Interrogativa Cantilena.
If all the world were Paper,
And all the Sea were Inke;
If all the Trees were bread and cheese,
How should we do for drinke?
If all the World were sand'o,
Oh then what should we lack'o ;
If as they say there were no clay,
How should we take Tobacco ?
If all our vessels ran'a,
If none but had a crack'a ;
If Spanish Apes eat all the Grapes,
How should we do for Sack'a?
If Fryers had no bald pates,
Nor Nuns had no dark Cloysters,
If all the Seas were Beans and Pease,
How should we do for Oysters?
If there had been no projects,
Nor none that did great wrongs;
If Fidlers shall turne players all,
How should we do for songs?
If all things were eternall,
And nothing their end bringing;
If this should be, then how should we,
Here make an end of singing?
SATURNE diseas'd with age, and left for dead;
Chang'd all his gold, to be involv'd in lead.
JOVE, Funo leaves, and loves to take his range; From whom, man learns to love, and loves to change.
JUNO checks Fove, that he to earth should come, Having her selfe to sport withall at home.
MARS is disarmed, and is to Venus gon,
Where Vulcans Anvill must be struck upon.
SOL sees, yet 'cause he may not be allow'd,
Το say he sees, he hides him in a cloud.
VENUS tels Vulcan, Mars shall shooe her Steed,
For he it is that hits the naile o'th head.
The Aery-nuntius sly MERCURIUS,
Is stoln from heaven to Galobelgicus.
LUNA is deemed chast, yet she's a sinner,
Witnesse the man that she receives within her:
But that she's horn'd it cannot well be sed,
Since I ne'r heard that she was married.
The 12. Signes of the Zodiack.
Venus to Mars, and Mars to Venus came,
Venus contriv'd, and Mars confirm'd the same :
Ida, the place, the game what best did please,
Whiles Vulcan found the Sun in ARIES.
TAURUS, as it hath been alledg'd by some,
Is fled from Neck and Throat to roare at Rome:
But now the Bull is growne to such a rate,
The price has brought the Bull quite out of date.
CANCER the backward Crab is figured here,
O'r stomach, breast and ribs to domineer.
Eve on a rib was made, whence we may know,
Women from Eve, were Crab'd and backward too.
VIRGO the Phoenix signe (as all can tell ye)
Has regiment o'r bowels, and o'r belly.
But now since Virgo could not her belly tame,
Belly has forc'd Virgo to lose her name.
SCORPIO serpent-like, most slily tenders,
What much seduceth men, his privy members:
Which mov'd our Grandam Eve give ear unto
That secret-member-patron Scorpio.
The goatish CAPRICORNE that us'd to presse
'Mongst naked Mermaidens, now's faln on's knees,
Where crest-faln too (poor Snake) he lies as low,
As those on whom he did his horns bestow.
With arm in arm our GEMINI enwreath,
Their individuate parts in life and death :
The arms and shoulders sway, O may I have
But two such friends to have me to my grave.
LEO a Port-like Prelate now become,
Emperiously retires to th'Sea of Rome:
A Sea, and yet no Levant-sea, for than
He were no Leo, but Leviathan.
LIBRA the reines, which we may justly call
A signe which Tradesmen hate the worst of all:
For she implies even weights, but do not look
To find this signe in every Grocers-book..
If thou wouldst please the lasse that thou dost marry,
The sign must ever be in SAGITTARY:
Which rules the thighs, an influence more common,
'Mongst Marmosites and Monkies, then some women.
AQUARIUS (as I informed am)
Kept Puddle-wharfe, and was a waterman,
But being one too honest for that kind,
He row'd to Heaven, and left those knaves behind.
PISCIS the fish is said to rule the feet,
And socks with all that keep the feet from sweat;
One that purveyes provision enough,
Of Ling, Poore-John, and other Lenten stuffe.
I sing thy praise, Bacchus,
Who with thy Thyrse dost thwack us;
And yet thou so dost black us
With boldnesse that we feare
No Brutus entring here;
Nor Cato the severe,
What though the Lictors threat us,
We know they dare not beat us;
So long as thou dost heat us,
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