couragement; having had already such a taste of what I am able perform.

their actions by any reflection upon Peter, but by observing the rules prescribed in their father's will. That he should remember Peter was still their 5 brother, whatever faults or injuries he had committed; and therefore they should by all means avoid such a thought as that of taking measures for good and evil from no other rule than of opposi

I record, therefore, that brother Jack, brimful of this miraculous compound, reflecting with indignation upon Peter's tyranny, and farther provoked by the despondency of Martin, prefaced his resolutions to this purpose. What,' said he, a rogue that locked up his drink, turned away our wives, cheated us of our 10 tion to him. That it was true, the testa

fortunes; palmed his damned crusts upon
us for mutton; and at last kicked us out
of doors; must we be in his fashions,
with a pox? A rascal, besides, that all
the street cries out against.' Having 15
thus kindled and inflamed himself as
high as possible, and by consequence in a
delicate temper for beginning a reforma-
tion, he set about the work immediately;
and in three minutes made more despatch 20
than Martin had done in as many hours.
For, courteous reader, you are given to
understand that zeal is never so highly
obliged as when you set it a-tearing; and
Jack, who doted on that quality in him- 25
self, allowed it at this time its full swing.
Thus it happened that, stripping down a
parcel of gold lace a little too hastily,
he rent the main body of his coat from
top to bottom; and whereas his talent 30
was not of the happiest in taking up a
stitch, he knew no better way than to
darn it again with packthread and a
skewer. But the matter was yet in-
finitely worse (I record it with tears) 35
when he proceeded to the embroidery:
for, being clumsy by nature, and of
temper impatient; withal, beholding mil-
lions of stitches that required the nicest
hand and sedatest constitution to extri- 40
cate; in a great rage he tore off the whole
piece, cloth and all, and flung them into
the kennel, and furiously thus continu-
ing his career: 'Ah, good brother Mar-
tin,' said he, 'do as I do, for the love of 45
God; strip, tear, pull, rend, flay off all,
that we may appear as unlike the rogue
Peter as it is possible; I would not for
a hundred pounds carry the least mark
about me that might give occasion to the 50
neighbors of suspecting that I was
lated to such a rascal.' But Martin, who
at this time happened to be extremely
his
sedate, begged
phlegmatic and
brother, of all love, not to damage his
coat by any means; for he never would
get such another: desired him to consider
that it was not their business to form

re

55

ment of their good father was very exact in what related to the wearing of their coats: yet it was no less penal and strict in prescribing agreement, and friendship, and affection between them. And therefore, if straining a point were at all dispensable, it would certainly be so rather to the advance of unity than increase of contradiction.

MARTIN had still proceeded as gravely as he began, and doubtless would have delivered an admirable lecture of morality, which might have exceedingly contributed to my reader's repose both of body and mind, the true ultimate end of ethics; but Jack was already gone a flight-shot beyond his patience. And as in scholastic disputes nothing serves to rouse the spleen of him that opposes so much as a kind of pedantic affected calmness in the respondent; disputants being for the most part like unequal scales, where the gravity of one side advances the lightness of the other, and causes it to fly up and kick the beam; so it happened here that the weight of Martin's argument exalted Jack's levity, and made him fly out, and spurn against his brother's moderation. In short, Martin's patience put Jack in a rage; but that which most afflicted him was, to observe his brother's coat so well reduced into the state of innocence; while his own was either wholly rent to his shirt, or those places which had escaped his cruel clutches were still in Peter's livery. So that he looked like a drunken beau, half rifled by bullies; or like a fresh tenant of Newgate, when he has refused the payment of garnish; or like a discovered shoplifter, left to the mercy of Exchange women; or like a bawd in her old velvet petticoat, resigned into the secular hands of the mobile. Like any, or like all these, a medley of rags, and lace, and rents, and fringes, unfortunate Jack did now appear: he would have been extremely glad to see his coat in

SECTION XI

the condition of Martin's, but infinitely gladder to find that of Martin in the same predicament with his. However, since neither of these was likely to come to pass, he thought fit to lend the whole business another turn, and to dress up necessity into a virtue. Therefore, after as many of the fox's arguments as he could muster up, for bringing Martin to reason, as he called it; or, as he meant 10 it, into his own ragged, bobtailed condition; and observing he said all to little purpose; what, alas! was left for the forlorn Jack to do, but, after a million of scurrilities against his brother, to run 15 writing it is as in traveling; if a man

mad with spleen, and spite, and contradiction. To be short, here began a mortal breach between these two. Jack went immediately to new lodgings, and in a few days it was for certain reported that 20 he had run out of his wits. In a short time after he appeared abroad, and confirmed the report by falling into the oddest whimseys that ever a sick brain conceived.

4

25

And now the little boys in the streets began to salute him with several names. Sometimes they would call him Jack the bald; sometimes, Jack with a lantern; 2 sometimes, Dutch Jack; sometimes, 30 French Hugh; sometimes, Tom the beggar; and sometimes, Knocking Jack of the North. And it was under one, or some, or all of these appellations, which I leave the learned reader to de- 35 termine, that he has given rise to the most illustrious and epidemic sect of Aeolists; who, with honorable commemoration, do still acknowledge the renowned JACK for their author and 40 founder. Of whose original, as well as principles, I am now advancing to gratify the world with a very particular account.

-Melleo contingens cuncta lepore. [Touching everything with a honeyed charm.]

1 That is, Calvin, from calvus, bald.

All those who pretend to inward light.

Jack of Leyden, who gave rise to the Anabaptists.

The Huguenots.

The Gueuses, by which name some Protestants in Flanders were called.

John Knox, the reformer of Scotland.

After so wide a compass as I have wandered, I do now gladly overtake and 5 close in with my subject, and shall henceforth hold on with it an even pace to the end of my journey, except some beautiful prospect appears within sight of my way; whereof though at present I have neither warning nor expectation, yet upon such an accident, come when it will, I shall beg my reader's favor and company, allowing me to conduct him through it along with myself. For in

is in haste to be at home (which I acknowledge to be none of my case, having never so little business as when I am there), and his horse be tired with long riding and ill ways, or be naturally a jade, I advise him clearly to make the straightest and the commonest road, be it ever so dirty; but then surely we must own such a man to be a scurvy companion at best; he spatters himself and his fellow-travelers at every step; all their thoughts, and wishes, and conversation turn entirely upon the subject of their journey's end; and at every splash, and plunge, and stumble, they heartily wish one another at the devil.

On the other side, when a traveler and his horse are in heart and plight, when his purse is full and the day before him, he takes the road only where it is clean and convenient; entertains his company there as agreeably as he can; but, upon the first occasion, carries them along with him to every delightful scene in view, whether of art, of nature, or of both; and if they chance to refuse, out of stupidity or weariness, let them jog on by themselves and be d-n'd; he'll overtake them at the next town; 45 at which arriving, he rides furiously through; the men, women and children, run out of gaze; a hundred noisy curs run barking after him, of which, if he honors the boldest with a lash of his 50 whip, it is rather out of sport than revenge; but should some sourer mongrel dare too near an approach, he receives a salute on the chaps by an accidental stroke from the courser's heels, nor is 55 any ground lost by the blow, which sends him yelping and limping home.

7 By these are meant what the author calls the true critics.

I now proceed to sum up the singular adventures of my renowned Jack; the state of whose dispositions and fortunes. the careful reader does, no doubt, most exactly remember, as I last parted with them in the conclusion of a former section. Therefore, his next care must be, from two of the foregoing, to extract a scheme of notions that may best fit his understanding for a true relish of what 10 is to ensue.

medicine.' In consequence of which raptures, he resolved to make use of it in the necessary as well as the most paltry occasions of life. He had a way of 5 working it into any shape he pleased; so that it served him for a nightcap when he went to bed, and for an umbrella in rainy weather. He would lap a piece of it about a sore toe, or, when he had fits, burn two inches under his nose; or, if anything lay heavy on his stomach, scrape off and swallow as much of the powder as would lie on a silver penny; they were all infallible remedies. With analogy to these refinements, his common talk and conversation ran wholly in the phrase of his will, and he circumscribed the utmost of his eloquence within that compass, not daring to let slip a syllable without authority from thence.

He made it a part of his religion never to say grace to his meat; 2 nor could all the world persuade him, as the common phrase is, to eat his victuals like a chris

JACK had not only calculated the first revolution of his brain so prudently as to give rise to that epidemic sect of Aeolists, but succeeding also into a new 15 and strange variety of conceptions, the fruitfulness of his imagination led him into certain notions, which, although in appearance very unaccountable, were not without their mysteries and their mean- 20 ings, nor wanted followers to countenance and improve them. I shall therefore be extremely careful and exact in recounting such material passages of this nature as I have been able to collect, either from 25 tian.3 undoubted tradition or indefatigable reading; and shall describe them as graphically as it is possible, and as far as notions of that height and latitude can be brought within the compass of a pen. 30 Nor do I at all question but they will furnish plenty of noble matter for such whose converting imaginations dispose them to reduce all things into types; who can make shadows, no thanks to the 35 sun; and then mould them into substances, no thanks to philosophy; whose peculiar talent lies in fixing tropes and allegories to the letter, and refining what is literal into figure and mystery.

40

JACK had provided a fair copy of his father's will, engrossed in form upon a large skin of parchment; and resolving to act the part of a most dutiful son, he became the fondest creature of it im- 45 aginable. For although, as I have often. told the reader, it consisted wholly in certain plain, easy directions, about the management and wearing their coats, with legacies, and penalties in case of 50 obedience or neglect, yet he began to entertain a fancy that the matter was deeper and darker, and therefore must needs have a great deal more of mystery at the bottom. 'Gentlemen,' said he, 55 'I will prove this very skin of parchment to be meat, drink, and cloth, to be the philosopher's stone and the universal

He bore a strange kind of appetite to snap-dragon, and to the livid snuffs of a burning candle, which he would catch and swallow with an agility wonderful to conceive; and, by this procedure, maintained a perpetual flame in his belly, which, issuing in a glowing steam from both his eyes, as well as his nostrils and his mouth, made his head appear, in a dark night, like the skull of an ass, wherein a roguish boy had conveyed a farthing candle, to the terror of his majesty's liege subjects. Therefore, he made use of no other expedient to light himself home, but was wont to say that a wise man was his own lantern.

He would shut his eyes as he walked along the streets, and if he happened to bounce his head against a post, or fall into a kennel, as he seldom missed either to do one or both, he would tell the gib

1 The author here lashes those pretenders to purity, who place so much merit in using Scripture phrases on all occasions.

The slovenly way of receiving the sacrament among the fanatics.

This is a common phrase to express eating cleanly, and is meant for an invective against that indecent manner among some people in receiving the sacrament; so in the lines before, which is to be understood of the Dissenters refusing to kneel

at the sacrament.

I cannot well find out the author's meaning here, unless it be the hot, untimely, blind zeal of enthusiasts.

giant Laurcalco, who was lord of the silver bridge. Most properly, therefore, O eyes, and with great justice, may you be compared to those foolish lights which 5 conduct men through dirt and darkness, till they fall into a deep pit or a noisome bog.'

ing prentices who looked on that he
submitted with entire resignation as to
a trip or a blow of fate, with whom he
found, by long experience, how vain it
was either to wrestle or to cuff; and
whoever durst undertake to do either
would be sure to come off with a swing-
ing fall or a bloody nose. 'It was This I have produced as a scantling of
ordained,' said he, 'some few days be- Jack's great eloquence, and the force of
fore the creation, that my nose and this 10 his reasoning upon such abstruse matters.
very post should have a rencounter; and
therefore nature thought fit to send us
both into the world in the same age, and
to make us countrymen and fellow-citi-
zens. Now, had my eyes been open, 15
it is very likely the business might have
been a great deal worse; for how many
a confounded slip is daily got by a man
with all this foresight about him? Be-
sides, the eyes of the understanding see 20
best when those of the senses are out
of the way; and therefore blind men are
observed to tread their steps with much
more caution, and conduct, and judg-
ment, than those who rely with too much 25 would be sure to get far enough out of

condence upon the virtue of the visual
nerve, which every little accident shakes
out of order, and a drop or a film can
whony disconcert; like a lantern among
a pack of roaring bullies when they 30
scour the streets, exposing its owner and
itself to outward kicks and buffets, which
both might have escaped if the vanity
of appearing would have suffered them
to walk in the dark. But farther. if we 35
examine the conduct of these boasted
lights, it will prove yet a great deal
worse than their fortune. 'Tis true, I
have broke my nose against this post,
because fortune either forgot, or did not 40
think it convenient, to twitch me by the
elbow, and give me notice to avoid it.
But let not this encourage either the
present age or posterity to trust their
noses into the keeping of their eyes, 45
which may prove the fairest way of
losing them for good and all. For, O ye
eyes, ye blind guides; miserable guard-
ians are ye of our frail noses; ye, I say,
who fasten upon the first precipice in 50
view, and then tow our wretched willing
bodies after you to the very brink of
destruction. But alas! that brink is
rotten, our feet slip, and we tumble
down prone into a gulf, without one 55
hospitable shrub in the way to break the
fall; a fall to which not any nose of
mortal make is equal, except that of the

He was, besides, a person of great design and improvement in affairs of devotion, having introduced a new deity, who has since met with a vast number of worshippers; by some called Babel, by others Chaos, who had an ancient temple of Gothic structure upon Salisbury plain, famous for its shrine and celebration by pilgrims.

When he had some roguish trick to play," he would down with his knees, up with his eyes, and fall to prayers, though in the midst of the kennel. Then it was that those who understood his pranks

his way; and whenever curiosity at-
tracted strangers to laugh or to listen,
he would, of a sudden,
spatter them with mud.

all be

In winter he went always loose and unbuttoned, and clad as thin as possible to let in the ambient heat; and in summer lapped himself close and thick to keep it

out.

he

In all revolutions of government would make his court for the office of hangman general; and in the exercise of that dignity, where he was very dexterous, would make use of no other vizard than a long prayer.

He had a tongue so musculous and subtile, that he could twist it up into his nose, and deliver a strange kind of speech from thence. He was also the first in these kingdoms who began to improve the Spanish accomplishment of braying; and having large ears, perpetually exposed and erected, he carried his art to such perfection, that it was a point

1 Vide [See] Don Quixote.

2 The villainies and cruelties, committed by enthusiasts and fanatics among us, were all performed under the disguise of religion and long prayers.

3 They affect differences in habit and behavior. • They are severe persecutors and all in a

form of cant and devotion.

$ Cromwell and his confederates went, as they called it, to seek the Lord, when they resolved to murder the king.

of great difficulty to distinguish, either by the view or the sound, between the original and the copy.

He was troubled with a disease reverse to that called the stinging of the tarantula; and would run dog-mad at the noise of music, especially a pair of bagpipes. But he would cure himself again by taking two or three turns in Westminsterhall, or Billingsgate, or in the boarding- 10 school, or the Royal Exchange, or a state coffee-house.

procure a basting sufficient to swell up his fancy and his sides, he would return home extremely comforted, and full of terrible accounts of what he had under5 gone for the public good. 'Observe this stroke,' said he, showing his bare shoulders; a plaguy janizary gave it me this very morning, at seven o'clock, as, with much ado, I was driving off the great Turk. Neighbors, mind, this broken head deserves a plaster; had poor Jack been tender of his noddle, you would have seen the pope and the French king, long before this time of day, among your and your warehouses. Dear christians, the great Mogul was come as far as Whitechapel, and you may thank these poor sides that he hath not (God bless us!) already swallowed up man, woman, and child.’

He was a person that feared no colors, but mortally hated all, and, upon that account, bore a cruel aversion against 15 wives painters, insomuch that, in his paroxysms, as he walked the streets, he would have his pockets loaden with stones to pelt at the signs.

Having, from this manner of living, 20 frequent occasion to wash himself, he would often leap over head and ears into the water, though it were in the midst of the winter, but was always observed to come out again much dirtier, if pos- 25 sible, than he went in.

He was the first that ever found out the secret of contriving a soporiferous medicine to be conveyed in at the ears; 2 it was a compound of sulphur and balm 30 of Gilead, with a little pilgrim's salve.

He wore a large plaster of artificial caustics on his stomach, with the fervor of which he could set himself a-groaning, like the famous board upon application 35 of a red-hot iron.

3

It was highly worth observing the singular effects of that aversion or antipathy which Jack and his brother Peter seemed, even to an affectation, to bear toward each other. Peter had lately done some rogueries that forced him to abscond, and he seldom ventured to stir out before night, for fear of bailiffs. Their lodgings were at the two most distant parts of the town from each other; and whenever their occasions or humors called them abroad, they would make choice of the oddest unlikely times, and most uncouth rounds they could invent, that they might be sure to avoid one another; yet, after all this, it was their perpetual fortune to meet. The reason of which is easy enough to apprehend; for, the frenzy and the spleen of both having the same foundation, we may look upon them as two pair of compasses, equally extended, and the fixed foot of each remaining in the same center, which, though moving contrary

He would stand in the turning of a street, and, calling to those who passed by, would cry to one, Worthy sir, do me the honor of a good slap in the 40 chaps. To another,Honest friend, pray favor me with a handsome kick on the arse: Madam, shall I entreat a small box on the ear from your ladyship's fair hands? Noble captain, lend a reason- 45 ways at first, will be sure to encounter

able thwack, for the love of God, with that cane of yours over these poor shoulders.' And when he had, by such earnest solicitations, made a shift to

1 They quarrel at the most innocent decency and ornament, and defaced the statues and paintings in all the churches in England.

somewhere or other in the circumference. Besides, it was among the great misfortunes of Jack to bear a huge personal resemblance with his brother 50 Peter. Their humor and dispositions were not only the same, but there was a close analogy in their shape, and size, and their mien. Insomuch, that nothing was more frequent than for a bailiff to

2 Fanatic preaching, composed either of hell and damnation, or a fulsome description of the joys of heaven; both in such a dirty, nauseous style, 55 as to be well resembled to pilgrim's salve.

The fanatics have always had a way of affecting to run into persecution, and count vast merit upon every little hardship they suffer.

The Papists and fanatics, though they appear the most averse to each other, yet bear a near resemblance in many things, as has been observed by learned men.