TO THE IMMORTAL MEMORY OF
ALIKE partaking of celestial fire,
Poets and heroes to renown aspire,
Till crown'd with honour, and immortal name,
By wit, or valour, led to equal fame,
They mingle with the gods who breath'd the noble flame.
To high exploits, the praises that belong,
Live, but as nourish'd by the poet's song.
A tree of life is sacred poetry,
Sweet is the fruit, and tempting to the eye;
Many there are, who nibble without leave,
But none who are not born to taste, survive.
Waller shall never die, of life secure,
As long as fame or aged time endure;
Waller, the muse's darling, free to taste
Of all their stores, the master of the feast;
Not like old Adam, stinted in his choice,
But lord of all the spacious paradise,
Those foes to virtue, fortune, and mankind,
Favouring his fame, once, to do justice join'd;
No carping critic interrupts his praise;
No rival strives, but for a second place;
No want constrain'd (the writer's usual fate)
A poet with a plentiful estate ;
The first of mortals who before the tomb
Struck that pernicious monster, envy, dumb;
Malice and pride, those savages, disarm'd;
Not Orpheus with such powerful magic charm'd,
Scarce in the grave can we allow him more,
Than living we agreed to give before.
His noble muse employ'd her generous rage
In crowning virtue, scorning to engage
The vice and follies of an impious age.
No satyr lurks within this hallow'd ground,
But nymphs and heroines, kings and gods
abound;
Glory, and arms, and love, is all the sound.
His Eden with no serpent is defil'd,
But all is gay, delicious all, and mild.
Mistaken men, his muse of flattery blame,
Adorning twice an impious tyrant's name;
We raise our own, by giving fame to foes;
The valour that he prais'd, he did oppose.
Nor were his thoughts to poetry confin❜d,
The state and business shar'd his ample mind;
As all the fair were captives to his wit,
So senates to his wisdom would submit ;
His voice so soft, his eloquence so strong,
Like Cato's was his speech, like Ovid's was his song.
Our British kings are rais'd above the herse,
Immortal made, in his immortal verse:
No more are Mars and Jove poetic themes,
But the celestial Charles's, and just James:
Juno and Pallas, all the shining race
Of heavenly beauties, to the queen give place;
Clear, like her brow, and graceful was his song.
Great like her mind, and like her virtue strong.
Parent of gods, who dost to gods remove,
Where art thou plac'd, and which thy seat above?
Waller, the god of verse, we will proclaim,
Not Phœbus now, but Waller be his name;
Of joyful bards, the sweet seraphic choir
Acknowledge thee their oracle and sire;
The spheres do homage, and the muses sing
Waller, the god of verse, who was the king.
No warning of the' approaching flame,
Swiftly, like sudden death, it came ;
Like travellers, by lightning kill'd,
I burn'd the moment I beheld.
In whom so many charms are plac'd,
Is with a mind as nobly grac'd;
The case, so shining to behold,
Is fill'd with richest gems and gold.
• Myra is thought by some to have been Mary D' Este de Módena, queen-consort of James the Second; and by others, to have been Frances Brudenell, daughter of Lord Brudenell, first married to the Earl of Newburgh, and secondly to Lord Bellew.
To what my eyes admir'd before,
I add a thousand graces more;
And fancy blows into a flame
The spark, that from her beauty came.
The object thus improv'd by thought,
By my own image I am caught;
Pygmalion so, with fatal art,
Polish'd the form that stung his heart.
WARN'D, and made wise by others' flame,
I fled from whence such mischiefs came;
Shunning the sex, that kills at sight,
I sought my safety in my flight.
But ah! in vain from fate I fly,
For first, or last, as all must die;
So 'tis as much decreed above,
That first or last we all must love,
My heart, which stood so long the shock Of winds and waves, like some firm rock, By one bright spark from Myra thrown, Is into flame, like powder, blown.
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