His elder brother was the Esau, that came out first and left him like
Jacob at his heels. His father has done with him as Pharaoh to the
children of Israel, that would have them make brick and give them no
straw, so he tasks him to be a gentleman, and leaves him nothing to
maintain it. The pride of his house has undone him, which the elder's
knighthood must sustain, and his beggary that knighthood. His birth and
bringing up will not suffer him to descend to the means to get wealth;
but he stands at the mercy of the world, and which is worse, of his
brother. He is something better than the serving-men; yet they more
saucy with him than he bold with the master, who beholds him with a
countenance of stern awe, and checks him oftener than his liveries. His
brother's old suits and he are much alike in request, and cast off now
and then one to the other. Nature hath furnished him with a little more
wit upon compassion, for it is like to be his best revenue. If his
annuity stretch so far, he is sent to the university, and with great
heart-burning takes upon him the ministry, as a profession he is
condemned to by his ill fortune. Others take a more crooked path yet,
the king's high-way; where at length their vizard is plucked off, and
they strike fair for Tyburn: but their brother's pride, not love, gets
them a pardon. His last refuge is the Low-countries,[18] where rags and
lice are no scandal, where he lives a poor gentleman of a company, and
dies without a shirt. The only thing that may better his fortunes is an
art he has to make a gentlewoman, wherewith he baits now and then some
rich widow that is hungry after his blood. He is commonly discontented
and desperate, and the form of his exclamation is, _that churl my
brother_. He loves not his country for this unnatural custom, and would
have long since revolted to the Spaniard, but for Kent[19] only, which
he holds in admiration.