Like feather bed betwixt a wall
And heavy brunt of cannon ball.
Ay me! what perils do environ
The man that meddles with cold iron!
Who thought he 'd won
The field as certain as a gun.
Nor do I know what is become
Of him, more than the Pope of Rome.
I 'll make the fur
Fly 'bout the ears of the old cur.
He had got a hurt
O' the inside, of a deadlier sort.
These reasons made his mouth to water.
While the honour thou hast got
Is spick and span new.
With mortal crisis doth portend
My days to appropinque an end.
For those that run away and fly,
Take place at least o' the enemy.
I am not now in fortune's power:
He that is down can fall no lower.
Cheer'd up himself with ends of verse
And sayings of philosophers.
If he that in the field is slain
Be in the bed of honour lain,
He that is beaten may be said
To lie in honour's truckle-bed.
When pious frauds and holy shifts
Are dispensations and gifts.
Friend Ralph, thou hast
Outrun the constable at last.
Some force whole regions, in despite
O' geography, to change their site;
Make former times shake hands with latter,
And that which was before come after.
But those that write in rhyme still make
The one verse for the other's sake;
For one for sense, and one for rhyme,
I think's sufficient at one time.
Some have been beaten till they know
What wood a cudgel's of by th' blow;
Some kick'd until they can feel whether
A shoe be Spanish or neat's leather.
No Indian prince has to his palace
More followers than a thief to the gallows.
Quoth she, I 've heard old cunning stagers
Say fools for arguments use wagers.
Love in your hearts as idly burns
As fire in antique Roman urns.
For what is worth in anything
But so much money as 't will bring?
Love is a boy by poets styl'd;
Then spare the rod and spoil the child.
The sun had long since in the lap
Of Thetis taken out his nap,
And, like a lobster boil'd, the morn
From black to red began to turn.
Have always been at daggers-drawing,
And one another clapper-clawing.
For truth is precious and divine,--
Too rich a pearl for carnal swine.