ride
   To have your ears most justly crucified,
   And cut so close until there be not leather
   Enough to stick a pen in left of either;
   Then will your consciences, your ears, and wit
   Be like indentures tripartite cut fit. 
   May your horns multiply and grow as great
   As that which does blow grace before your meat;
   May varlets be your barbers now, and do
   The same to you they have been done unto;
   That’s law and gospel too; may it prove true,
   Then they shall do pump-justice upon you;
   And when y’ are shaved and powder’d you shall fall,
   Thrown o’er the Bar, as they did o’er the wall,
   Never to rise again, unless it be
   To hold your hands up for your roguery;
   And when you do so may they be no less
   Sear’d by the hangman than your consciences. 
   May your gowns swarm until you can determine
   The strife no more between yourselves and vermin
   Than you have done between your clients’ purses;
   Now kneel and take the last and worst of curses—­
     May you be honest when it is too late;
     That is, undone the only way you hate.

AN EPIGRAMMATIST

Is a poet of small wares, whose Muse is short-winded and quickly out of breath.  She flies like a goose, that is no sooner upon the wing but down again.  He was originally one of those authors that used to write upon white walls, from whence his works, being collected and put together, pass in the world like single money among those that deal in small matters.  His wit is like fire in a flint, that is nothing while it is in, and nothing again as soon as it is out.  He treats of all things and persons that come in his way, but like one that draws in little, much less than the life:—­

   His bus’ness is t’ inveigh and flatter,
   Like parcel parasite and satyr.

He is a kind of vagabond writer, that is never out of his way, for nothing is beside the purpose with him that proposes none at all.  His works are like a running banquet, that have much variety but little of a sort, for he deals in nothing but scraps and parcels, like a tailor’s broker.  He does not write, but set his mark upon things, and gives no account in words at length, but only in figures.  All his wit reaches but to four lines or six at the most; and if he ever venture farther it tires immediately, like a post-horse, that will go no farther than his wonted stages.  Nothing agrees so naturally with his fancy as bawdry, which he dispenses in small pittances to continue his reader still in an appetite for more.

A FANATIC.