The Songs of Moses and Deborah Paraphras'd. With Poems on Several Occasions. Never before publish'd. To which is added, a Pindarick on Mr. L'Estrange

Book Description

London: Printed for Luke Meredith, 1685. [xvi], 142, [2]pp., 8vo. With the terminal leaf of publisher’s adverisements; a few insignificant stains and early pen-marks, upper corner off pp. 85-86 affecting only the page-number, no front free endpaper. Contemporary ownership inscription “Jo: Myddelton his book” on title. A very nice copy in contemporary, certainly publisher’s, sprinkled dark sheep; spine extremities a little rubbed. First edition of the author's only book, published when he was twenty-four. The “Songs of Moses and Deborah” take up about the first third of the book and are followed by such spritely poems as “On two Lads unfortunately expell'd the University for a Riot,” and “A Short Satyr against Keeping” -  For Jove could not restrain his lustful Soul; He (Poets say) was the first Keeping Fool.This satyr also has some good lines on contemporary writers, especially Dryden: Dryden, good man, thought Keeper to reclaim, Writ a kind satyr, call'd it Limberham. This all the herd of lechers strait alarms, From Charing-Cross to Bow was up in arms; They damn'd the play all at one fatal blow, And broke the glass that did their picture show.Another poem is called “On three Ladies, who going abroad in Masquerade, met with some Bullies, drew and fought ’em; in the fray, one of the Ladies was desperately wounded, 1683,” and the last is on the Tory journalist and pamphleteer Roger L'Estrange, quite long and unusually friendly considering L’Estrange’s role as literary censor.Wing C4625; Macdonald, Dryden, 236. Wing gives a fairly full list of locations, but this book is very uncommon in commerce, with only the Brett-Smith’s copy sold at auction since 1949 (Sotheby’s, May 2004, £780).

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