An Answer by the Calves-Head Club, to Ludlow the Regicide.

What ass in the universe would not kick at his master, if he was sure he could knock his head off, and shake off that burthen beneath which he groans, if he was not such a coward to be fearful of a greater? Rebellion is always sanctifyed if it succeeds well, and the end propos’d, obtain’d with safety, always gives glory to the atchievement. Authority is only obey’d, because ’tis fear’d; and if once trodden under foot, nothing appears so despicable, as he that mounts a resty steed is counted a good horseman, if he tames the beast; but if the stubborn courser throws his rider, he falls a laughing stock to the glad spectators.

You seem to be truly sensible how much we glory in that act, which ought to be as much your pride, as it is our satisfaction: we reverence the valiant arm that did the deed, and daily signalize our gratitude to the pious memory of those illustrious heroes, who by their undaunted magnanimity brought their unparallell’d undertakings to a hopeful issue, and left behind them such a glorious example, which we shall never neglect to imitate when ourselves have opportunity. We have long hoped for the lucky minute, wherein we might shew the world the strength of our resolutions, and the constancy of our principles, and make those cowardly slaves know, who pretend an abhorrence to your past bravery, that we are the cocks, when we dare crow, that will make the lion tremble; we have at all times when we meet, an ax hung up in our club-room, in pia memoria of your sacred action: but had we the true weapon, as much as we hate popery, we should turn idolaters, and worship it much more than Roman Catholicks do their pictures. We have every thirtieth of January a calves-head feast, in contempt of that head which fell a glorious sacrifice to your justice, over which we drink to the pious memory of Oliver Cromwell; confusion to monarchy; to the downfal of episcopacy; a health to every noble regicide, and to the universal propagation of all king-killing principles; and if these are not meritorious formalities, and decent observances, we know not how to oblige our honest brethren, who are co-habitants with you at such a distance beneath us.

To be accounted rebels and bold villains, does not in any measure make us uneasy; for the believing ourselves otherwise, is a compleat satisfaction to ballance their envy that so think us; besides the pleasure we find in accounting them fools, slaves and cowards, is really more to us than a sufficient recompence: so that by our vilifying our opposites, we deny them opportunity ever to be even with us. The author of the dialogue between Vassal and Freeman, is our secretary; you guess’d his name very right in your letter, and a notable fellow he is either in verse or prose, for the justification of our principles; and is such a desperate tongue-stabbing hero at pro and con, that he clears the house of all people wherever he comes, but those of his own kidney; he vindicates all the proceedings of the High Court of Justice, with such admirable obstinacy and impudence, that the best lawyer in Westminster-hall is not able to cope with him, and justifies the bringing of a king to a scaffold, when the people dislike his stewardship, with so much insolence and arrogance, and drags him to a block, as you would a bear to a stake, with so much decency, that had he liv’d in the happy days when you erected a High Court of Justice, he would have been the fittest man in the universe for two posts under you; First, To have been attorney-general, and then executioner, and would, I am confident, have so strenuously exerted himself in both offices, that he would have gained a double reputation with our godly party. First, For the discharge of the one with the utmost malignancy. And, Secondly, For the dispatch of the other without disguise; for I dare be confident, he has assurance enough to go through-stitch with any thing that the world calls villainy, if we but think it virtue without the fear of shame, or dread of punishment: indeed, had our growing principles at this day but such another champion to defend ’em, I do not question but in a few years we might bring matters to bear, and by downright dint of our own weapon, calumny, make way to play the old game over again, to a far better purpose than has been yet effected. With the great hopes of which we take leave at present, desiring your brother Lucifer upon all occasions to lend us his assistance. So we subscribe ourselves both his and your

Humble Servants,

J.T. S.B. J.S. &c.

From J. Naylor, to his Friends at the Bull and Mouth.

I had no sooner set footing into this deep abyss of midnight, to which the sun, moon and stars are as great strangers, as frost and snow are to the country of Ethiopia, but a parcel of black spiritual janizaries saluted me as intimately as if I had been resident in these parts during the term of an apprenticeship; at last up comes a swindging lusty, over-grown, austre devil, arm’d with an ugly weapon like a country dung fork, looking as sharp about the eyes as a Woodstreet officer, and seem’d to deport himself after such a manner, that discovered he had an ascendency over the rest of the immortal negroes, and, as I imagin’d, so ’twas quickly evident; for as soon as he espied me leering between the diminutive slabbering-bib, and the extensive brims of my cony-wool umbrella, he chucks me under the chin with his ugly toad-colour’d paw, that stunk as bad of brimstone as a card-match new lighted, crying, How now, honest James, I am glad to see thee on this side the river Styx, prithee hold up thy beard, and don’t be asham’d, thou art not the first quaker by many thousands that has sworn allegiance to my government; besides, thou hast been one of my best benefactors upon earth, and now thou shalt see like a grateful devil, I’ll reward thee accordingly: I thank your excellency kindly, said I, pray what is it your infernal protectorship will be pleas’d to confer upon me? To which his mighty ugliness reply’d, friend Naylor, I know thou hast been very industrious to make many people fools in the upper world, which has highly conduc’d to my interest. Then turning to a pigmy aërial, who attended his commands as a running footman; haste, Numps, says he, and fetch me the painted coat, which was no sooner brought, but, by Lucifer’s command, I was shov’d into it neck and shoulders, by half a dozen smutty valets de chambre, and in a minute’s time found my self trick’d up in a rainbow-colour’d coat, like a merry-andrew. Now, friend, says the ill-favour’d prince of all the hell-born scoundrels, for the many fools you have made above, I now ordain you mine below; so all the reward, truly, of my great services, was to be made Lucifer’s jester, or fool in ordinary to the devil: a pretty post, thought I, for a man of my principles, that from a quaker in the other world, I should be metamorphosed into a jack-adams in the lower one. I could not but think it a strange kind of mutation, and knew no more how to behave myself in my gaudy-colour’d robes, than if I had been damn’d, and cramm’d into a tortoise-shell, and must have walk’d about hell upon all fours with a house upon my back.

In a little time after this new dignity was conferr’d upon me, the devil happen’d to make a splendid entertainment for all the souls in his dominion, who in the upper world had been profess’d Quakers, where I, quoth the fool, was ordered to give my attendance for the diversion of the company, but found myself so strangely disappointed when I beheld the guests, that had I been messed in Noah’s ark among lyons, bears, and alligators, I could not have been more amaz’d than I was at the unexpected appearance and deportment of such a confus’d assembly: my master Lucifer, and Ramsey the jesuit at his right hand, sat at the upper end of the table, and the rest of the scrambling company were seated like so many hungry mechanicks at a corporation-feast; but instead of their conversation being Yea and Nay, there never was heard such swearing and cursing at a publick gaming-table, nor all the points of copulation more lewdly discuss’d at a bawdy-house; blasphemy was the modestest of their talk, and there I came in with ’em for a fool’s share, and exerted my talent to the approbation and applause of the whole society.

Observing such a wonderful change in these our infernal friends, from what they appeared to be in the upper world, made my curiosity itch mightily to know the reason of this surprising alteration; upon which, said I, prithee Lucifer, in plain words, (for we fools you must know may say any thing to our masters) what is the meaning that these people who were quondam quakers when upon terra firma, should turn such debauch’d libertines in these lower regions, and from the most religious and precise of all hypocritical heaven-servers, to become the most degenerate reprobates in all your damnable dominions? I’ll tell you, says Lucifer, the reason; always those that pretended to the greatest purity in the other world, put on the cloak of religion, not to save their souls but to hide their vices, as some women wear masks, not to preserve their beauty, but to hide their ugliness; and when that veil is taken away which obscur’d the sinfulness of their natures, or when opportunity gives them leave to be wicked without damage to their interest (as they may here) you see how loose and wanton the most zealous of both sexes will be, notwithstanding all the external promises of piety and vertue. These words, tho’ they came from the father of lies, yet their satirical force gave me such a stab in the conscience, that had my label of mortality been stung by a wasp or a hornet, it could not have griev’d the outward man more, than this diabolical saying did the inward; and knowing by experience it savour’d of a little truth, I thought I could do no more than communicate his answer to you my friends, who are lovers of verity, from whence you may discern with half an eye, that Satan understands you as well as he does the college of Jesuits, or a Dutch conventicle, and if you take not timely care, will certainly prove too cunning for you.

Perhaps you will think me a very imperfect intelligencer, to tell you of a feast, and give you no account of the provisions, or what sort food the devil in his sultry dominions entertains his friends withal; therefore in the next place I shall venture to give you a bill of fare, that you may know at present what you may expect hereafter, lest otherwise I should leave your curiosities unsatisfied, and keep you ignorant of those avernous dainties by which immortality is here subsisted.

The first course consisted of a huge platterful of scorpions spits-cock’d, a fricassee of young salamanders, a bailiff’s rump roasted, baisted with its own dung, and a cock phœnix scalded in his feathers, smother’d with melted soap and boil’d arsnick; these were gross, substantial meats, design’d chiefly for keen appetites. The second course contain’d six dozen of West-India gwanas roasted in their own shells, a dish of squab-hickaries poach’d, a brace of flying dragons stew’d in their own blood, and a dish of shovel-nos’d sharks fry’d with a leviathan in the middle, toss’d up with what’s as good for a sow as a pancake; these were dainties that could not but be acceptable to the most squeamish stomachs; but now for rarities that must please the gust of an emperor. The third and last course consisted of such spiritual nutriment, that the nicest palated soul on this side the adamantine gates, without a surfeit, might subsist on to all eternity, which was serv’d up to the table, in much greater order than any of the foregoing part of the entertainment. In the first place, a dish of metaphysical curds, swimming in the cream of eloquence, was brought to the upper end of the table, by a devil in a long gown, upon which piece of cookery Lucifer and the Jesuit fed very heartily. In the next place a dish of pickl’d enthusiasms well pepper’d with obstinancy, and cover’d with the vinegar of dissention, was handed to the board by a meagre-fac’d devil in a little band and long cloak, which by abundance of the company was highly approv’d on. The third dish was a mess of melancholy humdrums, mix’d with sobs and sighs, and garnish’d round with blasphemy and nonsense, serv’d up with a she devil in querpo-hood and green apron, which the whole assembly in general commended, and devour’d as greedily as a gang of Welsh drovers would do a mess of leek-porridge, or a dish of cows bubby. When every soul had fed plentifully, and refresh’d his immortality with a chearful dose of spirit of sulphur, I, quoth the fool, for the jest’s sake, was appointed to say grace after meat; and when I had discharg’d the office of a chaplain, as comical as I could, the guests stagger’d away like so many fluster’d long tails from a Kentish feast, and so the solemnity was ended.

I have little more news to communicate from these parts, only that within these few months, we have had five or six thousand diabolical spirits, return’d from their embassies in the upper world, who were many years since commanded thither by prince Lucifer, to the assistance and further establishment of our party and opinion, and had every one of them possess’d themselves of good quarters, and lay snug in the bosoms of our sanctified friends, but reported when they came back, that an old trout-back apostate, who lately fell from quakerism to the church, arming himself cap-a-pee with the armour of truth, took up the sword of the gospel, and by downright dint of scripture and sound reason, made so large a conquest over Satan’s subjects, that the devils were forc’d to quit their possessions, and leave great numbers of our friends to the mercy of G——d and their ecclesiastical enemies; but fresh recruits are daily sent among you from these infernal territories, hoping in a little time to recover our lost interest.

I would have troubled you a little further, but that Lucifer being put in a merry mood by the pleasing news of your European Differences, has order’d all his jesters to be in waiting, and you know, all princes upon publick rejoycings at court, must have their fools as well as knaves, to attend ’em: so farewel.

J. Naylor.

The Quakers Answer to James Naylor.

THY friends are all very much afflicted to hear that Satan the father of the wicked, has laid violent hands upon thee, and has drawn thee out of the light into the land of utter darkness; if the dross of the world, that ungodly mammon, which tempts the unwary often into the sins of the flesh and many other iniquities, would redeem thee from thy woful prison, where nothing is to be heard but weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth, we would lend thee our assistance with all our hearts; but the spirit within us has declar’d the truth, and told us, that thy unmerciful jaylor will take no bribe or bail, and that the debt thou art in for, the world cannot pay, and therefore we all fear thou art trapann’d into a loathsome gaol from whence there is no redemption. We thought the many persecutions thou underwent’st for the l—d’s sake in this world, (viz.) as peeping thro’ the yoak of infamy, and losing thy two members of attention. Secondly, for hugging the vagabonds land-mark against the will of the spirit, and undergoing the rod of correction. And, Thirdly, for suffering the clack of the spirit to be bored thro’ with a hot wimble, for warranting thyself to be the true son of thy father, would have been merits sufficient to have rais’d thee upon the pinnacle of mount Sion, and there to have fixed thee as a standing evidence of the truth to all eternity; but since the spirit within thee prov’d a lying spirit, that extinguished the light, and led thee like a blind guide into the dark ways of destruction; we that were the followers of thy false glimmerings, must forsake the errors, and seek the lord by a more perfect illumination, for the false fading jack-a-lanthorn which thou leftest among us, is burn’d into the socket, and now stinks in the nostrils of the righteous, far worse than the dying snuff of a cotton-candle; besides, what spiritual pilgrim in his progress to the land of the living, would follow a wicked Will-with-a-wisp, who has led a friend before into dark ways, and there left him to grope among the filthiness of sin and pricks of conscience to all eternity? no, if we follow thy ways, we shall err like stray’d sheep, and be pounded by Satan for wand’ring into the paths of the wicked.

That the father of lies, upon thy first entrance into his wicked habitation, should put thee into a fool’s jacket, we do not much wonder, for the painted marks of folly are Satan’s gay livery, with which he cloaths his wicked servants in this world as well as in his dominions; for didst thou ever behold on earth the sons of darkness, who follow the lust of the flesh, and delight in those pomps and vanities which the inward man forbids our frail natures to pursue, but they always were distinguish’d by some gaudy badge, which discovered their pride, or other infirmities? do not the high-priests of Baal wear lawn coversluts, and their head journeymen red pokes upon their backs? do not flatterers of princes wear badges on their breasts, and adorn their spindle-shanks with glittering gimcracks? do not their lazy slaves wear blue and yellow, that the world may know whose fools they are? do not the blessers of their food wear silken ornaments dangling from their proud necks to their ancles, that the publick may mistake them to be wiser than their neighbours? do not the captains of the host hoop their loins with golden sashes, and stick feathers in their caps to fright their foes with their finery? do not judges wear gowns of a crimson die, and the great men of the law wear the skull-caps of knavery, with the edges tipp’d with innocence, to deceive the vulgar? do not physicians ride in coaches with the weapons of destruction ty’d dangling at their arses, as it they were hurrying on a full trot to kill and not recover their patients? do not haughty vintners hypocritically tye on their blue ensigns of humility, to cozen their customers into an opinion of their lowliness? do not whoremongers and adulterers thatch their empty noddles with whole thickets of whores-hair? and do not wanton women wear turrets on their heads, and cover their tails with the bowels of the silk-worms? do not drunkards wear red noses, knaves hawks eyes, and liars impudent faces? in short, friend Naylor, most people upon earth have some badge or other of Satan’s livery; even kings themselves wear purple, and the whores of Babylon scarlet; therefore our friends are all of one opinion, that since thou departed’st so far from the light, as to suffer wicked Satan to decoy thee into his trapsoul of eternal darkness, he has done thee but justice to put thee into a fool’s coat, that every time thou art thoughtful of thy miserable confinement, thou may’st look upon thy party-coloured livery, and cry with a pitiful voice, alas, what a fool am I! which is all the comfort thy friends who are sorrowful for thy condition, are able to administer unto thee at this immensurable distance.

We are very glad to here that Satan is no niggard in his family, but like a generous host, provides so plentiful a table for his numerous guests: we thy Friends upon earth, have taken his infernal food into our serious consideration, and have resolv’d, nemine contradicente, to lead a starving life upon earth, rather than enter his palace-gate to be beholden to him for a dinner. We shew’d thy bill of fare to our friend Roberts, at the White hart in Chancery-lane, approv’d by the wicked men of the law, who love to profane their stomachs with fine feeding, to be as nice a gratifier of luxurious palates as ever handled ladle; and he declareth for truth, by the motion of the spirit, that tho’ he has often roasted a cod’s-head larded with bacon without tying it upon the spit, boil’d a pound of butter stuff’d with anchovies without melting it, grilliado’d jelly of harts-horn without dissolving it, fry’d a jackboot into incomparable tripe, stew’d pebble-stones till they have become as soft as stew’d prunes, and has made good savoury sauce with an addled egg and kitchin-stuff, yet he acknowledges himself wholly ignorant how to dress any one dish thou hast mentioned in the catalogue of thy dainties, and therefore desires thou wilt do him the friendly kindness to acquaint us in the next letter, what sort of cook Satan has got in his kitchin; and if he be a friend, whether thou think’st our friend Coquus’s wife mayn’t be admitted as his scullion, in case she would become a servant in thy master’s family, for she is grown so peevish, he is willing to part with her. So hoping thou wilt give us an account the next opportunity, we rest thy, Loving Friends.

From Lilly to Cooley the Almanack-maker in Baldwin’s-Gardens.

EVER since I took a trip into this lower world, and left you (by the help of Moon-groaping and Star-fumbling) to project almanacks, predict prodigies, and conjure up lost spoons, stoln good, and stray’d cattle, I have had no opportunity of paying my respects to you, till now, for ’tis so abominably up hill from our world to yours, that none but the devil himself is able to climb it, he being forced to creep upon all-four, like a squirrel up a nut-tree, all the way of his journey; and had I sent a letter by his cloven-footed worship, I was fearful you would not have thought him, at your years, a proper messenger. I hear, since I left you, you are grown as grey as a badger, and that you are approv’d by all cook-maids, porters-wives and basket-women, to be the most eminent bodkin and thimble-hunter of all the Ptolemeans in the town, and by the help of the twelve heavenly houses and their seven twinkling inhabitants, not only undertake, but make wonderful discoveries. Flat-caps and blue-aprons, I hear haunt your door every morning, as hawkers do a publisher’s, or journeymen-taylors a Smithfield cook’s at noon, some for a sixpenny, and some a twelvepenny slice of your Astrological judgment, of which, to show your honesty to the world, you give them such lumping pennyworths, that you have made the noble science of Heaven-peeping as cheap to the publick, as boil’d tripe in Fee-lane, or bak’d sheeps-head in your own element Baldwin’s-gardens. I am joyful to hear you are grown so great a proficient in the celestial gimcracks; but indeed, when I first knew you a joyner at Oxford, that us’d to make cedar cases for close-stool pans, I thought you as ingenious a mechanick in your way, as he that invented a mouse-trap or a nut-cracker, but little thought then, you would have laid down the plane and the hand-saw, of which you were an absolute master, to take up Albumazar’s weapons, the celestial globe and compasses, to which you were a mere stranger: but however, Astrology being a kind of liberal science all men I know are free to dive into the mystery, from the whimsey headed scholar, to the strolling tinker; therefore your leather-apron and glue-pot are no disparagement to your pursuit of the seven wandring informers, any more than it is a scandal to a mountebank to be first a fool, and then a travelling physician. Gadbury we know was no more than a country botcher, before he was admitted as a tenant into the twelve houses; and Partridge was no more than a London cobler, before he was made running footman to the seven planets; yet both these students in Astrology have arriv’d, I hear, to as great an eminency in their heavenly profession, as ever was acquired by the famed Dr. Saffold, or his successor Case, by long study and experience, in the noble arts of Poetry and Physick. Therefore why may not that spurious issue of a Carpenter call’d a Joiner, make as legitimate an Astrologer, as profound a Conjurer, as infallible a Fortune-teller, as the best of them; nay better, if he knows but to use his tongue like a smoothing-plane, and can take down the roughness of some peoples incredulity, then may he work them as he does his deal-boards, till he has glu’d or nail’d them fast to his own interest. These are the talents for which I hear you are famous above other Astrologers, and that by downright dint of craft, pout and banter, you have wheedled more money in your time out of chamber-maids, cook-wenches, old bawds, midwives, nurses, and young strumpets, than ever was got by the rug and leather, luck in a bag, or that in most excellent juggle on the cards, call’d preaching the parson: nay if all the gains that you have made of these three profitable inventions were to be join’d together; besides a whole mustard-pot full of broad-pieces, a drudging-box full of guineas, a meal-tub full of crowns and half crowns, and an old powdering-tub full of shillings and sixpences, which lie parcel’d up in your own house, I hear that you have several hundreds of pounds in the Stationers company, which, besides the interest of the money, entitles you every year to four good dinners in the hall, as many noddles full of rare claret, and four pockets full of venison-pasty for your female deputy, who is said to be a notable understrapper to you in the business of Astrology, and is of as much service to you as a second to a merry-andrew, for without the one, the other could do nothing.

I cannot but highly approve of the method I observe in your almanacks, for since you write every year four, i. e. three in other persons names, and one in your own, you have wisely projected a way to be infallibly right in your predictions of the weather, which are commonly varied under no more than four several denominations in any one of the four seasons; so that by making your prognostications in every almanack different, one must certainly tell right, and by keeping all four in your pocket, which I am inform’d you have cunning enough to take care of, by plucking out that which you know is agreeable and falls right, declaring yourself to be the author, you gain reputation, and by this juggle make some fools in your company believe that you have the stars at more command, than a Haberdasher of dead bodies has his linkmen at a funeral. This piece of cunning none of the celestial fraternity can justly blame you for, every artist well knowing a juggler and an astrologer are as inseperable companions as a bawd and a midwife, or a lawyer and a knave, for either without the other, like an adjective without a substantive, would be unable to stand by himself.

Of all the almanacks that are extant, none are so valuable in these subterranean regions as your own; few hawkers travel into these parts but they bring whole baskets full along with them, and the cry of Cooley’s almanack for two months in the year, is as universally bawl’d about hell’s metropolis, as mackrel among you when they come to be six a groat, or Chichester lobsters when they stink at midsummer. Of all the almanacks brought among us, prince Lucifer gives yours the preference and never goes without one in his pocket, to put him in mind of an Holy Rood day, that his devilship may not lose his nutting time. Your last English merlin but one, wanted of the four cardinal points, for which piece of forgetfulness, the devil in a great rage cry’d he ow’d you a shame, and I was since inform’d, that one of our infernal plenipotentiaries upon earth discharg’d his master’s promise in a short time after, at the Darby alehouse in Fulwood’s rents; by the same token, the liquor had so eclips’d your distinguishing faculties, that instead of a tankard of warm ale, that stood by you, you took hold of the candlestick, and in a drinking posture convey’d the lighted candle to your mouth, the taste of which was so intolerable to your lips, that you flung it away in a great passion, believing ’twas the tankard of drink, and swore the bitch of a wench had made it so scalding hot there was no drinking it. This unhappy accident occasion’d some ill-natur’d people to reflect on you, and say, how should you know a star from a kite-lanthorn, that could not distinguish between a tankard of warm ale and a lighted candle?

I have no news from these parts that can be welcome to a man of your gravity and profession. As for astrologers, they are no more regarded in this kingdom, than an honest man in your world, or a modest woman in a theatre, for the best employment that most of them aspire to here, is to carry a closestool-pan upon their back after a quack-doctor, which savory receptacle being put in a square case, makes our fraternity look like so many raree-show men loaded with their boxes of dancing baubles.

I must confess, doctor Saffold, that famous student in physick, poetry and astrology, whose verse was as good an emetick, as his pills were a purge, being Lucifer’s peculiar favourite, was advanc’d to the dignity of being flea catcher to his royal consort; but the other day had like to have lost his place, by chasing one of his lady’s little enemies into her mount of Venus, and beating the bush to start the game, was so wonderfully pleas’d at the pastime, that the old fool could not forbear laughing, which ill manners so inflam’d the infernal duchess, that she vow’d, except he would down on his knees and kiss what he laugh’d at, she would never forgive him; upon which the poor doctor was forc’d to join beards, or else would have been turned out, to his eternal shame as well as misery.

Albumazar and Ptolomy are set up like the two loggerheads at St. Dunstan’s church, and once in an hundred years they strike upon an huge bell the number of the centuries from the fall of Lucifer, that the devils and the damn’d may know how eternity passes; for you must imagine, as a quarter of an hour is to the time of your world, so is an hundred years to the eternity of ours, every watch goes here at least ten thousand years with but one winding up, for their movements, like our form and substance, are all spiritual, and the worst artist we have among us, your Fleetstreet Tompion is but a mere blacksmith to; as for my own part, I trudg’d for the first six months after Dr. Ponteus, with a steeple-crown’d conveniency, as I mentioned before, but having always such a stink of devil’s-dung in my nostrils, I petitioned for a remove, and was admitted to be a yeoman of the bason to Lucifer’s cloven-hoofs, to pick, wash, and refresh them after his return from earth, which he visits very often for the preservation of his interest in the upper world; and the worst inconveniency I find is, that his worship’s feet smell worse after much walking than a sweating negro’s.

But, however, my old friend, let not this discourse discourage you from venturing to come among us, or frighten you into a repentance of your frauds and subtilties, that may carry you another way; for a man of your merits, learn’d in Astrology from the very nose of the great bear, to the extreme point of the dragon’s tail, and skilful in the Mathematicks, from the mensuration of a surface to the most profound nicety in solid Geometry, need not question, but that your old acquaintance and assistant Satan, who has faithfully stood by you upon all occasions, will bestow some reputable post upon you, answerable to the gravity and skill of so understanding a wiseacre, to whom I subscribe my self a loving friend and brother Philomat.

Lilly.

Cooley’s Answer to Lilly.

I WOULD have you to know, I am not so far in my dotage, but I have reason enough left plainly to discern I am very much affronted in your ironical letter: as for my part, Mr. mean it as you please, I take it in good earnest, for it is not consistent with my temper and gravity at these years, to like such unmannerly jesting. Time was, I was a young fellow, that would have scolded with a butter-whore, box’d a carman, or have scribled scurrilously with any Lilly in the universe; but, alas! when a man has liv’d in this world to the age of near seventy, and has had familiar conversation with all the foolish women in the town, puzzled his brains with more angles, circles, squares, pentagons, hexagons, heptagons, and parallellopipedons, &c. than ever has been yet found in that most famous introduction to the mathematicks, call’d Euclid’s Gimcracks, pour’d as much Derby ale thro’ his guts every year as would have fill’d the great fatt at Heidelburg, and metamorphosed as much tobacco into smoak every month, as would have put a whole county into a mist; I think ’tis high time for a man to have done with discord, and begin to compose himself into a little harmony; therefore I take it ill you should attack me in my old age, especially when you have Hell on your side, and the devil and all to help you.

What, tho’ I was a joiner at Oxford, and once to shew myself a good workman, made a cedar close-stool case for the dean of Christ-Church, I question not but one time or other for the excellency of its work, it will be carried into the library, and be there preserv’d as a monument of its maker’s glory to all succeeding ages, when you will have no remains to put the world in mind of you, but your old conjuring countenance, painted upon a sign, and hung up over Black-friers gateway, subscribed with a little paultry poetry, fit for no body’s reading but a parcel of country hobbies, who have left the plow and the flayl, to come up to London to be cozen’d out of the fruits of their labour. It is well known, I was born and educated in a learned air, and tho’ a man be bred a cobler in that climate, he cannot help being a scholar, if he but furnish’d with as much brains as will fill a cockleshell. I confess, I have not had the honour to be entered of a college, yet by my own chamber-study, without a tutor, having a good natural genius, I could tell you how many parts of speech there were, by that time I was eighteen years of age; and I will appeal to the world, who may judge by my conversation, whether I have not made a wonderful advancement within these 50 years, insomuch that you may see I dare write Philomath, in the very title page of my almanack; and therefore, Mr. am not to be banter’d at these years. You have the confidence, in several parts of your letter to call me conjurer, tho’ I must tell you, Mr. by the way, you are the first person that ever thought me so. ’Tis true, I do sometimes when I am well paid for it, erect a scheme in search of lost goods, or stray’d cattle, and do presume secundum artem, to send the querent east, west, north, or south, a mile or two distance from the loser’s house, to search within six doors of the sign of the four-footed beast, and if they cannot find the thief one way, I can send them as far another for a new fee; and all this I can justify by the rules of Astrology as well as any man; but must an artist for this be called a conjurer, and by a person too who has been a professor of the same science? Indeed, old acquaintance, I take it very unkindly, because you yourself must needs know we are honest men that deserve no such character. As for my mistaking the lighted candle for a tankard of hot ale, I remember nothing of the matter; but Bacchus tho’ he be no planet, yet all men know he has a great ascendency over us mortals, and what he might influence me to do, when the light of reason, by which we see to distinguish, was eclipsed, I know not; but I am morally sure, when my senses are about me I am not easily to be so deceived; for I presume to know a pig from a dog, or the difference between a Thing and cartwheel, as well as Ptolomy himself were he now living.

You say, to my reputation, that my almanacks sell beyond any body’s in your subterranean country, and that Lucifer himself is never without one in his pocket: I am very glad to hear he is so much my friend, as to give mine the preference, and for his civility intend to send him one next year well gilt on the back, and bound up in calves-leather, by the hand of some friend or other, that shall swim in Derby ale to the very gates of his palace; such a wet soul that shall be as welcome as a shower of rain to your drowthy dominions. The pleasing news you have sent me is, that my works are so vendible in your parts, for I assure you, upon your intelligence, I shall raise the price of my copy the next year; for if my almanacks sell as well in hell as they do upon earth, I am sure the company of Stationers must get the devil and all by them. So I rest yours between enmity and friendship.

H. Cooley.

From Tony Lee to Cave Underhill.

I hear the effects of your debaucheries are tumbled into your pedestals, and make you walk with as much deliberation as Mr. Cant preaches; when a man is once so founder’d by the iniquity of his life, that his full speed is no faster than a snail’s gallop, and that his memory and his members both equally fail him, it is full time that he was travell’d to his journey’s end; for with what comfort can a man live in the world when it is grown weary of him? young men I know look upon you as superannuated, and had rather see a death’s-head and an hour-glass in their company, than see you make wry faces at your rheumatick twitches, or hear you banter upon your old gouty pains, and the past causes thereof between jest and earnest. When a man once comes to answer a bawdy question over the bottle silently, that is, with a feign’d simper and a shake of the head, no body cares a fart for him, he is good for nothing at those years, but, like Solomon’s proverbs, to let young men foresee that worldly pleasures, when they come to be old, are but vanity and vexation of spirit; and to stir up young women to despise the impotency of old age, which their fumbling fathers in vain admonish them to reverence. A young comedian is apt to make every body his jest; but when arriv’d at your years, himself becomes a jest to every body. Youth gives an air to wit that renders it delightful, but for an old man to pretend to talk wisely, is like a musician’s endeavouring to fumble out a fine sonata upon a wind-broach, tho’ the time be good, the instrument is imperfect, and the organs want that sound which should give a grace to the harmony. Some men at sixty, are apt to flatter themselves in publick under the imbecilities of nature, and will boastingly say, they can do every thing as well as they could at thirty; but experienced women, who are the best judges of human decay, are too sensible of their error, and, if modesty would give ’em leave, could easily demonstrate the difference. I thank my stars, I knew not by experience the winter of old age, but made my exit in the beginning of my autumn; but yet I found what nature at midsummer esteem’d a pleasure, was even then become a drudgery; and what used to be a refreshment to life, was found but a slavish exercise to the body; therefore I heartily pity your impotent condition, who has near twenty years surviv’d your grand climateric, till thou art forc’d to crawl about the world with a load of diseas’d flesh upon thy back, and art no less than a sumpter-horse to thy own infirmities. Methinks I see thee creeping upon the surface of the earth, upon a feeble pair of gouty supporters, thy loins swath’d up in flannel, leaning upon a crutch-head cane, and bending towards thy mother earth, who catches thee at every stumble, sometimes reflecting on the past pleasures of human life, and sometimes looking forward with imperfect eyes, towards the doubtful state of immortality, grinning as you walk at the gaiety of youth, and snarling in thy thoughts at those delights the weakness of thy age has put thee past enjoying; pursuing only that pleasure, which tho’ thy youth made vicious, is in age become thy support; that is, the bottle, which in thy younger days was oft made nauseous by excess; but wise experience now has taught thee sure to make the darling comfortable by a seasonable moderation: methinks I see thee use it now with caution, as if you hop’d by every glass you drank, to strengthen nature’s union, and keep your soul and body still from separation.

The ghost of a comedian in these shades is but an useless piece of immortality, for all the entertainments upon the stages of our infernal theatres are very tragical, no smile, no merry looks, or monky gestures us’d by your merry-andrews upon earth to provoke your listning audience to a laughter, are fashionable in these parts. If you intend to come among us, you must learn to howl, to grin, and gnash your teeth, unless you can make yourself so compleat a philosopher as to laugh at your own misery. Horror, darkness, and despair o’erspread the whole dominion, and our tyrannical prince is never better pleas’d than when he sees his subjects the most miserable. As for my part, as merry a representative of some foolish plebeian as I was in the upper world, I cannot in these melancholy grottos for the heart of me, frame so much as one chearful conceit to mitigate those torments, which by virtue of our diabolical laws are perpetually inflicted upon me: therefore those who betake themselves to these regions ought to arm themselves with abundance of resolution; for whoever flinches beneath their pains, do but encrease their punishment, for which reason I advise you to consider what you have to trust to, if your journey be downwards; and if you find it in your power, to divert your coming hither with prayers and tears to heaven, or else I must tell you in good earnest, you may jest on as I did, till you die and be damn’d like your humble servant,

Anthony Lee.

Cave Underhill’s Answer to Tony Lee.

Certainly you have a very good intelligence in your world, of the circumstances of us who dwell above you, or else you are the devil of a guesser, for you seem in your letter, to have as true a sense of my condition as if you were an eye-witness of it; for to tell you the truth on it, I find all the members of my body in such a fumbling condition, that I begin to think of a leap in the dark, and to wonder what in a little time will become of me; the people are still pleas’d to see me crawl upon the stage; indeed the shuffling pace that age and decay hath brought me to, makes the audience as merry as if it were a counterfeit gesture to provoke laughter; but, i’faith, brother Tony, that which makes them glad makes me sad, insomuch, that my heart has aked every time these five years, when I have play’d the sexton in Hamlet, for fear when I am once got into the grave, the grim tyrant should give me a turn over the perch, and keep me there for jesting with mortality.

Nature, which finds herself declining in me, is so greedy of new breath, that I gape as I crawl for the benefit of the fresh air, as if I was jaw-fallen, and those humming insects that are a pestiferous calamity this hot weather to all cooks-shops and sugar-bakers, are so unmannerly, that they fly over those few palisadoes of my breathing-hole that are left, and dung t’other side the pails, as if they took my mouth for a house of office; nay, sometimes in creeping along the length of a street, I have had my tongue so fly-blown, that had I not gone into a tavern and wash’d them off with a pint of canary, I don’t know, but my whole head might have been as full of maggots in a little time, as a sheep’s arse at Midsummer.

I find the greatest curse of my old age is, my desire surviving my capacity, for I protest, my inclinations are as youthful as ever, tho’ my ability is quite superannuated.

I am just now entring into a fit of the gout, which so terrifies me, that I pray one half minute, and curse the other, like a true bred seaman in a storm, therefore am forc’d to break off, blood and wounds, abruptly.

So farewel,

Cave Underhill.

From Alderman Blackwell to Sir Charles Duncombe.

HEaring what a noisy reputation you have acquir’d within the walls of England’s metropolis, and what a popular rumble your politick generosity makes over the heads of us, out of whose ruins you have, true citizen like, erected your own welfare, I could no longer forbear putting you in mind of some of your former managements, left some rakehelly rhime-tagger or other, should flatter you to believe you have honesty and integrity enough to qualify you for a bishop; I took you a meer bumkin, and taught you your trade for a basket of turky-eggs, and therefore it highly concerns your prudence to consider the obligation you lie under of carrying yourself to the world with all humility, tho’ aspir’d to the very pinnacle of prosperity, since the first cause of your advancement dropp’d out of the fundament of a turkey: the eggs, as an argument of their being new laid, I remember were besmeared with excrementitious tokens of good luck, which make me fancy, when I received them, they were beshitten omens of your future fortune, in whose behalf they were presented me.

Birds have often shew’d their tenderness and compassion to mankind: eagles have preserv’d infants in their nests, who have afterwards become singularly prosperous in the ages they have liv’d in. Sappho rais’d himself to the reputation of a God among the Persians by parrots, and yourself to the grandeur of an alderman by your mother’s hen turkies: for in all wonderful effects the leading cause ought to be reverenc’d and respected.

Nothing conduces more to the rise and riches of a citizen, than these three qualifications; nor can a man be a compleat trader without them: First, To be a hypocrite undiscernably: Secondly, A knave, and not mistrusted: And Thirdly, To be diligent in all matters that concern his own interest. These profitable talents I must needs confess you are absolute master of, and managed them with that admirable cunning, that I always conceiv’d a different opinion of you, till I had given it irrevocably into your power to feather your own nest, by compleating of my ruin; and like a true politician (I thank you) you made an excellent use of the lucky opportunity: for when the vicissitude of fortune had put my affairs in a little disorder, and I thought it best for the safety of my person to take foreign sanctuary, what friendly protections did you make, from the teeth outwards, of the faithful service you would do me in my absence, in order to compose and settle matters after such a manner, that all the difficulties should be remov’d and made easy, that had lessen’d my credit, and occasion’d me to withdraw? Upon which, I being too forward to believe a person, I had rais’d from sheep-skin breeches, and leathern shoe-ties, to the substance and reputation of a topping citizen, could never forget the obligation he lay under to do me justice, as to prove treacherous to his master, trusted you alone with my whole effects, and the sole power of managing my affairs according to your own discretion: but you, like a faithful steward, when my back was turn’d, instead of endeavouring to support my declining reputation, lessen’d my circumstances to my creditors far beneath their real estimate, till you had bought up my notes to the sum of a hundred thousand pounds, for an eighth part of their value, on your own behalf, with the ready specie I had left you to compound my matters; and like an honest man return’d them upon me at their full contents, cheating my creditors of seven parts in eight of their due, sinking the money to yourself, and leaving, like an ungrateful wretch, the kindest of all masters to die a beggar; in this, I say, you shew’d yourself a compleat citizen: First, A hypocrite in dissembling friendship to me: Secondly, A knave, in cheating me and my creditors; And Thirdly, An industrious man, in diligently converting so fair an opportunity so foully to your own interest.

Upon this basis (when downright knavery, according to the city phrase was term’d outwitting) you rais’d a popular esteem to yourself for being a wealthy man, and a cunning one, and as I have since heard, daily improv’d your riches as honestly as you got it; and by changing broad money into less, made your sums the larger: a pretty sort of a paradox, that a man by diminution should raise an increase: but the deed was darker than the saying, yet both very intelligible to money’d citizens in the age you live in. It is no great wonder, if rightly consider’d, that a man of your dealing should acquire such vast riches, since you were so well belov’d by your under agents, that scarce a sessions pass for seven years together, but one or other was hanged for the propagation of your interest, whilst yourself stood secure behind a bulwark of full bags, that skreen’d your person from the law, and your reputation from the danger of common slander.

Another fortunate opportunity you had of heaping more muck upon your fertile possessions, and manuring those mighty sums you had before collected, was the misfortunes of your prince, which largely contributed (as you honestly order’d the matter) to your further prosperity. Fourscore thousand pounds more added to your preceeding stock, was, indeed, enough to make a reasonable man contented; but as nothing less than the conquest of the whole world could satisfy the ambition of Alexander; so nothing, I am apt to think, but the riches of the universe, can quench the unbounded avarice of so aspiring a Crœsus. But oh the disappointments that attend the proud and wealthy! what signifies three hundred thousand pounds to an ambitious alderman, if he cannot take a peaceable nod in his elbow-chair of state, and be registered in the city-annals, lord-mayor of London, that posterity may read Duncombe and his turkies were as much renowned in the age they liv’d in, as Whittington and his cat? I am heartily sorry (since fortune’s favours, and your own indefatigable knavery, have so happily concurr’d to make you rich) that the electors of the city would not also agree to make you honourable; and that your oracle of time, that publick monument of your generosity, with your promise of a mansion-house for the city-magistrate, and the twelve apostles to be elevated at the east-end of St. Paul’s, will not all prevail upon the livery-men of London to chuse you into the trust and dignity, which would very highly become a person of your worth, honour, and integrity. But, as I well remember, one of the eggs was rotten, which I have since reflected on, and think it reasonable to judge, if there be any divination by eggs, that it predicted your hopes would be addled in this very affair; and do therefore advise you for the future, to decline all thoughts of the mayoralty. I am very well pleas’d that you deal barefac’d to the world in one particular, which is, that tho’ you keep a chaplain in your house to feed your ears with a few minc’d instructions, yet you entertain two mistresses publickly in your family, to reduce the rebellious flesh into an orderly subjection; from whence your neighbours may see, in matters of religion you are no hypocrite, but openly do that which more secret sinners would be asham’d to be caught in, who perhaps are full as wicked, tho’ they hide their vices with a sanctify’d coverslut, whilst you professing not much religion, scorn to make so ill a use as a cloak, of that little you are bless’d with.

I fear you are grown too bulky in estate to be long-liv’d in prosperity, you are a well-fed fish to be caught nibbling at the bait, and abundance of great men are angling for you; if you are once hamper’d by the hook, you will not shake yourself off easily: and methinks it’s pity a man that, I have some reason to say, has got an estate knavishly, should ever run the hazard of losing it foolishly; but preserve it according to the custom of the city, to build an alms-house after your decease, that may maintain about the thousandth part of as many people when he is dead, as he has cheated when he was living.

So farewel,

Blackwell.

The Answer to Alderman Blackwell.

WHO would ever be a servant, if it were not for the hopes of being at one time or other as good a man as his master? It’s the thoughts of bettering our own conditions without danger, that makes a man submit with patience to a servile subjection: but he that can govern his master, will never truly obey him; and he that finds he can outwit him, will be no longer his fool. Nature made us freemen alike, and gave us the whole world to seek our fortunes in; and he that by either wit, strength or industry, can straddle over the back of another, has the riding him for his pains. If one man that is poor, worms a rich man out of his estate, it is but changing condition with one another, and the world in general is not a jot the worse for it: besides, in most mens opinions, he best deserves an estate that has cunning enough to get one, and wit enough to keep it when he has got it. I know no injustice but what is punishable by the laws of the land; and if I can acquire an estate, tho’ fifty men starve for it, that the laws will protect me in, I think myself as rightfully possess’d as any man in the kingdom: he that is bubbled out of an estate will certainly fall under the character of a fool; and he that gets one will be as surely suspected for a knave; no man enjoys the reputation of an honest man, but he who bribes the world by courtesies into that opinion of him; and he who, like myself, scorns to be at the charge of purchasing on’t, shall be sure never to enjoy the character. Honesty and courage may be said to stand upon one bottom, for all men would derogate from both, and be knaves and cowards if they durst; for its the fear of being piss’d upon by every body, that makes men fight soberly; and the fear of punishment that makes men live honestly; yet a politick coward often passes for a brave man for want of being try’d; and an arrant knave, for want of opportunity for a very honest fellow.

You blame me for building my own welfare out of your ruin, and charge me with knavery for taking the advantage of your folly; I am of that old opinion, that all mankind are either fools or knaves; and it is a maxim in my politicks, that he who will not be a knave, the world will make a fool of him. One man’s oversight is always another’s gain. How then can you condemn me for laying hold of that opportunity, which your weakness gave me as a tryal of my wit? and had I neglected making a true use of it to my own advantage, I had made myself a greater fool than he who trusted a single man’s honesty with so large a temptation. Could you have kept your estate in your own power, how great was your indiscretion to deliver it into mine? and since I found, when I had it in my custody, I could secure it to myself, beyond the power of the law to recover it, how foolish shou’d I have been to have omitted the opportunity? in short, I am very well satisfyed at the usage I gave you, no check of conscience do I yet find that inclines me to repentance; but am heartily resolv’d, thro’ the course of my life, never to let slip so luscious an advantage.

As for my sorting of broad-money for the royal snippers, it was grown so universal a practice among all dealers, that it ceas’d from being thought criminal, and became a profitable trade; and I never was so lazy in my life, as to suffer any project to be on foot, wherein money was to be got, but I always had a hand in’t. The Hollanders clipp’d it openly in their shops, and pass’d it afterwards among us. And shall we suffer a foreign nation to ingross that advantage to themselves, which was doubtless rather the property of a true-born Englishman to enjoy? no I am a true lover of my country, and do assert, it’s better to be rogues among our selves, and cozen one another, than it is to be cheated in our own way by a pack of knavish neighbours.

As for my master king James, I dealt honestly by him as long as he continued my customer; but truly when his credit was sunk, and he was forc’d to take sanctuary in a foreign country, my conscience told me ’twas the safest way, even to serve my prince as I had done you my master; for indeed, I could not reasonably think; providence flung so many lucky hits in a man’s way for him to make no use of; besides, what signifies cozening a king of a trifling sum of fourscore thousand pound, when he was going into a country where every body knew he would be well provided for? I consider’d it would do me more kindness by half; and tho’ some of his friends blam’d me, yet I thought myself an honester man by much, than those who stripp’d him of his sovereignty; for if it was a sin to cheat him at all, then those who cheated him most were doubtless the most wicked; and to deal with you like an old friend, without dissimulation, as long as I can imagine there’s a man upon earth more sinful than myself I have a conscience that can fling nothing in my face, but what I can withstand boldly without blushing.

You seem to highly reflect upon me for keeping two domestick conveniences publickly in my family, as if a man of my grandeur should abridge himself of those pleasures which every apprentice-boy has the enjoyment of between the mistress and the maid, without stirring over the threshold; and sure an Alderman in the city, a grave magistrate, a man worth three hundred thousand pounds, need not be either afraid or asham’d of being suspected guilty of that little sniveling sin practis’d daily in every citizen’s house, from the very beds in the garret, down to the stools in the kitchen. Why, at that rate you would muzzle ones appetite, a man had better by half be a presbyterian parson, and have two or three pair of holy sisters to smuggle over every week, than to be an alderman of the city of London, and have his carnal inclinations priest-ridden with a curb-bridle.

As for the fair promises I made to the city in order to have coaks’d them to have chose me mayor, I design’d them only as alluring baits to tempt the godly party over to my interest, and in the common hall it took very good effect; but had I once got into the chair, I should have shew’d them a trick like Sir Timber Temple, and have reduc’d my mountain-promise into a mole-hill performance; which our cunning fraternity mistrusting (for always set a knave to catch a knave) by a piece of unpracticable subtilty they threw me out, when I thought myself as cock-sure of the honour as a man is of a morsel he has got in his mouth: but the city is so corrupted, that an honest church-man can put no confidence in a parcel of knavish fanaticks, but he is sure to be deceiv’d. Had the church party been strong enough to have brought me in, I had then caught what I gap’d for, as sure as there’s a cuckhold in Guild-Hall in the time of election: but knowing our court of wiseakers was at that time under the ascendency of a whiggish planet, I was fearful I should lose it; but they had better have chose me, for I assure them, I would sooner go into Barbary and feed ostriches with my money, than I would lay out one groat towards so much as the repairing of one of their old gates, or in adding any thing to the city’s magnificence, tho’ ’twas no more than a weather-cock: nay I have now so little charity for that ingrateful Sodom, that I would not be at the expence of giving them an engine, tho I was sure ’twould save them a second conflagration.

I fear, Sir, by this time I have quite tired your patience, and shall therefore conclude with this acknowledgment, that I liv’d under one of the best princes in the world, and one of the best masters in the kingdom, and that under both, I thank my stars, I have patch’d up a pretty good fortune, and I profess, as I am a christian of the true church by law establish’d, I would turn subject to the Grand Seignior, and servant to alderman Lucifer, to enjoy again two such precious opportunities. So I rest, with a quiet Conscience, your thankful Servant,

Charles Duncombe.