Short Poems

The couetous empericke Cozius cureth all
Saue those that stand in neede of phisick's skill;
You will inferre (perhaps) his skil's but small:
Well, God forgiue you then if you so will:
But sure one's wife that barraine long was thought,
He, gratis cur'd, and got with childe for nought.

C ORNUTUS saith his wife shall cleanly go:
Cleanly, Cornutus? costly thou wouldst say:
For thou thy substance dost on her bestow,
To clad in gilden gownes a clod of clay:
But who a gold-finch faine would make his wife,
Makes her (perhaps) a wag-taile all her life.

C LOPHUS hath two great helpes in reasoning
Although his reasons neuer helpe his sence;
Yet he in disputation still is king
Through brutish ignorance and Impudence:
Put by your helpes and with you Ile dispute.
If not, I yeelde more reason being mute.

Doll dranke tobacco, and away she flonge,
But going she let goe, and downe she fell;
Which shewd the powder and the peece were stronge:
Yet for recoyling breech't she would be well,
Least that her breech another time should bee,
Apt to let-goe and after to let-flee.

C OLONUS hath a leafe vpon his shin,
But such a leafe as nere will fall nor fade:
It's Morbus marke, much matter is therein,
A rendeuous for humors hot it's made:
Faire fall the man: for when the leafe doth fall,
Hee's like (a pox vpon't) to dye withall.

L UTUS by chance once drinking his wife's water
Sware, of the caske it tasted filthily;
Lutus thy taste is true, but nere the later,
The tongue herein hath told a filthie lye:
For from no caske it came, vnlesse it bee
A caske that makes a hed peece but for thee.

One call'd Calistus calues head, in a fume,
But he therein was fowly slandered;
For calues heads haue sweete teethe, free from the rhewme;
But he hath not one sweete toothe in his head.

B OMELTO braggs how many he hath beaten
And then hee looks as if he them had eaten:
That's like himselfe; for hee's a better eater
(Trye him who hath a stomack) then a beater.

P HAUORINUS vs'd to praise the quartaine-feauer;
Ould, beyond the moone would nutts commend;
Virgill, a gnatt, and Homer, honor'd euer
The fight of froggs, which do the most offend:
If these pure Wits most praise what most abhorre
What maruell ist though Marcus praise his whore.

P HRYNE is light, and yet she hath two bummes
Like a ful payre (at least) of mountanetts:
I maruell then from whence her lightnesse comes?
Faith from those bums, which she, through lightnesse setts
(For ballone-balls) to hire to all that play,
Who must, in time, quite volley them away.