A Committee man by his name should be one that is possessed, that's number enough in the compel­lation to make it an Epithite for Legion; he is per­sona in concreto (to borrow the Solecisme of a mo­derne Statesman) you may translate it by the red bull phrase and speak as properly, enter seven devills solus, It is a well trust title that contains both the number and the beast. For a Committee-man is a noun of Multitude, he must be spel­led with figures, like Antichrist wrapped in a paire, Royall of Sixes, thus the name is as monstrous as the man, a com­pleat notion of the same linnage with accomulative treason, for his office, it is the resurrection of the Heptarchy or Eng­land fritters, it is the broken meat of a Crumbling Prince, only the Royalty is greater, for it is here, as in the miracle of Loaves the voyder exceeds the Bill of fare, the Pope and he rings the Changes; here is a plurality of Crowns to one head, Joyne them together and ther's harmony in discord, the Tripple crowned Turn-Key of Heaven, with the tripple headed porter of hell, A Committee-man is the reliques of Regall Go­vernment, but like holy reliques he out bulks the substance [Page 2] whereof he is a remnant, ther's a score of Rings in a Com­mittee as in the reliques of the Crosse, ther's the number of twenty, This is the Gyant with the hundred hands that weilds the Scepter, the tyrannicall Beade-Roule by which the Kingdome prays backward, and with a kind of Rebus at every Curse drops a Committee man, Let CHARLES be wayned whose conducing clemency agravates the de­fection, and make Nero the question, better a Nero then a Committee, Ther's lesse examination by a single Bullet then by case shot.

Now a Committee-man is a party coloured officer, he must be drawne like Janus with Crosse and Pile in his countenance, as he relates to the Souldiers, or face about to his fleecing the Country, looke upon him Martially and he is a Justice of Warre.

One that hath bound his Dalton up in Buffe, and will needs be of the quorum to the best Commanders, he is one of Mars his Lay Elders, he shares in the Government, though a Non-conformist to his bleeding Rubick, he is the like Se­ctary in Armes as the Platonick is in love, keep a flattering in discourse but proves haggard in the action; he is not of the Souldiers and yet of his flock, it is an embleme of the gol­den age (and such indeed he makes it) to him, when so tame a Pigeon may commerce with vultures, Me thinks a Com­mittee hanging about a Governour and Bandleirs, dangling about furd Alderman have an Anagrame resemblance, ther's no Syntax between a Cap of maintenance and a helmet, who ever knew an enemy routed by a Grand Jury, and a bil­la vera: it is a left handed Garrison where their authority perches, but the more preposterous the more in fashion the right hand fights while the left rules the Reins, the truth is the Souldier and the Gentleman are like Don Quicchott and Sancho Pancha one fights at all adventures to purchase the other, the Government of the Island, a Committe-man pro­perly should be the Governour Natrosse to fit his tackle, and to new string him with sinnews of Warre for his chief use to raise assessements in the neighbouring Wapentake.

[Page 3] The Country people being like an Irish Cow, that will not give downe the Milk unlesse she see her Calf before her: hence it is, he is the Garrisons dry Nurce, he chews their Con­tribution before he feeds them, so the poor Souldiers live like Trochilus by picking the teeth of this sated Crocoadile.

So much for his warlike or ammunition face which is so preturnaturall that it is rather a vizard then a face, Mars in him hath but a blinking aspect, his face of Arms is like his Coate partie per pale, Souldier and Gentleman much of a scantling.

Now enter his Taxing and deglubing face, a squeezing look like that of Vespasians as if he were breeding over a closestoole. Take him thus and he is the Inquisition of the purse, an Auchentick Gypsie, that Nips your bung with a canting Ordinance, not a murthered fortune in all the Coun­try but bleeds at the touch of this malefactor, he is the spleen of the body politick that swells it self to the consumption of the whole, at first indeed he ferretted for the Parliament, but since he hath got of his Cope, he set up for himself, he lives upon the sins of the people, and that's a good standing dish too, he verifies the Axiom Eisdom mutritur ex quibus com­poniter, his dyet is suitable to his constitution, I have won­dred often why the plundred Country-men should repaire to him for succor, certainly it is under the same notion as one whose pockets are pickt goes to Mol: Cutpurse as the predomi­nant in that faculty.

He out dives a Dutchman, gets a noble of him that was never worth six pence, for the poorest escape not, but Dutch like he will be dreyning even in the dryest ground, he Aliens a Delinquents Estate with as little remorse as his other ho­linesse gives away an Hereticks Kingdome, and for the truth of the Delinquency, both Chapmen have a little share of Infallability, Lye is the Grand Sallad of Arbitrary Govern­ment, Executor to the Star-Chamber, and High-Commission for those Courts are not extinct, they survive in him like Dol­lary changed into single monys, to speak the truth hee's the universall tribunall for since these times, all causes fall to his [Page 4] Cognizance, as in a great infection diseases oft turn to the plague it concernes our Masters the Parliament to look about them [...] he proceeds at this rate, the Jack may come to swallow the Pike, as the interest often eats out the principall, as his commands are great, so he looks for reverence accordingly; He is very pun­ctuall in exacting your hat, and to say right, it is his due, but by the same title, as the upper garment is the vailes of the exe­cutioner; There was a time when such cattell would have hardly been taken upon suspition for men in office, unlesse the old proverb were renewed, and beggers make a free company, and those their wardens; you may see what it is to hang toge­ther, look upon them severally, and you cannot but fumble for some threeds of charitie, but oh they are Tarmagants in con­junction, like Fidlers who are Rogues when they goe singly, and joyned in consort, gentlemen Musitioners. I care not much if I untwist my Committee-man, and so give him the receipt of this grand Catholican, take a State Martyr, one that for his good behaviour, hath paid the Excise of his ears, so suffered Captivitie by the Land-piracie of Ship-money, next a primi­tive free-holder.

One that hates the King, because he is a Gentleman trans­gressing the Magna Charta of delving Adam. Adde to these a Mortified Bankerupt that helpes out his false Weights with some scruples of conscience, and with his peremptorie scales can doome his Prince with a Mene tecall. These with a new blew-stocking'd Justice lately made of a good basket-hilted Yeoman, with a short-handed Clerke tack't to the Reare of him, to carry the Knapsack of his understanding, together with two or three Equivocall Sirs, whose Religion like their Gentility is the Extract of their Acres, being therefore spiri­tuall, because they are earthly; Not forgetting the man of Law, whose corruption gives the Hogan to the sincerer Jun­cto; These are the simples of this pretious Compound, a kind of Dutch hotch-potch, the Hogan Mogan Committee­man.

A Commettee-man hath a Side-man, or rather a setter hight a Sequestrator, of whom you may say, as of the great [Page 5] Sultans horse, where he treads the grasse growes no more. Hee is the States Cormorant, one that fishes for the Publique, but feeds himselfe, the miserie is, he fishes without the Cormo­rants propertie, a rope to streighten the gullet, and to make hime disgorge. A Sequestrator! hee is the Devills Nuthooke, the signe with him is alwaies in the clutches. There's more Monsters retaine to him, then to all the limbes in Anatomie. 'Tis strange Physicians doe not apply him to the soles of the feet in a desperate Feavour, he drawes farre beyond Pigeons: I hope some Mountebanke will slice him, and make the Expe­riment. Hee is a tooth-drawer once removed, here's all the difference one applauds the Grinder, and the other the Grist. Never till now could I verifie the Poets description, that the ravenous Harpie had a humane visage: Death it selfe cannot quit scores with him, like the Demoniack in the Gospel hee lives among Tombes Nor is all the holy-water shed by Wi­dowes and Orphans a sufficient Exorcisme to dispossesse him. Thus the Cat sucks your breath, and the Fiend your blood; Nor can the Brotherhood of Witchfinders so sagely instituted with all their terrour weane the Familiars.

But once more to single out my imbost Committee-man his Fate (for I know you would fain see an end of him) is either a whipping Audit, when he is wrung in the withers by a Committee of Examinations; And so the spunge weeps out the moysture which he soaked before, or else he meets his pas­sing peale in the clamorous mutiny of a gut-foundred Garri­son; For the Hedge-sparrow will be feeding the Cuckow, till he mistake his Commons, and bite off her head. What-ever 'tis, it is within his desert, for what is observed of some Crea­tures, that at the same time they trade in productions three stories high▪ suckling the first, bigg with the second, and cliket­ting for the third; A Committeman in the Counterpoint, his Mischiefs superfetation a certaine scale of destruction, for hee ruines the Father, beggars the Sonne, and strangles the hopes of all posteritie.