So many miseries doe vs insnare,
That all our life is but a Race of Care;
And when I call my life vnto account,
To such great numbers doe my Cares amount
That Cares on Cares my mind so much doe lade,
As i of (nothing else but) Cares were made.
When I conceiue I am besieged round
With enemies, that would my soule confound,
As is the Flesh, the World and ghostly Fiends,
How (sen'rally) their force and flatt'ry bends,
To driue me to presumption or despare,
Tauoid temptations I am full of care.
When (consider what my God hath done
For me, and how his grace I daily shun:
And how my sinnes (for ought I know) are more
Then Stars in sky, or Sands vpon the shore,
Or wither'd leaues that Autumne tumbles downe,
And that sinnes leprosie hath ouergrowne
My miserable selfe from head to heele,
Then hopefull feares, and fearefull cares I feele.
When I doe see a man that conscience makes
Of what he speakes, or doth, or vndertakes;
That neither will dissemble, lye, or sweare,
To haue the loue of such a man I care.
I care, when i doe see a Prodigall
(On whom a faire estate did lately fall)
When as is spent his credit and his chink,
And he quite wasted to a snusse, doth stink,
Who in the Spring, or Summer of his Pride,
Was worship'd, honor'd, almost deisi'd:
And (whilst the golden Angels did attend him)
What swarms of friends, and kindred did befriend him,
Perswading him, that giue, & spend & lend,
Were vertues which on Gentry doe depend?
When such a fellow falne to misery,
I see forsaken and in beggery,
Then for some worthy friends of mine I care,
That they by such examples would beware,
A foole is he who giues (himselfe t'impaire)
And wise is he who giues what he may spare:
But those that haue too much, and nothing giue,
Are slaues of Hell, and pitty 'tis they liue.
But as the prodigall doth vainely spend,
As thogh his ill sprung wel-spring, ne'r would end,
Yet in his pouerty he's better much,
Then a hard-hearted miserable Clutch,
Because the Prodigall lets mony flie,
That many people gaine and get thereby.
A Prodigall's a Common-wealths man still,
To haue his wealth all common, tis his will,
And when he wants, he wants what he hath not,
But misers want what they both haue, and got.
For though man from the teate hath weaned bin,
Yet still our infancy we all are in,
And frō our birth, till death our liues doth smother,
All men doe liue by sucking one another.
A King with Clemency and Royalty,
Doth sucke his Subiects loue and loyalty:
But as the Sea sucks in the Riuers goods,
And Riuers backe againe, sucke in the floods,
So good Kings, and true Subiects, alwayes proue
To suck from each, protection, feare, and loue.
All Clients whatsoe'r are Lawyers nurses,
And many times they doe sucke dry their purses:
But though the Lawyer seemes in wealth to swim,
Yet many great occasions doe sucke him.
The Prodigalls estate, like to a flux,
The Mercer, Draper, and the Silkman sucks:
The Taylor, Millainer, Dogs, Drabs and Dice,
Trey-trip, or Passage, or The most at thrice;
At Irish, Tick-tacke, Doublets, Draughts or Chesse,
He flings his money free with carelessenesse:
At Nouum Mumchāce, mischance, (chuse ye which)
At One and thirty, or at Poore and rich,
Russe, slam, Trump, noddy, whisk, hole, Sant, New∣cut
Vnto the keeping of foure Knaues he'l put
His whole estate, at Loadum, or at Gleeke,
At Tickle-me quickly, he's a merry Greeke,
At Primesisto, Post and payre, Primero,
Maw, Whip-her-ginny, he's alib tall Hero;
At My-sow-pigg'd: and (Reader neuer doubt ye,
He's skill'd in all games, except) Looke about ye.
Bowles, shoue-groate, tennis, no game comes a mist,
His purse a nurse for any body is;
Caroches, Coaches, and Tobacconists,
All sorts of people freely from his fists,
His vaine expences daily sucke and soake,
And he himselfe sucks onely drinke and smoake:
And thus the Prodigall, himselfe alone,
Giues suck to thousands, and himselfe sucks none.
But for the miser, he is such an euill,
He sucks all, yet giues none sucke but the Deuill:
And both of them such cursed members are,
That to be neither of them both I care.
Thus young, old, all estates, men, maids, & wiues,
Doe sucke from one another, all their liues;
And we are neuer wean'd from sucking thus,
Vntill we dye, and then the wormes sucke vs.
I care when I want money, where to borrow,
And when I haue it, then begins new sorrow:
For the right Anagram of woe is owe.
And he's in woe that is in debt I know:
For as I car'd before to come in debt,
So being in, my care is out to get.
Thus being in or out, or out or in,
Where one care ends, another doth begin.
I care to keepe me from the Serieants mace,
Or from a barbrous Bayliffs rough embrace:
Or from a Marshals man that mercy lacks,
That liues a cursed life by poore mens wracks,
From Sericants that are Saracens by kinde,
From Bayliffs that are worse then Beares is minde: