Why are we rich, or great, except to fhew
All licence in our lives? What need we know,
More than to praise a dog, or horse? or speak
The hawking language? or our day to break
With citizens? let clowns, and tradesmen breed
Their fons to ftudy arts, the laws, the creed;
We will believe like men of our own rank,
In fo much land a year, or such a bank,
That turns us fo much moneys; at which rate
Our anceftours impos'd on prince and state.
Let poor nobility be virtuous : we,
Defcended in a rope of titles, be
From Guy, or Bevis, Arthur, or from whom,
'The herald will; our blood is now become
Paft any need of virtue. Let them care,
That in the cradle of their gentry are,
To serve the state by councils, and by arms.
Johnfon's Underwoods.
1. They are the breathing fepulchers of nobleness:
No trulier noble men, than lions pictures
Hung up for figns, are lions. Who knows not,
That lions the more foft kept, are more fervile?
And look how lions clofe kept, fed by hand,
Lose quite th’innative fire of fp'rit and greatness
That lions free breathe, forraging for prey;
And grow fo grofs, that maftiffs, curs, and mungrels
Have fpirit to cow them: fo our foft French nobles,
Chain'd up in ease and numb'd fecurity,
Their fpirits fhrunk up like their cov'tous fifts,
And never open'd but Domitian like,
And all his bafe cbfequious minions,
When they were catching, though it were but flies : Befotted with their peasants love of gain, Rufting at home, and on each other preying; Are for their greatness but the greater flaves: And none is noble, but who fcrapes and faves. 2. 'Tis bafe, 'tis bafe; and yet they think them high. 1. So children mounted on their hobby-horse,
Think they are riding; when with wanton toil
They bear what should bear them. A man may well
Compare them to those foolish great-fpleen'd camels,
That to their high heads, begg'd of fove horns higher;
Whose most uncomely, and ridic❜lous pride
When he had fatisfy'd, they could not use ;
But where they went upright before, they stoop'd,
And bore their heads much lower for their horns;
As these high men do, low in all true grace,
Their height being privileg'd to all things bafe.
And as the foolish poet, that ftill writ
All his moft felf-lov'd verfe in paper-royal,
Or parchment rul'd with lead, fmooth'd with the pumice,
Bound richly up, and ftrung with crimson ftrings;
Never fo bleft, as when he writ and read,
The ape-lov'd iffue of his brain; and never
But joying in himself; admiring ever:
Yet in his works behold him, and he fhew'd
Like to a ditcher: fo these painted men,
All fet on out-fide, look upon within,
And not a peafant's entrails you fhall find,
More foul and meazled, nor more starv'd of mind.
Chapman's Revenge of Buffy D'ambois.
Though we come not to plead our birth-right here,
Let him, for warriors fo fhould take their place,
In whom beft figns of nobleness appear,
Be grac'd, as firft who doth adorn a race:
Moft noble he who ftill by virtue strives,
To leave his name in minds of men engrav'd;
And to his off-fpring greater glory gives,
Than from his ancestors he hath receiv'd.
E. of Sterline's Alexandrean Tragedy.
Idle regards of greatness he did fcorn;
Careless of pomp, magnificent to be;
That man reputing to be nobleft born,
Which was the most magnanimous and free:
In honour fo impartial was he,
Efteeming titles, meritless and nought;
Unless with danger abfolutely bought.
Drayton's Robert Duke of Normandy.
Why thou enjoy'it as much of happiness,
As all the wing of fleight ambition flew at.
A dunghil was thy cradle : fo a puddle
By virtue of fun-beams, breaths a vapour
T'infect the purer air, which drops again
Into the muddy womb that firft exhal'd it.
John Ford's Perkin Warbeck,
Before that Aulicus was made a lord,
He was my friend; we might exchange a word,
As well as hearts: he could be never weary
Of my fociety, was jocund, merry,
Ingenuous, and as jealous to offend;
He was enjoy'd, he could enjoy his friend :
But now he fwells, looks big, his favours change,
As well as fortunes; now his eyes are strange,
His thoughts are councils, curious webs of state,
And all his actions must be wonder'd at:
His fpeeches must be laws, and ev'ry word
An oracle, to be admir'd, ador'd;
Friendship must now be service: a new mould
Must have new matter, melted from the old.
Oh, Aulicus, 'twere well, if thou couldft do
The very fame in fpiritual honour too!
OATH S.
It is great fin to fwear unto a fin;
But greater fin to keep a finful oath:
Who can be bound by any folemn vow
To do a murd'rous deed, to rob a man,
To force a spotlefs virgin's chastity,
To reave the orphan of his patrimony,
To wring the widow from her cuftom'd right,
And have no other reafon for his wrong,
But that he was bound by a folemn oath?
Shakespear's Second Part of K. Henry VI.
1. Begone, I fay: the gods have heard me swear.
2. The gods are deaf to hot and peevish vows;
They are polluted off'rings, more abhorr'd
Than spotted livers in the facrifice.
1. O! be perfuaded, do not count it holy,
To hurt by being juft; it were as lawful
For us to count we give what's gain'd by thefts,
And rob in the behalf of charity.
2. It is the purpose that makes strong the vow;
But vows to ev'ry purpose must not hold.
Shakespear's Troilus and Creffida. Sir, I beseech you, fay not your oaths were fuch, So like falfe coin, being put unto the touch; Who bear a flourish in the outward shew Of a true ftamp, but indeed are not fo.
Wilkins's Miferies of enforced Marriage. Though we need nothing to ftrengthen Our refolutions, yet we'll take an oath ; 'Tis good to have the gods along with us: A facrament is the tye, no lefs of Loyalty, than treafon.
It was an ill oath, better broke than kept ;
And fo are all oaths in the ftricter fenfe:
The laws of nature and of nations do
Difpenfe with matters of divinity
In fuch a cafe; for no man willingly
Would be an enemy to himself: the
Very beafts do by inftinct of nature
Seek for felf-prefervation; why not
Man, who is lord of reason? oaths, what
Are they but bubbles, that break with their own
Emptiness?
1. We will have his oath. 2. You have my folemn oath. 3. 'Tis more than needs.
Great men, were there no gods, would keep their words In rev'rence to themfelves; but gods there are,
Whom none needs rouse by oath to witness truth.
OBEDIENCE.
The king must rule, and we must learn t' obey;
True virtue ftill directs the noble way.
Shakespear and Rowley's Birth of Merlin.
For, as we fee, when fickness deeply root,
Meat, drink, and drugs alike do little boot;
Because all what should either nurfe, or cure,
As mafter'd by difeafes, grow impure:
So when excefs, the malady of might,
Hath dropfy like, drown'd all the ftiles of right,
Then doth obedience, elfe the food of pow'r,
Help on that dropfy-canker to devour.
Lord Brooke's Mustapha,
And while none dare fhew kings they go amifs;
Ev'n base obedience their corruption is.
To whom the gods and fortune had affign'd
Our fervice foldiers; now they have declar'd:
And let us follow, where they please to lead.
For faith is impious, friving to fuftain
That fide, whofe fall the gods themselves ordain. May's Cleopatra.
Next in order fad old-age we found,
His beard all hoar, his eyes hollow and blind, With drooping cheer ftill poring on the ground, As on the place where nature him affign'd To reft, when that the fifters had untwin'd His vital thread; and ended with their knife The fleeting courfe of faft declining life. Crook-back'd he was, tooth-fhaken, and blear-ey'd ; Went on three feet, and fometimes crept on four; With old lame bones that rattled by his fide; His fcalp all pilled, and with eld forlore: His wither'd fift ftill knocking at death's door;
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