Maft for our needs, turn fools up, and plough ladies
Sometime, to try what glebe they are; and this
Is no unfruitful piece. She and I now
Are on a project, for the fact, and venting
Of a new kind of fucus, paint for ladies,
To ferve the kingdom: wherein the herself
Hath travell'd, 'pecially, by way of service
Unto her fex; and hopes to get the whole monopoly,
As the reward of her invention.
1. I meant to have offer'd it
Johnson's Devil is an Afs.
Your lady fhip on the perfecting the patent.
1. For ferving the whole ftate with tooth-picks;
Somewhat an intricate bufinefs to difcourse, but
I show how much the subject is abus'd;
First, in that one commodity: then what diseases
And putrefactions in the gums are bred,
By thofe are made of adulterate and false wood;
My plot, for reformation of these fellows,
To have all tooth-picks brought unto an office,
There feal'd; and fuch as counterfeit 'em mul&ted:
And laft, for venting 'em, to have a book
Printed, to teach their ufe; which ev'ry child
Shall have throughout the kingdom that can read,
And learn to pick his teeth by which beginning
Early to practife, with fome other rules,
Of never fleeping with the mouth open, chawing
Some grains of maftick, will preferve the breath
Pure, and fo free from taint.
Thefe are my old projectors, and they make me
The fuperintendent of their business:
But ftill they shoot two or three bows too short,
For want of money and adventurers.
They have as many demurrs as the chancery;
And hatch more ftrange imaginations
Than any dreaming philofopher; one of them
Will undertake the making of bay-falt,
For a penny a bufhel, to ferve the state;
Another dreams of building water-works,
Drying of fens and marshes, like the Dutch-men:
Another ftrives, to raise his fortunes, from
Decay'd bridges, and would exact a tribute
From ale-houses, and fign-pofts: fome there are,
Would make a thorough-fare for the whole kingdom,
An office, where nature fhould give account
For all fhe took, and fent into the world:
For they were born in an unlucky hour,
For fome unfortunate mifchief or other,
Still comes athwart them! well I must in to them,
And feaft them with new hopes; 'twill be good sport
To hear how they difpute it pro and con.
Marmyon's Holland's Leaguer.
PROMISE.
Promifing is the very air of the
Time; it opens the eyes of expectation.
Performance is ever the duller for
His act; and, but in the plainer and fimpler
Kind of people, the deed is quite out of
Ufe. To promife, is moft courtly, and fashionable;
Performance is a kind of will or testament,
Which argues a great fickness in his judgment
That makes it.
Our promise muft not prejudice our good:
And that it is no reason that the tongue
Tie the whole body to eternal wrong.
1. We think your promifes fpring-tides; but we
Fear you'll ebb in your performance :
2. My deeds, and fpeeches, fir,
Are lines drawn from one center; what I promise
Dekker's Match me in London.
Court promises! let wife men count them curft;
For, while you live, he that scores best, pays worst.
Webster's White Devil.
Supply your promises with deeds;
You know that painted meat no hunger feeds.
Lords promifes are mortal, and commonly
Die within half an hour they are spoken.
Middleton's Mad World my Mafters.
Promifes of princes must not be
By after-arts evaded. Who dares punifh
The breach of oaths in lubjects; and yet flight
The faith he hath made them?
Habbington's Queen of Arragon.
You cannot lofe your virtue, fir, and then
I'm fure my courtesy will never fail :
To promife more, would make me feem too prodigal Of what you can't in nobleness receive.
Sir W. Davenant's Platonick Lovers.
'Tis apparent,
Thou wilt not fail thy friend in great engagements,
Who art fo punctual in a promis'd trifle.
2. The man that is not in th' enemy's pow'r,
Nor fetter'd by misfortune, and breaks promises,
Degrades himself; he never can pretend
Sir Robert Stapleton's Slighted Maid. ROSPERITY.
Profperity's the very bond of love,
Whofe fresh complexion, and whose heart together,
Shakespear's Winter's Tale.
Tell us, profperity is at highest degree,
The fount and handle of calamity:
Like duft before a whirlwind those men fly,
That proftrate on the ground of fortune lie;
And being great, like trees that broadest sprout,
Their own top-heavy ftate grubs up their root.
Chapman's First Part of Byron's Confpiracy: Things over-rank do never kindly bear,
As in the corn the flexure, when we fee
Fill but the straw, when it should feed the ear;
Rotting that time in rip'ning it should be,
And be❜ng once down, itself can never rear:
With us well doth this fimile agree
Of the wife man, due to the great in all,
By their own weight b'ing broken in their fall.
Self-loving man, what fooner doth abuse ;
And more than his prosperity doth wound?
Into the deep but fall how can he chufe
'That over-ftrides whereon his foot to ground?
Who fparingly profperity doth use,
And to himfelf doth after ill propound;
Unto his height who happily doth climb,
Sits above fortune, and controuleth time.
Drayton in the Mirror for Magiftrates:
Lo, when profperity too much prevails,
Above the judgment thus of vulgar minds;
As little barges burden'd with great fails,
They move in ftate, all fwoln with fortune's winds!
E. of Sterline's Alexandrean Tragedy.
Profperity doth bewitch men, feeming clear;
But leas do laugh, fhew white, when rocks are near. Webfter's White Devil.
When honeft plainness knows not how to live.
Shirley's Maid's Revenge:
Profperity to fwell him 'bove a mean;
Like thofe impressions in the air, that rife
From dunghill vapours, fcatter'd by the wind,.
Leaves nothing but an empty name behind.
Nabbs's Hennibal and Scipio:
Of both our fortunes good and bad, we find
Profperity more searching of the mind:
Felicity flies o'er the wall and fence,
While mifery keeps in with patience.
More in profperity is reason toft,
Than fhips in ftorms, their helms and anchors loft:
Before fair gales not all our fails we bear,
But with fide winds into safe harbours fteer.
More ships in calms on a deceitful coaft,
Or unfeen rocks, than in high ftorms are loft.
None violent empires long enjoy fecure;
They're mod'rate conditions that endure.
When fortune raifeth to the greatest height,
The happy man fhould moft fupprefs his state;
Expecting ftill a change of things to find,
And fearing, when the gods appear too kind.
PROVIDENCE.
Thus doth th' all working providence retain,
And keep for good effects the feed of worth ;
And fo doth point the ftops of time thereby,
In periods of uncertain certainty.
Daniel's Panegyrick to the King,
So blind's the sharpeft councils of the wife
This over-fhadowing providence on high,
And dazzleth all their cleareft-fighted eyes,
That they fee not how nakedly they lie:
There where they little think the storm doth rife,
And over-cafts their clear fecurity:
When Man hath ftopp'd all ways, fave only that,
Which, as leaft doubted, ruin enters at.
Daniel's Civil War.
What man, not wondring, can by deeds behold
The providence of all commanding Jove,
Whose brazen edicts cannot be controul'd;
Firm are the ftatutes of the states above:
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