Still to be neat, still to be dressed
As if you were going to a feast
Still to be powdered, still perfumed
Lady it is to be presumed Though arts hid causes are not found
All is not sweet, all is not sound
Give me a look, give me a face
That makes simpicity a grace
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free
Such sweet neglect more taketh me
Than all the adulteries of art They strike mine eyes but not my heart
By Boy,
in Epicoene (1.1.71-82),
Ben Jonson
in Bodleian Library MS English poetry e. 14, f. 12
Cock Lorel would needs have the devil his guest
And bad him into the Peak to dinner
Where never the friend had such a feast
provided yet at the cost of a sinner
His stomacke was queasy he came thither coached
The jogging had made some crudities rise
To help it he called for a puritan poached
That used to turn up the eggs off his eyes
And so recovered to his wish
He sat him down and he fell to eat
Promoter in plum broth was his first dish
His own privy kitchen had no such meat
Six pickled tailors sliced and cut
Sempsters tirewomen fit for his palate
With feathermen and perfumers put
Some twelve in a charger to make a grand sallat
A rich fat usurer in his marrow And by him on lawyer's and green sauce Both with his belly took in like a barrow As if till then he never had seen sauce
Then carbonadoed and cooked with pains
Was brought up a cloven sergeant's face
The sauce was made of a yeomans brains
that had been cloven out with his own mace
Two roasted sheriffs came whole to the board
The feast had nothing been without 'em
Both living and dead they were foxed and furred
Their chains like sausages hung about 'em
The next dish was the mayor of a town
With a pudding of maintenance thrust in his belly
Like a goose in his feathers dressed in his gown
And his couple of hench-boys boiled to a jelly BM at the moment the fact that this extract runs over two folios is not showing up on DEx [same song cont'd; bottom of page non-dramatic]
A London cuckold hot from the spit
And when the carver up had broke him
The devil chopped up his head at a bit
Both horns were very near to choke him
Yet though with the meat he was much taken
up on a sudden he shifted his trencher
as soon as he spied the bawd and bacon
by which you may know the devil is a wencher
The chin of a lecher too there was roasted
With a plump young harlot's haunch and garlic
A pander's pettitoes that had boasted
Himself for a captain yet never was warlike
A lusty fat pasty of a midwife hot
And for a cold baked meat into the story
A reverend painted lady was brought
Was coffined in crust till she was hoary
To these an overgrowne justice of peace
With a clerk like a gizzard trussed under each arm And warrant for sippets laid in his own grease
Set over a chafing-dish to be kept warm
The jowl of a jailor served for fish
A constable soused with vinegar by
Two aldermen lobsters asleep in a dish
A deputy tart and a churchwarden pie
All which devoured he then for a close
Did for a full draught of Derby call He heaved the huge vessel up to his nose
and left not till he had drunk up all
BM What is the second word? for a moment I believed it was covfefe?
If I freely may discover
What may pl e ase me in my lover
I would have her fair and witty
Savoring more of court then City
A little proud but full of pity
Light and humorous in her toying
Oft building hopes and soon destroying
Not too easy notnor too hard
All extremes I would have bard
She should be allowed her passions
So they were but use as fashions
Sometime forward and frowning
Sometime sickly and then sowning
Every fit with change still crowning
Purly jealous I would have her
Only constant when I crave her
Tis a virtue should not save her
Thus nor her delicates should claw me
Nor her peevishness annoy me
By Crispinus,
in Poetaster (2.3.135-144),
Ben Jonson
in Bodleian Library MS English poetry e. 14, f. 21r
Hence all you fond delights,
As short as are the nights
Wherein you spend your folly
There 's nothing truly sweet
If men could truly see't
Save only melancholy
Come folded arms and fixed eyes
A sight that piercing mortifies
A look that is fastened to the ground
A tongue chained without a sound
Fountainheads and pathless grows
Places where pale passion loves
Moonli ght walks, when all the foals
Are warmly housed save bats & owls
A midnight's bell a parting groan
These are the sounds we feed upon
Then stretch your limbs in a still gloomy valley
There's not in the life sweet save melancholy
By Passionate Lord,
in The Nice Valour (3.3),
Francis Beaumont
in Bodleian Library MS English poetry e. 14, f. 84rev