Time's out of tune, plaid upon however in XX satyres / by Thomas Bancroft.

SATYRE XIX. Against Cruelty.

AN errour 'tis as common as to cheat, Or lye, to take rude fierceness for a great Effect of fortitude, and those to be Most valiant that are flesht in cruelty, And bloudy-minded; whereas nothing can More ill-beseem th' harmonious frame of man Then harsh ungentleness, and nothing brings More fate and foul dishonour upon Kings Then wicked tyranny, when upon slight Pretences they strike out the vital light Of their true Subjects, or do otherwise Afflict them with more spoilful injuries, Breaking their fortunes, as the slender bands Of law they violate with armed hands. What good man does not loth the memory Of that prodigious Duke of Muscovie, Basilides? who sometimes loose would let Fierce hungry Bears amongst his Subjects met In thick assemblies, and delight to see Their limbs all torn with horrid cruelty, Saying, they might be glad in such a sort To suffer, sith they made their Soveraign sport. Almost as merciless those Princes are, Who to the very quick their Subjects parc With too sharp penalties and taxes, so Exhausting them, and keeping them so low

Under oppressions, that they scarce can raise Their hearts, but sink in sorrow all their dayes. That formidable tyrant of the East Deals worse with his Bashawes, whom (when increast Their treasures are to a full-heaped mass) He charges with seign'd crimes, but yet doth pass Sentence in earnest, and so takes away Both life and riches, as a double prey. Yet now and then (as when on dirt we tread, It spirts up sometimes from the foot to th' head) From under heaviest wrongs the Vulgar rise In tumules and seditious mutinies, Threatning the ruling Pow'rs, that from on high Fling on their necks the yokes of slavery, And whilst mens lives and states they dissipate At pleasure, drive them to be desperate. Then, as when dashing billowes break their mounds, Neptune runs wildly ore the fruitful grounds, Levels proud buildings in his watery way, Makes men and beasts his scaly Monsters prey, And hideous mischief works: so when the rude False-hearted and mad-headed multitude Gets strength and liberty, the Countrey wades In bloud let out by deadly-wounding blades, Justice packs thence with over-turned scales, The spirit of the world, Religion, fails, Wrong, rapine, cruelty with hasty feet Their inrodes make, and in confusion meet. Once in Palermo through a mis-conceit Taken against a Iew, in furious heat The people rose, and did not onely hale And beat and burn the wretch, but did assail All of his Nation, pillag'd, wounded, flew Them, and their bodies (some yet panting) threw To greedy flames, pluckt from the refuges Of Saints and Altars old men (succourless)

Children and maids, forthwith ingulphing all In one confus'd and ruthless Funeral: So wildly fierce and hard to be appeas'd Are tamest fools, when in commotion rais'd. 'Tis somewhat strange that men appear to be By nature bent to rigid cruelty; Yet so they seem, else would they not delight So much to see rude beasts to tug and fight, And take more pleasure in th' antipathy Of such, then in all loves compliancy. Old Rom•• saw this, and often would bestow Great cost in making many a savage show, The ruder sort to please; who onely took Delight at first on fighting beasts to look; But afterwards (as if they had by th' eye Drunk in full draughts of bloudy cruelty) They thought it braver sport upon the stage To see sword-players fiercely to engage Themselves in fight, and seldome off to goe Till Death stept in, and gave a parting blow. Augustus, though less taxt for tyranny Then many of his high flown family, Did yet command that onely loss of life Should be the up-stroke of the tragick strife, And one or both that made the people sport, Should fall in earnest, dye in woful sort. O men of stony bowels, steely breasts! Ruthless Spectators, brutisher then beasts! Traitors to Nature! that with smilling eyes Could view those dire prodigious cruelties; And if a Caitiff slave, all hew'd and hackt, Did (when his spirits fail'd, and heart-strings crackt) Beg a discharge, that he might longer live, Would not to th' wosul wretch that savour give, But urge on mischief, whilst his wounds gap'd wide For pity, weeping streams of bloud beside,

Till all the sand that on the Stage did lye, Wore the deep crimson dye of cruelty. Men make their eyes the in-lets of offence; And he that frequently his optick sense Feeds on fell objects, cannot but thereby Surset into hard-hearted cruelty, Cannot but grow obdurate by degrees, And lose all sense of others miseries. The Spaniards, when they planted first in rich Peru and other Coasts, that did bewitch Their eyes with shining treasures, were not so Like savage Wolves as they did after grow, When they had often sluced out the bloud Of the poor Natives, that in vain withstood The sweeping stream of avarice; for then They us'd them more like noisome beasts then men, Shot, stabb'd, brain'd thousands, others forc'd by flight To seek wild thickets, taking much delight To tire them with pursuit, to make them preys To hungry Mastiffs, to bestrew the wayes With their torn limbs, and sometimes ore the heads Of multitudes to fire the leavy Sheds. Thus they that boast that th'all-surveying Suns Light ever shines on some Dominions Of their great Kings, and got so clear a fame By brave Sea-travels, did obscure and shame Themselves by cruelties, so strangely wild And fierce, as all humanity exil'd. There's no such cruelty as that of wars; And he that of those harsh tumultuous jars ••pens the bloudy sluce to let in fate, The curse of Heaven and all good peoples hate Justly incurs. Can earth afford a sight More horrid, then to view in eager fight Armies engag'd? When Cannons thundring loud•• Swords flash out lightning in a stifling cloud

Of smoke and dust, enraged Horses neigh, Men grone and gush out bloud; here quivering lye Bemangled limbs, there heads are bowl'd along By their falls force, here trunked bodies slung And trampled on, there trailed guts are made Their gyves and chains that would not else be stay'd From acts of mischief, and thus every where In baleful dress stern horrour doth appear. But then the devastations of all sorts In times of war, demolishing of Forts, Razing of Castles, burning of whole Towns, Wasteful incursions into fruitful grounds, Rapines, taxations, turning out o'th' door Whole families; these, and a thousand more Such wicked mischiefs, heap up a degree Of high and most abhorred cruelty. Are not those Princes highly then to blame, Who (whilst at prouder eminence they aim, Or else stoop down to sordid avarice, Envy or Lust, or some such wretched vice) VVhole Nations do embroil, whole Kingdomes shake VVith the tempestuous tumults which they make, Little regarding what their fury spends Of bloud or treasure, so they gain their ends? A letters interception, an address T' a fo••reign Prince on private business, A jest, a prying int' affairs of State, Hath sometimes prov'd an instrument of fate To raise prodigious mischiefs that have shed Much bloud, and mighty Kingdomes ruined. Some such occasions (as 'tis said) did stir Up that grim Lion, the stout Swethlander, To pass int' Germany, and range for prey Beyond the bounds of vast Hercynia, Leaving a tract of bloud, a print of woe, Such as that wretched Nation long will show,

Though to wash off so terrible a stain, The Baltick waters were all spent in rain. The worlds malignity in this appears More, that whereas in some late bleeding years Men of high fortunes were by th' armed tout Pull'd from their perches, now they go about (Mad with revengeful thoughts) to do some right Unto themselves by their undoing quite Of their weak vassals; just as some that are Inflam'd with choler, do but little care Whom they assault, so that thereby they vent That angry heat that doth their hearts torment. Poor wretched starvelings that as thinly look As half-pin'd pris'ners, men whom wars have shook Almost no rags, and brought as low as dust, Must in their rents be onely rais'd, and must (As they have worn their flesh away) their bloud In some sort lose, I mean all livelihood: When now with careful heads, and painful hands They cannot answer to the hard demands Of pitriless oppressors, straight they must (As noisome creatures) from their homes be thrust, But first he stript almost as bare as those That Worms or Haddocks feed, their goods must lose, Of ruin'd families the doleful mones, That well might soften the Ceraunian stones, No more regarded are then childrens cryes, That were to Moloch burnt in sacrifice. Mine eyes have been the weeping witnesses Of a great Landlords greater wickedness, That did depopulate a town, and sent Poor people int' a kind of banishment, That in their stead he might some gamesome Deer Empark, and make more room for pleasure there. If this oppressor that set light by sin, Had as Actaeox metamorphos'd bin

Into an Hart, and by his own hounds rent In pieces, just had been his punishment, And much more mirth had from his branched pate Been rais'd, then sorrow from his bloudy fate. All things by Nature equally are free, And nothing private; but if industry, Conquest, or better hap, hath men endow'd With riches, must they needs grow fierce and proud, And rush down all (like torrents) in their way? This is to bear a rude impetuous sway As beasts do in the woods, where force prevails, And still the strong the weaker sort assails. Those that with biggest words of manhood boats, Most brutish are in deeds, and tainted most With inhumanity, a vice that waits Most frequently on gallant great estates, When through high diet, softness, nicety, Fastidious pride, and quainter luxury, Men are rob apt to break into a flame Of rage, which reason knows not how to tame. A small neglect, a hum, a nod, a wry Look, a knit brow, or somewhat bold reply, Hath sometimes set such persons in a heat; And then like raging Hercules they beat All in their way; their servants then, their wives, And children run to save their threatned lives, And scape the storm that blusters here and there, And fiercely flashing shews what claps are near. Surely that Barber had forgot to say His prayers right, who trimming th' other day A roaring Knight, and being busie about Washing his bristled chin and burnisht snout, (Whereon the water made a shining show Like dew upon a Rose, and dropt off so When it was shaken) could not well forbear Laughter, but stily did begin to fleer;

VVhich th' other noting (with a face all full Of suds, and signs of fury) forth did pull His deadly weapon, quickly put to flight The snapping youth, and then began to fight VVith's brushes, basons, glasses; rudely made Such spoil, that the poor Shaver was afraid To look into his shop again, and see The wild effects of barb'rous tyranny. VVhen men stop not th' eruptions of their ire, But give free way to passionate desire, And with its hasty torrent run along, They thus themselves befool, and others wrong. If all that are enrag'd to cruelty As was Dedalion, were transform'd (as he) To ravenotts Hawks, the Harpyes could not to Arcadian Phineus more annoiance do, Then birds of prey would pester us: poor Doves (Th' Emblemes of innocence and gentle loves) VVould find as little rest as that which flew From Noahs Ark before the Floud withdrew.