Chapter XV: Part 15

Is easily acquainted with all knowledges, but never intimate with any; he remembers he has seen them somewhere before, but cannot possibly call to mind where. He will call an art by its name, and claim acquaintance with it at first sight. He knew it perfectly, as the Platonics say, in the other world, but has had the unhappiness to discontinue his acquaintance ever since his occasions called him into this. He claps on all the sail he can possibly make, though his vessel be empty and apt to overset. He is of a true philosophical temper, contented with a little, desires no more knowledge than will satisfy nature, and cares not what his wants are so he can but keep them from the eyes of the world. His parts are unlimited; for as no man knows his abilities, so he does his endeavour that as few should his defects. He wears himself in opposition to the mode, for his lining is much coarser than his outside; and as others line their serge with silk, he lines his silk with serge. All his care is employed to appear not to be; for things that are not and things that appear not are not only the same in law, but in all other affairs of the world. It should seem that the most impudent face is the best; for he that does the shamefulest thing most unconcerned is said to set a good face upon it; for the truth is, the face is but the outside of the mind, but all the craft is to know how 'tis lined. Howsoever, he fancies himself as able as any man, but not being in a capacity to try the experiment, the hint-keeper of Gresham College is the only competent judge to decide the controversy. He may, for anything he knows, have as good a title to his pretences as another man; for judgment being not past in the case (which shall never be by his means), his title still stands fair. All he can possibly attain to is but to be another thing than nature meant him, though a much worse. He makes that good that Pliny says of children, _Qui celerius fari cepere, tardius ingredi incipiunt_. The apter he is to smatter, the slower he is in making any advance in his pretences. He trusts words before he is thoroughly acquainted with them, and they commonly show him a trick before he is aware; and he shows at the same time his ignorance to the learned and his learning to the ignorant.

A NEWSMONGER

Is a retailer of rumour that takes up upon trust and sells as cheap as he buys. He deals in a perishable commodity that will not keep; for if it be not fresh it lies upon his hands and will yield nothing. True or false is all one to him; for novelty being the grace of both, a truth grows stale as soon as a lie; and as a slight suit will last as well as a better while the fashion holds, a lie serves as well as truth till new ones come up. He is little concerned whether it be good or bad, for that does not make it more or less news; and, if there be any difference, he loves the bad best, because it is said to come soonest; for he would willingly bear his share in any public calamity to have the pleasure of hearing and telling it. He is deeply read in diurnals, and can give as good an account of Rowland Pepin, if need be, as another man. He tells news, as men do money, with his fingers; for he assures them it comes from very good hands. The whole business of his life is, like that of a spaniel, to fetch and carry news, and when he does it well he is clapped on the back and fed for it; for he does not take to it altogether, like a gentleman, for his pleasure, but when he lights on a considerable parcel of news, he knows where to put it off for a dinner, and quarter himself upon it until he has eaten it out; and by this means he drives a trade, by retrieving the first news to truck it for the first meat in season, and, like the old Roman luxury, ransacks all seas and lands to please his palate; for he imports his narratives from all parts within the geography of a diurnal, and eats as well upon the Russ and Polander as the English and Dutch. By this means his belly is provided for, and nothing lies upon his hands but his back, which takes other courses to maintain itself by weft and stray silver spoons, straggling hoods and scarfs, pimping, and sets at _L'Ombre_.

A MODERN CRITIC

Is a corrector of the press gratis; and as he does it for nothing, so it is to no purpose. He fancies himself clerk of Stationers' Hall, and nothing must pass current that is not entered by him. He is very severe in his supposed office, and cries, "Woe to ye scribes!" right or wrong. He supposes all writers to be malefactors without clergy that claim the privilege of their books, and will not allow it where the law of the land and common justice does. He censures in gross, and condemns all without examining particulars. If they will not confess and accuse themselves, he will rack them until they do. He is a committee-man in the commonwealth of letters, and as great a tyrant, so is not bound to proceed but by his own rules, which he will not endure to be disputed. He has been an apocryphal scribbler himself; but his writings wanting authority, he grew discontent and turned apostate, and thence becomes so severe to those of his own profession. He never commends anything but in opposition to something else that he would undervalue, and commonly sides with the weakest, which is generous anywhere but in judging. He is worse than an _index expurgatorius_; for he blots out all, and when he cannot find a fault, makes one. He demurs to all writers, and when he is overruled, will run into contempt. He is always bringing writs of error, like a pettifogger, and reversing of judgments, though the case be never so plain. He is a mountebank that is always quacking of the infirm and diseased parts of books, to show his skill, but has nothing at all to do with the sound. He is a very ungentle reader, for he reads sentence on all authors that have the unhappiness to come before him; and therefore pedants, that stand in fear of him, always appeal from him beforehand, by the name of Momus and Zoilus, complain sorely of his extra-judicial proceedings, and protest against him as corrupt, and his judgment void and of none effect, and put themselves in the protection of some powerful patron, who, like a knight-errant, is to encounter with the magician and free them from his enchantments.

A BUSY MAN

Is one that seems to labour in every man's calling but his own, and, like Robin Goodfellow, does any man's drudgery that will let him. He is like an ape, that loves to do whatsoever he sees others do, and is always as busy as a child at play. He is a great undertaker, and commonly as great an underperformer. His face is like a lawyer's buckram rag, that has always business in it, and as he trots about his head travels as fast as his feet. He covets his neighbour's business, and his own is to meddle, not do. He is very lavish of his advice, and gives it freely, because it is worth nothing, and he knows not what to do with it himself. He is a common-barreter for his pleasure, that takes no money, but pettifogs gratis. He is very inquisitive after every man's occasions, and charges himself with them like a public notary. He is a great overseer of State affairs, and can judge as well of them before he understands the reasons as afterwards. He is excellent at preventing inconveniences and finding out remedies when 'tis too late; for, like prophecies, they are never heard of till it is to no purpose. He is a great reformer, always contriving of expedients, and will press them with as much earnestness as if himself and every man he meets had power to impose them on the nation. He is always giving aim to State affairs, and believes by screwing of his body he can make them shoot which way he pleases. He inquires into every man's history, and makes his own commentaries upon it as he pleases to fancy it. He wonderfully affects to seem full of employments, and borrows men's business only to put on and appear in, and then returns it back again, only a little worse. He frequents all public places, and, like a pillar in the old Exchange, is hung with all men's business, both public and private, and his own is only to expose them. He dreads nothing so much as to be thought at leisure, though he is never otherwise; for though he be always doing, he never does anything.

A PEDANT

Is a dwarf scholar, that never outgrows the mode and fashion of the school where he should have been taught. He wears his little learning, unmade-up, puts it on before it was half finished, without pressing or smoothing. He studies and uses words with the greatest respect possible, merely for their own sakes, like an honest man, without any regard of interest, as they are useful and serviceable to things, and among those he is kindest to strangers (like a civil gentleman) that are far from their own country and most unknown. He collects old sayings and ends of verses, as antiquaries do old coins, and is as glad to produce them upon all occasions. He has sentences ready lying by him for all purposes, though to no one, and talks of authors as familiarly as his fellow-collegiates. He will challenge acquaintance with those he never saw before, and pretend to intimate knowledge of those he has only heard of. He is well stored with terms of art, but does not know how to use them, like a country-fellow that carries his gloves in his hands, not his hands in his gloves. He handles arts and sciences like those that can play a little upon an instrument, but do not know whether it be in tune or not. He converses by the book, and does not talk, but quote. If he can but screw in something that an ancient writer said, he believes it to be much better than if he had something of himself to the purpose. His brain is not able to concoct what it takes in, and therefore brings things up as they were swallowed, that is, crude and undigested, in whole sentences, not assimilated sense, which he rather affects; for his want of judgment, like want of health, renders his appetite preposterous. He pumps for affected and far-set expressions, and they always prove as far from the purpose. He admires canting above sense. He is worse than one that is utterly ignorant, as a cock that sees a little fights worse than one that is stark blind. He speaks in a different dialect from other men, and much affects forced expressions, forgetting that hard words, as well as evil ones, corrupt good manners. He can do nothing, like a conjurer, out of the circle of his arts, nor in it without canting and ... If he professes physic, he gives his patients sound, hard words for their money, as cheap as he can afford; for they cost him money, and study too, before he came by them, and he has reason to make as much of them as he can.

A HUNTER

Is an auxiliary hound that assists one nation of beasts to subdue and overrun another. He makes mortal war with the fox for committing acts of hostility against his poultry. He is very solicitous to have his dogs well descended of worshipful families, and understands their pedigree as learnedly as if he were a herald, and is as careful to match them according to their rank and qualities as High-Germans are of their own progenies. He is both cook and physician to his hounds, understands the constitutions of their bodies, and what to administer in any infirmity or disease, acute or chronic, that can befall them. Nor is he less skilful in physiognomy, and from the aspects of their faces, shape of their snouts, falling of their ears and lips, and make of their barrels will give a shrewd guess at their inclinations, parts, and abilities, and what parents they are lineally descended from; and by the tones of their voices and statures of their persons easily discover what country they are natives of. He believes no music in the world is comparable to a chorus of their voices, and that when they are well matched they will hunt their parts as true at first scent as the best singers of catches that ever opened in a tavern; that they understand the scale as well as the best scholar that ever learned to compose by the mathematics; and that when he winds his horn to them 'tis the very same thing with a cornet in a quire; that they will run down the hare with a fugue, and a double do-sol-re-dog hunt a thorough-base to them all the while; that when they are at a loss they do but rest, and then they know by turns who are to continue a dialogue between two or three of them, of which he is commonly one himself. He takes very great pains in his way, but calls it game and sport because it is to no purpose; and he is willing to make as much of it as he can, and not be thought to bestow so much labour and pains about nothing. Let the hare take which way she will, she seldom fails to lead him at long-running to the alehouse, where he meets with an after-game of delight in making up a narrative how every dog behaved himself, which is never done without long dispute, every man inclining to favour his friend as far as he can; and if there be anything remarkable to his thinking in it, he preserves it to please himself and, as he believes, all people else with, during his natural life, and after leaves it to his heirs male entailed upon the family, with his bugle-horn and seal-ring.

AN AFFECTED MAN

Carries himself like his dish (as the proverb says), very uprightly, without spilling one drop of his humour. He is an orator and rhetorician, that delights in flowers and ornaments of his own devising to please himself and others that laugh at him. He is of a leaden, dull temper, that stands stiff, as it is bent, to all crooked lines, but never to the right. When he thinks to appear most graceful, he adorns himself most ill-favouredly, like an Indian that wears jewels in his lips and nostrils. His words and gestures are all as stiff as buckram, and he talks as if his lips were turned up as well as his beard. All his motions are regular, as if he went by clockwork, and he goes very true to the nick as he is set. He has certain favourite words and expressions, which he makes very much of, as he has reason to do, for they serve him upon all occasions and are never out of the way when he has use of them, as they have leisure enough to do, for nobody else has any occasion for them but himself. All his affectations are forced and stolen from others; and though they become some particular persons where they grow naturally, as a flower does on its stalk, he thinks they will do so by him when they are pulled and dead. He puts words and language out of its ordinary pace and breaks it to his own fancy, which makes it go so uneasy in a shuffle, which it has not been used to. He delivers himself in a forced way, like one that sings with a feigned voice beyond his natural compass. He loves the sound of words better than the sense, and will rather venture to incur nonsense than leave out a word that he has a kindness for. If he be a statesman, the slighter and meaner his employments are the bigger he looks, as an ounce of tin swells and looks bigger than an ounce of gold; and his affectations of gravity are the most desperate of all, as the aphorism says--Madness of study and consideration are harder to be cured than those of lighter and more fantastic humour.

A MEDICINE-TAKER

Has a sickly mind and believes the infirmity is in his body, like one that draws the wrong tooth and fancies his pain in the wrong place. The less he understands the reason of physic the stronger faith he has in it, as it commonly fares in all other affairs of the world. His disease is only in his judgment, which makes him believe a doctor can fetch it out of his stomach or his belly, and fright those worms out of his guts that are bred in his brain. He believes a doctor is a kind of conjurer that can do strange things, and he is as willing to have him think so; for by that means he does not only get his money, but finds himself in some possibility by complying with that fancy to do him good for it, which he could never expect to do any other way; for, like those that have been cured by drinking their own water, his own imagination is a better medicine than any the doctor knows how to prescribe, even as the weapon-salve cures a wound by being applied to that which made it. He is no sooner well but any story or lie of a new famous doctor or strange cure puts him into a relapse, and he falls sick of a medicine instead of a disease, and catches physic like him that fell into a looseness at the sight of a purge. He never knows when he is well or sick, but is always tampering with his health till he has spoiled it, like a foolish musician that breaks his strings with striving to put them in tune; for Nature, which is physic, understands better how to do her own work than those that take it from her at second hand. Hippocrates says, _Ars longa, vita brevis_, and it is the truest of all his aphorisms--

"For he that's given much to the long art
Does not prolong his life, but cut it short."

THE MISER

Is like the sea, that is said to be richer than the land, but is not able to make any use of it at all, and only keeps it from those that know how to enjoy it if they had it. The devil understood his business very well when he made choice of Judas's avarice to betray Christ, for no other vice would have undertaken it; and it is to be feared that his Vicars now on earth, by the tenderness they have to the bag, do not use Him much better than His steward did then. He gathers wealth to no purpose but to satisfy his avarice, that has no end, and afflicts himself to possess that which he is, of all men, the most incapable of ever obtaining. His treasure is in his hands in the same condition as if it were buried uncier ground and watched by an evil spirit. His desires are like the bottomless pit which he is destined to, for the one is as soon filled as the other. He shuts up his money in close custody, and that which has power to open all locks is not able to set itself at liberty. If he ever lets it out it is upon good bail and mainprize, to render itself prisoner again whensoever it shall be summoned. He loves wealth as an eunuch does women, whom he has no possibility of enjoying, or one that is bewitched with an impotency or taken with the falling sickness. His greedy appetite to riches is but a kind of dog-hunger, that never digests what it devours, but still the greedier and more eager it crams itself becomes more meagre. He finds that ink and parchment preserves money better than an iron chest and parsimony, like the memories of men that lie dead and buried when they are committed to brass and marble, but revive and flourish when they are trusted to authentic writings and increase by being used. If he had lived among the Jews in the wilderness he would have been one of their chief reformers, and have worshipped anything that is cast in gold, though a sillier creature than a calf. St. John in the Revelations describes the New Jerusalem to be built all of gold and silver and precious stones, for the saints commonly take so much delight in those creatures that nothing else could prevail with them ever to come thither; and as those times are called the Golden Age in which there was no gold at all in use, so men are reputed godly and rich that make no use at all of their religion or wealth. All that he has gotten together with perpetual pains and industry is not wealth, but a collection, which he intends to keep by him more for his own diversion than any other use, and he that made ducks and drakes with his money enjoyed it every way as much. He makes no conscience of anything but parting with his money, which is no better than a separation of soul and body to him, and he believes it to be as bad as self-murder if he should do it wilfully; for the price of the weapon with which a man is killed is always esteemed a very considerable circumstance, and next to not having the fear of God before his eyes. He loves the bowels of the earth broiled on the coals above any other cookery in the world. He is a slave condemned to the mines. He laughs at the golden mean as ridiculous, and believes there is no such thing in the world; for how can there be a mean of that of which no man ever had enough? He loves the world so well that he would willingly lose himself to save anything by it. His riches are like a dunghill, that renders the ground unprofitable that it lies upon, and is good for nothing until it be spread and scattered abroad.

A SWEARER

Is one that sells the devil the best pennyworth that he meets with anywhere, and, like the Indians that part with gold for glass beads, he damns his soul for the slightest trifles imaginable. He betroths himself oftener to the devil in one day than Mecaenas did in a week to his wife, that he was married a thousand times to. His discourse is inlaid with oaths as the gallows is with nails, to fortify it against the assaults of those whose friends have made it their deathbed. He takes a preposterous course to be believed and persuade you to credit what he says, by saying that which at the best he does not mean; for all the excuse he has for his voluntary damning of himself is, that he means nothing by it. He is as much mistaken in what he does intend really, for that which he takes for the ornament of his language renders it the most odious and abominable. His custom of swearing takes away the sense of his saying. His oaths are but a dissolute formality of speech and the worst kind of affectation. He is a Knight-Baronet of the Post, or gentleman blasphemer, that swears for his pleasure only; a lay-affidavit man, _in voto_ only and not in orders. He learned to swear, as magpies do to speak, by hearing others. He talks nothing but bell, book, and candle, and delivers himself over to Satan oftener than a Presbyterian classis would do. He plays with the devil for sport only, and stakes his soul to nothing. He overcharges his oaths till they break and hurt himself only. He discharges them as fast as a gun that will shoot nine times with one loading. He is the devil's votary, and fails not to commend himself into his tuition upon all occasions. He outswears an exorcist, and outlies the legend. His oaths are of a wider bore and louder report than those of an ordinary perjurer, but yet they do not half the execution. Sometimes he resolves to leave it, but not too suddenly, lest it should prove unwholesome and injurious to his health, but by degrees as he took it up. Swearing should appear to be the greatest of sins, for though the Scripture says, "God sees no sin in His children," it does not say He hears none.

THE LUXURIOUS

Places all enjoyment in spending, as a covetous man does in getting, and both are treated at a witch's feast, where nothing feeds but only the imagination, and like two madmen, that believe themselves to be the same prince, laugh at one another. He values his pleasures as they do honour, by the difficulty and dearness of the purchase, not the worth of the thing; and the more he pays the better he believes he ought to be pleased, as women are fondest of those children which they have groaned most for. His tongue is like a great practiser's in law, for as the one will not stir, so the other will not taste without a great fee. He never reckons what a thing costs by what it is worth, but what it is worth by what it costs. All his senses are like corrupt judges, that will understand nothing until they are thoroughly informed and satisfied with a convincing bribe. He relishes no meat but by the rate, and a high price is like sauce to it, that gives it a high taste and renders it savoury to his palate. He believes there is nothing dear, nor ought to be so, that does not cost much, and that the dearest bought is always the cheapest. He tastes all wines by the smallness of the bottles and the greatness of the price, and when he is over-reckoned takes it as an extraordinary value set upon him, as Dutchmen always reckon by the dignity of the person, not the charge of the entertainment he receives, put his quality and titles into the bill of fare, and make him pay for feeding upon his own honour and right-worship, which he brought along with him. He debauches his gluttony with an unnatural appetite to things never intended for food, like preposterous venery or the unnatural mixtures of beasts of several kinds. He is as curious of his pleasures as an antiquary of his rarities, and cares for none but such as are very choice and difficult to be gotten, disdains anything that is common, unless it be his women, which he esteems a common good, and therefore the more communicative the better. All his vices are, like children that have been nicely bred, a great charge to him, and it costs him dear to maintain them like themselves, according to their birth and breeding; but he, like a tender parent, had rather suffer want himself than they should, for he considers a man's vices are his own flesh and blood, and though they are but by-blows, he is bound to provide for them, out of natural affection, as well as if they were lawfully begotten.

AN UNGRATEFUL MAN

Is like dust in the highway, that flies in the face of those that raise it. He that is ungrateful is all things that are amiss. He is like the devil, that seeks the destruction of those most of all that do him the best service, or an unhealthful sinner that receives pleasure and returns nothing but diseases. He receives obligations from all that he can, but they presently become void and of none effect, for good offices fare with him like death, from which there is no return. His ill-nature is like an ill stomach, that turns its nourishment into bad humours. He should be a man of very great civilities, for he receives all that he can, but never parts with any. He is like a barren soil; plant what you will on him, it will never grow, nor anything but thorns and thistles, that came in with the curse. His mother died in child-bed of him, for he is descended of the generation of vipers in which the dam always eats off the sire's head, and the young ones their way through her belly. He is like a horse in a pasture, that eats up the grass and dungs it in requital. He puts the benefits he receives from others and his own faults together in that end of the sack which he carries behind his back. His ill-nature, like a contagious disease, infects others that are of themselves good, who, observing his ingratitude, become less inclined to do good than otherwise they would be; and as the sweetest wine, if ill-preserved, becomes the sourest vinegar, so the greatest endearments with him turn to the bitterest injuries. He has an admirable art of forgetfulness, and no sooner receives a kindness but he owns it by prescription and claims from time out of mind. All his acknowledgments appear before his ends are served, but never after, and, like Occasion, grow very thick before but bare behind. He is like a river, that runs away from the spring that feeds it and undermines the banks that support it; or like vice and sin, that destroy those that are most addicted to it; or the hangman, that breaks the necks of those whom he gets his living by, and whips those that find him employment, and brands his masters that set him on work. He pleads the Act of Oblivion for all the good deeds that are done him, and pardons himself for the evil returns he makes. He never looks backward (like a right statesman), and things that are past are all one with him as if they had never been; and as witches, they say, hurt those only from whom they can get something and have a hank upon, he no sooner receives a benefit but he converts it to the injury of that person who conferred it on him. It fares with persons as with families, that think better of themselves the farther they are off their first raisers.

A SQUIRE OF DAMES

Deals with his mistress as the devil does with a witch, is content to be her servant for a time, that she may be his slave for ever. He is esquire to a knight-errant, donzel to the damsels, and gentleman usher daily waiter on the ladies, that rubs out his time in making legs and love to them. He is a gamester who throws at all ladies that are set him, but is always out, and never wins but when he throws at the candlestick, that is, for nothing; a general lover, that addresses unto all but never gains any, as universals produce nothing. He never appears so gallant a man as when he is in the head of a body of ladies and leads them up with admirable skill and conduct. He is a eunuch-bashaw, that has charge of the women and governs all their public affairs, because he is not able to do them any considerable private services. One of his prime qualifications is to convey their persons in and out of coaches, as tenderly as a cook sets his custards in an oven and draws them out again, without the least discomposure or offence to their inward or outward woman; that is, their persons and dresses. The greatest care he uses in his conversation with ladies is to order his peruke methodically, and keep off his hat with equal respect both to it and their ladyships, that neither may have cause to take any just offence, but continue him in their good graces. When he squires a lady he takes her by the handle of her person, the elbow, and steers it with all possible caution, lest his own foot should, upon a tack, for want of due circumspection, unhappily fall foul on the long train she carries at her stern. This makes him walk upon his toes and tread as lightly as if he were leading her a dance. He never tries any experiment solitary with her, but always in consort, and then he acts the woman's part and she the man's, talks loud and laughs, while he sits demurely silent, and simpers or bows, and cries, "Anon, Madam, excellently good!" &c. &c. He is a kind of hermaphrodite, for his body is of one sex and his mind of another, which makes him take no delight in the conversation or actions of men, because they do so by his, but apply himself to women, to whom the sympathy and likeness of his own temper and wit naturally inclines him, where he finds an agreeable reception for want of a better; for they, like our Indian planters, value their wealth by the number of their slaves. All his business in the morning is to dress himself, and in the afternoon to show his workmanship to the ladies, who after serious consideration approve or disallow of his judgment and abilities accordingly, and he as freely delivers his opinion of theirs. The glass is the only author he studies, by which his actions and gestures are all put on like his clothes, and by that he practices how to deliver what he has prepared to say to the dames, after he has laid a train to bring it in.

AN HYPOCRITE

Is a saint that goes by clockwork, a machine made by the devil's geometry, which he winds and nicks to go as he pleases. He is the devil's finger-watch, that never goes true, but too fast or too slow as he sets him. His religion goes with wires, and he serves the devil for an idol to seduce the simple to worship and believe in him. He puts down the true saint with his copper-lace devotion, as ladies that use art paint fairer than the life. He is a great bustler in reformation, which is always most proper to his talent, especially if it be tumultuous; for pockets are nowhere so easily and safely picked as in jostling crowds. And as change and alterations are most agreeable to those who are tied to nothing, he appears more zealous and violent for the cause than such as are retarded by conscience or consideration. His religion is a mummery, and his Gospel-walkings nothing but dancing a masquerade. He never wears his own person, but assumes a shape, as his master, the devil, does when he appears. He wears counterfeit hands (as the Italian pickpocket did), which are fastened to his breast as if he held them up to heaven, while his natural fingers are in his neighbour's pocket. The whole scope of all his actions appears to be directed, like an archer's arrow, at heaven, while the clout he aims at sticks in the earth. The devil baits his hook with him when he fishes in troubled waters. He turns up his eyes to heaven like birds that have no upper lid. He is a weathercock upon the steeple of the church, that turns with every wind that blows from any point of the compass. He sets his words and actions like a printer's letters, and he that will understand him must read him backwards. He is much more to be suspected than one that is no professor, as a stone of any colour is easier counterfeited than a diamond that is of none. The inside of him tends quite cross to the outside, like a spring that runs upward within the earth and down without. He is an operator for the soul, and corrects other men's sins with greater of his own, as the Jews were punished for their idolatry by greater idolaters than themselves. He is a spiritual highwayman that robs on the road to heaven. His professions and his actions agree like a sweet voice and a stinking breath.

AN OPINIONATER

Is his own confidant, that maintains more opinions than he is able to support. They are all bastards commonly and unlawfully begotten, but being his own, he had rather, out of natural affection, take any pains, or beg, than they should want a subsistence. The eagerness and violence he uses to defend them argues they are weak, for if they were true they would not need it. How false soever they are to him, he is true to them; and as all extraordinary affections of love or friendship are usually upon the meanest accounts, he is resolved never to forsake them, how ridiculous soever they render themselves and him to the world. He is a kind of a knight-errant that is bound by his order to defend the weak and distressed, and deliver enchanted paradoxes, that are bewitched and held by magicians and conjurers in invisible castles. He affects to have his opinions as unlike other men's as he can, no matter whether better or worse, like those that wear fantastic clothes of their own devising. No force of argument can prevail upon him; for, like a madman, the strength of two men in their wits is not able to hold him down. His obstinacy grows out of his ignorance, for probability has so many ways that whosoever understands them will not be confident of any one. He holds his opinions as men do their lands, and though his tenure be litigious, he will spend all he has to maintain it. He does not so much as know what opinion means, which, always supposing uncertainty, is not capable of confidence. The more implicit his obstinacy is, the more stubborn it renders him; for implicit faith is always more pertinacious than that which can give an account of itself; and as cowards that are well backed will appear boldest, he that believes as the Church believes is more violent, though he knows not what it is, than he that can give a reason for his faith. And as men in the dark endeavour to tread firmer than when they are in the light, the darkness of his understanding makes him careful to stand fast wheresoever he happens, though it be out of his way.

A CHOLERIC MAN

Is one that stands for madman, and has as many voices as another. If he miss he has very hard dealing; for if he can but come to a fair polling of his fits against his intervals, he is sure to carry it. No doubt it would be a singular advantage to him; for, as his present condition stands, he has more full moons in a week than a lunatic has in a year. His passion is like tinder, soon set on fire and as soon out again. The smallest occasion imaginable puts him in his fit, and then he has no respect of persons, strikes up the heels of stools and chairs, tears cards limbmeal without regard of age, sex, or quality, and breaks the bones of dice, and makes them a dreadful example to deter others from daring to take part against him. He is guilty but of misprision of madness, and if the worst come to the worst, can but forfeit estate and suffer perpetual liberty to say what he pleases. 'Tis true he is but a candidate of Bedlam, and is not yet admitted fellow, but has the license of the College to practise, and in time will not fail to come in according to his seniority. He has his grace for madman, and has done his exercises, and nothing but his good manners can put him by his degree. He is, like a foul chimney, easily set on fire, and then he vapours and flashes as if he would burn the house, but is presently put out with a greater huff, and the mere noise of a pistol reduces him to a quiet and peaceable temper. His temper is, like that of a meteor, an imperfect mixture, that sparkles and flashes until it has spent itself. All his parts are irascible, and his gall is too big for his liver. His spleen makes others laugh at him, and as soon as his anger is over with others he begins to be angry with himself and sorry. He is sick of a preposterous ague, and has his hot fit always before his cold. The more violent his passion is the sooner it is out, like a running knot, that strains hardest, but is easiest loosed. He is never very passionate but for trifles, and is always most temperate where he has least cause, like a nettle that stings worst when it is touched with soft and gentle fingers, but when it is bruised with rugged, hardened hands returns no harm at all.

A SUPERSTITIOUS MAN

Is more zealous in his false, mistaken piety than others are in the truth; for he that is in an error has farther to go than one that is in the right way, and therefore is concerned to bestir himself and make the more speed. The practice of his religion is, like the Schoolmen's speculations, full of niceties and tricks, that take up his whole time and do him more hurt than good. His devotions are labours, not exercises, and he breaks the Sabbath in taking too much pains to keep it. He makes a conscience of so many trifles and niceties, that he has not leisure to consider things that are serious and of real weight. His religion is too full of fears and jealousies to be true and faithful, and too solicitous and unquiet to continue in the right, if it were so. And as those that are bunglers and unskilful in any art take more pains to do nothing, because they are in a wrong way, than those that are ready and expert to do the excellentest things, so the errors and mistakes of his religion engage him in perpetual troubles and anxieties, without any possibility of improvement until he unlearn all and begin again upon a new account. He talks much of the justice and merits of his cause, and yet gets so many advocates that it is plain he does not believe himself; but having pleaded not guilty, he is concerned to defend himself as well as he can, while those that confess and put themselves upon the mercy of the Court have no more to do. His religion is too full of curiosities to be sound and useful, and is fitter for a hypocrite than a saint; for curiosities are only for show and of no use at all. His conscience resides more in his stomach than his heart, and howsoever he keeps the commandments, he never fails to keep a very pious diet, and will rather starve than eat erroneously or taste anything that is not perfectly orthodox and apostolical; and if living and eating are inseparable, he is in the right, and lives because he eats according to the truly ancient primitive Catholic faith in the purest times.

A DROLL

Plays his part of wit readily at first sight, and sometimes better than with practice. He is excellent at voluntary and prelude, but has no skill in composition. He will run divisions upon any ground very dexterously, but now and then mistakes a flat for a sharp. He has a great deal of wit, but it is not at his own disposing, nor can he command it when he pleases unless it be in the humour. His fancy is counterchanged between jest and earnest, and the earnest lies always in the jest, and the jest in the earnest. He treats of all matters and persons by way of exercitation, without respect of things, time, place, or occasion, and assumes the liberty of a free-born Englishman, as if he were called to the long robe with long ears. He imposes a hard task upon himself as well as those he converses with, and more than either can bear without a convenient stock of confidence. His whole life is nothing but a merrymaking, and his business the same with a fiddler's, to play to all companies where he comes, and take what they please to give him either of applause or dislike; for he can do little without some applauders, who by showing him ground make him outdo his own expectation many times, and theirs too; for they that laugh on his side and cry him up give credit to his confidence, and sometimes contribute more than half the wit by making it better than he meant. He is impregnable to all assaults but that of a greater impudence, which, being stick-free, puts him, like a rough fencer, out of his play, and after passes upon him at pleasure, for when he is once routed he never rallies again. He takes a view of a man as a skilful commander does of a town he would besiege, to discover the weakest places where he may make his approaches with the least danger and most advantages, and when he finds himself mistaken, draws off his forces with admirable caution and consideration; for his business being only wit, he thinks there is very little of that shown in exposing himself to any inconvenience.

THE OBSTINATE MAN

Does not hold opinions, but they hold him; for when he is once possessed with an error, 'tis, like the devil, not to be cast out but with great difficulty. Whatsoever he lays hold on, like a drowning man, he never loses, though it do but help to sink him the sooner. His ignorance is abrupt and inaccessible, impregnable both by art and nature, and will hold out to the last though it has nothing but rubbish to defend. It is as dark as pitch, and sticks as fast to anything it lays hold on. His skull is so thick that it is proof against any reason, and never cracks but on the wrong side, just opposite to that against which the impression is made, which surgeons say does happen very frequently. The slighter and more inconsistent his opinions are the faster he holds them, otherwise they would fall asunder of themselves; for opinions that are false ought to be held with more strictness and assurance than those that are true, otherwise they will be apt to betray their owners before they are aware. If he takes to religion, he has faith enough to save a hundred wiser men than himself, if it were right; but it is too much to be good; and though he deny supererogation and utterly disclaim any overplus of merits, yet he allows superabundant belief, and if the violence of faith will carry the kingdom of heaven, he stands fair for it. He delights most of all to differ in things indifferent; no matter how frivolous they are, they are weighty enough in proportion to his weak judgment, and he will rather suffer self-martyrdom than part with the least scruple of his freehold, for it is impossible to dye his dark ignorance into a lighter colour. He is resolved to understand no man's reason but his own, because he finds no man can understand his but himself. His wits are like a sack which, the French proverb says, is tied faster before it is full than when it is; and his opinions are like plants that grow upon rocks, that stick fast though they have no rooting. His understanding is hardened like Pharaoh's heart, and is proof against all sorts of judgments whatsoever.

A ZEALOT

Is a hot-headed brother that has his understanding blocked up on both sides, like a fore-horse's eyes, that he sees only straight-forwards and never looks about him, which makes him run on according as he is driven with his own caprice. He starts and stops (as a horse does) at a post only because he does not know what it is, and thinks to run away from the spur while he carries it with him. He is very violent, as all things that tend downward naturally are; for it is impossible to improve or raise him above his own level. He runs swiftly before any wind, like a ship that has neither freight nor ballast, and is as apt to overset. When his zeal takes fire it cracks and flies about like a squib until the idle stuff is spent, and then it goes out of itself. He is always troubled with small scruples, which his conscience catches like the itch, and the rubbing of these is both his pleasure and his pain. But for things of greater moment he is unconcerned, as cattle in the summer-time are more pestered with flies that vex their sores than creatures more considerable, and dust and motes are apter to stick in blear-eyes than things of greater weight. His charity begins and ends at home, for it never goes farther nor stirs abroad. David was eaten up with the zeal of God's house; but his zeal, quite contrary, eats up God's house; and as the words seem to intimate that David fed and maintained the priests, so he makes the priests feed and maintain him; and hence his zeal is never so vehement as when it concurs with his interest; for, as he styles himself a professor, it fares with him, as with men of other professions, to live by his calling and get as much as he can by it. He is very severe to other men's sins that his own may pass unsuspected, as those that were engaged in the conspiracy against Nero were most cruel to their own confederates; or as one says--

"Compounds for sins he is inclined to
By damning those he has no mind to."

THE OVERDOER

Always throws beyond the jack and is gone a mile. He is no more able to contain himself than a bowl is when he is commanded to rub with the greatest power and vehemence imaginable, and nothing lights in his way. He is a conjurer that cannot keep within the compass of his circle, though he were sure the devil would fetch him away for the least transgression. He always overstocks his ground and starves instead of feeding, destroys whatsoever he has an extraordinary care for, and, like an ape, hugs the whelp he loves most to death. All his designs are greater than the life, and he laughs to think how Nature has mistaken her match, and given him so much odds that he can easily outrun her. He allows of no merit but that which is superabundant. All his actions are superfoetations, that either become monsters or twins; that is, too much, or the same again; for he is but a supernumerary and does nothing but for want of a better. He is a civil Catholic, that holds nothing more steadfastly than supererogation in all that he undertakes, for he undertakes nothing but what he overdoes. He is insatiable in all his actions and, like a covetous person, never knows when he has done enough until he has spoiled all by doing too much. He is his own antagonist, and is never satisfied until he has outdone himself as well as that which he proposed, for he loves to be better than his word (though it always falls out worse) and deceive the world the wrong way. He believes the mean to be but a mean thing, and therefore always runs into extremities as the more excellent, great, and transcendent. He delights to exceed in all his attempts, for he finds that a goose that has three legs is more remarkable than a hundred that have but two apiece, and has a greater number of followers; and that all monsters are more visited and applied to than other creatures that Nature has made perfect in their kind. He believes he can never bestow too much pains upon anything; for his industry is his own and costs him nothing; and if it miscarry he loses nothing, for he has as much as it was worth. He is like a foolish musician that sets his instrument so high that he breaks his strings for want of understanding the right pitch of it, or an archer that breaks his with overbending; and all he does is forced, like one that sings above the reach of his voice.

THE RASH MAN