And wifely learn to curb thy forrows wild:
Think what a prefent thou to God hath fent,
And render him with patience what he lent!
This if thou do, he will an offspring give, That till the world's laft end fhall make thy name to live.
II. Anno ætatis 19. At a vocation Exercife in the College, part Latin, part Englife. The Latin Speeches ended, the English thus began.
HAIL native Language, that by finews weak
Didft move my firft endeavouring tongue to speak,"
And mad'ft imperfect words with childish trips,
Half-unpronounc'd, flide through my infant lips,
Driving dumb Silence from the portal door,
Where he had mutely fat two years before:
Here I falute thee, and thy pardon ask,
That now I ufe thee in my latter task:
Small lofs it is that thence can come unto thee,
I know my tongue but little grace can do thee:
Thou need'ft not be ambitious to be firft,
Believe me, I have thither packt the worst:
And, if it happens as I did forecast,
The daintieft dishes fhall be ferv'd up last,
I pray thee then deny me not thy aid
For this fame fmall neglect that I have made:
But hafte the ftrait to do me once a pleasure,
And from thy wardrobe bring thy chiefeit trea-
fure,
Not thofe new-fangled toys, and trimming flight
Which takes our late fantastics with delight,
But cull thofe richest robes, and gay'st attire
Which deepeft fpirits, and choiceft wits defire:
I have fome naked thoughts that rove about,
And loudly knock to have their passage out;
And, weary of their place, do only stay
Till thou haft deck'd them in thy beft array;
That fo they may, without fufpect or fears
Fly fwiftly to this fair affembly's cars.
Yet I had rather, if I were to choose,
Thy service in fome graver subject use,
Such as may make thee fearch thy coffers round,
Before thou clothe my fancy in fit found:
Such where the deep tranfported mind may foar
Above the wheeling poles, and at Heav'n's door
Look in, and fee each blifsful deity,
How he before the thunderous throne doth lie,
Lift'ning to what unfhorn Apollo fings
To th' touch of golden wires, while Hebe brings-
Immortal nectar to her kingly fire:
Then paffing through the spheres of watchful fire,
And mifty regions of wide air next under,
And hills of now, and lofts of piled thunder,
May tell at length how green-cy'd Neptune
In Heav'n's defiance muft'ring all his waves;
Then fing of fecret things that came to pass
When beldam Nature in her cradle was;
And last of kings and queens, and heroes old,
Such as the wife Demodocus once told
In folemn fongs at King Alcinous' feast,
While fad Ulyffes' foul and all the reft
Are held with his melodious harmony
In willing chains and fweet captivity.
But fie, my wand'ring Mufe, how thou doft stray?
Expectance calls thee now another way;
Thou know'ft it must be now thy only bent
To keep in compafs of thy predicament:
Then quick about thy purpos'd business come,
That to the next I may refign my room.
Then Ens is reprefented as Father of the Predicaments bis ten Sons whereof the eldest flood for Subflance quith bis canons, which Ens, thus Speaking explains.
Good luck befriend thee, Son; for at thy birth The fairy ladies danc'd upon the hearth; Thy droufy nurse hath fworn fhe did them spy Come tripping to the room where thou didst lie, And fweetly finging round about thy bed, Strow all their bleflings on thy fleeping head. She heard them give thee this, that thou shoulist ftill
From cyes of mortal walk invifible:
Yet there is fomething that doth force my fear;
For once it was my difmal hap to hear
A Sibyl old, bow-bent with crooked age,
That far events full wifely could prefage,
And in time's long and dark profpective glafs
Forefaw what future days fhould bring to país;
Your fon, faid fhe, (nor can ye it prevent)
Shall fubje&t be to many an accident:
O'er all his brethren he fhall reign as king,
Yet every one shall make him underling,
And thofe that cannot live from him afunder
Ungratefully fhall ftrive to keep him under :
In worth and excellence he fhall out-go them;
Yet being above them, he shall be below them :
From others he fhall ftand in need of nothing,
Yet on his brothers fhall depend for clothing:
To find a foe it fhall not be his hap;
And Peace fhall lull him in her flow'ry lap;
Yet fhall he live in ftrife, and at his door
Devouring war fhall never ccafe to roar:
Yea, it fhall be his natural property
To harbour thofe that are at enmity.
What power, what force, what mighty spell, if not
Your learned hands, can loose this Gordian knot?
The next Quantity and Quality pake in Profe, then Relation was call'd by his name
Rivers arife; whether thou be the fon
Of utmost Tweed, or Oofe, or gulphy Dun,
Or Trent, who like fome earth-born giant spreads
His thirty arms along th' indented meads,
Or fullen mole that runneth underneath,
Or Severn Swift, guilty of maiden's death,
Or rocky Avon, or of fedgy Lee,
Or coaly Tyne, or ancient hallow'd Dee,
Or Humber loud, that keeps the Scythian's name;
Or Medway smooth, or royal towered Thame.
III. On the Morning of Cbrifi's Nativity.
Compos'd 1629.
THIS is the month, and this the happy morn,
Wherein the Son of Heav'n's eternal King,
Of wedded maid, and Virgin mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For fo the holy Sages once did fing,
That he our deadly forfeit fhould release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.
That glorious form, that light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of majesty,
Wherewith he wont at Heav'n's high council-table
To fit the midst of Trinal Unity,
He laid afide; and here with us to be,
Forfook the courts of everlasting day,
But peaceful was the night,
Wherein the Prince of Light
His reign of peace upon the earth began:
The winds with wonder whift
And chofe with us a darkfome houfe of mortal Smoothly the waters kist,
Whifp'ring new joys to the mild ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While birds of calm fit brooding on the charmed
The fhepherds on the lawn,
Or e'er the point of dawn,
Sat fimply chatting in a ruftic row;
Full little thought they then
That the mighty Pan
Was kindly come to live with them below;
Perhaps their loves, or elfe their fheep,
Was all that did their filly thoughts fo bufy keep.
Their hearts and ears did greet,
As never was by mortal finger ftrook,
Divinely warbled voice
Anfw'ring the ftringed noife,
As all their fouis in blifsful rapture took :
The air fuch pleasure loth to lose,
With thousand echoes ftill prolongs each heav'nly
clofe.
Nature that heard fuch found,
Beneath the hollow round
Of Cynthia's feat, the airy region thrilling
Of him, to' whose happy-making fight alone, When once our heav'nly-guided foul fhall climb, Then all this earthy groffnefs quit,
Attir'd with stars, we fhall for ever fit,
In perfect diapafon, whilft they food,
In first obedience, and their state of good.
O may we foon again renew that fong,
And keep in tune with Heav'n, till God e'er long
To his celeftial confort us unite,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee, To live with him, and fing in endless morn of
VI. Upon the Circumcifion.
VIII. An Epitaph on the Marchioness of Winel efter.
THIS rich marble doth inter
YE flaming Powers, and winged Warriors bright, The honour'd wife of Winchefter.
That erft with mufic and triumphant fong,
First heard by happy watchful fhepherds' ear,
So fweetly fung your joy the clouds along,
Through the foft filence of the lift'ning Night;
Now mourn, and if fad fhare with us to bear
Your fiery effence can diftil no tear,
Burn in your fighs, and borrow
Seas wept from our deep forrow:
He who with all Heav'n's heraldry whilere
Enter'd the world, now bleeds to give us eafe;
Alas how foon our fin
Sore doth begin
His infancy to feise!
O more exceeding love, or law more just !
Juft law indeed, but more excecding love!
For we by rightful doom remedilefs
Were loft in death, till he that dwelt above
High thron'd in fecret blifs, for us frail duft
Emptied his glory, ev'n to nakedness;
And that great covenant which we ftill tranfgrefs
Entirely fatisfied,
And the full wrath befide
Of vengeful Juftice bore for our excefs,
And feals obedience firft with wounding smart This day, but O e'er long
Huge pangs and strong
Will pierce more near his heart.
BLEST pair of Sirens, pledges of Heav'n's joy,
Sphere-born harmonious fitters, Voice and Verfe,
Wed your divine founds, and mix'd power employ
Dead things with inbreath'd fenfe able to pierce,
And to our high rais'd phantafy prefent
That undisturbed fong of pure concent,
Ay fung before the faphir-colour'd throne
To him that fits thereon
With faintly fhout, and folemn jubilee,
Where the bright feraphim in burning row
Their loud up-lifted angel-trumpets blow,
And the cherubic hoft in thoufand quires
'Touch their immortal harps of golden wires.
With thofe juft fpirits that wear victorious palms,
Hymns devout and holy pfalms
Singing everlaflingly;
That we on earth with undifcording voice
May rightly anfwer that melodious noife;
As once we did, till disproportion'd Sin
Jarr'd against Nature's chime and with harfh din
Proke the fair mufic that all creatures made
To their great Lord whefe love their motion
fway'd
A viscount's daughter, an Earl's heir,
Befides what her virtues fair
Added to her noble birth,
More than fhe could own from earth.
Summers three times eight fave one
She had told; alas too foon,
After fo fhort time of breath,
To house with darkness, and with death.
Yet had the number of her days
Been as complete as was her praise,
Nature and Fate had had no ftrife
In giving limit to her life.
Her high birth, and her graces fweet,
Quickly found a lover meet;
The virgin quire for her requeft
The god that fits at marriage feaft;
He at their invoking came,
But with a fcarce well-lighted flame;
And in his garland as he stood
Ye might difcern a cypress bud,
Once had the early matrons run
To grect her of a lovely fon,
And now with fecond hope fhe goes,
And calls Lucina to her throes;
But whether by mifchance or blame
Atropos for Lucina came;
And with remorfelefs cruelty
Spoil'd at once both fruit and tree :
The hapless babe before his birth
Had burial, yet not laid in earth;
And the languifh'd mother's womb
Was not long a living tomb.
So have I feen fome tender flip,
Sav'd with care from Winter's nip,
The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck'd up by fome unheedy fwain,
Who only thought to crop the flow'r
New fhot up from vernal show'r;
But the fair bloffom hangs the head
Side-ways as on a dying bed,
And thofe pearls of dew the wears,
Prove to be prefaging tears,
Which the fad Morn had let fall
Gentle Lady, may thy grave
On her haft'ning funeral.
Peace and quiet ever have;
After this thy travel fore
Sweet reft feize thee evermore,
That to give the world incrcafe,
Shortened haft thy own life's leafe.
Here, befides the forrowing
That thy noble house doth bring,
Here be tears of perfect moan
Wept for thee in Helicon,
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