channel held his shield betwixt the Modern and the fountain, so
that he drew up nothing but mud. For, although no fountain on
earth can compare with the clearness of Helicon, yet there lies at
bottom a thick sediment of slime and mud; for so Apollo begged of
Jupiter, as a punishment to those who durst attempt to taste it
with unhallowed lips, and for a lesson to all not to draw too deep
or far from the spring.
At the fountain-head Wotton discerned two heroes; the one he could
not distinguish, but the other was soon known for Temple, general
of the allies to the Ancients. His back was turned, and he was
employed in drinking large draughts in his helmet from the
fountain, where he had withdrawn himself to rest from the toils of
the war. Wotton, observing him, with quaking knees and trembling
hands, spoke thus to himself: O that I could kill this destroyer
of our army, what renown should I purchase among the chiefs! but to
issue out against him, man against man, shield against shield, and
lance against lance, what Modern of us dare? for he fights like a
god, and Pallas or Apollo are ever at his elbow. But, O mother! if
what Fame reports be true, that I am the son of so great a goddess,
grant me to hit Temple with this lance, that the stroke may send
him to hell, and that I may return in safety and triumph, laden
with his spoils. The first part of this prayer the gods granted at
the intercession of his mother and of Momus; but the rest, by a
perverse wind sent from Fate, was scattered in the air. Then
Wotton grasped his lance, and, brandishing it thrice over his head,
darted it with all his might; the goddess, his mother, at the same
time adding strength to his arm. Away the lance went hizzing, and
reached even to the belt of the averted Ancient, upon which,
lightly grazing, it fell to the ground. Temple neither felt the
weapon touch him nor heard it fall: and Wotton might have escaped
to his army, with the honour of having remitted his lance against
so great a leader unrevenged; but Apollo, enraged that a javelin
flung by the assistance of so foul a goddess should pollute his
fountain, put on the shape of -, and softly came to young Boyle,
who then accompanied Temple: he pointed first to the lance, then
to the distant Modern that flung it, and commanded the young hero
to take immediate revenge. Boyle, clad in a suit of armour which
had been given him by all the gods, immediately advanced against
the trembling foe, who now fled before him. As a young lion in the
Libyan plains, or Araby desert, sent by his aged sire to hunt for
prey, or health, or exercise, he scours along, wishing to meet some
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tiger from the mountains, or a furious boar; if chance a wild ass,
with brayings importune, affronts his ear, the generous beast,
though loathing to distain his claws with blood so vile, yet, much
provoked at the offensive noise, which Echo, foolish nymph, like
her ill-judging sex, repeats much louder, and with more delight
than Philomela's song, he vindicates the honour of the forest, and
hunts the noisy long-eared animal. So Wotton fled, so Boyle
pursued. But Wotton, heavy-armed, and slow of foot, began to slack
his course, when his lover Bentley appeared, returning laden with
the spoils of the two sleeping Ancients. Boyle observed him well,
and soon discovering the helmet and shield of Phalaris his friend,
both which he had lately with his own hands new polished and gilt,
rage sparkled in his eyes, and, leaving his pursuit after Wotton,
he furiously rushed on against this new approacher. Fain would he
be revenged on both; but both now fled different ways: and, as a
woman in a little house that gets a painful livelihood by spinning,
if chance her geese be scattered o'er the common, she courses round
the plain from side to side, compelling here and there the
stragglers to the flock; they cackle loud, and flutter o'er the
champaign; so Boyle pursued, so fled this pair of friends: finding
at length their flight was vain, they bravely joined, and drew
themselves in phalanx. First Bentley threw a spear with all his
force, hoping to pierce the enemy's breast; but Pallas came unseen,
and in the air took off the point, and clapped on one of lead,
which, after a dead bang against the enemy's shield, fell blunted
to the ground. Then Boyle, observing well his time, took up a
lance of wondrous length and sharpness; and, as this pair of
friends compacted, stood close side by side, he wheeled him to the
right, and, with unusual force, darted the weapon. Bentley saw his
to save his body, in went the point, passing through arm and side,
nor stopped or spent its force till it had also pierced the valiant
Wotton, who, going to sustain his dying friend, shared his fate.
As when a skilful cook has trussed a brace of woodcocks, he with
iron skewer pierces the tender sides of both, their legs and wings
close pinioned to the rib; so was this pair of friends transfixed,
till down they fell, joined in their lives, joined in their deaths;
so closely joined that Charon would mistake them both for one, and
waft them over Styx for half his fare. Farewell, beloved, loving
pair; few equals have you left behind: and happy and immortal
shall you be, if all my wit and eloquence can make you.
And now. . . .
DESUNT COETERA.
CHAPTER II - A MEDITATION UPON A BROOMSTICK.
ACCORDING TO THE STYLE AND MANNER OF THE HON. ROBERT BOYLE'S
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MEDITATIONS.
THIS single stick, which you now behold ingloriously lying in that
neglected corner, I once knew in a flourishing state in a forest.
It was full of sap, full of leaves, and full of boughs; but now in
vain does the busy art of man pretend to vie with nature, by tying
that withered bundle of twigs to its sapless trunk; it is now at
best but the reverse of what it was, a tree turned upside-down, the
branches on the earth, and the root in the air; it is now handled
by every dirty wench, condemned to do her drudgery, and, by a
capricious kind of fate, destined to make other things clean, and
be nasty itself; at length, worn to the stumps in the service of
the maids, it is either thrown out of doors or condemned to the
last use - of kindling a fire. When I behold this I sighed, and
said within myself, "Surely mortal man is a broomstick!" Nature
sent him into the world strong and lusty, in a thriving condition,
wearing his own hair on his head, the proper branches of this
reasoning vegetable, till the axe of intemperance has lopped off
his green boughs, and left him a withered trunk; he then flies to
art, and pu
ts on a periwig, valuing himself upon an unnatural
bundle of hairs, all covered with powder, that never grew on his
head; but now should this our broomstick pretend to enter the
scene, proud of those birchen spoils it never bore, and all covered
with dust, through the sweepings of the finest lady's chamber, we
should be apt to ridicule and despise its vanity. Partial judges
that we are of our own excellencies, and other men's defaults!
But a broomstick, perhaps you will say, is an emblem of a tree
standing on its head; and pray what is a man but a topsy-turvy
creature, his animal faculties perpetually mounted on his rational,
his head where his heels should be, grovelling on the earth? And
yet, with all his faults, he sets up to be a universal reformer and
corrector of abuses, a remover of grievances, rakes into every
slut's corner of nature, bringing hidden corruptions to the light,
and raises a mighty dust where there was none before, sharing
deeply all the while in the very same pollutions he pretends to
sweep away. His last days are spent in slavery to women, and
generally the least deserving; till, worn to the stumps, like his
brother besom, he is either kicked out of doors, or made use of to
kindle flames for others to warm themselves by.
CHAPTER III - PREDICTIONS FOR THE YEAR 1708.
WHEREIN THE MONTH, AND DAY OF THE MONTH ARE SET DOWN, THE PERSONS
NAMED, AND THE GREAT ACTIONS AND EVENTS OF NEXT YEAR PARTICULARLY
RELATED AS WILL COME TO PASS.
WRITTEN TO PREVENT THE PEOPLE OF ENGLAND FROM BEING FARTHER IMPOSED
ON BY VULGAR ALMANACK-MAKERS.
BY ISAAC BICKERSTAFF, ESQ.
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I HAVE long considered the gross abuse of astrology in this
kingdom, and upon debating the matter with myself, I could not
possibly lay the fault upon the art, but upon those gross impostors
who set up to be the artists. I know several learned men have
ridiculous to imagine the stars can have any influence at all upon
human actions, thoughts, or inclinations; and whoever has not bent
his studies that way may be excused for thinking so, when he sees
in how wretched a manner that noble art is treated by a few mean
illiterate traders between us and the stars, who import a yearly
stock of nonsense, lies, folly, and impertinence, which they offer
to the world as genuine from the planets, though they descend from
no greater a height than their own brains.
I intend in a short time to publish a large and rational defence of
this art, and therefore shall say no more in its justification at
present than that it hath been in all ages defended by many learned
men, and among the rest by Socrates himself, whom I look upon as
undoubtedly the wisest of uninspired mortals: to which if we add
that those who have condemned this art, though otherwise learned,
having been such as either did not apply their studies this way, or
at least did not succeed in their applications, their testimony
will not be of much weight to its disadvantage, since they are
liable to the common objection of condemning what they did not
understand.
Nor am I at all offended, or think it an injury to the art, when I
see the common dealers in it, the students in astrology, the
Philomaths, and the rest of that tribe, treated by wise men with
the utmost scorn and contempt; but rather wonder, when I observe
gentlemen in the country, rich enough to serve the nation in
Parliament, poring in Partridge's Almanack to find out the events
of the year at home and abroad, not daring to propose a hunting-
match till Gadbury or he have fixed the weather.
I will allow either of the two I have mentioned, or any other of
the fraternity, to he not only astrologers, but conjurers too, if I
do not produce a hundred instances in all their almanacks to
convince any reasonable man that they do not so much as understand
common grammar and syntax; that they are not able to spell any word
out of the usual road, nor even in their prefaces write common
sense or intelligible English. Then for their observations and
predictions, they are such as will equally suit any age or country
in the world. "This month a certain great person. will be
threatened with death or sickness." This the newspapers will tell
them; for there we find at the end of the year that no month passes
without the death of some person of note; and it would be hard if
it should be otherwise, when there are at least two thousand
persons of note in this kingdom, many of them old, and the
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almanack-maker has the liberty of choosing the sickliest season of
the year where lie may fix his prediction. Again, "This month an
eminent clergyman will be preferred;" of which there may be some
hundreds, half of them with one foot in the grave. Then "such a
planet in such a house shows great machinations, plots, and
conspiracies, that may in time be brought to light:" after which,
if we hear of any discovery, the astrologer gets the honour; if
not, his prediction still stands good. And at last, "God preserve
King William from all his open and secret enemies, Amen." When if
the King should happen to have died, the astrologer plainly
foretold it; otherwise it passes but for the pious ejaculation of a
loyal subject; though it unluckily happened in some of their
almanacks that poor King William was prayed for many months after
he was dead, because it fell out that he died about the beginning
of the year.
To mention no more of their impertinent predictions: what have we
to do with their advertisements about pills and drink for disease?
or their mutual quarrels in verse and prose of Whig and Tory,
wherewith the stars have little to do?
Having long observed and lamented these, and a hundred other abuses
of this art, too tedious to repeat, I resolved to proceed in a new
way, which I doubt not will be to the general satisfaction of the
kingdom. I can this year produce but a specimen of what I design
for the future, having employed most part of my time in adjusting
and correcting the calculations I made some years past, because I
would offer nothing to the world of which I am not as fully
satisfied as that I am now alive. For these two last years I have
not failed in above one or two particulars, and those of no very
great moment. I exactly foretold the miscarriage at Toulon, with
all its particulars, and the loss of Admiral Shovel, though I was
mistaken as to the day, placing that accident about thirty-six
hours sooner than it happened; but upon reviewing my schemes, I
quickly found the cause of that error. I likewise foretold the
B
attle of Almanza to the very day and hour, with the lose on both
sides, and the consequences thereof. All which I showed to some
friends many months before they happened - that is, I gave them
papers sealed up, to open at such a time, after which they were at
liberty to read them; and there they found my predictions true in
every article, except one or two very minute.
As for the few following predictions I now offer the world, I
forbore to publish them till I had perused the several almanacks
for the year we are now entered on. I find them all in the usual
strain, and I beg the reader will compare their manner with mine.
And here I make bold to tell the world that I lay the whole credit
of my art upon the truth of these predictions; and I will be
content that Partridge, and the rest of his clan, may hoot me for a
cheat and impostor if I fail in any single particular of moment. I
believe any man who reads this paper will look upon me to be at
least a person of as much honesty and understanding as a common
maker of almanacks. I do not lurk in the dark; 1 am not wholly
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unknown in the world; I have set my name at length, to be a mark of
infamy to mankind, if they shall find I deceive them.
In one thing I must desire to be forgiven, that I talk more
sparingly of home affairs. As it will be imprudence to discover
secrets of State, so it would be dangerous to my person; but in
smaller matters, and that are not of public consequence, I shall be
very free; and the truth of my conjectures will as much appear from
those as the others. As for the most signal events abroad, in
France, Flanders, Italy, and Spain, I shall make no scruple to
predict them in plain terms. Some of them are of importance, and I
hope I shall seldom mistake the day they will happen; therefore I
think good to inform the reader that I all along make use of the
Old Style observed in England, which I desire he will compare with
that of the newspapers at the time they relate the actions I
mention.
I must add one word more. I know it hath been the opinion of
several of the learned, who think well enough of the true art of
astrology, that the stars do only incline, and not force the
actions or wills of men, and therefore, however I may proceed by
right rules, yet I cannot in prudence so confidently assure the
events will follow exactly as I predict them.
I hope I have maturely considered this objection, which in some
cases is of no little weight. For example: a man may, by the
influence of an over-ruling planet, be disposed or inclined to
lust, rage, or avarice, and yet by the force of reason overcome
that bad influence; and this was the case of Socrates. But as the
great events of the world usually depend upon numbers of men, it
cannot be expected they should all unite to cross their
inclinations from pursuing a general design wherein they
unanimously agree. Besides, the influence of the stars reaches to
many actions and events which are not any way in the power of
reason, as sickness, death, and what we commonly call accidents,
with many more, needless to repeat.
But now it is time to proceed to my predictions, which I have begun
to calculate from the time that the sun enters into Aries. And
this I take to be properly the beginning of the natural year. I
pursue them to the time that he enters Libra, or somewhat more,
which is the busy period of the year. The remainder I have not yet
adjusted, upon account of several impediments needless here to
mention. Besides, I must remind the reader again that this is but
a specimen of what I design in succeeding years to treat more at
large, if I may have liberty and encouragement.
My first prediction is but a trifle, yet I will mention it, to show
how ignorant those sottish pretenders to astrology are in their own