The women's petition against coffee representing to publick consideration the grand inconveniencies accruing to their sex from the excessive use of that drying, enfeebling liquor : presented to the right honorable the keepers of the liberty of Venus / by a well-willer. Well-willer. 1674 Approx. 12 KB of XML-encoded text transcribed from 5 1-bit group-IV TIFF page images. Text Creation Partnership, Ann Arbor, MI ; Oxford (UK) : 2004-03 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1). A66888 Wing W3331 ESTC R11811 12834905 ocm 12834905 94351 This keyboarded and encoded edition of the work described above is co-owned by the institutions providing financial support to the Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership. This Phase I text is available for reuse, according to the terms of Creative Commons 0 1.0 Universal . The text can be copied, modified, distributed and performed, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission. Early English books online. (EEBO-TCP ; phase 1, no. A66888) Transcribed from: (Early English Books Online ; image set 94351) Images scanned from microfilm: (Early English books, 1641-1700 ; 829:44) The women's petition against coffee representing to publick consideration the grand inconveniencies accruing to their sex from the excessive use of that drying, enfeebling liquor : presented to the right honorable the keepers of the liberty of Venus / by a well-willer. Well-willer. [2], 6 p. [s.n.], London : 1674. Reproduction of original in Bodleian Library. Created by converting TCP files to TEI P5 using tcp2tei.xsl, TEI @ Oxford. Re-processed by University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Northwestern, with changes to facilitate morpho-syntactic tagging. Gap elements of known extent have been transformed into placeholder characters or elements to simplify the filling in of gaps by user contributors. 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Copies of the texts have been issued variously as SGML (TCP schema; ASCII text with mnemonic sdata character entities); displayable XML (TCP schema; characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or text strings within braces); or lossless XML (TEI P5, characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or TEI g elements). Keying and markup guidelines are available at the Text Creation Partnership web site . eng Coffee -- Early works to 1800. Coffee -- Physiological effect -- Early works to 1800. 2003-10 TCP Assigned for keying and markup 2003-11 SPi Global Keyed and coded from ProQuest page images 2003-12 Mona Logarbo Sampled and proofread 2003-12 Mona Logarbo Text and markup reviewed and edited 2004-02 pfs Batch review (QC) and XML conversion THE WOMEN'S PETITION AGAINST COFFEE . REPRESENTING TO PUBLICK CONSIDERATION THE Grand INCONVENIENCIES accruing to their SEX from the Excessive Use of that Drying , Enfeebling LIQUOR . Presented to the Right Honorable the Keepers of the Liberty of VENVS . By a Well-willer — London , Printed 1674. To the Right Honorable the Keepers of the Liberties of Venus ; The Worshipful Court of Female-Assistants , &c. The Humble Petition and Address of several Thousands of Buxome Good-Women , Languishing in Extremity of Want. SHEWETH , THat since 't is Reckon'd amongst the Glories of our Native Country , To be A Paradise for Women : The same in our Apprehensions can consist in nothing more than the brisk Activity of our men , who in former Ages were justly esteemed the Ablest Performers in Christendome ; But to our unspeakable Grief , we find of late a very sensible Decay of that true Old English Vigour ; our Gallants being every way so Frenchified , that they are become meer Cock-sparrows , fluttering things that come on Sa● sa , with a world of Fury but are not able to stand to it , and in the very first Charge fall down flat before us . Never did Men wear greater Breeches , or carry less in them of any Mettle whatsoever . There was a glorious Dispensation ( 't was surely in the Golden Age ) when Lusty Ladds of s●ven or eight hund●ed years old , Got Sons and Daughters ; and we have read , how a Prince of Spain was forced to make a Law , that Men should not Repeat the Grand Kindness to their Wives , above NINE times in a night : But Alas ! Alas ! Those forwards Days are gone , The dull Lubbers want a Spur now , rather than a Bridle : being so far from doing any works of Supererregation that we find them not capable of performing those Devoirs which their Duty , and our Expectations Exact . The Occasion of which Insufferable Disaster , after a serious Enquiry , and Discussion of the Point by the Learned of the Faculty , we can Attribute to nothing more than the Excessive use of that Newfangled , Abominable , Heathenish Liquor called COFFEE , which Riffling Nature of her Choicest Treasures , and Drying up the Radical Moisture , has so Eunuch● our Husbands , and Crippled our more kind Gallants , that they are become as Impotent , as Age , and as unfruitful as those Desarts whence that unhappy Berry is said to be brought . For the continual sipping of this pittiful drink is enough to bewitch Men of two and twenty , and tie up the Codpice-point without a Charm. It renders them that use it as Lean as Famine , as Rivvel'd as Envy , or an old meager Hagg over-ridden by an Incubus . They come from it with nothing moist but their snotty Noses , nothing stiffe but their Joints , nor standing but their Ears : They pretend 't will keep them Waking , but we find by scurvy Experience , they sleep quietly enough after it . A Betrothed Queen might trust her self a bed with one of them , without the nice Caution of a Sword between them : nor can all the Art we use revive them from this Lethargy , so unfit they are for Action , that like young Train-band-men when called upon Duty , their Amunition is wanting ; peradventure they Present , but cannot give Fire , or at least do but flash in the Pan , instead of doing Execution . Nor let any Doating Superstitious Cato's shake their Goatish Beards , and tax us of Immodesty for this Declaration , since 't is a publick Grievance , and cries aloud for Reformation . Weight and Measure , 't is well known , should go throughout the world , and there is no torment like Famishment . Experience witnesses our Damage , and Necessity ( which easily supersedes all the Laws of Decency ) justifies our complaints : For can any Woman of Sense or Spirit endure with Patience , that when priviledg'd by Legal Ceremonies , she approaches the Nuptial Bed , expecting a Man that with Sprightly Embraces , should Answer the Vigour of her Flames , she on the contrary should only meet A Bedful of Bones , and hug a meager useless Corpse rendred as sapless as a Kixe , and dryer than a Pumice-Stone , by the perpetual Fumes of Tobacco , and bewitching effects of this most pernitious COFFEE , whereby Nature is Enfeebled , the Off-spring of our Mighty Ancestors Dwindled into a Succession of Apes and Pignies : and — The Age of Man Now Cramp't into an Inch , that was a Span. Nor is this ( though more than enough ) All the ground of our Complaint : For besides , we have reason to apprehend and grow Iealous , That Men by frequenting these Stygian Tap-houses will usurp on our Prerogative of Tatling , and soon learn to exeel us in Talkativeness : a Quality wherein our Sex has ever Claimed preheminence : For here like so many Frogs in a puddle , they sup muddy water , and murmur infignificant notes till half a dozen of them out-babble an equal number of us at a Gossipping , talking all at once in Confusion , and running from point to point as insensibly , and as swiftly , as ever the Ingenious Pole-wheel could run divisions on the Base-viol ; yet in all their prattle every one abounds in his own sense , as stiffly as a Quaker at the late Barbican Dispute , and submits to the Reasons of no other mortal : so that there being neither Moderator nor Rules observ'd , you may as soon fill a Quart pot with Syllogismes , as profit by their Discourses . Certainly our Countrymens pallates are become as Fanatical as their Brains ; how else is 't possible they should Apostatize from the good old primitive way of Ale-drinking , to run a Whoreing after such variety of distructive Forraign Liquors , to trifle away their time , scald their Chops , and spend their Money , all for a little base , black , thick , nasty , bitter , stinking , nauseous Puddle-water : Yet ( as all Witches have their Charms ) so this ugly Turkish Enchantress by certain Invisible VVyres attracts both Rich and Pooor ; so that those that have scarce Twopence to buy their Children Bread , must spend a penny each evening in this Insipid Stuff : Nor can we send one of our Husbands to Call a Midwife , or borrow a Glister-pipe , but he must stay an hour by the way drinking his two Dishes , & two Pipes . At these Houses ( as at the Springs in Afric ) meet all sorts of Animals , whence follows the production of a thousand Monster Opinions and Absurdities ; yet for being dangerous to Government , we dare be their Compurgaters , as well knowing them to be too tame and too talkative to make any desperate Polititians : For though they may now and then destroy a Fleet , or kill ten thousand of the French , more than all the Confederates can do , yet this is still in their politick Capacities , for by their personal valour they are scarce fit to be of the Life-guard to a Cherry-tree : And therefore , though they frequently have hot Contests about most Important Subjects ; as what colour the Red Sea is of ; whether the Great Turk be a Lutheran or a Calvinist ; who Cain's Father in Law was , &c. yet they never fight about them with any other save our Weapon , the Tongue . Some of our Sots pretend tippling of this boiled Soot cures them of being Drunk ; but we have reason rather to conclude it makes them so , because we find them not able to stand after it : 'T is at best but a kind of Earthing a Fox to hunt him more eagerly afterward : A rare method of good-husbandry , to enable a man to be drunk three times a day ! Just such a Remedy for Drunkenness , as the Popes allowing of Stews , is a means to prevent Fornication : The Coffee-house being in truth , only a Pimp to the Tavern , a relishing soop preparative to a fresh debauch : For when people have swill'd themselves with a morning draught of more Ale than a Brewers horse can carry , hither they come for a pennyworth of Settle-brain , where they are sure to meet enow lazy pragmatical Companions , that resort here to prattle of News , that they neither understand , nor are concerned in ; and after an hours impertinent Chat , begin to consider a Bottle of Claret would do excellent well before Dinner ; whereupon to the Bush they all march together , till every one of them is as Drunk as a Drum , and then back again to the Coffe-house to drink themselves sober ; where three or four dishes a piece , and smoaking , makes their throats as dry as Mount Aetna enflam'd with Brimstone ; so that they must away to the next Red Lattice to quench them with a dozen or two of Ale , which at last growing nauseous , one of them begins to extol the blood of the Grape , what rare Langoon , and Racy Canary may be had at the Miter : Saist thou so ? cries another , Let 's then go and replenish there ▪ with our Earthen Vessels : So once more they troop to the Sack-shop till they are drunker than before ; and then by a retrograde motion , stagger back to Soberize themselves with Coffee : Thus like Tennis Balls between two Rackets , the Fopps our Husbands are bandied to and fro all day between the Coffee-house and Tavern , whilst we poor Souls sit mopeing all alone till Twelve at night , and when at last they come to bed smoakt like a Westphalia Hogs-head we have no more comfort of them , than from a shotten Herring or a dryed Bulrush ; which forces us to take up this Lamentation and sing , Tom Farthing , Tom Farthing , where hast thou been , Tom Farthing ? Twelve a Clock e're you come in , Two a Clock e're you begin , And then at last can do nothing : Would make a Woman weary , weary , weary , would make a Woman weary , &c. Wherefore the Premises considered , and to the end that our Just Rights may be restored , and all the Antient Priviledges of our Sex preserved inviolable ; That our Husbands may give us some other Testimonies of their being Men , besides their Beards and wearing of empty Pantaloons : That they no more run the hazard of being Cuckol'd by Dildo's : But returning to the good old strengthning Liquors of our Forefathers ; that Natures Exchequer may once again be replenisht , and a Race of Lusty Hero's begot , able by their Atchievments , to equal the Glories of our Ancesters . We Humbly Pray , That you our Trusty Patrons would improve your Interest , that henceferth the Drinking COFFEE may on severe penalties be forbidden to all Persons under the Age of Threescore ; and that instead thereof , Lusty nappy Beer , Cock-Ale , Cordial Canaries , Restoring Malago's , and Back-recruiting Chocholet be Recommended to General Use , throughout the Vtopian Territories . In hopes of which Glorious Reformation , your Petitioners shall readily Prostrate themselves , and ever Pray , &c. FINIS .