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I'm glad that city, t'whom I ow'd before
(But, ah me! Fate hath crost that willing score)
A father, gave me a godfather too;
And I'm more glad, because it gave me you;
Whom I may rightly think, and term, to be
Of the whole city an epitome.

I thank my careful Fate, which found out one
(When Nature had not licensed my tongue
Farther than cries) who should my office do;
I thank her more, because she found out you:
In whose each look I may a sentence see;
In whose each deed, a teaching homily.
How shali I pay this debt to you? My fate
Denies me Indian pearl or Persian plate;
Which though it did not, to requite you thus,
Were to send apples to Alcinous,

And sell the cunning'st way.-No! when I can,
In every lo, in every verse, write Man;
When my quill relisheth a school no more;
When my pen-feather'd Muse hath learnt to soar,
And gotten wings as well as feet; look then
For equal thanks from my unwearied pen:
Till future ages say, 'twas you did give
A name to me, and I made yours to live.

ON THE

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SON AND HEIR TO SIR THOMAS LITTLETON,
INTO THE WATER TO
WHO WAS DROWNED LEAPING
SAVE HIS YOUNGER BROTHER.

AND must these waters smile again, and play
About the shore, as they did yesterday?
Will the Sun court them still? and shall they show
No conscious wrinkle furrow'd on their brow,
That to the thirsty traveller may say,
"I am accurst; go turn some other way

It is unjust: black Flood! thy guilt is more,
Sprung from his loss, than all thy watery store
Can give thee tears to mourn for birds shall be,
And beasts, henceforth afraid to drink of thee.

What have I said? my pious rage hath been
Too hot, and acts, whilst it accuseth, sin.
Thou'rt innocent, I know, still clear and bright,
Fit whence so pure a soul should take its flight.
How is angry zeal confin'd! for he
Must quarrel with his love and piety,
That would revenge his death. Oh, I shall sin,
And wish anon he had less virtuous been.
For when his brother (tears for him I'd spill,
But they're all challeng'd by the greater ill)
Struggled for life with the rude waves, he too
Leapt in, and when hope no faint beam could show,
His charity shone most: "Thou shalt," said he,
"Live with me, brother, or I'll die with thee;"
And so he did! Had he been thine, O Rome!
Thou would'st have call'd this death a martyrdom,
And sainted him. My conscience give me leave,
I'll do so too: if Fate will us bereave
Of him we honour'd living, there must be
A kind of reverence to his memory,
After his death; and where more just than here,
Where life and end were both so singular?
He that had only talk'd with him, might find
A little academy in his mind;

Where Wisdom master was, and fellows all
Which we can good, which we can virtuous, call:
Reason, and Holy Fear, the proctors were,

To apprehend those words, those thoughts, that err.

His learning had out-run the rest of heirs,
Stol'n beard from Time, and leapt to twenty years.
And, as the Sun, though in fall glory bright,
Shines upon all men with impartial light,
And a good-morrow to the beggar brings
With as full rays as to the mightiest kings:
So he, although his worth just state might claim,
And give to pride an honourable name,
With courtesy to all, cloath'd virtue so,
That 'twas not higher than his thoughts were low.
In 's body too no critique eye could find
The smallest blemish, to belye his mind;
He was all pureness, and his outward part
But represents the picture of his heart.
When waters swallow'd mankind, and did cheat
The hungry worm of its expected meat;
When gems, pluckt from the shore by ruder hands,
Return'd again unto their native sands;
'Mongst all those spoils, there was not any prey
Could equal what this brook hath stol'n away.
Weep then, sad Flood; and, though thou'rt innocent,
Weep because Fate made thee her instrument:
And, when long grief hath drunk up all thy store,
Come to our eyes, and we will lend thee more.

A TRANSLATION OF

VERSES UPON THE BLESSED VIRGIN, WRITTEN IN LATIN BY THE RIGHT WORSHIPFUL DR. A.

AVE MARIA.

ONCE thou rejoiced'st, and rejoi e for ever,
Whose time of joy shall be expired never:
Who in her womb the hive of comfort bears,
Let her drink comfort's honey with her ears.
You brought the word of joy, in which was born
An had to all! let us an hail return!
From you "God save" into the world there came
Our echo hail is but an empty name.

GRATIA PLENA.

How loaded hives are with their honey fill'd,
From divers flowers by chymic bees distill'd!
How full the collet with his jewel is,
Which, that it cannot take by love, doth kiss:
How full the Moon is with her brother's ray,
When she drinks-up with thirsty orb the day!
How full of grace the Graces' dances are!
So full doth Mary of God's light appear.
It is no wonder if with Graces she
Be full, who was full of the Deity.

DOMINUS TECUM.

THE fall of mankind under Death's extent
The quire of blessed angels did lament,
And wish'd a reparation to see

By him, who manhood join'd with deity.
How grateful should man's safety then appear
T' himself, whose safety can the angels cheer!

BENEDICTA TU IN MULIeribus,
DEATH came, and troops of sad Diseases led
To th' Earth, by woman's hand solicited:
Life came so too, and troops of Graces led
To th' Earth, by woman's faith solicited.
As our life's springs came from thy blessed womb,
So from our mouths springs of thy praisę shaf

come:

Who did life's blessing give, 'tis fit that she, Above all women, should thrice blessed be.

ET BENEDICTus fructus VENTRIS TUI.

WITH mouth divine the Father doth protest, He a good word sent from his stored breast; 'Twas Christ: which Mary, without carnal thought, From the unfathom'd depth of goodness brought The word of blessing a just cause affords To be oft blessed with redoubled words!

SPIRITUS SANCTUS SUPERVÉNIET IN TE.

As when soft west-winds strook the garden-rose, A shower of sweeter air salutes the nose; The breath gives sparing kisses, nor with power Unlocks the virgin-bosom of the flower: So the Holy Spirit upon Mary blow'd, And from her sacred box whole rivers flowed: Yet loos'd not thine eternal chastity; Thy rose's folds do still entangled lie. Believe Christ born from an unbruised womb, So from unbruised bark the odours come.

ET VIRTUS ALTISSIMI OBUMBRABIT TIBI. GOD his great Son begot ere time begon; Mary in time brought forth her It le son, Of double substance One; life he began, God without mother, without father, man. Great is the birth; and 'tis a stranger deed That she no man, thau God no wife, should need; A shade delighted the child-bearing maid, And God himself became to her a shade. O strange descent! who is light's author, he Will to his creature thus a shadow be. As unseen light did from the Father flow, So did seen light from Virgin Mary grow. When Moses sought God in a shade to see, The father's shade was Christ the Deity. Let's seek for day, we darkness, whilst our sight In light finds darkness, and in darkness light.

ODE I.

ON THE PRAISE OF POETRY.

'Tis not a pyramid of marble s one,

Though high as our ambition;

'Tis not a tomb cut out in brass, which can Give life to th' ashes of a man ;

But verses only: they shall fresh appear,

Whilst there are men to read or hear. When Time shall make the lasting brass decay,

And eat the pyramid away;

Turning that monument wherein men trust

Their Lames, to what it keeps, poor dust; Then shall the epitaph remain, and be

New-graven in eternity.

Poets by Death are conquer'd; but the wit
Of poets triumph over it.

What cannot verse?

took

When Thracian Orpheus

His lyre, and gently on it strook,
The learned stones came dancing all along,
And kept time to the charming song.

With artificial pace the warlike pine,

The elm and his wife the ivy twine,

With all the better trees, which erst had stood
Unmov'd, forsook their native wood.
VOL. VII.

The laurel to the poet's hand did bow,
Craving the honour of his brow;
And every loving arm embrac'd, and made
With their officious leaves a shade.
The beasts too strove his auditors to be,

Forgetting their old tyranny.

The fearful hart next to the lion came,

Nightingales, harmless Syreas of the air,
And wolf was shepherd to the lamb.

And Muses of the place, were there;
Who, when their little windpipes they had found
Unequal to so strange a sound,

O'ercome by art and grief they did expire,

And fell upon the conquering lyre. Happy, O happy they, whose tomb might be, Mausolus! envied by thee!

ODE II.

THAT A PLEASANT POVERTY IS TO BE PREFERRED
BEFORE DISCONTENTED RICHES.

WHY, O! doth gaudy Tagus ravish thee,
Though Neptune's treasure-house it be?
Why doth Pactolus thee bewitch,
Infected yet with Midas' glorious itch?
Their dull and sleepy streams are not at all,
Like other floods, poetical;

They have no dance, no wanton sport,
No gentle murmur, the lov'd shore to court.
No fish inhabit the adulterate flood,

Nor can it feed the neighbouring wood; No flower or herb is near it found, But a perpetual winter starves the ground. Give me a river which doth scorn to show An added beauty; whose clear brow May be my looking-glass to see What my face is, and what my mind should be! Here waves call waves, and glide along in rank, And prattle to the smiling bank; Here sad king-fishers tell their tales, And fish enrich the brook with silver scales. Daisies, the first-born of the teeming spring, On each side their embroidery bring; Here lilies wash, and grow more white, And daffodils, to see themselves, delight. Here a fresh arbour gives her amorous shade, Which Nature, the best gardener, made. Here I would sit and sing rude lays, Such as the nymphs and me myself should please. Thus I would waste, thus end, my careless days; And robin-red-breasts, whom men praise For pious birds, should, when I die, Make both my monument and elegy.

ODE III.

TO HIS MISTRESS.

TYRIAN dye why do you wear,

You whose cheeks best scarlet are?
Why do you fondly pin

Pure linen o'er your skin,
(Your skin that's whiter far)
Casting a dusky cloud before a star.
Why bears your neck a golden chain?
Did Nature make your hair in vain,

Of gold most pure and fine?
With gems why do you shine?

They, neighbours to your eyes, Show but like Phosphor when the Sun doth rise. I would have all my mistress' parts One more to Nature than to arts;

I would not woo the dress,

Or one whose nights give less
Contentment than the day,

She's fair, whose beauty only makes her gay.

For 'tis not buildings make a court,
Or pomp, but 'tis the king's resort:
If Jupiter down pour

Himself, and in a shower
Hide such bright majesty,

Le than a golden one it cannot be.

ODE IV.

ON THE UNCERTAINTY OF FORTUNE.

A TRANSLATION.

LEAVE off unfit complaints, and clear
From sighs your breast, and from black clouds
your brow,

When the Sun shines not with his wonted cheer,
And Fortune throws an advers cast for you!
That sea which vext with Notus is,
The merry East-winds will to morrow iss.
The Sun to day riles drowsily,
To-morrow 'twill put on a look more fair:
Laughter and groaning do alternately
Return and tears sport's nearest neighbours are.
'Tis by the gods appointed so,

That gd fare should with mingled dangers flow.
Who drave his oxen yesterday,
w over the noblest Romans reign,
the Gabi and the Cures lay

Do

An
The yoke which from his oxen he had ta'en:
Whom Hesperus saw poor and low,
The Morn ng's eye beholds him greatest now.
If Fortune knit amongst her play
But seriousness, he shall again go home
To his old country-farm of yesterday,
To scoffing people no mean jest become;

An with the crowned axe, which he
Had rul'd the world, go back and prune some tree;
Nay, if he want the fuel cold requires,
With his own fasces he shall make him fires.

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UPON THE SHORTNESS OF MAN'S LIFE.

MARK that swift arrow! how it cuts the air,
How it out-runs thy following eye!
Use all persuasions now, and try
If thou canst call it back, or stay it there.
That way it went; but thou shalt find
No tract is left behind.

Fool! 'tis thy life, and the fond archer thou.
Of all the time thou'st shot away,
I'll b.d thee ieich but yesterday,
And it shall be too haru a task to do.

Besides repentance, what canst find
That it bach leit behind?
Our life is carried with too strong a tide;

A doubtful cloud our substance bears,
And is the horse of all our years.
Each day doth on a winged whirlwind ride.
We and our glass run out, and must
Both render up our dust.

But his past life who withou. grief can see;
Who never thinks his end too near,
But says to Fame, Thou art mine heir;"
That man extends life's natural brevity-
This is, this is the only way

To out-live Nestor in a day.

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Tell me not how the waves appear Of Cam, or how it cuts the learned shire;

I shall contemn the troubled Thames On her chief holiday; ev'n when her streams Are with rich folly gilded; when The quondam dung-boat is made gay, Just like the bravery of the men, And graces with fresh paint that day; When th' city shines with flags and pageants there, And satin doublets, seen not twice a year.

Why do I stay then? I would meet Thee there, but plummets hang upon my feet; "Tis my chief wish to live with thee, But not till I deserve thy company:

Till then, we'll scorn to let that toy, Some forty miles, divide our hearts: Write to me, and I shall enjoy Friendship and wit, thy better parts. Though envious Fortune larger hindrance brings, We'll easily see each other; Love hath wings.

MISCELLANIES.

THE MOTTO.

TENTANDA VIA EST, &c.

WHAT shall I do to be for ever known,

And make the age to come my own?

I shall, like beasts or common people, die,
Unless you write my elegy;

Whilst others great, by being born, are grown ;
Their mothers' labour, not their own.

In this scale gold, in th' other fame does lie,
The weight of that mounts this so high.

These men are Fortune's jewels, moulded bright;
Brought forth with their own fire and light:
If I, her vulgar stone, for either look,

Out of myself it must be strook.

Yet I must on. What sound is 't strikes mine ear?
Sure I Fame's trumpet hear:

It sounds like the last trumpet; for it can
Raise up the buried man.

Unpast Alps stop me; but I'll cut them all,

And march, the Muses' Hannibal. Hence, all the flattering vanities that lay Nets of roses in the way!

Hence, the desire of honours or estate,

And all that is not above Fate !

Hence, Love himself, that tyrant of my days! Which intercepts my coming praise.

Come, my best friends, my books! and lead me

on;

'Tis time that I were gone. Welcome, great Stagyrite! and teach me now All I was born to know:

Thy scholar's victories thou dost far out-do;

He conquer'd th' earth, the whole world you. Welcome, learn'd Cicero! whose blest tongue and wit

Preserves Rome's greatness yet: Thou art the first of orators; only he

Who best can praise thee, next must be.
Welcome the Mantuan swan, Virgil the wise!

Whose verse walks highest, but not flies;
Who brought green Poesy to her perfect age,
And made that art which was a rage.
Tell me, ye mighty Three! what shall I do
To be like one of you?

And, whilst with wearied steps we upwards go,

See us, and clouds, below.

ODE. OF WIT.

TELL me, O tell, what kind of thing is Wit,
Thou who master art of it?

For the first matter loves variety less;
Less women love 't, either in love or dress.
A thousand different shapes it bears,
Comely in thousand shapes appears.
Yonder we saw it plain; and here 'tis now,
Like spirits, in a place we know not how.
London, that vents of false ware so much store,
In no ware deceives us more;

For men, led by the colour and the shape,
Like Zeuxis' birds, fly to the painted grape.
Some things do through our judgment

pass

As through a multiplying-glass;

And sometimes, if the object be too far,
We take a falling meteor for a star.

Hence 'tis, a Wit, that greatest word of fame,
Grows such a common name;

And Wits by our creation they become,
Just so as titular bishops made at Rome.

'Tis not a tale, 'tis not a jest
Admir'd with laughter at a feast,
Nor florid talk, which can that title gain;
The proofs of Wit for ever must remain.
'Tis not to force some lifeless verses meet
With their five gouty feet.
All, every where, like man's, must be the soul,
And Reason the inferior powers controul.

Such were the numbers which could call The stones into the Theban wall. Such miracles are ceas'd; and now we see No towns or houses rais'd by poetry. Yet 'tis not to adorn and gild each part; That shows more cost than art. Jewels at nose and lips but ill appear; Ratner than all things Wit, let none be there. Several lights will not be seen,

If there be nothing else between.

But you have climb'd the mountain's top, there sit Men doubt, because they stand so thick i' th' sky,

On the calm flourishing head of it,

If those be stars which pai t the galaxy.

Tis not when two like words make up one noise
(Jests for Dutch men and English boys);
In which who finds out Wit, the same may see
In an'grams and acrostic poetry:

Much less can that have any place

At which a virgin hides her face.
'Such dross the fire must purge away: 'tis just
The author blush there, where the reader must.
Tis not such lines as almost crack the stage
When Bajazet begins to rage;
Nor a tall metaphor in the bombast way;
Nor the dry chips of short-lung'd Seneca ;
Nor upon all things to obtrude

And force some odd similitude.
What is it then, which, like the power divine,
We only can by negatives define?

In a true piece of Wit all things must be,
Yet all things there agree;

As in the ark, join'd without force or strife,
All creatures dwelt; all creatures that had life:
Or, as the primitive forms of all

(If we compare great things with small)
Which, without discord, or confusion, lie
In that strange mirror of the Deity.
But Love, that moulds one man up out of two,
Makes me forget, and injure you :
I took you for myself, sure, when I thought
That you in any thing were to be taught.

Correct my errour with thy pen;
And, if any ask me then

What thing right Wit and height of genius is,
I'll only show your lines, and say, 'Tis this.

TO THE LORD FALKLAND,

FOR HIS SAFE RETURN FROM THE NORTHERN
EXPEDITION AGAINST THE SCors.

GREAT is thy charge, O North! be wise and just,
England commits her Falkland to thy trust;
Return him safe; Learning would rather choose
Her Bodley or her Vatican to lose:

All things that are but writ or printed there,
In his unbounded breast engraven are.
There all the sciences together meet,
And every art does all her kindred greet,
Yet justle not, nor quarrel; but as well
Agree as in some common principle.
So, in an army govern'd right, we see
(Though out of several countries rais'd it be)
That all their order and their place maintain,
The English, Dutch, the Frenchman, and the Dane:
So thousand divers species fill the air,
Yet neither crowd nor mix confus'dly there;
Beasts, houses, trees, and men, together lie,
Yet enter undisturb'd into the eye.

And this great prince of knowledge is by Fate
Thrust into th', noise and business of a state.
All virtues, and some customs of the court,
Other men's labour, are at least his sport;
Whilst we, who can no action undertake,
Whom idleness itself might learned make;
Who hear of nothing, and as yet scarce know,
Whether the Scots in England be or no;
Pace dully on, oft tire, and often stay,
Yet see his nimble Pegasus fly away.
'Tis Nature's fault, who did thus partial grow,
And her estate of wit on one bestow;

Whilst we, like younger brothers, get at best
But a small stock, and must work out the rest.
How could he answer 't, should the state think fit
To question a monopoly of wit?

Such is the man whom we require the same
We lent the North; untouch'd, as is his fame.
He is too good for war, and ought to be
As far from danger, as from fear he's free.
Those men alone (and those are useful too)
Whose valour is the only art they know
Were for sad war and bloody battles born;
Let them the state defend, and he adorn.

ON THE DEATH OF

SIR HENRY WOOTTON. WHAT shall we say, since silent now is he Who when he spoke, all things would silent be? Who had so many languages in store, That only Fame shall speak of him in more; Whom England now no more return'd must see; He's gone to Heaven on his fourth embassy. On Earth he travell'd often; not to say H' had been abroad, or pass loose time away. In whatsoever land he chanc'd to come, He read the men and manuers, bringing home Their wisdom, learning, and their piety, As if he went to conquer, not too see. So well he understood the most and best Of tongues, that Babel sent into the West; Spoke them so truly, that he had (you'd swear) Not only liv'd, but been born every where. Justly each nation's speech to him was known, Who for the world was made, not us alone; Nor ought the language of that man be less, Who in his breast had all things to express. We say, that learning's endless, and blame Fate For not allowing life a louger date :

He did the utmost bounds of knowledge find, He found them not so large as was his mind; But, like the brave Pellæan youth, did moan Because that ́art had no more worlds than one; And, when he saw that he through all had past, He dy'd, lest he should idle grow at last.

ON THE DEATH OF MR. JORDAN,

SECOND MASTER AT WESTMINSTER SCHOOL.

HENCE, and make room for me, all you who come
Only to read the epitaph on this tomb!
Here lies the master of my tender years,
The guardian of my parents' hope and fears;
Whose government ne'er stood me in a tear ;
All weeping was reserv'd to spend it here.
Come hither, all who his rare virtues knew,
And mourn with me: he was your tutor too.
Let's join our sighs, till they fly far, and shew
His native Belgia what she's now to do.
The league of grief bids her with us lament;
By her he was brought forth, and hither sent
In payment of all men we there had lost,
And all the English blood those wars have cost.
Wisely did Nature this learn'd man divide;
His birth was theirs, his death the mournful pride
Of England; and, t' avoid the envious strife
Of other lands, all Europe had his life,

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