Selected quad for the lemma: fire_n
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A91823
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An ingenious poem, called The drunkards prospective, or Burning-glasse. Composed by Joseph Rigbie, gentleman, clerke of the peace of the county palatine of Lancaster.; Drunkards prospective
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Rigby, Joseph, d. 1671.
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1655
(1655)
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Wing R1473; Thomason E1606_3; ESTC R22176
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20,978
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53
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their sin Laid open to their view let them begin Their lives for to amend and to repent Or hearken to their grievous punishment For by the Lawes of God and eke of man After conviction there is none that can Avoid the sentence After sentence past Then execution comes for sure at last If a reprieve or pardon be not got Damning or hanging is drinks after-shot If therefore there be any unto God Of those Antipodes that scorn his rod That in these lines as through prospective true Of his condition taken hath a view Yet neither sting nor prick of conscience feels But fixt on earth casts heaven at his heels Or that hath seen in this same glasse most cleare The ugly face of his foule heart appeare And likewise read how Satan doth delude him And from Gods presence seeks for to exclude him Yet notwithstanding still himselfe doth give In brutish sensuality to live And sets at light all counsels threats and terrors And doth resolve not to repent his errours But stubbornly himselfe therein to cherish Let him know this that he shall surely perish Thus saith the Lord your selves you have abused For I have called and you have refused You simple things have in your hearts devised All my counsels all my threats despised I stretcht my hand and you would not regard Therefore destruction shall be your reward And let them know how many severall woes The word of God pronounceth against those That at the wine themselves together link And mighty are to poure downe strong drink And let them know the time will surely come Christ shall pronounce this fearfull dreadful doom Int ' everlasting fire depart from me Ye cursed workers of iniquity Here without thirst they drink there let them think How they shall thirst and never have no drinke Yea though the fire be hot the thirst be great A drop of water little to the heat Know that the fire and thirst they shall abide And the least drop of water be deni'd Lâ—t drunkards know and knowing eke confesse Paul's a true Prophet Esay is no lesse Yea it 's an ods that they can never part But entertain uncleannesse in the heart No man can sort with Heathens Pagans Turks But he shall frame and learn to do their works Consider well Peter his change and fall After he came into the high Priest's hall Nay you shall seldome see a fellon die Or an offender but this is his cry If I had chanc'd ill company to misse Ah I am sure I 'd never come to this Wherefore as Ioseph hearing 's mistresse say Come let us lye together fled away Even so take care that thou away do shrink When Drunkards cry come let us goe and drink Beware lest they betray thee with their kisses When they speak faire beleeve the serpent hisses Likewise be carefull not for to resort To drinking places for to play or sport My tongue would blister if I should say lesse They 'r nurseries of riot and excesse I wish I might not say that many are The Devil's shops for venting of his ware The very sinks of sinne and common shoares For drunkards swearers murtherers and whores Yea Satan's Throne where he doth Chaire-man sit Sequestring each man both from grace and wit Their lands their goods their cattle and their stocks And for their fifts doth order them the pox But what of these I say I must take heed Lest I as Paul at Ephesus doe speed And by some one Demetrius be cry'd down With greaâ—s Diana throughout all the Towne Sirs by this craft you know we get our wealth Though others as Delinquents lose their health But thus much I conceive here by the way As not incongruous observe we may That in regard th' excesse o' th' trencher's not So soon perceiv'd as is th' excesse o' th' pot And th' outward visible effects with us Are not so stupid or notorious Drunk'nesse is more ridiculous then it And more declaim'd against in holy Writ So that by use the word Sobriety Doth temp'rance now in drinking signify Therefore the Glutton's sin is now in lesse Disreputation then is Drunkennesse Yet as to each th' affection stands in all Th' intemperance alike is criminall Yet one word more I will presume to add Which if it take effect my heart will glad To you Church-Wardens Constables and others That love the Lord the Church the State your brothers Your selves your sons the people of the land Put forth against this sin your helping hand Help help the Lord the lawes some ground to win Against I say against this mighty sinne Use all meanes possible for to prevent it And if you cannot faile not to present it Say not that he which herein doth offend Is such a Gentleman or such a friend But know that he who is offended's dearer Greater and better and unto you nearer Or if you needs the Gentleman will free Take care the Drunkard He presented be Or if you please for to let slip your friend Be sure the Drunkard to the stocks you send But most of all they are to be desired And in the name of God strictly required Within Commission of the Peace that be That they their Countries peace preserved see And all their wil skill strength and power bend This many headed monster for to rend Draw these loose teeth that it may gather health Out of the mandable of the Commonwealth You may if you these To res but disband Of infinite distempers cure the land Make known your love to God hatred to sinne The zeale and courage that you have within Balke none forbeare with none that do offend Untill their sinfull lives they do amend Now you have heard the thing that I do aske Arise up then be doing of your taske Which if you do to pray I will not cease That you in grace and wisdome may increase And know that this to do if you neglect Even he that hath of persons no respect Will surely in his fury and his rage Your negligence reward with Ahab's wage I wish that all men would beware in time Of this so odious detestable crime Or it will prove at length they may be sure Like to a desperate plague that knowes no cure And yet let Drunkards know sins are remitted Upon repentance as if not committed Peter his Master Christ did thrice deny Paul persecuted him exceedingly As thou dost in his members yet they twaine Upon repentance mercy did obtaine Manasses Mary Magdalen the thiefe Witnesse true sorrow never wants reliefe Repent and do not from his precepts range And God he will his dreadfull sentence change It is a truth to be beleev'd and read The womans seed shall bruise the serpent's head And thou O Father that alone canst give Life to the dead unto their souls say Live To thee nothing is hard thou canst of stones Make and raise children to thy holy ones Send down thy heavenly spirit and thereby Those dead and stony hearts so mollify That they
talke Have feet and yet like dead men cannot walke Have eares and heare not nay the truth to tell Noses and their own vomits cannot smell And if for men they would reputed be They are but like that man in lunacie Vext with an evill spirit wherewithall Oft into fire and water he did fall Whom none could cure untill the Master came Though his Disciples did attempt the same So brutish Drunkards through excesse are lost And by that fiend from post to pillar tost Moses nor Aaron they cannot endure Caesar nor Paul can work on them no cure Nor word nor sword can make them to decline Their wicked waies such are the fruits of Wine This an hard saying by some may be thought But thus much we from Gods own word are taught And I may speak it as a truth most clear That corporall torments of ill spirits here Are not so rare as spirituall are rife From which no man is free in this our life One hath the spirit of errour another of feare Departs from faith to truth dare not appeare A third of Fornication and the next Sore with the spirit of blasphemy is vext A fifth with th' spirit of Giddinesse is led Not having understanding in his head Some have the spirit of pride others of slumber Envy and falshood doe possesse a number All have a worldly spirit but Drunkards have Legions of spirits leading to their grave For every raigning sinne a Devill is And quite deprives them of eternall blisse Drunkards are Captives to the Devill still At his command ready to doe his will He is their Father King their God their treasure Ruling and in them working his owne pleasure He makes them Traitors as he Iudas did Puts in their hearts to do what he shall bid Like Ananias and Sapphira both Makes them to lye nay bind it with an oath He enters Drunkards and with one accord Makes them to tempt the spirit of the Lord. As by the Serpent he speaks in them by them Or Ahab's Prophets if you doe but try them He acts by them and stretcheth forth their hand As by King Herod over all the Land So that as Paul guided by God you see Could say I live not but God lives in me So Drunkards they may say and fitly thus We live not but the Devill lives in us For they so curse so swear so skip so hop That questionlesse they have receiv'd the sop Drunkards with their own conscience do not 'gree But with remembrance of their vices be Disquieted And still their thoughts torment With feare of some ensuing punishment And with the gripes of conscience pinched thus Seek out companions boon voluptuous So that to Stewes and Taverns they are given And thither as free horses they are driven That trot away need neither spur nor wand Let them but see the shaking of a hand Nay they are such sworne friends unto the cup They 'll need no more hold but a finger up They are so ready at the Devil's becks They 'll post as if they meant to break their necks If he suggest the thought or speak the word They 'll any mischiefe act by tongue or sword If he say slander lye they 'll doe you 'll see As fully falsely spirefully as he If he bid quarrell fight revenge nay worse Murther destroy blaspheme forswear and curse They instantly obey and doe begin To act as soone as he commands the sinne Thus farre I have Drunkards set forth entire And think that none can tax me for a lyer Now whilst they sit and take the other cup I will anatomize and cut them up And I will sparingly in this my verse But few of their ill qualities rehearse Instead of a great number so that you May well by them guesse at the residue The first ill quality I doe present Is that they think each hour a day that 's spent Each day a moneth that they 'r not at the tap Or tumbled downe to take a gentle nap Or that their money be all spent and gone And credit with the tapster they have none And when they have thus lavisht out their store They plot and practice how they should get more And so they fall to secret mischiefe hence Or to an open course of violence So that the taphouse fits them for the Jaile The Jaile to th' gibbet sends them without faile For those that through a Lattice sang of late You oft find crying through an iron grate Yet this the work of many moneths may be But trace them step by step and you shall see So soone as to the Ale-bench they are got Up comes uncall'd for every man his pot Of losing of their custome upon paine Which being doft are quickly fill'd againe For their attendant hath a strict command That the pots neither full nor empty stand Thus they each day as soon as they do rise Offer to Bacchus their first sacrifice If you the reason do desire to know I will it in a word most plainly shew In mornings being sick to th' jugg they jog Each one to take a haire of the same dog That bit them over-night And so they first Do drunkennesse prepare to add to thirst To qualify the old heate with a new By drinking Savin to wash down the Rue Which is not sin to cure but sinne to smother Heaping up vengeance one upon another Or as some Surgeons use to deale By deading flesh an ulcer for to heale Which to the sore doth give but small reliefe But renders them insensible of griefe Through desperate custome hath this viperous brood Made others physick their own naturall food For they themselves to tipling so do give Without excesse of Wine they cannot live They drink and vent and vent and drink amaine Sellâ—ngers round and then the same againe Yea every cup is fast to others wedg'd They alwaies double drink they must be pledg'd He that begins how many soe'r they be Looks that each one do drink as much as he And he will drink although his face he mars Untill his eyes do stare like blazing stars And now by that that these gutmongers brave Dubbled their mornings draught most finely have And gulped downe each one a many quarts As easy as their drink up comes their hearts Yea let them get a pot more in their pate You 'd wonder how confusedly they 'll prate Their restlesse tongues do to small purpose chatter And like loose windowes in the wind do clatter As sick mens pulses in distemper great Alwaies but ever out of order beat And in the loose discourse which from them flowes All secrets whatsoever they disclose As when Wine purgeth that comes to the brim Which is i' th' bottome and a loft doth swim Or else the vessell bursteth Even so Doth Drunkennes vent what the heart doth know For if that wisedome and discretion be Hoops to a vessell pray you then tell me How should the liquor in these hogsheads stay When that the hoops are taken quite away