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mixtures of beasts of several kinds. He is as curious of his pleasures
as an antiquary of his rarities, and cares for none but such as are very
choice and difficult to be gotten, disdains anything that is common,
unless it be his women, which he esteems a common good, and therefore
the more communicative the better. All his vices are, like children that
have been nicely bred, a great charge to him, and it costs him dear to
maintain them like themselves, according to their birth and breeding;
but he, like a tender parent, had rather suffer want himself than they
should, for he considers a man's vices are his own flesh and blood, and
though they are but by-blows, he is bound to provide for them, out of
natural affection, as well as if they were lawfully begotten.

AN UNGRATEFUL MAN

Is like dust in the highway, that flies in the face of those that raise
it. He that is ungrateful is all things that are amiss. He is like the
devil, that seeks the destruction of those most of all that do him the
best service, or an unhealthful sinner that receives pleasure and
returns nothing but diseases. He receives obligations from all that he
can, but they presently become void and of none effect, for good offices
fare with him like death, from which there is no return. His ill-nature
is like an ill stomach, that turns its nourishment into bad humours. He
should be a man of very great civilities, for he receives all that he
can, but never parts with any. He is like a barren soil; plant what you
will on him, it will never grow, nor anything but thorns and thistles,
that came in with the curse. His mother died in child-bed of him, for he
is descended of the generation of vipers in which the dam always eats
off the sire's head, and the young ones their way through her belly. He
is like a horse in a pasture, that eats up the grass and dungs it in
requital. He puts the benefits he receives from others and his own
faults together in that end of the sack which he carries behind his
back. His ill-nature, like a contagious disease, infects others that are
of themselves good, who, observing his ingratitude, become less inclined
to do good than otherwise they would be; and as the sweetest wine, if
ill-preserved, becomes the sourest vinegar, so the greatest endearments
with him turn to the bitterest injuries. He has an admirable art of
forgetfulness, and no sooner receives a kindness but he owns it by
prescription and claims from time out