Coʹrah

in Dryden’s satire of Absalom and Achitophel, is meant for Dr. Titus Oates (Numbers xvi.). North describes him as a short man, extremely ugly: if his mouth is taken for the centre, his chin, forehead, and cheek-bones would fall in the circumference.

“Sunk were his eyes, his voice was harsh and loud;

Sure signs he neither choleric was, nor proud;

His long chin proved his wit; his saint-like grace

A church vermilion, and a Mosesʹ face.

His memory, miraculously great,

Could plots, exceeding man’s belief, repea

Dryden: Absalom and Achitophel, i. 646–51.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.