The poore Committee-mans Accompt, avouched
by BRITANNICUS.
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O Yes! Behold here's my accompt,
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I'm ready for to make it,
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If any man who loves the King
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will please to come and take it;
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I am not as the Cavaliers
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are pleas'd to call me, Traytor;
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I am a poore Committees Clerke,
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a simple harmlesse Creature;
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That this is true you need not doubt,
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examine Mr. Needam,
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Hee'l tell you true, and sweare it too,
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for the Kingdomes freedome.
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Free Pole-money, free money lent
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upon the Propositions,
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Free money rais'd for Irish Lands,
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but God knowes the conditions;
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Free money lent on Ordinance,
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free Subsidies full fifty,
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If our Committees grow not rich,
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Ile never think them thrifty;
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That this is true, etc.
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The fift and twentieth part, Excise,
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Customes and Sequestrations;
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The Kings Revenues too we have,
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besides the great Taxation;
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And that great taxe is monthly laid
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upon the associated,
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Which comes to threescore thousand pounds
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a month, if rightly stated:
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That this is true, etc.
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But O! that Tophet Goldsmiths-Hall,
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where men make composition,
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Which gets (they say) the devill and all,
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that Spanish Inquisition:
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If any Dives should fall sicke,
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and dye (as men are sickly)
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They would his heire a Lazarus make,
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and they would doe it quickly:
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That this is true, etc.
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They say they fourescore thousand had,
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some make it up a hundred,
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Suppose foure hundred pound a man,
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a sum scarce to be numbred;
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The Bishops Lands are but a toy
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with such great summes compared,
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Yet those we hope will one day come,
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amongst us to be shared:
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That this is true, etc.
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Ship-money was a hideous thing
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these payments are but trifles,
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That was injoyned by the King,
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all Law and Justice stifles:
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These toyes the Parliament injoynes,
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therein all Subjects share too,
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Yet they who at the Stern doe sit,
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for this will take a care too;
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That this is true, etc.
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Alas! why should such men pay debts,
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the Cavaleeres did plunder?
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If not, yet they their charges beare,
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then is it not a wonder,
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The wicked should say they grow rich,
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who but contrive the payments,
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And of the publike stock take care,
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their gains scarce finds them rayments:
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That this is true, etc.
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These men defie all wicked tongues,
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that challenge close Committees,
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Let them throw stones have don no wrong
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is't not a thousand pitties,
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Such carefull pious men as those,
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who have done their endeavors,
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To purge the Church and wicked state,
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should now be thought deceivers?
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That this is true, etc.
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Suppose they have a publick stock
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sure that must be concealed,
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It was but for the publike rais'd,
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and it shall be revealed;
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We know, that were the stock as great
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as Davids, which amounted
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To such a summe, we have such men,
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it need not to be counted:
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That this is true you need not doubt,
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examine Mr. Needame,
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Hee'l tell you true, and sweare it too,
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for the Kingdomes freedome.
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