With specious pretences and foreign expenses,
we war for religion and waste all our chink.
'Tis nipped and 'tis clipped,
and 'tis lent and 'tis spent 'till 'tis gone,
'tis gone to the devil - devil, I think!

We pay for our newborn, we pay for our dead.
We pay if we're single, we pay if we're wed.
To show that our merciful senate don't fail,
they begin at our head and tax down to the tail.

We parted with all our old money to shew.
We foolishly hope for a plenty of new.
But might have remembered when we came to the push,
That a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush!

We now like poor wretches are kept under hatches,
At rack and at manger like beasts in the ark.
Since our burgesses and knights make us pay for our lights,
Why should we, why should we be kept in - kept in the dark?

We pay through the nose by the subjecting foes,
Yet for all our expenses get nothing but blows.
At home we are cheated, abroad we're defeated,
But the end on't, the end on't, the Lord above knows.

We pay for our newborn, we pay for our dead.
We pay if we're single, we pay if we're wed.
To show that our merciful senate don't fail
they begin at our head and tax down to the tail.