The Visions of Dom Francisco de Quevedo Villegas Part 6

At these words a hollow-eyed, supercilious senator (that had been of the conspiracy, and was then blazing like a pitched barrel) raised himself, and with a faint voice asked Caesar what reason he had to complain! "For, prince," says he, "if King Ptolomy murdered Pompey the Great, upon whose score he held his kingdom, why might not the Senate as well kill you, to recover what you had taken from them? And in the case betwixt Caesar and Pompey, let the devils themselves be judges. As for Achilles (who was one of the murderers) what he did, was by Ptolomy's command, and then he was but a free-booter neither, a fellow that got his living by rapine and spoil: but Caesar was undoubtedly the more infamous of the two. 'Tis true, you wept at the sight of Pompey's head, but such tears as were more treacherous than the steel that killed him. Ah cruel compa.s.sion and revengeful piety! that made thee a more barbarous enemy to Pompey, dead than living. Oh that ever two hypocrite eyes should creep into the first head of the world! To conclude, the death of Caesar had been the recovery of our republic, if the mult.i.tude had not called in others of his race to the government, which rendered thy fall the very hydra of the empire."

We had had another skirmish upon these words, if Lucifer had not commanded Caesar to his cell again, upon pain of death; and there to abide such correction as belonged to him, for slighting the warnings he had of his disaster. Brutus and Ca.s.sius too were turned over to the politic fools: and the senators were dispatched away to Minos and Rhadamanthus, and to sit as a.s.sistants in the devils' bench.

After this I heard a murmuring noise, as of people talking at a distance, and by degrees I made it out that they were wrangling and disputing still louder and louder, till at length it was but a word and a blow, and the nearer I came the greater was the clamour. This made me mend my pace; but before I could reach them, they were all together by the ears in a b.l.o.o.d.y fray: they were persons of great quality all of them, as emperors, magistrates, generals of armies. Lucifer, to take up the quarrel, commanded them peace and silence, and they all obeyed, but it vexed them to the hearts to be so taken off in the full career of their fury and revenge. The first that opened his mouth was a fellow so martyred with wounds and scars, that I took him at first for an indigent officer; but it proved to be c.l.i.tus (as he said himself). And one at his elbow told him, he was a saucy companion, for presuming to speak before his time; and so desired audience of Lucifer, for the high and mighty Alexander, the son of Jupiter, and the emperor and terror of the world: he was going on with his qualities and t.i.tles; but an officer gave the word, Silence, and bade c.l.i.tus begin; which he took very kindly, and told his story.

"If it may please your Majesty," says he, "I was the first favourite of this emperor, who was then lord of all the known world, bare the t.i.tle of the King of Kings, and boasted himself for the son of Jupiter Hammon; and yet after all this glory and conquest, he was himself a slave to his pa.s.sions: he was rash and cruel, and consequently incapable either of counsel or friends.h.i.+p. While I lived I was near him, and served him faithfully; but it seems he did not entertain me so much for my fidelity as to augment the number of his flatterers; but I found myself too honest for a base office; and still as he ran into any foul excesses, I took a freedom, with all possible modesty, to show him his mistakes. One day, as he was talking slightly of his father Philip (that brave prince, from whom he received as well his honour as his being) I told him frankly what I thought of that ingrat.i.tude and vanity, and desired him to treat his dead father with more reverence, as a prince worthy of eternal honour and respect. This commendation of Philip so inflamed him, that presently he took a partisan and struck me dead in the place with his own hand. After this, pray'e where was his divinity, when he gave Abdolominus, (a poor garden-weeder) the kingdom of Sidonia, which was not, as the world would have it, out of any consideration of his virtue, but to mortify and take down the pride and insolence of the Persians. Meeting him here just now in h.e.l.l, I asked him what was become of his father Jupiter now, that he lay so long by't, and whether he were not yet convinced that all his flatterers were a company of rascals, who with their incense and altars would persuade him that he was of divine extraction and heir-apparent to the throne and thunder of Jupiter. This now was the ground of our quarrel. But, invectives apart, who but a tyrant would have put a loyal subject to death, only for his affection and regards to the memory of his dead father? how barbarously did he treat his favourites, Parmenio, Philotas, Calisthenes, Amintas, etc., so that good or bad is all a case, for 'tis crime enough to be the favourite of a tyrant; as, in the course of human life, every man dies because he is mortal, and the disease is rather the pretext of his death than the cause of it." "You find now,"

says Satan, "that tyrants will show their people many a dog trick, when the humour takes them. The good they hate, for not being wicked; and the bad, because they are no worse. How many favourites have you ever seen come to a fair and timely end? Remember the emblem of the sponge, and that's the use that princes make of their favourites: they let them suck and fill, and then squeeze them for their own profit."

At that word there was heard a lamentable cry, and at the same time a venerable old man, as pale as if he had no blood in his veins, came up to Lucifer, and told him that his emblem of the sponge came very pat to his case; "for," says he, "I was a great favourite, and a great h.o.a.rder of treasure, a Spaniard by birth, the tutor and confidant of Nero, and my name is Seneca. Indeed his bounties were to excess, he gave me without asking, and in taking I was never covetous but obedient. It is in the nature of princes, and it befits their quality, to be liberal where they take a liking, both of honour and fortunes; and 'tis hard for a subject to refuse, without some reflection upon the generosity or discretion of his master. For 'tis not the merit or modesty of the va.s.sal, but the glory of the prince that is in question; and he is the best subject that contributes the most to the splendour and reputation of his sovereign.

Nero indeed gave me as much as such a prince could bestow, and I managed his liberalities with all the moderation imaginable; yet all too little to preserve me from the strokes of envious and malicious tongues, which would have it, that my philosophising upon the contempt of the world was nothing else but a mere imposture, that with less danger and notice I might feed and entertain my avarice, and with the fewer compet.i.tors.

Finding my credit with my master declining, it stood me upon to provide some way or other for my quiet, and to withdraw myself from being the mark of a public envy. So I went directly to Nero, and with all possible respect and humility made him a present back again of his own bounties.

The truth is, I had so great a pa.s.sion for his service, that neither the severity of his nature nor the debauchery of his manners could ever deter me from exhorting him to n.o.bler courses, and paying him all the duties of a loyal subject. Especially in cases of cruelty and blood, I laid it perpetually home to his conscience, but all to little purpose; for he put his mother to death, laid the city of Rome in ashes, and indeed depopulated the empire of honest men. And this drew on Piso's conspiracy, which was better laid than executed; for upon the discovery, the prime instruments lost their lives; and by Divine Providence this prince was preserved, in order (as one would have thought) to his repentance and change of life. But upon the issue the conspiracy was prevented, and Nero never the better. At the same time he put Lucan to death, only for being a better poet than himself. And if he gave me my choice what death to die, it was rather cruelty than pity; for in the very deliberation which death to choose, I suffered all even in the terror and apprehension that made me refuse the rest. The election I made was to bleed to death in a bath, and I finished my own dispatches. .h.i.ther; where, to my further affliction, I have again encountered this infamous prince, studying new cruelties and instructing the very devils themselves in the art of tormenting."

At that word Nero advanced, with his ill-favoured face and shrill voice.

"It is very well," says he, "for a prince's favourite or tutor to be wiser than his master; but let him manage that advantage then with respect, and not like a rash and insolent fool make proclamation presently to the world, that he's the wiser of the two. While Seneca kept himself within those bounds, I lodged him in my bosom, and the love I had for that man was the glory of my government; but when he came to publish once (what he should have dissembled or concealed) that it was not Nero but Seneca that ruled the empire, nothing less than his blood could make satisfaction for so intolerable a scandal, and from that hour I resolved his ruin. And I had rather suffer what I do a hundred times over than entertain a favourite that should raise his credit upon my dishonour. Whether I have reason on my side or no, I appeal to all this princely a.s.sembly: draw near, I beseech ye, as many as are here, and speak freely, my royal brethren, Did ye ever suffer any favourite to escape unpunished, that had the impudence to write [I and my king] to make a stale of majesty, and to publish himself a better statesman than his master?" "No, no," they cried out all with one voice, "it never was, and never shall be endured, while the world lasts: for we have left our successors under an oath to have a care on't. 'Tis true, a wise counsellor at a prince's elbow is a treasure, and ought to be so esteemed while he makes it his business to cry up the abilities and justice of his sovereign; but in the instant that his vanity transports him to the contrary, away with him to the dogs, and down with him, for there's no enduring of it."

"All this," cried Seja.n.u.s, "does not yet concern me; for though I had indeed more brains than Tiberius, yet I so ordered it that he had the credit in public of all my private advices. And so sensible he was of my services, that he made me his partner and companion in the empire; he caused my statues to be erected, and invested them with sacred privileges. 'Let Seja.n.u.s live,' was the daily cry of the people; and in truth, my well-being was the joy of the empire; and far and near there were public prayers and vows offered up for my health. But what was the end of all? When I thought myself surest in my master's arms and favour, he let me fall, nay he threw me down, caused me to be cut in pieces, delivering me up to the fury of a barbarous and enraged mult.i.tude, that dragged me along the streets, and happy was he that could get a piece of my flesh to carry upon a javelin's point in triumph. And it had been well if this inhuman cruelty had stopped here; but it extended to my poor children, who, though unconcerned in my crimes, were yet to partake in my fate. A daughter I had, whom the very law exempted from the stroke of justice, because of her virginity; but to clear that scruple, she was condemned first to be ravished by the hangman, and then to be beheaded, and treated as her father. My first failing was upon temerity and pride: I would outrun my destiny, defy fortune; and for Divine Providence I looked upon it as a ridiculous thing. When I was once out of the way, I thought doing worse was somewhat in order to being better; and then I began to fortify myself by violence, against craft and malice. Some were put to death, others banished, till, in fine, all the powers of heaven and earth declared themselves against me. I had recourse to all sorts of ill people and means. I had my physician for poisoning, my a.s.sa.s.sins for revenge; I had my false witnesses and corrupt judges; and, in truth, what instruments of wickedness had I not? And all this, not upon choice or inclination, but purely out of the necessity of my condition. Whenever I should come to fall, I was sure to be forsaken both of good and bad; and therefore I shunned the better sort, as those that would only serve to accuse me; but the lewd and vicious I frequented, to increase the number of my complices, and make my party the stronger. But, after all, if Tiberius was a tyrant, I'll swear he was never so by my advice; but, on the contrary, I have suffered more from him for plain dealing and dissuading him, than the very subjects of his severity have commonly suffered by him. I know, 'tis charged upon me, that I stirred him up to cruelty, to render him odious, and to ingratiate myself to the people.

But who was his adviser, I pray 'e, in this butcherly proceeding against me? Oh Lucifer, Lucifer! you know very well that 'tis the practice of tyrants, when they do amiss themselves, and set their people a-grumbling, to lay all the blame (and punishment too) upon the instrument; and hang up the minister for the master's fault. 'This is the end of all favourites,' cries one; 'Not a halfpenny matter if they were all served so,' says another. And every historian has his saying upon this catastrophe, and sets up a buoy to warn after-ages of the rock of court favours. The greatness of a favourite, I must confess, proclaims the greatness of his maker; and the prince that maintains what he has once raised does but justify the prudence of his own choice; and whenever he comes to undo what he has done, publishes himself to be light and unconstant, and does as good as declare himself (even against himself) of the enemy's party."

Up stepped Plaintain then, (Severus his favourite) he that was tossed out of a garret window to make the people sport. "My condition in the world," says he, "was perfectly like that of a rocket or fire-work: I was carried up to a prodigious height in a moment, and all people's eyes were upon me, as a star of the first magnitude; but my glory was very short-lived, and down I fell into obscurity and ashes." After him, appeared a number of other favourites; and all of them hearkening to Bellisarius the favourite of Justinian, who, blind as he was, had already knocked twice with his staff, and shaking his head, with a weak and complaining voice, desired audience; which was at length granted him, silence commanded; and he said, as follows.

"Princes," said he, "before they destroy the creatures they have raised and chosen, should do well to consider, that cruelty and inconstancy is much a greater infamy to a prince than the worst effects of it can be to a favourite. For my own part, I served an emperor that was both a Christian and a great lover and promoter of justice. And yet, after all the services I had done him, in several battles and adventures, (insomuch that he was effectually become my debtor, for the very glory of his empire) my reward, in the end, was to have my eyes put out, and (with a dog and a bell) to be turned a-begging from door to door. Thus was that Bellisarius treated, whose very name formerly was worth an army, and he was the soul of his friends as well as the terror of his enemies. But a prince's favour is like quick-silver-restless and slippery, never to be fixed, never secured. Force it, and it spends itself in fumes; sublime it, and 'tis a mortal poison. Handle it only, and it works itself into the very bones; and all that have to do with it, live and die pale and trembling."

At these words, the whole band of favourites, set up a hideous and a heavy groan, trembling like aspen leaves, and at the same time reciting several pa.s.sages out of the Prophet Habbakuk, against careless and wicked governors. By which threatenings is given to understand, that the Almighty, when He has a mind to destroy a wicked ruler, does not always punish one potentate by another, and bring His ends about by a trial of arms, or the event of a battle; but many times makes use of things the most abject and vile, to confound the vanity and arrogance of the mighty; and makes even worms, flies, caterpillars, and lice to serve Him as the ministers of His terrible justice; nay, the stone in the wall and the beam in the house shall rise in judgment against them.

This discourse might have gone further, but that the company presently parted, to know the meaning of a sudden noise and clatter they heard, that half-deafened the auditory. And what was it at last? but a scuffle between the Gown-men and the Brothers of the Blade; and there were persons of great honour and learning, young and old, engaged in the fray; the men of war were at it das.h.i.+ng with their swords, and the gentlemen of the long robe, fencing, some with tostatus, others with huge pandects, that with their old wainscot covers were as good as bucklers, and would now and then give the foe a heavy rebuke, over and above. The combat had certainly been very b.l.o.o.d.y, if one of Lucifer's constables had not commanded them in the king's name to keep the peace; which made it a drawn battle. And with that, one of the combatants, with the best face he had, said aloud, "If ye knew, gentlemen, either us, or our quarrel, you'd say we had reason, and perhaps side with us." At that instant, there appeared Domitian, Commodus, Caracalla, Phalaris, Heliogabalus, Alcetes, Andronicus, Busiris, and old Oliver, with a world of great personages more; which, when Lucifer saw, he disposed himself to treat that majestical appearance, as much to their satisfaction as was possible. And then came up a grave ancient man, with a great train at his heels, that were all b.l.o.o.d.y, and full of the marks they had received under the persecution of these tyrants.

"You have here before ye," quoth the old man, "Solon; and these are the seven sages, native of Greece, but renowned throughout the universe. He there in the mortar is that Anaxarchus that was pounded to death by command of Nicocreon. He with the flat nose is Socrates; the little crump-shouldered wretch was the famous Aristotle; and t'other there, the divine Plato. Those in the corner are all of the same profession too, grave and learned philosophers, that have displeased tyrants with their writings; and, in fine, the world is stored with their works and h.e.l.l with the authors. To come to the point, most mighty Lucifer, we are all of us dealers in politics, great writers and deep-read men in the maxims of State and Government. We have digested policy into a method, and laid down certain rules, by which princes may make themselves great and beloved. We have advised them impartially to administer justice; to reward virtue, as well military as civil; to employ able men, banish flatterers; to put men of wisdom and integrity in places of trust; to reward or punish without pa.s.sion, and according to the merits of the cause, as G.o.d's vice-gerents. And this now is our offence. We name no body, we design no body; but 'tis crime enough to wish well to the way and to the lovers of virtue." With that, turning toward the tyrants.

"Oh most unjust princes," said he, "those glorious kings and emperors from whom we took the model of our laws and instructions are now in a state of rest and comfort, while you are tormented. Numa is now a star in the firmament and Tarquin a fire-brand in h.e.l.l. And the memory of Augustus and Trajan is still fresh and fragrant, when the names of Nero and Sardanapalus are more putrid and odious than their bodies."

When Dionysius the tyrant heard this, (with his companions about him) flesh and blood could hold no longer; and he cried out in a rage, "That roguy philosopher has told a thousand lies. Legislators, with a pox?

Yes, yes, they are sweet legislators, and princes have many a fair obligation to them. No, no, sirrah," says he to Solon, "you are all of you a company of quacks; ye prate and speculate of things ye don't understand; and with your d.a.m.ned moralities set the people agog upon liberty, cry up the doctrine of free-born subjects, and then our portion is persecution in one world and infamy in t'other."

"We shall have a fine time on't, my most gracious prince," cried Julian the apostate, staring Lucifer in the face, "when these dunghill pedants, a company of c.o.c.k-brained, ridiculous, mortified, ill-bred, beggarly tatterdemalions, shall come to erect a committee for politics, and pa.s.s sentence upon governors and governments; stiling themselves (forsooth) the supporters of both, without any more skill than my horse in what belongs to either. Tell me," says he, "if a brave prince had not better be d.a.m.ned than subject himself to hear one of these t.u.r.dy-facy-paty-nasty lowsie-fartical rascals, with a scabbed head and a plantation of lice in his beard, and his eyes crept into the nape of his neck, p.r.o.nouncing, for an aphorism, that a prince that looks only to one is a tyrant, and that a true king is the shepherd and servant of his people. Ah, rash and besotted c.o.xcombs! If a king looks only to others, who shall look to him? As if princes had not enemies enough abroad, without being so to themselves too. But you may write your hearts out, and never the nearer.

Where's our sovereignty? if we have not our subjects' lives and estates at our mercy. And where's our absolute power? if we submit to the counsels of our va.s.sals. If we have not to satisfy our appet.i.tes, avarice and revenge, we want power to discharge the n.o.blest ends of government. These contemplative idiots would have us make choice of good officers, to keep the bad in order; which were a madness, in our condition. Let them be complaisant, and no matter for any other merit or virtue. A parcel of good offices, handsomely disposed among a pack of cheats and atheists, will make us a party another day; whereas all is lost that's bestowed upon honest men, for they're our enemies; speak truth then all of ye, and shame the devil; for the butcher fats his sheep only for the shambles.

"I have said enough, I suppose, to stop your mouths, but here's an orator will read you another-gates lecture of politics than any you have had yet, if you'll give him the hearing. Photinus, advance," said Julian, "and speak your mind;" whereupon there appeared a brazen-faced fellow, with a hanging look and twenty other marks of a desperate villain who, with a h.e.l.lish yell, and three or four wry mouths for a prologue, brake into his discourse.

The wicked advice of one of Ptolomy's courtiers, about the killing of Pompey: taken out of Lucan's _Pharsalia_, Lib. 8.

"Methinks, under favour (most renowned Ptolomy) we are now slipped into a debate, a little beside the business. The question is whether Pompey should be delivered up to Caesar, or no. That is to say, whether in reason of state it ought to be done; and we are formalising the matter, whether in point of equity and justice it may be done. Bodies politic have no souls, and never did any great prince turn a council of state into a court of conscience, but he repented it. Kingdoms are to be governed by politicians, not by casuists; and there is nothing more contrary to the true interest of crowns and empires, than in public cases to make a scruple of private duties. The argument is this: Pompey is in distress; and Ptolomy under an obligation, so that it were a violation of faith and hospitality not to relieve him. Now give me leave to reason in the other way. Pompey is forsaken, and persecuted by the G.o.ds; Caesar upon the heels of him, with victory and success. Shall Ptolomy now ruin himself, to protect a fugitive, against both heaven and Caesar! I must confess, where honesty and profit are both of a side, 'tis well; but, where they disagree, the prince that does not quit his religion, for his convenience, falls into a direct conspiracy against himself. He shall lose the hearts of his soldiery, and the reputation of his power.

Whereas, on the contrary, the most hateful tyrant in the world shall be able to keep his head above water, let him but give a general licence to commit all sorts of wickedness; you'll say 'tis impious, but I say, what if it be? who shall call you to account? These deliberations are only for subjects that are under command, and not for sovereign princes whose will is a law."

Exeat Aula Qui volet esse pius,

He was never cut out For a Court, that's devout.

"In fine, since either Pompey or Ptolomy must suffer, I am absolutely for the saving of Ptolomy, and the presenting of Pompey's head, without any more ado, to Caesar. A dead dog will never bite."

Photinus had no sooner made an end, but Domitian appeared in a monstrous rage, and lugging of poor Suetonius after him like a bear to the stake.

"There is not in nature," says he, "so d.a.m.ned a generation of scribbling rogues as these historians. We can neither be quiet for them, living nor dead: for they haunt us in our very graves; and when they have vented the humour and caprice of their own brains, that forsooth must be called, The Life of such an Emperor. And, for an instance, I'll show ye what this impertinent chronicler says of myself. 'He had squandered away his treasure,' says he, 'in expensive buildings, comedies, and donatives to the soldiers.'

"Now would I fain know which way it could have been better employed.

"In another place, he says, that 'Domitian had some thoughts of easing himself in his military charges, by reducing the number; but that he durst not do, for fear some of his neighbours should put an affront upon him. So that, to lick himself whole, he fell to raking and sc.r.a.ping whatever he could get, either from dead or living; and any rascal's testimony was proof enough for a confiscation: for there needed no more to undo an honest man, than to tell a tale at court that such a one had spoken ill of the prince.'

"Is this the way of treating majesty? what could this impudent pedant have said worse, if he had been speaking of a pick-pocket or a pirate?

But princes and thieves are all one to them.

"He says further, that 'Domitian made seizure of several estates, without any sort of right whatsoever; and there went no more to his t.i.tle than for a false witness to depose that he heard the defunct declare, before he died, that he made Caesar his heir. He set such a tax upon the Jews, that many of them denied their religion to avoid it; and I remember that, when I was a young fellow, I saw an old man of fourscore and ten taken upon suspicion by one of Domitian's spies, and turned up in a public a.s.sembly, to see if he were circ.u.mcised.'

"Be ye now judges, gentlemen of the Black Guard, if this be not a most intolerable indignity. Am I to answer for the actions of my inferior officers? It amazes me that my successors should ever endure these scandalous reports to be published, especially against a prince that had laid out so much money in repairing the libraries that were burnt."

"It is very true," said Suetonius in a doleful tone, "and I have not forgotten to make mention of it to your honour. But what will you say, if I show you, in a warrant under your hand, this execrable and impious blasphemy? It is the command of your Lord and G.o.d. And in fine, if I speak nothing but truth, where's your cause of complaint? I have written the Lives too of the great Julius Caesar, and the divine Augustus, and the world will not say but I have done them right. But for yourself, and such as you, that are effectually but so many incarnate and crowned plagues, what fault have I committed in setting before your eyes those tyrannies, which heaven and earth cannot but look upon with dread and horror?"

This discourse of Suetonius was interrupted by the babbler, or Boutefeu, that rounded Lucifer in the ear, and told him, "Look ye, sir," says he, pointing with his finger, "that limping devil there, that looks as if he were surbated with beating the hoof, has been abroad in the world, this twenty year, and is but just now come back again." "Come hither, sirrah," cries Lucifer; and so the poor cur went wriggling and glotting up toward his prince. "You are a fine rogue to be sent of an errand, are ye not?" says Lucifer, "to stay twenty year out, and come back again e'en as wise as ye went: what souls have ye brought now? or what news from t'other world?" "Ha! your highness," quoth the devil, "has too much honour and justice to condemn me unheard. Wherefore be pleased to remember, that at my going out you gave me charge of a certain merchant; it cost me the first ten year of my time to make him a thief, and ten more to keep him from turning honest again, and restoring what he had stolen." "A fine fetch for a devil this, is it not?" cried Lucifer.

"But h.e.l.l is no more the h.e.l.l it was when I knew it first, than chalk is cheese; and the devils nowadays are so d.a.m.nedly insipid and dry, they're hardly worth the roasting. A senseless puppy to come back to me with a story of Waltham's calf, that went nine mile to suck a bull. But he's not master of his trade yet." And with that Lucifer bade one of his officers take him away and put him to school again; "for I perceive he's a rascal," says he, "and he has e'en been roguing at a play-house, when he should have been at church." In that instant, from behind a little hill, a great many men came running as hard as they could drive after a company of women: the men crying out, "Stop, stop," and the women crying for help. Lucifer commanded them all to be seized, and asked what was the matter. "Alas, alas!" cried one of the men, quite out of breath, "these carrions have made us fathers, though we never had children."

"Govern your tongue, sirrah," cried a devil of honour, out of respect to the ladies, "and speak truth: for 'tis utterly impossible you should be fathers without children." "Pardon me," said the fellow, "we were married men, and honest men and good house-keepers, and have born offices in the parish, and have children that call us fathers; but 'tis a strange thing, we have been abroad some of us by the seven year together; others, as long bed-rid; and so impotent, that the civilians would have put us _inter frigidos et maleficiatos_: and yet our wives have brought us every year a child, which we were such fools as to keep and bring up, and give ourselves to the devil at last to get them estates; out of a charitable persuasion (forsooth) they might yet be our own, though for a twelve-month together (perhaps) we never so much as examined whether our wives were fish or flesh. But now since the mothers are dead, and the children grown up, we have found the tools that made them. One has the coachman's nose, another the gentleman-usher's legs, a third a cousin-german's eyes. And some, we are to presume, conceived purely by strength of imagination, or else by the ears like weazels."

Thereupon appeared a little remnant of a man, a dapper Spaniard, with a kind of a besome-beard, and a voice not unlike the yapping of a foysting cur. As he came near the company, he set up his throat, and called out, "Ah jade!" says he, "I shall now take ye to task, ye wh.o.r.e you, for making me father my negro's b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and for the estate I settled upon him. I did ever mis...o...b.. foul play, but should never have dreamt of that ugly toad, when there was such choice of handsome, l.u.s.ty young fellows about us; but it may be she had them too. I cursed the monks many and many a time, I remember, to the pit of h.e.l.l, heaven forgive me for't; for the strumpet would be perpetually gadding abroad, under colour of going to confession, and in sooth I was never any great friend to penance and mortification. And then would I be easing my mind ever and anon to this cursed Moor. 'I cannot imagine,' said I, 'where this mistress of thine should commit all the sins that she goes every hour of the day to confess at yonder monastery.' And then would this dog-Moor answer me. 'Alas, good lady! I would e'en venture my soul with hers with all my heart; she spends all her time you see in holy duties.' I was at that time so innocent, that I suspected nothing more than a pure respect and civility to my wife; but I have learnt better since, and that effectually his soul and hers were commonly ventured in the same bottom; yes, and their bodies too, as I perceive by their magpie issue, for the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds take after both father and mother."

"So that at this rate," cried the adopted fathers, "the husband of a wh.o.r.e has a pleasant time on't. First, he's subjected to all the pukings, longings, and peevish importunities, that a breeding woman gives those about her till she's laid; and then comes the squalling of the child, and the twittle-t.w.a.ttle-gossipings of the nurse and midwife, that must be well treated too, well lodged, and well paid. 'A sweet baby,'

says one (to the jade the mother on't) "tis e'en as like the father as if he had spit it out on's mouth; it has the very lips, the very eyes of him,' when 'tis no more like him than an apple is like an oyster. And, in conclusion, when we have borne all this, and twenty times more in t'other world with a Christian patience, we are hurried away to h.e.l.l, and here we lie a company of d.a.m.ned cuckolds of us; and here we are like to lie, for ought I see, in _saecula saeculorum_: which is very hard, and in truth out of all reason."

I cut this visit short, to see what news in a deep vault near at hand, where we heard a great bustle and contest betwixt divers souls and the devils. There were the presumptuous, the revengeful, and the envious, gaping and crying out as they would break their hearts. "Oh, that I could but be born again!" says one; "Oh, that I might back into the world again!" says another; "Oh, that I were but to die once more!" cries a third. Insomuch that they put the devils out of all patience, with their impertinent and unprofitable wishes and exclamations. "Hang yourselves,"

cried they, "for a pack of cozening, bawling rascals: you live again? and be born again? and what if you might do't a thousand times over? You would only die at last a thousand times greater villains than now you are, and there would be no clearing h.e.l.l of you with a dog-whip.

However, to try you and make you know yourselves, we have commission to let you live again and return. Up then ye varlets, go, be born again; get ye into the world again. Away," cried the devils, with a l.u.s.ty lash at every word, and thrust hard to have got them out. But the poor rogues hung an a.r.s.e, and were struck with such a terror, to hear of living again, and returning, that they slunk into a corner, and lay as quiet upon't, as lambs.

At length, one of the company that seemed to have somewhat more brain and resolution than his fellows, entered very gravely upon the debate, whether they should go out or no. "If I should now," says he, "at my second birth, come into the world a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, the shame would be mine, though my parents committed the fault; and I should carry the scandal and the infamy of it to my grave. Now put case, my mother should be honest, (for that's not impossible) and that I came into the world, legitimate; how many follies, vices, and diseases are there that run in a blood! Who knows, but I should be mad, or simple? swear, lie, cheat, wh.o.r.e; nay if I came off, with a little mortification of my carcase, as the stone, the scurvy, or the n.o.ble pox, I were a happy man. But oh the lodging, the diet, and the cookery that I am to expect for a matter of nine months in my mother's belly; and then the b.u.t.ter and beer that must be spent to sweeten me, when I change my quarter. I must come crying into the world, and live in ignorance even of what life is till I die; and then as ignorant of death too, till 'tis pa.s.sed. I fancy my swaddling-clouts and blankets to be worse than my winding-sheet; my cradle represents my tomb.

And then who knows, whether my nurse shall be found, or no? She'll over-lay me perhaps; leave me some four and twenty hours, it may be, without clean clouts, and a pin or two all the while, perchance, up to the hilts in my backside. And then follows breeding of teeth, and worms; with all the gripes and disorders that are caused by unwholesome milk.

These miseries are certain, and why should I run them over again?

"If it happen that I pa.s.s the state of infancy, without the pox or measles, I must be then packed away to school, to get the itch, a scaled head, or a pair of kibed heels. In winter, 'tis ten to one you find me with a snotty nose, and perpetually under the lash, if I either miss my lesson or go late to school. So that hang him, for my part, that would be born again, for any thing I see yet.

"When I come up toward man, the women will have me as sure as a gun, for they have a thousand ginnes and devices to catch wood-c.o.c.ks; and if ever I come to set eye upon a la.s.s that understands dress and raillery, I'm gone, if there were no more lads in Christendom. But, for my part, I am as sick as a dog, of powdering, curling, and playing the ladybird. I would not for all the world be in the shoemaker's stocks, and choke myself over again in a straight doublet, only to have the ladies say, 'Look, what a delicate shape and foot that gentleman has.' And I would take as little pleasure to spend six hours, of the four and twenty, in picking grey hairs out of my head or beard, or turning white into black.

To stand half ravished in the contemplation of my own shadow; to dress fine, and go to church only to see handsome ladies; to correct the midnight air with ardent sighs and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns; and to keep company with owls and bats, like a bird of evil omen; to walk the round of a mistress'

lodging, and play at bo-peep at the corner of every street; to adore her imperfections, (or as the song says, - for her ugliness, and for her want of coin); to make bracelets of her locks, and truck a pearl necklace for a shoestring. At this rate, I say, cursed again and again be he, for my part, that would live over again so wretched a life.

"Being come now to write full man, if I have an estate how many cares, suits, and wrangles go along with it! If I have none, what murmuring and regret at my misfortunes! By this time, the sins of my youth are gotten into my bones; I grow sour and melancholy; nothing pleases me; I curse old age to ten thousand devils; and the youth which I can never recover in my veins, I endeavour to fetch out of the barbers' shops, from perruques, razors, and patches, to conceal, or at least disguise all the marks and evidences of Nature in her decay. Nay, when I shall have never an eye to see with nor a tooth left in my head, gouty legs, wind-mills in my crown, my nose running like a tap, and gravel in my reins by the bushel, then must I make oath that all this is nothing but mere accident, gotten by lying in the field, or the like, and out-face the truth in the very teeth of so many undeniable witnesses. There is no plague comparable to this hypocrisy of the members. To have an old fop shake his heels, when he's ready to fall to pieces; and cry, these legs would make a s.h.i.+ft yet to play with the best legs in the company; and then, with a l.u.s.ty thump on's breast, fetch ye up a hem, and cry, 'Sound at heart, boy,' and a thousand other fooleries of the like nature. But all this is nothing to the misery of an old fellow in love, especially if he be put to gallant it against a company of young gamesters. Oh the inward shame and vexation, to see himself scarce so much as neglected. It happens sometimes that a jolly lady, for want of better entertainment, may content herself with one of these reverend fornicators, instead of a whetstone; but alack, alack! the poor man is weak though willing; and after a whole night spent in cold and frivolous pretences and excuses, away he goes with torments of rage and confusion about him, not to be expressed; and many a heavy curse is sent after him for keeping a poor lady from her natural rest to so little purpose. How often must I be put to the blush too, when every old toast shall be calling me old acquaintance, and telling me, 'Oh sir, 'tis many a fair day since you and I knew one another first. I think 'twas in the four and thirtieth of the Queen, that we were school-fellows. How the world's altered since!' etc.

And then must my head be turned to a _memento mori_; my flesh dissolved into rheums; my skin withered and wrinkled; with a staff in my hand, knocking the earth at every trembling step, as if I called upon my grave to receive me; walking, like a moving phantosme; my life little more than a dream; my reins and bladder turned into a perfect quarry; and the urinal or p.i.s.spot my whole study. My next heir watching, every minute, for the long-looked-for and happy hour of my departure; and in the meantime, I'm become the physician's revenue, and the surgeon's practice, with an apothecary's shop in my guts; and every old jade calling me grandsire. No, no; I'll no more living again, I thank ye: one h.e.l.l rather than two mothers.

"Let us now consider the comforts of life, the humours and the manners.

He that would be rich must play the thief or the cheat; he that would rise in the world must turn parasite, informer, or projecter. He that marries ventures fair for the horn, either before or after. There is no valour without swearing, quarrelling, or hectoring. If ye are poor, n.o.body owns ye. If rich, you'll know n.o.body. If you die young, 'What pity it was,' they'll say, 'that he should be cut off thus in his prime.'

If old, 'He was e'en past his best; there's no great miss of him.' If you are religious, and frequent the church and the sacrament, you're an hypocrite; and without this, you're an atheist or an heretic. If you are gay and pleasant, you pa.s.s presently for a buffoon; and if pensive and reserved, you are taken to be sour and censorious. Courtesy is called colloguing and currying of favour; downright honesty and plain-dealing is interpreted to be pride and ill manners. This is the world; and for all that's in't I would not have it to go over again. If any of ye, my masters," said he to his camerades, "be of another opinion, hold up your hands." "No, no," they cried all unanimously, "no more generation-work, I beseech ye; better the devils than the midwives."

After this came a testator, cursing and raving like a bedlam, that he had made his last will and testament. "Ah villein!" said he, "for a man to murder himself as I have done! If I had not sealed, I had not died. Of all things, next a physician, deliver me from a testament. It has killed more than the pestilence. Oh miserable mortals, let the living take warning by the dead, and make no testaments. It was my hard luck, first to put my life into the physician's power, and then, by making my will, to sign the sentence of death upon myself, and my own execution. 'Put your soul and your estate in order,' says the doctor, 'for there's no hope of life;' and the word was no sooner out, but I was so wise and devout (forsooth) as to fall immediately upon the prologue of my will, with an _In nomine Domini_, Amen, etc. And when I came to dispose of my goods and chattels I p.r.o.nounced these b.l.o.o.d.y words (I would I had been tongue-tied when I did it), 'I make and const.i.tute my son, my sole executor. _Item_, to my dear wife, I give and bequeath all my plays and romances, and all the furniture in the rooms upon the second storey. To my very good friend T. B. my large tankard, for a remembrance. To my foot-boy Robin, five pound to bind him prentice. To Betty, that tended me in my sickness, my little caudle-cup. To Mr. Doctor, my fair table diamond, for his care of me in my illness.' After signing, and sealing, the ink was scarce dry upon the paper, but methought the earth opened as if it had been hungry to devour me. My son and my legatees were presently casting it up, how many hours I might yet hold out. If I called for the cordial julep, or a little of Dr. Gilbert's water, my son was taking possession of my estate, my wife so busy about the beds and hangings that she could not intend it. The boy and the wench could understand nothing but about their legacies. My very good friend's mind was wholly upon his tankard. My kind Dr. I must confess took occasion, now and then, to handle my pulse, and see whether the diamond were of the right black water, or no. If I asked him what I might eat, his answer was, 'Anything, anything, e'en what you please yourself.' At every groan I fetched, they were calling for their legacies, which they could not have till I was dead.

"But if I were to begin the world again, I think I should make another kind of testament. I would say: 'A curse upon him that shall have my estate when I am dead, and may the first bit of bread he eats out on't choke him. The devil in h.e.l.l take what I cannot carry away, and him too, that straggles for't, if he can catch him. If I die, let my boy Robin have the strappado, three hours a day, to be duly paid him during life.

Let my wife die of the pip, or the mother (not a halfpenny matter which), but let her first live long enough to plague the d.a.m.ned doctor, and indite him for poisoning her poor husband.' To speak sincerely, I can never forgive that dog-leech. Was it not enough to make me sick when I was well, without making me dead when I was sick? And not to rest there neither, but to persecute me in my grave too. But, to say the truth, this is only neighbours' fare; for all those fools that trust in them are served with the same sauce. A vomit or a purge is as good a pa.s.sport into the other world as a man would wish. And then, when our heads are laid, 'tis never to be endured the scandals they cast upon our bodies and memories! 'Heaven rest his soul,' cries one, 'he killed himself with a debauch.' 'How is't possible,' says another, 'to cure a man that keeps no diet?' 'He was a madman,' cries a third, 'a mere sot, and would not be governed by his physician. His body was as rotten as a pear, he had as many diseases as a horse, and it was not in the power of man to save him. And truly 'twas well that his hour was come, for he had better a great deal die well than live on as he did.' Thieves and murtherers that ye are, you yourselves are that hour ye talk of. The physician is only death in a disguise, and brings his patient's hour along with him. Cruel people! Is it not enough to take away a man's life, and like common hangmen to be paid for't when ye have done, but you must blast the honour too of those you have dispatched, to excuse your ignorance? Let but the living follow my counsel, and write their testaments after this copy, they shall live long and happily, and not go out of the world at last like a rat with a straw in his a.r.s.e (as a learned author has it) or be cut off in the flower of their days, by these counterfeit doctors of the faculty of the close-stool."