Scene 1.

LUcifer, Be not retrograde to my Commands.

Agrippa, I must be true and constant to my self. Your Commands are de­structive of Arcana Imperii, the fundamen­tal Secrets of our Kingdom.

Lucifer, I presume not to re­fine or advance thy Knowledge; I acknow­ledge the old Angel in thee. But if thou dost not answer with obsequious and rigorous obedience to these my Sacred Charms, acted on the Spire and Pinnacle of Ma­gick, thou wilt unhinge the Master-piece of Combination betwixt thee and the learned and high-flown part of the world, besides other evils that are ancillary and dependent.

Great Sir, Speak your Com­mands more at large, more circumstantially.

Give attendance. Look about thee. These are persons whom I devoutly reverence, who sit high and enthron'd in my thoughts and estimation. They hear every day from all parts much of thee in the world, and of thy Serpentine and Drago­nish Cunning; and the reports of thy de­ceit, lubricity, policies, continually crowd in their ears for entrance. Hither they have retired to receive right, downright, and candid Information. Here stands my charge. Discover here theatrically, the most deep­bottom'd and profound contrivances, by which thou dost amuse, imperil, ensnare the world, and involve it in thy dragonish tayl. My Charge does not out-walk it to thy quotidian windings; and petty tum­bling-tricks. These Heroick Spirits are cir­cled here, to take-a near view of the great Wheel in its motion, upon which the lesser wheels and waights wait and attend.

This would untwist my great work, unwind and unravel all.

Thou speak'st under thy self. [Page 2] Thy Policies have been abundantly dis­mantled amongst men, and yet thy King­dom is not unbottom'd, shakes not yet; yea, stands upon a firmer Basis and Pede­stal than formerly. Howsoever most mens understandings are illustrated, their blind Wils will alwaies be prepossest, obstinate and deaf to goodness. We bandy words. Thou, though the grand Emperour of infer­nal Spirits, art not exotick and eccentrical from my Commands. Be pliable, be con­formable, or praestat componere fluctus.

Mighty Sir, I compose my troubled and tempestuous thoughts: I strike sayl, and submit.

Enough. I go. I have omitted no tittle of observance in the steerige of my Charge, no sacred Character, Word, Ce­remony. Slignot thou in the least Atome or Punctisio of performance. Exit Agrippa.

This proud Agrippa fancies he wields and commands me by a Magical power meerly natural, as a Prince his Slave by a Despotical Dominion. There is no such power in Rerum Naturâ. I hold him by the secret Nerves & Ligaments of a traditional and implicit Compact: and therefore must obey, or discharge my Hold, damp and dead my Title. Lucifuga.

Your Pleasure, great Prince of Night.

I am engag'd by some Reasons of State, for a time here at London. Fol­low me in the dress of a Page, and be ready to be visible or invisible as I shall design.

I am, high Sir, your both visi­ble and invisible Servant, to be seen and not heard, heard and not seen, neither heard nor seen, both seen and heard; to be felt and not smelt, smelt and not felt, both felt and smelt, neither smelt nor felt; when, where, how, or in what shape you shall direct.

Act 1. Scen. 2.

This is the Sacred Grove, this the newest Spring-Garden: Here she dwels. A solitary place, shap't and carv'd by Na­ture into a fit Receptade for such and so sublime a person. Surely, she understands the language of Birds, the Songs of the Wood-Quiristers, and is promoted in her Knowledge by them. And here the free and open Ayre allowes her a more liberal Prospect towards Heaven, when she looks beyond the Birds, and the Sea-Stargazer the Ʋranoscopus. Who gives Answer here?

I most humbly desire access to the Lady of this Place.

How do you call her?

She is universally known by the name of Lady Devotion.

Here she resides indeed. But ac­cess to her is not rashly & suddenly grant­ed. You must begin at me: my name is Fear. When you are initiated by sufficient and inward acquaintance with me, I shall with due Fear give you up into the chast hands of Innocency; Innocency will inno­cently endear you to Simplicity; Simplicity with an unleven'd Simplicity will resign you to Knowledge; Knowledge will know­ingly prefer you to Prudence; and Prudence will prudently conduct you to the Lady Devotion, who will devoutly receive you.

I most humbly desire admit­tance.

What is your Name?

Aristotle Junior. I am a Gradu­ate in the University, intending by a right Line forward.

[Page 3]

You may enter: But first, with a reverent Fear hear your Welcom.

Act 1. Scen. 3.

Ignoro, Our very knowing (if I may so speak without prejudice to your Name) and long-sleev'd Lawyer by Sta­tute; and Magnifico, our magnifying and multiplying Souldier, be not so ready­footed. By Justice, which you ought to [Page 5] maintain with your Tongue, & you defend with your Sword, the Precedency belongs to me. It is my part; first to salute the Lady.

I am the right owner though not in possession. My very Vocation gives it me to have and to hold by firm Tenure. I defend man, and his Heire, and his heirs heirs to the worlds end in their just and lawful Rights, secundum aquum & bonum, with respect to all their outward Goods.

You deal abroad. I come near to him: I maintain him in his inward health, and soulder up his Body in case of sick­ness.

And I defend and maintain the Common-wealth, and general Good. By how much therefore the General Good is more divine than a Good which is particu­lar and private, by so much is my Work and Employment more worthy, more no­ble, and more exceilent than yours or yours. Upon this your Ground I challenge both the Place, and him that claimes it be­fore me. And my Sword shall uphold my Right founded upon the publick Good. Stand off.

The second Place is due to me. I am sure I am the better man of the two. Ignoro, stand thou off. Lawyers of all others are farthest from Devotion.

Unhand me. Gentlemen, bear witness: A meer Action of Battery se­cundum statuta. The next Water is brought to thee to be cast, in my own defence I will break the Urinal about thy head, yea though it contain the Poets Water. For the present, I am a Sufferer.

Within there.

What demand you, Gentlemen?

Hither we have march't to visit the Lady Devotion. My name is Magnifico. I am a Souldier. Little Devotion will serve my turn.

My name is Galen junior, I am a Physitian; and though most of us be Athe­ists, a little Devotion is a healthsom In­gredient in some kind of Medicine.

My name is Ignoro, I am a Lawyer, I desire to take all my Fees, lawful, or un­lawful, a little devoutly.

Gentlemen, True Devotion is not little. But as Wheat passes through ma­ny hands and offices before it comes to the Table in pure Manchet: So before ye can be admitted into the Royal presence of Lady Devotion, ye must here imploy some time in learning and imbibing the directi­ons and documents, first, of Fear, after­wards of Innocency, then of Simplicity, then again of Knowledge, and lastly, of Pru­dence.

How? Gentlemen, Heard ye this Lecture? Have we Novitiats and Pu­pillages to undergo? We must be set back to School again. A Souldier should not fear, neither be innocent, much less simple.

Sir, Once more, My name is Ig­noro. A Lawyer is the Phenix of his age, if he be knowing above the common level of Noverint Ʋniversi and false Latine.

Nor should a Physitian be pru­dent. I must kill unadvisedly, and with­out justifying what I do with a Probatum est.

Adieu Friend; Tell your Lady we return, and go in search of another Mi­stress.

Gentlemen, Let's be Friends, and hew out our way to better Fortunes. Devotion. does not become us: It is not in fashion within our Territories.

The first thing I do, shall be this: I'le take a Vomit, and fetch her out of my Stomack, that I may have no more appe­tite to her.

And thou shalt give me a scowring [Page 4] Purge, and I'le send her nimbly going [...] ­ther way, that I may take Bribes cleanly, nimbly, and with activity.

Act 1. Scene 4.

Pretty.

Madam.

Well and wittily answer'd: That put together, is Pretty Madam. Thou art Pretty and witty too. I know that I am beautiful, and I know thee to be Pretty.

I am your Servant Pretty, Ma­dam.

Good again. I am pretty outward­ly, and inwardly pretty. I am pretty and holy too.

Madam, you are more than pretty and holy, you are exceedingly holy.

Girl, thou sayest truth: I exceed in my kind of Holiness, or I should not be the Lady I am, Madam Hypocrisie. Well: Call my three English Scholars forth, that I may see what Progress they have made in my kind of Holiness.

Yonder peevish Lady Devotion lives re­tired, as if she fear'd Mankind, or that a Kiss would blast her. I am hospitable: I reject no man. She prepares all persons by Influence from her inferiour Servants: for her presence; as men are prepar'd in Tur­ky for the Baths: I receive all at their first entrance, into my near Embraces.

Here they are, Madam.

'Tis well. Mr. Complement my both stately and Coutreous Courtier, Mr. De­mure my moraliz'd and civil Citizen, and Gaffer Highshooe my bondst Countreyman, or Countreyman of the honest party: I am desirous to behold some fait fruits of your Proficiency in my School. First, Should your Affairs urge you to profess love where ye do not, or cannot love, to countenance your profession, how would ye look in such a case, how behave your selves, with what sweet words would ye accost the person, what would ye say?

Our honourable Mistress, I would look thus.

And I thus, or thus.

And I thus, and thus, and thus again.

My behaviour should be this.

And this mine.

And mine as you zee.

And I would say, Noble Sir, I do love you beyond the faint apprehension of humane capacity, beyond what all Orators can speak, and beyond what any man can do but my self; and then in an holy man­ner, I would swear toot, and second my Oath with ar eye towards Heaven.

I would say, Dear Brother, I do love you with as much zeal as my poor heart is able to hold without breaking: my love to you, is just weight according to the ballance of sincerity: yea, I profess, and again profess, and profess again, that I love you without the Leven or taint of any kind of Impurity.

And I would zay, Master, indeed and in truth now I do love your Worship: In good sooth I do. I have lov'd you, I do love you, and I will love you now and a­non too.

This is Scholar-like. If your ne­cessities should require that ye cheat a man, how then?

Then would I look him in the face with a smiling and amiable counte­nance, with all the Graces dancing on my Forehead and Cheeks: I would joyn eye [Page 6] to eye; I would open my cherry lips, and shew him my white and ivory teeth in to­ken of my innocency: I would salute him with an earthquake of my head: and after­wards, bow my body to him thus low, and speak all the fairest words that Cicero could have utter'd when his wits were most fresh in a Sun-shiny morning.

I would embrace him, and gently pull his body close to my heart-side; I woul musick this action with a groan, after the accent of

the Dove when he courts his Mistress: I would stoop, and hold my ear upwards toward his mouth, as if I did ex­pect Mahomets Pigeon: I would speak whiningly, and be ready to weep, and then wipe-mine eyes very painfully and indu­striously from the tears which were not. Afterwards, I would conscientiously do my best endeavour, as your Ladyship fables it, to cheat him.

And I would first stand aloof off, and strive to look paleas if I fear'd him, and send half a score of long-Legs before me: then would I move devoutly by little and little, every step should zignifie a man of Worship, towards him: I would no go close, but hold off, as if he were zome fine thing that had wrought false Miracles: I would look very simply and innocently, af­ter the manner of us honest Countreymen, or like our countrey Lombs: I would scratch my head on this side and on the tother; as if I had a mind to dig up a nest of good words with my nails: And then, acting prettily with my right hand betwixt my mouth and my heart, I would say something which I neither meant nor understood; and cheat him purely.

Your Judgment of this, Pretty.

'Tis pretty well, Madam.

Superlatively well: I my self could not soar higher. How would ye walk the streets in a City as this is? Have ye learn'd all your postures of Godliness, all your tra­verses of Salutation, your pious Gestures of Reprehension, that ye may be thought ir­reproveably holy, to be perform'd, as ye go, on every side?

I would walk, salute, and repre­hend thus.

I after this manner.

And I zo, in City and Coun­trey.

Excellently! Ye all in your kinds, merit a Garland of Preferment. Pretty; In­troduce my three Out-landers: If they have thriv'd as throughly, I am rich in Agents and

Emissaries: I shall be able to delude the whole world: The Devil will hardly keep himself out of the Snare.

Mr. See Senior, my Spanish Scholar; Mr. Signior See, my pure Italy; and Mon­sieur Kickshaw, my Scholar from France; My thoughts triumph in the Climax, to the top of which my English Scholars have ri­sen: there wants but the other Wing on your side, and I fly.

Madam, See Senior will not be dropping or dropping on his part. I have learn'd exactly to kneel upon one Knee, and to draw part of my long Rapier in my publick Devotions, to signifie my readi­ness to defend the truth: to praise the mild­ness and modesty of the Inquisition, though it be cruel above the Gallies: to pretend fulness from a Bunch of Grapes, and a Clove of Garlick, beyond what all the va­rieties of England afford. I often pray to the powers in Heaven, but I swear by them oftner. My heart is most zealous towards the She-Saints above; but I am yet more [Page 7] servent towards the pretty hearts beneath, and if they fail, the Beast fals even to my desires. I more love the Image in holy things, than the Substance: I can be cruel to the raising of horrour and trembling in the hearers, as I have been in the Indies: and leave the Jesuits to colour and cover it with a godly reason; as somthing may be studied in the favour of all things, though never so barbarous and horrid: I can bring torturing whips for England in a Navy, and delegate the Jesuits to forge that I brought them to whip and discipline my self in the Raptures and Ecstasies of my Devotion: I am a true servant to the Jesuits in the pro­motnig of their ends; but I falsly forget that the end should be good, and the acti­on agreeable: I work mischief slowly, but surely: I shall perform incomparably more: Let this suffice to be spoken.

Madam, you will not find me empty; a man so near the Fountain-head and so wax-like to the Impression of high things: I abound with all the possible garbs of Devotion, and with Bell-concep­tos to garnish them: My Soul is enticed forth every day at my ears, and I am carri­ed wholly out of my self, with the Musick of the Churches; but I direct little atten­tion to the thing signified: I have a Serag­lio of women in my thoughts: but the for Boy waits there as most delicious: May it please your Madam-ship; the Turk him­self is not so frolick in this kind of Devoti­on as I am. I stile my self much an admirer and honourer of the Jesuits: but for the ancient Father of the Society in the casa professa; he is the man in my breast: I dure let him loose to combate with the old De­vil himself in Matchevelism: I own the holy Monuments of the good men in old time; and those are abundantly sufficient to save me: to the which I add a few dull and scanty Devotions; As, once in a hundred years I convert a Jew, and perhaps a whore when she is rotten, old, and past pleasure: I pass and repass many godly Legerde­mains in the Inquisition; but I seldom con­vert any there, except it be into ashes by fire: and if any man prevent me by death, I make a flame-offering of his car case, as I did of Spalato's in Campo di fiori; and that believe me, Madam, was a fat one, I had a godly English Friend, who came from England to Rome, the other day, and there mournfully complain'd with much of your spirit, that he had been horribly persecuted by the wild and savage English: and in the Rant of his Tavern-devotion, came head­long down the Tavern Stairs, and broke his neck, beyond the skill of the Bone-set­ter, & so his hypocritical mouth was stopt. It belongs to this Story, Madam, that a devout Spaniard came a while ago into Eng­land with intention to convert it, as having heard that the people were wild, and liv'd in Woods, and Caves of the earth: but ar­riving at Canterbury, and by most plain and manifold experience finding it otherwise, he fairly, but not softly, return'd from thence wiser than he came. Truly, Madam; we do hatch & patch together many preci­ous & godly Stories in Italy, which though they be somwhat near to good ends, are very wide of truth; and yet good Ends must be fought by proportionable means, and Truth wants not the helping hand of Falshood to support it: I am your Vassal at hand to act the rest.

Madam, I do not implunge my self over head and ears into Devotion; because as the Veretians and other high-mo­ving and Eagle-wing'd Italians, I have a no­ble part of the Atheist within me: but I can play the devout fool prettily and mo­dishly at set times: And of all Nations, I do you most humble service, Madam. For, such a monstrous and long-sided: P [...], [Page 8] such a changeling and phantastical dress, such a Pedlars-pack of Ribbands, concur­ring with an outward form of Devotion, is the top and top-gallant of Hypocrisie. Be­sides, the modes and numberless number of Fashions, that never Flanders-Horse was sick of so many, in benevolous Conjunction with Godliness, pencil forth and give Hy­pocrisie in her full splendor. Afterwards, the Complements a la mode de France, which multiply words beyond limit, and above Arithmetick, and recount to a Lady her both invisible and impossible Perfecti­ons, when they meet in the same point with a scarlet Tincture of Piety, degenerate into perfect Hypocrisie. Madam, I pretend to Valour and a generous heart: and in­deed, when I was a Boy in long coats, I rode upon a Bear, as our honorable custom is in Paris, led by the Bear-hood to my Fa­thers Door; and thence it came, as the speech of the Vulgar goes, that I could ne­ver be afraid afterwards of man or beast. And in Paris, the Captains of our Train'd Bands are for the greatest part Taylors, Ma­dam, as I am, not only because they rode upon Bears when they were in Coats and bare behind, but also because they are nim­ble at their weapon, and to put them in mind of going through-stitch with their work when they fight: And yet, I confess to you, Madam, that when I am well bea­ten by a Spaniard or an Englishman, I cry Mon dieu, Mon dieu: and this is Hypocrisie too, though of a lower Orb. We plead all with one mouth against the Inquisition; but par ma Foy, we have a French Inquisiti­on in Paris, otherwise call'd the Bastille, which is not parallel'd by either Italian or Spanish Inquisition: And is it not exalted and sublimated Hypocrisie, when we bear a superlative name near to him above the world, as if we were most abstracted from the world; and yet we teach the world, and all the Phantasmes and lying Legends of the world to all the world. Madam, I am old excellent in the practise of a singular vertue which the precise part of people call Lying: Indeed I can scarce tune my mouth to speak Truth: And I can swear such Oaths, as would blister an ordinary mans ears: I am very quick and pliable at steal­ing: and then I can salve it, daub it, and guild it over with a Lye: To tell all, is be­yond all my power: For the rest, I rest your Tres-humble and restless Serviteur, Monsieur Kickshaw, of Paris, Tay­lor.

Europe is mine; the other three Parts are within my Verge: My hopes are high as the Firmament. My Servants, hom­bred and forraign, are men of all hours, weigh all the moments and niceties of Po­licy, know all the private Overtures and Inclinations of Opportunity, all the knacks of Hypocrisie; and are able to vie cunning with all the simple, lean, and fagg end of the world. Scholars and Friends; howso­ever we must bear before us a plausible out-side, a fair Forehead of Carriage, a Gloss of Demeanour; yet inwardly, a­mongst our selves, we may be free and jolly; and as the Brethren in private, turn Wine down by the Tayl into the belly of a fat Capon, at a Merchants Table, to compose good Sauce; in like manner, we may rejoyce at due times, with, in, and over the Creature. Let's have a Dance in the venturous aspirings of our Hopes, and the soarings of our present Joyes.

Madam, I hear the motion of some approaching persons.

Let's withdraw.

Act 1. Scen. 5.

Still my Stomack is upon a blab­bing account, it utters all: It disburses faster than it receives: I think my Vomit will never leave giving, till it gives up sto­mack and all. I mixt it very high, and it works accordingly.

And my Belly tumbles and tum­bles without end, after this puissant Chy­mical Purge: I fear, I shall purge my guts forth. Certainly, I was full of Devotion: I had more matter in me than I was aware of: O, I must go.

The Lawyer has a motion. This fals right: Now we cannot jarre in con­test for precedency: the place is peacea­bly deliver'd up to me: and I will not dis­band, or give a pass to the present opportu­nity.

Good Sir, speak not except your business be both weighty and godly; I am engag'd in my Devotions.

A Maid as fair as may be, as fair as May is, as fair as a Morning in May: I am sorry shee's bookish: yet our most free, blith and buxom Girls here, expose com­monly a godly Book on the Cupbards head in their Chambers, where they continually sacrifice to Venus. Sweet Maid, are you the Lady of this fair Building? If it were assig­ned to the fairest of Maids, it would be yours.

Sir, I may not dispense with my mouth to answer your vain and imperti­nent discourse otherwise than thus: You stile me Sweet; this Book is sweeter than all Nature's Wardrobe of sweet things; and for the fair building, this little Book builds fairer. The fairest of Maids is Ver­tue; here she dwels, and here.

This Maid transports me. Sweet and fair, beyond compare.

I beseech you, Sir, be not grievous to me.

The Musick invites me: I must sit down, hood mine eyes, and set my thoughts flying upon high things, with my Arms pleated in this devout Knot.

Having transported me, her self is now transported.

Sans doubt, this holy Creature lives many degrees above mortality.

I have met with one in History, that de­sired, and very much endeavoured to see himself sleep; but could never bring both ends of his desire together. Such a sleep as this in such a Creature, would keep me a­wake without sleeping.

O, I am heart-sick still. And no marvel: For the Intention of the Vomit was, to fetch all Devotion out of my heart. But the sight of this pretty Heart somwhat eases my dull heart, and relieves me. Sleeps she?

No. She meditates.

I have been so liberal in purging, that I am perswaded I have left my Soul behind me: O my sweet Soul, Have I then lost thee?

Your Soul is not so sweet, if you have left it behind you. Look hither, Law­yer, the sweet Soul's before you.

[Page 10]

She is an Angel.

Lawyer, You are without cir­cumlocutions, a Dunce. Who ever read of a She-Angel? or, of an Angel that put on the shape of a woman? I is enough, that an Angel and a woman concur in some point of similitude.

She is such an Angel that I should not refuse for a Fee.

She is warm, as we are: and soft as the finest Persian Silk.

Be not rude, Gentlemen: Ye have chas't away my purest and divinest thoughts. Now I am bold, with direct lan­guage to demand your business.

Our business, Fair-one, is; we are ambitious to submit our selves to your Tuition, and enter here as Scholars.

Say ye so? Then I in the Madams name, pronounce your Welcom: Pray, enter.

Act 1. Scen. 6.

My Charge sits heavy on my heart; but I must amand it to execution: The grand Machin by which the world wheels towards me, is; when the leading Clerks abandon candor, plain-dealing, and simplicity, and evade profoundly hypocri­tical. For they governing others as the Shrubs of people, by vertue of the reve­rent opinion which men have traditionally received, concerning their Power, Holi­ness, Abilities, draw them like inferiour wheels into a combination and subordinate motion, conformably to their Ends. The Habit I wear, is the Dress of an English Je­suit, as he commonly appears in his Coun­trey. I will not delegate the acting of the Part, to any: I scarce presume upon my own sufficiency, as equal to the Magisterial height of their Performance: Page, Give notice to Madam Hypocrisie, that I come to take a sensible view of her Scholars, and a­dopt the ripest of them into my Service. If all things fall pliable, because I greatly cover Honour and Adoration, let me be honour'd before these people with her lou­dest Musick in my entrance: I follow im­mediatly.

Scen. 1.

HAving orderly perform'd the Injunctions prescrib'd to you according to the Method and Oeconomy of this House, I am order'd, as you have [Page 11] heard, by Lady Devotion, to render you to the place where I first receiv'd you. We all hope, that you will retain the scarlet Dye wherewith you are imbued: Besides, It is our order, that as we sing the Introit of him that enters, so we give a Musical Farewel to him agreeably in his dismission. I take my leave, and leave you to your attention.

I am humbly thankful.

The blessed Angels constellate here: Yea Heaven it self is translated hi­ther: Nothing sublunary is more divine: I owe my true life, and all that is conse­quent to it, to this place: I must now think my self the last, and least, and lowest of all men: Speak in the abstract from the Lists, Lines, and Limits of all Hypocrisie; and act agreeably to the Commutations and Di­stributions of Aristotelical Justice: It re­mains, that I wait continually the falling of the Dew: The Shell wherein the Orient Pearl is born, opens it self towards Heaven, begging as it were, one clean drop of proli­sical and procreating Dew: which having obtained, it presently shuts, keeps the door against all outward things, and secretly transforms and ripens that heavenly drop into a precious Margarite.

Act 2. Scen. 2.

Devotion has been long filing and polishing him: Madam, you must needs intend and bend your utmost skill to reduce him.

[Page 12]

Sir, I shall walk up close to what your Commands impose upon me: I will not lagg behind them, if my power faints not, and except I be arrested by ne­cessity.

Devotion in all her aims drives at this, to bring you and your Art and Power to nothing. A thing will run away through many changes, and put on many strange shapes if the Chymist or Alchymist pursues it, and endeavours the reduction of it to nothing: This way he comes: I will be near in ambush, that if your Plot flagg and hang down the head, I may discharge my strongest Machin upon him. Lucifuga, Wait you invisibly at his Elbow, on his heart-side.

Sir, I will have him on the left side, the right side, the wrong-side, the in­side, the out-side, the fore-side, the back­side, every side.

Pretty, Let us now sweetly touch all the most Musical strings of Hypocrisie.

Madam, Pretty will do all things handsomly.

Maid, durst I be angry, I would chide you.

Madam, durst I be stubborn or proud, I would excuse my fault: yet, prompted from within, I humbly say, that when I omitted my duty towards you, I was otherwise busied.

How mean you busied?

I am very loath to answer, lest I should seem vain.

I charge you, answer me.

It comes with leaden heels from my own mouth. In the contemplation of heavenly things.

I forgive you. Thou art as vertu­ous as fair.

Now Madam, durst I be angry, I would chide you.

Why, prythee?

You call me vertuous: a name which unbecomes you to badge me with, or me to hear assigned to my self without a deluge of tears. O Madam, what have you done?

Amiss, dear Maid: I can mingle an Ocean of Tears with your Deluge, in expiation of my Crime: Forgive me Maid.

Forgive me, Madam.

Your ear: Pretty, Dost thou act the Crocodile best now, or I?

Both are as like to the Crocodile as the Crocodile is like to himself: All Preambles to the devouring of this Schol­lar.

Let's change the Humour: Maid, where shall we select and pick forth a Me­ditation for the present?

We have Matter enough every where, Madam. Those two Turtles that stand billing yonder, are an Embleme of chast Love.

A most happy Subject: Let's part a little, and retrait inwardly.

I have discovered their several glances towards me: Prudence, assist me farther. Yonder pretty party-colour'd Ad­der, watching in the greenest grass, is truly emblematical to me: I like not these af­fected Pageants of Devotion, these paint­ed Sepulchers, these Dunghils cover'd with Snow as with a fair sheet. Devotion in the Majesty and Royalty of it, is inward: In the outside, 'tis like a modest face, abus'd if painted: The more sublime the Star is, it appears the lesser: Deep waters are si­lent: The rich Ears of Corn, and the Boughs heavy-laden with fruit, bow and humble their heads towards the earth that bears them. Chaffe and Straw ride upon [Page 13] the Superfice of the waters to be seen, when heavy things sink, hide, and conceal them­selves: The Silk-worm folds up and houses it self in the little Ball of Silk which it makes, and that from its inwards: Gold is modest in its shining: Jewels, though shining, are small: The Ayr is that by which ut medium diaphanum, all things here are seen, but the Ayr it self is not seen. The Empyreal Heaven, though so shining, that it is able to make a continual day amongst us, is hidden: Nihil in mari eminet praeter saxa: Nothing holds up the head at Sea, but Rocks. The Sun declining, the sha­dowes encrease: Cernendi vis in albugine sita non est: the white of the Eye sees not. The Seminal and Medicinal Vertues are inward: The Soul is invisible.

Good Mistress, assist with your Charity a poor, old, lame man.

A poor man. A meditation of chast Love, is agreeably perfected by the practise of Charity: Old man, I am tender-ear'd: You must not beg of me twice at the same time. Because you are poor, I give you this; because you are old, this; and this, because you are lame.

Alass poor man! I have no world­ly goods to give you: I am a Servant. Yet, because you are poor, I give you readiness of good-will, and compassion; because you are old, and suburb'd near your grave, you shall partake of my best Devotions: and because you are lame, I give you tears, weep over you, cry with you.

God bless you both, good Mistresses I thank you.

Methinks, this Charity is too full of words, too circumstantial.

O prophane! This is the Musick of the Bear-Garden, and of the Counttey-Alehouse: not heavenly Musick: Maid, chide him hence.

Depart, O thou prophane Per­son.

Desist: It may be this is his way of begging. Somtimes the poor call at the doors of rich men after this Piping man­ner: Give him this Alms.

Friend: Madam gives you a libe­ral Almes. He both plaies and dances now. He doubles his Prophaneness.

Let him alone. Having receiv'd a large Almes, the poor man is overjoy'd. We may stop our ears, and look another way.

In rich-furred beasts their Cases are far better than their Bodies: and in the Cinnamon-Tree the Bark is much dea­rer than the Bulk: Suavius olet flos, cum folia nihil oleant: The Flower is more sweet­sented, where the Leaves cannot be sent­ed, as in the Violet, the Rose; scarlet, pur­ple, or the fine crimson-Violet, is a royal Cloath, not by reason of the Wool but the Dye: In our actions the Byas wheels the other way. These hypocritical Juggles are execrable in themselves, and adverse to me: I cannot endure the presentation of them longer.

Now the grand Genius of our Society be propitious, or I forfeit my much desired Prey. Honoured Sir, what do you here? This Woman is no sutable Con­sort for you. Madam, I know you, and your fair Fairy Waiting-maid. Quit the Place.

Sir, This was Madam Hypocrisie, her own [Page 14] and very self; and the other was her act­ing Girl, her play-maid.

I divin'd some such thing: Truly Sir, whosoever you are, I have a reserve of Honour for you as you profess against Hy­pocrisie. But pray Sir, let not my question be unpardonable: who are you?

I am forsooth, a Father of the Socie­ty. You see forsooth, what Swarms of Schis­maticks we have in these parts; and how forsooth, that in all Meetings scarce two men appear, as the Schools speak, of the same numerical Judgment. Forsooth, the Truth is, the Nation is like a Forrest on the Coasts of Barbary; where every Beast proudly forrageth for himself according to the latitude of his strength, and combates with every living thing he comes near, ei­ther upon the account of Offence or De­fence: So that forsooth, this may truly be called, and in civil terms, as the Civilians speak, Religio Deserti, the Religion of the Forrest or Wilderness, or the wild Boar's and Bear's Religion.

Sir, I find you are knowing: Hi­ther I subscribe to your Discourse: And indeed I would steer any Discourse, that I might be set in as much distance from Hy­pocrisie as the Globe of the earth would permit. But you know how harshly and untuneably change sounds in the ears of all men.

Pray forsooth, courteously lend an ear: Then only Change is a Defect, when it is opposite or fals cross to the well-be­ing or perfection of the thing changed, and is in some kind a degradation of it: This is forsooth, as the Rhetoritians speak, ipsa luce lucidius, clearer than the light or Sun: because the Heavens and heavenly Bodies are incessantly changed in their motions: We are changed for the better in our grow­ings outward and inward: Every season of the year revels, and causes many changes in the world: which forsooth, cannot be imputed to the things changed as defects, but adhere to them as legitimate perfections of their Natures and Beings.

Holy Sir, I do most highly value your Holiness, and your Learning: and humbly require of you more particular In­formation.

Child, give me leave, forsooth, to call you so: For now forsooth, you are, and shall be my Ghostly Child: I see for­sooth, you are ingenious. I will send you first to Flanders; afterwards to Spain; then to Italy; to sublimate and heighten your Learning and Experience; and that you may learn the Arts and Sciences where they are best taught. More of this betwixt us in private.

The Field is ours: We have at last wrought him to us: Open Hypocrisie, Strumpet-like, is too palpable. I am now visible to you.

Act 2. Scene 3.

I have bound him by Command, and by Promise I my self am bound to se­cure with my presence the execution. An­guilla est, elabitur: If we give him his head, he slips. My Presence will keep him fixt.

What seeks this Maid here? Fie on you; so bold? 'Tis a Spirit: and I must lay it.

The Affair refers me to you: and you are here.

Be thou Spirit, or Flesh, thou [Page 15] hast no part in the Comedy.

But I have Sir. No long part you would say; but a necessary part I have.

Your place is the Pit: and your Business is to wait there.

And from thence I came.

The Gentlemen there are per­plex't and troubled: They complain, that your Jesuit sends a chief Actour beyond the Seas; and that either your Scene must be preposterously chang'd, or they shall be deprived of the principal Occurrences which happen to him.

Neither: by vertue of my first and fundamentel Promise, my power shall bring him hither at due times, to act over again the most remarkable Occurrences: and he shall neither know where he is, nor what befals him. Return this Answer, with my devoutest Respects.

I shall. If you will civilly take your leave of me, I shall present you with a Sevil-Orange.

Is this your custom?

No, Sir: but it was in my desires to teach you manners.

Act 2. Scen. 4.

Well, Madam; I have dispatcht my Scholar to St. Omers, you may now en­ter your whole Tribe. Every one shall re­ceive his Charge, and I will discharge you of their persons. Mr. Complement, your charge is, that you stow fire in the Court: Speak every where of Abuses; and of a sin­gular discerning Spirit, and a Holiness which you have, but others are naked of, as prophane: Turn up the white of your eye, and shew it, as if that were the outside of your Soul, according to the Naturalist, Pro­fectò in oculis animus inhabitat; truly the Soul dwels in the eyes: Draw every word through your Nose, as if it past through a middle sort of crack't Organ-Pipe: and lift up your hands towards that which scru­pulous men call Heaven, and close them when they are extended, as if you had fast hold of Heaven. Pretend alwaies like an Apton in the first onset, true things, and such as are in use with holy men: those delude irrefragably: The people regard not the tayl of the Business: The Snake having past his head, draws his body after him into the Faction. Tell the people, that by how much an Element is more near to Heaven, it is by so much the more pure, [...]ctive, noble: that the Water is more pure than the Earth, the Ayr than the Water; and Elementary Fire than the Ayr: That the higher the Ayr is, it is the purer still, and more subtile: That in a Limbeck the things of greatest purity and vertue, are sublimated, that is, hast to the top of the Limbeck; the drossy matter fals. Let there be a new shap't Achates in every pe­riod. It is not necessary, that one experien­cing if Sea-water be salt, should drink up: the whole Sea: nor that I should foot it over every particular: your own Genius will direct you forward. There is no more excellent manner of cozening and gu [...]ling the simple Herd of people, than with the specious Mantle of Religion, because Re­ligion out-powers, and, overswaies all in [Page 16] mankind. Mr. Demure, and Gaffer High-shooe; you for the City, and you for the Countrey, are charged accordingly. Galen junior, when you are call'd to sick persons, and find that their sicknesses lay close siege to their bodies, first prepare them by some eloquent Preamble. Say, if you see the wa­ter in a calm Ser troubled, and rise high in­to the Ayr, take heed, ther's a Whale near. Turn it homwards thus; Sickness disturb­ing so highly the peace and tranquility of the Body, Death is imminent. Then make reverend mention of the Society, and re­count the numerous Conversions that we have wrought in the world, and press it home to their Consciences, that they leave us honourable Legacies according to their Conditions, yea though they beggar and leave succourless their own dear children: We are not their Heirs at Common Law, but upon a higher account: Tell them, other­wise they are near to a Gulf, a Precipice: Then while the Iron is hot, and upon the Anvile, send for us. If need urge, we shall use you in Deletories, vulgarly call'd poy­sons, when we prosecute a pious End. But if any of our holy Society be sick, they pay you not, because they pray for you: The Prayers of the Society are above price, and cannot be valued. Ignora, you must wire­bind and enchain your self to the common Rabble in the Decisions of Law-cases: af­fect the names of popular and Patriot: de­sert noble Interests, though never so just: and though you take Fees on both sides, be sure you herd it with the Rascal Deer; they couch the safest; they are the more numerous, and clamorous. If any case of­fer it self, wherein the religious profit and emolument of the Society is involv'd, take all shapes, as the Cameleon at Land, the Po­lypus in the sea; all colours, as the Tar­rand in the Garden; before you let your Cause fall: Regard not the poor stand­ing in competition with us; in ballance with us, they are the German Bishops Rats: We are poor, and entangled in debt; though in truth we were never yet acquain­ted with debt; that's our Pretence, en­franchised, guided and guarded with a reli­gious Equivocation; as far as you know to the contrary, we are in debt. Magnifico, Your charge is clear: you know your ma [...]ch: The Word is enough to a Souldier. My three outlandish Imps, ye must away, each with all expedition to his Country. Your Business wherein ye concenter, is, to de­base and vilifie the English Nation in all your Discourses, all places: Tell your Coun­tries, that they are a people of degenerous and ungarrison'd Souls, Adamites in un­derstanding; and if they have any, have but a surface-knowledge, and that most pa­radox to Truth: That they live altogether in Forrests and Caves, and in the white Rocks from which England was named Al­bion; and eat raw flesh, and oftentimes the flesh of Children: That they are a ti­morous and soft-fac'd people, unapt for wars; yea ready to entertain a conquest with most humble submission. Mr. See Se­nior, Give your people to understand, that they are the most credulous, and the most noble-soul'd Nation of all others: That if at any time they design another Armado for England, they take a special care they do not provide such an other holy Nun to give a solemn blessing to it; she was after­wards solemnly prov'd to be a Witch. Pray them, that when they work their false Mi­racles, they will carry their hands, and their invisible juggling-Hair more covertly and cleverly: The falshood of some these times, hath been Chrystal-clear in the view of Reason: the most learned Laureat's of Spain it self, were confounded in the sight of them; and the Inquisition it self was angry, because they were not acted with [Page 17] more nimbleness. Tell them, their most prophane and bawdy Comedies in their Processions on their greatest dayes, are not convenient. I cannot be infinite. Com­mend my brotherly Respects to Father Es­cobar at Valladolid: Tell him, his Morals thrive wonderfully: The Mystery of Je­suitisme is little availeable against them: they have overturn'd all Law, Right, Ho­nesty, and deified the Jesuit, made him the great God of Nature, all cases of Consci­ence answering, turning, and returning to him, whenas they should return, turn, and answer to him above. Mr. Signior See, Re­commend my most humble Vassallage to the grand Signior at Rome: Pray his Holi­ness, that there be sudden provision by pen­sion made here, for the poorer and scab'd sort of Priests; they are in the Antecamera to a falling condition: Ascertain to him, that some of the most active and unquiet Spirits amongst them, have taken Pensions here, to discover the Mysterious Intentions and Actions of Rome and Spain, and at the same time, the very very same, have re­main'd pension'd by his Holiness to betray the Affairs of their own Countrey to him: Insomuch that of late, one of them heated and heighten'd in his Cups at a Tavern, and his Friend desiring to depart, said with Cy­nick Modesty, Stay, Friend, the Pope and the Rebel in England (he nam'd him) shall pay for all: Fail not to lay this at his Holi­ness his Feet when you kiss them. We of the Society are glewed by a particular vow of Obedience to his Holiness: It was the Wisdom of our Patron did it, that our ad­vancements might be joyntly conserved: our Interest is closely twisted and pleaced with his. Signifie to his Holiness, that his wicked Priests get Bastards a pace here; and then, having been overdoers, and over­done themselves, pretend to be only Over­seems to the Children: So far forth, that one being demanded why he knav'd it for a Bastard, defended his Act and Monument scholastically with Aristotles Ipse dixit; who saies, that then a living thing is per­fect, quandò general sibi simile in Naturâ, when it begets a like to it self in Nature. Pray him to keep the Rithm if not the rea­son, and uphold constantly the Jews and the Stews; that we may have more ho­nourable Examples of Jewish women turn'd Christians, to the end they may turn whores; which amongst the Jews is highly punishable. Tell him likewise that false Miracles are greatly advantageous to the Cause, if they be done as the Roman School-men speak, et si non castè, tamen cau­tè; although not chastly and truly, yet wa­rily to prevent scandal; wherein our own Honour is more consider'd, than the Ho­nour of him who is most honourable. Mon­sieur Kickshaw; Load and physick this Na­tion as far as possibly you can, with the pret­ty Muld-sack or Don Quickshot, of your new Fashions: And as old Rome did a­bound with the gods of all the Countreys they conquer'd, introduce the Folsies and Drolleries of all the world hither: That best suits with you, that have the best name in the superlative degree: And still wire­draw the people here, with forestalling and diverting their Trade. Forgive my length: My Matter, like an Ocean, had I given way, had over-towr'd me. Let's privately rejoyce a while, as Witches have their pri­vate Revellings, and then wee'l take our Leaves.

Most gladly, Reverend Father.

Reverend Father, they all crave your ho­ly Benediction, in lieu of a choyce Viari­cum before they depart.

O, I give it most willingly. Go, my Children, and may your Foreheads be as wals of Corinthian Brass, and may your [Page 18] tuus lead all Europe.

Madam, In certain concurrences of par­ticulars, to prevent suspition, I shall need a Lady to sustain the person of my Wife: Therefore to palliate my own Person, I retain you and your Maid.

You honour us, Reverend Father.

Act 2. Scen. 5.

Sweet Nice, unhinge your heart from that low-orb'd Religion of Popery, which thus imperils both your Soul and Body.

My Lord, I cannot. All which that Religion proposes, goes parallel with the most pure, chast, and refined Truths. If you do not relinquish me to my own liber­ty, I shall weep, until I have not another little drop to stagnate in my eyes as want­ing strength to follow the rest.

What a deep-wrought and root­ed Delusion is this? If Ignorance hath not uncoyn'd your Soul, and rendred you un­reasonably renacious of your own Judg­ment; If your heart be not in a total E­clipse and Epilepse by the vigorous reverbe­rations of self-Opinion, you will book it there, that all your noble friends are o­therwise devoted.

My Friends are not competent Presidents to me for the carriage of my own heart. Noble Unkle, If you take me off from this divine foundation, I shall ever be in a rolling condition, ever like a float­ing Island, or the Sea-weed, and never se­curely know where to take or keep root.

They are the Jesuits that have done this: they have out-channel'd their Talents; led them through all the Me­anders and Labyrinths of Errour, and sta­ted them incompatible and inconsistent with Truth. Dear Cozen, I pity you; you have taken a wandring Star for the Pole.

Noble Sir, you borrow your name from the Nobleness of our Family: I con­jure you by all the lineal and collateral de­scents of it, to allow me liberty of Con­science.

I may not: My Conscience swaies me the other way. You want no­thing: No Pleasures are denied to you; of which my House flowes with Variety. you are in the Milky way to peace of mind, if you can bend your heart to walk in it.

There is no peace without the qui­et enjoyment and exercise of Religion.

Madam, I belong to a most Re­verend Father of the Society, to whom your most distressed condition is made known. He will be here quickly, and you may have the benefit of Confession.

Dear Boy, that cannot be; I am not permitted to speak with any person in private.

Madam, the Father is wise: hee'l find a way.

Poor Girl! I bleed inwardly for her: Before she fell into this Trance, her Soul was encaged and engaged like a Bird of Paradise in a pure Body; like the Bird which the Indians call in their Lan­guage Manuco Diata, Aviculam Dei, the little Bird of God, because it is never seen on the ground, but dead: She was drest modestly, and like one of the Sister-hood: Now her hair is mathematically trim'd, curl'd figure-fashion, and with exquisite Artifice woven into Nets and Snares. [Page 19] Howsoever her heart is qualified, she hath more of the world upon her back, than for­merly. It is a notorious folly, to be proud of a rich Scarf holding up a lame Arm, or of a gay Garment covering our Nakedness. Escobar the Spanish Jesuit hath open'd a broad way to these loose and heathenish Dresses. O the Jesuits! Surgeons are mo­dest-handed, wary, and soft in their touches, but Murderers care not where they strike, cut, wound. What's he? A little Devil. Cozen, are you a Witch too, Do you deal with the Devil and all? What are you, Sir­rah? Whence came you? and to whom do you pertain?

Good my Lord, Speak not so much beneath your Blood and Education. It is a Blackamore Boy: Do not such obtrude themselves to us every day in the Streets?

O Cozen: the Jesuits have be­mir'd your Affections: and the Will be­ing surpriz'd with a Passion (be it Love, Anger, or any other) the Understanding in a Soul divested of Prudence, easily conde­scends, and represents all things of the same colour, the same dimensions with the passion. Troubled water renders not the Sun-beams, though most right and pure in themselves, but distorted. The Chrystal­line humour wherein the visive power is Queen Regent, is [...]ot colour'd. Winnow and sift your heart, to find and single out that which threw you into this Abyss. He that fals into the water by the breaking of the Ice, must rise where he fell, or he is lost beyond recovery.

My Lord, I am your Votary, but I am grounded; I stick close to my Root.

Pray come up to my Proposals: I will send for one who shall free the Ho­nour of all our Doctrines, which your fan­cy either from the multiplying or extenua­ting Glass, mishapes to you.

Your Lordship may send for him, but I shall not entertain him: He will be as unwelcom unto me as a Spectre.

Then let some of your own Learned Acquaintance be call'd, to plain as with a Roller, a Cylinder, the way before you: or, be your own Physitian: Cozen, clean the Gold and keep it: Select the Gold, and throw aside the drossie part: and amongst other things you find, find your Errour: You see, sweet Cozen, that I de­sire to descend into your heart gently, as the Sun-beams into a Chamber through the window, without opening the Casement, or breaking the Glass.

My Lord, you miscenter your hopes. Your Lordship will never be able to pull the Thorn of scruple out of my Conscience. Good my Lord, surrender me to my Medi­tations. Solitariness is my best Compa­nion.

I do, but with some kind of Regret.

We who are upon the earth, de­termining and sentencing from the verdict of Sense, fancy, at the least in our first Ap­prehensions, these things below to be great, and the glorious and shining Bodies above, to be small: If we were advanced to the place where the Stars are, these things would appear to us very small, if seen at all, and those would shew themselves: It sticks in the narrowness of my mouth; I put it over to my thoughts. O the little­ness and vileness of these inferiour things! In natural things, the higher the Sun mounts, the less shadows it casts: and in artificial things, the Pyramid ascending higher and higher, is lesser still and lesser: So manner'd ought we to be in our out­ward deportment.

Act it to the life now, and you fasten her. A young Maid believes and loves with equal readiness.

Maid: Heaven greets you: I come not to way-lay your Devotions, but so raise and perpetuate them. Let not your Unkle with his out-stretch't perswasions lay or alhy your Zeal. Hereticks are mer­ciless, Iron-breasted, Rock-hearted, and people of hardned and petrified Bowels: There is no seed, no footstep of Mercy in then; only perhaps now and then certain arreptitious emications and Star-twinck­lings of natural, moral, and old- Roman ten­derness. If any of these, walking in the painted Galleries of their Imagination, fancy they do works of mercy, when they do thus and thus because others have done so and so before them, they miscarry; For their Mercy is as their Belief, is beleper'd by it; and the stream cannot be cleaner, clearer, higher than the Fountain, or the Branch purer and more generous than the Root. The Magnetisme of Piery hath wrought upon you; and the Torpedo and Remora, the World and Heresie, the De­vils Factors, should act no farther by their secret Influx upon your Breast: You have given your Faith to the Firmament, and you must not follow in the train of the Pla­nets; that is, move on, and retrait in the same Line, and in going forward be som­times periodical and stationary. You are Heaven-sixt: beware of sublunary Divini­ty. Relapses are dangerous: because Na­ture after a sickness is unarm'd, and left un­able to resist their Assaults. You must pass as a beloved Mirrour of Patience, through all the Topicks and Tacticks of Affliction: which like Galilaeus his Glass, brings most remote things near to you.

I am scarce yet recollected. O now for an eye-cataclysme, till I go to the place where this Angel dwels, by water in mine own Tears.

Act 2. Scen. 6.

I present my self now, that I may begin to fall quadrate or into a punctual Cone with my promise. I have brought St. Omers hither; Here you shall see de­cipher'd and shadow'd what was there act­ually and substantially done: We will not miss in an Hebrew Point or Tittle of Truth. I should afterwards translate our Scholar hither from Spain, but I cannot: Time out-runs us. Where our Matter is in­finit, we must circumscribe our selves. How­soever, as in the turning of an Artificial Globe, new shapes and Figures continually appear, so Changes and Varieties encoun­ter you continually. The Poet hath enchar­ged upon us to make hast, or you would see nothing answerable to such a vast Orb of Matter.

The Jesuits here have set me un­der Lock and Key, and curtain'd all the Windows. I have no benefit of Light, but in one corner, where a little Ray peeps in upon a Picture. And the Picture represents the Hollanders as having taken a Ship, wherein were many Jesuits, and thrown [Page 21] them overboard into the Sea: but in vain, for the Jesuits lie all upon the Surface of the water, with their faces looking com­fortably towards Heaven, and cannot sink, but are all sustain'd by Miracle: It is strange that the Jesuits being men so weighty in worth, should now be so light, and not worth their weight either in Gold or ought else. I hear likewise, that they use dark Chambers, and Pictures presenting Homi­cides, to sad and tragical ends: It is whis­per'd by their own Pupils here. This my present Employment they call their exer­cise: And it was impos'd upon me in my entrance, to search my Inwards whether I have a Call to be a Jesuit or no. I do not like these quotidian and ubiquetary Mira­cles; nor this warping of divine things to self-ends. Hypocrisie haunts me still: The Picture, Image, or the Representation in a Looking-glass, that shews a Face less than it is, may happily be like the Face it shews, and symmetrical with it; but the Repre­sentation, Image, or Picture that swels up the Face, and allows it greater, except it be wrough so for the suppliance of what is lost by distance, attempts above it self, is monstr ous, and cannot be like its Arche­type; because Proportion is retain'd in Re­presentations which are lesser than the life, but in such as are greater, the Composition is discompos'd, and the Proportion seat­ter'd.

I wish forsooth all happiness to you: Child, how fare you forsooth in your heavenly Meditations? I have brought you a Relick here of most high considera­tion; a, Feather forsooth of the wing of an Arch-Angel. Look not upon it but with due reverence.

Father forsooth, my Meditations gain and win much upon me: But when I was a Cantabrigian, as having been matricu­lated in that University, my Master taught me that Angels were immaterial and incor­poreal; and that they appear in the shapes of young men, to signifie their strength, virtue, and power, and that they are wing'd in the Picture, to set in view their readi­ness and quickness in their moving from one place to another.

Your Cantabrigians forsooth, are fallen as from Religion, so from Learn­ing. We of the Society are Antistites, At­lantes, & Heroes Literarum, the most learn­ed of all the world.

This is a Feather from a West-In­dian Bird, which the good Father would entitle to Heaven.

And Child forsooth, how stand you affected to our Vocation?

Father, I have a special observance for your Order (I must speak here after this Dialect) but I desire to be more experi­ence-proof, before I determine upon a set­tlement.

Child forsooth, you fear want perhaps, because we are vow'd away to po­verty. We have alwaies a secular Priest at­tending upon us, that purchases Lands for us in his own namé.

And is not this Hypocrisie, which put me upon the wing, and engaged me to flie our of England?

Besides, we of the English So­ciety, have a Ship that trades betwixt Lon­don and Flanders; in the which we conti­nually receive and return the best Goods at the best advantage: and we in these parts, receive ten thousand Pounds in ready coyn every year out of England. You stand upon a broad bottom, if you joyn with us: We are above him that wrote, Ego & Rex me­us; I and my King: Emperours, Kings, [Page 22] Princes, Cardinals, Dukes, Generals of Armies by Land and Sea, fear us, and there­fore court us: We are furnished with se­cret Engines, able with ease to subdue them and their Families: The Pope him­self in the traverse of the Business, is our Vassal: he loves us outwardly above all o­thers, because he inwardly fears us more than he fears all others. If any Cardinal or other person grow into a Favourite, we send from some part of the world, one of our Order that is allied to him, to reside near him in his Orb, and maintain him ours. No Prince in the world feeds fuller and higher than we, if you consider Nature in her ordinary Demands: Be ours Child, and we will hugg thee thus, and thus.

Father, I am yours; though not declaratively, yet affectionately: I humbly desire to remain free a while.

Be it so. You are ours then, in Affection, not in present manifestation, implicitly, not explicitly, as the Schoolmen speak. Forsooth, I set you free. I forsooth, will call a Council of our Fathers, who shall dispose of you ad melius esse, that you may return to us in the Rebound.

Scen. 1.

NOw the many-wir'd Plot works. My Engineers from the School of Vain-Glory, have wild-fir'd all Places. The Souldier shines gloriously in the Field under my Standard: The Law­yer tongue; it nimbly at the Bar in my Cause: The Physitian gains upon dying people, and extorts Moneys and Gifts to foment the Combustion: The Preacher is altogether declamatory and fulminating a­gainst mine and his Enemies. The Courti­er, Citizen, Countreyman nobly maintain their Triangle. My Out-landers have spur­red up the Spirits of neighbouring Nati­ons, from the earth into theayr, where they sly (like the Vulture hovering over the Lion and the wild-Boar in their comba­tings, as hoping to devour the Carcases of both.) In this Tropick of things, I have seated the Provincial of our Society here with his Council, in a Noble House near to London-Wall; whence they dispatch e­very day the most nimble-witted Mem­bers of our Society, into the Conventicles, and Army. When the people are pull'd up by the root from Religion, they must needs fall back upon ours.

Come, come: Are ye fitted in all Points?

We are, Most Reverend Fa­ther.

Thou and thy Maid look as in­nocently as a placid and fair Child pressing the Teat. Let's away.

Act 3. Scen. 2.

Come, Sr. John Wit-little; This is alwaies the merriest day of the week with us; though indeed mirth cannot well at­temper it self to these new-born Troubles: but we hope the storm will not long rage, it is so violent. The Transision in Musick from a Discord to a Concord, is very swee [...]: from a Concord to a Discord, harsh and unpleasant.

My Lord: I could wish you would conclude a final and happy Concord betwixt me and Mrs. Dorothy.

That will never be concluded, Sir John Wit-little.

And pray, why, fair Mrs. Dorothy?

Because you are Sir John Wit-little.

I am sure, there is not only Wit-little, but also little Wit in that An­swer.

Let her be as free as Ayr in her Speeches: you shall have her in the Exit of the Business.

But he shall never hold her.

Mrs. Dorothy, it will be your securest way to take me. I'le be a Papist or Atheist or any thing to please you.

You have not understanding e­nough to be a Papist, nor sufficient Wit to be an Atheist.

I have understanding enough, to adore you as my Saint, wit enough to worship you as my Image.

Fie, fie, Sr. John; You are pro­phane.

I will not be prophane to please you: and to please you, I will be prophane again; if you please, that I will.

Sr. John, Let her abound in her own sense.

Sense! I am almost in a mind, she's deprived of all her Senses, that can­not see, nor hear, nor smell, nor tast nor touch enough in me to make her love me: Madam, Speak punctually, and to the Needle's point, Will you have me?

I shall then speak sharply: No.

Why then, I'le marry thy Wir.

Sr. John, you must first find another Wit to match it.

Must I, whether I can or no?

Wher's this Noble Lord, whose nature so perfectly consorts with his name? and who is so large-handed and boundless in his Entertainments, the Lord Libe­ral?

Sir, I am the Master of this Place.

In a good and auspicious hour you speak it: My Lord, we understood, that this was your weekly day of Jollity, and I was bold to bring my wife in my hand with me; that we might [...]ive up the rich experience of your Noble Entertain­ment.

Ye are welcom. This can be no Priest or Jesuit, he has a Wife. We stand out of the Gun-shot of danger. Sir, our Manner and Oeconomy is, first to dance, and then to banquet. We excuse no Gen­tile Person that enters.

My Lord, I run all honourable hazards among Friends.

Madam, This is a good man, as they are call'd, a Priest, and Father of the Society: now time, and opportunity invite you to Confession.

[Page 24]

But I want the coveniency of pri­vacy.

Madam, you may do it in the Dance: It hath been practised by the Learned Society, in case of Necessity.

I thank you: I shall not fail to im­brace the present occasion.

Come, Gentlemen, and Ladies, sort your selves.

This is a Child worth Gold: Her hand was double-pav'd with twenty Shilling Pieces: This Golden Girl must not be neglected: Give her notice, that I will visit her often: the manner thus.

Friends, and Strangers, the Banquet attends you within.

Act 3. Scen. 3.

Sir, a Pursevant having received Information that you are a Jesuit, pursues you neat at hand: You are visible, though I am not.

Inspire me, thou quodlibetical Spirit of our Society:

Sir: You must be as quick as Lightning: he is very near: I almost see his shadow.

What shop is that?

A Coblers: they call him the singing Cobler: and most commonly his Songs inveigh against the Papists.

Friend, Ther's an Angel for thee, lend me thy Apron, Cap, and Tools; and stand thou aside a little: I am in dan­ger to be arrested.

Alas poor Gentleman!

They are.

Friend, Happiness attend you.

Many Thanks to your Worship: What pity 'tis, so proper a Gentleman should be arrested?

Act 3. Scen. 4.

Gentlemen, I have now cited Rome hither, the seven Hils and all: when you have seen our Scholar there; my helm will be needless; he will presently do his own Arrint, and himself return to you. Ob­serve him with a near eye; because the place is esteem'd as Caput Orbis, the Head of the world.

Child, forsooth, Approach not too near; that Image works Miracles: It hath cured the lame and the blind, indeed all kinds of Infirmities: and which is most miraculous, it hath spoken like one of us.

Father Tompson, This puts my Belief upon the Rack: And I will ingenu­ously give you my Reason; because the de­vil spake first in the old heathenish Images, and this is fac't like an apish Imitation of the Devil.

Pray forsooth, Child, doubt not: you must believe it.

It stands out of the Zodiack of Reason, out of the Horizon of Science.

Forsooth, so do all Miracles: If you were not Aristotle Junior, and a Philo­sophical Pygmie, but the Aristotle and a Giant amongst Philosophers, you must im­moveably believe what we reach you. This Backwardness attests to a Dyscrasie in your Soul, a Peacokness in your heart; we may not pride it, especially in matters concer­ning our adhesion to Religion. Aristotles Image in the Vatican, is more obedient than you.

But less intelligent. Father Tom­pson, I put upon me the name of Aristotle Junior, only to plain it, that I was a young Aristotelian in the University of Cambridge, and opposite to the Ramists.

I see forsooth, that you have Pa­roxysmes still with reference to the old He­retick [Page 26] in you; We of the Society, in whom Learning and Industry, as necessary search­ers into the Languages Oriental and Oc­cidental, the Heptarchy of Liberal Sciences, Arts, and all the rich Armories, Closets, and Cabinets of Knowledge, are met and married, believe it. And I desire, that your heart be fidus Achates, a faithful Acha­tes to the Cause you have undertaken.

And I desire, that solid Truth re­main implanted in me. Truly, Father, it was reported in England by our Miracle­mongers there, that all the Pictures in a Priests Chamber, the night before he was taken, sweat; and it made me sweat ever after when I thought on't.

Child forsooth, I fear that you will miscarry hereafter: The Sieve put into the water, is full: Remove the Sieve out of the water, and the water is out of the Sieve. I know not, with what heart you have come amongst us. The Abyssin or Aethiopian goes into the Bath black, and black returns out of it.

Father, I did not take up this Re­ligion, as those who were born of Parents steering this way; and agreeably educated; who therefore suck so strongly, that they draw bloud in place of Milk, and promiscu­ously swallow all, because their Friends were all of the same Feather. I embraced it upon a pious and vertuous account. I may as well bring the Arctick and the An­tartick, the two Poles of the world together, as enforce my heart to close with impudent Falshood, with fallacy that is pellucid and transparent. You may drop this, if you please, into your own heart like Arabian Gumme, and let it congeal and stick there, that your Soul may be there entoom'd, as the Fly or Spider in the Gumme or Am­ber. My heart will not receive it: May that be alwaies deep-inlaid and enamel'd with known truth: I'le tell you, Father; I saw an Image the other day, that was re­mov'd with a Procession, to a better lodg­ing, because it wrought infinite Miracles; and the Image was all over most miserably worm-eaten. Me thinks the Power, if it be a good one, that works these wnoders with reflection upon the Image, should also pre­serve the miraculous Image from Rotten­ness, and from the Common people of Creepers the worms. I speak the Dictats of an unbyassed heart; pray interpret all according to the Algebra of Candout.

Chrissime fili mi, Crede.

It speaks: A Miracle, a Miracle, in a fit time, in its proper season.

Dear Father, what said it?

Chrissime fili mi, Crede: my most dear Child, believe: You believe now, I hope. O, I am rapt, I am in a Trance.

The good old Father is transport­ed in earnest, or he deeply dissembles. Whosoever thou art, if thou wilt gain me, speak my Language: He cannot. This I­mage is back-fastned to the Wall: I have read of private doors in the old Paganish Images.

It is hollow. Who's with­in there? The Tongue within, cannot speak English; and perhaps no more La­tine. Still I am Pearl-and-Coral seeking in the bottom of the Ser.

A Cunning Youth! What a pre­cious Father of the Society would this man make? I will hereafter deal more candidly with him.

O Father, I am abundantly sa­tisfied.

I am abundantly glad of it, my most dear Child; that's your Name now: We consume our selves like Candles, in our giving light unto others.

Father, what man is this that so strangely varies and multiplies his faces, and Postures?

It is, my most dear Child, a man possess't with a Devil: The virtue of the Image works this extravagant effect upon him. But I shall be plain with you: I have somthing within me; it burns and moves like Thunder in my Breast, and I cannot hold it from you, except I should cry fire. These dirty people that receive Alms un­der the name of people possessed with De­vils, are most exact Counterfeits: if they were truly possess't, they would speak all Languages: The Devil is a prime Master of Languages: He is no Alien from any kind of natural Knowledge. The permissi­on of these, and the like, are piae fraudes, pious and holy Cousenages; Thus Images and Reliques are worshipped with a more large measure both of inward and outward Worship. We have here in the Market, Relique-sellers; and they are continually in fee with such a man as this, who by his Mimical, Antick, and Tragical Gestures, reconciles those vendible Reliques with the Belief of the People, before whom they are exposed to sale. A thing being set like a Pillar, supposed like a Mathematical Principle or Postulate, and granted as un­deniably true, we may defend and uphold it by all kind of means.

But, Father, this is not ut Scholastici loquuntur, as the Schoolmen speak, who alwaies prescribe, that we should pro­portion the Means to the End, and that Bonum ex integrâ causâ, Good is from an entire Cause, sejoyn'd from all admixtion of evil.

My most dear Child: The Books of the ancient Schoolmen are crowded with polygeneous, impertinent and imper­vious Doctrines of no worth or weight, not one Grain heavy, as being meer ebulliti­ons of over-wrought, and Feaver-tired Brains: from the which our modern Divi­nity is separated by an Ecliptick, as being transacted in Regulam Plumbeam or Lesbi­am, a Leaden Rule; and bow'd appliably to all our purposes: This Rule then ob­tains, when the Judge bends the Law to the Cause, and not the Cause to the Law: The things we believe and do, are infalli­bly true and good: and the Law must be bended to them by a pliable Interpreta­tion.

This Divinity is not divine.

My most dear Child: The posses't man expects an Alms: Give him one.

Notwithstanding all his various and indefinite Motions, his right hand bal­lanc'd with an Almes, finds the way readi­ly to his Pocket. How comes it that he foames at the mouth so liberally?

That Legerdemain is advanc't from the Apothecaries Shop: And use hath apted his Face, Eyes and Mouth to these horrid Representations. He roars only, when the holy thing is near, or set in view; and then he expects to be loaded with Alms.

Having all he can expect, he is gone. My most dear Child: You have seen Mrs. Ward and her Jesuitrices, as tender-headed peo­ple call them.

I have Father. We were six Schol­lars of us; and they set us at a round Ta­ble, so placed, that we sate a Scholar and a Maid, a Scholar and a Maid: and which way soever we turn'd our faces, to the right, or to the left, we had a pretty Maid, a Quicksilver-tongu'd Girl to face us. They told: us in the Crowd of other things, that they wrought Miracles in Ger­many, [Page 28] a great way off.

Maids do you call them? They were English Chambermaids indeed. And the Miracles they wrought in Germany, were, Three or four of them were there got with child, and afterwards, they miracu­lously became Maids again. But there is a Bull in agitation, to come forth with a roa­ring and raging noise, in opposition to Mrs. Ward and her licentious Crew, against which there is no Ward nor Guard. My most dear Child, I am forsooth, very desi­rous, that because you are upon your Missi­on for England, you should see Father John Barnes, a Learned Englishman, and a Bene­dictine Monk, sent to Rome, and committed to the Inquisition here, by his own Order and Countreymen. This place belongs to the Inquisition: I will presently speak with the Fathers of the Inquisition, and give you a call from yonder Window.

The Sun in Egypt after the Inun­dation of Nile, heating the Mud, quarter­makes, & half-makes, and when it perfect­ly makes, makes but imperfect Creatures, as Frogs, Serpents, and such like. I have read in my Name-sake, every man by na­ture desires to know: This muddy forging of Miracles will never promote a desiring heart to perfect Knowledge. The Natura­lists have found by curious Inquisition, that if a Pearl which is foul, be swallowed into the womb of a Dove, and remain there some while; the Dove will give it again most pure and orient: Every thing must be tried and examin'd, according to my Les­son treasur'd up from the School of Devo­tion, in the womb of devout Simplicity, which womb will free it from spots, clouds, deformity. Yet I find that in all these er­roneous deviations, there is some colour or semblance of Truth, or somthing like an Asteriske, or finger pointing to past truths. Thus did the Devils Oracles deliver many sound Truths, the better, under such palli­ations, to disseminate and publish their most unsound Errours: Thus doth a stink offend us more, when concomitant with some weak Perfume which it hath pro vehi­culo, than if it singly sets upon us; the per­fume procuring for the stink, easier admit­tance into our sense: Thus Poysons are most dangerous and irremediable, when joyned in commission with a Cordial that is not able to resist them; it serving to con­duct them to the heart, and being unable to vanquish their malignity: Thus the old Fowlers deceived Pigeons by shewing an exoculated Pigeon leaping and dancing in a Net.

St. From the other

Window I call'd him: but this is the window from whence we must be Spectators. It is the Ring-dove that builds her Nest early, and unplumes her skin to soften it with her own Feathers, when oftentimes her self dies of cold. I would endanger my life to write this man ours. The turning Pictures shew oftentimes a Lion on the one side, and a Lamb on the other: I have great hopes, that he carries a Lamb inwardly. Love and hatred are like the two ends of a Perspective-Glass, the one multiplies, the other makes less: I would gladly settle him in a Mean betwixt both.

My most dear Child, I have procur'd a Convenience from the good Fathers here: and we shall see more than ordinary.

The better to discern the Ar­teries and the Vital Spirits in them, Vesali­us the Anatomist was wont to cut up men alive: in these they observe the beating of the Pulse. My torturers are more cruel: they search me through and through every day, and yet, I live to see my self out-live my self.

Father, I hear him, but, I see him not: Darkness interposes it self; the place is as dark as Hell.

You shall see him presently.

Some hold that the soul is extraduce; and that one man begets ano­ther, Body and Soul; and that the Soul is enlightned from the Father, as a Candle from a Candle; otherwise, say they, a man begets but half a man, and stands many stairs lower than a Beast, that begets the whole Beast; and that the three Faculties of the Soul should be infus'd in man, whereof the two inferiour are begot in Beasts, seems not to be a well-cemented Truth.

He talkes idly.

They have design'd him for mad­ness; because he was Master of a dange­rous Head-piece.

O Barnes, Barnes, The torments that I feel, are most unsufferable: and out­strip, out-run, out-fly humane Apprehensi­on. Thou wilt quickly be in the same Cir­cle of Condition with me.

Who art thou?

A Damned Spirit; who when I was a Passenger in the world, was affected as thou art, and affianced to the Religion of wicked and abominable England. I was commanded to tell thee, that two deaths stand gaping for thee with open jawes in thy way; and it is recorded in the black and fatal Volume of Destiny, that both shall swallow thee: The Funeral fire shall resolve thy Body into ashes; and thy soul widdow'd of understanding, shall everlast­ingly be bedded with me in Hell. Hogs and Dogs, Cats and Rats are more happy than thou and I. I must not stay longer, for fear of discovery. I go: my Tormentor cals.

All things fall out perpendicu­larly to my fears. I shall be burnt here at Rome: and I shall be damn'd hereafter in Hell: These two, like malevolous and malignant Planets, are in conjunction: I have oculos pumiceos, eyes of Pumice-stone: I cannot weep. These desperate Tormen­tors have sunk me into desperation: O!

The wise Alchymist, in the whole progress of his Art, extracts things purer and purer from grosser things.

Act 3. Scen. 5.

My Lord, the Gentleman's Wife that yesterday was your Guest, pro­mist me the sight of a Quaker this day: I have a great mind to see a Quaker. Their outward appearance is highly com­mended.

Sr. John: Toads and Serpents have been found in the midst and heart of the fairest-colour'd Stone or Marble being hollow. I love to be like the Pearl, which is united in it self, and called Ʋnio. If I should put my heart upon the Wheel, to run round, the sequel would be dangerous, [Page 30] and perhaps like the famous, or infamous rather, motion of the Wheel, which was first set on going, and then carried about and about, round and round, with Bags of Sand tyde to the Wheel, and falling still as the wheel mov'd more and more forcibly, until the violent motion kindled fire in it, and burnt it out of all Motion, but what the sporting wind bestowed upon the cold ashes.

Madam: You are welcome to my Father-in-Law's house: by that name I commonly stile him: I see you stand close to your word.

Else I were not enstated in that Honesty which I pretend to.

Is this your Quaker?

Yes, Sr. John: This is the Mufty and Head of the Sect.

My Lord, pray speak to him: I am not wife enough.

Friend: What is your Judg­ment concerning Religion!

Thou man, who gave thee Au­thority, thus to question me, thy Fellow-Creature? I am free, and unquestionable in the matter of Religion.

Quaker, You should uncover your head: This is a Lord.

Man, thou art deceiv'd: I will not put off my Hat, though he be a Lord: He is but a man as I am, and my Fellow by Birth.

What is your Profession?

I am a poor ingerant Coun­treyman, a Cobler by Trade, that profess the knowledge of Truth in a larger size, than ordinary.

How attain'd you to this Know­ledge of so large a Circumference, if you be ignorant of Learning?

By Inspiration.

My Lord, he is inspirited of en­times, and speaks beyond a man.

The Comet is perfectly circular, except where it blazes: yet wants the Perfection and perfect Influence of a star: though because it is neerer, it seems fairer: Besides, it is an Upstare, and risen out of gross Matter. Our Quaker blazes only in the business of Religion.

Now his Fit enters upon him. Maid, give him a Chair.

This is fine sport.

The Ague shakes him.

He returns to himself.

The Nightingale growing fat, cannot sing: I have long fasted. Accord­ing to the multitude of Operations (be they of the same or a different nature) in which the Soul doth busie her self, she per­formeth each particular Operation with less obsequiousness and ability, and there­fore less perfectly. Because the Soul being finite and limited, her active virtue is also limited and finite; and so fitting and ap­plying her activity to divers operations, she gives the cause that each participateth a less portion thereof. It is not within the Sphere of humane power, that one should at the same very time, observingly contem­plate the Feature of a mans face, beheld with his eyes, and judiciously bend his Thoughts to the curious and bewitching Strains of Musick intruding upon his Ears; nor in the same instant attentively discern the Differences and several Garbs of Co­lour and Figure. Had I a hundred Under­standings, and as many Tongues, I have Matter wherewith to lade and load them. Man, there is yet Terra Incognita, a Land unknown to thee, with respect unto know­ledge and Religion. The truly knowing [Page 31] people, wheresoever they are, are infalli­ble. He that thinks such a People can fall, fears the ruine of the Firmament, and is more than somwhat like him, who-being Galens Patient, and very sick, told him de­manding in the morning how he did; that he had been restless and without sleep all the nigh [...]; heaving himself from side to side, and heavily groaning; and had been grievously troubled in seriously thinking, what should become of him (sick man) if Atlas, weary now at last, should steal away his out-worn shoulder, and Heaven, with all the Larks in the Ayr, fall upon him ly­ing weak in his Bed. Without Infallibility, there is no certainty, no security. And what are all Professors, compar'd to us? They are deckt like heathenish Indians, with fine Feathers; filch't from Birds, that when they were alive, flew near Heaven; while these, because their feathers are ascititious, cannot fly, can scarcely creep. If they raise an old Truth, like the shape of a fair plant or flower in a Glass, they suddenly draw the flame or Candle away, and let it fall to dull Ashes again. Other men are petty Chapmen, and Pedlers of Divinity: Man, if thou wilt know, know that I am the knowing man: And man, thou maiest know it by this: of a simple and ignorant man, I am suddenly exalted above my self by Rapture. Persons ill-affected in their eyes, many times see two things, when but one presents it self: every man in their seeing, hath two heads, four eyes, two Mouths, two Bodies, four hands, as many feet; and is twice himself, and a double man. Man, thou maiest think me double and deceitful, but the fault is in thy Eyes, not in me.

Now he goes back to the simple man he was.

This begets wonder. But he that is red through blushing, cannot be said to have a red face: He that is pale through fear, cannot be said to have a pale Countenance. As one good or evil Act ren­ders not a man morally and throughly good or evil: we being truly nam'd good or evil, just or unjust, from the Habits and the multiplication of Acts issuing from them: so a Fit of Knowledge, fits not a man for the Name of a knowing man.

O Sweet-heart, Had you been here, you had seen a Quaker in his Fit: He quakes and shakes like the Leaves of a tree in a fresh wind.

Such sights are not pleasant to me, Sr. John Little-Wit.

My Lord, she speaks with the Quaker.

It matters not: I had rather she were a Quaker than a Papist. Tender In­fants are most subject to fascination; she has Age.

Madam, Your Portion being in your own hands; bagg it; and I will find waies to fetch it: Afterwards, I shall con­vey you to a Nunnery.

You will make me happy.

Come, loving Guests, receive the Civility of the House.

Madam: You have sign'd us yours by this Favour: How does your hus­band?

Well, I hope, Sr. John.

Come Quaker, go with us.

Man, I follow thee.

Act 3. Scen. 6.

I was directed hither by a Friend belonging to the House, to see a Jesuit in his Habit, who will presently pass this [Page 32] way. I am an Exerciser amongst the Bre­thren of the Separation: My Name is A­bram Ninny: and it would be a consolati­on to me, to know by sight of the eye, what manner of man a Jesuit is, and how he goes orderly drest in private.

This is not he.

I am newly return'd from Rome by Sea to London; and I would fain see the Father that sent me over, and debate the business with him, because it answer'd not in all Angles to my Expectation. This is the Jesuits House in the Savoy, that se­cretly beats the name of their Founder. One thing more, lies gnawing at my heart: I find a strange fall of the Leaf in my own Countrey: Every man has moulded a new Religion to himself. I have a Vision: I am haunted with Visions, being newly come from Rome: Me thinks, this House is like a Theater, and throng'd with people. Gentlemen: I'le open to you a Secret, lock'd up in the close Cabinet of my Thoughts. But, I pray, keep it as a Secret, and tell it not abroad: neither let it pass into the cold ayr: We experimentally find in the world, that Princes have their Jayle; for Offenders, and their Bedlams for mad people: And I know, that—I dare better shew towards him with my hand, than name him here, is the greatest of Princes; and that Hell is his Jayle. And in good sooth I never heard or read of sto­ried forth, never beheld a place, which can now more appliably be call'd his Bedlam than England. But ye will say, How so? England a Bedlam? the great Bedlam of the world? Are all the people of England mad? Soft and fair. I Answer: No. For in a Bedlam-house, the mad people have their sober Keepers, their wise Physitians, their civil Waiters and Servants; and al­so those, whose Office it is to whip them, and thereby to awake and recal their senses; and one of the last, I hope I shall be. Thet's the Secret.

O I am rob'd, I am rob'd; I had a Purse of Gold given me this morning by a Noble woman-penitent, which she stole from her Husband; and another he-peni­tent coming afterwards, has pickt my pock­et and rob'd me of it; O Villain, Miscre­ant, Caitiffe! According to Learned Fa­ther Escobar, he is damn'd already. The Rogue came to Confession to me, kneel'd humbly at my feet, confessed with a sad voyce, an humble mouth, sigh'd, sob'd, groan'd, shak'd his head, look'd like a Car­case, and with a face equally divided and shar'd betwixt sorrow and care: he cried too; the vile Knave wept, as I thought, heartily; the tears ran hastily down his Cheeks, as if there were a modest conten­tion, or striving betwixt his Cheeks, which should▪ deliver his tears soonest to his bosom: he kept his Right and righ­teous hand acting & tabering at his heart, while with his other hand, his unrighteous hand, left-handed Rascal, he pick'd my Pocket, and got away my Purse, my Purse of Gold, containing as much pure Gold, as being well husbanded by our secular Procu­rator, would have given our Body here a full and copious Dinner every Thursday at our Garden-house of Recreation, I mean, every one six Dishes, whereof one should have been a fat plump Partridge, or som­thing, as the Logicians speak, equipollent, to the worlds end. The Curse of our Gene­ral, and of all our Sociey be upon him: The Curse and the Firebrand thrown down [Page 33] from the top of the Great Church at Rome, follow him.

Father, Father, this Passion does not become you, sits not well upon your forehead.

Are not you the Thief? you are like him.

Look upon me well, good Father, and with unpassion'd eyes.

O my good Child, are you come again? Forsooth, I am glad to see you. How relish you the good things in forreign Parts?

Father, tanquam in tabellâ, in brief. First, you sent your Letter of com­mendations by me, and it had certain pri­vate Marks in the bottom, according to your private Book of Rules, Politick rules, printed at Rome, and no where else, which I have now seen; and this was to signifie to the Jesuits, that if I refused to be a mem­ber of your Society, they might use me ad libitum, at their pleasure. Secondly, You sent Letters every Moneth to the English Colledges at S. Omers, at Valladolid in Spain, and at Rome where I was, to be read in the hearing of all the Scholars; and these Letters recounted wondrous things as done in England, disgraceful to the English, though conducing to the confirmation of the Scholars in their Judgments, which things were neither done, nor feasible. The Business of Garnets Straw was meet Forge­ry; the Painter afterwards discover'd his own Folly, and yours; and your different Pictures of the Straw (I have seen them) gave evidence against you. Fox, the Au­thour of the famous Martyrology, never be­liev'd his Head was an Urinal. The Learn­ed Church-man of England, did not die a Papist. I could exasperate your ears with a thousand of these. Thirdly, I never yet saw a Jesuit or other Priest, of whom I could honestly say, this is a just man, his Heart and his Tongue concur, Truth and his Tongue are Unison: They are Mounte­banks in Religion, and have Spawns of De­ceit and Equivocation in their Mouths: they religiously keep Matchavels Rule; Bespatter thy Adversary with all sorts of Dirt and filth, aliquid for sit àn adhaerebit; it is likely that somwhat of it will stick close to him. Fourthly,—

This is the Jesuit, in the Habit of his Order: a very passionate man: And now I look better upon him, this man ex­ercis'd in our Chair the other day, habited as I am. Jesuit, I defie thee.

Who are you?

A Brother of the Separation. I de­fie thee, Jesuit.

How came you hither?

Upon my Legs. Jesuit, I defie thee. Thou art an Impostor, a Deluder: thou hast polluted and contaminated our Chair, and I will burn it. I defie thee, Jesuit.

Cnipperdoling, vanish. Thee I defie.

Romes Janizary, I defie thee.

Gentlemen, I defie you both. But you two are not so tender-hoof'd, but you may stable closer together, if you please. You both know, or have reason to know, that I know you both. Come, come, stand as far off as you can one from the other: Ile bring you together, I warrant you. Jesuit, and Brother of the Separation: First, Are [Page 34] ye not both wild-fire-heated, and con­temners of Government, if heteroclite from your Designes? This cannot be de­nied: the meridian Sun is not more visible. Come both a little nearer, for this first rea­son. Again, you brother of the Separation, have not you kicked against lawfull Go­vernment, instigated by the Grounds and Reasons of the Jesuits, their Schoolmen, Controvertists, Casuists; have you not co­pied your Motives and Arguments out of their Champions? do not I know you have? Neerer now on each side. Yet again. Do you not both in all Nations, where there is an overswaying and prevalent party, conso­ciate, side, vote, and dance in the same Fairy Ring, against the party authorized by the swaying Power? Ye do, ye do: Nearer, nearer yet. I have brought you to half-way Tree on both sides. Still on. Vox populi, the voice of the people who best know you, as with an irresistible charm will bring you neerer on both quarters. Are not you nam'd the Puritanical Jesuit, and you the Jesuitical Puritan? Neerer again. I follow the chase. Are ye not both so fevere and rigid in your Directions, Instructions, Counsils, as if ye were both Enthusiasm'd with a singular spirit above all others? Now ye are within the stretch of arms. Do ye not both with the same quibble of cunning insinuate into houses by mens wives, and there Lord it over their Husbands and the whole Family? I must not exceed my por­tion of time, and speak from the Center beyond the Periphery. Now come close together, joyn hands, imbrace according to the Jesuitical Hugg. Why now ye are friends. O let poor deluded England, be now asham'd of what is past, be provident and circumspect for hereafter. All was Je­suitical: the Jesuit as the evil Genius, was the true and only Malignant: In all the combination and complication of the ma­ny-headed Factions, he had access by him self or his Agents to the chief Actours while he blew the coles, with Julian, at the Devil's Altar. And now ye are coupled Ile tell you a Story; it hath, Janus-like, two faces, as looking Romeward and hi­therward. Rome was with Child, and she brought forth her eldest Son, the Bene­dictine; to him as the Heir she gave her Lands: She remain'd free a while; at length was with child again, and brought into the light two children, the Dominican and the Franciscan; to the first, having given away her Lands, she gave certain Houses and monies in a Pensionary man­ner; to the other, having nothing left, the Wallet, and set him out of doors a beging. She stood clear again, till at last she was mountain-big with child; She long'd, she groan'd, she drew her breath short, she made store of outlandish faces: In the conclusion she gave into the world a lusty Boy, who being newly born utter'd from behind the Midwifes lapfull, a sign of good luck; this was the Jesuit: His Mother ha­ving given away Lands, Houses, Wallet, took him up, gave him a smart clap on the right buttock, and said, My dearling, shift for thy self; and he did so most accurately. Turn the story hither: Our Mother here was with child, and with child, again, and again. I so much honour the first-born chil­dren, that I shall not name them in this Comical Air; the Presbyterian himself shall pass by me, without a glance upon him: questionless he means well, though he deserves not this Elogy from me, yet I am so sick of the Jesuit and Monk, that I must praise him. But Brother of the Sepa­ration, you were the last-born, have run with the Torrent, and shifted for your self, to rejoyce over the Creaturē; and therein you and the Jesuit are uniform. This is all, I take my leave.

[Page 35]

And I likewise. Farewell Bro­ther.

Brother, Farewell. I must pro­ceed to a new leven. The name of Jesuit is now grown ragged, rugged, odious. His murders, equivocations, coosenages, and the like, are over-palpable. I must translate my Crown, Empire, and Per­son to an Order, having more of pious outside. Let me see: there 'tis: the blessed Benedictine is the man: he that in publick looks not beyond the length of his grave. His antiquity, and the opi­nion of the people will assist me.

Scene I.

YOur Scholar and ours has put to Sea again for France, Mr. Hugh the Comedian-Preacher, came from his Master Fieri-facias to him with such a hanging message, that it discompos'd and tempested his thoughts, put him in­to a shaking fit: and not without right reason: for one of his Coat and Consti­tution was left shorter by the head the o­ther day. He has desir'd of me to render him once again to you from Paris; and I shall do it Presto. But I promist him to present you first with a Dance of Spanish Clowns, as he has seen them Dance in the Church, by Order from the Inquisition, and as the manner is, upon the most festi­val Dayes, in the Spanish-Churches, be­fore the highest Altar: this passing with them for a part of devout Worship, and a most excellent work of Devotion. They come: judg you.

Act 4. Scene 2.

This Bell calls us to Coun­sil. Come Father Robert: but where's F. Prior?

He comes.

Reverend Father Prior, having lodg'd this Meteor of a man in the Bastille, we must secure him there by plausible rea­sons dispers'd amongst the people.

Yes, Father Prior, our soundest and profoundest way of proceeding will be, to give amongst the people, that he is an Intelligencer and Spy from the Re­bels in England, and that there has been a continual intercourse of Letters betwixt them and him.

But Fathers, I have heard from persons of untainted reputation that he has been seven times Imprison'd, and twice Plunder'd to the last farthing, in the defence and favour of the Royal Party.

It slenders not our cause. The [Page 36] business is agitated here, whither such a report can not easily reach; I have other­wise posses't and fill'd the Chancellor; and ordain'd by his Order and Sanction, that besides his being Dungeon'd, he shall be punish'd beyond humane sufferance; for, as the honest English Taylor holily and cross-legg'd saies: he deserves to be stab'd or have his throat cut.

Reverend F. Prior, you have Ca­pitulum lepidissimum, a notable head-piece; and you look so like a carcass, and with such a mortified countenance, so like the ghost of Godlinesse, that whatsoe­ver you countenance, will pass for pure and holy. Licence me to speak a free word: you remember, that a Noble Frenchman said to you, Had he but your face in the forefront of his head, he should be able to cozen the whole world.

Verily, I was made for my Pri­orship: I am call'd to it, and my parts are consonant and agreeable. I look like an Anatomy, I speak humbly and with a dy­ing man's voice, like a Saint, and I do like my self. I declare to you, Fathers, I love not the Prisoner, because my Bro­ther the Franciscan conspir'd with him in England, professing, that had he been enabled with his parts, he would have turn'd heretick as he did.

Fathers, I am your Definitor: let me define for you. We will out-wait this hard Winter. If there be not a settle­ment in England before the Summer visit us, we will send him to the Inquisition at Rome, and there burn him alive to vile ashes.

Father Bennet Nelson, you speak like an Orthodox Brother, rightly de­scended from Bishop Bonner. I will pro­cure in England sufficient provision of Monies from the Catholicks there for this godly purpose, who will gladly contri­bute to such a meritorious work. He is our deadly enemy: he has wrought a­gainst us mischiefs without president, be­yond example, above parallel. He wrote a Book in England, and entitled it, The Serpent and the Dragon, or, The Jesuit and the Monk, or, Profession and Pra­ctice: the Jesuite was but the Serpent, and the Monk was the Dragon. Now the Author is both Serpent and Dragon, and deserves to be burnt beyond ashes if it were possible. Plangenti nemo condolet Draconi: No man condoles with a mourn­ing Dragon. And before this Book he set his Picture, fetching the Devil out of a Monk in the form of a Pig: Hog as he was.

I receiv'd a Letter from St. Mal­loes, signifying, that he with certain En­glish Merchants visited our Fathers there, every one bringing his Bottle of Wine, otherwise, as our Fathers there innocent­ly call it, of Crimson; and our holy Fa­thers there drank so fully, plentifully and rejoycingly of it, that they told him in the extasie of their joy, he did in very deed deserve to be Canonized by his Ho­liness for his charity towards them; and yet, both he and the Merchants reported, the good men were drunk, crimson­fac'd, and drunk with crimson: a very plot.

Truly, Father, there was a no­ble Personage from England here in Paris, that numbred this Varlet amongst his Friends, he call'd him his Chaplain; and one Winter night, they congeal'd into company with a good Father here in Town: he had an imperfection, that he would be drunk every day: in fine, he was overtaken with drink that night, and slept in a chair: and presently they sent for a great Glass of Oyle, (sit down here [Page 37] Father Robert, and I will shew the man­ner,) and powred it upon the bare, bald, and holyest part of his head, saying, O Priest, we annoint thee King of drun­kards; and leave thee drunk with Wine and drown'd in Oyle.

Father Prior, and Father Nelson: I did but kiss a Woman in the Old-Baily at London, and do a little something more to her; and as you shall believe me to be a true child of the Church, I had but one child by her, a dainty Boy, and as like my self, as if I had spat him out of my mouth; and this vile fellow set it going upon wheels through City and Coun­trey.

He is a most pernicious man.

Fathers, this our Convent of Paris excepted, (and he has been in Paris many times, and once resided here four years together,) he has liv'd in all our Monasteries through the whole Chri­stian world: he liv'd in our Abby at Lambspring in Germany, in our Mona­steries at Doway in Artois, at Dulewart in Lorain, at St. Malloes in Britanny: he knows all our secrets, and all the se­cret conveyances betwixt the Rebels and us, and has heard from us uncomely words lackying thereunto. None of our Fathers in their Monasteries would re­ceive him into the Habit, lest he should know more of our inside, and bemire us further: Father Cressy whisper'd to him in his ear, that he was sick of all our Mona­steries, and he presently talk't it abroad. He fancies to himself a perfection accor­ding to the Primitive Model; and he de­sires and seeks according to this his Plato­nical Idea. F. Prior: It is the setled do­ctrine of the Jesuites, That he who threa­tens or intends to publish the secrets of a Religious-House may be lawfully kil'd. Now there is a two-fold manner of kil­ling: we may kill directly as the Jesuites do, (which is too publick, incurres too much upon the senses,) or indirectly as we. Let those sufferances be multiplied upon him in the Bastille, that no ordina­ry man can endure without death, (which is a kind of indirect killing:) If his body be of heart-oake, and he scapes this, to the fire and fagot with him at Rome.

Fathers, I approve and sanctifie your counsel. Here let us center: The cause is good, the end excellent: the affair must and shall prosper.

One word in the by. We have money of his which hath remained dor­mant in our hands these two years: but he must not have it, lest it should serve to manage him into England, if he should break Prison. And whereas he is upon our account unraveld three hundred pounds and upwards, besides all sorts of cloathes and other goods which he gave us, and of which we have milkt and gel­ded him, hereticks would say, defrau­ded him; now the matter moves upon an­other hinge. O the brave Goose-pies that we begg'd him out of.

My brain is in labour. Perhaps I shall bring forth another way, a way more compendiary, to shorten his life in the Bastille. He is there the most part of his time in pitchy darkness: a Spider in his salt, and there entoomb'd in her own venome, would be thought to de­stroy him casually; and then we may ex­alt Providence.

Fathers, It will not be cross to our design, if we likewise inform the Chancellour that he is a Monk: The Chancellour knows a Monk should not abide out of his Monastery: This will fortifie and confirm the Chancellour in his honourable act of imprisoning him. For set aside his Priapisme, the Chancel­our [Page 38] carries the face of a conscience.

It would not be amiss.

Thus then. We have decreed, and the plot is modeliz'd, let us proceed to performance, and go on upon this Helix, wider and wider.

O Father, you have dignum ca­put cui posterit as devoveat capitolium, an­serinâ operâ praeservandum, a reverend head, to the which posterity may worthi­ly devote a Capitol, to be preserv'd after­wards by Geese.

F. Robert, you are alwayes merry. Come let us go, and hammer the iron while it is incorporated with fire.

Act 4. Scene 3.

O Torment! The pangs of Death cannot be more grievous: and my pangs are notoriously more grievous to me than the pangs of Death, because mine are continual. The whole Fabrick of my body is so stifned and benum'd with cold, so bruis'd and sor'd with the hard­nesse of the rocky ground, that I cannot use a limb without excessive pain, and shaking of the whole frame. They have detain'd me here in the Bastille the space of fifteen Weeks, without Bed, Cover­ing, Cap, Wastcoate, Shirt, or other Linnen, (the French, my Executioners, rob'd me of all,) without Chair, Stoole, Table, Fire, Candle, Water, Knife, Spoone; without any succour for the ne­cessities of nature, further than the floor of this close and dark Dungeon or Cave where I lye: and by a little peeping-hole I have discover'd a Sentinel continually standing with his Musket, to receive me, if I should appear in the least part of me. Dare these blessed-nam'd Benedictines e­ver professe, that they are flesh and blood? the wild Indian man-eaters are not more barbarous; nor the bruite beasts of the wildernesse more savage. Can it now be denyed from the conse­quents of this cruelty, that their lives in their Monasteries are absolutely disso­lute, when they endeavour by such un­hew'd and Scythian means to forestall the discovery of them. It is likely they will pull to themselves in the covering of their nakednesse other pretences, that as Ti­berius the Emperor abused the vestals, they may first render me dishonourable, and then miserable: But here, two things obtain no small surplussage of confirma­tion; two things which walk it and stalk it as open truths in England, though con­tradiction be much obstreperous: The first, The people of this Gang, this sharp­pointed fang, are most horribly Cruel: The second, Rome cannot stand without the prop of a Lye. I never hammered a­ny thing against them, but Truth: a Goldsmith is a Smith, but a Gold-smith. I wonder not now, that they are so de­bauched in their Monasteries, and that their old Monks talke of the evils they committed in their youths, with such high merriment and complacence: for cruel­ty supposeth many great sins, hath ma­ny foul enormities that forerun it. They now act upon the very Life-blood of me. Nothing more puts me upon the rack, than that I suffer all this from the imme­diate hand of a walking Pedlars Pack, a Periwig'd people; a Nation of Anticks; a people terrible to none but to one ano­ther, [Page 39] as fearing amongst themselves Mor­bum Gallicum, the French Pox; exube­rant in their outward and croutching Spaniel Complements, but wretchedly destitute of all truly-gentile and solid ci­vility; A barbarous extract of Gauls, Huns, Goths, Vandals, Longobards; Men that have alwayes their Master the Devil in their mouths; quick to strike and kill, but slow to do it nobly. Let them go as they are, the Indian Birds or Butterflies of men. May the noble Casti­lian, and brave Englishman in a fit time revenge my wrongs upon them. Rejectus à Servis puerulus, in Matris redit & ru­it amplexus: The Child roughly treated by the Servants whom he fondly loved, returns and runs into the imbraces of his dear Mother. O dear England! I have been so long watching and waking, that neither my fancy nor eyes perform faith­full service to my understanding. It seems to me, that I see strange things, Pig­mies, Giants, strange Birds, Beasts, Fishes, Serpents, Monsters. All extra­ordinary stories that I have read or heard of, shew themselves to me, besides por­tents and prodigies. I hear whatsoever my fancy delivers to be said. I dream that I sleep, sometimes bedded in Snow, sometimes in the Waters, in the Field sometimes, where I am pelted with hail. They will not allow me pen, inke, pa­per, or light: yet I have made and re­corded in my memory a Latin Epistle, which I will commend to paper, and perhaps devote to the Presse, if ever good Heaven indulge freedom to me. In this Epistle there is a Latin Hymn: My fancy sings it oftentimes to me. I wish for sym­metry-sake, and because it contains my sad story, that some propitious and un­seen mouth might sing it, reprive and act the part of my fancy, whilest I intend a lit­tle to slumbering.

Monsieur Englishman, you are free from the Dungeon, and have the li­berty of the Common Prison.

I most humbly thank you, Mon­sieur: you are a good Angel. Pray be a little charitable, and help me to rise: O, gently, gently: for charity sake, gent­ly. O my poor leggs, they refuse to sup­port my body. I can scarce enforce my arms to the least duty. There is a Con­juration of Aches through my whole body.

Signior Englishman, I am glad you are dismis'd and rescued from your Dungeon. Prisoners love here, as being in câdem navi, in the same ship. I am a stranger as you are, a noble Italian; and therefore, more particularly sympa­thiz'd with you. I am commonly call'd Don Lewis.

Noble Sir: I am affectionate­ly yours. You will favour me to descend beneath your self, and acquaint me why you are detain'd here.

Precisely and nakedly, for the speaking of naked Truth: There is an Italian Bishop here in Paris, a man of sublime power, but of a leaden heart: He privately professes against the Im­mortality of the soul; and uses, against all the Sallies of Nature, a Boy every night, (such is the vile extravagancy of our Nation.) This I spake into the open aire: And though the Truth of it is as well and throughly known to me, as that I walke and talke, yea, although they thought so worthily of me here, as to send me their Embassadour to Naples, yet they imprison'd me. The grand af­fair of your Countrey is setled en su ser y puesto, (I doubt not but you understand Spanish;) or you had been sent to the Inquisition, and your body had made a Bone-fire there: I am a Roman born, and know the manner of it; your A­shes should have been thrown into the River Tiber, to feed the Water-snakes. But your enemies here, were big with hopes, that the Dungeon would have murder'd you. Your own Countrey Monks were your Hangmen; we know all here.

I consider'd them as being in the condition of Angels, that Sun-beam­like attend to the world, as helpers of others towards Heaven, and in them­selves [Page 41] are separate from it, and united with Heaven as the beams with the Sun. I fancied, that as Stars which have the least Circuit, are nearest the Pole; so men who are least perplexed with businesse, are nearest to Heaven, because we can­not remove a thing from earth, but we must exalt it nearer to Heaven.

You have been much entang­led in the love of them: but as businesses commonly move now, it is a putrified course of life in many parts, and respects. A corrupted Monk is like the reflexion of the great Angel-Image from a Steeple­top in Millan, which at one stroke, limb'd it self on the Clouds in the Air, of themselves prepar'd for such an im­pression, and only amazed and amuzed the vulgar heads, who vainly took the vain reflexion of an Image on the Clouds, for a most heavenly Saint or Angel. But when the Monks come down out of the Clouds, we know them better, because they are near to us: we never find a­broad, men so passionate, so profane: besides that they are commonly drunken Beasts, and lazy lousie belly-gods; these their mysteries I inwardly know: in ma­ny Monasteries they study Magical and Demoniacal Arts; they learn the Art of compounding Philters, and thereby draw Nobles to love them above their own children; they compose poisons of all sorts; they destroyed Henry the se­venth, Emperour, with a subtle and most sacrilegious poison in a Church, and your King John in a Monastery; the Monk is the Jesuit's great Grandfather; the Monks coin false money; they falsi­fie stones of middle rank into Pearls, and Jewels; by the transmutation of Met­tals, they raise them into a kind of coun­terfeit silver.

This I knew done by Father Broughton, an English Monk, at Lamb­spring in Germany, amongst the Woods there, who, had he not been a Monk, had ended his life at Brussels on the Gal­lows for the like forgery.

They leave the Frier many akers behind them, that was the casual author of Gunpowder: they make pow­ders, the smell of which procures lust, and sets body and soul on fire: they mix the purest paint for women: their abun­dance of idle time incites them as to mon­strous evils, so to marvellous curiosities. Trithemius, a famous Abbot, shewed Maximilian the Emperour his wife, even long after her death, and Verrucam in collo ejus, the very Wart in her neck, by which the Emperour particularly knew her. I could recount a hundred of these: There was a kind of mortal punishment amongst the old Jews, badg'd with the title of Combustio anima, the burning of the soul, wherein they powred scalding Lead into the mouth of the condemned person, by the which his inwards were consumed, the shape and outward bark of his body, remaining still with due proportion. The body of the Monk is extant still, his soul is burnt forth: Tri­themius satisfied royal curiosity, and I have complied with yours. I am a child of Rome both in birth and belief; but abuses are now grown into a wilde Forrest, and men are become as the wilde Beasts. It hath oftentimes pleaded a­gainst me in my heart, Are there no true worshippers in all the world, but the three wickedest Nations of all the world? Time will open it self, that I may hap­pily have place to give you the Story of Rome according to my knowledge, and the Chronicle of my own memory, from Urban the eighth, and the childehood of his Popedome, to Parturiunt montes, [Page 42] nascetur ridiculus mus; the Mountains bring forth, and the ridiculous Mouse is born. I will not now disease you fur­ther; your indisposition admonishes me.

Your servant, noble Don. The Novilships in the Monasteries, are but idle, inauspicacious, impertinent, and tri­fling merriments, put in comparison with what I have suffered; and yet they would have delivered me up for fuel to the most implacable revenge of the Inqui­sition. Graft a Rose-tree, then convey a grain of Musk into a cleft in the stock, and all the Roses that come of the stock, will carry Musk about them. I hope that all my after-actions will be steept in this affliction. I must withdraw.

Act. 4. Scen. 4.

Sir John, You gave me amongst your commands, to provide for your use a small quantity of Love-powder; and here I present it to you in this little bag of silk.

Madam, You oblige me be­yond world without end, but I must re­taliate, and return you satisfaction. Ma­dam, pray what cost it?

It will be abundant satisfaction if you shall please to accept it, and that it will cost you if you have it.

Dear Madam, I would I were wiser and more knowing, that I might thank you more learnedly; but I will give your Boy something, and something to your Maid. And how must I use this Love-powder, Madam?

Sir, You must apply the Bag a few minutes, to the Nose of the person whom you desire to fire with the love of you.

Very good: this I shall dexte­rously do.

That Powder hath no such power attending upon it; my Mistresse trifles with him: but I have a perfume here, sufficiently operative, according­ly as it is presented. Noble Sir, Pray license a poor servant from the Blacks, to present a poor something to you as an Emblem, Flag, Ensign, Obelisk, Pyramid, Trophy, of his most humble service; and vaslalage. You were pleas'd even now to give me gold; and I desire to be your grateful servant, and return your gold presently in a Present.

O brave black Boy! What hast thou there that thou would'st sacrifice to me?

Only a pair of Gloves, Sir.

A fair pair indeed.

Their greatest fairnesse is, that they were presented with a grateful heart.

Where were these Gloves made, Boy?

In Italy, Sir John, and there perfum'd in a Monastery.

I know not what a Monastery is, but I believe 'tis a sweet place, for the Gloves are wondrous sweet.

The more you acquaint them with your Nose, and smell of them, Sir John, if my Augury deceive me not, the sweeter you will find them.

Boy, I would fain put my powder upon experience, before I prove it on my Mistresse.

You may, Sir, with expe­dition. Which of these, my Mistresse of her Maid, do you desire should love you?

I know not which, they are both comely. I could love them both: let them both love me.

Why then it shall be so.

[Page 34]

But how shall I apply the Bag to their Noses?

O Sir, I can lay them both to sleep in a moment.

That will be fine indeed. But how, prythee?

By murmuring a certain ma­gical word in their ears. I shall effect all this presently. Madam, The fat Val­lyes are low and humble: I humbly desire leave to deliver an humble word to you in your ear.

Do so, Boy.

And another to you, Mi­stresse Pretty, preambled with a loving kisse.

Contented, so that you leave behind you, none of your Blackamore­ship upon my lips.

Fear not; I'le not part from any of it.

Sleep takes me by storm.

That's my first and last Peal to sleep.

Now Sir John, use your silken Bag.

Thou art a rare black Boy. My House here in London shall be prefac'd with the Sign of the black Boy, for thy sake.

I shall be rarer presently, if I fail not in my Prognosticks. Sir John, with your other hand ward the sent from your own Nose, by applying your Gloves to it.

Thy counsel's seasonable. I am tickled with the thought, how vehe­mently these two fair-ones, this pair of Beauties will love me.

Now remove your siege to the other. Sir John, they will love you most amorously; love you above them­selves; above whatsoever is most dear to them, or the world cals precious Enough; now conceal your Bag.

On with your Gloves Sir John, and avert the smell of the Powder.

Sir John, you are natures Ma­sterpiece, the world's chief Jewel, and earth's prime Perfection; the Sun it self is not more radiant.

Egregious Powder; pure Italy.

Sir John, This Lady is my Mi­stresse indeed; but you are the grand Duke and Master of my affections.

Poor Heart. I have powder'd you both.

Sir John, you are like the Herb called the Tartar-Lamb, that with secret pullings attracts the juyce and vir­tue of, and seems, like our Lamb in the fields, to put a mouth to, and open­ly feed upon the Plants and Herbs on eve­ry side of it. You have attracted both our loves to your self, and we fade and wither, as being so near you without en­joyment.

A certain learned Physitian was of the mind, that the world would thrive better, if none but young, strong, and healthful persons should be parents, and procreate children. Sir John and I are healthful, strong, and young.

Distressed Girl.

I hope and fear, and after the first lineaments of my fear, wipe all a­way and hope again, and in the strength and puissance of this last hope, I will go to him couragiously. Pray Sir John, salute me.

Most willingly, sweet Lady.

His language is direct, and hath no enormous obliquity in it; it is of the finest silk, the softest feather. I presume he will answer me with like ci­vility. [Page 44] Sir John, I am my Mistresses Ape, and would fain imitate her: pray give me your blessing, I mean the blessing of your warm lips.

Sweet Maid, I blesse thee. O Paragons, thou of Women, she of Maids! In my Fancy, I am now kingdom'd, crown'd, scepter'd, thron'd, and foot­stool'd.

What means this? My Heart, and Head are both dart-wounded toge­ther.

My love of Sr John, is not an ear­thy passion, it is rather a celestial flame kindled at the Planet Venus. Prett. Every thing grows vile when it is joyned with a thing beneath it self, as silver combined with lead: but a thing is dignified and exalted, when united with a better thing, as lead commixed with silver. I should receive worth, lustre, and splendour, if joyned with Sir John Wit-little; and I should be the Lady Wit-little.

Dregs of women-kind, I ab­hor you both: I abominate all your sex: the Toad is not so loathsome to me. Here is my Joy: most beautious Boy, my on­ly Joy, I love thee; love thee with weight, and without measure.

Now you are fast, Ha ha he. Laugh Pretty, Ha ha he.

Ha ha he. My Mistresse laughs so heartily, that I am her Eccho.

Had we brought him true love-powder, he would have played false with his Mistresse, whom we destin and shall quickly make over to a Nunnery. Now he feels the virtue of Italian Gloves.

Who stuck those Lillies in thy face? What Artist so knowingly mingled the Lillies and Roses there? O my white Boy, my Angelical Boy, I have a trian­gular glasse in my Fancy, and mine eyes act after it, and behold all rich colours in thy face. Thy face is like, and not like the Rainbow; in thy face, there is both Bow and Arrow; from thy face I am shot; I am on fire with such a con­flagration of love towards thee, that I can scarcely contain my self from falling down before thee and adoring thee.

If you love me, follow me.

He must follow thee who can­not live without thee, or love any but thee?

Now the work is upon the wheel, and runs on apace, It grows high, a short time will ripen it.

She whispers to Pretty.

Sir John Wit-little, where is he? Where is Sir John, Madam?

He was here, my Lord, and here he walk'd and talk'd, and all-bepas­sion'd himself in the uproar of his own thoughts, as pretending that your Noble Kinswoman did not look favourably up­on him: on a sudden, he catcht himself away, without any civil adieu, vowing at the threshold, that he would immedi­ately travel beyond the bounds of this Island, and never turn his foot again to­wards this House, or Countrey.

Upon my Honour, I am sor­ry. This is your fault, Nice.

My Lord, It is my happinesse that I am deliver'd from a Fool.

But Nice, That Fool came of wise parents, and is a large-landed Fool; he is worth a thousand-wise-men of or­dinary condition.

True worth, my Lord, is not mea­sur'd by the false rule of Riches.

Cozen, Cozen, Where there are riches without measure, education will fashion a child begotten by a Fool, into a person of true worth.

The short and the long is, If I [Page 45] should have lov'd him in short for your sake, for my own sake I could not have lov'd him long.

Why smile you, Maid?

There is a Changeling at the door, who begs with a basket hook'd on his arm: He talks and behaves himself so strangely, that he would raise a spirit of laughter in a stone.

My Lord, pray let me see him. A little Recreation unbends, and eases me.

Let him be call'd hither.

Maid, call him.

This Changeling is your Ghostly Father: from a Jesuite he is new-alchymiz'd into a Benedictine: such a Gradation being lawfull, because the Benedictine is the more perfect. And your experience will plain it to you, that he is the far more perfect, I dare say to my self, Knave. He brings the Basket, therein to carry away part of your por­tion.

A Changeling cannot endan­ger my Cozen within the circle of my fears.

O rich Cozens, rich Cozens, how do ye all here? how do you? Rich Cozens, give something to your poor Cozen; some bread and cheese, or eggs, or pie, or bacon, or what ye please, rich Cozen. Ha, ha, he. O, that's my Lord-Cozen: what an unmannerly fool am I? I should stand a great away off, I should not come near my Lord Cozen. Good day to you, Lord Cozen. My Lord Co­zen is a jolly fine old man: Ha, ha, he.

Friend, come neer, what hast thou in thy basket?

My basket is therefore shut, because you should not see what I have there, Lord Cozen: Ha, ha, he. But in earnest Lord Cozen, I have nothing there yet, I thank you.

Dost thou thank me, that thou hast nothing there?

I, Lord Cozen, I thank you for nothing, Ha, ha, he.

You shall thank me for some­thing, anon.

So I will when I have it, Lord Cozen, Ha, ha, he.

Nice, I commit the storing of his basket to you: let it be well fill'd.

I undertake it as a work of Cha­rity.

Thank you heartily, pretty Cozen: you are a very pretty Cozen: and I love a pretty Cozen heartily: Ha, ha, he. And Cozens all, if you be good Cozens, help me to a Wife amongst you. Lord Cozen, I want a Wife: Ha, ha, he.

Thou knowst not how to use a Wife.

To use a Wife is a natural work, Lord Cozen: and a Natural knows it best. Ha, ha, he.

He sayes true. But why does he pull up his right leg hastily in that man­ner?

My Lord, it is the custom of Changelings. I should think it were, be­cause he belongs to other Parents, and his right foot intends a nimble motion to­wards them.

Pretty Cozen, Is that your Mother?

No: She is a Gentleman's Wife in the City here.

Gentleman's Wife, and my lo­ving Cozen, how do you? Ha, ha, he.

Well I thank you, fool.

[Page 46]

Cozen, Cozen; have you made a fool of me, that you call me so? Ha, ha, he.

No, no: I am thy Friend. I shall help to the filling of thy Basket.

I thank you, Cozen Fool.

I perceive, we must not call him fool.

No. The veriest Fools think themselves the wisest.

I, I, Lord Cozen; that's the reason that so many rich and great men think themselves so wise. Lord Cozen, let me ask you a simple question without offence.

Speak freely.

I will, Lord Cozen. My sim­ple question is: whether it be possible to make a fool of a Lord? Ha, ha, he.

Why truly, a man may make a Lord of a Fool: But it is not ordinary to make a Fool of a Lord, except it be of such a Lord as was made a Lord of a Fool.

Right, Lord Cozen, very right. My back-part itches, Lord Cozen: some good is coming towards me.

Thou art a Fool in grain, an unmannerly Fool. He comes a gooding. Nice, Take in the fool with you, and load his basket with good Provision; then send him packing. Madam, pray refresh your self a little farther before you leave us.

My Lord, you are noble.

Come, Cozen.

I, I, pretty Cozen. Pretty Co­zen, I will follow you close. M ^rs Dorothy, a word of advertisement: the next time, I come as a Chimny-sweeper; af­terwards as a Tinker.

I understand you. And you shall only sweep my Chimny, mend and scour my Kettel.

Act. 4. Scene 5.

I am restor'd hither from Paris. And though the Jesuits, Jesuitically call me the Benedictines Carrier; because I convey Boyes and Maids out of England to holy places, that is, Monasteries and Nunneries, yet in truth I am an honou­rable Procuratour for the Benedictines. I have put on my habit here, that I might appear the more venerable to this Knight, whose vast Estate we sit brooding upon, that we may bring it into the light ours. The Writings are here drawn, and he is answerable to us, by the procuration of this good Boy, both in Religion, and all our other Desires. We intend him for one of our Monasteries abroad: that he, like the Eagle hovering over the Empe­rour's Corps, yeelded up and exposed to the funeral Flames, may be elevated from the Earth towards Heaven, while his Estate perishes from him under him. It will suit more analogically, according to Logick with us, than with him. Our Vocation is more high, our lives are more holy, our Persons are sacred. Be­sides, we have reform'd his Soul; for the which, his Estate, though great, is but a small paiment: If he were able to exonerate both the Indies into our laps, he could not require us worthily. Our Abby of Lambspring we subtilly reco­ver'd from the Lutherans: we fool'd a doting old Abbot with false Alarums out of England, till he invested us in our Colledge at Doway: Our Parisian House we purchas'd by setting a Death's-Head, or the Head of a carrion Calf, upon a [Page 47] Man's Body: Our House at Dulewort we bought with a portion of a Ghost-led Maid, who now lives neer us there, affli­ctedly upon our alms, and repents of her mistaken Charity. Our Priory at S ^t Mal­loes came feather'd by a French Merchant, whom we piously inveigled to his undo­ing, and afterwards inserted, though aforreign Plant, into our holy Congrega­tion. And if this fair Estate be added upon a particular and enclosed account, it will nobly support us in England: and we shall be congenerous and homogene­ous (I never went beyond Logick) with our selves.

S ^r John, you have well slept.

My Angel-fac'd Boy, I dreamt of thee; thou tak'st up all my Thoughts; thou begin'st, thou endest, and thou art my whole Business.

Reverend Father, pray shew S ^r John the Writings.

Here they are, S ^r John.

I, I, I, take all, and more than all. I'le set my Hand and Seal to the Writings.

Good S ^r John grants all, while you syllogize: I speak not beyond Lo­gick; when I had learn'd the Fallacies, I had learn'd enough.

My only bliss is to move after the steerige of my dear Boy.

S ^r John, when you are dead, you will find your Lands again in another Countrey with advantage.

I doubt it not, Reverend Fa­ther; you speak Oracles, I sacrifice to you. Take all, reserv'd that I may not dis-anchor from the love of my snow and milky-fac'd Boy: His face is the milky way that leads to Jupiter's Throne.

S ^r John, our most charitable, and our most noble Benefactour, by virtue of these writings, when they have their Pass from your hand and seal, your whole Estate is by you given and made over to a faithfull friend of ours, that negotiates for us.

Even to whom you please.

Had I the least dram or grain of Conscience, this should not be done. The man is Civilitèr mortuus, as the Lawyers tongue it, defunct and dead in Law: he is not himself. If one write a Will or Testament, and hold the Pen with a dead Man's hand, that Will will not hold in Law: It was not his Will; because it was not written by him, with Virtue derived from any principle of life in him. Some Law I have: No man can cheat ad unguem, quickly and neatly, without a little knowledge of Law. But peace barking Dog, Conscience, Peace; check me not. Quodibetical Brains have Consciences of all sorts and sizes, large, little, short-wasted. Then S ^r John, you will ratifie and confirm these Writings be­fore witnesses.

Yes, if my dear Boy speak An­gel-lik, and say I.

And you will retire immediately to a Monastery.

I remit all to my fair Poy's can, did Brest.

Then I have well preach'd: enough for this time. As the great Scar­let-traind Cardinal at Rome, the Son of a Fisherman, when he had gain'd possessi­on of the Porphiry-Chair, remov'd the Net, which he had formerly set in view, as a Memorial of his low Parentages mottoing his action with these pithy words, The Fish is caught.

Act. 4. Scene 6.

Delicious London, once more I [Page 48] salute thee. Thy buildings are now glo­rionsly beautifull, if my eyes may sen­tence for thee. Here dwels Simplicity, here Justice is enthron'd. O People of England, learn your own Happinesse, your earthly Happinesse drops and distils from your own hands. Be obedient, and conform to the good and easie Laws here; and you comprize more than the Happi­nesse of all the other Fortunate Ilands; Arabia the Happy is not so happy, and fragrant as your Countrey. Knew ye the slavish condition of France, the beg­gery of Spain, the buggery of Italy, Spain, and France, the general wicked­ness of all the world, ye would quietly sit down, every one at his own Door, and calmly say, Heaven be blessed that I was born in little England. Here all Persons are free, breathe freely, eat comfortably, use freely and fully their own. Where is it so besides here? Now ye are in joynt again, stand Atlas-firm, bear up your little Heaven of quiet here: or as ye are now the most happy, ye will be otherwise the most despicable and most unhappy of all Nations. The natu­ral desire a man has of self-preservation, like adverse Wind and Tyde, lately cast me back into France, and the English Monks there, the sordid idle Monks, more than impal'd me in the Bastille, be­cause I threatned to impound them here, as detaining from me a fair Sum of my own Monys most due to me. And to guild, to varnish, to burnish this their unhew'd, ragged, and ragged Action, they plyde my story with lies of Defence, lies of Offence, lies with heads, but not with feet, lies with feet, but not with heads; lies with neither head nor foot; lies whisper'd, and loud lies. Oye Scholars of our most renowned Uni­versities, set bounds to your feet, and limits to your Thoughts: I was my Fa­thers eldest Son, and Heir to a comfort­able Estate of Houses and Lands; and I threw all behinde me, to be cheated, most religiously cheated by secular Priests, Jesuites, Monks, Friers; but amongst all these godly Cheaters, the Monk is the Grandee, the Pontifex maxi­mus, the first and Universal Bishop. Two years he held me now fast in Prison, in a loathed Prison: and after the Business was made publick here by my private Letters, clear'd me of the Prison, but unwillingly, but conditionally that I should be confin'd there all my life: I consented in the lip: Afterwards plead­ing that my Body was greatly disorder'd in respect of health, desir'd a few dayes wherein to physick it (I meant with a better Air;) and in that little Tract of Time wherein it was supposed I took Physick, hasted privately to Diep, a Port-Town in France, where I found sixteen English Monks attending the Passage-Boat: they prevented my Passage with them, and posted away Letters to Paris, solliciting that I should be stopt; but the Hugonots of Diep past me over the night following. In all their Houses in those transmarine parts, there are none left but boyes and old Men; hither they are all come. The greatest Crocodile was at first harbour'd in an Egge, which is Paulò majus anserino, a little bigger than a Goose-egg. And yet, the Crocodile is a Devourer of Men: and when, being horrour-struck, these cannot weep for themselves, mockingly weeps over them; grows huge, and on to the last period of life; and is different, not a little from the Goose, in shape, substance, colour, manners; though they favour one ano­ther in the Egg. No sensual Creature spreads to so vast a bigness, from so small beginnings, as this Egg-Crocodile. In [Page 49] two years I had not the benefit of a fresh Shirt. I had preserv'd some rich Goods from the ravenous Officers who took me: And John Baptista Palliot, the President of Noury in France, my fellow-prisoner, who desired and undertook to secure them for me at his own house, secur'd them there indeed, but from me, and for himself, he, being in account a person of Honour, and I indeed a wrongfully and poor imprison'd stranger. Another French Prisoner wearied me oftentimes, with desiring me that he might use my body Sodomitically. The Frenchmen say: Omnis Jesuita aut Magus aut Sodomita, Every Jesuite is a Magitian or a Sodo­mite: This I know not; the other, ex­perience brought home to me. Upon composed and most deliberate thoughts, I set up this resolution like a Colossus: I will yield up my life on a Gallows here, before I will set my foot again where proud Rome does Mistris it: because her Vassals are more than heathenishly cruel, more unclean than Turks and Indians. London, I joyfully kiss thy ground, which others kick and tread upon: allow me a Grave here: Thy air seems to me per­fum'd: and I am now, as it were, born again.

Scene 1.

THe good man, and my blessed Father, now a Benedictine, has been twice more with me, first Chim­ney-sweeper, then Tinker-like; he has perform'd his part to the last and least point of Action; and all the money is gone with him, by a most cleanly con­veyance. In my thinking, since he went Benedictine, he has publickly more of of Saint in his face, and reaches farther and is more active privately. This is the Now of Time, wherein he promis'd to come, and divert our houshold here, that they being held by the eyes, and amused in their Fancies, I might make my escape, and steer towards a Nunnery.

There he comes. Blessed Man, he keeps close to his Time.

The Silk-Worm,

and the Spider, both work; and both, out of their own bowels and substance. So far they work together. Now they differ in their working. One of them only works substantially. The Spider works for his own private end and gain, (great gain to gain a little Flye;) The Silk-Worme for others. The Spider works a poor, thin, weak, black, idle Web; the Silk-Worm a rich, fair, Silken Substance. The con­clusion falls thus, The Spiders work is swept, and swept; swept down, and [Page 50] swept away; the work of the Silk-Worm is a Courtier, and acceptable to Princes. I deal in Thousands; I work for the Re­ligious Brethren in our Abby of Lamb­spring, and in our Monasteries of Doway, Paris, Dulewart, St. Malloes: These will feed fat, and pray for me when I am lean and rotten.

A walk to the Royal Exchange and home again, will beget me a good ap­petite to my supper. Now Friend, what's your business here?

My very good Lord, no great business: But, if it please you, my Lord: that is: if it be not offensive to your Lord­ship: that is: if your good Lordship thinks it convenient: that is: if your Ho­nour deem honourably of it: that is.

Speak, friend, leave shaking of thy head, and speak.

That is.

Away with that That is, do not retard your business.

I would make your Honours Servants a little Pastime, my Lord: I, and my bonny Beast here. An old Ape has an old eye, my Lord.

Well, well, if this be all, we shall agree. The Times are now quiet a­gain, I thank Heaven: and my House is a house of singular freedom, and of Enter­tainment as free as Noble. But what can you and your Ape do?

Do? Rather, what can we not do, my Lord? We can Dance, Ca­per, Curvet, shew Tricks of all sorts, fashions, conditions; drink whole Boles, play at Cards, Dice, Tables; fight at back-Sword, single-Rapier, at Sword and Dag­ger, quarter-Staff; (my Ape's an expert Fencer, my Lord;) run a Tilt; sing Prick't-Song; shew you a Maid (and that's a wonder, my Lord,) and shew you a Maid that goes for a Maid, and is not a Maid, (and my Lord, that's no wonder at all:) If your Lordship has a Thief or a Drunkard amongst your Ser­vants, my Ape will bring him forth. An old Ape has an old eye, my Lord.

A nimble-pated Fellow. Go in, Friend: Tell my Servants I gave you leave to enter my house. I intended a walk: but if I hear my Servants are pleas'd with your Pastime, I'le come and be your Spe­ctator my self.

My Lord, your more than thrice humble servants, I and my Ape. An old Ape has an old eye, my Lord.

Go thy way: thou dost out­wit the Ape, I warrant thee. O my poor Nice, if she were reduc'd, I should be mertier, more debonnaire, and more delighted with such sights than I am. Men have learned the way of changing bitter Almond-trees into sweet ones: which is: they pierce them near to the root, and let forth the bitter juyce: so these bit­ter-hearted Romanists should let their perverse and sower inclinations forth, at the root of their Hearts; and become of bitter, better. The Priests, whose actions are as dirty as their thoughts are foul, have wrought this irrecoverable mischief in my house. The Physitians, that they may draw the vapours from the head of the Patient, apply Pigeons to the soles of his feet: If these seven-hill'd Saints would walk innocently, and with Pige­ons at their feet; they would not be troubled with such gross and idle fumes in their Brains as they are. They do not con­sider, that the Life of man is a very Bub­ble: A Bubble puts on the form of an Hemisphere: And shadowing half the [Page 51] world, as being an Hemisphere; it ac­cordingly consists of two Elements; It is Air within, which is invisible for its Rarity; and without, a thinne-shap'd Skinne of Water: and there is all the Bubble. The Air deciphers our soul; and the watery skin, our body: the skin presently breaks: the Aire as presently breaks loose; and there is a present end of the Bubble.

There's my invitation. I would not let desire loose to range through the world, like a wilde-Ass in the Arabian Desert; but honest recreations are the Didacticks of humane providence.

The servants are all met to view the Sport which the Ape and his Master make; and I must be their Ape, imitate them, and adde to the number.

This idle Page obstructs my way.

Mrs. Dorothy, with your faire leave, you know that all the Servants are charg'd to acquaint my Lord, if you stir out of the house, as now you have, or be­yond the Garden.

Pretty Boy hold thy peace, thou wert alwayes my friend, there's a piece for thee. Delay the search after me, till I have pass'd this street and the next.

Madam, I shall not be wanting to your design.

She's gone. I must keep silence now, or go too.

Page, where are you?

Here, my Lord.

Call my Nice down: tell her, here's very pretty sport.

I go, my Lord, I move as quick as lightning. I have read in an English Author of a melancholy-she that thought she could break to pieces, the whole world with the motion of one short fin­ger; and crush it into a Miscellany with the clintching of her little hand. Mrs. Do­rothy thinks now, that she has the great world in her little maiden hands, to dis­pose of as she list. Liberty is sweet, espe­cially after a long and tedious time of re­straint. The Bird out of the Cage, is like the Bird that saw the Sea, turn'd and made a long flight the clean contrary way: she wings it in the Air, at length, weary, pearches upon a Bough, and sings for joy, she is not bounded.

Page, why Page, Page I say.

My Lord.

Where's my Nice? why comes she not?

She is not in her Chamber, my Lord. I am going to the Garden: she's there, my Lord, I think.

Make hast, Page.

All the hast I make, shall not overtake Mrs. Dorothy. And hast thou given me a twenty shilling piece, sweet Virgin? I'le keep it for thy sake: and it shall conserve the Idea of thee in my thoughts. She must be now out of reach, or in some nearness to it.

Page.

Let him call again, 'twill open his pipes.

Page you Rogue.

I will not answer to the name of Rogue: let him call once more.

Page, my Nice.

My Lord, I cannot see her in the Garden. The Privy door is shut. But I shut it.

How? is she not in her Cham­ber? nor to be seen in the Garden? She never staid so long in the little House there, Servants, search all the house. Go page, kick forth that rascal-fellow with the Ape O my Nice, my Nice. A noise within of searching.

Servants, search every corner, every Ratand Mouse-hole.

Good Mr. Page, kick not so hard.

Not just so hard, but harder if I can. Out, you ditch and dunghill rascal; foh; I have kick'd him till he stinks a­gain.

Let me give him one kick. He is a Rogue by Act of Parliament: foh: He or his Ape stinks, or both.

Good my Lord, spare me. Why then did your Lordship admit a Rogue into your house.

Take another kick for that, you profes't Rogue.

I must bid you farewell with a parting kick.

From within, She is not in this Cham­ber. Here she is not. I cannot find her this way.

Poyse her Trunks, and answer presently what weight they bear.

That's done already, my Lord: there's nothing in them.

I am undone: my Nice is lost, she is lost. Had she the invisible Ring? or did she send her money away by night through the Air, as Witches ride? I'le search all the house my self, and add the evidence of my own senses. O this cursed Ape-Carrier; he has embroil'd us all; he was at least the occasion of her escape, if she be gone.

Act 5. Scene 2.

Mrs. Dorothy, I speak your wel­come to this house, I dare say, with a matchless affection. Here you may dilate your heart. Such dangers as you fear, can­not reach hither. And you will find no ri­gid Uncle here.

Madam, I equally rejoyce in my own liberty and your love. But whereas I had so much of the Schollar given to me in my breeding, that I understand above the plain of learning, and therefore have long ago done with legitimating heresie, or crutching it up, or skinning it over with hypocrisie; whereas I cannot con­verse with Blackamore-soul'd Atheists, or with Dwarf-devotion'd Hypocrites: cannot attend to Pulpit-Cymbalists, (let them stand for me in a perpetual Pancra­sie, in the Solstice of their Honour;) nor to the Tub-Prophets, living under the Meridian of bitter-sweet, under the Equi­noctial of good and evil; nor disquiet the Crasis of my Soul with the new-fangled Presbyter and his painted Pageantry, and manifold Anticks: Whereas I cannot em­balm him, nor pitty and condole with his surviving Amorosos and Fantasticks: it rests in the Repository, that I give life to my zealous Determinations, and repair to a Nunnery, to the which the beauty of that state lures me.

Mrs. Dorothy, The Angels sit on your lips, and speak from your mouth, or the Nightingale sings there. Bring your thoughts forth, while they are warm. The image of a Prince is then impressed upon the Gold, when it is melting soft. I [Page 53] see, that you are excellently skill'd in the sacred Opticks; and have a seeing soul, that hever knows night. A Looking-Glass set against the Sun, not onely receives the Beams of the Sun, but also the Image of it.

Madam, the Ostrich leaves her Eggs on the Libyan-shore, to be hatch't by the Sun, but I must concurre to my own happinesse. Besides, In the Nunne­ry I shall be wholly disenchanted from these feares, and from communication with those heady people, who precipitate themselves into more changes than the Beast and Herb-Chameleons in the Natu­ralist, or Proteus in the Fiction; yea, become as the soul of man in the opinion of some great Pretenders to learning; which is, say they, round and globous in the head, long in the arms, broad in the brest; and as the light is indeed, round in the Sun, in the fire Pyramidal. Now they have no reason to object change against me, because they have so often changed from themselves.

Mistris, There are in view as ma­ny subjects of change, as there are crea­tures under the Moon: Because earthly and inferior bodies are by the Laws of nature, subjected to the bodies that are superiour and heavenly: which being in continual Motion and Revolution, and continually changing in their Positions and Aspects; and moreover, darting as they move with and in their spheres, new influences upon the Sublunaries, make new impresses upon them accordingly. But your change was effected from above the Moon, and was Heavenly in the high­est degree.

Madam, I perceive that our bree­ding hath incircled us in a like proporti­on of knowledg. The soul it self is chan­ged from without by the presentation of external and occasional Objects; and from within by the Passions, and is driven every way by them, as the Waves by the Winds; indeed, primordially and prin­cipally by love, the Amazon-Queen of the Passions; afterwards by her Bride­maids, Desire and Hope; yea, by Anger Love's-Champion. And then the chan­ges are good or evill, as the objects are evil or good, concerning which these Passions are excited; and as the carriage of the Passions in their tendencies, is or­dinate, (managed by a prudent and pi­ous Ordination) or disordinate: The Sea breaking its bounds, is boundless in mischief. To wade nearer our affair: The best change of the soul, answerable to man as a reasonable creature, and within the Dominions of nature; is, when the moral vertues in it, are directed and gui­ded by Prudence, and every Action tu­tour'd by some vertue, because the Pas­sions are obedient to reason. Nature is higher perfected by degrees: but of that I will speak in the Nunnery.

You give plentifull testimony, that you understand the businesse before you, and that you are well rooted and grounded in it.

O my most sugar and hony­child, my spirit leaps in my body like the Lambs in a good Pasture, to find thee here. Thy Gold is all safe: The entire summe, my pretty Duckling, amounts to five thou­sand pounds. But I have a request to thee, Fair one; a most humble request, imcomperable beauty. (It is a Rule we have, and we act by it, good words put us to no charge: hence we get all we can, but we part from nothing.) What saist thou, fairest of Maids, Saint upon earth, canst thou grant me a reasonable request?

[Page 54]

Reverend Father, I shall grant it, if it fall within my Verge: I am ready to give it passage by my ears to my willing soul.

Why this it is then, devout Mrs. Dorothy, (that name most propor­tions your condition, (you go now to un­dergo a poor life; and it is essentiall to your future state, that you vow poverty: The Nuns seldome receive with a Novice above five hundred Pounds, (it is a great summe for them) you have five thousand: Divine Mrs. Dorothy, give us the rest: and we will found a new Monastery; you shall be set up before the Gate as the Foundresse of it, I mean your Image; and the Monks there shall continually pray for zealous Mrs. Dorothy, now, hereafter, and to the worlds end.

Reverend Father, your Request is, as you languag'd it, reasonable: it is granted.

O heavenly creature, I adore thy Devotion. O that we were all, or the best of us, so devout as thou art. Thou mak'st the tears go ambling down my ctheeks: tears of Comfort. I am com­forted, that thou hast one foot in Hea­ven already. I am Mathematically cer­tain, as the Schools speak, that the to­ther will follow; I am more than moral­ly certain, and almost certain by physical certitude; and I cannot but leap for joy, for joy that the tother foot will certainly follow. To Heaven, to Heaven, 'tis even so, a Maid to Heaven dos easily go, for joy what I say I scarcely know. I forget. Mistris of my heart, give way to my ex­pression, I have given order to Father Robert to go to your Uncle in the disguise of a Seaman; and to say that he saw you take Shipping at Gravesend, and Saile under the Conduct of a good Wind for France: Otherwise, Sweetheart, par­don my boldnesse, he will lay waite for you at the Port-Towns: when he shall believe, and is satisfied, that you are gone, and the search is blown over, you shall away indeed with safety.

This invention is steep'd in Pru­dence. Reverend Father, I am a great ad­mirer of your wisdom.

In fine: We must now be merry. It is reckon'd amongst our cu­stomes, that when we send any to Mo­nasteries, Nunneries, or the like, they take their last leaves of the world with extraordinary jollity; and so must you: Wee'l be jovially merry before we part. Madam, where's your little Cozen? (the Girle that I begot of thy body, when I kept my Rule, and look't not beyond my own length, or the length of my Grave;) let us begin our Carnival with a Song.

Pretty, Call my Cozen.

They may honestly be mer­ry, who afterwards presently renounce all mirth. He who saies, that fraud cannot be pious, nor piety fraudulent, is an Ass, a short ear'd Ass, and was never bottom'd in Schoole Divinity.

My little Cozen, pleasure us now with a Song, and you bind us over to kiss your hands. (She sings.) As much to the pur­pose as you can.

Directly to the purpose.

Mistresse Dorothy, England's Helen for beauty: my Cozen levels at your favour.

She has her aim. She sings like a little Nun.

Three or four dayes we con­secrate to mirth.

Our Prologue to it has been sweet.

To singing, dancing, feasting.

Betwixt fasting and feasting, there is but the difference of one poor let­ter; we may readily slip out of one into the other.

Come dear Friends, follow me merrily, merrily.

Act. 5. Scen. 3.

My Cozen is uncag'd, and I fear flown beyond catch, beyond reco­very. Had she been within my Wals, and but as big as a new-born child, or a childe's Baby, I had found her; but she cannot here be found, who is not here. What shall I do? No, that will be to Inn at the Labour in vain: Something I have brought forth; under what Star I know not: I will send to all the Port-Towns that are near, chance may be so gracious to me, that I may take her in one of them at the rebound, at the second run. If I catch her, I shall cage her compani­ons.

My Lord, A poor Sea-man at the door, is very earnest to speak with your Lordship. He talks of businesse, and that of no small importance; and he sayes, he must not, as being a poor man, send his businesse by an Interpreter.

A Sea-man? and with im­portant businesse? send him to me.

Most certainly, my Cozen cannot reach the Sea so soon: she is not wing'd at her feet like Mercury. He may be a poor man, that has had great losses at Sea, and comes a begging; if so, he will be a fit Subject of charity, and libe­rality: indeed the winds have chid and bellow'd loud alate.

Seaman, What wind blew you hither?

May it please your Lordship, an angry wind, may it please your Lord­ship; a roaring and raging wind, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship.

I thought so, I did imagine it was a begging businesse: it pleases not me, that you were molested with an an­gry [Page 57] wind, endamag'd by a roaring and raging wind. But what's your present condition?

May it please your Lordship, I did belong, may it please your Lordship, to a Vessel call'd the Virgin, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lord­ship.

The Virgin? 'Twas not the Virgin Martyr, her name was not Doro­thy, was it?

May it please your Lordship, no, not so, may it please your Lordship.

O, on with your Story. The fellow's distracted with his losses, or ve­ry sick of the Simples.

May it please your Lordship, In this weak Vessel call'd the Virgin, may it please your Lordship, we made notwith­standing a Voyage to the West-Indies, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship; and after some length of time, may it please your Lordship, we return'd in due time, may it please your Lordship, rich-laden, may it please your Lordship. We were bound, may it please your Lordship, I say, may it please your Lordship, we were bound in our return for London, may it please your Lordship, and at the River's mouth, may it please your Lordship, our weak Vessel known by the name of Virgin, may it please your Lordship, by reason of that angry, roaring, and raging wind, may it please your Lordship, I cannot tell it without weeping, may it please your Lordship, foundred like a tyred Mare, like old Hob­son's Mare, may it please your Lordship, and we all that were in the Vessel named the Virgin, were cast away and lost, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship. I my self was quite cast away with the rest, may it please your Lordship, as far as I can remember, may it please your Lordship, but here I am again, I think, may it please your Lord­ship, or, I am sure, my Ghost, may it [...] your Lordship, to beg your be­ [...], may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship.

But how cam'st thou to shore?

May it please your Lordship, I know not whether I am at shore yet or no, may it please your Lordship, but if I am at shore, may it please your Lord­ship, I came to shore, like Bacchus astride upon a Hogshead, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lord­ship.

Were none sav'd but thee?

May it please your Lordship, again I say as I said before, I do not as yet well know whether I am sav'd or no, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship.

Alas poor simple fellow, the fright his dazled his understanding. There are twenty shillings for thee, to recruit and refresh thee after thy sorrows and losses.

May it please your Lordship, I thank your Lordship, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship, may it please—

No more of that, may it please your Lordship.

Pardon me, my Lord, my pur­pose was to say it twenty times over, be­cause your Lordship gave me twenty shillings, and I desire to be hired so, may it please or not please your Lord­ship.

Sea-man, you have your alms.

May it, or may it not please your Lordship, if you are pleas'd, I am pleas'd, pleas'd I am not if you are not [Page 58] pleas'd, may it please or not please your Lordship, twenty-score thanks for your twenty shillings, may it please or not please your most liberal Lordship.

I had forgot half my Arrant, may it please your Lordship. I lost my memo­ry when I was cast away, may it please your Lordship. We having lost one Virgin at the Rivers mouth, may it please your Lordship, I found another at the tail of the salt water, may it please your Lordship. Now I come to Mistresse Do­rothy, may—

My Cozen Dorothy, what of her?

May it please your Lordship.

No, no, she does not please my Lordship. Once more I tell you, lop that off.

Then I shall speak no more of her, may it please your Lordship.

Again? yes, yes, on with Mi­stresse Dorothy.

Why then, may it please your Lordship.

Yet again?

My Lord, in good earnest, my Lord, I am but a simple Idiot: I cannot tell you the Story, except you suffer me to tell it after my manner: I must go in my beaten road, steer my own course, my Lord.

Tell it then after thy manner.

May it please your Lordship, Mrs Dorothy took shipping at Gravesend, yesterday morning at five of the Clock, may it please your Lordship. The Sea­men, my Brethren that belong'd to the vessel, presently weigh'd Anchor; the wind was fair for her, as fair as she, may it please your Lordship; and so it has held; and by this time she must needs be in Holland, or in France, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lord­ship.

But how camest thou to know she was my Nice Dorothy, and to be di­rected hither?

May it please your Lordship, I begg'd of her, as I now do of your Lord­ship, and told her I was going beyond London a great way to my Friends in the Countrey, may it please your Lordship; and presently she put her white hand into her pocket, and pull'd forth two half crowns, and gave them to me, may it please your Lordship, and made me pro­mise her, that I would bring hither her Duty to your Lordship, and this news with it, may it please your Lordship, may it please your Lordship. Moreover, she gave me a Token for your Lord­ship.

A Token? thou gav'st me no Token: where's the Token?

May it please your Lordship: a Token, by the which your Lordship should know, that it was she, concern­ing a strange man and an Ape, but that I have almost forgot, because the best part of my memory was cast away when I was drown'd, may it please your Worship, Lordship I should have said. Now you have both ends of my Story, there is all, if it like your Lordship, if it like your Lord­ship.

None of it likes me. By all signs and tokens this must be she. Then all farther enquiry will be vain, and run upon a false Bias. Seaman, here, I give thee a Crown more for thy fidelity.

May it please your Lordship, I came with Fidelity, and I shall depart with Fidelity, and perhaps that will deserve a Crown more, may it please your Lordship, and it like your Lordship. My Lord frowns. I must be gone.

[Page 59]

Act. 5. Scen. 4.

I have seen a Sight here, per­haps not unusual, yet strange to me: a Mountebank in this blind and uncouth part of the Suburbs, upon a common Stall. I took him for a Ballad-singer, till I came neer him: but finding him af­terwards to be a Mountebank, I waited upon the sequel. He had his paints, his white and red for women; his powders of all colours; his perfumes, mixt and simple; his salves for all fores and griefs; he could abate the Drunkards rednesse, and fire in his face, and raise a pale co­lour to beauty, from within: he could awake Appetite, set a man to sleep, by­asse nature as he pleas'd: He could fur­nish a man or woman with new teeth, new eyes, new ears, new noses, new arms, new legs: I expected when he would have said, new Heads, new Hearts. If my Ears scout it rightly for my Soul, I heard him say, that he could restore a lost Maiden-head. He spake contemptibly of drinking poisons: that, said he, the common Rabble and Rub­bish of Mountebanks, the vile Offal of Quacksalvers can do. He suppled us with a Story of one Barthochabas an Au­thor of Sedition amongst the old Jews, who so medicin'd his mouth, and ma­nag'd a device in it, that he seem'd to vomit fire; and he profes't upon the Re­putation of a Gentleman, that he had the Receipt: He put on with another Example of a man at Millan an Italian City, who washed his face and hands with scalding lead, as carelesly and as confidently, as a man washeth his hands and face with ordinary water; having first washed them with an extraordinary, new-found, and hardening water of his own: And of this water he protested as he was an Artist, he had a great Quanti­ty. We had from him a whole fardle of such stuff. To all People that bought of his Trash to the value of Twelve-pence, he gave a printed Bill, designing the Place where he lies, and the manifold motions and out-walkings of his skill. I stood in the crowd while he staid upon the Stall; and when he came down and leyel'd himself with the People, I ob­serv'd that speaking with several Persons, he did insinuate these or the like words; All men have a natural care of their Bo­dies, but who regards his own Soul? If a simple Asse fals in the streets, many wise men run to lift the simple Asse up; but if a Man's Heart or Soul lies wallow­ing in the dirt, such a Soul or Heart is not regarded; pray, come to my lodg­ing: these words had their mysterious aim. Now this metaphysical Doctor, this all-able Mountebank with all his packs, and his knacks, is the Benedictine-Jesuite, whom I have us'd, and by whom I have been manifoldly abus'd. As I take it, he takes this way. The Bastille has chang'd me, and I believe he knows me not. I'le tosse a word or two with him as he passes.

Our Army is vanish't, our Conventicles are quell'd and supprest: and we must be doing, be Soul-catching: By idleness the dead Sea has been long found dangerous. The Intelligencies alwayes move the Heavens: the Windes the Air and Sea: Fire is never out of [Page 60] Action. Besides, Vespatian the Emperor was wise; Dule is odor lucri ex re quâlibet: Thus alwayes something comes in; and something has some savour. The Spani­ards wittily, and with a Sarcasm call the Jesuits, Los teatinos, y los Padres Teati­nos, the Teatines, and the Teatine Fa­thers; from this Account: A Spanish Painter being scandal-struck by the Co­vetousness of the Jesuits, drew a Picture after this manner: He hung in the upper­most Part of his Table, a vast Purse of Money: He set round about it, in the lower parts; one of every sort of Men­dicant Friers; who looked upwards wil­lingly, yea devoutly upon it, but durst not touch it, as being forbidden by the Rules of their several Orders: He paint­ed a Jesuite in some distance, armed with a Bow and Arrows, and looking over (and indeed over-reaching) the poor Mendicants: For, he held up his Bow, and had let his Arrow flie, which had struck the Mark (the Purse) and now stuck in it; he still keeping a fierce and eager eye upon the Mark: And the Painter had learnedly derived these Latin words from his mouth, hanging, as if the cold Air had frozen them into a Record, To attingo, ô Purse, I reach thee, I hit thee, I have thee: whence the Spaniards, being edified by the devotion of the Painter, and the holiness of the Picture, presently call'd the Jesuits, Los Teatinos, the Spa­nish word coming up as neerly as it may, to the Latine, from which the Spanish Language hath deviated: But the Painter had excellently compleated his Piece, had he pictured our modern English Monk catching away the Purse, for which all the others gap'd, and which the Jesuite thought he had heart-struck.

Sir, I am a most humble Peti­tioner to you.

Where's your Petition?

My mouth presents it, Sir.

My ears are open to receive it.

That I may have leave to love you, and be your Scholar. I have been your Hearer, and you have transform'd me into a great Lover and Honourer of you.

What are your wants?

I am wanting both in Soul and Body, Sir.

I can supply the wants of both: both I cure.

Divine Mountebank!

Come to my Chamber.

Pray, favour me with leave to wait upon you thither.

Most willingly.

Act. 5. Scene 5.

Ye are both apt Scholars. But you, Boy, must learn to open your mouth wi­der, when the fit's upon you.

I open it as wide as I can, good Father.

Take this Apple, and extend your mouth to the wideness of the Apple: 'Tis of a fit bigness. And you, Woman, when you act the possest person, do not stare enough: your eyes must always be rounded into a larger Circle, but then especially. And if any be immodest to­wards you, you must not take notice of it, at such a time, but rather shew wil­lingness, because the Devil, under whose power you are then conceiv'd to groan and lie grave [...]'d, is delighted with wan­tonness.

Reverend Father, you have taught me obedience, and I shall practise it.

Boy, I am very much pleas'd with your vomiting of nails, crooked pins, nee­dles, hair, pibble stones, and the like: [Page 61] Your conveyance is nimble. Both of you must be carefull, that ye do not go aside into any strangeness of Action, except a Priest, or at least some devout Person of our Religion offer himself. The Devil is not rous'd up with the presence of Here­ticks. In the company of such, and none but such, you should demean your selves quietly and cheerfully.

I understand your condition. You are an Heretick: you shall know better within a Cubit of Time. This is my dwelling; and that my loving Brother. Father Robert, this Gentleman is an He­retick, and a Scholar, but a kind of Seeker.

Woman, Boy, the Stranger is an Heretick: while we are here, you know your parts.

This is Father Robert: but I thank the Bastille (against my will) he knows me not. What strange and unrea­sonable carriage have this Woman and Boy.

Alas, miserable and unhappy Creatures, they are possest.

How possest?

Possest with Devils.

Sir, you seem in the shell, in the face or fore-head, to be well affected towards us, or at least less ill-affected, and less indispos'd to Goodness. I confess to you, as to a Friend, prompted by the Bird of good Omen within me, that I and my Brother there, have been eatechiz'd at Rome, and that we are Benedictine Priests. Sir, our Order is the most ancient, and most holy of all others: the Devil is troubled that we are station'd so neer him: If you were here alone, the Devil would lie down, leave barking, and be qui­et as a Lamb, because you are yet abstract­ed from the lines of Communication with us.

I am as much Priest as they; for Priesthood cannot be lost, but they are ignorant of it, because they have lost my face out of their remembrance. In good time, Sir. But under favour, I have read in your Authors, that the occasion other Orders rose, was, because the Monks were defective in that part, which the new ri­sing Order most profest: as that the Do­minicans rose, because the Monks were Kitchin-bound, and their mouths were stop'd, they became dumb and muzzl'd in publick; good men, they dealt out their time in eating, hunting both Hare and Fox, and purging their reins according to lease: The Franciscans came, because the Monks were proud; and the Bernar­dines for the same reason, because the Monks were fat and stately: the Jesuites came shoving in at last, because the Monks had long desisted from the teach­ing of Children, and thereby ingaging rich Parents, and from the recovering of Nations, and thereby obliging the most rich Parent of all at Rome: and so in others. Whom did, or do the Jesuites and they love, but in order to their own ends, and for gain-sake? Who have been more scan­dalous in all the wandrings of wickedness, than the Monks with their poatch'd Eyes in their Meditations? The worst of Gene­va-Jesuites might better and more justly be canoniz'd after the Age is pass'd wher­in he liv'd, than the best of Monks in these parts. And I have read in a learned Monk, that as Rivers after long running run slen­der and muddy, so the best things gather dust, and contract corruption in length of Time. Your Pontifices maximi, grand Fathers at Rome, have commonly most excellent Resolutions and Actions at their first entrance into their Irish-wooden Chair; but they soon Reed-like hold down their Heads: The Italians jest it [Page 62] notably, though profanely. If you censure me, that I whip the Monks too hard, blame me, scourge me; but then, you must blame and scourge with me holy Writers in all Ages, the learned Angel of Hippo, divine Salvianus, our English Gildas, and a thousand worthy Rabbies more. Had they seen our dayes:—

They are Scandals you stum­ble at.

You must abjure those, if you enter our list.

Father Robert, let us leave him: that the Miracle of the Woman and Boy may further convince him.

Sir, you may repose your self, if you please, a while here. A little rem­nant of business in the house, summons us. Our stay shall be short.

I shall patiently wait your lei­sure. How now? Exeunt Luc. and Rob. A clear case, The Devil dreads not me. A sudden change indeed: This Miracle is but of the lower Classis. Woman and Boy, away with this Hocus and Pocus his Kinsman, let them praestò be gone, this thred bare kind of Juggling; (I have been us'd to this Pass and Repass-Part of Bar­tholmew Fair:) Let me tell you in a single Word, if you do not both confess to me your double-dealing, I'le instantly fetch a Constable, and ye shall be soundly whipt in Bridewell till ye do confess, and per­haps Justice will not stop or pause there. I'le do't immediatly.

O good Sir, come back. I am a poor Widdow, and have nothing where­with to keep life and soul together.

And I am a very poor Boy. Sir, I was a Beggar-Boy, and begg'd from door to door.

I am satisfied. Not a word of what has hapned, as you love your own safeties.

Boy, we must not say a word of this to the Fathers: if we do, we shall be turn'd forth a begging.

Is the Gentleman gone?

Yes, reverend Father: but thun­der-struck with the Miracle: He will, he saies, wait upon you an other time.

So, so: come, supper attends us.

Act 5. Scene 6.

They within depend upon me to begin this last Scene with a Dance fa­shionable to our Matter: and they will not be denied. The Dancers commence their entrance.

This is the Monk that Poison'd Henry the seventh Emperour, in a Church, being devoutly on his knees: In what manner he poison'd him, it is profane to name, and therefore was most impious and most execrable to do. Andreas Lampugnanus, a Courtier of Millan, neerly followed him, in Time, with respect unto the Place, and in the substance of Practise; but the Devil could not have scrued a Wicked­ness higher than the Monk did. Rottennes follow both their memories.

This is the Monk that Poison'd John King of England in a Monastery, and that he might accomplish his mischievous work without suspicion, first poison'd himself, drinking a health to the King in a poison'd Cup. Let his Name be thought as poisonous as his Poison.

This is Clement the Jacobin Frier, that [Page 63] murthered Henry the third, King of France, by searching into his body with a sanctified Knife; to whose Pralse Sice Cinque, the great Caliph at Rome, a kinde of almighty Favourer and Patron of the Jesuits, dedicated a Panegyricall Ora­tion; May he and his Patron be never remembred, but under the notion that the Devil was Patron to both.

This is Barrier, that attempted the murther of Henry the fourth, the late fa­mous King of France, with a poison'd Altar-Dagger, a Poison'd Dagger con­secrated on the Altar. May he and his Dagger be odious to the whole Mass of Mankinde.

This is Raviliack, Barriers Executor; animated thereunto by Varad a Jesuit: Let him and his Counsell our be so loath'd and abhorr'd by all men, that after­wards the very Toad may seem amiable to us.

This with his dark Lanthorn is Guido Vaux. His horrid attempt and compli­ance with Garnet and Oldcorn Jesuits, and others is not forgotten; though the Age now declining, the Friends of that Fa­ction report it a meer Fable: In the Age following, they will infallibly declare it a Fable ex Gathedrâ. Father Tompson, our Schollars Ghostly Father at Rome, boasted that he was an Actor in the Pow­der-Treason, and that he then digg'd many times under our Parliament-House till every thred of his shirt was wet. All those horrid Plotters were afterwards chronicled for Martyrs, in the English Martyrologie printed Anno Dom. 1608, and Garnets Picture exposed to sale, was adorned with Rayes about the Head, sig­nifying his Glory and Saintship. May all good People lay the memories of these Saints beneath them, when they go to the little House in the Garden.

This is Tony, a young extract of Ro­mish blood, that wounded our Poet in the face with a Knife of the Dagger-Fa­shion, intending to kill him. Let him pass as the simple Tony, and Fool of the Company. If any one hath incurr'd that wicked Name of Rebel, let him behold here with horrour, whom he hath imita­ted: The Monks have imitated the De­vil, the first and grand Rebel; the Jesu­its have imitated the Monks, and the De­vil; and Rebels imitate the Jesuits, the Monks, & the Devil.

Sir, will you buy a Book, a Godly Book?

What Books have you?

Books of Devotion, Sir: you may take your choice of English or La­tin.

Are you a Booksellour?

Yes, Sir, a poor one: but my Books are not sold publickly.

Your Books, I see, belong to the t'other side of the great Pond.

They do, Sir: therefore they bear the higher price here.

Madam, will your Ladiship be pleas'd to buy a Book?

Sir, I have good Books to sell.

Are you there again. He sells his Books as a Pedling sort of men sell [Page 64] base Tobacco; in the streets, but with­out publick notice.

One short word with you, Sir: You remember the most heavy charge you laid upon me.

I do.

I have done what lies on my part. If there were an Ocean of Time, I could meet it with a Sea of Matter: But all things have their assigned limits: and by the foot of Hercules, Pythagoras his Schollar may proportion the whole Bo­dy. I have carried you up to the highest Orb of my Policies: which is: to dis­guise the most innocent and most simple Persons into the most busie-witted and most pragmaticall: and thereby, to turn vertue in her native white, and her un­mingled colour, forth into contempt: So that all true Piety comes into the gripe of Scorn; and all Truth within the censure of Suspition: onely Politick Knaves thrive, and poor Honesty is neglected and rejected. Now Sir, having done my work I expect my wages.

What wages?

Your self.

I renounce you.

I shall not easily renounce my Right in you. Look you, Sir. I can ap­pear like my self at my pleasure.

Heaven shield us: Is our most reverend Father turn'd Devil? Father Robert help us. Lend me a godly Book.

And me another. O good lack, I have been at confession with the devil ma­ny a time. I fear he will not keep counsel.

This is strange in a high and mighty measure. Yet Mistris. Few there are of your reverend Fathers, that would not shrink into Devils, if they should ap­pear in their own likenes.

I am amaz'd. What! Is my re­verend Brother a Devil? Thou foul fin: would'st thou be so limit-less, as to take our holy Habit upon thee? how durst thou presume to touch it?

Sir, he claims me too; because I commanded him by the Power of natu­ral Magick: and for this he would spoil our Comedy.

I have rather conserv'd your Comedy: who should otherwise have introduced the Monks poisoning their Adversaries, and the Jesuites lessoning their Scholars at the sight of Pictures, and the stabbing of Images, to stab and kill.

Let me see, where is my Flagel­lum Daemonum? Thou hellish Dog, De­part, or I will amand, ablegate, and send thee to some vast and horrid Desert, where in all thy Apparitions thou shalt fright nothing but contemptible Flies, ignoble Serpents, and the like. Thou hast long been wandring, and here thou art out of thy proper Place, and I arrest thee. Thou goest: I have it here. Ego te, Be­stiam infernalem—.

The Magitian is but one. I may gain thousands by relinquishing him, and plying the credulous world with a belief that I fear such bug bears. O, O.

Once I have said, and I say the se­cond time, Ego te Bestiam infernalem—.

O, no more of that, good Sir: I'le leave the Magitian behind me, and go quietly away, if you please to loose me.

Well done, Reverend Father: your Books are formidable: the Devil fears you, and them.

I fear not this Monkish Devil. Sir, what shall I give you for your Fla­gellum Daemonum? It will be helpfull to me in scourging the Monks: I doubt not but I shall find more Devils amongst them.

[Page 65]

How say you, good Sir, shall I depart quietly?

Quietly, and quickly.

Wife, shall I not kiss before I go?

I abhor thee. I confess I had a child by thee thou cursed Incubus, but I was never married to thee. The name of Husband and Wife with us, were but words, I abbor thee.

As my Mistris abhors thee, so do I abhor thee. Whatsoever I confes't to thee, I'le confess again to a lawfull Priest.

And I.

My Lord, O my Lord Luci­fen: Order you had, or you could not have conserv'd your Government: now All's out of all Order. The Monks and Jesuites in your long absence have set all Hell on fire: they differ'd at first amongst themselves, and now they have stir'd up, and set all Hell against you. Your very Se­raglio of Vestals are wrought and brought into the Combustion.

O, Now am I sick indeed, and beyond Legerdemain. You are the sini­ster cause of all this, Agrippa.

Touch him not. Ego te, Bestiam infernalem—.

I swell into the Mountain Olympus. O, how I swell! I shall burst asunder: And there's a dreadfull tempest in my stomack. How, and where shall I empty my self? I know not where to be­stow my troubled stomack, and my sedi­tious belly. O good Females help me. O some kind body, point me to a secret place. O.

Help the Devil? Not I.

Your helping hand Lucifuga.

O Juno Lucina fer opem. Noise of straining.

Sir: I admonish you in private, to guard your Person: the Monks and Je­suites cannot observe a distance; they will endanger your life by themselves or their Abettors.

I am in your opinion: but if they kill me, they will immortalize the settled opinion the world hath of them; and I shall appear before him who knows that in all the story, I have kept the path of substantial Truth; and alwayes like Timanthes the Painter, cover'd more than I shew'd. I may have misplac'd and mis­center'd an Action, but in the substance I have been quadrate with Truth. Beyond this, These Renegadoes expose our Nati­on, being also their own, ridiculous in their Colledg-Comedies beyond the Seas: why should not we then, within our own Sphere and Region, pay them with the Law of Talion, especially after such most abusive, and most injurious Transactions?

I side with you.

And now, if Archimedes were alive, be would sooner undertake to num­ber the sands of the Sea, than to summe up the lies that will Epilogize to the Epi­logue of this Comedy.

My Lord's well amended. He has both vomited and gone to the stoole. He spew'd a proud Jesuite: and was brought to bed backwards of a drun­ken Monk. Here he comes in the midst of them.

The Jesuire is as like him as if he spat him out of his mouth.

The Monk is a Reverend Monk of a little one.

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A Sir Reverence Monk, you should have said.

I have suffered thee too long. De­part: Ego te—

Lord, and Prince: your presence in Hell will soon allay this Insurrection.

Be gone. Ego te Bestiam—

I go.

Farewell, Agrippa: I'le weave out the little parcel of my life, in the good old Garden-house of Devotion.

I and my Maid will setup School again: we shall never want Schollars. But Pretty, we must have a special care to keep the Devil out of our Quarters.

Madam, every man that offers himself at the Door, shall there bare his feet: wee'l see if he be cloven-sooted or no.

I'le joyn my forces with Fa­ther Robert, my zealous Defender against the Devil. Sir, I shall buy Books of you.

And I shall further instruct you.