Clievelandi Vindiciæ, or, Clieveland's genuine poems, orations, epistles, &c. purged from the many false and spurious ones which had usurped his name, and from innumerable errours and corruptions in the true copies : to which are added many never printed before, with an account of the author's life.

The Character of a Diurnal-maker.

A Diurnal-maker is the Sub-almoner of History, Queen Mabs Register, one whom, by the same Figure that a North-country Pedlar is a Merchant-man, you may style an Author. It is like over∣reach of Language, when every Thin, Tinder-cloak'd Quack must be called a Doctor; when a clumsie Cobler usurps the Attribute of our English Peers and is vamp'd a Translator. List him a Writer, and you smother Geoffry in Swabber-slops; the very name of Dabler over-sets him; he is swallowed up in the phrase, like Sir S. L. in a great Saddle, nothing to be seen, but the Giddy Feather in his Crown. They call him a Mercury, but he becomes the

Epithet, like the little Negro mounted up∣on an Elephant, just such another Blot Rampant. He has not Stuffings sufficient for the Reproach of a Scribler; but it hangs about him like an old Wifes Skin, when the Flesh hath forsaken her, lank and loose. He defames a good Title as well as most of our Modern Noble Men; those Wens of Greatness, the Body Politick's most pec∣cant Humours, Blistred into Lords. He hath so Raw-bon'd a Being, that how∣ever you render him, he rubs it out and makes Rags of the Expression. The silly Country-man, who seeing an Ape in a Scarlet-coat, bless'd his young Worship, and gave his Landlord joy of the hopes of his House, did not slander his Complement with worse Application, than he that names this Shred an Historian. To call him an Historian is to knight a Mandrake: 'tis to view him through a Perspective, and by that gross Hyperbole to give the Re∣putation of an Engineer to a Maker of Mouse-traps. Such an Historian would hardly pass muster with a Scotch Stationer in a Sieveful of Ballads and Godly Books. He would not serve for the Breast-plate of a begging Grecian. The most cramp'd Compendium that the Age hath seen since all Learning hath been almost torn into

Ends, outstrips him by the Head. I have heard of Puppets that could prattle in a Play, but never saw of their Writings be∣fore. There goes a Report of the Holland Women, that together with their Chil∣dren, they are delivered of a Sooterkin, not unlike to a Rat, which some imagine to be the Off-spring of the Stoves. I know not what Ignis fatuus adulterates the Press but it seems much after that fashion, else how could this Vermin think to be a Twin to a Legitimate Writer; when those weekly Fragments shall pass for History, let the poor man's Box be entituled the Exchequer, and the Alms-basket a Maga∣zine. Not a Worm that gnaws on the dull Scalp of Voluminous Hollinshed, but at e∣very Meal devour'd more Chronicle, than his Tribe amounts to. A Marginal Note of W. P. would serve for a Winding-sheet, for that man's Works, like thick-skinn'd Fruits, are all Rinde, fit for nothing but the Authors Fate to be pared in a Pil∣lory.

The Cook, who serv'd up the Dwarf in a Pye (to continue the Frolick) might have lapp'd up such an Historian as this in the Bill of Fare. He is the first Tincture and Rudiment of a Writer, dipp'd as yet in the preparative Blew, like an Almannack

Well-willer. He is the Cadet of a Pam∣phleteer, the Pedee of a Romancer; he is the Embryo of a History slink'd before Ma∣turity. How should he Record the Issues of Time, who is himself an Abortive? I will not say but that he may pass for an Hi∣storian in Garbier's Academy; he is▪ much of the size of those Knot-grass Professors. What a pitiful Seminary was there project∣ed! yet sutable enough to the present U∣niversities, those dry Nurses, which the Providence of the Age has so fully re∣form'd, that they are turn'd Reformado's: But that's no matter, the meanner the bet∣ter. It is a Maxim observable in these days, That the only way to win the Game is to play Petty Iohns. Of this number is the Esquire of the Quill; for he hath the Grudging of History, and some Yawnings accordingly. Writing is a Disease in him, and holds like a Quotidian; so 'tis his In∣firmity that makes him an Author, as Ma∣homet was beholding to the Falling-sick∣ness to vouch him a Prophet. That nice Artificer, who filed a Chain so thin and light, that a Flea could trail it (as if he had work'd Short hand, and taught his Tools to Cypher) did but contrive an Em∣blem for this Skip-Jack and his slight pro∣ductions.

Methinks the Turk should license Diur∣nals, because he prohibits Learning and Books. A Library of Diurnals is a Ward∣robe of Frippery; 'tis a just Idea of a Limbo of the Infants. I saw one once that could write with his Toes, by the same token I could have wished he had worn his Copies for Socks; 'tis he without doubt from whom the Diurnals derive their Pedigree, and they have a Birth right accordingly, being shuffled out at the bed's feet of History. To what infinite numbers an Historian would multiply, should he ••••umble into Elves of this Profession? To supply this smalness they are fain to joyn Forces, so they are not singly but as the Custom is in a Croaking Committee. They tug at the Pen, like slaves at the Oar, a whole Bank together; they write in the Posture that the Suedes gave fire in, over one another's heads. It is said there is more of them go to a Suit of Cloaths than to a Britannicus: in this Polygamy the Cloaths breed, and cannot determine whose Issue is Lawfully begotten.

And here I think it it were not amiss to take a particular how he is accoutred, and so do by him as he in his Siquis for the Wall-ey'd Mare, or the Crop Flea-bitten, give you the Marks of the Beast. I begin

with his Head, which is ever in Clouts, as if the Night-cap should make Affidavit, that the Brain was pregnant▪ To what purpose doth the Pia Mater lie in so dully in her white Formalities: sure she hath had hard Labour; for the Brows have squeezed for it, as you may perceive by his Butter'd Bon grace, that Film of a De∣micastor; 'tis so thin and unctuous that the Sun-beams mistake it for a Vapour, and are like to Cap him; so it is right Heliotrope, it creaks in the Shine and flaps in the Shade: whatever it be, I wish it were able to call in his ears. There's no proportion between that Head and Appurtenances; those of all Lungs are no more fit for that small Noddle of the Circumcision, than Brass Bosses for a Geneva-Bible. In what a puzzling Neu∣trality is the poor Soul that moves be∣twixt two such ponderous Biasses? His Collar is edg'd with a piece of peeping Linnnen, by which he means a Band; 'tis the Forlorn of his Shirt crawling out of his Neck: indeed it were time that his Shirt were jogging; for it has serv'd an Appren∣tiship and (as Apprentices use) it hath learn∣ed its Trade too, to which effect 'tis marching to the Paper-mill, and the next week sets up for it self in the shape of a Pamphlet. His Gloves are the shavings of

his Hands; for he casts his Skin like a can∣cell'd Parchment. The Itch represents the broken Seals. His Boots are ••he Legacies of two black Jacks, and till he pawn'd the Silver that the Jacks were tipp'd with, it was a pretty Mode of Boot-hose-tops. For the rest of his Habit he is a per∣fect Sea-man, a kind of Tarpawlin, he be∣ing hang'd about with his course Compo∣sition, those Pole-davie Papers.

But I must draw to an end; for every Character is an Anatomy-lecture, and it fares with me in this of the Diurnal-maker, as with him that reads on a begg'd Male∣factor, my Subject smells before I have gone thorow with him; for a parting Blow then. The word Historian imports a sage and solemn Author; one that curles his Brow with a sullen Gravity, like a Bull-neck'd Presby∣ter, since the Army hath got him off his Juris∣diction, who Presbyter like sweeps his Breast with a Reverend Beard, full of Native Moss-Troopers: not such a squirting Scribe as this, that's troubled with the Rickets, and makes penny-worths of History. The Col∣lege-Treasury that never had in Bank a∣bove a Harry-groat, shut up there in a me∣lancholick solitude, like one that is kept to keep possession, had as good Evidence to shew for his Title, as he for an Histori∣an:

so, if he will needs be an Historian, he is not Cited in the Sterling acceptation, but after the Rate of Blew-caps Reckoning, an Historian Scot. Now a Scotch-man's Tongue runs high Fullams. There is a Cheat in his Idiom; for the sence Ebbs from the bold Expression, like the Citizen's Gallon, which the Drawer interprets but half a Pint. In summ; a Diurnal-maker is the Antimark of an Historian; he differs from him as a Dril from a Man, or (if you had rather have it in the Saints Gibbrish) as a Hinter doth from a Holder-forth.