Artemisa to Cloe.  
A LETTER FROM A LADY IN THE TOWN, TO A LADY IN THE COUNTRY; CONCERNING The Loves OF THE TOWN:  
BY A PERSON of QVALITY.  
LONDON, Printed for William Leach, at the Sign of the Crown in Cornhill: M.DC.LXXIX.   

Artemisa to Cloe.  

CLOE in VERSE by your Command I Writ,  
Shortly you'll bid me ride a-stride and Fight;  
Such Talents better with our SEX agree,  
Than lofty flights of dangerous Poetry.  
Amongst the Men, I mean the Men of Wit,  
(At least they passed for such before they writ:)  
How many bold Adventurers for the Bayss,  
Proudly designing large Returns of Praise.  

Who durst that Stormy Path-less World Explore,  
Were soon tossed back and wracked on the dull Shore,  
Broke of that little Stock they had before?   
How would a Woman's tottering Bark be tossed,  
Where stoutest Ships, the Men of War are lost.  
When I reflect on this, I strait grow wise,  
And my own self I gravely thus advise:  
Dear Artemisa Poetry's a Snare,  
Bedlam has many Mansions, have a Care;  
Your Muse directs you, makes your Reader sad;  
You fancy y'are inspired, he thinks you mad.  
Consider too, 'twill be discreetly done,  
To make yourself the Fiddle of the Town:  
To find th' ill-humoured Pleasure at their need,  
Scorned if you fail, and Cursed if you succeed.  

Yet like an arrant Woman, as I am,  
No sooner well convinced, Writings a shame;  
That Whore is scarce a more reproachful Name   
Than Poetess!—  
As Men that Mary, or as Maids that Woe,  
'Cause 'tis the very worst thing they can do:  
Pleased with the Contradiction and the Sin;  
Methinks I stand on Thorns till I begin.   

You expect to hear at least, what Loves have passed  
In this lewd Town, since you and I meet last;  
What Change hath happened of Intrigues, and whether  
The old Ones last; or who and who's together:  
But how, my Dearest Cloe, shall I set  
My Pen to write, what I would fain forget?  
Or name that lost thing LOVE, without a Tear,  
Since so Debauched by illbred Customs here.  
LOVE! the most Generous Passion of the Mind,  
The softest Refuge Innocence can find:  
The safe Director of unguided Youth,  
Fraught with kind Wishes, and secured by Truth.  
That Cordial Drop Heaven in our Cup has thrown,  
To make the Nauceous Draught of Life go down:  
On which one only Blessing, God might Raise  
In Lands of Atheists Subsidies of Praise.  
For none did e'er so dull and stupid prove,  
But felt a God, and blessed his Power in Love.  
This only Joy, for which poor we were made  
Is grown like Play to be an arrant Trade:  
The Rooks creep in; and it has got of late  
As many little Cheats and Tricks as that.  
But what yet more a Woman's Heart would vex,  
'Tis chief carried on by our own Sex:  

Our silly Sex, who born like Monarches, Free,  
Turn Gipsies for a meaner Liberty,  
And hate Restraint, tho' but from Infamy.   

They call what ever is not Common, Nice,  
And deaf to Nature's Rules and Loves Advice,  
Forsake the Pleasures, to pursue the Vice.   
To an exact Perfection they have wrought,  
The Action Love, the Passion is forgot:  
'Tis below Wit they'll tell you to Admire,  
And even without approving, they Desire:  
Their private wish obey the public Voice,  
'Twixt good and bad Whimsy decides, not Choice  
Fashions grow up so fast, at Forms they strike,  
They know what they would have, not what they like.  

B— is a Beauty, if some few agree  
To call him so, the rest to that Degree  
Affected are, that with their Ears they see.   
Where I was Visiting the other Night,  
Comes a Fair Lady with her humble Knight:  
Who had prevailed on her by her own Skill,  
At his Request, tho' much against his Will.  
To come to London—  
As the Coach Stopp'd, we heard her Voice more lou●  
Than a Great-bellied Woman's in a Crowd:  
Telling her Knight that her Affairs require,  
He for some Hours Obsequiously retire.  

I think she was ashamed to have him seen,  
(Hard Fate of Husbands) the Gallant had been,  
Though a diseased hard-favoured Fool brought in.   
Dispatch, says She, your Business you pretend,  
That beastly Visit to the drunken Friend:  
A Bottle ever makes you look so fine,  
Methinks I long to smell you stink of Wine:  
Your Country drinking Breathes enough to kill  
Sour Ale corrected with a Lemmon-Pill;  
Prithee farewell, we'll meet again anon,  
The necessary Thing bows, and is gone:  
She flies up Stairs, and all the haste does show,  
That fifty Antic Postures will allow:  
And then bursts out, Dear Madam, am not I  
The alter'dst Creature breathing, let me die;  
I find myself ridiculously grown  
Embarrassè with being out of Town.  
Rude and untaught, like any Indian Queen,  
My Country-nakedness is strangely seen.  
How is Love governed? Love that rules the State;  
And pray who are the Men most worn of late?  
When I was Married, Fools were Al-a-mode,  
The Men of Wit were then held Incommode:  

Slow of Belief, and fickle in Desire,  
Who e'er they'll be persuaded, must inquire;  
As if they came to spy, not to admire.   
With searching Wisdom, fatal to their Ease,  
They'll still find out, why what may, should not please:  
Nay, take themselves for injured, if we dare  
Make them think better of us than we are:  
And if we hid our Frailties from their Sights,  
Call us deceitful Jilts, and Hypocrites.  
They little guests who at our Arts are grieved,  
The perfect Joy of being well deceived,  

Inquisitive as jealous Cuckolds grow,  
Rather than not be knowing, they will know  
What being known creates their certain Woe.   
Women should these of all Mankind avoid,  
For Wonder by clear Knowledge is destroyed.  

Woman who is an arrant Bird of Night,  
Bold in the Dusk before a Fool's dull Sight,  
Should fly, when Reason brings the Glaring Light.   

But the kind easy Fool, apt to Admire  
Himself, trusts us; his Follies all conspire  
To flatter his, and favour our Desire.   
Vain of his proper Merit, he with ease  
Believes we love him best, who best can please:  
On him our common gross dull Flatteries pass,  
Ever most Joyful when most made an Ass:  
Heavy to apprehend; tho' all Mankind  
Perceive us false, the Fop concerned is blind;  
Who doting on himself—  
Thinks every one that sees him of his Mind.  
These are true Womens-men:— Here forced to cease  
For want of Breath, not Will, to hold her peace:  
She to the Window runs, where she had spied,  
Her much esteemed dear Friend, the Monkey tied:  
With forty Smiles, as many Antic Bows,  
As if't had been the Lady of the House,  
The d●rty chattering Monster she embraced,  
And made it this fine tender Speech at last:  
" Kiss me thou Curious Miniture of Man,  
" How odd thou art, how pretty, how Japan!  
" O! I could live and die with thee.— Then on  
For half an Hour in Compliment she run.  

I took this time to think what Nature meant,  
When this mixed thing into the World she sent;  
So very wise, yet so impertinent:   
One who knew every thing, who 'twas thought fit  
Should be a Fool through Choice, not want of Wit:  
Whose Foppery, without the help of Sense,  
Can ne'er have rise to such an Excellence.  
Nature's as lame in making a true Fop,  
As a Philosopher the very top  
And Dignity of Folly we attain;  
By curious search and labour of the Brain;  
By Observation, Counsel, and deep Thought:  
God never made a Coxcomb worth a Groat,  
We own that Name to Industry and Arts,  
An Eminent Fool must be a Fool of Parts:  
And such an one was she, who had turned o'er  
As many Books as Men, loved much, read more;  
Had a discerning Wit; to her was known  
Every one's Fault and Merit, but her own:  

All the good Qualities that ever blessed  
A Woman so distinguished from the rest,  
Except Discretion only, she possessed.   
And now Monsieur dear Pugg, she cries adieu,  
And the Discourse broke off, does thus renew:   

" You Smile too see me, whom the World perchance  
Mistakes to have some Wit; so far advance  
The Interest of Fools, that I approve  
Their Merit more than Men's of Wit, in love.  
But in our Sex too many Proofs there are,  
Of such whom Wits undo, and Fools repair.  
This in my time was so received a Rule,  
Hardly a Wench in Town but had her Fool;  
The meanest common Slut, who long was grown  
The Jest and Scorn of every Pit Buffoon,  
Had yet left Charms enough to have subdued  
Some Fop or other fond to be thought lewd.  
Foster could make an Irish Lord a Nokes,  
And Betty Morris had her City Coke.  
A Woman's near so ruined, but she can  
Be still revenged on her Undoer Man:  
How lost so e'er, she'll find some Lover more  
A lewd abandoned Fool, then she's a Whore.  
That wretched Thing Corinna, who had run  
Through all the several Ways of being undone.  
Cozened at first by Love, and living then  
By turning the too dear bought Trick on Men:  
Gay were the Hours, and Winged with Joy they flew,  
When first the Town her early Beauty knew:  
Courted, admired, and loved, with Presents fed,  
Youth in her Looks, and Pleasure in her Bed;  
Till Fate, or her ill Angel thought it fit  
To make her dote upon a Man of Wit;  
Who found 'twas dull to love above a Day,  
Made his ill-natured Jest, and went away.  
Now scorned by all, forsaken and oppress't,  
She's a Memento mori to the Rest:  
Diseased, decayed, to take up Half a Crown.  
Must Mortgage her long Scarff, and Manto Gown.  
Poor Creature! who unheard of, as a Fly  
In some dark Hole must all the Winter lie:  
And Want, and Dirt endure a whole half Year,  
That for one Month She Tawdry may appear.  
In Easter Term She gets her a new Gown,  
When my young Master's Worship comes to Town:  
From Pedagog and Mother just set free,  
The Heir and Hopes of a great Family;  
Who with strong Ale and Beef the Country Rules,  
And ever since the Conquest have been Fools:  
And now with careful Prospect to maintain  
This Character, lest crossing of the Strain  
Should mend the Booby-breed, his Friends provide  
A Cousin of his own for his fair Bride.  
And thus set out—  
With an Estate, no Wit, and a young Wife,  
The solid Comforts of a Coxcomb's life:  
Dunghill and Pease forsook, he comes to Town,  
Turns Spark, learns to be lewd, and is undone.  
Nothing suits worse with Vice, than want of Sense,  
Fools are still wicked at their own Expense.  
This o'er grown Schoolboy lost Corinna wins,  
And at first dash, to make an Ass gins:  
" Pretends to like a Man who has not known  
" The Vanities nor Vices of the Town.  
" Fresh in his Youth, and faithful in his Love,  
" Eager of Joys, which he does seldom prove:  
" Healthful and Strong, he does no Pains endure,  
" But what the Fair One he adores can cure.  
" Grateful for Favours, does the Sex esteem,  
" And Libels none for being kind to him:  
" Than of the Lewdness of the Town complains,  
" Rails at the Wits and Atheists, and maintains  
" 'Tis better than good Sense, than Power, than Wealth,  
" To have alone untainted Youth, and Health.  
The unbred Puppey, who had never seen  
A Creature look so Gay, or talk so Fine,  
Believes, then falls in Love, and then in Debt,  
Mortgages all, even to the Ancient Seat:  
To buy his Mistress a new House for Life,  
To give her Plate and Jewels, robs his Wife;  
And when to th' height of Fondness he is grown,  
'Tis time to poison him, and all's Her own.  
Thus meeting in her Common Arms his Fate,  
He leaves her Bastard-Heir to his Estate:  
And as the Race of such an Owl deserves,  
His own dull lawful Progeny he starves.  
Nature who never made a thing in vain,  
But does each Insect for some end ordain;  
Wisely contrived kind-keeping Fools no doubt,  
To patch up Vices, Men of Wit wear out.  
Thus she ran on two Hours, some Grains of Sense,  
Mixed with whole Volleys of Impertinence.  

But now 'tis time I should some pity show  
To Cloe, since I cannot choose but know  
Readers must Reap the Dulness Writers Sow.   
By the next Post such Stories I will tell,  
As joined with these, shall to a Volume swell:  
As True as Heaven, more Infamous than Hell;  
But now you're tired, and so am I Farewell.    
FINIS.