Festina lente, not too fast;

For haste, the proverb says, makes waste.
The quirks and cavils thou dost make

Are false, and built upon mistake ;

And I shall bring you with your pack.
Of fallacies, t'Elenchi back;

And put your arguments in mood

And figure to be understood.

I'll force you by right ratiocination

To leave you vitilitigation,

And make you keep to the question close,

The question then, to state it first,
Is which is better, or which worst,
Synods or bears ? bears I avow
To be the worst, and synods thou.
But to make good th' assertion,

Thou say'st th' are really all one.

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If so, not worst; for if th' are idem,
Why then, tandundem dat tandidem.

For if they are the same, by course
Neither is better, neither worse.
But I deny they are the same,

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More than a maggot and I am.

For though they do agree in kind,

Specific difference we find

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And can no more make bears of these,

Than prove my horse is Socrates.

That synods are bear-gardens too,

Thou do'st affirm; but I say, no;

And thus I prove it in a word;

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Whats'ever assembly's not impower'd

To censure, curse, absolve, and ordain,

Can be no synod; but bear-garden

Has no such pow'r; ergo, 'tis none:

And so thy sophistry's o'erthrown.

But yet we are beside the question,
Which thou didst raise the first contest on:
For that was, Whether bears were better
Than synod-men? I say, negatur.
That bears are beasts, and synods men,
Is held by all; they're better then :
For bears and dogs on four legs go,
As beasts; but synod-men on two.
'Tis true they all have teeth and nails,
prove that synod-men have tails

But

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Or that a ragged, shagged fur
Grows o'er the hide of Presbyter;
Or that his snout or spacious ears
Do hold proportion with a bear's.

A bear's a savage beast, of all
Most ugly and unnatural ;
Whelp'd without form, until the dam
Has lick'd it into shape and frame:

But all thy light can ne'er evict,

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That ever synod-man was lick'd,
Or brought to any other fashion,
Than his own will and inclination.
But thou do'st further yet in this
Oppugn thyself and sense; that is,
Thou wouldst have Presbyters to go

For bears and dogs, and bear-wards too;
A strange chimera of beasts and men,
Made up of pieces heterogene;

Such as in nature never met

In eodem subjecto yet.

Thy other arguments are all

Supposures hypothetical,

That do but beg, and we may choose

Either to grant them, or refuse;

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Much thou hast said, which I know when 1325

And where thou stol'st from other men,

(Whereby 'tis plain thy light and gifts Are all but plagiary shifts;)

And is the same that ranter said,

Who, arguing with me, broke my head,

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And tore a handful of my beard;

The self-same cavils then I heard,

When b'ing in hot dispute about

This controversy, we fell out;

And what thou know'st I answer'd then, 1335 Will serve to answer thee again.

Quoth Ralpho, Nothing but th' abuse Of human learning you produce; Learning, that cobweb of the brain,

Profane, erroneous, and vain ;

A trade of knowledge, as replete
As others are with fraud and cheat:
An art t' encumber gifts and wit,
And render both for nothing fit;

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Makes light inactive, dull and troubled,

Like little David in Saul's doublet;

A cheat that scholars put upon

Other men's reason and their own;

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A sort of error, to ensconce

Absurdity and ignorance,

That renders all the avenues

To truth, impervious and abstruse,
By making plain things, in debate,
By art perplex'd and intricate:

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For nothing goes for sense or light,

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That will not with old rules jump right:
As if rules were not in the schools

Deriv'd from truth, but truth from rules.

This Pagan, heathenish invention
Is good for nothing but contention.
For as, in sword-and-buckler fight,
All blows do on the target light:

So when men argue, the greatest part

O' th' contest falls on terms of art,

Until the fustian stuff be spent,

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And then they fall to the argument.

Quoth Hudibras, Friend Ralph, thou hast

Outrun the constable at last:

For thou art fallen on a new

Dispute, as senseless as untrue,
But to the former opposite,
And contrary as black to white:

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