An Expostulation with Inigo Jones

Master Surveyor, you that first began
From thirty pounds in pipkins, to the man
You are: from them leap'd forth an architect,
Able to talk of Euclid, and correct
Both him and Archimede; damn Archytas,
The noblest inginer that ever was:
Control Ctesibius, overbearing us
With mistook names, out of Vitruvius;
Drawn Aristotle on us, and thence shewn
How much Architectonice is your own:
Whether the building of the stage, or scene,
Or making of the properties it mean,
Vizors, or antics; or it comprehend
Something your sur-ship doth not yet intend.
By all your titles, and whole style at once,
Of tireman, mountebank, and justice Jones,
I do salute you: are you fitted yet?
Will any of these express your place, or wit?
Or are you so ambitious 'bove your peers,
You'd be an Assinigo by your ears?
Why much good do't you; be what part you will,
You'll be, as Langley said, " an Inigo still."
What makes your wretchedness to bray so loud
In town and court? are you grown rich, and proud?
Your trappings will not change you, change your mind;
No velvet suit you wear will alter kind.
A wooden dagger is a dagger of wood,
Nor gold, nor ivory haft can make it good.
What is the cause you pomp it so, I ask?
And all men echo, you have made a masque.
I chime that too, and I have met with those
That do cry up the machine, and the shows;
The majesty of Juno in the clouds,
And peering forth of Iris in the shrouds;
The ascent of lady Fame, which none could spy,
Not they that sided her, dame Poetry,
Dame History, dame Architecture too,
And goody Sculpture, brought with much ado
To hold her up: O shows, shows, mighty shows!
The eloquence of masques! what need of prose,
Or verse, or prose, t' express immortal you?
You are the spectacles of state, 'tis true,
Court-hieroglyphics, and all arts afford,
In the mere perspective of an inch-board;
You ask no more than certain politic eyes,
Eyes, that can pierce into the mysteries
Of many colours, read them, and reveal
Mythology, there painted on slit deal.
Or to make boards to speak! there is a task!
Painting and carpentry are the soul of masque.
Pack with your pedling poetry to the stage,
This is the money-got, mechanic age.
To plant the music where no ear can reach,
Attire the persons, as no thought can teach
Sense, what they are; which by a specious, fine
Term of you architects, is call'd Design;
But in the practised truth, destruction is
Of any art, beside what he calls his.
Whither, O whither will this tireman grow?
His name is Σκηνοποιός, we all know,
The maker of the properties, in sum,
The scene, the engine; but he now is come
To be the music-master; tabler too;
He is, or would be, the main Dominus Do-
All of the work, and so shall still for Ben,
Be Inigo, the whistle, and his men.
He's warm on his feet, now he says; and can
Swim without cork: why, thank the good queen Anne.
I am too fat to envy, he too lean
To be worth envy; henceforth I do mean
To pity him, as smiling at his feat
Of lantern-lerry, with fuliginous heat
Whirling his whimsies, by a subtilty
Suck'd from the veins of shop-philosophy.
What would he do now, giving his mind that way,
In presentation of some puppet-play,
Shou'd but the king his justice-hood employ,
In setting forth of such a solemn toy?
How wou'd he firk, like Adam Overdo,
Up and about; dive into cellars too,
Disguised, and thence drag forth Enormity,
Discover Vice, commit Absurdity:
Under the moral, shew he had a pate
Moulded or strok'd up to survey a state!
O wise surveyor, wiser architect,
But wisest Inigo; who can reflect
On the new priming of thy old sign-posts,
Reviving with fresh colours the pale ghosts
Of thy dead standards; or with marvel see
Thy twice conceived, thrice paid for imagery;
And not fall down before it, and confess
Almighty Architecture, who no less
A goddess is, than painted cloth, deal board,
Vermillion, lake, or crimson can afford
Expression for; with that unbounded line,
Aim'd at in thy omnipotent design!
What poesy e'er was painted on a wall
That might compare with thee? what story shall,
Of all the worthies, hope t' outlast thy own,
So the materials be of Purbeck stone?
Live long the feasting-room! and ere thou burn
Again, thy architect to ashes turn;
Whom not ten fires, nor a parliament, can
With all remonstrance, make an honest man.