Tedious have been our Fasts, and long our Prayers; To keep the Sabbath such have been our cares, That _Cisly_ durst not milk the gentle Malls, To the great dammage of my Lord Mayors Fooles, Which made the greazie Catchpoles sweare and curse The Holy-day for want o’th’ second course; And men have lost their Body’s new adorning Because their cloathes could not come home that morning. The sins of Parlament have long been bawl’d at, The vices of the City have been yawl’d at, Yet no amendment; Certainly, thought I, This is a Paradox beyond all cry. Why if you ask the people, very proudly They answer straight, That they are very godly. Nor could we lawfully suspect the Priest, Alas, for he cry’d out, _I bring you Christ_: And trul’ he spoke with so much confidence, That at that time it seem’d a good pretence: Then where’s the fault? thought I: Well, I must know; So putting on cleane cuffes, to Church I goe. Now ’gan the Bells to jangle in the Steeple, And in a row to Church went all the people. First came poore Matrons stuck with Lice like Cloves, Devoutly come to worship their white loaves, And may be smelt above a German mile. Well, let them goe to fume the Middle-Ile. But here’s the sight that doth men good to see’t, Grave Burghers, with their Posies, Sweet, sweet, sweet, With their fat Wives. Then comes old _Robin_ too, Who although write or reade he neither doe, Yet hath his Testament chain’d to his waste, And his blind zeale feels out the proofs as fast, And makes as greasie Dogs-ears as the best. A new shav’d Cobler follows him, as it hapt, With his young _Cake bread_ in his cloak close wrapt; Then panting comes his Wife from t’other end O’th’ Town to hear Our Father and see a friend; Then came the shops young Fore-man, ’tis presum’d, With hair rose water’d, and his gloves perfum’d, With his blew shoo-strings too, and besides that, A riband with a sentence in his hat. The Virgins too, the fair one, and the Gypsie, _Spectatum veniunt, veniunt spectentur ut ipsæ_. And now the silk’n Dames throng in, good store, And casting up their noses, to th’ pew dore They come, croud in, for though the pew be full They must and will have room, I, that they wull; Streight that she sits not uppermost distast One takes; ’Tis fine that I must be displac’d By you, she cries then, Good Mistris Gill Flurt; Gill Flurt, enrag’d cries t’other, Why ya dirt- -ie piece of Impudence, ye ill-bred Thief. I scorn your terms, good Mistris Thimble-mans wife. Marry come up, cries t’other, pray forbear, Surely your husband’s but a Scavenger, Cries t’other then, and what are you I pray? No Aldermans wife for all you are so gay. Is it not you that to all Christenings frisk it? And to save bread, most shamefully steal the bisket,