No More Learning

"

Why, what unhallowed ruffian would have writ In such a scurrilous
manner to a friend! Why should he think I tell my apricots?

[_Enter_ BRAIN-WORM.

Take you this letter, and deliver it my son,
But with no notice I have opened it, on your life.

[_Exeunt. Then, enter_ YOUNG KNOWELL, _with the letter,
and_ BRAIN-WORM.

YOUNG KNOWELL: Did he open it, say'st thou?

BRAIN-WORM: Yes, o' my word, sir, and read the contents.
For he charged me on my life to tell nobody
that he opened it, which unless he had done he would
never fear to have it revealed.

[YOUNG KNOWELL _moves apart to read the letter. Enter_
STEPHEN. KNOWELL _laughs_.

STEPHEN: 'Slid, I hope he laughs not at me; an he
do----

KNOWELL: Here was a letter, indeed, to be intercepted
by a man's father! Well, if he read this with
patience---- (_Seeing_ STEPHEN) What, my wise cousin!
Nay, then, I'll furnish our feast with one gull more.
How now, Cousin Stephen--melancholy?

STEPHEN: Yes, a little. I thought you had laughed
at me, cousin.

KNOWELL: Be satisfied, gentle coz, and, I pray you,
let me entreat a courtesy of you. I am sent for this
morning by a friend in the Old Jewry: will you bear me
company?

STEPHEN: Sir, you shall command me twice as far.

KNOWELL: Now, if I can but hold him up to his
height!


SCENE II. --BOBADILL'S _room, a mean chamber, in_ COB'S _house_.
BOBADILL _lying on a bench. Enter_ MATTHEW, _ushered
in by_ TIB.

MATTHEW: 'Save you, sir; 'save you, captain.

BOBADILL: Gentle Master Matthew! Sit down, I pray
you. Master Matthew in any case, possess no gentlemen
of our acquaintance with notice of my lodging. Not
that I need to care who know it! But in regard I would
not be too popular and generally visited, as some are.

MATTHEW: True, captain, I conceive you.

BOBADILL: For do you see, sir, by the heart of valour
in me except it be to some peculiar and choice spirit like
yourself--but what new book have you there?

MATTHEW: Indeed, here are a number of fine
speeches in this book.

"O eyes, no eyes, but fountains fraught with tears"--

There's a conceit! Another:

"O life, no life but lively form of death!
O world, no world but mass of public wrongs"--

O the Muses! Is't not excellent? But when will you come to see my
study? Good faith I can show you some very good things I have done of
late. But, captain, Master Well-bred's elder brother and I are fallen
out exceedingly.

BOBADILL: Squire Down-right, the half-brother was't not? Hang him rook!
Come hither; you shall chartel him. I'll show you a trick or two you
shall kill him with, at pleasure, the first staccato, if you will, by
this air. Come, put on your cloak, and we'll go to some private place
where you are acquainted, some tavern or so. What money ha' you about
you?

MATTHEW: Faith, not past a two shillings or so.

BOBADILL: 'Tis somewhat with the least; but come, we will have a bunch
of radish and salt to taste our wine, and after we'll call upon Young
Well-bred.

[_Exeunt_.


ACT II

SCENE I. --KITELY'S _house_. KITELY _explains to_ DOWN-RIGHT _that_
WELL-BRED, _who lodges with him brings riotous companions
to the house, which makes him much troubled for his pretty
wife and sister_. BOBADILL _and_ MATTHEW _calling in search
of_ WELL-BRED, _the former insults_ DOWN-RIGHT, _and leaves
him storming_.


SCENE II. --_Moorfields_. _Enter_ BRAIN-WORM, _disguised as a maimed
soldier_.

BRAIN-WORM: The truth is, my old master intends to
follow my young master, dry-foot, over Moorfields to
London this morning. Now I, knowing of this hunting
match, or rather conspiracy, and to insinuate with my
young master, have got me before in this disguise, determining
here to lie in ambuscade. If I can but get
his cloak, his purse, his hat, anything to stay his journey,
I am made for ever, in faith. But here comes my young
master and his cousin, as I am a true counterfeit man of
war, and no soldier.

[_Enter_ YOUNG KNOWELL _and_ STEPHEN. BRAIN-WORM,
_with a cock-and-bull tale of his services in the
wars, persuades_ STEPHEN _to buy his sword as a
pure Toledo. Exeunt. Presently, enter_ OLD KNOWELL,
_and_ BRAIN-WORM _meets him_.

BRAIN-WORM (_aside_): My master! Nay, faith, have at
you; I am fleshed now, I have sped so well. Worshipful
sir, I beseech you, respect the estate of a poor soldier;
I am ashamed of this base course of life, but extremity
provokes me to it; what remedy?

KNOWELL: I have not for you now.

BRAIN-WORM: Good sir, by that hand, you may do the
part of a kind gentleman, in lending a poor soldier the
price of a can of beer; Heaven shall pay you, sweet worship!

KNOWELL: Art thou a man, and shamest not thou to beg?
To practise such a servile kind of life?
Either the wars might still supply thy wants,
Or service of some virtuous gentleman.

BRAIN-WORM: Faith, sir, I would gladly find some
other course--I know what I would say; but as for
service--my name, sir? Please you, Fitzsword, sir.

KNOWELL: Say that a man should entertain thee now,
Would'st thou be modest, humble, just, and true?

BRAIN-WORM: Sir, by the place and honour of a
soldier.

KNOWELL: Nay, nay, I like not these affected oaths.
But follow me; I'll prove thee. [_Exit. _

BRAIN-WORM: Yes, sir, straight. 'Slid, was there ever
a fox in years to betray himself thus! Now shall I be
possessed of all his counsels, and by that conduit, my
young master. [_Follows_ KNOWELL.


ACT III

SCENE I. --_A room in the Windmill Tavern. _ WELL-BRED, BOBADILL,
MATTHEW. _Enter_ YOUNG KNOWELL _with_ STEPHEN.

WELL-BRED: Ned Knowell! By my soul, welcome!
(_Lower_) Sirrah, there be the two I writ of. But what
strange piece of silence is this? The sign of the Dumb
Man?

KNOWELL: Oh, sir, a kinsman of mine; he has his
humour, sir.

STEPHEN: My name is Master Stephen, sir; I am
this gentleman's own cousin, sir; I am somewhat melancholy,
but you shall command me.

MATTHEW: Oh, it's your only fine humour, sir. Your
true melancholy breeds your perfect fine wit. I am melancholy
myself, divers times, and then I do no more but
take pen and paper presently, and overflow you half a
score or a dozen of fine sonnets at a sitting.

WELL-BRED: Captain Bobadill, why muse you so?

KNOWELL: He is melancholy, too.

BOBADILL: Why, sir, I was thinking of a most honourable
piece of service was performed at the beleaguering
of Strigonium; the first but the best leaguer that ever
I beheld with these eyes. Look you, sir, by St. George,
I was the first man that entered the breach; and had I
not effected it with resolution, I had been slain if I had
had a million of lives. Observe me judicially, sweet sir.
They had planted me three demiculvirins just in the
mouth of the breach, but I, with these single arms, my
poor rapier, ran violently upon the Moors, and put 'em
pell-mell to the sword.

[_Enter_ BRAIN-WORM, _who discloses himself apart, to_
KNOWELL _and_ Well-Bred, _and reports that_ OLD
KNOWELL _is awaiting his return at_ JUSTICE
CLEMENT'S _house. Exeunt_.


SCENE II. --_At_ KITELY'S. KITELY _has gone to_ JUSTICE CLEMENT'S;
_very anxious about his wife and sister, he has ordered_
CASH _to send him a messenger if_ WELL-BRED _comes home
with any of his boon-companions. Enter to_ CASH,
WELL-BRED, _with the party as in the last scene_.

WELL-BRED: Whither went your master, Thomas,
canst thou tell?

CASH: I know not; to Justice Clement's, I think, sir.

[_Exit. _

KNOWELL: Justice Clement! What's he?

WELL-BRED: Why, dost thou not know him? He is a
city magistrate, a justice here, an excellent good lawyer
and a great scholar; but the only mad merry old fellow
in Europe. [_Enter_ CASH.

BOBADILL: Master Kitely's man, pray thee vouchsafe
us the lighting of this match. (CASH _takes match, and
exits_) 'Tis your right, Trinidado. Did you never take
any, Master Stephen?

STEPHEN: No, truly, sir, but I'll learn to take it now,
since you commend it so.

BOBADILL: Sir, I have been in the Indies where this
herb grows; where neither myself nor a dozen gentlemen
more of my knowledge have received the taste of any
other nutriment in the world for the space of one and
twenty weeks, but the fume of this simple only. By Hercules,
I do hold it, and will affirm it, before any prince in
Europe, to be the most sovereign and precious weed that
ever the earth tendered to the use of man.

[COB _has entered meanwhile_.

COB: Mack, I marvel what pleasure they have in taking
this roguish tobacco. It's good for nothing but to
choke a man, and fill him full of smoke and embers.
And there were no wiser men than I, I'd have it present
whipping, man or woman, that should but deal with a
tobacco pipe.

[BOBADILL _cudgels him. Enter_ CASH, _who drags off the
lamenting_ COB. _While the rest are conversing_,
MATTHEW _and_ BOBADILL _slip out_.

WELL-BRED: Soft, where's Master Matthew? Gone?

BRAIN-WORM: No, sir, they went in here.

WELL-BRED: Oh, let's follow them. Master Matthew
is gone to salute his mistress in verse. We shall have the
happiness to hear some of his poetry now. He never
comes impoverished. [_Exeunt. _


SCENE III. --JUSTICE CLEMENT'S. COB _finds_ KITELY _and reports the
arrival of_ WELL-BRED'S _party_. KITELY _hurries home
in a panic. Enter_ CLEMENT _with_ OLD KNOWELL _and_ FORMAL.

CLEMENT (_to_ COB): How now, sirrah? What make
you here?

COB: A poor neighbour of your worship, come to
crave the peace of your worship; a warrant for one that
has wronged me, sir; an I die within a twelvemonth and
a day, I may swear by the law of the land that he killed
me.

CLEMENT: How, knave? What colour hast thou for
that?

COB: Both black and blue, an't please your worship;
colour enough, I warrant you. [_Baring his arm_.

CLEMENT: How began the quarrel between you?

COB: Marry indeed, an't please your worship, only
because I spake against their vagrant tobacco; for nothing
else.

CLEMENT: Ha! You speak against tobacco. Your
name?

COB: Cob, sir, Oliver Cob.

CLEMENT: Then, Oliver Cob, you shall go to jail.

COB: Oh, I beseech your worship, for heaven's sake,
dear master justice!

CLEMENT: He shall not go; I did but fear the knave.
Formal, give him his warrant. (_Exeunt_ FORMAL _and_
COB) How now, Master Knowell, in dumps? Your
cares are nothing. What! Your son is old enough to
govern himself; let him run his course.


ACT IV


SCENE I. --_At_ KITELY'S. DAME KITELY _and_ DOWN-RIGHT, _who, to his
sister's great indignation, is reproving her for admitting_
WELL-BRED'S _companions. Enter_ BRIDGET, MATTHEW, _and_
BOBADILL; WELL-BRED, STEPHEN, YOUNG KNOWELL, _and_
BRAIN-WORM _at the back_.

BRIDGET: Servant, in truth, you are too prodigal
Of your wit's treasure thus to pour it forth
Upon so mean a subject as my worth.
What is this same, I pray you?

MATTHEW: Marry, an elegy, an elegy, an odd toy.
I'll read it if you please.

[_Exit_ DOWN-RIGHT, _disgusted. The rest listen to_
MATTHEW'S _"elegy," consisting of scraps from Marlowe.
As_ DOWN-RIGHT _re-enters, fuming_, WELL-BRED
_is beginning to chaff_ MATTHEW. DOWN-RIGHT
_interrupts with an attack on the whole company, and
threatens to slit_ BOBADILL'S _ears. Swords are drawn
all round, and_ KNOWELL _is endeavouring to calm the
disturbance, when_ KITELY _enters_.

WELL-BRED: Come, let's go. This is one of my
brother's ancient humours, this.

STEPHEN: I am glad nobody was hurt by his "ancient
humour. "

[_Exeunt all but they of the house_. BRIDGET _and_ DAME
KITELY _praise the conduct of_ KNOWELL, _whereupon_
KITELY _conceives that he must be_ DAME KITELY'S
_lover_.


SCENE II. --_The Old Jewry_. WELL-BRED _has agreed with_ KNOWELL _to
persuade_ BRIDGET _to meet him at the Tower so that they
may be married_. BRAIN-WORM _has been despatched to
carry out other details of the plot. Meeting_ OLD KNOWELL
_with_ FORMAL _he reports that (as_ FITZSWORD) _his
connection with_ OLD KNOWELL _has been discovered; that
he has escaped with difficulty from_ YOUNG KNOWELL, _and
that the father had better hasten to_ Cob's _house to catch
his son in_ flagrante delicto. _He then goes off with_
FORMAL. _Enter_ BOBADILL, YOUNG KNOWELL, MATTHEW,
_and_ STEPHEN.

BOBADILL: I will tell you, sir, by way of private; were
I known to her majesty, I would undertake to save three
parts of her yearly charge in holding war. Thus, sir, I
would select nineteen more gentlemen of good spirit;
and I would teach the special rules, your punto, your reverso,
your staccato, till they could all play very near
as well as myself. We twenty would come into the field,
and we would challenge twenty of the enemy; kill them,
challenge twenty more; kill them, and thus kill every
man his twenty a day, that's twenty score; twenty score,
that's two hundred; five days a thousand, two hundred
days kills forty thousand.

[_Enter_ DOWN-RIGHT, _who challenges_ BOBADILL _to draw
on the spot, and cudgels him while_ MATTHEW _runs
away, to_ KNOWELL'S _enjoyment. Exeunt all_.
WELL-BRED _makes the proposed arrangement with_
BRIDGET. BRAIN-WORM, _who has stolen_ FORMAL'S
_clothes, tricks_ KITELY _and_ DAME KITELY _severally
into hurrying off to_ COB'S _house to catch each other
in misdoing. Then, meeting_ BOBADILL _and_
MATTHEW _he engages to procure them a warrant against_
DOWN-RIGHT, _and a sergeant to serve it_.
OLD
KNOWELL, KITELY, _and_ DAME KITELY _attended by_
CASH, _meet outside_ COB'S _house, each with their own
suspicions; there is a general altercation, while_ TIB
_refuses to admit any of them_.


SCENE III. --_A street_. BRAIN-WORM, _who has exchanged_ FORMAL'S
_clothes for a sergeant's attire. Enter_ MATTHEW _and_
BOBADILL.

MATTHEW: 'Save you, friend. Are you not here by
appointment of Justice Clement's man?

BRAIN-WORM: Yes, an't please you, sir; with a warrant
to be served on one Down-right.

[_Enter_ STEPHEN, _wearing_ DOWN-RIGHT'S _cloak, which
he had picked up in the scrimmage. As they are
arresting him_, DOWN-RIGHT _enters. He submits to
arrest, but has_ STEPHEN _arrested for wearing his
cloak. The whole party marches off to_ JUSTICE
CLEMENT'S.


ACT V


SCENE. --_Hall in_ JUSTICE CLEMENT'S. CLEMENT, KITELY, OLD KNOWELL.

CLEMENT: Stay, stay, give me leave; my chair, sirrah.
Master Knowell, you went to meet your son. Mistress
Kitely, you went to find your husband; you, Master
Kitely, to find your wife. And Well-bred told her first,
and you after. You are gulled in this most grossly all.

[BOBADILL _and_ MATTHEW _are ushered in; then_ BRAIN-WORM,
_with_ DOWN-RIGHT _and_ STEPHEN; _all make their charges_.

CLEMENT: You there (_to_ BOBADILL), had you my
warrant for this gentleman's apprehension?

BOBADILL: Ay, an't please your worship; I had it of
your clerk.

CLEMENT: Officer (_to_ BRAIN-WORM), have you the
warrant?

BRAIN-WORM: No, sir; your worship's man, Master
Formal, bid me do it.

BRAIN-WORM, _in fear of some worse penalty, discloses himself. As
he reveals one after another of his devices, the delighted_ JUSTICE
_begs for him a readily granted pardon from_ OLD KNOWELL. _Finally,
he announces that by this time_ YOUNG KNOWELL _and_ BRIDGET _are
married_. CLEMENT _despatches a servant to bring home the young couple
to dinner "upon my warrant. " Enter_ BRIDGET, YOUNG KNOWELL, _and_
WELL-BRED.

CLEMENT: Oh, the young company--welcome, welcome,
give you joy. Nay, Mistress Bridget, blush not;
Master Bridegroom, I have made your peace; give me
your hand. So will I for all the rest, ere you forsake
my roof. Come, put off all discontent; you, Master
Down-right, your anger; you, Master Knowell, your
cares; Master Kitely and his wife, their jealousy.

KITELY: Sir, thus they go from me. Kiss me, sweetheart.

CLEMENT: 'Tis well, 'tis well. This night we'll dedicate
to friendship, love, and laughter.


FOOTNOTES:

[P] Ben Jonson was born at Westminster in 1573. He was
brought up by his stepfather, a master bricklayer, and educated at
Westminster School, where he got his learning under Camden. While
still a youngster, he went a-fighting in the Low Countries, returning
to London about 1592. In 1598 he emerged as a dramatic author with
the play "Every Man in His Humour. " This was the first of a series of
comedies, tragedies, and masques, which rank highly. In human interest,
however, none surpassed his first success. Unlike Shakespeare, with
whom he consorted among the famous gatherings of wits at the Mermaid
Tavern, Jonson regarded himself as the exponent of a theory of dramatic
art. He was steeped in classical learning, which he is wont to display
somewhat excessively. Besides his dramas, Jonson wrote many lyrical
pieces, including some admirable songs, and produced sundry examples of
other forms of versification. He died on August 6, 1637.




JUVENAL[Q]




Satires


_I. --Of Satire and its Subjects_

Still shall I hear and never pay the score,
Stunned with hoarse Codrus' "Theseid" o'er and o'er?
Shall this man's elegies and the other's play
Unpunished murder a long summer day?

The poet exclaims against the dreary commonplaces in contemporary
poetry, and against recitations fit to crack the very statues and
colonnades of the neighbourhood! But _he_ also underwent his training
in rhetoric.

So, since the world with writing is possessed,
_I'll versify in spite_, and do my best
To make as much wastepaper as the rest!

It may be asked, why write satire? The reason is to be found in the
ubiquitous presence of offensive men and women. It would goad anyone
into fury to note the social abuses, the mannish women, and the
wealthy upstarts of the imperial city.

When the soft eunuch weds, and the bold fair
Tilts at the Tuscan boar with bosom bare,
When all our lords are by his wealth outvied
Whose razor on my callow beard was tried,
When I behold the spawn of conquered Nile,
Crispinus, both in birth and manners vile,
Pacing in pomp with cloak of purple dye--
I cannot keep from satire, though I try!

There is an endless succession of figures to annoy: the too successful
lawyer, the treacherous spy, the legacy-hunter. How one's anger blazes
when a ward is driven to evil courses by the unscrupulous knavery of a
guardian, or when a guilty governor gets a merely nominal sentence!

Marius, who pilled his province, 'scapes the laws,
And keeps his money, though he lost his cause:
His fine begged off, contemns his infamy,
Can rise at twelve, and get him drunk ere three--
Enjoys his exile, and, condemned in vain,
Leaves thee, victorious province, to complain!
Such villainies roused Horace into wrath,
And 'tis more noble to pursue his path
Than an old tale of Trojan brave to treat,
Or Hercules, or Labyrinth of Crete.

It is no time to write fabulous epics when cuckolds connive at
a wife's dishonour, and when horse-racing ne'er-do-wells expect
commissions in the army. One is tempted to fill volumes in the open
street about such figures as the forger carried by his slaves in a
handsome litter, or about the wealthy widow acquainted with the mode
of getting rid of a husband by poison.

Wouldst thou to honours and preferment climb?
Be bold in mischief--dare some mighty crime,
Which dungeons, death, or banishment deserves,
For virtue is but drily praised--and starves.
To crime men owe a mansion, park, and state,
Their goblets richly chased and antique plate.
Say, who can find a night's repose at need,
When a son's wife is bribed to sin for greed,
When brides are frail, and youths turn paramours?
If nature can't, then wrath our verse ensures!
Count from the time since old Deucalion's boat,
Raised by the flood, did on Parnassus float:
Whatever since that golden age was done,
What human kind desires, and what they shun,
Joy, sorrow, fear, love, hatred, transport, rage,
Shall form the motley subject of my page.
And when could Satire boast so fair a field?
Say, when did vice a richer harvest yield?
When did fell avarice so engross the mind?
Or when the lust of play so curse mankind?
O Gold, though Rome beholds no altar's flame,
No temples rise to thy pernicious name,
Such as to Victory, Virtue, Faith are reared,
Or Concord, where the clamorous stork is heard,
Yet is thy full divinity confessed,
Thy shrine established here, in every breast.

After a vigorous outburst against the degrading scramble among
impoverished clients for doles from their patrons, and a mordant
onslaught upon the gluttony of the niggardly rich, Juvenal sees in his
age the high-water mark of iniquity.

Nothing is left, nothing for future times,
To add to the full catalogue of crimes:
Vice has attained its zenith; then set sail,
Spread all thy canvas, Satire, to the gale.


_II. --A Satire on Rome_

This sharp indictment is put in the mouth of one Umbricius, who is
represented as leaving his native city in disgust. Rome is no place
for an honourable character, he exclaims.

Here, then, I bid my much-loved home farewell.
Ah, mine no more! There let Arturius dwell,
And Catulus; knaves, who, in truth's despite,
Can white to black transform, and black to white.
Build temples, furnish funerals, auctions hold,
Farm rivers, ports, and scour the drains for gold!
But why, my friend, should _I_ at Rome remain?
_I_ cannot teach my stubborn lips to feign;
Nor when I hear a great man's verses, smile,
And beg a copy, if I think them vile.

The worst feature is the predominance of crafty and cozening Greeks,
who, by their versatility and diplomacy, can oust the Roman.

I cannot rule my spleen and calmly see
A Grecian capital--in Italy!
A flattering, cringing, treacherous artful race,
Of torrent tongue, and never-blushing face;
A Protean tribe, one knows not what to call,
Which shifts to every form, and shines in all:
Grammarian, painter, augur, rhetorician,
Rope-dancer, conjurer, fiddler, and physician,
All trades his own your hungry Greekling counts;
And bid him mount the sky--the sky he mounts!

The insinuating flatteries of these aliens are so masterfully
contrived that the blunt Roman has no chance against such a nation of
actors.

Greece is a theatre where all are players.
For, lo! their patron smiles--they burst with mirth;
He weeps--they droop, the saddest souls on earth;
He calls for fire--they court the mantle's heat;
"'Tis warm," he cries--the Greeks dissolve in sweat!

Besides, they are dangerously immoral. Their philosophers are
perfidious. These sycophant foreigners can poison a patron against a
poor Roman client. This leads to an outburst against poverty and its
disadvantages.

The question is not put, how far extends
One's piety, but what he yearly spends.
The account is soon cast up: the judges rate
Our credit in the court by our estate.
Add that the rich have still a gibe in store,
And will be monstrous witty on the poor.

This mournful truth is everywhere confessed--
Slow rises worth by property depressed.
At Rome 'tis worse; where house-rent by the year,
And servants' bellies costs so devilish dear.

It is a city where appearance beyond one's means must be kept up;
whereas, in the country one need never spend money even on a toga.
Everything has its price in Rome. To interview a great man, his
pampered lackeys must have a fee.

Then there are risks in a great capital unknown in country towns.
There are tumble-down tenements with the buttresses ready to give;
there are top garrets where you may lose your life in a fire. You
could buy a nice rustic home for the price at which a dingy hovel is
let in Rome. Besides, the din of the streets is killing. Rome is bad
for the nerves. Folk die of insomnia. By day you get crushed, bumped,
and caked with mud. A soldier drives his hobnails into your toe. You
may be the victim of a street accident.

Heavens! should the axle crack, which bears a weight
Of huge Ligurian stone, and pour the freight
On the pale crowd beneath, what would remain,
What joint, what bone, what atom of the slain?
The body, with the soul, would vanish quite,
Invisible, as air, to mortal sight!
Meanwhile, unconscious of their master's fate,
At home they heat the water, scour the plate,
Arrange the strigils, fill the cruse with oil,
And ply their several tasks with fruitless toil.
But he, the mangled victim, now a ghost,
Sits pale and trembling on the Stygian coast,
A stranger shivering at the novel scene,
At Charon's threatening voice and scowling mien,
Nor hopes a passage thus abruptly hurled,
Without his farthing to the nether world.

In the dark there are equal perils.

Prepare for death if here at night you roam,
And sign your will before you sup from home.

Lucky if people throw only dirty water from their windows! Be thankful
to escape without a broken skull. A drunken bully may meet you.

There are who murder as an opiate take,
And only when no brawls await them, wake.

And what chance have you, without attendants, against a street rough?
Then there is the burglar; and the criminal classes are regularly
increased in town whenever the authorities grow active enough to clear
the main Italian roads of bandits.

The forge in fetters only is employed;
Our iron-mines exhausted and destroyed
In shackles; for these villains scarce allow
Goads for our teams or ploughshares for the plough.
Oh, happy ages of our ancestors,
Beneath the kings and tribunician powers!
One jail did all the criminals restrain,
Whom now the walls of Rome can scarce contain.


_III. --A Satire on the Vanity of Human Wishes_

Look round the habitable world; how few
Know their own good; or, knowing it, pursue.
To headlong ruin see whole houses driven,
Cursed with their prayers, by too indulgent heaven.

The several passions and aspirations of mankind, successively
examined in the light of legend and history, prove how hollow, if not
pernicious, are the principal objects of pursuit. Wealth is one of the
commonest aims.

But avarice spreads her deadly snare,
And hoards amassed with too successful care.
For wealth, in the black days, at Nero's word,
The ruffian bands unsheathed the murderous sword.
Cut-throats commissioned by the government
Are seldom to an empty garret sent.
The traveller freighted with a little wealth,
Sets forth at night, and wins his way by stealth:
Even then he fears the bludgeon and the blade--
Starts in the moonlight at a rush's shade,
While, void of care, the beggar trips along,
And to the robber's face will troll his song.

What would the "weeping" and the "laughing" sages of ancient Greece
have thought of the pageants of modern Rome? Consider the vanity of
ambition. It is illustrated by the downfall of the powerful minister
Sejanus. On his overthrow, the fickle mob turned savagely upon his
statues.

What think the people? They!
They follow fortune, as of old, and hate
With all their soul the victim of the state.
Yet in this very hour that self-same crowd
Had hailed Sejanus with a shout as loud,
If his designs (by fortune's favour blessed)
Had prospered, and the aged prince oppressed;
For since our votes have been no longer bought,
All public care has vanished from our thought.
Romans, who once with unresisted sway,
Gave armies, empire, everything, away,
For two poor claims have long renounced the whole
And only ask--the circus and a dole.

Would you rather be an instance of fallen greatness, or enjoy some
safe post in an obscure Italian town? What ruined a Crassus? Or a
Pompey? Or a victorious Caesar? Why, the realisation of their own
soaring desires.

Another vain aspiration covets fame in eloquence. But the gift
of oratory overthrew the two greatest orators of Greece and
Rome--Demosthenes and Cicero. If Cicero had only stuck to his bad
verses, he would never have earned Antony's deadly hatred by his
"Second Philippic" (see Vol. IX, p. 155).

"I do congratulate the Roman state
Which my great consulate did recreate! "
If he had always used such jingling words
He might have scorned Mark Antony's swords.

A different passion is for renown in war. What is the end of it all?
Only an epitaph on a tombstone, and tombstones themselves perish; for
even a tree may split them!

Produce the urn that Hannibal contains,
And weigh the paltry dust which yet remains.
AND IS THIS ALL? Yet THIS was once the bold,
The aspiring chief, whom Afric could not hold.
Spain conquered, o'er the Pyrenees he bounds;
Nature opposed her everlasting mounds,
Her Alps and snows. O'er these with torrent force
He pours, and rends through rocks his dreadful course.
Already at his feet Italia lies.
Yet, thundering on, "Think nothing done," he cries,
"Till Rome, proud Rome, beneath my fury falls,
And Afric's standards float without her walls! "
But what ensued? Illusive glory, say.
Subdued on Zama's memorable day,
He flies in exile to a petty state,
With headlong haste; and, at a despot's gate,
Sits, mighty suppliant, of his life in doubt,
Till the Bithynian monarch's nap be out!
Nor swords, nor spears, nor stones from engines hurled,
Shall quell the man whose frown alarmed the world:
The vengeance due to Cannae's fatal field,
And floods of gore, a poisoned ring shall yield!
Fly, madman, fly! At toil and danger mock,
Pierce the deep snow, and scale the eternal rock,
To please the rhetoricians, and become
A declamation--for the boys of Rome!

Consider next the yearning after long life.

Pernicious prayer! for mark what ills attend
Still on the old, as to the grave they bend:
A ghastly visage, to themselves unknown;
For a smooth skin, a hide with scurf o'ergrown;
And such a cheek, as many a grandam ape
In Tabraca's thick woods is seen to scrape.

The old man rouses feelings of impatient loathing in those around him;
his physical strength and faculties for enjoyment are gone. Even if
he remain hale, he may suffer harrowing bereavements. Nestor, Peleus,
and Priam had to lament the death of heroic sons; and in Roman history
Marius and Pompey outlived their good fortune.

Campania, prescient of her Pompey's fate,
Sent a kind fever to arrest his date:
When lo! a thousand suppliant altars rise,
And public prayers obtain him of the skies.
The city's fate and his conspired to save
His head, to perish near the Egyptian wave.

Again, there is the frequent prayer for good looks. But beauty is a
danger. If linked with unchastity, it leads to evil courses. Even if
linked with chastity, it may draw on its possessor the tragic fate
of a Lucretia, a Virginia, a Hippolytus, or a Bellerophon. What is a
Roman knight to do if an empress sets her heart on him?

Amid all such vanities, then, is there nothing left for which men may
reasonably pray?

Say, then, shall man, deprived all power of choice,
Ne'er raise to Heaven the supplicating voice?
Not so; but to the gods his fortunes trust.
_Their_ thoughts are wise, _their_ dispensations just.
What best may profit or delight they know,
And real good for fancied bliss bestow;
With eyes of pity they our frailties scan;
More dear to them than to himself is man.
By blind desire, by headlong passion driven,
For wife and heirs we daily weary Heaven;
Yet still 'tis Heaven's prerogative to know,
If heirs, or wife, will bring us weal or woe.
But (for 'tis good our humble hope to prove),
That thou mayst still ask something from above,
Thy pious offerings to the temple bear,
And, while the altars blaze, be this thy prayer:
O THOU, who know'st the wants of human kind,
Vouchsafe me health of body, health of mind;
A soul prepared to meet the frown of fate,
And look undaunted on a future state;
That reckons death a blessing, yet can bear
Existence nobly, with its weight of care;
That anger and desire alike restrains,
And counts Alcides' toils, and cruel pains,
Superior far to banquets, wanton nights,
And all the Assyrian monarch's soft delights!
Here bound, at length, thy wishes. I but teach
What blessings man, by his own powers, may reach.
THE PATH TO PEACE IS VIRTUE. We should see,
If wise, O Fortune, nought divine in thee:
But _we_ have deified a name alone,
And fixed in heaven thy visionary throne!