3. Now we have gain'd we must not stop and sleep Out all the rest of our mysterious reign It is as hard and glorious to keep A victory as it is to obtain 4. Nay to what end did we once barter Minds Onely to know and to neglect the claim Or like some Wantons our Pride pleasure finds To throw away the thing at which we aim 5. If this be all our Friendship does design We covet not enjoyment then but power To our Opinion we our Bliss confine And love to have but not to smell the flower 6. Ah! then let Misers bury thus their Gold Who though they starve no farthing wil produce But we lov'd to enjoy and to behold And sure we cannot spend our stock by use 7. Think not 't is needless to repeat desires The fervent Turtles alwayes court and bill And yet their spotless passion never tires But does increase by repetition still 8. Although we know we love yet while our Soul Is thus imprisoned by the Flesh we wear There 's no way left that bondage to controul But to convey transactions through the Ear. 9. Nay though we reade our passions in the Eye It will oblige and please to tell them too Such joys as these by motion multiply Were 't but to find that our Souls told us true 10. Believe not then that being now secure Of either's heart we have no more to doe The Spheres themselves by motion do endure And they move on by Circulation too 11. And as a River when it once hath paid The tribute which it to the Ocean owes Stops not but turns and having curl'd and play'd On its own waves the shore it overflows 12. So the Soul's motion does not end in bliss But on her self she scatters and dilates And on the Object doubles still by this She finds new joys which that reflux creates 13. But then because it cannot all contain It seeks a vent by telling the glad news First to the Heart which did its joys obtain Then to the Heart which did those joys produce 14. When my Soul then doth such excursions make Unless thy Soul delight to meet it too What satisfaction can it give or take Thou being absent at the interview 15. 'T is not Distrust for were that plea allow'd Letters and Visits all would useless grow Love whose expression then would be its cloud And it would be refin'd to nothing so 16. If I distrust 't is my own worth for thee 'T is my own fitness for a love like thine And therefore still new evidence would see T' assure my wonder that thou canst be mine 17. But as the Morning-Sun to drooping Flowers As weary Travellers a Shade do find As to the parched Violet Evening-showers Such is from thee to me a Look that 's kind 18. But when that Look is drest in Words 't is like The mystick pow'r of Musick 's union Which when the Finger doth one Viol strike The other 's string heaves to reflection 19. Be kind to me and just then to your love To which we owe our free and dear Converse And let not tract of Time wear or remove It from the privilege of that Commerce 20. Tyrants do banish what they can't requite But let us never know such mean desires But to be grateful to that Love delight Which all our joys and noble thoughts inspires LX. La Grandeur d'esprit A Chosen Privacy a cheap Content And all the Peace a Friendship ever lent A Rock which civil Nature made a Seat A Willow that repels the mid-day heat The beauteous quiet of a Summer's day A Brook which sobb'd aloud and ran away Invited my Repose and then conspir'd To entertain my Phancie that retir'd As Lucian's Ferry-man aloft did view The angry World and then laugh'd at it too So all its sullen Follies seem to me But as a too-well acted Tragedy One dangerous Ambition doth befool Another Envies to see that man Rule One makes his Love the Parent of his Rage For private Friendship publickly t' engage And some for Conscience some for Honour die And some are merely kill'd they know not why More different then mens faces are their ends Whom yet one common Ruine can make Friends Death Dust and Darkness they have only won And hastily unto their Periods run Death is a Leveller Beauty and Kings And Conquerours and all those glorious things Are tumbled to their Graves in one rude heap Like common dust as common and as cheap At greater Changes who would wonder then Since Kingdoms have their Fates as well as men They must fall sick and die nothing can be In this World certain but uncertainty Since Pow'r and Greatness are such slippery things who 'd pity Cottages or envy Kings Now least of all when weary of deceit The World no longer flatters with the Great Though such Confusions here below we find As Providence were wanton with Mankind Yet in this Chaos some things do send forth Like Jewels in the dark a Native worth He that derives his high Nobility Not from the mention of a Pedigree Who thinks it not his Praise that others know His Ancestors were gallant long agoe Who scorns to boast the Glories of his bloud And thinks he can't be great that is not good Who knows the World and what we Pleasure call Yet cannot sell one Conscience for them all Who hates to hoard that Gold with an excuse For which he can find out a nobler use Who dares not keep that Life that he can spend To serve his God his Country and his Friend Falshood and Flattery doth so much hate He would not buy ten Lives at such a rate Whose Soul then Diamonds more rich and clear Naked and open as his face doth wear Who dares be good alone in such a time When Vertue 's held and punish'd as a Crime Who thinks dark crooked Plots a mean defence And is both safe and wise in Innocence Who dares both fight and die but dares not fear Whose only doubt is if his cause be clear Whose Courage and his Justice equal worn Can dangers grapple overcome and scorn Yet not insult upon a conquer'd foe But can forgive him and oblige him too Whose Friendship is congenial with his Soul Who where he gives a heart bestows it whole Whos 's other ties and Titles here do end Or buried or completed in the Friend Who ne're resumes the Soul he once did give While his Friend's Company and Honour live And if his Friend's content could cost the price Would count himself a happy Sacrifice Whose happy days no Pride infects nor can His other Titles make him slight the man No dark Ambitious thoughts do cloud his brow Nor restless cares when to be Great and how Who scorns to envy Truth where e're it be But pities such a Golden Slavery With no mean fawnings can the people court Nor wholly slight a popular report Whose house no Orphan groans do shake or blast Nor any riot of help to serve his taste
forgiven and our stars appeased Your Mercy which no Malice could destroy Shall first bestow and then instruct our Joy For bounteous Heav'n hath in your Highness sent Our great Example Bliss and Ornament VIII On the Death of the Illustrious Duke of Gloucester GReat Glou'ster's dead and yet in this we must Confess that angry Heaven is wise and just We have so long and yet so ill endured The woes which our offences had procured That this new stroke would all our strength destroy Had we not known an intervall of Joy And yet perhaps this stroke had been excused If we this intervall had not abused But our Ingratitude and Discontent Deserv'd to know our mercies were but lent And those complaints Heav'n in this rigid fate Does first chastise and then legitimate By this it our Divisions does reprove And makes us joyn in grief if not in love For Glorious Youth all Parties do agree As in admiring so lamenting thee The Soveraign Subject Foreiners delight Thou wert the universal Favourite Not Rome's belov'd and brave Marcellus fell So much a Darling or a Miracle Though built of richest bloud and finest earth Thou hadst a heart more noble then thy birth Which by th' afflictive changes thou didst know Thou hadst but too much cause and time to shew For when Fate did thy Infancy expose To the most barbarous and stupid Foes Yet thou didst then so much express the Prince As did even them amaze if not convince Nay that loose Tyrant whom no bound confin'd Whō neither Laws nor Oaths nor Shame could bind Although his Soul was then his Look more grim Yet thy brave Innocence half softened him And he that Worth wherein thy Soul was drest By his ill-favour'd clemency confest Lessening the ill which he could not repent He call'd that Travel which was Banishment Escap'd from him thy Trials were encreas'd The scene was chang'd but not the danger ceas'd Now from rough Guardians to Seducers gone Those made thy Temper these thy Judgmt known Whil'st thou the noblest Champion wert for Truth Whether we view thy Courage or thy Youth If to foil Nature and Ambition claims Greater reward then to encounter Flames All that shall know the story must allow A Martyr's Crown prepared for thy brow But yet thou wert suspended from thy Throne Til thy Great Brother had regain'd his own Who though the bravest Suff'rer yet even he Could not at once have mist his Crown and Thee But as Commission'd Angels make no stay But having done their errand go their way So thy part done not thy restored State The future splendour which did for thee wait Nor that thy Prince and Countrey must mourn for Such a Support and such a Counsellor Could longer keep thee from that bliss whence thou Look'st down with pity on Earth's Monarchs now Where thy capacious Soul may quench her thirst And Younger Brother may inherit first While on our King Heav'n does this care express To make his Comforts safe he makes them less For this successful Heathens use to say It is too much great Gods send some allay IX To Her Royal Highness the Duchess of York on her commanding me to send her some things that I had written TO you whose Dignity strikes us with aw And whose far greater Judgment gives us law Your Mind being more transcendent then your State For while but Knees to this Hearts bow to that These humble Papers never durst come near Had not your pow'rful Word bid them appear In which such majesty such sweetness dwells As in one act obliges and compells None can dispute commands vouchsaf'd by you What shall my fears then and confusion doe They must resign and by their just pretence Some value set on my obedience For in Religious Duties 't is confest The most Implicite are accepted best If on that score your Highness will excuse This blushing tribute of an artless Muse She may encourag'd by your least regard Which first did worth create and then reward At modest distance with improved strains That Mercy celebrate which now she gains But should you that severer justice use Which these too prompt Approches may produce As the swift Doe which hath escaped long Believes a Vulgar hand would be a wrong But wounded by a Prince falls without shame And what in life she loses gains in fame So if a Ray from you chance to be sent Which to consume and not to warm is meant My trembling Muse at least more nobly dies And falls by that a truer sacrifice X. On the Death of the Queen of Bohemia ALthough the most do with officious heat Onely adore the Living and the Great Yet this Queen's Merits Fame hath so far spread That she rules still though dispossest and dead For losing one two other Crowns remain'd Over all hearts and her own griefs she reign'd Two Thrones so splendid as to none are less But to that third which she does now possess Her Heart and Birth Fortune so well did know That seeking her own fame in such a Foe She drest the spacious Theatre for the fight And the admiring World call'd to the sight An Army then of mighty Sorrows brought Who all against this single Vertue fought And sometimes stratagems and sometimes blows To her Heroick Soul they did oppose But at her feet their vain attempts did fall And she discovered and subdu'd them all Till Fortune weary of her malice grew Became her Captive and her Trophee too And by too late a suit begg'd to have been Admitted Subject to so brave a Queen But as some Hero who a field hath wone Viewing the things he had so bravely done When by his spirit's flight he finds that he With his own Life must buy the Victory He makes the slaughter'd heap that next him lies His Funeral Pile and then in triumph dies So fell this Royal Dame with conquering spent And left in every breast her monument Wherein so high an Epitaph is writ As I must never dare to copy it But that bright Angel which did on her wait In fifty years contention with her fate And in that office did with wonder see How great her troubles how much greater she How she maintain'd her best Prerogative In keeping still the power to Forgive How high she did in her Directions go And how her Condescension stoop'd as low With how much Glory she had ever been A Daughter Sister Mother Wife and Queen Will sure employ some deathless Muse to tell Our children this instructive Miracle Who may her sad Illustrious Life recite And after all her Wrongs may doe her Right XI On the 3. of September 1651. AS when the glorious Magazine of Light Approches to his Canopy of Night He with new splendour clothes his dying Rayes And double brightness to his Beams conveys And as to brave and check his ending fate Puts on his highest looks in 's lowest state Drest in such terrour as to make us all Be Anti-Persians and adore his Fall Then quits the
prevents his Enemies For he can neither envy nor despise But in the beauty of his ordered Mind Doth still a new rich satisfaction find Innocent Epicure whose single breast Can furnish him with a continual feast A Prince at home and Sceptres can refuse Valuing onely what he cannot lose He studies to doe good a man may be Harmless for want of Opportunity But he 's industrious kindness to dispence And therein onely covets eminence Others do court applause and fame but he Thinks all that giddy noise but Vanity He takes no pains to be observ'd or seen While all his acts are echoed from within He 's still himself when Company are gone Too well employ'd ever to be alone For studying God in all his volumes he Begins the business of Eternity And unconcern'd without retains a power To suck like Bees a sweet from ev'ry flower And as the Manna of the Israelites Had several tastes to please all Appetites So his Contentment is that catholick food That makes all states seem fit as well as good He dares not wish nor his own fate propound But if God sends reads Love in every wound And would not lose for all the joys of Sense The glorious pleasures of Obedience His better part can neither change nor lose And all God's will can bear can doe can chuse LXXIII Death 1. HOw weak a Star doth rule Mankind Which owes its ruine to the same Causes which Nature had design'd To cherish and preserve the frame 2. As Commonwealths may be secure And no remote Invasion dread Yet may a sadder fall endure From Traitors in their bosom bred 3. So while we feel no violence And on our active Health do trust A secret hand doth snatch us hence And tumbles us into the dust 4. Yet carelesly we run our race As if we could Death's summons wave And think not on the narrow space Between a Table and a Grave 5. But since we cannot Death reprieve Our Souls and Fame we ought to mind For they our Bodies will survive That goes beyond this stayes behind 6. If I be sure my Soul is safe And that my Actions will provide My Tomb a nobler Epitaph Then that I onely liv'd and dy'd 7. So that in various accidents I Conscience may and Honour keep I with that ease and innocence Shall die as Infants go to sleep LXXIV To the Queen's Majesty on her late Sickness and Recovery THe publick Gladness that 's to us restor'd For your escape from what we so deplor'd Will want as well resemblance as belief Unless our Joy be measur'd by our Grief When in your Fever we with terrour saw At once our Hopes and Happiness withdraw And every crisis did with jealous fear Enquire the News we scarce durst stay to hear Some dying Princes have their Servants slain That after death they might not want a Train Such cruelty were here a needless sin For had our fatal Fears prophetick been Sorrow alone that service would have done And you by Nations had been waited on Your danger was in ev'ry Visage seen And onely yours was quiet and serene But all our zealous Grief had been in vain Had not Great Charles's call'd you back again Who did your suff'rings with such pain discern He lost three Kingdoms once with less concern Lab'ring your safety he neglected his Nor fear'd he Death in any shape but this His Genius did the bold Distemper tame And his rich Tears quench'd the rebellious Flame At once the Thracian Hero lov'd and griev'd Till he his lost Felicity retriev'd And with the moving accents of his wo His Spouse recover'd from the shades below So the King's grief your threatned loss withstood Who mourn'd with the same fortune that he woo'd And to his happy Passion we have been Now twice oblig'd for so ador'd a Queen But how severe a Choice had you to make When you must Heav'n delay or Him forsake Yet since those joys you made such haste to find Had scarce been full if he were left behind How well did Fate decide your inward strife By making him a Present of your Life Which rescu'd Blessing we must long enjoy Since our Offences could it not destroy For none but Death durst rival him in you And Death himself was baffled in it too FINIS Errata For Rosannia read Rosania throughout Pag. 81. for Bodiscist read Bodidrist LXXV Upon Mr. Abraham Cowley's Retirement ODE I. NO no unfaithful World thou hast Too long my easie Heart betray'd And me too long thy Foot-ball made But I am wiser grown at last And will improve by all that I have past I know'twas just I should be practis'd on For I was told before And told in sober and instructive lore How little all that trusted thee have won And yet I would make haste to be undone Now by my suff'ring I am better taught And shall no more commit that stupid fault Go get some other Fool Whom thou mayst next cajole On me thy frowns thou dost in vain bestow For I know how To be as coy and as reserv'd as thou 2. In my remote and humble seat Now I 'm again possest Of that late fugitive my Breast From all thy tumults and from all thy heat I le find a quiet and a cool retreat And on the Fetters I have worn Look with experienc'd and revengeful scorn In this my sov'raign Privacy 'T is true I cannot govern thee But yet my self I may subdue And that 's the nobler Empire of the two If ev'ry Passion had got leave Its satisfaction to receive Yet I would it a higher pleasure call To conquer one then to indulge them all 3. For thy inconstant Sea no more I 'le leave that safe and solid Shore No though to prosper in the cheat Thou shouldst my Destiny defeat And make me be Belov'd or Rich or Great Nor from my self shouldst me reclaim With all the noise and all the pomp of Fame Judiciously I 'le thee despise Too small the Bargain and too great the Price For them to cozen twice At length this secret I have learn'd Who will be happy will be unconcern'd Must all their Comfort in their Bosom wear And seek their treasure and their power there 4. No other Wealth will I aspire But of Nature to admire Nor envy on a Laurel will bestow Whil'st I have any in my Garden grow And when I would be Great 'T is but ascending to a Seat Which Nature in a lofty Rock hath built A Throne as free from trouble as from guilt Where when my Soul her wings does raise Above what Worldlings fear or praise With innocence and quiet pride I 'le sit And see the humble Waves pay tribute to my feet O Life Divine when free from joys diseas'd Not always merry but 't is always pleas'd 5. A Heart which is too great a thing To be a Present for a Persian King Which God himself would have to be his Court Where Angels would officiously resort From its own height should much decline If this Converse it should resign Ill-natur'd World for thine Thy unwise rigour hath thy Empire lost It hath not onely set me free But it hath made me see They onely can of thy possession boast Who do enjoy thee least and understand thee most For lo the Man whom all Mankind admir'd By ev'ry Grace adorn'd and ev'ry Muse inspir'd Is now triumphantly retir'd The mighty Cowley this hath done And over thee a Parthian Conquest won Which future Ages shall adore And which in this subdues thee more Then either Greek or Roman ever could before FINIS