M

1

THE

SATIRES

OF

Dr. JOHN DONNE,

Dean of ST. PAUL's,

VERSIFIED:

Quid vetat et nosmet Lucili scripta legentes
Quaerere, num illius, num rerum dura negarit
Verficulos natura magis factos, et euntes
Mollius?

HOR.

S

SATIRE II.

I do hate

IR; though (I thank God for it)
Perfectly all this town; yet there's one state

In all ill things so excellently best,
That hate towards them, breeds pity towards the rest.
Though Poetry, indeed, be such a fin,

As, I think, that brings dearth and Spaniards in :
Though like the pestilence, and old-fashion'd love,
Ridlingly it catch men, and doth remove
Never, till it be starv'd out; yet their state
Is poor, disarm'd, like Papifts, not worth hate.

One (like a wretch, which at barre judg'd as dead,
Yet prompts him which stands next, and cannot read,
And saves his life) gives Idiot Actors means,
(Starving himself) to live by's labour'd scenes.
As in some Organs, Puppits dance above
And bellows pant bellow, which them do move.
One would move love by rythmes; but witchcraft's

charms

Bring not now their old fears, nor their old harms;

SATIRE II.

Y

ES; thank my stars!

stars! as early as I knew

This Town, I had the sense to hate it too:

Yet here, as ev'n in Hell, there must be still

One Giant-Vice, so excellently ill,

That all befide, one pities, not abhors;

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As who knows Sapho, smiles at other whores.

I grant that Poetry's a crying fin;

It brought (no doubt) th' Excise and Army in: Catch'd like the Plague, or Love, the Lord knows

how,

But that the cure is starving, all allow.
Yet like the Papist's, is the Poet's state,

Poor and disarm'd, and hardly worth your hate!
Here a lean Bard, whose wit could never give
Himself a dinner, makes an Actor live :
The Thief condemn'd, in law already dead,
So prompts, and saves a rogue who cannot read.
Thus as the pipes of fome carv'd Organ move,
The gilded puppets dance and mount above.
Heav'd by the breath th' inspiring bellows blow:
Th' inspiring bellows lie and pant below.

One fings the Fair; but fongs no longer move; No rat is rhym'd to death, nor maid to love:

Rams, and flings now are filly battery,

Pistolets are the best artillery.

And they who write to Lords, rewards to get,
Are they not like fingers at doors for meat?

And they who write, because all write, have still
That 'scuse for writing, and for writing ill.
But he is worst, who beggarly doth chaw
Others wits fruits, and in his ravenous maw
Rankly digefted, doth those things out-spue,

As his own things; and they're his own, 'tis true,
For if one eat my meat, though it be known,

!

The meat was mine, the excrement's his own.

But these do me no harm, nor they which use,

to out-usure Jews, T'out-drink the sea, t'out-swear the Letanie, Who with fins all kinds as familiar be As Confeffors, and for whose sinful sake Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make; Whose strange fins Canonifts could hardly tell In which Commandment's large receit they dwell.

In love's, in nature's spite, the siege they hold,
And scorn the flesh, the dev'l, and all but gold.

These write to Lords, some mean reward to get,
As needy beggars fing at doors for meat.
Those write because all write, and fo have still
Excuse for writing, and for writing ill.

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Wretched indeed! but far more wretched yet
Is he who makes his meal on others wit:
'Tis chang'd, no doubt, from what it was before,
His rank digeftion makes it wit no more:
Sense, paft thro' him, no longer is the same;

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For food digested takes another name.

I pass o'er all those Confeffors and Martyrs,
Who live like S-tt-n, or who die like Chartres,
Out-cant old Efdras, or out-drink his heir,

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Out-usure Jews, or Irishmen out-swear;
Wicked as Pages, who in early years

Act fins which Prisca's Confeffor scarce hears.

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Ev'n those I pardon, for whose sinful fake
Schoolmen new tenements in hell must make;
Of whose strange crimes no Canonift can tell
In what Commandment's large contents they dwell.

NOTES.

to receive every thing within them, that either the Lary of Nature or the Gospel commands. A just ridicule on those practical Commentators, as they are called, who include all moral and religious Duties within them.

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