read that Virgil used to make fifty or sixty verses in a morning, and afterwards reduce them to ten. This was an unthrifty vanity, and argues him as well ignorant in the husbandry of his own poetry as Seneca says he was in that of a farm; for, in plain English, it was no better than bringing a noble to nine-pence. And as such courses brought the prodigal son to eat with hogs, so they did him to feed with horses, which were not much better company, and may teach us to avoid doing the like. For certainly it is more noble to take four or five grains of sense, and, like a gold-beater, hammer them into so many leaves as will fill a whole book, than to write nothing but epitomes, which many wise men believe will be the bane and calamity of learning. When he writes he commonly steers the sense of his lines by the rhyme that is at the end of them, as butchers do calves by the tail. For when he has made one line, which is easy enough, and has found out some sturdy hard word that will but rhyme, he will hammer the sense upon it, like a piece of hot iron upon an anvil, into what form he pleases.

There is no art in the world so rich in terms as poetry; a whole dictionary is scarce able to contain them, for there is hardly a pond, a sheep-walk, or a gravel-pit in all Greece but the ancient name of it is become a term of art in poetry. By this means small poets have such a stock of able hard words lying by them, as dryads, hamadryads, Aonides, fauni, nymphae, sylvani, &c., that signify nothing at all, and such a world of pedantic terms of the same kind, as may serve to furnish all the new inventions and thorough reformations that can happen between this and Plato's great year.

When he writes he never proposes any scope or purpose to himself, but gives his genius all freedom; for as he that rides abroad for his pleasure can hardly be out of his way, so he that writes for his pleasure can seldom be beside his subject. It is an ungrateful thing to a noble wit to be confined to anything. To what purpose did the ancients feign Pegasus to have wings if he must be confined to the road and stages like a pack-horse, or be forced to be obedient to hedges and ditches? Therefore he has no respect to decorum and propriety of circumstance, for the regard of persons, times, and places is a restraint too servile to be imposed upon poetical license, like him that made Plato confess Juvenal to be a philosopher, or Persius, that calls the Athenians Quirites.

For metaphors, he uses to choose the hardest and most far-set that he can light upon. These are the jewels of eloquence, and therefore the harder they are the more precious they must be.

He'll take a scant piece of coarse sense and stretch it on the tenterhooks of half-a-score rhymes, until it crack that you may see through it and it rattle like a drumhead. When you see his verses hanged up in tobacco-shops, you may say, in defiance of the proverb, "that the weakest does not always go to the wall;" for 'tis well known the lines are strong enough, and in that sense may justly take the wall of any that have been written in our language. He seldom makes a conscience of his rhymes, but will often take the liberty to make "preach" rhyme with "cheat," "vote" with "rogue," and "committee-man" with "hang."

He'll make one word of as many joints as the tin-pudding that a juggler pulls out of his throat and chops in again. What think you of _glud-fum-flam-hasta-minantes?_ Some of the old Latin poets bragged that their verses were tougher than brass and harder than marble; what would they have done if they had seen these? Verily they would have had more reason to wish themselves an hundred throats than they then had to pronounce them.