BEING one autumn at a friend’s house in the country (which was indeed a
most delicious retreat) I took a walk one moonlight night into the park,
where all my past visions came fresh into my head again, and I was well
enough pleased with the meditation. At length the humour took me to
leave the path, and go further into the wood: what impulse carried me to
this, I know not. Whether I was moved by my good angel, or some higher
power, but so it was that in half a quarter of an hour, I found myself a
great way from home, and in a place where ’twas no longer night; with the
pleasantest prospect round about me that ever I saw since I was born.
The air was calm and temperate; and it was no small advantage to the
beauty of the place, that it was both innocent and silent. On the one
hand, I was entertained with the murmurs of crystal rivulets; on the
other, with the whispering of the trees; the birds singing all the while
either in emulation, or requital of the other harmonies. And now, to
show the instability of our affections and desires, I was grown weary
even of tranquillity itself, and in this most agreeable solitude began to
long for company.
When in the very instant (to my great wonder) I discovered two paths,
issuing from one and the same beginning but dividing themselves forwards,
more and more, by degrees, as if they liked not one another’s company.
That on the right hand was narrow, almost beyond imagination; and being
very little frequented, it was so overgrown with thorns and brambles, and
so stony withal, that a man had all the trouble in the world to get
into’t. One might see, however, the prints and marks of several
passengers that had rubbed through, though with exceeding difficulty; for
they had left pieces of heads, arms, legs, feet, and many of them their
whole skins behind them. Some we saw yet upon the way, pressing forward,
without ever so much as looking back; and these were all of them
pale-faced, lean, thin, and miserably mortified. There was no passing
for horsemen; and I was told that St. Paul himself left his horse, when
he went into’t. And indeed, there was not the footing of any beast to be
seen. Neither horse nor mule, nor the track of any coach or chariot.
Nor could I learn that any had passed that way in the memory of man.
While I was bethinking myself of what I had seen, I spied at length a
beggar that was resting himself a little to take breath; and I asked him
what inns or lodgings they had upon that road. His answer was that there
was no stopping there, till they came to their journey’s end. “For
this,” said he, “is the way to paradise, and what should they do with
inns or taverns, where there are so few passengers? Do not you know that
in the course of nature, to die is to be born, to live is to travel; and
the world is but a great inn, after which, it is but one stage either to
pain or glory?” And with these words he marched forward, and bade me
God-b’w’ye, telling me withal that it was time lost to linger in the way
of virtue, and not safe to entertain such dialogues as tend rather to
curiosity than instruction. And so he pursued his journey, stumbling,
tearing his flesh, and sighing, and groaning at every step; and weeping
as if he thought to soften the stones with his tears. This is no way for
me, thought I to myself; and no company neither; for they are a sort of
beggarly, morose people, and will never agree with my humour. So I drew
back and struck off into the left-hand way.
And there I found company enough and room for more. What a world of
brave cavaliers! Gilt coaches, rich liveries, and handsome, lively
lasses, as glorious as the sun! Some were singing and laughing, others
tickling one another and toying; some again, at their cheese-cakes and
China oranges, or appointing a set at cards: so that taking all together,
I durst have sworn I had been at the park. This minded me of the old
saying, “Tell me thy company, and I’ll tell thee thy manners;” and to
save the credit of my education, I put myself into the noble mode, and
jogged on. And there was I at the first dash up to the ears, in balls,
plays, masquerades, collations, dalliances, amours, and as full of joy as
my heart could hold.
It was not here, as upon t’other road, where folks went barefoot and
naked, for want of shoemakers and tailors, for here were enow, and to
spare; beside mercers, drapers, jewellers, bodice-makers, peruke-makers,
milliners, and a French ordinary at every other door. You cannot imagine
the pleasure I took in my new acquaintance; and yet there was now and
then some justling and disorder upon the way, chiefly between the
physicians upon their mules, and the infantry of the lawyers, that
marched in great bodies before the judges, and contested for place. But
the physicians carried it in favour of their charter, which gives them
privilege to study, practise, and teach the art of poisoning, and to read
lectures of it in the universities. While this point of honour was in
dispute, I perceived divers crossing from one way to the other, and
changing of parties. Some of them stumbled and recovered; others fell
down right. But the pleasantest gambol of all was that of the vintners.
A whole litter of them tumbled into a pit together, one over another, but
finding they were out of their element, they got up again as fast as they
could. Those that were in the right-hand way, which was the way of
paradise, or virtue, advanced very heavily, and made us excellent sport.
“Prithee look what a Friday-face that fellow makes!” cries one; “Hang
him, prick-eared cur,” says another; “Damn me,” cries a third, “if the
rogue be not drunk with holy water;” “If the devil had raked hell, he
could not have found such a pack of ill-looked rascals,” says another.
Some of them stopped their ears, and went on without minding us. Others
we put out of countenance, and they came over to us. And a third sort
came out of pure love to our company.
After this, I observed a great many people afar off in a by-path: with as
much contrition and devotion in their looks and gestures as ever I saw in
men. They walked shaking their heads, and lifting up their hands to
heaven; and they had most of them large ears, and, to my thinking, Geneva
Bibles. These, thought I, are a people of singular integrity, and
strictness of life, above their fellows; but coming nearer, we found them
to be hypocrites; and that though they’d none of our company upon the
road, they would not fail to meet us at our journey’s end. Fasting,
repentance, prayer, mortification, and other holy duties, which are the
exercise of good Christians, in order to their salvation, are but a kind
of probation to these men, to fit them for the devil. They were followed
by a number of devotees, and holy sisters, that kissed the skirts of
their garments all the way they went, but whether out of zeal, spiritual,
or natural, is hard to say; and undoubtedly, some women’s kisses are
worse than Judas’s. For though his kiss was treacherous in the
intention, it was right yet in the application: but this was one Judas
kissing another, which makes me think there was more of the flesh than of
the spirit in the case. Some would be drawing a thread now and then out
of the holy man’s garment, to make a relic of. Others would cut out
large snips, as if they had a mind to see them naked. Some again desired
they would remember them in their prayers; which was just as much as if
they had commended themselves to the devil by a third person. Some
prayed for good matches for their daughters; others begged children for
themselves: and sure the husband that allows his wife to ask children
abroad will be so civil as to take them home, when they are given him.
In fine, these hypocrites may for a while perchance impose upon the
world, and delude the multitude; but no mask or disguise is proof against
the all-piercing eye of the Almighty. There are I must confess many
religious and godly men, for whose persons and prayers I have a great
esteem. But these are not of the hypocrites’ humour, to build their
hopes and ambition upon popular applause, and with a counterfeit
humility, to proclaim their weakness and unworthiness; their failings;
yea and their transgressions in the market-place; all which is indeed but
a true jest; for they are really what they say, though they would not be
thought so.
These went apart, and were looked upon to be neither fish nor flesh nor
good red-herring. They wore the name of Christians; but they had neither
the wit nor the honesty of pagans. For they content themselves with the
pleasures of this life, because they know no better. But the hypocrite,
that’s instructed both in the life temporal and eternal, lives without
either comfort in the one, or hope in the other; and takes more pains to
be damned than a good Christian does to compass his salvation. In short,
we went on our way in discourse. The rich followed their wealth, and the
poor the rich; begging there what Providence had denied them. The
stubborn and obstinate went away by themselves, for they would hear
nobody that was wiser than themselves, but ran huddling on, and pressed
still to be foremost. The magistrates drew after them all the solicitors
and attorneys. Corrupt judges were carried away by passion and avarice.
And vain and ambitious princes trailed along with them principalities and
commonwealths. There were a world of clergy upon this road too. And I
saw one full regiment of soldiers there, which would have been brave
fellows indeed, if they had but been half so good at praying and
fighting, as they were at swearing. Their whole discourse was of their
adventures, how narrowly they came off at such an assault; what wounds
they received upon t’other breach; and then what a destruction they made
at such a time, of mutton and poultry. But all they said came in at one
ear and went out at t’other. “Don’t you remember, sirrah,” says one,
“how we clawed it away at such a place!” “Yes, ye damned rogue you,”
cries t’other, “when you were so drunk you took your aunt for the bawd.”
These and such as these were the only exploits they could truly brag of.
While they were upon these glorious rhodomontades, certain generous
spirits from the right-hand way, that knew what they were, by the boxes
of passports, testimonials, and recommendations they wore at their
girdles, cried out to them, as if it had been to an attack: “Fall on,
fall on, my lads, and follow me. This, this is the path of honour, and
if you were not poltroons you would not quit it for fear of a hard march,
or an ill lodging. Courage comrades; and be assured that this combat
well fought makes all your fortunes, and crowns ye for ever. Here, ye
shall be sure both of pay and reward, without casting the issue of all
your hazards and hopes upon the empty promises of princes. How long will
ye pursue this trade of blood and rapine? And accustom your ears and
tongues to the tragical outcries of, Burn; No quarter; Kill, or Die. It
is not pay, or pillage, but Virtue that’s a brave man’s recompense.
Trust to her, and she’ll not deceive ye. If it be the war ye love, come
to us; bear arms on the right side, and we’ll find you work. Do not you
know that man’s life is a warfare? That the world, the flesh, and the
devil, are three vigilant enemies? And that it is as much as his soul is
worth, to put himself, but for one minute, out of his guard. Princes
tell ye, that your bloods and your lives are theirs, and that to shed the
one, and lose the other, in their service, is no obligation, but a duty.
You are still however to look to the cause; wherefore turn head, and come
along with us, and be happy.” The soldiers heard all this with exceeding
patience and attention; but the brand of cowardice had such an effect
upon them, that without any more ado, like men of honour, they presently
quitted the road; drew; and as bold as lions, charged headlong into a
tavern.
After this, we saw a great troop of women, upon the highway to hell, with
their bags and their fellows, at their heels, ever and anon hunching and
justling one another. On the other side, a number of good people, that
were almost at the end of their journey, came over into the wrong road;
for the right-hand way growing easier and wider toward the end, and that
on the left hand, on the contrary, narrower, they thought they had been
out of their way, and so came in to us; as many of ours went over to
them, upon the same mistake. Among the rest, I saw a great lady, without
either coach, sedan, or any living creature with her, foot it all the way
to hell: which was to me so great a wonder, considering how she had lived
in the world, that I presently looked about for a public notary to make
an entry of it. The woman was in a most miserable pickle; and I did not
know what design she might drive on, under that disguise; but finding
never a notary, or register at hand, though I missed my particular aim,
yet I was well enough pleased with it, for I took it then for granted
that I was in my ready way to heaven. But when I came afterward to
reflect upon the crosses, afflictions, and mortifications, that lie in
the way to paradise; and to consider that there was nothing of that upon
this road; but on the contrary, laughing, singing, frollicking, and all
manner of jollity: this I must confess gave me a qualm, and made me a
little doubtful whither I was going.
But I was quickly delivered of that doubt by a gang of married men, that
we overtook with their wives in their hands, in evidence of their
mortifications: “My wife’s my witness,” cries one, “that every day since
I married her has been a fasting day to me; to pamper her with
cock-broth, and jellies. And my wife knows how I have humbled my body by
nakedness; for I have hardly allowed myself a rag to my backside; or a
shoe to my foot, to maintain her in her coach, pages, gowns, petticoats,
and jewels.” So that upon the matter, I perceive an unlucky hit with a
wife gives a man as much right to the catalogue of martyrs, as if he had
ended his days at the stake.
The misery these poor wretches endured made me think myself in the right
again; till I heard a cry behind me, “Make way there; make way for the
’pothecaries.” Bless me, thought I, if they be here, we are certainly
going to the devil. And so it proved, for we were just then come to a
little door, that was made like a mousetrap, where ’twas easy to get in,
but there was no getting out again.
It was a strange thing, that scarce anybody so much as dreamt of hell,
all the way we went; and yet everybody knew where they were, as soon as
they came there; and cried out with one voice, “Miserable creatures! we
are damned, we are damned.” That word made my heart ache; and is it come
to that? said I. Then did I begin with tears in my eyes to reflect upon
what I had left in the world, as my relations, friends, ladies,
mistresses, and in fine, all my old acquaintance: when with a heavy sigh,
looking behind me, I saw the greater part of them posting after me. It
gave me, methought, some comfort, that I should have so good company;
vainly imagining that even hell itself might be capable of some relief.
Going farther on I was gotten into a crowd of tailors, that stood up
sneaking in a corner, for fear of the devils. At the first door, there
were seven devils, taking the names of those that came in; and they asked
me mine, and my quality, and so they let me pass. But, examining the
tailors, “These fellows,” cried one of the devils, “come in such shoals,
as if hell were made only for tailors.” “How many are they?” says
another. Answer was made, “About a hundred.” “About a hundred? They
must be more than a hundred,” says t’other, “if they be tailors; for they
never come under a thousand, or twelve hundred strong. And we have so
many here already, I do not know where we shall ’stow them. Say the
word, my masters, shall’s let them in or no?” The poor prick-lice were
damnedly startled at that, for fear they should not get in: but in the
end, they had the favour to be admitted. “Certainly,” said I, “these
folks are but in an ill condition, when ’tis a menace for the devils
themselves to refuse to receive them.” Thereupon a huge, overgrown,
club-footed, crump-shouldered devil, threw them all into a deep hole.
Seeing such a monster of a devil, I asked him how he came to be so
deformed. And he told me, he had spoiled his back with carrying of
tailors: “for,” said he, “I have been formerly made use of as a sumpter
to fetch them; but now of late they save me that labour, and come so fast
of themselves, that ’tis one devil’s work to dispose of them.” While the
word was yet speaking, there came another glut of them, and I was fain to
make way, that the devil might have room to work in, who piled them up,
and told me they made the best fuel in hell.
I passed forward then into a little dark alley, where it made me start to
hear one call me by my name, and with much ado I perceived a fellow there
all wrapt up in smoke and flame. “Alas! sir,” says he; “have you
forgotten your old bookseller in Popes-Head Alley?” “I cry thee mercy,
good Livowell,” quoth I, “what? art thou here?” “Yes, sir,” says he,
“’tis e’en too true. I never dreamt it would have come to this.” He
thought I must needs pity him, when I knew him: but truly I reflected
rather upon the justice of his punishment. For in a word, his shop was
the very mint of heresy, schism, and sedition. I put on a face of
compassion however, to give him a little ease, which he took hold of, and
vented his complaint. “Well sir,” says he, “I would my father had made
me a hangman, when he made me a stationer; for we are called to account
for other men’s works, as well as for our own. And one thing that’s cast
in our dish, is the selling of translations, so dog cheap, that every sot
knows now as much as would formerly have made a passable doctor, and
every nasty groom and roguey lackey is grown as familiar with Homer,
Virgil, Ovid, as if ’twere _Robin the Devil_, _The Seven Champions_, or a
piece of George Withers.” He would have talked on, if a devil had not
stopped his mouth with a whiff from a roll of his own papers, and choked
him with the smoke on’t. The pestilent fume would have dispatched me
too, if I had not got presently out of the reach on’t. But I went my
way, saying this to myself, If the bookseller be thus criminal, what will
become of the author!
I was diverted from this meditation, by the rueful groans of a great many
souls that were under the lash, and the devil tyrannising over them with
whips and scourges. I asked what they were, and it was told me, that
there was a plot among the hackney-coachmen to exhibit an information
against the devils, for taking the whip out of their hands, and setting
up a trade they had never served to, (which is directly contrary to
_Quinto Elizabethæ_). “Well,” said I: “but why are these tormented
here?” With that, an old sour-looked coachman took the answer out of the
devil’s mouth, and told me, that it was because they came to hell a
horseback, which they pretended was a privilege that did not belong to
rogues of their quality. “Speak truth, and be hanged,” cried the devil;
“and make an honest confession here. Say, sirrah, how many bawdy voyages
have you made to Hackney? How many nights have you stood pimping at
Marybone? How many whores and knaves have you brought together? And how
many lies have you told, to keep all private, since you first set up this
scandalous trade?” There was a coachman by, that had served a judge, and
thought ’twas no more for his old master to fetch a rascal out of hell
than out of Newgate; which made this fellow stand upon his points, and
ask the devil, how he durst give that language to so honourable a
profession; “for,” says he, “who wears better clothes than your coachmen?
Are not we in our velvets, embroideries, and laces? and as glorious as so
many phaetons? Have not our masters reason to be good to us, when their
necks are at stake and their lives at our mercy? Nay, we govern those,
many times, that govern kingdoms; and a prince is almost in as much
danger of his coachman as of his physician. And there are that
understand it too, and themselves, and us; and that will not stick to
trust their coachmen as far as they would do their confessors. There’s
no absurdity in the comparison; for if they know some of their privacies,
we know more; yes, and perhaps more than we’ll speak of.” “What have we
here to do?” cried a devil that was ready to break his heart with
laughing. “A coachman in his tropes and figures? An orator instead of a
waggoner? The slave has broke his bridle, and got his head at liberty,
and now he’ll never have done.” “No, why should he?” says another that
had served a great lady more ways than one. “Is this the best
entertainment you can afford your servants? your daily drudges? I’m sure
we bring you good commodity, well packed; well conditioned; well
perfumed; right, neat, and clean: not like your city-ware that comes
dirty to you, up to the hocks; and yet every daggle-tailed wench, and
skip-kennel, shall be better used than we. Ah! The ingratitude of this
place! If we had done as much for somebody else, as we have done for
you, we should not have been now to seek for our wages. When you have
nothing else to say, you tell me that I am punished for carrying the
sick, the gouty, the lame, to church, to mass; or some straggling
virgins, back again to their cloister: which is a damned lie; for I am
able to prove, that all my trading lay at the play-houses, bawdy-houses,
taverns, balls, collations: or else at the _Tour à la Mode_, where there
was still appointed some after-meeting; to treat of certain affairs, that
highly import the interest and welfare of your dominions. I have indeed
carried my mistress sometimes to the church door, but it signified no
more than if I had carried her to a conventicle; for all her business
there was to meet her gallant, and to agree when they should meet next;
according to the way of devotion now in mode. To conclude: It is most
certain, that I never took any creature (knowingly) into my coach, that
had so much as a good thought. And this was so well known, that it was
all one to ask, If a lady were a maid, or if she had ever been in my
coach. If it appeared she had, he that married her knew beforehand what
he had to trust to. And after all this, ye have made us a fair
requital.” With that the devil fell a-laughing, and with five or six
twinging jerks, half flayed the poor coachman; so that I was e’en glad to
retire, in pity partly to the coachman and partly to myself; for the
currying of a coachman is little better than the turning up of a
dunghill.
My next adventure was into a deep vault, where I began immediately to
shudder, and my teeth chattered in my head. I asked the meaning of it;
and there came up to me a devil, with kibed heels and his toes all
mortified; and told me that that quarter was allotted to the buffoons and
drolls, “which are a people,” says he, “of so starved a conceipt, and so
cold a discourse, that we are fain to chain and lock them up, for fear
they should spoil the temper of our fire.” I asked if a man might see
them. The devil told me yes, and showed me one of the lewdest kennels in
hell. And there were they at it, pecking at one another, and nothing but
the same fooleries over and over again that they had practised upon
earth. Among the buffoons, I saw divers that passed here in the world
for men of honesty and honour; which were in, as the devil told me, for
flattery, and were a sort of buffoon, that goes betwixt the bark and the
tree. “But, why are they condemned?” said I. “The other buffoons are
condemned,” quoth the devil, “for want of favour; and these, for having
too much, and abusing it. You must know, they come upon us, still at
unawares; and yet they find all things in readiness; the cloth laid, and
the bed made, as if they were at home. To say the truth, we have some
sort of kindness for them; for they save us a great deal of trouble, in
tormenting one another.
“Do you see him there? That was a wicked, and a partial judge; and all
he has to say for himself, is, that he remembers the time when he could
have broke the neck of two honest causes, and he put them only out of
joint. That good fellow there was a careless husband, and him we lodge
too with the buffoons. He sold his wife’s portion, wife and all, to
please his companions; and turned both into an annuity. That lady there
(though a great one) is fain to take up too with the buffoons, for they
are both of a humour: what they do with their talk, she does with her
body, and seasons it to all appetites. In a word, you shall find
buffoons in all conditions; and, in effect, there are nigh as many as
there are men and women: for the whole world is given to jeering,
slandering, backbiting, and there are more natural buffoons than
artificial.”
At my going out of the vault, I saw a matter of a thousand devils
following a drove of pastry-men, and breaking their heads as they passed
along, with iron peels. “Alack!” cried one of them, that was yet in a
whole skin, “it is hard the sin of the flesh should be laid to our
charge, that never had to do with women.” “Impudent, nasty rascals,”
quoth a devil, “who has deserved hell, if they have not? How many
thousand men have these slovens poisoned, with the grease of their heads
and tails, instead of mutton-suet? with snot-pies for marrow; and flies
for currants? How many stomachs have they turned into lay-stalls with
the dogs’-flesh, horse-flesh and other carrion that they have put into
them? And do these rogues complain (in the devil’s name) of their
sufferings! Leave your bawling, ye whelps,” says he, “and know, that the
pain you endure is nothing to that of your tormentors. And for your
part,” says he, to me, with a sour look, “because you are a stranger, you
may go about your business; but we have a crow to pluck with these
fellows, before we part.”
I went next down a pair of stairs into a huge cellar, where I saw men
burning in unquenchable fire; and one of them roaring, cried out, “I
never over-sold; I never sold, but at conscionable rates, why am I
punished thus?” I durst have sworn it had been Judas, but going nearer
to him, to see if he had a red head, I found him to be a merchant of my
acquaintance, that died not long since. “How now, old Martin,” said I,
“art thou there?” He was dogged, because I did not call him Sir, and
made no answer. I saw his grief, and told him how much he was to blame,
to cherish that vanity even in hell, that had brought him thither. “And
what do ye think on’t now,” said I, “had not you better have traded in
blacks than Christians? Had not you better have contented yourself with
a little, honestly got, than run the hazard of your soul for an estate;
and have gone to heaven afoot, rather than to the devil on horseback?”
My friend was as mute as a fish; whether out of anger, shame, or grief, I
know not. And then a devil in office took up the discourse. “These
pickpocket rogues,” says he, “did they think to govern the world with
their own weights and measures, _in secula seculorum_? Methinks, the
blinking and false lights of their shops should have minded them of their
quarter, in the other world, aforehand. And ’tis all a case, with
jewellers, goldsmiths, and other trades, that serve only to flatter and
bolster up the world in luxury and folly. But if people would be wise,
these youths should have little enough to do. For what’s their cloth of
gold and silver, their silks, their diamond and pearl, (which they sell
at their own price) but matter of mere wantonness and superfluity? These
are they that inveigle ye into all sorts of extravagant expenses, and so
ruin ye insensibly, under colour of kindness and credit. For they set
everything at double the rate; and if you keep not touch at your day,
your persons are imprisoned, your goods seized, and your estates
extended. And they that helped to make you princes before, are now the
forwardest to put you into the condition of beggars.”
The devil would have talked on, if I had given him the hearing, but there
was such a laugh set up on one side of me, as if they would all have
split; and I went to see what the matter was; for ’twas a strange thing,
methought, to hear them so merry in hell. The business was, there were
two men upon a scaffold, in Gentile habits, gaping as loud as they could
bawl. One of them had a great parchment in his hand, displayed, with
divers’ labels hanging at it, and several seals. I thought at first it
might have been execution-day, and took the writing for a pardon or
reprieve. At every word they spoke, a matter of seven or eight thousand
devils burst out a-laughing, as they would have cracked their sides. And
this again made me think, it might be some jack-pudding or mountebank,
showing his tricks or his attestations, with his congregation of fools
about him. But, nearer hand, I found my mistake; and that the devils’
mirth made the gentlemen angry. At last, I perceived that this great
earnestness of theirs was only to make out their pedigree, and get
themselves passed for gentlemen; the parchment being a testimonial from
the Heralds Office to that purpose. “My father,” says he with the
writing in’s hand, “bore arms for His Majesty in many honourable
occasions of watching and warding; and has made many a tall fellow speak
to the constable, at all hours of the night. My uncle was the first man
that ever was of the Order of the Black-Guard: and we have had five brave
commanders of our family, by my father’s side, that have served the State
in the quality of marshal’s men and turnkeys, and given His Majesty a
fair account of all the prisoners committed to their charge. And by my
mother’s side, it will not be denied but that I am honourably descended;
for my grandmother was never without a dozen chamber-maids and nurses in
family.” “It may be ’twas her trade,” quoth the devil, “to procure
services and servants, and consequently to deal in that commodity.”
“Well, well,” said the cavalier, “she was what she was; and I’m sure I
tell you nothing but truth. Her husband wore a sword, by his place, for
he was a Deputy-Marshal; and to prove myself a man of honour, I have it
here in black and white, under the Seal of the Office. Why must I then
be quartered among a pack of rascals?” “My gentleman friend,” quoth the
devil, “your grandfather wore a sword, as he was usher to a fencing
school; and we know very well what his son and grandchild can pretend to.
But let that pass; you have led a wicked and infamous life, and spent
your time in whoring, drinking, blaspheming, and in lewd company; and do
you tell us now of the privileges of your nobility? Your testimonials;
and the Seal of the Office? A fart for your privileges, testimonials,
office and all. There is no honour, but virtue. And if your children,
though they had a scoundrel to their father, should come to do honourable
and worthy things, we should look upon them as persons sacred, and not
dare to meddle with them. But talking is time lost; you were ever a
couple of pitiful fellows, and your tails scarce worth the scalding.
Have at ye,” says he, and at that word, with a huge iron bar he gave him
such a salute over the buttocks, that he took two or three turns in the
air, heels over head, and dropped at last into the common-shore; where
never any man as yet found the bottom.
When his companion had seen him cut that caper, “This usage,” says he,
“may be well enough for a parchment gentleman; but for a cavalier of my
extraction, and profession, I suppose you’ll treat him with somewhat more
of civility and respect.” “Cavalier,” quoth the devil, “if you have
brought no better plea along with you than the antiquity of your house,
you may e’en follow your comrade, for ought I know, for we find very few
ancient families that had not some oppressor or usurper for their
founders; and they are commonly continued by the same means they were
begun. How many are there of our titular nobility, that write Noble
purely upon the account of their violence and injustice? Their subjects
and tenants, what with impositions, hard services, and racked rents, are
they not worse than slaves? If they happen to have anything
extraordinary, as a pleasant fruit, a handsome colt, a good cow; and that
the landlord, or his sweet lady take a liking to it, they must either
submit to part with it gratis, or else take their pay in foul language or
bastinadoes. And ’tis well if they ’scape so: for many times when the
sign’s in Gemini, their wives and daughters go to pot, without any regard
of laws either sacred or profane. What damned blasphemies and
imprecations do they make use of, to get credit with a mistress or a
creditor, upon a faithless promise! How intolerable is their pride and
insolence, even towards many considerable officers, both in Church and
State! for they behave themselves as if all people below their quality
and rank in the world were but as so many brutes, or worse. As if human
blood were not all of a colour; as if nature had not brought them into
the world the common way, or moulded them of the same materials with the
meanest wretches upon the earth. And then, for such as have military
charges and commands, how many great officers are there, that without any
consideration of their own, or their princes’ honour, fall to spoil and
pillage? Cozening the State with false musters, and the soldiers of
their pay; and giving them, instead of their due from the prince, a
liberty of taking what is not their due from the people; forcing them to
take the bread out of the poor labourers’ mouths to fill their own
bellies, and protecting them when they have done in the most execrable
outrages imaginable. And when the poor soldier comes at last to be
dismissed, or disbanded; lame, sick, beggarly, naked almost, and enraged;
with nothing left him to trust to but the highway to keep him from
starving. What mischief is there in the world, that these men are not
the cause of? How many good families are utterly ruined, and at this day
in the hospital, for trusting to their oaths and promises! and becoming
bound for them, for vast sums of money to maintain them in tipple, and
whores, and in all sorts of luxury and riot?” This rhetorical devil
would have said a thousand times more, but that his companions called him
off, and told him they had business elsewhere. The cavalier hearing
that, “My friend,” said he, “your morals are very good, but yet with your
favour, all men are not alike.” “There’s never a barrel better herring,”
said the devil, “you are all of ye tainted with original sin, and if you
had been any better than your fellows you had never been sent hither.
But if you are indeed so noble, as you say, you’re worth the burning, if
’twere but for your ashes. And that you may have no cause of complaint,
you shall see, we’ll treat you like a person of your condition.” And in
that instant, two devils presented themselves; the one of them bridled
and saddled; and the other, doing the office of the squire; holding the
stirrup, with his left hand, and giving the gentleman a lift into the
saddle with the other. Which was no sooner done, but away he went like
an arrow out of a bow. I asked the devil then into what country he
carried him. And he told me, not far: for ’twas only matter of decorum,
to send the nobility to hell a-horseback. “Look on that side now,” says
he, and so I did; and there I saw the poor cavalier in a huge furnace,
with the first inventors of nobility, and arms: as Cain, Cham, Nimrod,
Esau, Romulus, Tarquin, Nero, Caligula, Domitian, Heliogabalus; and a
world of other brave fellows, that had made themselves famous by
usurpation and blood. The place was a little too hot for me, and so I
retired, meditating on what I had heard; and not a little satisfied with
the discourse of so learned a devil. Till that time I took the devil for
a notorious liar; but I find now that he can speak the truth too, when he
pleases; and I would not for all I am worth but have heard him preach.
When I was thus far, my curiosity carried me still farther; and within
twenty yards I came to a huge muddy, stinking lake, near twice as big as
that of Geneva; and heard in’t so strange a noise that I was almost out
of my wits to know what it was. They told me that the lake was stored
with Doüegnas, or Gouvernantes, which are turned into a kind of frogs in
hell, and perpetually drivelling, sputtering, and croaking. Methought
the conversion was apt enough; for they are neither fish, nor flesh, no
more than frogs; and only the lower parts of them are man’s-meat, but
their heads are enough to turn a very good stomach. I could not but
laugh to see how they gaped, and stretched out their legs as they swam,
and still as we came near they’d scud away and dive.
This was no place to stay in, there was so noisome a vapour; and so I
struck off, upon the left hand, where I saw a number of old men beating
their breasts and tearing their faces, with bitter groans and
lamentations. It made my heart ache to see them, and I asked what they
were: answer was made, that I was now in the quarter of the fathers that
damned themselves to raise their posterity; which were called by some,
the unadvised. “Wretch that I am!” cried one of them, “the greatest
penitent that ever lived, never suffered the mortification I have
endured. I have watched, I have fasted, I have scarce had any clothes to
my back; my whole life has been a restless course of torment, both of
body and mind: and all this, to get money for my children; that I might
see them well married; buy them places at court, or procure them some
other preferment in the world: starving myself in the conclusion, rather
than I would lessen the provision I had made for my posterity. And yet,
notwithstanding this my fatherly care, I was scarce sooner dead, than
forgotten: and my next heir buried me without tears, or mourning; and
indeed without so much as paying of legacies, or praying for my soul: as
if they had already received certain intelligence of my damnation. And
to aggravate my sorrows, the prodigals are now squandering and consuming
that estate, in gaming, whoring, and debauches, which I had scraped
together by so much industry, vexation and oppression, and for which I
suffer at this instant such insupportable torments.” “This should have
been thought on before,” cried a devil, “for sure you have heard of the
old saying, ‘Happy is the child whose father goes to the devil.’” At
which word, the old misers brake out into fresh rage and lamentation,
tearing their flesh, with tooth and nail, in so rueful a manner, that I
was no longer able to endure the spectacle.
A little farther there was a dark, hideous prison, where I heard the
clattering of chains, the crackling of flames, the slapping of whips, and
a confused outcry of complaints. I asked what quarter this was; and they
told me it was the quarter of the Oh that I had’s! “What are those,”
said I? Answer was made, that they were a company of brutish sots, so
absolutely delivered up to vice, that they were damned insensibly, and in
hell before they were aware. They are now reflecting upon their
miscarriages and omissions, and perpetually crying out, “Oh that I had
examined my conscience!” “Oh that I had frequented the Sacraments!” “Oh
that I had humbled myself with fasting, and prayer!” “Oh that I had
served God as I ought!” “Oh that I had visited the sick, and relieved
the poor!” “Oh that I had set a watch before the door of my lips!”
I left these late repentants, (as it appeared) in exchange for worse,
which were shut up in a base court, and the nastiest that ever I saw.
These were such as had ever in their mouths, “God is merciful, and will
pardon me.” “How can this be,” said I, “that these people should be
damned? when condemnation is an act of justice, not of mercy.” “I
perceive you are simple,” quoth the devil, “for half these you see here,
are condemned with the mercy of God in their mouths. And to explain
myself, consider I pray’e how many sinners are there, that go on in their
ways, in spite of reproof, and good counsel; and still this is their
answer, ‘God is merciful, and will not damn a soul for so small a
matter.’ But let them talk of mercy as they please, so long as they
persist in a wicked life, we are like to have their company at last.”
“By your argument,” said I, “there’s no trusting to Divine Mercy.” “You
mistake me,” quoth the devil, “for every good thought and work flows from
that mercy. But this I say: He that perseveres in his wickedness, and
makes use of the name of mercy, only for a countenance to his impieties,
does but mock the Almighty, and has no title to that mercy. For ’tis
vain to expect mercy from above, without doing anything in order to it.
It properly belongs to the righteous and the penitent; and they that have
the most of it upon the tongue have commonly the least thought of it in
their hearts: and ’tis a great aggravation of guilt, to sin the more, in
confidence of an abounding mercy. It is true that many are received to
mercy, that are utterly unworthy of it, which is no wonder, since no man
of himself can deserve it: but men are so negligent of seeking it
betimes, that they put that off to the last, which should have been the
first part of their business; and many times their life is at end, before
they begin their repentance.” I did not think so damned a doctor could
have made so good a sermon. And there I left him.
I came next to a noisome dark hole, and there I saw a company of dyers,
all in dirt and smoke, intermixed with the devils, and so alike that it
would have posed the subtlest inquisitor in Spain to have said, which
were the devils and which the dyers.
There stood at my elbow a strange kind of mongrel devil, begot betwixt a
black and a white; with a head so bestruck with little horns, that it
looked at a distance like a hedgehog. I took the boldness to ask him,
where they quartered the Sodomites, the old women and the cuckolds. “As
for the cuckolds,” said he, “they are all over hell, without any certain
quarter or station; and in truth, ’tis no easy matter to know a cuckold
from a devil, for (like kind husbands) they wear their wives’ favours
still, and the very same headpieces in hell that they wore living in the
world. As to the Sodomites, we have no more to do with them than needs
must; but upon all occasions, we either fly, or face them: for if ever we
come to give them a broadside, ’tis ten to one but we get a hit betwixt
wind and water; and yet we fence with our tails, as well as we can, and
they get now and then a flap o’er the mouth into the bargain. And for
the old women, we make them stand off; for we take as little pleasure in
them, as you do: and yet the jades will be persecuting us with their
passions; and ye shall have a bawd of five-and-fifty do ye all the
gambols of a girl of fifteen. And yet, after all this, there’s not an
old woman in hell; for let her be as old as Paul’s — bald, blind,
toothless, wrinkled, decrepit: this is not long of her age, she’ll tell
you; but a terrible fit of sickness last year, that fetched off her hair,
and brought her so low that she has not yet recovered her flesh again.
She lost her eyes by a hot rheum; and utterly spoiled her teeth with
cracking of peach-stones and eating of sweet-meats when she was a maid.
And when the weight of her years has almost brought both ends together,
’tis nothing she’ll tell ye but a crick she has got in her back: and
though she might recover her youth again, by confessing her age, she’ll
never acknowledge it.”
My next encounter was, a number of people making their moan that they had
been taken away by sudden death. “That’s an impudent lie,” cried a
devil, “(saving this gentleman’s presence) for no man dies suddenly.
Death surprises no man, but gives all men sufficient warning and notice.”
I was much taken with the devil’s civility and discourse; which he
pursued after this manner. “Do ye complain,” says he, “of sudden death?
that have carried death about ye, ever since you were born; that have
been entertained with daily spectacles of carcasses and funerals; that
have heard so many sermons upon the subject; and read so many good books
upon the frailty of life and the certainty of death. Do ye not know that
every moment ye live brings ye nearer to your end? Your clothes wear
out, your woods and your houses decay, and yet ye look that your bodies
should be immortal. What are the common accidents and diseases of life,
but so many warnings to provide yourself for a remove? Ye have death at
the table, in your daily food and nourishment; for your life is
maintained by the death of other creatures. And you have the lively
picture of it, every night for your bedfellow. With what face then can
you charge your misfortunes upon sudden death? that have spent your whole
life, both at bed, and at board, among so many remembrances of your
mortality. No, no; change your style, and hereafter confess yourselves
to have been careless and incredulous. You die, thinking you are not to
die yet; and forgetting that death grows upon you, and goes along with ye
from one end of your life to the other, without distinguishing of persons
or ages, sex or quality; and whether it finds ye well or ill-doing; As
the tree falls, so it lies.”
Turning toward my left hand, I saw a great many souls that were put up in
gallipots, with _Assa fœtida_, _Galbanum_, and a company of nasty oils
that served them for syrup. “What a damned stink is here,” cried I,
stopping my nose. “We are now come undoubtedly to the devil’s house of
office.” “No, no,” said their tormentor, (which was a kind of a
yellowish complexioned devil) “’tis a confection of apothecaries. A sort
of people, that are commonly damned for compounding the medicines by
which their patients hoped to be saved. To give them their due, these
are your only true and chemical philosophers; and worth a thousand of
Raymund Lullius, Hermes, Geber, Ruspicella, Avicen, and their fellows;
’tis true, they have written fine things of the transmutation of metals;
but did they ever make any gold? Or if they did, we have lost the
secret. Whereas your apothecaries, out of a little puddle-water, a
bundle of rotten sticks, a box of flies—nay out of toads, vipers, and a
Sir Reverence itself, will fetch ye gold ready minted, and fit for the
market; which is more than all your philosophical projectors ever
pretended to. There is no herb so poisonous, (let it be hemlock) nor any
stone so dry, (suppose the pumice itself) but they’ll draw silver out of
it. And then for words, ’tis impossible to make up any word out of the
four-and-twenty letters, but they’ll show ye a drug, or a plant of the
name; and turn the alphabet into as good money as any’s in your pocket.
Ask them for an eye-tooth of a flying toad; they’ll tell ye, yes, ye may
have of it, in powder; or if you had rather have the infusion of a tench
of the mountains, in a little eel’s milk, ’tis all one to them. If there
be but any money stirring, you shall have what you will, though there be
no such thing in nature. So that it looks as if all the plants and
stones of the creation had their several powers and virtues given them,
only for the apothecaries’ sakes; and as if words themselves had been
only made for their advantage. Ye call them apothecaries, but instead of
that, I pray’e call them armourers; and their shops, arsenals; are not
their medicines as certain death as swords, daggers, or muskets? while
their patients are purged and blooded into the other world, without any
regard either to distemper, measure, or season.
“If you will now see the pleasantest sight you have seen yet, walk up but
these two steps, and you shall see a jury (or conspiracy) of
barber-surgeons, sitting upon life and death.” You must think that any
divertisement there was welcome, so that I went up, and found it in truth
a very pleasant spectacle. These barbers were most of them chained by
the middle, their hands at liberty, and every one of them a cittern about
his neck, and upon his knees a chess-board; and still as he reached to
have a touch at the cittern, the instrument vanished; and so did the
chess-board, when he thought to have a game at draughts; which is
directly tantalising the poor rogues, for a cittern is as natural to a
barber as milk to a calf. Some of them were washing of asses’ brains,
and putting them in again; and scouring of negroes to make them white.
When I had laughed my fill at these fooleries, my next discovery was, of
a great many people, grumbling and muttering, that there was nobody
looked after them; no not so much as to torment them; as if their tails
were not as well worth the toasting as their neighbours’. Answer was
made, that being a kind of devils themselves, they might put in for some
sort of authority in the place, and execute the office of tormentors.
This made me ask what they were. And a devil told me (with respect) that
they were a company of ungracious, left-handed wretches, that could do
nothing aright. And their grievance was that they were quartered by
themselves; but not knowing whether they were men or no, or indeed what
else to make of them, we did not know how to match them, or in what
company to put them. In the world they are looked upon as ill omens; and
let any man meet one of them, upon a journey in a morning, fasting, ’tis
the same thing as if a hare had crossed the way upon him; he presently
turns head in a discontent, and goes to bed again. Ye know that Scævola,
when he found his mistake, in killing another for Porsenna (the
secretary, for the prince) burned his right hand in revenge of the
miscarriage; now the severity of the vengeance, was not so much the
maiming or the crippling of himself, but the condemning of himself to be
for ever left-handed. And so ’tis with a malefactor that suffers
justice; the shame and punishment does not lie so much in the loss of his
right hand, as that the other is left. And it was the curse of an old
bawd, to a fellow that had vexed her, that he might go to the devil by
the stroke of a left-handed man. If the poets speak truth, (as ’twere a
wonder if they should not) the left is the unlucky side; and there never
came any good from it. And for my last argument against these creatures;
the goats and reprobates stand upon the left hand, and left-handed men
are, in effect, a sort of creature that’s made to do mischief; nay
whether I should call them men, or no, I know not.
Hereupon, a devil beckoned me to come softly to him; and so I did,
without a word speaking or the least noise in the world. “Now,” says he,
“if you’ll see the daily exercise of ill-favoured women, look through
that lattice window.” And there I saw such a kennel of ugly bitches, you
would have blest yourself. Some, with their faces so pounced and
speckled, as if they had been scarified, and newly passed the
cupping-glass; with a world of little plaisters, long, round, square; and
briefly, cut out into such variety, that it would have posed a good
mathematician to have found out another figure; and you would have sworn
that they had been either at cat’s play or cuffs. Others, were scraping
their faces with pieces of glass; tearing up their eyebrows by the roots,
like mad; and some that had none to tear were fetching out of their black
boxes, such as they could get, or make. Others were powdering and
curling their false locks, or fastening their new ivory teeth in the
place of their old ebony ones. Some were chewing lemon peel, or
cinnamon, to countenance a foul breath; and raising themselves upon their
ciopines, that their view might be the fairer and their fall the deeper.
Others were quarrelling with their looking-glasses, for showing them such
hags’ faces: and cursing the State of Venice for entertaining no better
workmen. Some were stuffing out their bodies, like pack saddles, to
cover secret deformities: and some again had so many hoods over their
faces, to conceal the ruins, that I could hardly discern what they were;
and these passed for penitents. Others, with their pots of hog’s grease
and pomatum were sleeking and polishing their faces, and indeed their
foreheads were bright and shining, though there were neither suns nor
stars in that firmament. Some there were (in fine) that would have
fetched a man’s guts up at’s mouth, to see them with their masques of
after-births; and with their menstruous slibber slobbers, daubing one
another to take away the heats and bubos. “Nasty and abominable!” I
cried. “Well,” quoth the devil, “you see now how far a woman’s wit and
invention will carry her to her own destruction.” I could not speak one
word for astonishment at so horrid a spectacle, till I had a little
recollected myself; and then said I, “If I may deal freely without
offence, I dare defy all the devils in hell to outdo these women. But
pray’e let’s be gone, for the sight of them makes my very heart ache.”
“Turn about then,” said the devil, and there was a fellow sitting in a
chair, all alone; never a devil near him; no fire or frost; no heat or
cold, or anything else, that I could perceive, to torment him; and yet
crying and roaring out the most hideously of anything I had yet heard in
hell; tearing his flesh, and beating his body, like a bedlam; and his
heart, all the while, bleeding at his eyes. Good Lord, thought I, what
ails this wretch, to yell out thus when nobody hurts him! So I went up
to him. “Friend,” said I, “what’s the meaning of all this fury and
transport? for, so far as I can see, there’s nothing to trouble you.”
“No, no,” says he with a horrid outcry, and with all the extravagances of
a man in rage and despair, “you do not see my tormentors; but the
all-searching eye of the Almighty sees my pains as well as my
transgressions, and with a severe and implacable justice has condemned me
to suffer punishments answerable to my crimes.” (Which words he uttered
with redoubled clamours.) “My executioners are in my soul, and all the
plagues of hell in my conscience. My memory serves me instead of a cruel
devil. The remembrance of the good I should have done, and omitted; and
of the ill I should not have done, and did. The remembrance of the
wholesome counsels I have rejected, and of the ill example I have given.
And for the aggravation of my misery; where my memory leaves afflicting
me, my understanding begins: showing me the glories and beatitudes I have
lost, which others enjoy, who have gained heaven with less anxiety and
pain than I have endured to compass my damnation. Now am I perpetually
meditating on the comforts, beauties, felicities, and raptures of
paradise, only to enflame and exasperate my despair in hell; begging in
vain but for one moment’s interval of ease, without obtaining any; for my
will is also as inexorable as either my memory or my understanding. And
these (my friend of the other world) are the three faculties of my soul,
which Divine Justice, for my sins, has converted into three tormentors,
that torture me without noise; into three flames, that burn me without
consuming. And if I chance at any time to have the least remission or
respite, the worm of my conscience gnaws my soul, and finds it, to an
insatiable hunger, an immortal aliment and entertainment.” At that word,
turning towards me with a hellish yell, “Mortal,” says he, “learn, and be
assured from me, that all those that either bury or misemploy their
talents, carry a hell within themselves, and are damned even above
ground.” And so he returned to his usual clamours. Upon this, I left
him, miserably sad and pensive. Well, thought I, what a weight of sin
lies upon this creature’s conscience! Whereupon the devil observing me
in a muse, told me in my ear, that this fellow had been an atheist, and
believed neither God nor devil. “Deliver me then,” said I, “from that
unsanctified wisdom, that serves us only for our further condemnation.”
I was gone but a step or two aside, and I saw a world of people running
after burning chariots, with a great many souls in them, and the devils
tearing them with pincers; and before them marched certain officers,
making proclamation of their sentence, which with much ado I got near
enough to hear, and it was to this effect. “Divine Justice hath
appointed this punishment to the scandalous, for giving ill examples to
their neighbours.” And at the same time, several of the damned laid
their sins to their charge, and cried out, that ’twas ’long of them they
were thus tormented. So that the scandalous were punished both for their
own sins and for the offences of those they had misled to their
destruction. And these are they of whom ’tis said, that they had better
never have been born.
My very soul was full of anguish, to see so many doleful spectacles; and
yet I could not but smile, to see the vintners everywhere up and down
hell, as free as if they had been in their taverns, and only prisoners
upon parole. I asked how they came by that privilege; and a devil told
me, there was no need of shackling them, or so much as shutting them up;
for there was no fear of their making a ’scape, that took so much pains
in the world, and made it their whole business to come thither. “Only,”
says he, “if we can keep them from throwing water in the fire, as they do
in their wines, we are well enough. But if you would see somewhat worth
the while, leave these fellows, and follow me; and I’ll show ye Judas and
his brethren, the stewards, and purse-bearers.” So I did as he bade me,
and he brought me to Judas, and his companions, who had no faces, divers
of them, and most of them no foreheads.
I was well enough pleased to see him, and to be better informed; for I
had ever fancied him to be a kind of an olive-coloured,
tawny-complexioned fellow, without a beard; and an Eunuch into the
bargain: which perhaps (nay probably) he was; for nothing but a capon, a
thing unmanned, could ever have been guilty of so sordid and treacherous
a villainy, as to sell and betray his Master, with a kiss; and after
that, so cowardly, as to hang himself in despair, when he had done. I do
believe, however, what the Church says of him, that he had a carrot beard
and a red head; but it may be his beard was burnt, and as he appeared to
me in hell I could not but take him for an Eunuch, which to deal freely,
is my opinion of all the devils, for they have no hair; and they are for
the most part wrinkled and baker-legged.
Judas was beset with a great many money-mongers and purse-bearers, that
were telling him stories of the pranks they had played, and the tricks
they had put upon their masters, after his example. Coming up to them, I
perceived that their punishment was like that of Titius, who had a
vulture continually gnawing upon his liver; for there were a number of
ravenous birds perpetually preying upon them, and tearing off their
flesh; which grew again as fast as they devoured it; a devil in the
meantime crying out, and the damned filling the whole place with clamour
and horror; Judas, with his purse, and his pot by his side, bearing a
large part in the outcry and torment. I had a huge mind (methought) to
have a word or two with Judas, and so I went to him with this greeting:
“Thou perfidious, impudent, impious traitor,” said I, “to sell thy Lord
and Master at so base a price, like an avaricious rascal.” “If men,”
said he, “were not ungrateful, they would rather pity, or commend me, for
an action so much to their advantage, and done in order to their
redemption. The misery is mine, that am to have no part myself in the
benefit I have procured to others. Some heretics there are (I must
confess to my comfort) that adore me for’t. But do you take me for the
only Judas? No, no. There have been many since the death of my Master,
and there are at this day, more wicked and ungrateful, ten thousand times
than myself; that buy the Lord of Life, as well as sell Him, scourging
and crucifying Him daily with more spite and ignominy than the Jews. The
truth is, I had an itch to be fingering of money, and bartering, from my
very entrance into the apostleship. I began, you know, with the pot of
ointment, which I would fain have sold, under colour of a relief to the
poor. And I went on, to the selling of my Master, wherein I did the
world a greater good than I intended, to my own irreparable ruin. My
repentance now signifies nothing. To conclude, I am the only steward
that’s condemned for selling; all the rest are damned for buying: and I
must entreat you, to have a better opinion of me; for if you’ll look but
a little lower here, you’ll find people a thousand times worse than
myself.” “Withdraw then,” said I, “for I have had talk enough with
Judas.”
I went down then some few steps, as Judas directed me; and there I saw a
world of devils upon the march, with rods and stirrup-leathers in their
hands, lashing a company of handsome lasses, stark naked, and driving
them out of hell, (which methought was pity, and if I had had some of
them in a corner, I should have treated them better) with the
stirrup-leathers, they disciplined a litter of bawds. I could not
imagine why these, of all others, should be expelled the place, and asked
the question. “Oh,” says a devil, “these are our factresses in the
world, and the best we have, so that we send them back again to bring
more grist to the mill: and indeed, if it were not for women, hell would
be but thinly peopled; for what with the art, the beauty, and the
allurements of the young wenches, and the sage advice and counsel of the
bawds, they do us very good service. Nay, for fear any of our good
friends should tire upon the road, they send them to us on horseback, or
bring them themselves, e’en to the very gates, lest they should miss
their way.”
Pursuing my journey, I saw, a good way before me, a large building, that
looked (methought) like some enchanted castle, or the picture of
ill-luck; it was all ruinous, the chimneys down, the planchers all to
pieces, only the bars of the windows standing; the doors all bedaubed
with dirt, and patched up with barrel-heads, where they had been broken.
The glass gone, and here and there a quarrel supplied with paper. I made
no doubt at first but the house was forsaken; but, coming nearer, I found
it otherwise, by a horrible confusion of tongues and noises within it.
As I came just up to the door, one opened it, and I saw in the house many
devils, thieves, and whores. One of the craftiest jades in the pack,
placed herself presently upon the threshold, and made her address to my
guide and me. “Gentlemen,” says she, “how comes it to pass, I pray’e,
that people are damned both for giving and taking? The thief is
condemned for taking away from another; and we are condemned for giving
what is our own. I do not find, truly, any injustice in our trade; and
if it be lawful to give every one their own, and out of their own, why
are we condemned?” We found it a nice point, and sent the wench to
counsel learned in the law, for a resolution in the case. Her mentioning
of thieves made me inquire after the scriveners and notaries. “Is it
possible,” said I, “that you should have none of them here? for I do not
remember that I have seen so much as one of them upon the way; and yet I
had occasion for a scrivener, and made a search for one.” “I do believe
indeed,” quoth the devil, “that you have not found any of them upon the
road.” “How then?” said I, “what, are they all saved?” “No, no,” cried
the devil, “but you must understand, that they do not foot it hither, as
other mortals; but come upon the wing, in troops like wild geese; so that
’tis no wonder you see none of them upon the way. We have millions of
them, but they cut it away in a trice, for they are damnedly rank-winged,
and will make a flight, in the third part of a minute, betwixt earth and
hell.” “But if there be so many,” said I, “how comes it we see none of
them?” “For that,” quoth the devil, “we change their names, when they
come hither once, and call them no longer notaries or scriveners, but
cats: and they are so good mousers, that though this place is large, old,
and ruinous, yet you see not so much as a rat or a mouse in hell, how
full soever of all other sorts of vermin.” “Now ye talk of vermin,” said
I, “are there any catchpoles here?” “No, not one,” says he. “How so,”
quoth I, “when I dare undertake there are five hundred rogues of the
trade for one that’s ought.” “The reason is,” says the devil, “that
every catchpole upon earth carries a hell in’s bosom.” “You have still,”
said I, crossing myself, “an aching tooth at those poor varlets.” “Why
not,” cried he, “for they are but devils incarnate, and so damnedly
versed in the art of tormenting, that we live in continual dread of
losing our places, and that His Infernal Majesty should take these
rascals into his service.”
I had enough of this, and travelling on, I saw a little way off a great
enclosure, and a world of souls shut up in’t; some of them weeping and
lamenting without measure, others in a profound silence. And this I
understood to be the lovers’ quarter. It saddened me to consider, that
death itself could not kill the lamentations of lovers. Some of them
were discoursing their passions, and teasing themselves with fears and
jealousies; casting all their miseries upon their appetites and fancies,
that still made the picture infinitely fairer than the person. They were
for the most part troubled with a simple disease, called (as the devil
told me) “I thought.” I asked him what that was, and he answered me, it
was a punishment suitable to their offence: for your lovers, when they
fall short of their expectations, either in the pursuit or enjoyment of
their mistresses, they are wont to say, “Alas! I thought she would have
loved me; I thought she would never have pressed me to marry her; I
thought she would have been a fortune to me; I thought she would have
given me all she had; I thought she would have cost me nothing; I thought
she would have asked me nothing; I thought she would have been true to my
bed; I thought she would have been dutiful and modest; I thought she
would never have kept her gallant.” So that all their pain and damnation
comes from I thought this or that, or so, or so.
In the middle of them was Cupid, a little beggarly rogue, and as naked as
he was born, only here and there covered with an odd kind of embroidery:
but whether it was the workmanship of the itch, pox, or measles, I could
not perfectly discover; and close by him was this inscription—
Many a good fortune goes to wrack;
And so does many an able back;
With following whores and cards and dice,
Were poxed and beggared in a trice.
“Aha!” said I, “by these rhymes methinks the poets should not be far
off;” and the word was hardly out of my mouth, when I discovered millions
of them through a park pale, and so I stopped to look upon them. (It
seems in hell they are not called poets now, but fools.) One of them
showed me the women’s quarter there hard by, and asked me what I thought
of it, and of the handsome ladies in it. “Is it not true,” says he,
“that a buxom lass is a kind of half chamber-maid to a man? when she has
stripped him and brought him to bed, she has done her business, and never
troubles herself any further about the helping him up again, and dressing
him.” “How now,” said I, “Have ye your quirks and conceipts in hell? In
troth ye are pleasant: I thought your edge had been taken off.” With
that, out stepped the most miserable wretch of the whole company laden
with irons: “Ah!” quoth he, “I would to God the first inventor of rhymes
and poetry were here in my place,” and then he went on with this
following and sad complaint.