a mean trade, or anything that might disparage the height of man in him, and yet thinks no death comparably base to hanging neither.  One that will do nothing upon command, though he would do it otherwise; and if ever he do evil, it is when he is dared to it.  He is one that if fortune equal his worth puts a lustre in all preferment; but if otherwise he be too much crossed, turns desperately melancholy, and scorns mankind.

A MERE GULL CITIZEN

Is one much about the same model and pitch of brain that the clown is, only of somewhat a more polite and finical ignorance, and as sillily scorns him as he is sillily admired by him.  The quality of the city hath afforded him some better dress of clothes and language, which he uses to the best advantage, and is so much the more ridiculous.  His chief education is the visits of his shop, where if courtiers and fine ladies resort, he is infected with so much more eloquence, and if he catch one word extraordinary, wears it forever.  You shall hear him mince a compliment sometimes that was never made for him; and no man pays dearer for good words,—­for he is oft paid with them.  He is suited rather fine than in the fashion, and has still something to distinguish him from a gentleman, though his doublet cost more; especially on Sundays, bridegroom-like, where he carries the state of a very solemn man, and keeps his pew as his shop; and it is a great part of his devotion to feast the minister.  But his chiefest guest is a customer, which is the greatest relation he acknowledges, especially if you be an honest gentleman, that is trust him to cozen you enough.  His friendships are a kind of gossiping friendships, and those commonly within the circle of his trade, wherein he is careful principally to avoid two things, that is poor men and suretyships.  He is a man will spend his sixpence with a great deal of imputation,[85] and no man makes more of a pint of wine than he.  He is one bears a pretty kind of foolish love to scholars, and to Cambridge especially for Sturbridge[86] fair’s sake; and of these all are truants to him that are not preachers, and of these the loudest the best; and he is much ravished with the noise of a rolling tongue.  He loves to hear discourses out of his element, and the less he understands the better pleased, which he expresses in a smile and some fond protestation.  One that does nothing without his chuck,[87] that is his wife, with whom he is billing still in conspiracy, and the wantoner she is, the more power she has over him; and she never stoops so low after him, but is the only woman goes better of a widow than a maid.  In the education of his child no man fearfuller, and the danger he fears is a harsh school-master, to whom he is alledging still the weakness of the boy, and pays a fine extraordinary for his mercy.  The first whipping rids him to the university, and from thence rids him again for fear of starving, and the best