Microcosmography. Earle John
Чтение книги онлайн.

Читать онлайн книгу Microcosmography - Earle John страница 13

Название: Microcosmography

Автор: Earle John

Издательство: Public Domain

Жанр: Зарубежная классика

Серия:

isbn:

isbn:

СКАЧАТЬ he is one that mistakes much his abusers for friends, and his friends for enemies, and he apprehends your hate in nothing so much as in good council. One that is flexible with any thing but reason, and then only perverse. [A servant to every tale and flatterer, and whom the last man still works over.] A great affecter of wits and such prettinesses; and his company is costly to him, for he seldom has it but invited. His friendship commonly is begun in a supper, and lost in lending money. The tavern is a dangerous place to him, for to drink and be drunk is with him all one, and his brain is sooner quenched than his thirst. He is drawn into naughtiness with company, but suffers alone, and the bastard commonly laid to his charge. One that will be patiently abused, and take exception a month after when he understands it, and then be abused again into a reconcilement; and you cannot endear him more than by cozening him, and it is a temptation to those that would not. One discoverable in all silliness to all men but himself, and you may take any man's knowledge of him better than his own. He will promise the same thing to twenty, and rather than deny one break with all. One that has no power over himself, over his business, over his friends, but a prey and pity to all; and if his fortunes once sink, men quickly cry, Alas! – and forget him.

      XXVII.

      A TOBACCO-SELLER

      Is the only man that finds good in it which others brag of but do not; for it is meat, drink, and clothes to him. No man opens his ware with greater seriousness, or challenges your judgment more in the approbation. His shop is the rendezvous of spitting, where men dialogue with their noses, and their communication is smoak.48 It is the place only where Spain is commended and preferred before England itself. He should be well experienced in the world, for he has daily trial of men's nostrils, and none is better acquainted with humours. He is the piecing commonly of some other trade, which is bawd to his tobacco, and that to his wife, which is the flame that follows this smoak.

      Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

      Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

      Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

      Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.

      1

      So Washbourne, in his Divine Poems, 12mo. 1654:

      " – ere 'tis accustom'd unto sin,

      The mind white paper is, and will admit

      Of any lesson you will write in it." – p. 26.

      2

      This, and

1

So Washbourne, in his Divine Poems, 12mo. 1654:

" – ere 'tis accustom'd unto sin,The mind white paper is, and will admitOf any lesson you will write in it." – p. 26.

2

This, and every other passage throughout the volume, [included between brackets,] does not appear in the first edition of 1628.

3

Adam did not, to use the words of the old Geneva Bible, "make himself breeches," till he knew sin: the meaning of the passage in the text is merely that, as a child advances in age, he commonly proceeds in the knowledge and commission of vice and immorality.

4

St. Mary's church was originally built by king Alfred, and annexed to the University of Oxford, for the use of the scholars, when St. Giles's and St. Peter's (which were till then appropriated to them,) had been mined by the violence of the Danes. It was totally rebuilt during the reign of Henry VII., who gave forty oaks towards the materials; and is, to this day, the place of worship in which the public sermons are preached before the members of the university.

5

Brachigraphy, or short-hand-writing, appears to have been much studied in our author's time, and was probably esteemed a fashionable accomplishment. It was first introduced into this country by Peter Bales, who, in 1590, published The Writing Schoolmaster, a treatise consisting of three parts, the first "of Brachygraphie, that is, to write as fast as a man speaketh treatably, writing but one letter for a word;" the second, of Orthography; and the third, of Calligraphy. Imprinted at London, by T. Orwin, &c. 1590. 4to. A second edition, "with sundry new additions," appeared in 1597. 12mo. Imprinted at London, by George Shawe, &c. Holinshed gives the following description of one of Bale's performances: – "The tenth of August (1575,) a rare peece of worke, and almost incredible, was brought to passe by an Englishman borne in the citie of London, named Peter Bales, who by his industrie and practise of his pen, contriued and writ within the compasse of a penie, in Latine, the Lord's praier, the creed, the ten commandements, a praier to God, a praier for the queene, his posie, his name, the daie of the moneth, the yeare of our Lord, and the reigne of the queene. And on the seuenteenthe of August next following, at Hampton court, he presented the same to the queene's maiestie, in the head of a ring of gold, couered with a christall; and presented therewith an excellent spectacle by him deuised, for the easier reading thereof: wherewith hir maiestie read all that was written therein with great admiration, and commended the same to the lords of the councell, and the ambassadors, and did weare the same manie times vpon hir finger." Holinshed's Chronicle, page 1262, b. edit, folio, Lond. 1587.

6

It is customary in all sermons delivered before the University, to use an introductory prayer for the founder of, and principal benefactors to, the preacher's individual college, as well as for the officers and members of the university in general. This, however, would appear very ridiculous when "he comes down to his friends" or, in other words, preaches before a country congregation.

7

of, first edit. 1628.

8

I cannot forbear to close this admirable character with the beautiful description of a "poure Persone," riche of holy thought and werk, given by the father of English poetry: —

"Benigne he was, and wonder diligent,And in adversite ful patient:And swiche he was ypreved often sithes.Ful loth were him to cursen for his tythes,But rather wolde he yeven out of doute,Unto his poure parishens aboute,Of his offring, and eke of his substance.He coude in litel thing have suffisance.Wide was his parish, and houses fer asonder,But he ne left nought for no rain ne thonder,In sikenesse and in mischief to visiteThe ferrest in his parish, moche and lite,Upon his fete, and in his hand a staf.And though he holy were, and vertuous,He was to sinful men not dispitous,Ne of his speche dangerous ne digne,But in his teching discrete and benigne.To drawen folk to heven, with fairenesse,By good ensample, was his besinesse.He waited after no pompe ne reverence,Ne maked him no spiced conscience,But Cristes lore, and his apostles twelve,He taught, but first he folwed it himselve." Chaucer, Prol. to Cant. Tales, v. 485.

We may surely conclude with a line from the same poem,

"A better preest I trowe that nowher non is."
СКАЧАТЬ
<p>48</p>

Minshew calls a tobacconist fumi-vendulus, a smoak-seller.