Almighty Spirit! Thou that by
Set turns and changes from Thy high
And glorious throne dost here below
Rule all, and all things dost foreknow!
Can those blind plots we here discuss
Please Thee, as Thy wise counsels us?
When Thou Thy blessings here doth strow,
And pour on earth, we flock and flow,
With joyous strife and eager care,
Struggling which shall have the best share
In Thy rich gifts, just as we see
Children about nuts disagree.
Some that a crown have got and foil'd
Break it; another sees it spoil'd
Ere it is gotten. Thus the world
Is all to piecemeals cut, and hurl'd
By factious hands. It is a ball
Which Fate and force divide 'twixt all
The sons of men. But, O good God!
While these for dust fight, and a clod,
Grant that poor I may smile, and be
At rest and perfect peace with Thee!
CASIMIRUS, [LYRICORUM] LIB. II. ODE VII.
It would less vex distressèd man
If Fortune in the same pace ran
To ruin him, as he did rise.
But highest States fall in a trice;
No great success held ever long;
A restless fate afflicts the throng
Of kings and commons, and less days
Serve to destroy them than to raise.
Good luck smiles once an age, but bad
Makes kingdoms in a minute sad,
And ev'ry hour of life we drive,
Hath o'er us a prerogative.
Then leave—by wild impatience driv'n,
And rash resents—to rail at heav'n;
Leave an unmanly, weak complaint
That death and fate have no restraint.
In the same hour that gave thee breath,
Thou hadst ordain'd thy hour of death,
But he lives most who here will buy,
With a few tears, eternity.
CASIMIRUS, [LYRICORUM] LIB. III. ODE XXII.
Let not thy youth and false delights
Cheat thee of life; those heady flights
But waste thy time, which posts away
Like winds unseen, and swift as they.
Beauty is but mere paint, whose dye
With Time's breath will dissolve and fly;
'Tis wax, 'tis water, 'tis a glass,
It melts, breaks, and away doth pass.
'Tis like a rose which in the dawn
The air with gentle breath doth fawn
And whisper to, but in the hours
Of night is sullied with smart showers.
Life spent is wish'd for but in vain,
Nor can past years come back again.
Happy the man, who in this vale
Redeems his time, shutting out all
Thoughts of the world, whose longing eyes
Are ever pilgrims in the skies,
That views his bright home, and desires
To shine amongst those glorious fires!
CASIMIRUS, LYRIC[ORUM] LIB. III. ODE XXIII.
'Tis not rich furniture and gems,
With cedar roofs and ancient stems,
Nor yet a plenteous, lasting flood
Of gold, that makes man truly good.
Leave to inquire in what fair fields
A river runs which much gold yields;
Virtue alone is the rich prize
Can purchase stars, and buy the skies.
Let others build with adamant,
Or pillars of carv'd marble plant,
Which rude and rough sometimes did dwell
Far under earth, and near to hell.
But richer much—from death releas'd—
Shines in the fresh groves of the East
The phœnix, or those fish that dwell
With silver'd scales in Hiddekel.
Let others with rare, various pearls
Their garments dress, and in forc'd curls
Bind up their locks, look big and high,
And shine in robes of scarlet dye.
But in my thoughts more glorious far
Those native stars and speckles are
Which birds wear, or the spots which we
In leopards dispersèd see.
The harmless sheep with her warm fleece
Clothes man, but who his dark heart sees
Shall find a wolf or fox within,
That kills the castor for his skin.
Virtue alone, and nought else can
A diff'rence make 'twixt beasts and man;
And on her wings above the spheres
To the true light his spirit bears.
CASIMIRUS, [LYRICORUM] LIB. IV. ODE XV.
Nothing on earth, nothing at all
Can be exempted from the thrall
Of peevish weariness! The sun,
Which our forefathers judg'd to run
Clear and unspotted, in our days
Is tax'd with sullen eclips'd rays.
Whatever in the glorious sky
Man sees, his rash audacious eye
Dares censure it, and in mere spite
At distance will condemn the light.
The wholesome mornings, whose beams clear
Those hills our fathers walk'd on here,
We fancy not; nor the moon's light
Which through their windows shin'd at night
We change the air each year, and scorn
Those seats in which we first were born.
Some nice, affected wand'rers love
Belgia's mild winters, others remove,
For want of health and honesty,
To summer it in Italy;
But to no end; the disease still
Sticks to his lord, and kindly will
To Venice in a barge repair,
Or coach it to Vienna's air;
And then—too late with home content—
They leave this wilful banishment.
But he, whose constancy makes sure
His mind and mansion, lives secure
From such vain tasks, can dine and sup
Where his old parents bred him up.
Content—no doubt!—most times doth dwell
In country shades, or to some cell
Confines itself; and can alone
Make simple straw a royal throne.
CASIMIRUS, [LYRICORUM] LIB. IV. ODE XIII.
If weeping eyes could wash away
Those evils they mourn for night and day,
Then gladly I to cure my fears
With my best jewels would buy tears.
But as dew feeds the growing corn,
So crosses that are grown forlorn
Increase with grief, tears make tears' way,
And cares kept up keep cares in pay.
That wretch whom Fortune finds to fear,
And melting still into a tear,
She strikes more boldly, but a face
Silent and dry doth her amaze.
Then leave thy tears, and tedious tale
Of what thou dost misfortunes call.
What thou by weeping think'st to ease,
Doth by that passion but increase;
Hard things to soft will never yield,
'Tis the dry eye that wins the field;
A noble patience quells the spite
Of Fortune, and disarms her quite.
THE PRAISE OF A RELIGIOUS LIFE BY MATHIAS CASIMIRUS. [EPODON ODE III.]
IN ANSWER TO THAT ODE OF HORACE, BEATUS ILLE QUI PROCUL NEGOTIIS, &c.
Flaccus, not so! that worldly he
Whom in the country's shade we see
Ploughing his own fields, seldom can
Be justly styl'd the blessed man.
That title only fits a saint,
Whose free thoughts, far above restraint
And weighty cares, can gladly part
With house and lands, and leave the smart,
Litigious troubles and loud strife
Of this world for a better life.
He fears no cold nor heat to blast
His corn, for his accounts are cast;
He sues no man, nor stands in awe
Of the devouring courts of law;
But all his time he spends in tears
For the sins of his youthful years;
Or having tasted those rich joys
Of a conscience without noise,
Sits in some fair shade, and doth give
To his wild thoughts rules how to live.
He in the evening, when on high
The stars shine in the silent sky,
Beholds th' eternal flames with mirth,
And globes of light more large than Earth;
Then weeps for joy, and through his tears
Looks on the fire-enamell'd spheres,
Where with his Saviour he would be
Lifted above mortality.
Meanwhile the golden stars do set,
And the slow pilgrim leave all wet
With his own tears, which flow so fast
They make his sleeps light, and soon past.
By this, the sun o'er night deceas'd
Breaks in fresh blushes from the East,
When, mindful of his former falls,
With strong cries to his God he calls,
And with such deep-drawn sighs doth move
That He turns anger into love.
In the calm Spring, when the Earth bears,
And feeds on April's breath and tears,
His eyes, accustom'd to the skies,
Find here fresh objects, and like spies
Or busy bees, search the soft flow'rs,
Contemplate the green fields and bow'rs,
Where he in veils and shades doth see
The back parts of the Deity.
Then sadly sighing says, "O! how
These flow'rs with hasty, stretch'd heads grow
And strive for heav'n, but rooted here
Lament the distance with a tear!
The honeysuckles clad in white,
The rose in red, point to the light;
And the lilies, hollow and bleak,
Look as if they would something speak;
They sigh at night to each soft gale,
And at the day-spring weep it all.
Shall I then only—wretched I!—
Oppress'd with earth, on earth still lie?"
Thus speaks he to the neighbour trees,
And many sad soliloquies
To springs and fountains doth impart,
Seeking God with a longing heart.
But if to ease his busy breast
He thinks of home, and taking rest,
A rural cot and common fare
Are all his cordials against care.
There at the door of his low cell,
Under some shade, or near some well
Where the cool poplar grows, his plate
Of common earth without more state
Expect their lord. Salt in a shell,
Green cheese, thin beer, draughts that will tell
No tales, a hospitable cup,
With some fresh berries, do make up
His healthful feast; nor doth he wish
For the fat carp, or a rare dish
Of Lucrine oysters; the swift quist
Or pigeon sometimes—if he list—
With the slow goose that loves the stream,
Fresh, various salads, and the bean
By curious palates never sought,
And, to close with, some cheap unbought
Dish for digestion, are the most
And choicest dainties he can boast.
Thus feasted, to the flow'ry groves
Or pleasant rivers he removes,
Where near some fair oak, hung with mast,
He shuns the South's infectious blast.
On shady banks sometimes he lies,
Sometimes the open current tries,
Where with his line and feather'd fly
He sports, and takes the scaly fry.
Meanwhile each hollow wood and hill
Doth ring with lowings long and shrill,
And shady lakes with rivers deep
Echo the bleating of the sheep;
The blackbird with the pleasant thrush
And nightingale in ev'ry bush
Choice music give, and shepherds play
Unto their flock some loving lay!
The thirsty reapers, in thick throngs,
Return home from the field with songs,
And the carts, laden with ripe corn,
Come groaning to the well-stor'd barn.
Nor pass we by, as the least good,
A peaceful, loving neighbourhood,
Whose honest wit, and chaste discourse
Make none—by hearing it—the worse,
But innocent and merry, may
Help—without sin—to spend the day.
Could now the tyrant usurer,
Who plots to be a purchaser
Of his poor neighbour's seat, but taste
These true delights, O! with what haste
And hatred of his ways, would he
Renounce his Jewish cruelty,
And those curs'd sums, which poor men borrow
On use to-day, remit to-morrow!
AD FLUVIUM ISCAM.
Isca parens florum, placido qui spumeus ore
Lambis lapillos aureos;
Qui mæstos hyacinthos, et picti
ἄνθεα
tophi
Mulces susurris humidis;
Dumque novas pergunt menses consumere lunas
Cœlumque mortales terit,
Accumulas cum sole dies, ævumque per omne
Fidelis induras latex;
O quis inaccessos et quali murmure lucos
Mutumque solaris nemus!
Per te discerpti credo Thracis ire querelas
Plectrumque divini senis.
VENERABILI VIRO PRÆCEPTORI SUO OLIM ET SEMPER COLENDISSIMO MAGISTRO
MATHÆO HERBERT.
Quod vixi, Mathæe, dedit pater, hæc tamen olim
Vita fluat, nec erit fas meminisse datam.
Ultra curasti solers, perituraque mecum
Nomina post cineres das resonare meos.
Divide discipulum: brevis hæc et lubrica nostri
Pars vertat patri, posthuma vita tibi.
PRÆSTANTISSIMO VIRO THOMÆ POËLLO IN SUUM DE ELEMENTIS OPTICÆ
LIBELLUM.[56]
Vivaces oculorum ignes et lumina dia
Fixit in angusto maximus orbe Deus;
Ille explorantes radios dedit, et vaga lustra
In quibus intuitus lexque, modusque latent.
Hos tacitos jactus, lususque, volubilis orbis
Pingis in exiguo, magne[57] Poëlle, libro,
Excursusque situsque ut Lynceus opticus, edis,
Quotque modis fallunt, quotque adhibenda fides.
Æmula Naturæ manus! et mens conscia cœli.
Ilia videre dedit, vestra videre docet.
AD ECHUM.
O quæ frondosæ per amœna cubilia silvæ
Nympha volas, lucoque loquax spatiaris in alto,
Annosi numen nemoris, saltusque verendi
Effatum, cui sola placent postrema relatus!
Te per Narcissi morientis verba, precesque
Per pueri lassatam animam, et conamina vitæ
Ultima, palantisque precor suspiria linguæ.
Da quo secretæ hæc incædua devia silvæ,
Anfractusque loci dubios, et lustra repandam.
Sic tibi perpetua—meritoque—hæc regna juventa
Luxurient, dabiturque tuis, sine fine, viretis
Intactas lunæ lachrymas, et lambere rorem
Virgineum, cœlique animas haurire tepentis.
Nec cedant ævo stellis, sed lucida semper
Et satiata sacro æterni medicamine veris
Ostendant longe vegetos, ut sidera, vultus!
Sic spiret muscata comas, et cinnama passim!
Diffundat levis umbra, in funere qualia spargit
Phœnicis rogus aut Pancheæ nubila flammæ!
THALIA REDIVIVA.
1678.
TO THE MOST HONOURABLE AND TRULY NOBLE HENRY, LORD MARQUIS AND EARL OF
WORCESTER, &c.
My Lord,
Though dedications are now become a kind of tyranny over the peace and
repose of great men; yet I have confidence I shall so manage the present
address as to entertain your lordship without much disturbance; and
because my purposes are governed by deep respect and veneration, I hope
to find your Lordship more facile and accessible. And I am already
absolved from a great part of that fulsome and designing guilt, being
sufficiently removed from the causes of it: for I consider, my Lord,
that you are already so well known to the world in your several
characters and advantages of honour—it was yours by traduction, and the
adjunct of your nativity; you were swaddled and rocked in't, bred up and
grew in't, to your now wonderful height and eminence—that for me under
pretence of the inscription, to give you the heraldry of your family, or
to carry your person through the famed topics of mind, body, or estate,
were all one as to persuade the world that fire and light were very
bright bodies, or that the luminaries themselves had glory. In point of
protection I beg to fall in with the common wont, and to be satisfied by
the reasonableness of the thing, and abundant worthy precedents; and
although I should have secret prophecy and assurance that the ensuing
verse would live eternally, yet would I, as I now do, humbly crave it
might be fortified with your patronage; for so the sextile aspects and
influences are watched for, and applied to the actions of life, thereby
to make the scheme and good auguries of the birth pass into Fate, and a
success infallible.
My Lord, by a happy obliging intercession, and your own consequent
indulgence, I have now recourse to your Lordship, hoping I shall not
much displease by putting these twin poets into your hands. The minion
and vertical planet of the Roman lustre and bravery, was never better
pleased than when he had a whole constellation about him: not his
finishing five several wars to the promoting of his own interest, nor
particularly the prodigious success at Actium where he held in chase the
wealth, beauty and prowess of the East; not the triumphs and absolute
dominions which followed: all this gave him not half that serene pride
and satisfaction of spirit as when he retired himself to umpire the
different excellencies of his insipid friends, and to distribute laurels
among his poetic heroes. If now upon the authority of this and several
such examples, I had the ability and opportunity of drawing the value
and strange worth of a poet, and withal of applying some of the
lineaments to the following pieces, I should then do myself a real
service, and atone in a great measure for the present insolence. But
best of all will it serve my defence and interest, to appeal to your
Lordship's own conceptions and image of genuine verse; with which so
just, so regular original, if these copies shall hold proportion and
resemblance, then am I advanced very far in your Lordship's pardon: the
rest will entirely be supplied me by your Lordship's goodness, and my
own awful zeal of being, my Lord,
Your Lordship's most obedient,
most humbly devoted servant,
J. W.
TO THE READER.
The Nation of Poets above all Writers has ever challenged perpetuity of
name, or as they please by their charter of liberty to call it,
Immortality. Nor has the World much disputed their claim, either easily
resigning a patrimony in itself not very substantial; or, it may be, out
of despair to control the authority of inspiration and oracle. Howsoever
the price as now quarrelled for among the poets themselves is no such
rich bargain: it is only a vanishing interest in the lees and dregs of
Time, in the rear of those Fathers and Worthies in the art, who if they
know anything of the heats and fury of their successors, must extremely
pity them.
I am to assure, that the Author has no portion of that airy happiness to
lose, by any injury or unkindness which may be done to his Verse: his
reputation is better built in the sentiment of several judicious
persons, who know him very well able to give himself a lasting monument,
by undertaking any argument of note in the whole circle of learning.
But even these his Diversions have been valuable
with the matchless
Orinda; and since they deserved her esteem and commendations, who so
thinks them not worth the publishing, will put himself in the opposite
scale, where his own arrogance will blow him up.
I. W.
TO MR. HENRY VAUGHAN THE SILURIST: UPON THESE AND HIS FORMER POEMS.[58]
Had I ador'd the multitude, and thence
Got an antipathy to wit and sense,
And hugg'd that fate, in hope the world would grant
'Twas good affection to be ignorant;[59]
Yet the least ray of thy bright fancy seen,
I had converted, or excuseless been.
For each birth of thy Muse to after-times
Shall expiate for all this Age's crimes.
First shines thy Amoret, twice crown'd by thee,
Once by thy love, next by thy poetry;
Where thou the best of unions dost dispense,
Truth cloth'd in wit, and Love in innocence;
So that the muddy lover may learn here,
No fountains can be sweet that are not clear.
There Juvenal, by thee reviv'd, declares
How flat man's joys are, and how mean his cares;
And wisely doth upbraid[60] the world, that they
Should such a value for their ruin pay.
But when thy sacred Muse diverts her quil
The landscape to design of Sion's hill,[61]
As nothing else was worthy her, or thee,
So we admire almost t' idolatry.
What savage breast would not be rapt to find
Such jewels in such cabinets enshrin'd?
Thou fill'd with joys—too great to see or count—
Descend'st from thence, like Moses from the Mount,
And with a candid, yet unquestion'd awe
Restor'st the Golden Age, when Verse was Law.
Instructing us, thou so secur'st[62] thy fame,
That nothing can disturb it but my name:
Nay, I have hopes that standing so near thine
'Twill lose its dross, and by degrees refine.
Live! till the disabusèd world consent
All truths of use, of strength or ornament,
Are with such harmony by thee display'd
As the whole world was first by number made,
And from the charming rigour thy Muse brings
Learn, there's no pleasure but in serious things!
Orinda.
UPON THE INGENIOUS POEMS OF HIS LEARNED FRIEND, MR. HENRY VAUGHAN, THE
SILURIST.
Fairly design'd! to charm our civil rage
With verse, and plant bays in an iron age!
But hath steel'd Mars so ductible a soul,
That love and poesy may it control?
Yes! brave Tyrtæus, as we read of old,
The Grecian armies as he pleas'd could mould;
They march'd to his high numbers, and did fight
With that instinct and rage, which he did write.
When he fell lower, they would straight retreat,
Grow soft and calm, and temper their bold heat.
Such magic is in Virtue! See here a young
Tyrtæus too, whose sweet persuasive song
Can lead our spirits any way, and move
To all adventures, either war or love.
Then veil the bright Etesia, that choice she,
Lest Mars—Timander's friend—his rival be.
So fair a nymph, dress'd by a Muse so neat,
Might warm the North, and thaw the frozen Gete.
Tho. Powell, D.D.
TO THE INGENIOUS AUTHOR OF THALIA REDIVIVA.
Ode I.
Where reverend bards of old have sate
And sung the pleasant interludes of Fate,
Thou takest the hereditary shade
Which Nature's homely art had made,
And thence thou giv'st thy Muse her swing, and she
Advances to the galaxy;
There with the sparkling Cowley she above
Does hand in hand in graceful measures move.
We grovelling mortals gaze below,
And long in vain to know
Her wondrous paths, her wondrous flight:
In vain, alas! we grope,[63]
In vain we use our earthly telescope,
We're blinded by an intermedial night.
Thine eagle-Muse can only face
The fiery coursers in their race,
While with unequal paces we do try
To bear her train aloft, and keep her company.
II.
The loud harmonious Mantuan
Once charm'd the world; and here's the Uscan swan
In his declining years does chime,
And challenges the last remains of Time.
Ages run on, and soon give o'er,
They have their graves as well as we;
Time swallows all that's past and more,
Yet time is swallow'd in eternity:
This is the only profits poets see.
There thy triumphant Muse shall ride in state
And lead in chains devouring Fate;
Claudian's bright Phœnix she shall bring
Thee an immortal offering;
Nor shall my humble tributary Muse
Her homage and attendance too refuse;
She thrusts herself among the crowd,
And joining in th' applause she strives to clap aloud
III.
Tell me no more that Nature is severe,
Thou great philosopher!
Lo! she has laid her vast exchequer here.
Tell me no more that she has sent
So much already, she is spent;
Here is a vast America behind
Which none but the great Silurist could find.
Nature her last edition was the best,
As big, as rich as all the rest:
So will we here admit
Another world of wit.
No rude or savage fancy here shall stay
The travelling reader in his way,
But every coast is clear: go where he will,
Virtue's the road Thalia leads him still.
Long may she live, and wreath thy sacred head
For this her happy resurrection from the dead.
N. W., Jes. Coll., Oxon.
TO MY WORTHY FRIEND, MR. HENRY VAUGHAN THE SILURIST.
See what thou wert! by what Platonic round
Art thou in thy first youth and glories found?
Or from thy Muse does this retrieve accrue?
Does she which once inspir'd thee, now renew,
Bringing thee back those golden years which Time
Smooth'd to thy lays, and polish'd with thy rhyme?
Nor is't to thee alone she does convey
Such happy change, but bountiful as day,
On whatsoever reader she does shine,
She makes him like thee, and for ever thine.
And first thy manual op'ning gives to see
Eclipse and suff'rings burnish majesty,
Where thou so artfully the draught hast made
That we best read the lustre in the shade,
And find our sov'reign greater in that shroud:
So lightning dazzles from its night and cloud,
So the First Light Himself has for His throne
Blackness, and darkness his pavilion.
Who can refuse thee company, or stay,
By thy next charming summons forc'd away,
If that be force which we can so resent,
That only in its joys 'tis violent:
Upward thy Eagle bears us ere aware,
Till above storms and all tempestuous air
We radiant worlds with their bright people meet,
Leaving this little all beneath our feet.
But now the pleasure is too great to tell,
Nor have we other bus'ness than to dwell,
As on the hallow'd Mount th' Apostles meant
To build and fix their glorious banishment.
Yet we must know and find thy skilful vein
Shall gently bear us to our homes again;
By which descent thy former flight's impli'd
To be thy ecstacy and not thy pride.
And here how well does the wise Muse demean
Herself, and fit her song to ev'ry scene!
Riot of courts, the bloody wreaths of war,
Cheats of the mart, and clamours of the bar,
Nay, life itself thou dost so well express,
Its hollow joys, and real emptiness,
That Dorian minstrel never did excite,
Or raise for dying so much appetite.
Nor does thy other softer magic move
Us less thy fam'd Etesia to love;
Where such a character thou giv'st, that shame
Nor envy dare approach the vestal dame:
So at bright prime ideas none repine,
They safely in th' eternal poet shine.
Gladly th' Assyrian phœnix now resumes
From thee this last reprisal of his plumes;
He seems another more miraculous thing,
Brighter of crest, and stronger of his wing,
Proof against Fate in spicy urns to come,
Immortal past all risk of martyrdom.
Nor be concern'd, nor fancy thou art rude
T' adventure from thy Cambrian solitude:
Best from those lofty cliffs thy Muse does spring
Upwards, and boldly spreads her cherub wing.
So when the sage of Memphis would converse
With boding skies, and th' azure universe,
He climbs his starry pyramid, and thence
Freely sucks clean prophetic influence,
And all serene, and rapt and gay he pries
Through the ethereal volume's mysteries,
Loth to come down, or ever to know more
The Nile's luxurious, but dull foggy shore.
I. W., A.M. Oxon.
CHOICE POEMS ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS.
TO HIS LEARNED FRIEND AND LOYAL FELLOW-PRISONER, THOMAS POWEL OF
CANT[REFF], DOCTOR OF DIVINITY.