Page:Gondibert, an heroick poem - William Davenant (1651).djvu/31

 youth, and sickly age; Young men (as if they were not quite deliver'd from Childhood, whose first exercise is Language) imagine it consists in the Musick of Words, and believe they are made wise by refining their speech, above the vulgar Dialect; which is a mistake almost as great as that of the people, who think Orators, (which is a title that crowns at riper years those that have practis'd the dexteritie of tongue) the ablest men; who are indeed so much more unapt for governing, as they are more fit for Sedition: and it may be said of them as of the Witches of Norway, who can sell a Storm for a Doller, which for Ten Thousand they cannot allay. From the esteem of speaking they proceed to the admiration of what are commonly call'd Conceits, things that sound like the knacks or toys of ordinarie Epigrammatists: and from thence, after more conversation and varietie of objects, grow up to some force of Fancie; Yet even then, like young Hawks, they stray and flie far off, using their libertie as if they would nere return to the Lure; and often go at check, ere they can make a stedie view, and know their game.

Old men, that have forgot their first Childhood and are returning to their second, think it lies in agnominations, and in a kind of an alike tinkling of words; or else in a grave telling of wonderfull things, or in comparing of times without a discover'd partialitie; which they perform so ill by favouring the past, that, as 'tis observ'd, if the bodies of men should grow less, though but an unmeasurable proportion in Seven years, yet reckoning from the Floud, they would not remain in the Stature of Frogs; So if States and particular persons had impair'd in government, and increas'd in wickedness proportionably to what Old men affirm they have done, from their own infancie to their age; all publick Policie had been long since Confusion, and the congregated World would not suffice now to people a Village.

The last thing they suppose to be Wit, is their bitter Morals, when they almost declare themselves Enemies to