Mrs. Wardens OBSERVATIONS Upon Her HUSBAND'S Reverend SPEECH In the presence of certain Gentlewomen of RATCLIFFE and WAPPING.  
THE right Worshipful Mr. WARDEN, calling for his flowered Sattin-sleeves with the Canvas-backe, his Wife perceived by that, and the brushing of his Demicaster, it was Hall-day. His Breeches were Velvet, entailed to the Heirs male of his Family, ever since the Scottishman begged the Wardrobe. Thus put into Print (his Garters composed into a truelove's knot, and his Shoes shining to the terror of poor people) away He trots, with as much grace is an Hartfordshire-horse, leaving his thrice reverend Wife with a penny-pot of Alicante and a toast in her hand: I say, his Thrice reverend Wife, as show had been sometimes a Schoolmistress, now a Midwife, and Mrs. Warden.  
She had scarce liked her lips after the first glass, but five or six of her Daughters from Ratcliff and Wapping, came to offer their Eggs and Muskodell unto her. They had lately delivered a Petition concerning their opinions in redress of matters in State, and had elected Mr. WARDEN (since the same of his Speech had spread him) to be their Spokesman when occasion should offer.  
Now after some three or four Quarts, and a little bandy talk the Eggs provoked, one of them very demurely rising drops a Wapping curtsy, simpers twice or thrice, cast up her squints, and gins (with a look like skimed Milk) as morally as the Song of Towle, Towle, Towle, gentle Bell for a soul, etc. to be very Religiously angry with the King and a Malignant party of Nobility, Clergy, Judges, Gentry, and Reprobate Cavaliers; nay, and in truth it is feared (saith she) that three parts of the Kingdom have their eyes blinded with a kind of Duty and Conscience, and what is the root of all this unrighteousness, but that abominable Profane, Superstitious, Idolatrous, Babilonish, and conjuring book of Common—. Hear her face grew black, and she sat down to take breath: whilst another of the Nymphs, called Gammer Toad-fish starts up in her place, and cries: Nay, Mother, there be some that blush not to talk of a Prerogative, and I know not what, as if we of the Elect could speak Treason; Nay, (profane wretches) there want not some that dare laugh and gibe at Mr. Warden himself, and his thrice-endowed Speech, at our Petition too, though it were penned by as Zealous a Brewer's Clerk, as ever prayed in Hebrew. With that the very ancient Gentlewoman (in a kind of anger, like an Ape when it is mocked) throws a clean Partlet upon her shoulders, and nestling in her Chair like a Bear, that is to show tricks, after three or four mops and mows, thus bespoke attention.  
Most pure and chosen of the Times, my Daughters and Companions in Predestination, I know you will not doubt that truth, which a most Learned man and friend of ours, hath very ignorantly and impudently set forth, that Democricy, Aristocricy, etc. (he might have added Hypocrisy) are as much from God, as Monarchy. By which position (to speak truth) he shows his wisdom in his Ignorance by proving nothing. It may hold that a Stable, or an house of Office are places, and as ancient as Churches; therefore as Sacred and proper to teach in. And by the same belief (when He shall but please to say it) are we to obey and confide in our own opinions before all things. Which inference and your ascertion throws me very pregnantly upon my Husband's argument of the Malitia.  
The Malitia (dear Daughters and Sisters of the Pint) hath already been most faithfully handled by one great Observator, and not unlearnedly by my Husband, on which I raise my first observation. That, as the Philosophers have a Maxim, we are borne for our Country, so the Lawyers have a Rule, That every man is next to himself: By which it will follow (and must) If men be bound either to hazard their Lives, or words for their Country, that Leg●talionis, their Country is bound to hazard their Estates, Wives, and Children to requite and uphold them; for what are their estates, wives, and children, if not protected and secured theirs? So that to an easy judgement it will appear, the Militia is but a mutual bond and interchange of men's estates and affections, and (as that worthy lover of his King saith) a very legal invention to keepeth City loyal to the King, and to make the King confide in the City. Beside the great and unknown benefit it bringeth to Feather-makers, Brokers, and other dutiful Subjects, whereas the Commission of Array is another thing, and if any be so presumptuous to think it legal, yet by the same Author we are informed, there is an equity in the Law beyond the letter, by which we may dispense with our estates and consciences as we please, believe what we list, and take up new Opinions and Arms, as we shall think fitting for Church or Commonwealth. Nor stand we bound (an happiness of these present times before any other) to confide in any such exposition of Judges or Lawyers before our own: But as I have often heard my learned and double-combed Husband say, Oh what a flourishing Commonwealth should we see, if it were contrived into Halls and Companies, and governed by Wardens and Masters? Indeed this would come very near that Model of Church government laid down by that most hypocritical and seditious Fox of the Church, who begot the Protestation protested (pardon me Elect Members of the Conventicle) they be Hieroglyphic terms to express his zeal, learning, and boldness by. And now I am come so near the Church, I will place my observation upon my Husband's point as it stands, and only peep in at the window, because I know you are all Gentlewomen of the function, and shown your abilities in all those places by him mentioned. It is nothing what language their Liturgy is in, for they confess the most unlearned may know enough to be saved by: Ergo, Learning is needless, & if needless, why not profane? Nay I gather further thus: If learning were either necessary or convenient, the Scriptures would enjoin it as it doth other things that are so, but the most unlearned may be saved, nay are saved; Ergo, Learning is neither necessary nor convenient: and so from the major consequently to the minor; if not Learning, neither Reason nor Sense. For as that man of Revelations Mr. Greene proves it fully, Ignorance and Noise, are marks sufficient enough whereby to know our Election: and the other with the sanctified Lungs, Mr. Hunt, in his tale of a Tub, both maintaineth and maketh good, Learning to be a mere trouble and vexation to Religion. By which reasons weo can (if it please us) as easily prove it as lawful for women as men to be Bishops (if Bishops were lawful at all) which we must deny. And therefore I hope it shall not need much breath to prove them Antichristian, where it is so orthodoxly believed already; not because of their estates and honours (for riches and honour are not to be despised, if placed upon the right Saints) but because they will not resign them to us and our righteous seed, who ought to inherit the Earth. And here again, we have just cause to vent out holy malice against the Laws for putting a profane bridle on us; but thanks be given, the bowels of our hope is somewhat enlarged.  
The Anabaptists most excellently deny a great part, if not almost all the Scriptures that make against them any way, and do not we as religiously leave out divers Epistles making against us, or call them Apocryphal? By which Spirit, I hope it is no hard thing to prove a Ba●ne, or Stable, or any hole, places most proper to our doctrine & conversation; for it is Religion makes a church, not the Church Religion; therefore any place may be made a Church. Besides you know we congregate together in the Spirit, to feel as well as hear; and I pray, in what Church of our opposites have you that free conveniency? Then for the universality of it, what Church can be more universal for Simplicisme, Dotagisme, and Hypocrisisme?  
As for the Babylonish Rags and Antichristian Wardrobe, let us leave them to the Kirke of Scotland and Amsterdam; their Surplices to make sarkes, and their Copes to make cushions: Only our observation voluntarily here thrusts itself in, in which I must hearty admire our brothers of Scotland, that at their first coming hither, they could forget (for what it had been for them to remember a greater matter?) and overlook all this needless trumpery in the Church, when they begged the leads of it: Which if I could but believe they assayed, I should think their modesty not the less meritorious, though they hardly missed.  
Now concerning the pearl Hatband my most ever-Round-headed Husband yawns at in his Speech, you shall see it, but truly I confess I never wore it with that pride and delight since he compared it to Popish beads, a word so unnatural to me, that verily I must drink the other cup to reconcile my stomach; but let me tell you ingeniously, it is more for the Pope's sake and the King of Spain's, than the Religion merely itself; for insooth there be many principles in that Religion which we do not deny for wholesome and Orthodox, only we scorn to own them from the Jesuits, our own inventions being the only and infallible rule of all our Faith, Hope, and Charity: As first, that Church holdeth Ignorance the Mother of Devotion, an Article of our Faith. Then they have their Revelations, Visions, Dissensions, so have we. They have private Shrifts, so we. They call it a Venial sin with a sister, and in case of necessity can forgive a Neighbour's wife, so we. They allow Deposing and regulating of Princes by tumults and other ways, so do we. They endeavour to domineer over Church and State, so would we. They hatch Factions, and say it is good fishing in troubled streams, so do we. And lastly, they deny all this in plain words, but grant it in effects, and so do we.  
And although we cannot endure a Surplice, or Cross, the Pope's Bulls, nor his fiercer beasts the Jesuits, yet we hold it lawful by the same virtue of equivocations, and mental reservations, to cheat, swear, and lie with any that is not one of us, nay even among ourselves, if there be an holy cause. And to say which is the best subject, or most honest, the jesuites or we, would be a very hard question, if we were suffered to make our own laws: Yet by my Husband's leave, though he speak in the abundance of his good will to the advancement of the holy Brethren, me thinks it would be a more heavenly sight to see Mr. How, or the grave Observator himself in his Barre-gowne, mounted upon the steps at the Banqueting house in Whitehall, expounding Chapters to the Courtiers and Cavaliers, and to have all the Privy Council chosen out of the Elect, the Pensioners Lay doctors, and the Guard devout Elders; then for Lord Chamberlain, Groom of the stool, and Bedchamber (places indeed most consonant to women) some of the Holy Sisters, who received their education against the world, the flesh, and the Devil in the Zion of New-England, that both the King and State might the more securely confide in their Continence and purity. Let us all fling up the whites of our eyes in an holy hope, that the strong breathing of the spirit may stir up some worthy instruments to say Amen to the work.  
But to draw to a conclusion, because I perceive by the fervent twinkling of your eyes, and ardent licking of your lips, you would be at your devotions, I shall but wag my petticoat at the first of his two last reasons concerning Ireland. And I observe that the spirit doth never leave us destitute of sanctified shifts to overreach our adversaries the Protestants; for if we be constrained to break in knavery or beggary, yet we still have some refuge or land of Promise to fly to. Yet sincerely for living in Ireland (though I confess the advantage great we have wrought of it and the present times) I know not what to say, because no venomous beast will live there; nor need we care, since New-England (as I verily believe) was found out to that purpose: For the design there I will speak little now, because (as the case standeth) for my part, I had rather all the Soldiers were in Hull then in Ireland; for if the King once take that, by the help of his loving and dutiful Subjects (as he calleth them) it will put the Brethren to a great many of hard texts and tedious prayers, if it do not break the heart of our Conventicle: And what jealousy and fear can be like that? I appeal to any Reverend Round-head that is not a Cuckold (if there be such an one,) therefore it is high time to bestir us, (and so please you Mistress Spritsayle but lend me the Chamber-pot) we will have the other quart, and I will conclude, as the same Gentleman began, applying all in these words, that as our case is not like Scotland's, so Scotland's never was, nor (I think) can be ever like ours.  
Dixi. J. B.