NEWS from the PRESS: OR, THE BLACK DEVIL CONJURED.  
BEING A satire Against scribbling.  
Scripturiendi Pruritus Scabies Seculi:  

— Those who writ, because all writ have still,  
The same plea for writing, and for writing ill.   Doctor Donn. 

With Allowance.   
Printed in the Year, 1673.   

Papers Complaint: OR, A satire Against scribbling.  Scripturiendi Pruritus Scabies Seculi. 

PAtience be gone, what stoic can refrain,  
From Transport of a generous disdain?  
When Segniour Sap, and whifling Spruce Invade  
The Press, and scribbling is become a Trade.  
By which each self-conceited Fop essays  
To periwig his empty skull with Ba●s;  

Wits, Half-wits, no-wits, learned, unlearned in spite  
Of Art and Nature, all presume to writ,  
From the brave laureate, to the chanting White,   
It takes us, for our lives we can't refrain,  
So general's the looseness in the Brain:  
remarks, Animadversions, Songs, Essays,  
Lampoons, Reflections, Farces, damned dull Plays;  
Long-winded Letters, Answers, and Replies,  
With endless, well as senseless Drolleries,  
So fast and thick on every Stall are spread,  
We may esteem them happy, cannot red.   

One Writes for famed, and thinks the Devils in't,  
If he Commence not Wit, that's Fool in Print,  
Command of Miss draws in another throng,  
Phillis and Cloris thus came first in Song:  
Some with old wonders bubble the fond Town,  
bribed with vast hopes of promised Half-crown;  
Or take news for their Hackney-muses theme,  
And vent lies fast as gazette of Harleem:  
Oh! for a lumping Sessions now they cry,  
Condemn's fine Princess or Duval to die;  
Who after they have paid the Hang-mans Fees,  
Must suffer far more cruelty by these:  
From Collar-band to flaunting Pantaloons,  
We List ourselves Parnassian Dragoons:  
This Bob foresaw, and being quiter pamp'd dry,  
Huddles himself in blind obscurity,  
Where over nappy Ale he chews the Cud,  
On Jests that in King James's days were good:  
Since him, some stories sprung up, who( might it be)  
writ even more Impertinently than he:  
Red-Lattice scribblers, whose dull Rhymes do flow,  
Just as the inspiring tap runs, high or low:  
Peace croaking Smith-field, spawn no more, have done,  
Your tattered vermin, Frogs of Hellicon!   

But why, Green-sickness muse I feed'st thou on Trash,  
More fit for Beadles then a Satyrs lash!  
Unbend a while, and scorning gaudy bribe,  
Unmask the follies of a Silken Tr●be:  
That learned rabble, whose humour outdoes  
The Burghers nonsense, and the clotted shoes,  
Who manage their Polemicks at such ra●●,  
Each Author seems commenced at billingsgate;  
Our Mountain Wits, big of a Mouse lie in,  
And for a Birth produce a souter kin:  
As quarrelsome Divines so long Dispute,  
Dark Texts, and one another still Confute.  
Till greener Heads viewing each sides defeat,  
Rashly conclude their whole Doctrine a Cheat;  
So through the Factions of a Numerous Crew,  
( Who Laugh at all that's old, and Dam what's new)  
About this Wit such dreadful Wars befall,  
That wiser men suspect, they'he none at all,  
Or that 'tis grown the Philosophers ston,  
Which all pretend, yet is preduc'd by none.  
Cats, Rats, and Savage Stags once in a Trice,  
turned as great Hec's, as Homers Frogs and Mice;  
A furious Contest for a while grew hot,  
Betwixt the Urinal and Gally-pot:  
And made some luckless Reams by that abuse,  
Fit only for their purging patients use:  
The Brave Society soon after felt,  
And stood the Shock of a more furious pelt,  
The politics came next into dispute,  
And Drollery had struck poor Jo. mute.  
But that a brisk second stepped in, and then,  
Pelmel they carry on the work again;  
Contempt of Clergy made a noble Rumble,  
But to please country person that did grumble.  
He shifts the Scene, since each Collar's his Man,  
Hey for our Town! Have at Leviathan,  
The Rota to no purpose venom Spit,  
For that was answered long before 'twas writ.   

By scattered Penny-books, some scribblers try,  
How Souls will Thrive on minced Divinity,  
Some Hail-shot pamphlets pilfer'd from the store,  
Of those brave Souls that Duel'd Rome before  
Squirt forth against the Pope whilst others play,  
The folly dwells in a Transprosing way:  
Most weed old Authors from whose shreds they bring,  
Like Taylors Cushion some fine pre-bald thing  
So the Jay struts it in her borrowed plumes,  
So Bankrupts swagger, with entrusted Sums;  
If any in our low degenerate age,  
With Sock or Buskin Court the thriveing Stage;  
Our Natural Follies higher to advance,  
Five acts are stuffed with Rudeness Song and Dance.  
Unhappy times! when what should physic be,  
Turns poison and augments the Melady:  
As condemned Prisoner at the Bar half dead,  
Himself promps one stands next and cannot red,  
And thereby saves his life, so these do give,  
( Though starve themselves) others means how to live,  
And Booksellers grown rich, can proudly ride,  
Whilst their poor Authors lackey by their side,  
The lazy Belly its State to Maintain,  
Imposes Contributions on the Brain.  
When Colon Croaks, 'tis time to take the Pen,  
Your pardon Sirs! Subjects are plenty then:  
If Game-cock beat, or Madams parrot die,  
There's one panegyric, and one Elegy.   

Mean while poor paper tu●ns more pale to see.  
Her self thus tortured by their Cruelty;  
Must I she crys have my Innocent Dress,  
Thus blurred and sullied by the fluxing Press,  
The Press, vile Engine! which more hurt hath done,  
Than Hells invention of the murdering Gun:  
Shall every wanton witty Fop one meets  
Soil with his Surqued●ies my chaster sheets?  
Better those wrags to which my birth I owed,  
Had been before in Surgeons Lint bestowed;  
Better should long short-handed Sermons fill,  
My strutting leaves scrawl'd out by greasy will,  
Or petty Foggers Green-bag jail me close,  
With latin that's enough for purging Dose:  
To light Tobacco, ensh●ine Soap, or wrap  
Up nasty stinking Bolus for a clap.   

Be't what it will I suffer, the sin's less,  
Than for to be the prostitute oth Press.   
FINIS.