athercock chopping with the
wind, so pliant to move, and so stiff when fixed--when we observe this
"preciousest grueller" clothed in purple, and equally hardy in the
most opposite measures--become a favourite with James II., and a
furious advocate for arbitrary power; when we see him railing at and
menacing those, among whom he had committed as many extravagances as
any of them;[315] can we hesitate to decide that this bold, haughty,
and ambitious man was one of those who, having neither religion nor
morality for a casting weight, can easily fly off to opposite
extremes? and whether a puritan or a bishop, we must place his zeal to
the same side of his religious ledger--that of the profits of barter!

The quarrel between Parker and Marvell originated in a preface,[316]
written by Parker, in which he had poured down his contempt and abuse
on his old companions, the Nonconformists. It was then Marvell clipped
his wings with his "Rehearsal Transprosed;" his wit and humour were
finely contrasted with Parker's extravagances, set off in his
declamatory style; of which Marvell wittily describes "the volume and
circumference of the periods, which, though he takes always to be his
chiefest strength, yet, indeed, like too great a line, weakens the
defence, and requires too many men to make it good." The tilt was now
opened, and certain masqued knights appeared in the course; they
attempted to grasp the sharp and polished weapon of Marvell, to turn
it on himself.[317] But Marvell, with malicious ingenuity, sees Parker
in them all--they so much resembled their master! "There were no
less," says the wit, "than six scaramouches together on the stage, all
of them of the same gravity and behaviour, the same tone, the same
habit, that it was impossible to discern which was the true author of
the 'Ecclesiastical Polity.' I believe he imitated the wisdom of some
other princes, who have sometimes been persuaded by their servants to
disguise several others in the regal garb, that the enemy might not
know in the battle whom to single." Parker, in fact, replied to
Marvell anonymously, by "A Reproof to the Rehearsal Transprosed," with
a mild exhortation to the magistrate to crush with the secular arm the
pestilent wit, the servant of Cromwell, and the friend of Milton. But
this was not all; something else, anonymous too, was despatched to
Marvell: it was an extraordinary letter, short enough to have been an
epigram, could Parker have written on