Bear me, some God! oh! quickly bear me hence To wholesome solitude, the nurse of sense; Where Contemplation prunes her ruffled wings, And the free soul looks down to pity kings! There sober thought pursu'd th' amusing theme, Till fancy colour'd it, and form'd a dream. A vision hermits can to hell transport,
And forc'd ev'n me to see the damn'd at Court.
Not Dante dreaming all th' infernal state,
Beheld such scenes of envy, sin, and hate.
Base fear becomes the guilty, not the free,
Suits tyrants, plunderers, but suits not me.
Shall I, the terror of this sinful Town
Care if a liv'ry'd lord, or smile, or frown?
Who cannot flatter, and detest who can,
Tremble before a noble serving-man?
O my fair mistress, Truth! shall I quit thee
For huffing, braggart, puft, nobility?
At home in wholesome solitariness
My piteous soul began the wretchedness
Of suitors at Court to mourn; and a trance,
Like his who dreamt he saw hell, did advance
Itself o'er me: such men as he saw there
I saw at Court, and worse, and more. Low fear
Becomes the guilty, not th' accuser; then
Shall I, none's slave, of high-born, or rais'd men
Fear frowns, and, my mistress Truth! betray thee
For th' huffing, braggart, puft, nobility?
Thou who, since yesterday, hast roll'd o'er all
The busy, idle blockheads of the ball,
Hast thou, Sun! beheld an emptier sort
Than such as swell this bladder of a Court?
Now pox on those who shew a court in wax!
It ought to bring all courtiers on their backs;
Such painted puppets! such a varnish'd race
Of hollow gewgaws, only dress and face!
Such waxen noses, stately staring things---
No wonder some folks bow, and think them kings.
See! where the British youth, engag'd no more
At Fig's, at White's, with felons, or a whore,
Pay their last duty to the Court, and come
All fresh and fragrant to the drawing room;
No, no; thou which since yesterday hast been
Almost about the whole world, hast thou seen,
O Sun! in all thy journey, vanity
Such as swells the bladder of our Court? I
Think he which made your waxen garden, and
Transported it from Italy, to stand
With us at London, flouts our courtiers; for
Just such gay painted things, which no sap nor
Taste have in them, ours are; and natural
Some of the stocks are, their fruits bastard all.
Tis ten a'clock, and past; all whom the mews,
Baloun, or tennis, diet, or the stews
Had all the morning held, now the second
Time made ready, that day, in flocks are found
In hues as gay, and odours as divine,
As the fair fields they sold to look so fine.
That's velvet for a king! the flatt'rer swears;
'Tis true, for ten days hence 'twill be King Lear's.
Our Court may justly to our stage give rules,
That helps it both to fools'-coats, and to fools.
And why not players strut in courtiers' clothes?
For these are actors too as well as those :
Wants reach all states; they beg but better drest,
And all is splendid poverty at best.
Painted for sight, and essenc'd for the smell,
Like frigates frought with spice and cochineal,
Sail in the ladies: how each pirate eyes
So weak a vessel, and so rich a prize!
In the presence, and I, (God pardon me!)
As fresh and sweet their apparels be, as be
The fields they sold to buy them. For a king
Those hose are, cry the flatt'rers; and bring
Them next week to the theatre to sell.
Wants reach all states. Me seems they do as well
At stage as courts. All are players; whoe'er looks
(For themselves dare not go) o'er Cheapside books,
Shall find their wardrobe's inventory. Now
The ladies come. As pirates, which do know
That there came weak ships fraught with cochineal,
The men board them, and praise (as they think) well
Their beauties; they the men's wits: both are bought:
Why good wits ne'er wear scarlet gowns, I thought.
Top-gallant he, and she in all her trim,
He boarding her, she striking sail to him.
Dear Countess! you have charms all hearts to hit!
And, sweet Sir Fopling! you have so much wit!
Such wits and beauties are not prais'd for nought,
For both the beauty and the wit are bought.
'Twould burst ev'n Heraclitus with the spleen
To see those antics, Fopling and Courtin:
The presence seems, with things so richly odd,
The mosque of Mahound, or some queer pagod.
See them survey their limbs by Durer's rules,
Of all beau-kind the best-proportion'd fools!
Adjust their clothes, and to confession draw
Those venial sins, an atom, or a straw;
But oh what terrors must distract the soul
Convicted of that mortal crime------a hole?
This cause, these men, men's wit for speeches buy,
And women buy all reds which scarlets dye.
He call'd her beauty lime-twigs, her hair net:
She fears her drugs ill laid, her hair loose set.
Wouldn't Heraclitus laugh to see Macrine
From hat to shoe himself at door refine,
As if the presence were a Mosque; and lift
His skirts and hose, and call his clothes to shrift,
Making them confess not only mortal
Great stains and holes in them, but venial
Feathers and dust, wherewith they fornicate:
And then by Durer's rules survey the state
Or should one pound of powder less bespread
Those monkey tails that wag behind their head?
Thus finish'd, and corrected to a hair,
They march, to prate their hour before the fair.
So first to preach a white-glov'd chaplain goes,
With band of lily, and with cheek of rose,
Sweeter than Sharon, in immac'late trim,
Neatness itself impertinent in him.
Let but the ladies smile and they are blest:
Prodigious! how the things protest, protest.
Peace, fools! or Gonson will for Papists seize you,
If once he catch you at your Jesu! Jesu!
Nature made ev'ry fop to plague his brother,
Just as one beauty mortifies another.
Of his each limb, and with strings the odds tries
Of his neck to his leg, and waist to thighs.
So in immaculate clothes, and symmetry
Perfect as circles, with such nicety
As a young preacher at his first time goes
To preach, he enters, and a lady, which owes
Him not so much as good-will, he arrests,
And unto her protests, protests, protests;
So much as at Rome would serve to have thrown
Ten cardinals into the Inquisition;
And whispers by Jesu so oft, that a
Pursuivant would have ravish'd him away
For saying our Lady's psalter. But 'tis fit
That they each other plague: they merit it.
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