The Drunkards Character, Section 22
§ 22.
5 FIfthly, as hee deformes his body,Drunkennes brings poverty. impaires his health, shortens his life, beastiates his soule, &c. so he consumes his estate, and brings himselfe to poverty, and want, as, to whom is poverty, as Salomon speakes, but to Drunkards? who thinke no cost too much that is bestowed on their bellies, who consume their wealth at the wine, even while they have swallowed downe their whole estates. As let the Drunkard have but a groate, it burnes in his purse till it be drowned in drinke; if hee have gold, he will change it; if plate, hee will pawne it; and rather then not satisfie his gut, away goes all to the coate on his backe; yea, rather then hee will scant (as they say) his belly, had hee a jewell as rich as tenne Lordships, or as Cleopatra's was, that womanlike swaggerer, his throate shall have it. O that either wealth, or any other blessing should be cast away thus basely! Or, suppose he bee a labouring man, and must earne it before he have it, he will drinke as much in a day (saith St. Ambrose) as hee can get in a weeke, spend twelve pence sooner, then earne two pence. And hence it commeth to passe, that the company keeper goes commonly in a ragged coate, as it is seldome seene that they offend the Statute against excesse in apparell, for rather then so, they will goe naked, and count that too a voluntarie penance.
Thus the Drunkard having spent all in superfluities, in the end hee wants necessaries, and because in youth hee will drinke nothing but wine, in his old age he is constrained to drinke water: yea, hee throwes his house so long out at windowes, that at last his house throwes him out at doores. And when all is gone, glad would he be to be a Swineheard, like the Prodigallson, but knowing himself unworthy of any mans entertainment; hee growes weary of his life, and is ready to make himselfe away, like Peter the Cardinall, base son to Sixtus the fourth that monstrous Epicure, the shame of the latter times; or like Apicius, the shame of the ancient age wherein he lived.
All which the Scriptures make good, where it is said, that the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty, and the sleeper shall be cloathed with raggs. Pro. 2…. 21. And againe peremptorily, he that loveth wine and oyle shall not bee rich, Prov. 21. 17.
Now that this is so, every officer of a Parish knowes to his great trouble, and the inhabitants cost: yea, were I enjoyned to take up a ragged regiment, I should thinke it no hard taske to muster up a thousand men, (admit but drunkards to be men) out of the very suburbs, that in sheere drinke spend all the cloaths on their beds and backs; yea, that drinke the very bloods of their wives and children, for hee brings not this misery upon himselfe alone▪ but his whole family, wife children, servants, all are impoverisht, yea, nere famished, to satisfie his throat: in which regard he is worse than an Infidell, 1 Tim. 5. 8.
The Drunkard spends all in the Alehouse; and cares not, so hee fares well abroad, though his family starve at home: he sucks so much of the juyce of barley into his owne throat, that his family is either parcht with famine, or burnt with thirst.
But marke how they are met with all; for, as if God would pay them in their own coyne, how oft have I seene vermin sucking the drunkards blood, as fast as he doth that of the Grape and Malt? Neither stayes hee here, for the tiplers progresse is commonly from luxurie, to beggery; from beggery, to thievery; from the Taverne, to Tyburne; from the Alehouse, to the Gallowes.
I might go on, and shew you how this vice hinders men from performing the works of charity and mercy, and how the Drunkard defrauds the poore of that which he might, and ought to impart unto them, if hee lived moderately: but I hasten to shew you his inwards; only this let me tell him, that he shall once give an account for every idle penny hee spends, much more for every idle shilling, pound, &c.