THE Shoe- Maker Beyond his LAST: OR, A satire UPON Scurrilous Poets, Especially NED W— D, Author of a Poem entitled, A Journey to Hell: Or, a Visit paid to the Devil.  
LONDON, Printed for S. Cook, and are to be Sold by most Booksellers. 1700.   

THE Shoemaker Beyond His LAST, etc.  

WHAT private Sin hath fertile England Nursed,  
That She is thus severely Plagued, and Cursed?  
Infected with Ingend'ring Spawn of Knaves  
Who Poison Wit, and make the Muse's Slaves;  
In such an Age as this is, swelled with Pride,  
That Wit and Learning both in Triumph Ride,  
Exasperated Pens should all Conspire  
To Blast this Seed before it groweth higher;  
Among the rest my Vengeance shall be hurled,  
I'll chase these simple Blockheads through the World,  
Till Conscience terrifies them for the Crime,  
Which makes an angry Muse against them Rhyme.   

Ye drowsy Sinners look about, and mend  
Your Lives, be mindful of the Latter-end;  
This wicked World much longer cannot stand,  
I'm sure the Day of Judgement is at Hand;  
For as the Mass in order was begun,  
So towards its End prepost'rously 'twill run;  
And never more contrary did it go  
The course ordained than now, for Tailors do  
Turn Doctors; Cordwainers Astrologers,  
Who play the devil and Two Sticks with the Stars;  
Bankrupts turn Lawyers; Mechanics without Sense  
Ravish the Muses, brazened Insolence  
Protects ' 'em. Now a silly Prentice-Boy,  
With Billet deux endeavours to decoy  
Some sorry Servant-Wench to be his Spouse;  
Who, if she cannot Read the Verses, goes  
To some by-Scriv'ner, who doth them explain,  
And Twopences has to answer them again.   

Each Beau in Playhouse, Pit, or Gallery,  
Cloys Orange Wenches with dull Poetry,  
By Momus, and Old Acco there Inspired,  
Each Swears the Creature has his Senses Fired  
With Love: Alas! more Knowledge is among  
illiterate Link-boys which do nightly throng,  
About an Alehouse, or a Tavern-door,  
To light Home Cully, Bawd, and drunken Whore,  
Than is amongst such Self-conceited Fools,  
Who can't distinguish Pigs from Joynted-Stools;  
More Eloquence flows from the Tongues which Beg,  
With counterfeited Sores, or tied up Leg,  
For Farthings in Lincolns-Inn-Fields, to be  
Fuddling at Night with their Fraternity.   

Here some fanatic Tinker in a Rage,  
Pretends to Satyrize the wicked Age,  
So out of an Enthusiastic Fit  
(Which clogs his Brains, and doth his Thoughts be-s— t)  
He Writes to get the popular Applause  
Of Independants, thinking that the Cause  
Will make them (like the Jewish Rabble) cry  
He is some GOD, his Name we'll Deify.   

A Lawyer's Clerk sits at his rotten Desk,  
Doth on the Works of Learned Bards Burlesque;  
One from his Infancy a Hare-brain Fool,  
But got a little Book learned at some School,  
Where Learning was for Parish-childrens free,  
By a dead Lords, or Lady's Charity.  
His Works, as soon as Born, do curse their Fate,  
And like old Almanacs grow out of Date;  
Unknown in Duck-Lane, or St. Paul's-Church-Yard,  
They moulding lie, no one the Works Regard;  
Then for a Halfpenny per Pound they Sell  
Them for Wast-paper, or they'll serve as well  
As can be for Bum-fodder when you S— t,  
Truly for nothing else the Stuff is fit.   

A Mercer that in Rhyming doth Delight,  
In that sweet Dialect pretends to Write;  
Not Learned at all, he would (but never can)  
By Learning claim to be a Gentleman;  
His Wit's so short, to call that Name his own,  
That Amorett he would Swear must be a Noun;  
Show him but such a Word as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he  
Would Swear it was no Word, there could not be  
Such Characters in use with any Land,  
They were no Letters; but a Mad-Man's Hand▪  
Put but the dunny Lubber to spell The,  
He'd stand and Pause, and then cry S— O— T;  
A Sot indeed! but instinct we may ' spy,  
There is in Dulness, and Simplicity,  
Which made the Hog's-head of Recorded Shame,  
Sound the right Echo of his Sottish Name:  
Poor foolish Pamus, he may, to obtain  
The little Wit he Lost, sue (though in vain)  
All whom he meets: his dram of Sense thinks fit  
To let his clacking Tongue outrun his Wit,  
Which is but shallow; at the highest Tide  
Over its puddled Stream an Ant may stride.   

A Tallow-Chandler thinking that he may,  
Like Marsyas, with great Apollo play,  
Makes silly Ballads to old women's Tunes,  
On Country Bumpkins, Jilts, and Scottish Loons:  
With Ladder he his half-tiled Garret Scales,  
The Ceiling hung with Cobwebs; dingy Walls,  
Daubed like a Tailor's Shop, with Snot and Spittle;  
A rotten Floor, and Furniture but little.  
There doth he sit, and scribble all the Year,  
For Bread and Butter, and Six Shilling Beer.   

An ignorant Joiner driven to his Shifts,  
Upon the double-headed Hill he lifts  
His Thought, which puts his Head to harder Pains  
Than Jove's, when Pallas tumbled in his Brains;  
Like Dogs which bark against the Moon, but can  
Not reach it, so this Self-conceited Man,  
To spend his ever Idle time, doth vent  
His Thoughts on Themes beyond his Element  
To comprehend: his Skull, that's void of Wit.  
Reason, or Understanding's only fit  
To be chained to the Corner of a Street,  
For Passengers to Piss in, if they see't.   

A starving Barber that for Twopences Shaves,  
But take the Year round nothing by it Saves;  
Till Shirt is washed and dried, a Bed doth lie,  
There makes a Song or Two, then, like the Fly  
That sat upon the Charied Wheel, and praised  
Herself by saying, What a Dust I've raised;  
He thinks Wit makes him Great, when, all this while,  
It is his Nonsense makes the People Smile:  
In Foolishness he Swaggers, Bounces, Huff,  
And surfeits all the Town with bombast Stuff,  
scummed off the settlings of a frothy Wit,  
To have a Name; but if a Name he'll get,  
It must be like Herostratus his Fame,  
Got by Reproaches, Scandals, Scoffs, and Shame.   

Lewd Rhimes a foolish Glover writes for want,  
But yet his Scribbling's insignificant;  
Instead of Guineas from a Lord for the  
Epistle, all bedaubed with Flattery,  
The common Hangman doth his Pains Reward,  
By burning what he writes in Palace-Yard:  
Against the Precepts of Anatomy,  
His stinking Arss-gut in his Pate doth lie,  
So what he eateth upwards straight ascends,  
And there to Ordure turning much offends,  
With stifling Fumes the little Wit which grows  
Wild in his Noddle; like a Man that goes  
A Journey, when the clearness of the Skies  
Is wrapped in Fogs, (which from the Earth arise  
In noisome Steams, and in them lose his way,  
So in-turd-Mists his Fancy runs astray:  
The flashing Vapours of his Nail-thick Scull,  
In which the Organs of his Sense play dull,  
Led his confounding Wit a rambling Dance,  
Through Whimsies, Self-conceit, and Ignorance;  
Till in Maeander's roving round about,  
He Whips, and Spurs up Nonsense to get out.  
To name the Calls of each poor Bankrupt Wretch▪  
That Writes for Bread, my Catalogue would stretch.  
Through all the Companies which show their Trade,  
By Streamers at a Lord May'r's Cavalcade.  
Who are resolved now to plague the State  
With Rhyming, ' cause they would not tolerate  
Their cheating in whitefriars, and the Mint;  
It's time to give their Villainy a Stint.   

Into Twelve Parts this Kingdom now divide,  
Eleven aim on Pegasus to Ride;  
But sift good Poets from Pretenders, and  
I'm sure we have not sixscore in the Land:  
Bad Poets nowadays do stroll about,  
As thick as Pettifoggers in a Court:  
They are as common as deceitful Cracks,  
Or Lying, Impudent, Base, Knavish Quacks,  
Who ride about from Street to Street to tell  
What famous Pacquets they for Twopences sell,  
To any Man who has a mind to lose  
His Life before his Time; thus they abuse  
The Ignorant, great Doctors say they be,  
Although they cannot construe Recipe.   

As some believing Oafs at every turn  
To know their Fortune will devoutly run  
To Sharpers, studying Astrology,  
An Art composed of Cheats and Fallacy:  
But hearing talk of Schemes, Conjunctions, Signs,  
Azimuths, Oppositions, Sextiles, Trines,  
They think they're Names of Spirits; and suppose  
These Shirks have got 'em faster by the Nose  
Than Dunstan had the Devil; so will some  
To Nasty, Pedling, Senseless Poets come  
To have a Ballad on coy Sweethearts made,  
Or lewd Lampoons upon some tired Jade,  
Which they (as well as their insipid Wit,  
Or little skill of Rhyming will permit)  
Do blunder over for a little Drink,  
And sixpence to recruit their wasted Ink.   

Good Poets must be Poets born, inspired  
With natural Parts, as well as Parts acquired,  
Masters of Horace's Language, and the Tongue  
Of Homer, other Arts to them belong:  
Therefore for you whose Breeding is no more  
Than Reading, Writing, casting up a Score  
Of Ten or Fifteen Pounds, for shame leave off  
The Art which makes the Country at you scoff.  
illiterate Men, who cannot keep their Wives,  
Themselves, and Children, but lead sorry Lives,  
For Soldiers go, else by the London-Cries,  
As Prunes, or Mother Shipton's Prophecies,  
Old Chairs to Mend, Pearmains, or Windsor-bowls,  
Thread-laces, Chimney-sweep, Geese, Ducks, or Fowls;  
A Livelihood endeavour all to get;  
And never triumph over little Wit.  
Do this, and then perhaps ye'll never starve,  
By Rhimes you will; and if you'll not observe  
Ne suitor ultra crepidam, the Ashes  
Of Oldham will arise to give you lashes.   

Ah! treacherous Slaves, how come you to escape  
The Sessions-house so often, for the Rape  
Committed on the Muses, up and down,  
Publicly, in all places of the Town?  
Which spurious issue of each forced Verse  
Your impious Hands, Sirs, aught to be the Hearse,  
To carry them to a consuming Flame,  
For all things should return from whence they came;  
Have you no good Receipt, to cure that Itch  
Of Rhyming, which I fear will make you scratch  
Your Brains to pieces? get in time a Cure,  
Or else none can your Company endure;  
But do not Brimstone use, for that will smell,  
And make 'em think the Sacred Nine are fell  
From steep Parnassus, to the Pit of Hell.   

Upon the Laureate of this gang I'll fall,  
For their Presumption he shall pay for all;  
I charge you fairly to stand on your Guard,  
No favour will I show you foolish W— d,  
Unless its Credit to you, that I do  
Take Notice of one Fool, and Coxcomb too:  
Lackey to Fools, blind Buzzard, Son of Sloth,  
If your nonsensical, and canting Wrath,  
Can't from lampooning these my Lines refrain,  
Able I am, and will lash you again,  
Or any of your Crew.—   

How long have you a Poet been I pray?  
Or who was it that put you in that way?  
Great Stallion of the Town, thy giddy Brains,  
(Grown Rude and Headstrong for the want of Reins,  
To keep 'em stayed) writes Verses? I must tell  
The World, Fate having a design to sell  
Your Credit, and resolved to redicule  
You to the Country for an arrant Fool,  
Doth egg you on to Write in Dogg'rel Rhimes,  
The only Sickness of the present times:  
It makes my queezy Stomach Sick and Weak,  
To see you let your Nonsense spring a-leak,  
And Founder. I petswaded am to think  
Poor Battus that you wast your Pens and Ink,  
For Flouts, and soul Disgrace; the Town's disdain  
Doth style you one of that insipid Train,  
Which put their Friends for Wit but to the Charge  
Of primer, Psalter, Copy-book, and large  
Octavo Bible, and a Since a Week  
For Schooling at the Devil's Arss-a-Peak.  
You know no Pardon is allowed a Spy,  
Therefore by Law of Arms expect to Die,  
As all your Similes are at an end,  
I think that Man that Kills you is your Friend;  
For once they fail you must expect to be  
Reduced to your former Poverty;  
The Press you stuff and gorges every Season,  
Much more with Nonsense, than with solid Reason;  
Your dull, debauched, putrified Brains,  
Flyblown with Nonsense, and fantastic Strains  
Of idle Thoughts to Maggots turn, which make  
You talk of things at Random; for the sake  
Of Coin you scribble. To all goodness spite  
(Reason it's not) that urges you to Write.   

Thou sole Promoter of deformed Vice,  
Pray what's the Moral of Sot's Paradise?  
The Walk to Islington, the Trips you make  
Abroad? and Journey to the sulphurous Lake?  
None as I know of; but the Visit paid  
The Devil was by Don Quevedo made,  
Translated by the celebrated Hand  
Of brave L'Estrange, or else you understand  
Him not; thus Plagiary you do Live  
By What the Wits indeed to Fools do give.  
If some of our Clergy are so bad  
As you do make them, you no reason had  
To speak against them ere thou art Reformed  
From all those Sins which hath thy Body Stormed;  
Besides Respect to our Religion ought  
To'ye kept Reflections from your wicked Thought.   

Art thou a Man, and ' buse the Clergy so,  
If Man, art thou begat as other? no;  
As Serpents which in Lybian Deserts be,  
Engendering in the Sands promiscuously,  
And breed such Monsters of so strange a kind,  
That they were not for Nature's Work designed:  
So you fell Creature was as strangely bred,  
Of Man's Seed spilt on Mummy of the Dead,  
Mixed with Witches Excrements, to be  
A Plague (till choked) to Christianity;  
For which, one day or other, you will feel  
The stripes of Nemesis, whose Rods are Steel;  
But antic Tricks proclaim you for an Ape,  
Or Monkey moulded in a neater Shape  
Than us'al; which grieves me your pains will end  
(Like other Beasts) when Death shall for you send.  
I don't believe thou'rt made of Flesh and Blood  
At all, thou only art a Log of Wood;  
Which he that made the Iron Dove to fly  
(To show his cunning Ingenuity)  
Has carved like a humane Figure, and  
By Clockwork makes it move Eyes, Legs, or Hand,  
But speak it does not, it's a Wizard (Drunk  
With Spite) that bellows through the liseless Trunk:  
Or else the Liver-knawn Prometheus,  
Is broken lose from frozened Caucasus,  
So ventures privately with stolen Fire,  
Life into one Clay Statue to inspire;  
To be Revenged on the Deity,  
The Author of his pain; and thou art he.  
If you for nothing carp on such as these,  
You'll rail against your God for Bread and Cheese.   

The World is come to that pass now adays,  
That Slaund'rers will or Nothing Slanders raise,  
If Kings cannot from Slaund'rous Tongues be free,  
Much less a Subject: It's not Quality,  
Renown, great Learning, Virtue, or Estate,  
Or Charity can in the least abate  
The rigid Censures of cursed, partial Tribes,  
Sprung I believe from Pharisees and Scribes,  
Who other People would for Vices blame,  
Though they themselves were guilty of the same.  
With Vice they were enamoured, yet those Sects  
Forbade it; still the Devil Sin Corrects:  
Was each one's Fault upon their Forehead writ,  
I'm sure you could no man of Sinning twit.   

Thou little, nasty, filthy, partial Knave,  
How most imperiously you Scold and Rave  
Against the little Practisers of Law,  
And Physic; great ones keep your Pen in awe,  
Who ought the most of all to have the Lash,  
But lo! you run the Gauntlet through such Trash,  
Clerks o'th' Court, rude Bailiffs, Hangmen, and  
Base Gaolers ' who no Mercy Understand;  
Sow-guelders', Barber-surgeons, and a Crew  
Of Tooth drawers, as Ignorant as you,  
Therefore on such you vented all your Spleen,  
Because you would not have the Lash again.   

Indeed Ned W— d, thy Lines doth run as Harsh  
As thou in Satyrising art too rash,  
But yet I own in one thing you excel  
(For all my jesting) sacred Couleighs Skill,  
So much as he exceeded you in Wit,  
So much thou wilt outrun the Bard in Feet,  
Twelve are the most, I think, which he doth use,  
But one more thou'rt resolved to give thy Muse.  
Truly Jack Adam's born at Clerkenwell,  
The greatest Changeling of his time, could tell  
More matters of Prosodia than you,  
Who knows not when a Stanza's Wrong, or True.  
I wonder the Churchwardens do not where  
You dwell, of such an Idiot take care,  
To put you out to some old Parish-Nurse,  
And some small matter once a Year disburse  
For Slabb'ring-Bib, green Tunick, Petticoat,  
The common Livery to show you Dote:  
But if he be not of the Parish which  
He lurks in now, good Beadle with a Switches  
Drive him before you to a Whipping-post,  
Where flaug him till he in his Dung is lost,  
Let not your Hand yield pity to his pain,  
Then pass the idle Vagrant home again;  
But where that is, the Lord of Oxford knows,  
For I done't; nor himself (Sirs) I suppose.   

Dost say, thy Soul is innocent and bright,  
The greatest Stain that blots the darkest Night,  
Eclipseth it, to Hell so well thou'rt known,  
Had you been there, they'd kept you for their own;  
Thy Sins had pressed you to the deepest place,  
Where Souls are tortured for the want of Grace.  
The cries of starved Bastards, or the Tears  
Of Maids you've Broached for these many Years,  
Are evidence enough to keep you there,  
Whenever you on Earth shall disappear:  
They say in ev'ry Parish that's in Town,  
A little Son or Daughter thou may'st own.   

As for your Second Part, or any other  
Journey to Hell, or News of Smoke or Smother,  
It's not worth while to talk of, so keep on  
The Brimstone Road, till I have bid you done.  
Thou interloper of a noble Trade,  
To which thou art beholding for thy Bread,  
Sell not your Stuff at Home, go you and cry  
With other Hawkers what's your Infamy.  
It's too much Justice to make you my Scorn,  
(Cursed Rake) I wish thou never hadst been born,  
For fear it should be made a damning Crime,  
In Writing ' 'gainst such Fools as thou'rt in Rhyme.  
What Epithet shall I on you bestow?  
Rise Hell to tell me, for I do not know!  
W— d still I'll call you, no Name else is worse,  
Wherefore I shall entail the sequent Curse  
On you, and all such who themselves forge●,  
And on the sacred Sister's Rapes commit.  
O Envy! let my Thoughts upon 'em fly,  
To Kill such Varlets all by Sympathy.  
Pray pay 'em off with Nits, Lice, Itch, and Scabs.  
Let 'em be taunted at by dirty Drabs,  
Who keeps 'em for their Pimps, and Right or Wrong  
Let Cullies Kick 'em as they go along,  
Bark little Dogs; upon 'em Smell and Piss:  
Then Boys that see the Passage at 'em Hiss.  
To Bedlam send these Foes of Sense, to be  
For Mice, and other Vermin, Company,  
Whilst they do squeak, let them Curse, Swear, and Rail  
For Bread and Butter given out by Tale.  
The Straits of all the Poor in Town befall  
Such Miscreants, this lump of Leaven. All  
The Curses of Ash-wednesday be their Doom.  
Let desperate Debts confine them to their Room;  
Grant every rap at Door may make 'em fear  
A sponging Bailiff, or a Serge'nt's there:  
But then Enact, that no Redletter Day  
Be their safe Sanctuary, that they may  
As much Confinement suffer in their Holes,  
As if they Prisoners were in County Goals.  
I wish 'em all the Punishment which be  
Passed on convicted Rogues, for Larcenie;  
Manslaughter; O! to Curse in full, let all  
The Crimes be theirs that comes to Hicks his Hall,  
So monthly let 'em take Old-Baily Air;  
Or at Assizes out of Town appear  
So often, that a Neck-Verse shall not save  
Them from the Gallows, and a High-way-grave.  
Light on 'em Curses vented by the Poor,  
When Parsons for their Tyths stand at the Door.  
O! grant for every Letter in this satire,  
Or Letter Written since the use of Paper,  
That new Distempers be found out in Heaven,  
And all at once to such dull Poets given.   
FINIS.