Agreed in nothing, but t' abolish,
Subvert, extirpate, and demolish:
For knaves and fools being near of kin,
As Dutch boors are t' a sooterkin,
Both parties join'd to do their best
To damn the public interest,
And herded only in consults,
To put by one another's bolts;

Tout-cant the Babylonian labourers,
At all their dialects of jabberers,
And tug at both ends of the saw,
To tear down government and law.

For as two cheats that play one game,
Are both defeated of their aim,

So those who play a game of state,
And only cavil in debate,

Although there's nothing lost nor won,
The public business is undone;
Which still the longer 'tis in doing,
Becomes the surer way to ruin.

This, when the royalists perceiv'd,
(Who to their faith as firmly cleav'd,
And own'd the right they had paid down
So dearly for, the church and crown)
Th' united constanter, and sided

The more, the more their foes divided;
For though outnumber'd, overthrown,
And by the fate of war run down,
Their duty never was defeated,

Nor from their oaths and faith retreated;

For loyalty is still the same,

Whether it win or lose the game;

True as the dial to the Sun,
Although it be not shin'd upon.
But when these brethren in evil,
Their adversaries, and the Devil,
Began once more to show them play,
And hopes, at least, to have a day,
They rally'd in parades of woods,
And unfrequented solitudes;
Conven'd at midnight in outhouses,
Tappoint new-rising rendezvou⚫es,
And, with a pertinacy unmatch'd,
For new recruits of danger watch'd.
No sooner was one blow diverted,
But up another party started!
And, as if Nature, too, in haste
To furnish out supplies as fast,

Before her time had turn'd destruction
Ta new and numerous production;
No sooner those were overcome,
Bet up rose others in their room,
That, like the Christian faith, increast
The more, the more they were supprest;
Whom neither chains, nor transportation,
Proscription, sale, or confiscation,
Nor all the desperate events
Of former try'd experiments,

Nor wounds, could terrify, nor mangling, To leave off loyalty and dangling, Ar Death (with all his bones) affright From venturing to maintain the right, I staking life and fortune down Vanst all together, for the crown; But kept the title of their cause From forfeiture, like claims in laws; And prov'd no prosperous usurpation Can ever settle on the nation;

Until, in spite of force and treason,
They put their loyalty in possession;
And, by their constancy and faith,
Destroy'd the mighty men of Gath.

Toss'd in a furious hurricane,
Did Oliver give up his reign,
And was believ'd, as well by saints
As mortal men and miscreants,
To founder in the Stygian ferry,
Until he was retriev'd by Sterry ;
Who, in a false erroneous dream,
Mistook the New Jerusalem
Profanely for th' apocryphal
False Heaven at the end o' th' hall;
Whither it was decreed by Fate
His precious relics to translate:
So Romulus was seen before
By as orthodox a senator,
From whose divine illumination
He stole the pagan revelation.

Next him his son and heir apparent
Succeeded, though a lame vicegerent,
Who first laid by the parliament,

The only crutch on which he leant,
And then sunk underneath the state,
That rode him above horseman's weight.
And now the saints began their reign,
For which they 'ad yearn'd so long in vain,
And felt such bowel hankerings,

To see an empire all of kings,
Deliver'd from th' Egyptian awe
Of justice, government, and law,
And free t' erect what spiritual cantons
Should be reveal'd or gospel Hans-towns,
To edify upon the ruins

Of John of Leyden's old outgoings,
Who, for a weathercock hung up
Upon their mother-church's top,
Was made a type by Providence,
Of all their revelations since,

And now fulfill'd by his successors,
Who equally mistook their measures :
For, when they came to shape the model,
Not one could fit another's noddle;
But found their light and gifts more wide
From fadging, than th' unsanctify'd;
While every individual brother
Strove hand to fist against another,
And still the maddest, and most crackt,
Were found the busiest to transact;
For, though most hands dispatch apace
And make light work, (the proverb says)
Yet many different intellects

Are found t' have contrary effects;
And many heads t' obstruct intrigues,
As slowest insects have most legs.

Some were for setting up a king,
But all the rest for no such thing,
Unless king Jesus: others tamper'd
For Fleetwood, Desborough and Lambert:
Some for the rump; and some, more crafty,
For agitators, and the safety:

Some for the gospel, and massacres
Of spiritual affidavit-makers,
That swore to any human regence
Oaths of suprem'cy and allegiance;
Yea, though the ablest swearing saint,
That vouch'd the bulls o' th' covenant:

Others for pulling down th' high places
Of synods and provincial classes,
That us'd to make such hostile inroads
Upon the saints, like bloody Nimrods:
Some for fulfilling prophecies,
And th' extirpation of th' excise;
And some against th' Egyptian bondage
Of holy-days, and paying poundage:
Some for the cutting down of groves,
And rectifying bakers' loaves;
And some for finding out expedients
Against the slavery of obedience:
Some were for gospel ministers,
And some for re-coat seculars,

As men most fit t' hold forth the word,
And wield the one and th' other sword:
Some were for carrying on the work
Against the pope, and some the Turk:
Some for engaging to suppress
The camisado of surplices,

That gifts and dispensations hinder'd,

And turn'd to th' outward man the inward;
More proper for the cloudy night
Of popery than gospel light:
Others were for abolishing
That tool of matrimony, a ring,

With which th' unsanctify'd bridegroom
Is marry'd only to a thumb;
(As wise as ringing of a pig,

That us'd to break up ground, and dig)
The bride to nothing but her will,
That nulls her after-marriage still:
Some were for th' utter extirpation
Of linsey-woolsey in the nation;
And some against all idolizing
The cross in shop-books, or baptizing:
Others, to make all things recant
The Christian or surname of Saint,

And force all churches, streets, and towns,
The holy title to renounce:
Some 'gainst a third estate of souls,
And bringing down the price of coals:
Some for abolishing black-pudding,
And eating nothing with the blood in;
To abrogate them roots and branches;
While others were for eating haunches
Of warriors, and, now and then,
The flesh of kings and mighty men:
And some for breaking of their bones
With rods of iron, by secret ones;
For thrashing mountains, and with spells
For hallowing carriers' packs and bells;
Things that the legend never heard of,
But made the wicked sore afeard of.

The quacks of government (who sate
At th' unregarded helm of state,
And understood this wild confusion
Of fatal madness and delusion
Must, sooner than a prodigy,
Portend destruction to be nigh)
Consider'd timely how t' withdraw,

And save their windpipes from the law;
For one rencounter at the bar

Was worse than all they 'ad 'scap'd in war;
And therefore met in consultation

To cant and quack upon the nation;

Not for the sickly patient's sake,
Nor what to give, but what to take;

To feel the purses of their fees,
More wise than fumbling arteries;
Prolong the snuff of life in pain,
And from the grave recover-Gain.

'Mong these there was a politician
With more heads than a beast in vision,
And more intrigues in every one
Than all the whores of Babylon;
So politic, as if one eye

Upon the other were a spy,

That, to trepan the one to think

The other blind, both strove to blink;
And in his dark pragmatic way

As busy as a child at play.

He 'ad seen three governments run down,
And had a hand in every one;

Was for them, and against them all,
But barbarous when they came to fall:
For, by trepanning th' old to ruin,
He made his interest with the new one;
Play'd true and faithful, though against
His conscience, and was still advanc'd:
For, by the witchcraft of rebellion
Transform'd t'a feeble state-camelion,
By giving aim from side to side,
He never fail'd to save his tide,
But got the start of every state,
And, at a change, ne'er came too late;
Could turn his word, and oath, and faith,
As many ways as in a lath;

By turning wriggle, like a screw,
Int' highest trust, and out, for new:
For when he ad happily incurr'd,
Instead of hemp, to be preferr'd,
And pass'd upon a government,
He play'd his trick, and out he went;
But being out, and out of hopes
To mount his ladder (more) of ropes,
Would strive to raise himself upon
The public ruin, and his own;
So little did he understand

The desperate fear he took in hand,
For, when he 'ad got himself a name
For frauds and tricks, he spoil'd his game;
Had fore'd his neck into a noose,

To show his play at fast and loose;
And, when he chanc'd t' escape, mistook,
For art and subtlety, his luck.
So right his judgment was cut fit,
And made a tally to his wit.
And both together most profound
At deeds of darkness under ground;
As th' earth is easiest undermin'd,
By vermin impotent and blind.

By all these arts, and many more
He 'ad practis'd long and much before,
Our state-artificer foresaw
Which way the world began to draw:
For, as old sinners have all points
O' th' compass in their bones and joints,
Can by their pangs and aches find
All turns and changes of the wind,
And, better than by Napier's bones,
Feel in their own the age of moons:

2 This was sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, who com plied with every change in those times.

So guilty sinners, in a state,
Can by their crimes prognosticate,
And in their consciences feel pain
Some days before a shower of rain:
He, therefore, wisely cast about
All ways he could, t' insure his throat,
And hither came, t' observe and smoke
What courses other riskers took,
And to the utmost do his best
To save himself, and hang the rest.

To match this saint there was another,

As busy and perverse a brother,

An haberdasher of small wares

In politics and state affairs;

More Jew than rabbi Achithophel,
And better gifted to rebel;

For when he 'ad taught his tribe to 'spouse

The cause, aloft upon one house,
He scorn'd to set his own in order,
Bat try'd another, and went further:
So suddenly addicted still
To's only principle, his will,
That, whatsoe'er it chanc'd to prove,
Nor force of argument could move,
Nor law, nor cavalcade of Ho'born,
Could render half a grain less stubborn;
For he at any time would hang,
For th' opportunity t' harangue;
And rather on a gibbet dangle,
Than miss his dear delight, to wrangle;
In which his parts were so accomplisht,
That, right or wrong, he ne'er was nonplust;
But still his tongue ran on, the less
Of weight it bore, with greater ease,
And, with its everlasting clack,
Set all men's ears upon the rack.
No sooner could a hint appear,
But up be started to picqueer,

And made the stoutest yield to mercy,
When he engag'd in controversy:
Not by the force of carnal reason,
But indefatigable teasing;
With vollies of eternal babble,
And clamour, more unanswerable.
For though his topics, frail and weak,
Could ne'er amount above a freak,
He still maintain'd them, like his faults,
Against the desperat'st assaults,
And back'd their feeble want of sense
With greater heat and confidence;

As bones of Hectors, when they differ,

The more they 're cudgell'd, grow the stiffer.
Yet, when his profit moderated,

The fury of his heat abated;
For nothing but his interest
Could lay his devil of contest:

It was his choice, or chance, or curse,
Tespouse the cause for better or worse,
And with his worldly goods and wit,
And soul and body, worshipp'd it:
Bat when he found the sullen trapes
Possess'd with th' Devil, worms, and claps,
The Trojan mare, in foal with Greeks,
Not half so full of jadish tricks,
Though squeamish in her outward woman,
As loose and rampant as Dol Common,
He still resolv'd, to mend the matter,
Tadhere and cleave the obstinater;
And still, the skittisher and looser
Her freaks appear'd, to sit the closer:
VOL VILL

For fools are stubborn in their way,
As coins are harden'd by th' allay;
And obstinacy's ne'er so stiff,
As when 'tis in a wrong belief.
These two, with others, being met,
And close in consultation set,
After a discontented pause,
And not without sufficient cause,
The orator we nam'd of late,
Less troubled with the pangs of state,
Than with his own impatience
To give himself first audience,
After he had a while look'd wise,

At last broke silence, and the ice.

Quoth he, "There's nothing makes me doubt Our last outgoings brought about, More than to see the characters

Of real jealousies and fears,

Not feign'd, as once, but sadly horrid,
Scor'd upon every member's forehead;
Who, 'cause the clouds are drawn together,
And threaten sudden change of weather,
Feel pangs and aches of state-turns,
And revolutions in their corns;
And, since our workings-out are crost,
Throw up the cause before 'tis lost.
Was it to run away we meant
When, taking of the covenant,
The lamest cripples of the brothers
Took oaths to run before all others,
But, in their own sense, only swore
To strive to run away before,

And now would prove, that words and oath
Engage us to renounce them both?
'Tis true the cause is in the lurch,

Between a right and mongrel-church,

The presbyter and independent,

That stickle which shall make an end on 't;
As 'twas made out to us the last
Expedient,-(I mean Margaret's fast)
When Providence had been suborn'd
What answer was to be return'd:
Else why should tumults fright us now,
We have so many times gone through,
And understand as well to tame,

As, when they serve our turns, t' inflame?
Have prov'd how inconsiderable
Are all engagements of the rabble;
Whose frenzies must be reconcil'd
With drums and rattles, like a child,
But never prov'd so prosperous,
As when they were led on by us;
For all our scouring of religion
Began with tumults and sedition;
When hurricanes of fierce commotion
Became strong motives to devotion;
(As carnal seamen, in a storm,
Turn pious converts, and reform)
When rusty weapons, with chalk'd edges,
Maintain'd our feeble privileges,
And brown-bills, levy'd in the city,
Made bills to pass the grand committee;
When Zeal, with aged clubs and gleaves,
Gave chase to rochets and white sleeves,
And made the church, and state, and laws,
Submit t' old iron, and the cause.
And as we thriv'd by tumults then,
So might we better now again,
If we knew how, as then we did,
To use them rightly in our need:

M

Tumults, by which the mutinous
Betray themselves instead of us;
The hollow-hearted, disaffected,
And close malignant are detected;
Who lay their lives and fortunes down,
For pledges to secure our own;
And freely sacrifice their ears
T' appease our jealousies and fears:
And yet for all these providences
W' are offer'd, if we had our senses,
We idly sit, like stupid blockheads,
Our hands committed to our pockets,
And nothing but our tongues at large,
To get the wretches a discharge:
Like men condemn'd to thunderbolts,
Who, ere the blow, become mere dolts;
Or fools besotted with their crimes,
That know not how to shift betimes,
That neither have the hearts to stay,
Nor wit enough to run away;
Who, if we could resolve on either,
Might stand or fall at least together;
No mean nor trivial solaces
To partners in extreme distress;
Who use to lessen their despairs、
By parting them int' equal shares ;
As if, the more they were to bear,
They felt the weight the easier;
And every one the gentler hung,
The more he took his turn among.
But 'tis not come to that, as yet,
If we had courage left, or wit,
Who, when our fate can be no worse,
Are fitted for the bravest course,
Have time to rally, and prepare
Our last and best defence, Despair:
Despair, by which the gallant'st feats
Have been achiev'd in greatest straits,
And horrid'st dangers safely wav'd,
By being courageously outbrav'd;
As wounds by wider wounds are heal'd,
And poisons by themselves expell'd:
And so they might be now again,
If we were, what we should be, men;
And not so dully desperate,
To side against ourselves with Fate:
As criminals, condemn'd to suffer,

Are blinded first, and then turn'd over.
This comes of breaking covenants,
And setting up exauns of saints,
That fine, like aldermen, for grace,
To be excus'd the efficace:

For spiritual men are too transcendent,
That mount their banks for independent,
To hang, like Mahomet, in the air,
Or St. Ignatius, at his prayer,
By pure geometry, and hate
Dependence upon church or state:
Disdain the pedantry o' th' letter,
And, since obedience is better
(The Scripture says) than sacrifice,
Presume the less on 't will suffice;
And scorn to have the moderat'st stints
Prescrib'd their peremptory hints,
Or any opinion, true or false,
Declar'd as such, in doctrinals;
But left at large to make their best on,
Without being call'd t' account or question:
Interpret all the spleen reveals,

As Whittington explain'd the bells;

And bid themselves turn back again
Lord mayors of New Jerusalem;
But look so big and overgrown,
They scorn their edifiers to own,

Who taught them all their sprinkling lessons,
Their tones, and sanctify'd expressions;
Bestow'd their gifts upon a saint,
Like charity, on those that want;
And learn'd th' apocryphal bigots

T' inspire themselves with short-hand notes;
For which they scorn and hate them worse,
Than dogs and cats do sow-gelders:
For who first bred them up to pray,
And teach the house of commons' way?
Where had they all their gifted phrases
But from our Calamies and Cases?
Without whose sprinkling and sowing,
Who e'er had heard of Nye or Owen?
Their dispensations had been stifled,
But for our Adoniram Byfield;
And, had they not begun the war,
They 'ad ne'er been sainted as they are:
For saints in peace degenerate,
And dwindle down to reprobate;
Their zeal corrupts, like standing water,
In th' intervals of war and slaughter;
Abates the sharpness of its edge,
Without the power of sacrilege:

And though they 've tricks to cast their sins,
As easy as serpents do their skins,
That in a while grow out again,

In peace they turn mere carnal men,
And, from the most refin'd of saints,
As naturally grow miscreants,
As barnacles turn soland geese
In th' islands of th' Orcades.
Their dispensation 's but a ticket
For their conforming to the wicked,
With whom the greatest difference
Lies more in words and show, than sense
For as the pope, that keeps the gate
Of Heaven, wears three crowns of state,
So he that keeps the gate of Hell,
Proud Cerberus, wears three heads as well;
And, if the world has any troth,
Some have been canoniz'd in both.

But that which does them greatest harm,
Their spiritual gizzards are too warm,
Which puts the overheated sots

In fever still, like other goats;

For though the whore bends heretics
With flames of fire, like crooked sticks,
Our schismatics so vastly differ,

Th' hotter they're they grow the stiffer;
Still setting off their spiritual goods
With fierce and pertinacious feuds ;
For Zeal's a dreadful termagant,
That teaches saints to tear and rant;
And independents to profess
The doctrine of dependences;
Turns meek, and secret, sneaking ones,
To Rawheads fierce and Bloodybones:
And, not content with endless quarrels
Against the wicked and their morals,
The Gibellines, for want of Guelfs,
Divert their rage upon themselves.
For, now the war is not between
The brethren and the men of sin,
But saint and saint, to spill the blood
Of one another's brotherhood,

Where neither side can lay pretence
To liberty of conscience,

Or zealous suffering for the cause,
To gain one groat's-worth of applause;
For, though endur'd with resolution,
Twill ne'er amount to persecution.
Shall precious saints, and secret ones,
Break one another's outward bones,
And eat the flesh of brethren,
Instead of kings and mighty men?
When fiends agree among themselves,
Shall they be found the greater elves?
When Bell 's at union with the Dragon,
And Baal-Peor friends with Dagon;
When savage bears agree with bears,
Shall secret ones lug saints by th' ears,
And not atone their fatal wrath,
When common danger threatens both?
Shall mastiffs, by the collars pull'd,
Fagag'd with bulls, let go their hold?

And saints, whose necks are pawn'd at stake,
No notice of the danger take?

But though no power of Heaven or Hell
Can pacify fanatic zeal,

Who would not guess there might be hopes,
The fear of gallowses and ropes,
Before their eyes, might reconcile
Their animosities a while,

At least until they 'ad a clear stage,

And equal freedom to engage,

Without the danger of surprise

By both our common enemies?

"This none but we alone could doubt, Who understand their workings-out,

And know them, both in soul and conscience,
Given up t' as reprobate a nonsense
As spiritual outlaws, whom the power
Of miracle can ne'er restore.

We, whom at first they set-up under,
In revelation only' of plunder,
Who since have had so many trials
Of their incroaching self-denials,
That rook'd upon us with design
To out-reform and undermine;

Took all our interests and commands
Perfidiously out of our hands;
Involv'd us in the guilt of blood,
Without the motive-gains allow'd,
And made us serve as ministerial,
Like younger sons of father Belial:
And yet, for all th' inhuman wrong
They 'ad done us and the cause so long,
We never fail'd to carry on
The work still, as we had begun;
But true and faithfully obey'd,

And neither preach'd them hurt, nor pray'd;
Nor troubled them to crop our ears,
For hang us, like the cavaliers;
Nor put them to the charge of gaols,
To find us pillories and carts' tails,
Or hangman's wages, which the state
Was fore'd (before them) to be at;
That cut, like tallies to the stumps,
Our ears for keeping true accompts,
And burnt our vessels, like a new
Seal'd peck, or bushel, for being true;
But hand in hand, like faithful brothers,
Held for the cause against all others,
Disdaining equally to yield
One syllable of what we held.

And, though we differ'd now and then
'Bout outward things, and outward men,
Our inward men, and constant frame
Of spirit, still were near the same;
And till they first began to cant,
And sprinkle down the covenant,
We ne'er had call in any place,
Nor dream'd of teaching down free grace;
But join'd our gifts perpetually
Against the common enemy,
Although 'twas our and their opinion,
Each other's church was but a Rimmon;
And yet for all this gospel-union,
And outward show of church-communion,
They'd ne'er admit us to our shares,
Of ruling church or state affairs,
Nor give us leave t' absolve, or sentence
T' our own conditions of repentance;
But shar'd our dividend o' the crown
We had so painfully preach'd down,
And forc'd us, though against the grain,
T' have calls to teach it up again;
For 'twas but justice to restore
The wrongs we had receiv'd before;
And, when 'twas held forth in our way,
We 'ad been ungrateful not to pay;
Who, for the right we 've done the nation,
Have earn'd our temporal salvation,
And put our vessels in a way,

Once more, to come again in play:

For if the turning of us out

Has brought this providence about,

And that our only suffering

Is able to bring in the king,

What would our actions not have done,
Had we been suffer'd to go on?
And therefore may pretend t' a share,
At least, in carrying on th' affair:
But whether that be so or not,
We've done enough to have it thought,
And that's as good as if we 'ad done 't,
And easier pass'd upon account:
For if it be but half deny'd,
'Tis half as good as justify'd.
The world is naturally averse
To all the truth it sees or hears,
But swallows nonsense, and a lie,
With greediness and gluttony;

And though it have the pique, and long,
'Tis still for something in the wrong;
As women long, when they 're with child,
For things extravagant and wild;
For meats ridiculous and fulsome,
But seldom any thing that 's wholesome;
And, like the world, men's jobbernoles
Turn round upon their ears, the poles,
And what they're confidently told,

By no sense else can be control'd.

"And this, perhaps, may prove the means Once more to hedge-in Providence.

For, as relapses make diseases

More desperate than their first accesses,

If we but get again in power,
Our work is easier than before,
And we more ready and expert
I' th' mystery, to do our part:
We, who did rather undertake
The first war to create than make;
Aud, when of nothing 'twas begun,
Rais'd funds, as strange, to carry 't o1;