The Infancy of the World
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The source of this document is the Early English Books Online (EEBO-TCP) website. Those books were transcribed in a character for character manner and can be very cumbersome to read since there was no standard spelling during that time. Many spelling variations such as "unlesse", "vnlesse", and "vnles" regularly appear.
This project was conceived to clean up those books as much as possible and make them more accessible to the interested reader, leading to the creation of a massive list of variant spellings and their corrections. This was used to clean up the text, but is of course only as complete as the list itself. Because of the nature of the original transcription, some words have missing characters or places where the original language (e.g., Greek) was not transcribed. This effort does not change that. Be aware that the original transcription can also be faulty and in some cases entire sentences may be missing.
Although this is no substitute for a properly compared, proofed, and scholarly edition, I believe that the result is a document which is far more accessible, particularly for searching for terms using standard spelling. The document has been cleaned and presented in what I hope is a pleasing and useful format for the vast majority of Christian brothers and sisters who just want access to read these spiritually nourishing works.
However, a word of warning: The Puritans were a very diverse group of people and their age was characterized with godliness, but also much upheaval, disputation and strife. They disagreed on many doctrines and some of these works contain less orthodox or Scriptural views than others. The reader is strongly advised to read with discernment, particularly if it is unknown whether author is trustworthy.
This project took a huge amount of time and skill to bring to fruition. I would particularly like to thank David Jonescue for the initial list of Puritans he found on EEBO and the concept behind this project as well as the continuous, unceasing efforts toward seeing this complete. Without his labor, this would not be available. Alex Sarrouf was invaluable in providing the initial list of over 7,000 spelling variations he had identified and corrected, as well as continuing to review more than 16,000 additions to that list for any typos.
Logan West
(with David Jonescue and Alex Sarrouf)
www.puritansearch.org
ΚΟΣΜΟΒΡΕΦΙΑ, OR THE INFANCY OF THE WORLD: With an Appendix of God's resting day, Ed • n Garden; Mans Happiness before, Misery after, his Fall.
Whereunto is added, The Praise of Nothing; Divine Ejaculations; The four Ages of the world; The Birth of Christ;
Also a Century of Historical Applications; With a Taste of Poetical FICTIONS.
Written some years since by N. B. then of Eaton School;
And now published at the request of his Friends.
London, Printed for Robert Crofts, and are to be sold at his Shop at the Crown in Chancery Lane, under Sergea • ts Inn, 1658.
Basilius Seluciensis:
Deus cùm res creatas in morem scalae adaptaverit, per cas sui amantibus, ascensum ad se extruxit.
Sermon p • imo.
Basilius Magnus:
Deus fecit mundum: ut bonus, utilem: ut sapiens, pulcherimum: ut poten • , maximum.
Si haec didicerimus, nos ipsos agnoscemus, D • um cognoscemus, conditorem adorabimus, Domino serviemus, patrem glorificabimus, nutricium diligemus, benefactorem reverebimur, authorem praesentis et futurae v • tae colere nunquam desinemus. In Hexametr • .
Augustinus.
Interrogavi molem mundi, dic mihi, esne tu deus meus? et respon • it voice forti: Non sum Deus tuus, sed per ipsum ego sum: quem quaer • s in me, ipse fecit te et me, et cum quaere supra te et supra me.
In solil • qūijs.
Pro. 16. 4. The Lord hath made all things for himself.
Pro. 3. 19. The Lord by wisdom hath founded the Earth, by understanding hath he established the Heavens.
Psal. 8, 1. O Lord our God, how excellent &c.
To the Right Honorable, FRANCIS ROUS, Esq; Provost of Eaton Coll. and one of the Council to his Highness the Lord Protector: N. B. wisheth increase of grace, and peace, in Christ here; and everlasting glory hereafter.
Right HONORABLE,
JT is now six years complete, since I was through your favor, removed from my late reverend fathers side; and placed in that Famous, and flourishing School of Eaton: from whence, after somc continuance there, having not the happiness (nor was I alone) to be transplanted elsewhere, in a College of the same foundation: whither want of learning, or somewhat else, as much (what if I say more?) looked upon by many nowadays, or both, were impediments? I shall not now stand to determine; but sure I am, though I could be so forward as the best, yet was I as ardently desirous after knowledge as the most, and happily, I may truly say of others, what I should blush to say of myself; that in them was verified that of the Poet Juvenal,
Haud facile emergunt quorum virtutibus obstat
Res angusta domi.
Can virtue be advanced? now, virtue's poor;
Thou bring'st naught (friend) go get thee out of door.
Neither doth it now repent me of going into that Labyrinth, though I could not get out by the same clue: for I confess it hath much bettered my knowledge, in the finding out many difficult intricacies in the most useful tongues. And that I might not be ungrateful unto you by whom I have profited, I thought it not amiss (especially knowing you to be affected with Poetry) to present you, for a new-years gift, these first fruits gathered at play-times there; they being the recreative condiments to my Philological Studies; humbly craving your Honors acceptance of them: And although they are not so fair, nor so ripe for your sake as I could wish them, yet are they as good as the third Lustrum of mine age was then able to produce, which I hope may render them the more pardonable, if they taste harsh and untoothsome. I cannot but say they are too mean to stand in competition with so great a favor; yet I conceive they may serve as well as the best, to testify my unwillingness to stifle your name in the River Lethe, or to rake up the glowing embers of the encourageing bounty of my honorable Maecenas, in the ashes of Oblivion: My Muse therefore having nothing else, leaves these leafes with you as a concise Epitomie of the voluminous thankfulness own you by
Canterb. Dec. 29. 1656.
Sir,
Your Honors obliged servant, and daily Orator. NICH: BILLINGSLY.
To the Candid Reader,
Gentle Reader,
I Little thought when first I composed these few lines, that they should ever appear in public view; but thy kind entertainment of my first Pilgrim that adventured abroad into the world, hath emboldened me (my friends likewise, whom I have cause to honor) very much encouraging me thereunto, to thrust upon thee this second also, which how well thou wilt use I know not, for that I must stand to thy courtesy; But I tell thee this beforehand, thou must not expect here any strong lines, high tow'ri •• fancies, and soaring inventions, which were (when I penned this) inconsistent with my boyish years. If the natures of Wells, Rivers, Fountains, Springs, Trees, Plants, Flowers, Birds, Beasts, Fishes, Starrs &c. delight thee to know, thou hast them here set down as well as I could, and I wish they were better for thy sake then they are: although, I must needs say, I colected them for mine own pleasure and profit: For the first I found no better remedy to rouse myself out of my dumpish malencholy (to which I was naturally inclined) then a fit of Poetry. For the second I conceived that my digesting into a little room what I found scatered here and there in divers Authors, touching this subject (which is so exceeding comprehensive) might be advantageous to my memory in the retaining of the several Species of things created, and that so my soul might rise up to a higher pitch, in admiring at the All creators glory. Thus (Reader) dost thou see how I aimed at mine own ends in scribbling this Tractate. Now my desire is thou mayest find the same ends in reading of it, that the Lyricks words might be made good in me;
Aut prodesse volunt &c.
To profit or delight, Poets take care;
Or to do both at once, delighted are,
Thy friend to serve thee if thou pleasest. N. B.
The Worlds Creation, sung by Mr. Nicholas Billingsly, at fifteen years of Age.
PEace to
Du Bartas
Ghost: no murders here,
Or should we touch our dear dead
Sylvester
Would vocal blood out murder murder cry,
With witnesses in gules, 'gainst
Billingsl
•
?
No, no great souls, your weeks all years out-run,
And like your world wait on C
•
nflag
•
ation.
At first divinest love with brooding wings
Made warm the worlds great egg, in which all things
Like Atoms slept until th' Eternal one
Old nothing wakened to perfection.
Since when some wits at
Mose
•
bush took light,
Enough to blind the dim▪ey▪d Stagyrite:
And by their numbers taught Philosophy;
How, when began the worlds E
•
iphanic.
Amongst the r
•
st our friend not past fifteen,
Who from his girdle upward's, epicene;
Apollo-like,
without a beard, nor can
His doubtful chin betray him to be man.
This Cockrel-muse betimes in his own morn,
Hath clap'd his wings, and sung the World is born.
Wl: Jacob. 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
To my friend the Author of this Book cui Titulus est Κοσμοβρεφία
Non sat erat legisse semel, bis terque libellum,
Ipse quater legi, lectus & usque iuvat.
Dull Panigericks are not worth a rush,
Good wine will sell without an Ivy bush;
A well compacted Poem will invite
Each Readers palate, whet the appetite:
A comely feature needs no paint, and where
Bright
Sol
doth shine, we need no Tapers there.
Then take this Nothing naked as it is,
A Metaphisick, Hymn, or Genesis:
Du Bartus
first, (let
Bartas
have his due)
Imparted to us what
Sylvester
knew.
My learned friend well mounted, ergo bolder,
Upon
Du Bartas
and
Sylvester
's shoulder,
Did
(Janus
like) look backward and before
And saw as much as all the rest, or more:
Nay pregnant he, before his glass had run
Full fifteen winters, was the Muses Son;
Of nothing, he could something then indite,
To non-plus him that was the Stagyrite.
O cursed Heretics! who dare to tell
A race of men, before the first man fell:
Read but this Book thou wilt believe as soon,
Phantastick world's created in the Moon.
Edvardus Brown Cantuar. Reg. Scho. Archi-didasc.
Januar. 1. 5656.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 — —
God, the most great and mighty Architect,
Did all of naught, but his own love, erect;
And by the pleasure of hi
•
free good will,
With wondrous works the heaven and earth did fill
And on each creature in this Universe,
Did strange and sundry natural gifts disperse:
His boundless power, the dead from ground can raise
And out of Sucklings mouths doth perfect praise:
Wisdom he gives to men of elder years,
And it in very young ones oft appear
•
:
Witness the Author of this worthy Book,
Who at his age of fifteen undertook
This his industrious and painful task,
God's wonders great in nature to unmasque:
Wherein the reader may his soul delight
Of God himself in having some sweet sight:
Which should the heart to be set on him move,
For his great goodness, wisdom, power and love.
Amic • suo Authore amore nec non affinitate conjunctissimo.
Ternis rem grandem verbis, includere dictus
Unus erat Patrum; sit tria verba liber:
Seria mira bonis ponis graviter que libelum
Musa dat; exiguum nec sale mole carens.
Tho: Wotton.
To my Son (in Law) upon his Poem.
A
Silly Ass for some disaster,
Reprov'd the madness of his Master:
And shall not I speak now in season,
Who am a man endued with reason;
Especially when God appears
So merciful to tender years;
In that he would his praise be sung
By one that was exceeding young;
To teach us how to bless his name,
Who all-things did of nothing frame:
My prayers shall still to God be sent,
To bless his little instrument.
John Stodder.
To my dear Brother the Author of this Book called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 .
WHat write so well as this, and but fifteen?
How ripe art thou in wit? in years how green?
In the
Aurora
of thine age, betimes,
How expert art thou in composing Rhimes?
My Muse (alas!) scarce ever could aspire
To make a verse;
Apollo
and his Lyre
Are strangers to me; on the forked hill
I never slumbered; never bath'd my Quill
In Hipocrene: but having read thy Book
Of the Worlds birth, my Pen in hand I took,
And went to write, indeed, I could not choose
But make a verse, inspired by thy Muse.
I well remember what a deal a do
I ma
•
e to fumble out a verse or two.
When on
Apollo,
and the triple Trine,
I only did reply for Discipline;
Worth's in thy Book, and what care I who know it,
Love wings my Muse; 'tis love makes me a Poet▪
John Billingsly.
To my good friend Mr. Nicholas Billingsly in Honor of this work, penned by him about the fifteenth year of his age.
GOd that did all things out of Nothing raise,
And hath from mouths of Babes ordained his praises
When thou wast nothing but a suckling Muse.
The Chaos of a man, he did infuse
His grace so in thy heart, that thou in verse
Didst portray out his glorious universe:
To sing his praises, he did make thy Pen
Distil celestcal Nectar: yea, and when
Thou wert a stripling he did then adorn
Thy fruitful head with th' Amalthean horn.
Thou like another Grand-seir, to each creature
Hast given a name according to its Nature:
Of Trees, Plants, Stones, their secret mysteries
Of Beasts, and Birds thou writest plain Histories:
Whiles others af thine Age misspent their times
In toys and pastimes, thou in sacred Rhimes
Applid'st thyself to celebrate the praise
Of God that first hath lent unto thee days:
And if such fruit thy tender buds bring forth,
In riper age admired shall be thy worth.
Jo: Swan. Cleric.
Ian: 20. 1656.
To my friend the Author, on his Poem entitled 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 ,
WHen I survey thy well-composed piece
I stand amazed at thy rare Artifice
Thy curious Pencil guided by a hand
More skillful then
Apelles
could command,
Hath, to the gre
•
test Artists emulation,
A stately Landskip of the Worlds Creation,
Drawn to the life: my friend each polished line
Is guilded over with eloquence divine:
Which feeds with loftier Ayers, juditious ears
Then those causd by the motion of the Spheres.
I will only aedd, by way of approbation,
Thy serious work's an heavenly Recreation,
Francis Taylor.
Cant. Jan. 1. 1656.
To his very loving friend, M • . Nicholas Billingsly, on his accurate Poem.
ATomes, say some, by chance together thrown
The world was made of: sure had they but known
Of this its nobler birth, not one would dare
To say that chance could make it half so fair.
Here Epicurus who i
•
s Picture drew,
•
n lines like his opinion seldom true,
In this composed piece, might at one sight
Have seen to set both verse and judgment right▪
Thus Sir, takeing the blot from Poetry,
In this you make both it and truth agree.
D. R. Col. Mert
In amici sui opus exquisitum Κοσμοβρεφίαν.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
,
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
;
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
Jo: Cox. E Coll. Mer • ▪ O • on nuper Et • nens •• ▪
In Amici sui meri • isim • : Nicholas Billingsly amaenam Κοσμοβρεφίας Synopsin Carmen Encomiasticon, Januar. 16. 1657.
In nova fert animus Lector? novus iste libellus
Mira quidem dictu, sed nova sacra tenet.
Protulit ex nihilo divina potentia cuncta:
Infantem Mundum, Musa tenella cannot;
Musa diu la
•
itans haec, Etonensis Alumni,
Proripit in lucem; dant tria lustra senem.
Accipias lectu dignissima carmina; fructus
Si ribi; & Authori laus; honor atque D
•
o.
On the same:
Those various Species which thine eye may look
Upon in the' Volumne of the worlds gr
•
at Book,
Six days was Midwife too; and then God ceased
From working, yet from working doth not rest:
For he it is supporteth all things still,
By the Eternal purpose of his will.
My friend (kind Reader) sends thee nothing less
Then all-things pressing, from the sweating Press:
A work, some years ago by him compil'd,
At fitfteen years of age, a very child:
The Muses nursed him on Parnassus tops,
And filed his Quill with Heleconian drops;
Which if thou mind, I make no question of it
But thou wilt find pleasure co-chaind with profit.
Tho. Carter. Cleric.
In Amici sui merito Charissimi Mundi Cunabula sieve Κοσμοβρεφίαν.
Carmine si molli vafrum traducere Ulyssem,
Divorum{que} Ortua, truculenta{que} Cesaris arma
Dicere Apollineis dignentur frondibus altis:
Ab Jove principium prima{que} ab origin Mundi,
Rerum primatias versu diducere causas,
Quae laus? quod decus est aeterno marmore dignum?
Scivimus Iliadas angusta in nuce coarctus;
Ast hic in parvo cernendus Cortice Mundus;
Omnia nempe tuo Serventur clausa libello;
At ne cuique nihil juste videretur abesse,
Et nihil extremum merito superadditur ipsum;
Talia si scribas aevo miranda Minori,
Q
•
anta suis tandem seris speremus ab annis.
Jo. Wind Interi. Templi alumnus et nuper in Coll: Wad: Comm • ns.
Deo Ter Opt. Max.
OH from thy Radient Throne above
Look down on me, Great God of love:
With sacred Light my Soul infuse,
And wing, for flight, mine unfledg'd Muse,
That she may like the morning Lark
Mount up and sing: Lord I am a spark;
But if thy Bellows please to blow
Me up, Oh then I needs must glow.
My God to me a Being gave,
To use those little gifts I have;
Oh may I then to after days
Make known my All-Creators praise;
As by instinct the Loadstone draws
The iron, as the Amber, straws;
So let thy grace mine heart attract,
Dear Lord! O make me have respect
To all thy righteous Laws, begin
To purge out all my dross: my Tinn
Remove far from me; Oh inflame
My frozen Spirit, to praise thy Name.
Let Heaven fill me to the brim
Above the world, Oh may I swim.
And (as it were) my soul divorce
From Transient joys: Oh steer my course
According to thy compass: Guid
My reeling Pinace, make the Tide
Tranquil, and let the milder gale
Of thy sweet Spirit, stuff my Sail,
Until I safely am arriven
At the desired Haven, Heaven;
Where I shall see the God of nature,
And always praise the worlds Creator.
The Worlds Infancy.
The Argument.
God begins the Worlds Creation,
Light from out of darkness brings.
Giving wondrous Operation,
To Wells, Rivers, Fountaixs, Springs.
SECT. I.
GOd, when besides himself there nothing was;
But a rude Chaos, a confused Mass,
Of things disordered; all together hurled,
Did by his providence ordain the world.
And first his, power, and coelestial might,
Clear light extracted, from the shades of night,
Then did he spread a glorious Curtain out,
Spangled with Starrs, and glory round about,
Embost with pearl, embroidered with gold,
With Chrysolits, and Carbuncles enrould.
O work to be admired; what pen? what story!
Can point▪ can blazon the Almighty's glory.
I wanting Eagles eyes, am over-daz'd,
With too great light and winking stand amazed,
Thus, thus, heavens Architect by's word of power,
Ed
•
ficated the ae
•
herial Tower,
The Mass he dissipating, drew from thence,
The Center of the va
••
Circumference,
The so
•
id substance altogether clung,
And by g'ome
•
rica proportion hung,
In figure of a Sp
•
aer; this naked globe
He circumvested in a sea green robe,
The Elements, Earth, Water, Ayer, and Fire,
Took each their station, Vu
•
can did aspire
To the sublimest Orb, Jove next in power
Predomi
•
ates: next him, the watery Bower,
Of curl'd-hair Neptune stands and last of all
Doth drossy
Vesta
to the bottom fall:
V
•
sta
's inthron'd,
Vesta
that doth adorn,
Her breasts wi
•
h flowers, and her lap with corn,
Vesta
si
•
k
•
down beneath her brothers sway
Being of more solidity then they▪
The dry▪ and humid, heavy, and the light,
Soft▪ hard, b'ing opposites do disunite.
Wet things with wet, cold things cōmix with cold,
Hot things with hot, do correspondence hold.
From the Seas raging Tyranny, the Land
Is kept (Oh power) with slipp'ry walls of sand.
Had the Sea leave to rāge beyond its bound
Earth'
•
Fabric would (undoubtedly) be drowned;
But the Almighty's force of arms asswage
Th'impetuous threats of her imperious rage:
The Sea (now mild) engirds the earth abou
•
,
And like a Snake goes wriggling in and out:
The M
•
rine Empress lib'rally bestows
Her store, and into divers Channels flows.
A River in the late world brought to light
Runs all the day, and resteth all the night.
Conspicuous silver waved Euphrates,
P
•
yes tribute to the domineering seas,
The streams of Tanais, transparent Po
And clear Erid'nus, from the Ocean go.
The rive
•
Erax, and the swift Meander,
Whose winding Mazes in and out do wander,
(Much like the Lab'rinth of fair
Rosamond
Or that Daedalian frame which did abscond
The monstrous Minotaur, in former days
So intricate for their retorted ways)
Niphates
bringing Tigers up and
Phasis
Fall on and Court with amorous embraces
The fair Queen
Glance;
nimble-footed Rhene
Whose earth-dividing course both run between
The Belgians, and the Germans, hath its motion
From Phorbas, Phorbas Kingling of the Ocean.
The Amazonian Thermodontin brooks,
And Oax also to the Ocean looks.
The river Jordan is a stream compounded
Of Jor and Dan, by cursed
Asphaltis
bounded.
Gold-sanded Tagus, and the bow-string Tybur,
Yellow Pactolus, and Cantabrian Iber,
Take from the Seas their rise, the flowing Ganges,
With wandering current through the orient ranges
Septemfluous Nile, and Armenian Tigris,
Libanian Jordan, Aquitanian Ligris,
Arcadian Ladon, and the Thuscian Arne,
The Thracian Stroymon, the Campanian Sarne,
Rhone, Incest, Lister, and the Marsyan tydes,
Flow from, and to, the swelling Oceans sides:
Caucasian Indus, which receiveth plenty
Of pleasant rivers wanting one of twenty.
And what doth Simois? and what Matrona,
But wait and tend upon the Queen
Diona?
All rivers in the world, or small or mighty
Derive their lineage, from great Amphitrite,
Hence comes our British Severn, Wye, Lugg, Umber
And thousands too innumerous for number.
But stay my Muse thou hadst almost forgot
The Kentish Medway one of greatest note
Next to that famous navigable Thames
Whose breasts are silv'red with compounded streams
Which bear up floating houses, what a train
Of lusty watermen doth Thames maintain?
Who though with rapid force they are backwards hurled
Yet are they often forwards in the world.
Great London is the Bow, the Thames the string
The Boats are arrows which about do spring
The Streams Sabbatical do rest and stay.
In observation of the Sabbath day.
Add here the German Savenire Pouhont,
And med'cinable Spa in great account
For its effecting strange unheard of things,
Unparalel'd by none unless the springs
Of Tunbridg famous in our Kentish county,
For casting up their subterraneous bounty,
Which relishing of Iron, and sulph'ry veins
Cures well nigh all infirmities and pains,
Nay lengthens life causing the fates tounspin
Lifes drawn out thread, hath any got the spleen?
The dropsy? the vertigo? or the stone?
These waters will yield remedy alone.
Suppose th'art Lunatick, or Planet struck,
Hear's that will help thee, if thou hast the luck
To come and take it, is it thine endeavor
To be rid of the Collick or the feavour,
Or the Obstructions of the Mesentery,
Reines, Melt, and liver? wouldest thou fain be merry
And freed from Melancholy? if you pleas
•
To use these waters, doubtless, you will have ease;
Gouts Ischyatica's, the French-man's pox,
And what flows from Pandora's opened box
These Springs resist, and for your comfort here
Green sickness, Maids, a remedy is near.
And you, disheartened Sarah's, do but come
And drink, and you will have an enlarged womb.
In brief, to cure all maladies, there dwells
A Sovereign virtue in these Tunbridge Wells.
Nor must I leave those Bristol Baths which are
For their effects so wonderful, so rare.
All Aches Cramps, Convulsions▪ (and what not?)
Dy in those waters naturally hot.
Well, I cou
•
d wish those Authors of disorders
T
•
o much increased in those B
•
istoll borders
I mean that frantic self-afflicting crew
Of trembling Quakers, with their Captain too
Tongue-bored Nailor, branded in the forehead
W
•
th B for blasphemy, were in those torrid
And
•••
lding Currents forced to stand awhile
My Ge
•
ius tells me they'd at last recoil
〈◊〉
fond conceits, and soon be a forsaking
Their censuring others, and give over Quaking.
The ub'rous fountains and each conduit brings
Its store of water from their bubbling springs,
Of
Neptune
's stock
Acidalus
came down,
Yielding her store, to the Baeotian Town.
So Aganippe is a sacred fountain,
U
•
'd by the Ladies of the by-fork'd mountain,
And Arethusa, whose mellifluous womb
Is sweet, nay sweeter then the honey-comb.
What should I speak of th' Hippocrenian Well?
And what shall I of the Clitorian tell?
The first whereof the Muses haunt a brook
The hoof of winged Pegasus hath struck
The other Fount, (it seems to me divine,)
Can make men sober when ore took with wine,
The Well Telpissa, is so cold so chill
That it
Tyresia,
(as they say) did kill,
Th' Ammonian Fount, is cold and hot by turns
Cold in the day, and in the night it burns.
'It is said the sportfull Eleusinian spring,
Will dance when shepherds are disposed to sing,
Clarean a Well (for it there needs no strife,)
Doth lengthen eloquence, but shortens life,
Sweet Helicon's a consecrated Well.
To th'Muses, in it do the Muses dwell.
Phineus, a Well, is wholesome in the day
To drink, but hurtful in the night (men say)
The fount Cabura yields a fragrant smell,
The well Halcyon, danceth very well,
Cilician Cydnus, cures the gout. the spring
Leucoges eye sight to the blind doth bring,
Cyzices quencheth hot Idalian fire,
A draught of Lycus causeth life toexpire.
All things do in the gulf of Sylla sink.
The Stream Anyger, casts a loathsome stink:
Azanium is a Well which doth incline,
Bacchus
his Genial Friends to loath all wine.
Athamas water setteth wood on fire
Making the kindled flames for to aspire.
There are a number more which he that looks
Shall find set down in Learned Authors Books,
My Muse hath touched the chiefest she hath read,
And tired with search, discretion calls to bed.
The Argument.
God doth in a lib'ral measure,
Furnish these inferior Bowers
With a large unsumm'd up treasure,
Of Trees, and Fruits, Plants and Flowers.
SECT. 2.
AS soon as God's all pow'rful hand had laid
The worlds foundation, to the earth he said,
Lay by thy mournful weeds, unite thy powers,
And make a garland of the choicest flowers,
Embost with Gems, and Diamonds; then crown
Thy front, and put on an Embroider'd gown,
Nay and the more thy glory for to grace,
With liveliest colors beautify thy face.
Put one thy Periwig, all fruits, plums, pears,
Shall hang like Jewels, dangling in thine ears.
With that arose this new proclaimed Queen,
Her Ebon mantle turned a galant green,
Befring'd with flowers; the Gorget that she wore
Was lac'd with
Flora's
pride, bestarched ore
With Deaws, and rory mists, her hand did hold
A royal Scepter made of burnish'd gold.
Rich Gems, rare Jewels, precious stones are set
Up charily in her wombs Cabinet.
This stately Empress don's her dangling T
••
sses,
And makes no more ado but tricks and dr
•
sses
Her wanton bosom with delightful flowers,
'Gainst
Ioves
descending in his silver showers.
The heavens as braclets, her pure hands bedeck
The stars are Beads which go about her neck,
Her lilly neck so that fair
Uenus
seeks
Her heaven-stol'n beauty in her earthly cheeks,
Wild Ash trees from earths swelling matrice spring
The river Sallowes, fens forth Alders bring
The Mirtle loves the shore, Vines do enfold
Their arms on hills, the Yew tree haunts the cold,
The fruitful Almond from earths womb doth come
The sweet-scent Aromatick Balsamum;
The box-tree ever green, the tow'ring Cedar,
The stately Pine, which doth in height succeed her
The lovely Chery-trees sanguineous sap,
Is nourished in Demegorgon's lap,
The war used Cornell, and the M
•
st-full Beach,
The fun'ral Cypress, and the velvet Peach,
The Ambrosiack Cinnamon, the Fig,
The P
•
mpkin and the aged Oke (so big)
The Juniper which yields a fragrant smell,
And Sea green Willows on the earth do dwell.
The Daphnean Laurel tree, which doth not dread
The thund'
•
ets voice, whose hair-abounding head
Is never bald; but doth forever flourish,
Springs from the earth, it is the earth doth norish
The never fading Palms; the beauteous Fir
Streight as an arrow; and the red'lent Myrrh,
The broad branch'd Plane-tree, with his spacious leaves
The wanton Jvy which adhers and cleavs
To other Arbors, groweth everywhere,
The downy Popl
•
r, The Piram'dal Peare,
The Melt-tree, Weapons Needles Thred, affords
Clothes-Honey, Sugar, Balm, Wine, Parchment, Cords
The Vine suporting Eim, the pearly Plum,
The balefull P
••
ch-tree, sweating forth its gum.
The fulsome Bullace, and the prickly Holly,
The furr'd coat Chestnut, and the shrub Trifolly,
The golden Orange, and the plush-coat Quince,
Which ord'red well yields Marm'let for a Prince,
The shad
•
e Linden, Goosberries and Wardens,
The Mulb'ry Raspb'ry, Strawb'ry, grow in gardens
All these and many more come from the earth
Earth gives them nutriment as well as birth,
The earth, mother of all things; suckles all
Her vegetative ofsprings, great and small
At God's command Dame
Tellus
decked her bowers
With verdent herbs, and Odorif'rous Flowers,
Of sundry virtues, and of sundry hew,
Some green, some red, some yellow, white, some blew.
Here doth the
Cardu's-Benedictus
grow,
Both to the plague and stone a deadly foe:
Here jaundis-cureing, Horehound, which is good
Against the Asthma; here is Southern-wood
Good against Feavours; here the Worm-wood eases
All Surfeits, drunk'ness, Cholerick Diseases.
Cough-chasing, Rocket, Rue-expelling vapors,
Which dim the sight; the palate-pleasing Capers
Helping the Spleen; sweet-scenting Marjoram
Is here; and there the Bawm of Abraham;
Here grows the Beet; yonder the Daffadill;
And there the fragrant spreading Cammomill;
Here is Mint, Centory, and Columbine,
And there the Cowslip and the Eglantine;
See here is Ey-bright, Annis, Cumin, Carry,
Dittander there, behold the herb Cost-mary,
Here is Germander, Melilot also,
And Harts-tongue, Harts-horn, Harts-ease, there do grow
Roots white and red, and chockly, Artycocks,
Here maidens hair is,
alias,
Venus locks,
Here thriveth Hyssop, Lavender, and Sorrel,
Yonder the Night-shade, called Pety-morel,
Here Palma-Christi doth itself expand,
There Peneroyal, royaly doth stand.
Here groweth Parsly, yonder sprouteth Tansy;
And here the Lovage, yon' the Lovers Pansy.
Her's drowsy Popy, there are Dasies blowing,
And sweet Angelica is yonder growing:
Here Cic'ry springs, there Fumitory thrives,
Staves-aker lives here, that the Lowse unlives.
Here's sovr'aine Rhubarb, yonder is sweet Basil,
There Fullers herb, known by the name of Thasil,
Yonder spread Mandrakes, the neglected Nettle,
There doth its foot in Tellus bosom settle.
Here's Sav'ry, Savery, and Helebore,
(Of which they say
Anticyras
hath store)
Parsnips, and Turneps, and Potatoes too,
Coleworts, and Cabbage, and the Radish do
Rise from the ground; Elicampane, the Rape,
And all plants else have from the earth their shape
All sorts of grain Wheat, Barley, Oats, and Poder
Whose sap-less stalks the stall-fed Ox do fodder.
Burrage, and Bugloss, Fennel, Water-cresses,
Dame
Tellus
with all these her bosom dresses,
Now walk we (Reader) into Flora's Bowers,
For recreation; here are curious flowers,
To make fine Posies with; here here behold
The purple Violet, and Marigold.
Seest how these variegated beds do show
As many coulors as the Rainy Bow?
Here's choice of Pinks, & banks of Damask Roses
Their sight doth pleas our eyes, their smell, our noses
The clear faced Lily smiles, so here great store
Of Gil' flowers, Tulips, and—but what need more
In vain alas! in vain I go about
To reckon all the branches which do sprout
From out Methymna; the Hyblean Bees,
And yellow sands, near the Pactolian Seas,
Are not so numerous, the stars give place
(If numbered) to the Demegorgon's race,
'It is night, and
Titan
his refulgent beams
Doth hide their glory in the Western streams
The third day left a universal shade,
And heaven was pleased with the works he made.
The Argument.
God doth the Canopy of heaven,
With sparkling glittering Gems inlay.
The twelve signs, and planets seven.
Strange effects, the Milky way.
SECT. 3.
THe morrow after, when the light be purl'd
The yearly mantle of the new-made world;
Heavens hand, still nilling to be idle, gilded
The earths fair seeling, he before had built.
Starrs are heavens Scutchions, thick as Argus eyes
They hang, and twinckle in the marble skies
Of great or lesser magnitudes, each one
Shine like the Iacynth and the Jasper stone.
But far more glorious, yea they go beyond
The fy'ry Carbuncle, the Diamond,
And golden Crisolit, their beauty shines
So bright, nay brighter, then the wealthy Mines
Of hot Arabia, or Pactolean Seas,
The tails of Peacocks, are but toys to these,
The purple Amethist, the Hesphesite,
And costly O pall's nothing near so bright;
Earths rarest Jewels, maynit with them compare,
The costliest Gems are not so rich as they are:
These pearls which garnish the aetherial story,
Are lively emblems of their makers glory.
These glittering Sphaeres, about the axle roll
Which joins to th' Arctick and Antarctick Pole:
This part cold Boreas, and the North starr sees:
Hot Auster, vieweth the Antipodes.
The Ursa Major, and the Minor too,
Their backs turned to it, round the North Pole go:
The Dragon, which did keep through watchfulness
The golden Apples of th' Hesperides
Much like the windings of a river flows,
His widened mouth like a Charybdis shows.
Herc'les beneath him kneels, next whom the Crown
Of Ariadne, on the earth shines down.
Here Snake-engirted Serpentarius stands,
Squeezing the bending Snake in's griping hands,
Under him Scorpio exporrected lies:
There Libra's beam, turns in the Azure skies.
Arctophylax here drives his wane; in's groyne
The radiant luster of a lamp doth shine;
He treads on Virgo who a sheaf doth bear,
Next whom appeareth Berenices hair,
The great Bears hind feet, on the Lion tread,
Cancer and Gemini with his doub e head
Are next, and near to Leda's egg hatched twins
Auriga holds strong wine; close by him shines
The rainy starr of the Olenian Goat;
Jove's
nurses next Aix and Aelice note.
Here prostrate on the floor, behold a Bull,
Whose sublime horns with Starrs are beautiful:
The brood-hen or the rainy Hyades
See there, (some call them the Atlantides)
The tail of Cynosure the little Bear
Points at the widened Arms of Cepheus there,
Whose sad wife Cassiopea next complains
For her Andromeda, bound fast in chains:
Next winged Pegasus on high doth mount
Whose hoof struck whilom th' Heliconian Fount;
And just before the Dwarf in fetters bound
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
or Triangulus is found.
Two fishes, linked by their tails lie forth,
One Southward, and the other tow'rds the North,
A sword in Perseus right hand out is spread,
In's left the snaky haird Medusa'es head.
He sits among the Pleiad's, his wing'd shoes.
Most sweetly there the Lyre of Merc'ry goes.
The Armiger of
love,
spreads here her wings,
And there the Swan that her own El'gy sings.
See where swift Pegasus his mouth is placed,
There Joves Cup-bearer Ganimede is graced;
Beneath whom doth arise the Capricorn,
There Sagitarius doth the Heavens adorn,
His winged dart flies from his boisterous string
Betwixt the Eagles. and the Vulters wing.
The Dolphin last of all swims in the North,
Which saved Arion, in the Sea cast forth.
(Sweet Jesu! bear me to the Port of Zion,
Be thou my Dolphin I will be thy Arion.
Orion mounteth▪ nigh the Southerne Pole,
With golden belt begyrt; his left-foot sole:
He gently dippeth in the silver streams
Of swift Erid'nus; next the Dog-starr gleams,
Whose yelping frights the Hare; there swims the Whale.
Pegasian Argo next is under sails,
Which bore the Argonauts, and Peers of Greece,
Together with the Colchian golden fleece.
The Southern Garland, called Ixion's wheel,
Lies under horned Sagittarius heel.
Yonder is the Thuribulum divine;
There doth the Kid; and here the Centaur shine.
In folds, the truc'lent Hydra lies, enrould,
On whom stands Corvus, and a cup of gold
The Crater of the Powers: in the skies
By th'egg-hatched breth'ren, little Procyon lies.
See there the embroyred Bauldrick, and the stars
Thereon engrav'd, Supine Astronomers.
The Ram, Bull, Twins, Crab, Lion, Virgo, Scale,
Scorp, Archer, Capri. Aquar. Pisces, call:
The Ram, the Bull, the Twins, show in the Spring
Crab, Leo, Virgo, do the Sumer bring.
Scale, Scorpion, Archer, gather corn together,
Goat Gan'med, Pisces, rise in winters weather.
Six Springs, and Harvests Aequinoctials share,
Summer and winter's Solstice six declare.
Seav'n wandering Planets, you may here see soon,
Saturn, Jove, Mars, Sol, Uenus, Merc'ry, Moon.
From these alone, from these aetherial flames
The Seav'n days of the week derive their nam's,
God placed in the Firmament of heaven
These pilgrim-planets, all in number Seaven
They and the golden Bauldricks thrice four powers,
Have influence in these bodies of ours:
They rule the Head, Neck, Arms, & Brest complete.
Back, Bely, Reins, Secrets, Thighs, Knees, Legs, Feet,
Ther's many thousand nameless glittering globe,
Here inter-woven in this spangled Robe.
And in Earth's Tester, all with stars set round
The
Lactea via
of Jehovah's found:
This way doth lead to the Tribunal Throne
Of thund'ring
Jove,
this is the way alone
Conducts to bliss, if thou wilt enter in
Thy milk-white conscience must be free from sin:
The way doth lie direct, thou canst not miss:
A pure white conscience is the way to bliss,
The Argument.
The Creation of the Sun
And the Moon in full Carier,
They alternately do run
Unto either Hemisphere.
SECT. 4.
When heavens great builder had about enrould
This Marble Gallery, with studs of gold;
He made the greater, and the lesser light
Alternately to rule the Day and Night;
Illustrious Phaebus his refulgent face,
The upper and the lower world doth grace,
With equal splendor; his irradient beams
Refresheth all things; his ignivomous teams
Run restless races; his all-quickening power
Gives life and breath to every plant and flower;
Unto our sight it ev'dently appears,
His revolution makes up days and years:
He circulates in twice twelve hours time
The Universe, spends half in this our clime,
And when his Chariots rapid wheels are whirled
Into the Climates of th'inferior world;
He on the lower Hemisphere displays
His Rosy light and bright refu
•
gent rays,
Then pale-faced Phaebe riseth to fulfill
Her nightly course, ascending up the hill
Of the renoun'd Olympus, joys to spread
The glittering glory of her new-made head,
Silv'ring the world in her nocturnal race,
She reigns as Empress in her brothers place
And emulates his rays, (although more dim)
What light she hath is all derived from him;
She every month doth wax and wane and show
Now Semicircled like a half bent bow:
But when Sol doth against her full face shine,
Earth interpoz'd in the Eccliptick line;
Her round cheeks are Ecclips'd, her masked face
Admits the glory of its borrowed grace,
She wears a Cypress hood and overshrouds
Her shamfac'd count'nance, in the gloomy clouds.
This Nights fair Lady, by her influence brings
Admir'd effects to sublunary things.
O sacred prudence, every day nay hover
Sets forth the greatness of th' Almighty's power,
His power fills all things, if I tow'r the skies
I do behold it in those twinkling eyes.
Do not I see it in the burnish'd Sun,
And Moon, which round about their Circle run?
And if from heaven I to the earth descend,
Are not his wonders there without an end
Nay sails I out into the boundless Seas
God's goodness meets me; go I where I please
His mercies find me; if I take the wings
Of fair
Aurora,
if I search the springs
Of his abundant grace; and if I
•
oul
Even from the Arctick to th'Antarctick Pole.
His favors do prevent me; Sea and Land
Enrich'd are by the All-creators hand.
Dive I to the sulphureous pit of hell,
There, there th' eternal doth in Justice dwell
Look here, look there, nay turn I where I will
I see God's greatness and his goodness still.
No God's with him may equalized be;
Where is there such another God as he?
I stand amazed, on his stupendous name,
O with what words may I express the same▪
And now the Major-General of day,
(Whose eye doth all things in the world survey)
Hastens his Chariot to th' Hesperian streams,
Un-yokes his horses hides his blewing beams
In Thetis bosom; by the western Seas
He setting, riseth to th' Antipodes.
The sable Curtains of thick darkness spread
To give us notice Sol is gone to bed:
Night harnisseth her Stallions, and doth crown
Her head with popy; in a mourning gown
She widow-like appears; a leaden mace
Her sleepy hand engrasps, her steps deface
The Crystal-brow of day, and out she spreads
The spangled Orb of heaven, about the beds
Of everything that draweth breath she closes
All eyes and leaves them to their sweet reposes:
All things do sleep, the Lady of the night
Entring her brothers place, borrows his light;
Pale Luna rising from the Orient streams
Of Thetis brandisheth her trembling beams:
Th' Olimphick Tow'r sh' ambitiously aspires
Concomitated with her sister fires.
The perfect colors of all earthly things
Are hid with dim-ey'd darkness sable wings:
The fourth day left a universal shade,
And heaven was pleased with the works he made.
The Argument.
God replenisheth the waters
With innumberd living creatures,
Giving to them divers natures,
Properties, and several features.
SECT. 5.
WHen rosy-faced Aurora did unfold
Her dappled Curtains, fring'd with burnish'd gold,
And rudie
Titan
from his saffron bed
Rowzed the glory of his early head:
God spake the word, and fishes small and mighty
Furnish'd the Courts of Sea-green Amphitrite;
The family of
Neptune
soon amounted
To a great number more then can be counted.
Some of these wat'ry Citizens do love,
Salt habitations; others fresh approve.
Nature hath given to these new formed creatures,
Diversities of natures, names, and features.
The Sturgeon loves to swim against the stream;
These live in ponds, the Perch, the Roch, & Bream,
The retrograding, Crab the Canther chaste,
The Cephalus find in the Sea repast,
He hides his head then thinks himself secure,
The crafty Barble first unhooks the Lure.
"Great
Neptune
's Sea Clark called the Calamary,
"About him doth his Pen and Penknife carry.
The lowzy Arica feeds upon flesh,
The Lamp'ry, Salmon live in waters fresh.
The tongueless Carp, doth in the fish pond dwell
The eyeless Cockle walketh from his shel.
The Music charmed Dolphin, feried ore
Sea coast Arion to the wish▪d for shore.
The fish Plagusia swimeth one her sides,
The Remora resisteth winds and tides.
Large Oars stu
•
'd sails, and cleaving to a ship
Strongly and straingly stops it, if you rip
Thorn'd-foot Echinus, and him water give,
He'l reunite his parts dis-join'd and live.
The wide-mouthed Labrax ever loves to yawn:
She Pearl-fish, always leagueth with the Prawne.
Are you a hungry go and catch a Conger
What fish is larger then the Whale or longer?
His monstrous bulk doth like an Island seem,
Around enclosed in a watery stream.
The gilden Spirlings in cold winters weather,
Ly round (to keep them warm) in bals together.
The wing'd Voligo 'bove the water flies;
His head between his feet and belly lies,
The Wolf-fishc aught, ploughs with his tail the sand,
And hiding there, escapes the fishers hand.
From Margarus our Margerites do come:
The Meryx [Cow like] chews the cud say some.
When the Milvago 'bove the waves doth fly,
Tempests and storms give over immediately.
The Musculus (making his fins his Oars)
Ushers the Whale from rocky shelves & shores.
Ears to the belly of the Oysters join;
The Oxyringus eyes most brightly shine.
The Muscle and the speckled Leopard:
The Peacock swimmeth like the heaven bestarr'd
Pediculus the Dolphins parasite,
Doth in the food, the Dolphin gets, delight.
The bleating Sea calf, hath an hairy hide.
The fraud'lent Manifeet loves paciride.
Th'adultrous Sargus, the Sea grunting-hog,
The Turbet the Caerulian speckled frog.
The Scarus much delights to ruminate
The Scolopender swal'wing hook and bait
Vomits his bowels? having loss'd the hook
It slips them in again and is not took.
The Stockfish is a fish that will not boil
Unless you beat it with a stick a while
The bane-tooth'd Cuttle nigh destructions brink
Absconds her body with effused ink,
Which while it dazleth the poor fishers eyes
From the surprizer then escapes the prize.
The water's scale-backed golden-coated Ape,
Is like the earths in color and in shape.
The Star-fish, by a natural instinct
Burneth what e're it toucheth; would you thinkit?
It is said the Cramp fish will benum the hands
Of him that fisheth, and a distance stands.
The Lampreys life within her tail doth lie:
From Purple-fishes comes our purple dy.
Nature doth the Amphibious Sea-calf give,
By water and by land full leave to live,
She breeds upon the land and by degrees
Her young sh' accustoms to the briny Seas.
A thousand colors (ifit be true) 'tis strange
(As in Hyena's) in her eyes do range.
The Sea grape squezed in the Vintage press,
Of Wine will take away the irksomeness.
The skin of Pompilous makes many a thong
Of a great value ever-during strong.
Th' Adult'rous Sargus changing mates behorns
The pates of He-Goats which before had horns.
Th' Vranoscop, always his eyes round balls
Bands (as it were) against th' aetherial walls.
Lexus a fish is enemy to man,
And man to him, both are each others bane.
And thou Thymalus, left almost behind,
What fish more precious then thy noble kind?
Can anything in sweetness thee excel?
Yields any odour a more fragrant smell?
Above all fishes thou deserve'st the Palme,
In that thou breathest like Arabian balm.
The wry-mouthed Plais, the Whiting, & the Mackrel:
The slippry Eel, the Lobster, and the Cackrel
Making the eater laxative; the Trout,
The Herring King of fish, the Flownder, Pout,
The Wraith, the Gudgeon, and the boneless Seal,
And more there are, whose names I must conceal;
A world of Paper, and a Sea of Ink,
Would scarce suffice to hold them all I think.
But ah! what do we? we must hast to th'shore
The winds do rise, the waves begin to roar:
Let's tack about, and strive the land to gain,
Enough of roaming on the foaming main.
Hark! Cliô hark! behold the warbling Choir,
Call thee to play upon thine Iv'ry Lyre.
The Argument.
Heer there is a winged nation
Wandering in the fields and groves,
All of one kind keep, their fashion,
God his fifth days work approves.
SECT. 5.
Now on the feather'd fowls bestow thine eyes,
(Kind reader) and observe their properties.
Mark how they fly and cut the flitting air,
These clap their wings, and those do quite contrair
Some run upon the ground, and some always
Do leap from bough to bough from spray to spray,
These are delighted in the shady gtove;
Whilst others in the open champion rove.
Some choose to fly on high, and some as low,
And some do fly as swift as others go.
These hop about, while others love to sing
The praises of their everlasting King:
Some deserts haunt, some take a pride to show
Their 'pinions color'd like the rainy bow.
The silvan Choristers in various notes.
Send out sweet Carrols from their mus' call throats
The warbling Philomel her Sonnets sings,
So shril that at the sound each forest
•
ings.
The milk-white Swan the river swims along,
Dying, sings sweetest, her Elegious song.
The pretty Linne
•
, and the whistling Thrush,
And Mavis chaunt in every thorny bush
Eare▪charming Ditties, and in ample st
•
ry
Devulge the greatness of their makers glory.
Nature to speak the Cissa doth inveigle
'It is strange to think how the Majestick Eagle
The Armiger of
Jove,
with percing eye
Dares to coufront the Sun's coruscancy.
Amongst these aiery Citizens we find
The Cipphos tost with every gust of wind
The gaggling-Goose, the G
•
ssing, & the Gander;
The brood-hen clucking, to and fro do wander:
Th' indulgent Stork most gratefuly doth feed
His aged parents, in their time of need:
He b
•
oods and carries them; the kissing Dove
Always lives single, having lost her love:
Th' Hedg Sparrow norisheth the Cucko's eggs.
The bird Apodes useth not his legs.
Hast thou the Iaundice? Icterus but eye,
And thou wilt recover but the bird will dy.
The stately Cock, with his elated Crest
Comes stalking on, new rowzed from his rest,
His tail advanced, with a clear voice he crows,
He daunts the Lion and the light foreshowes,
Fair weather follows when the Cranes soar high
Fowl weather follows when a pace they fly.
The greedy Corm'rant seeing storms before,
With clam'rous noise doth hasten to the shore.
The Cat faced melancholy Owl doth hollow
The swift wing'd lofty winding garr'lous swallow
Sings as she flies; this Herald of the spring,
From frozen winter flies with speedy wing.
The great Be backward flies, the Black-Bird loves
To lead a solitary life in groves.
The Chough's fair body is about enroul'd
With plumes of silver, mixed with plums of gold.
The gnat-devouring Bat suckles her brood,
And shreds (for she hath teeth) her gotten food.
The prattling Parrot with his opned beak
In human language takes a pride to speak.
The Pel'can
•
ares her breast her young ones slain;
And with her blood reviveth them again.
The chat'ring Py foretelling guests are near.
The chirping Sparrowes under house eves are.
The scent-strong Vulter in his flight most slow,
Loves Carrion touching not what mortals sow;
Five hundred miles doth putred Carrion smell
(If all be true Historians do tell)
The inauspicious Crow, th' unluckie Kite.
The witless Woodcock, and the simple Snite:
The long-neck'd hern, the wadling duck, & widgeon
The gold-finch, bull-finch, chaffinch & the pidgeon
The Lapwing, Wagtail, Feildfare, and the Stare.
The pleasant Phesant and the Partridg rare.
The Kestrel, Martin, Puet and the Plover,
The Rook, the Titmouse, up and down do hover.
The Robin-red-breast flieth too and fro,
The Red-shank, Red-start and the Red-tail too.
The rav'nous Raven and the prattling Iay,
Proud of his borrowed plums, his plums so gay.
The Iron eating Corp'sent Estrich runs
As swift as doth a horse, Spinturus shuns
No sacred place, for she a burning cole
Hath from the Alters very often stole.
The envious Peacock hideth out of spite
His med'cinable dung from human sight:
Treads softly like a thief, but from his throat
Yels out a horible Tartarian note;
A pride he takes in flinging up his head,
And doth abroad his starie spangles spread.
The Be with laden thighs doth whom return
With prudent art doth tare the honey-comb
With flowery Tyhme (oh admirable thing!)
So loud a humming voice, so stiff a sting.
Plant-wasting Locusts which without wings fly,
The Moth, the Hornet, Butterfly, and Fly?
The golden coloured Cantharides
Are styled infects; I may add to these
Th' industrious Silk-worm which of Thisbian rine
And leaves; for nobles silken-sleeves doth twine.
Next in my way the Indian Griffin flies,
With's snow-white wings; his fierce and fiery eyes
Even dazzle mine; four feet he doth not lack
A purp
•
e belly and a cole black back;
His hindmost part is fashioned like a Lion,
His unked talents tare what he doth fly on.
And lastly, although last of all, not least
Th' Arabian Phenix passeth all the rest:
The rarest bird that under heaven flies,
Glory's enthroned in her sparkling eyes.
A golden collar goeth round her neck:
A Purple color doth her body deck;
A goodly tail she bears: a plumy crown
Upon her head appears; a scarlet down
Adornes her back: search throughout every clime
You will find one only living at one time.
Six hundred years she lives then being old
Builds her a nest, a nest she doth infold
With fragrant Cassia, Cinnamon, and Myr
•
h,
And such l
•
ke Aromatick sprigs, tointerr
Her self therein; she makes hir self an Urn
And fi'ry Titan with his rays doth burn
(His rags reflecting on her lab'ring wings)
The crazy Phenix; from whose ashes springs
A little worm crawling in fun'ral spices,
And from that worm another Phenix rises.
When God created had all winged creatures
Divers for natures, discrepant in features,
And gave them power with their nimble wings
To soar alof
•
, above terestrial thin
•
s:
The fifth day left a universal shade,
And heaven was pleased with the works he made.
The Argument.
Go
•
cre
•
ts beasts great and small,
And appoi
•
ts their habitation,
On the earth, earth feeds them all
All affords us admiration.
SECT. 7.
NOw radient Sol his morning beams displaies
Gilding the mountains with his pregnant rays.
Th' Almighty God, he, who alone is able
T' accomplish all things; furnisheth the Table
Of earths fair parlor, with a sumptuous feast,
Against the coming of some Lordly guest.
The earth, the d
•
m of all things, forth doth bring
Millions of creatures, every creeping thing
The earth doth suckle, 'tis the earth doth breed
A world of hungry animals to feed
On her provisions, every kind of beast
Draws life (as well the greatest as the least)
From her exub'rant breast; seest how the Fawns
Do skip and frisk about the lovely Lawns.
The keen-tusk'd salvage Macedonian Bore:
The greedy Wolf (t' whom Lambs are an ey-sore)
The yoke-fit heifer, and the ubr'ous Cow,
The horse, true drudg, to the laborious plough
The slow pac'd burden-bearing long-ear'd Ass
And bastard Mules do crop the tender grass.
The gen'rous Spaniel, and the faithful Dog,
The belly-grunting mire-delighting hog.
The Leopard famous for his speckled coat.
The tim'rous Coney and the browsing Goat.
The stinking Pole-Cat, and the mouzing Cat,
Which sees as well by night as day the Rat
That corn-devouring creature, and the Mouse.
That haunts the corners of the statliest house,
The Beaver much esteemed for his skin
Must needs among the train be railed in.
The Armadilio besieged round
With shells like armor, undermines the ground.
Alternately his sex Hyaena changes,
His eyes assume all colors which as strange is;
Such Dogs as on his shadow light grow dumb:
His feet stick fast whoever sees him come;
Calling the shepherds from their thatched bowers,
He slays them, and their sl
•
utered Corps devours.
The shagie Bear doth fashion out her young,
By licking them all over with her tongue.
The q
•
ick-eyed Linx, his back bespeckled all
Can with hi
•
sight impeirce the thickest wall.
The suck-egg Weasil, and the hearkening Hare,
(Which l
•
tters every month through out the year,)
The hounds d
•
ceiveth by her winding flight,
Rest
•
all day (if not ra
•
s'd) and tun's all night,
In p
•
ace
•
ull warrens, here are fleecy fl
•
cks
O
•
bleating sheep, there lurks the subtle Fox
Loathsome for smell. the little eyeless Moles,
And thievish Pict's lie hid in secret holes.
The bob-taild Squi
•
rel doth a storm foresee,
Seeming to be as weather-wise as we;
The buff whose firm impenetrable skin
Made into sheilds no shafts can enter in.
The truc'lent P
•
nther, and the direful Tiger,
Devou
•
their captives with undaunted vigor,
The by-corn'd Girass doth the deserts like,
His n
•
ck'
•
as long as is a martial Pike.
The Salamander liveth in the flame,
It's extreme coldness putteth out the same,
Th' egg-hatched Cham
•
lion by the air is f
•
d
And turn toall colors except white and red.
The rough Baboone, and E
•
heop an Ape,
Imitate man are most like men in shape.
'It is fabled that the Naiades do make
With their loud roarings even th' earth to qkuae.
The thorn-armed hedge-hog; for his various amell,
The Ortus famous; and the bunch-backed Camel.
Slow pac'd Ignatus unto these I will put
It sings six notes fa, sol, la, mi, re, ut.
The scaly Dragon, and the furr'd-coat Ermin,
Locusts, and Catterpilers, such like verm
•
n.
The double-headed Amphisben
•
, and
Innum'rous insects creep upon the land,
The ven'mous Viper doth her b
•
ood devour,
Again the brood, enclosed in the bower
Of their dams womb; impatient of delay
Break through their sides and so their dams do sl
•
y.
The hoarse-resounding Grashoppers in thick
•
s
Do sing abroad; as doth at home the Cricke
•••
Earth breeds all rep
•
ils every kind of form
The Glow, the Palmer, and the Canker-worm,
The Toad, (the earths unprofi
•
able clog.)
The hissing Serpent and the croaking Frog.
The saffron-hating Crocodile will run
On those that fly▪ but the pursuers shun.
The dreadful Basilisk baneful eye doth slay
Whom e're it looks upon, his breath (they say)
H
•
s poysnous breath, will taint, nay mor
•
, unlock
The firmest Marbl
•
, and obdurest rock.
The horny-nos'd Rhinoceros will whet
His horn
•
're on the Elephant he set.
The Lion next upon the stage I will bring,
Of men the terror, of all beasts the king.
He cometh ramping, with his eyes bright shining,
Most bravely minded, yet to preys inclining:
The Crowing Cock, the rattling Carr, and fire,
Do terrify this beast, this beast so dire,
This formidable beast is mild to those
Who do submit, but cruel to his foes:
Gratefull to those his benefactots are;
Humble to those that humbleness declare.
The Elephant next claimeth excellence,
This beast comes nearest unto human sense;
He knows his country speech, he's used in wars,
He worshippeth the Sun, the Moon, the Starrs:
The greatest of all beasts the earth doth hold,
He's proud of trappings wrought with burnish'd gold
Adores the King, his most ambitious spirit
Aspires to glory, glory to inherit.
But oh! who can sufficiently declare
God's works, the which so full of wonder are!
And now for to conclude earth doth produce
All beasts, and every creeping thing for use;
After their sev'rall kinds on earth they trade
And God was pleased with the works he made.
The Argument.
God a living soul sublime
Breath's in man composed of slime,
Of a rib he framing woman,
Gives her for a help unto man.
SECT. 8.
GOd having made the world, and all therein,
To frame a little world▪ did now begin;
This little world is man, he formed last,
Of the four elements the Proto-plast.
The great, almighty, everlasting God
Created
Adam
of a ruddy clod.
God, was the true
Prometheus,
did inspire
His earthly-nostrils with coelestial fire.
Man like himself he made in sacred feature,
And under his command brought every creature.
This little world is in the great world placed,
And with the title of a King is graced.
This Micro-cosm instal'd by God alone
Of the great world obtains the royal throne,
The King of Kings gave to his regal hand
The juri
•
diction bot
•
of Sea and Land.
What things soever any eye can see
Within the furnished world his subjects be:
What birds soever in the air have motion,
What fish s
•
ever glidea along the Ocean,
What beasts soever on the hills do feed,
Wh
•
t e're the melancholy deserts breed,
What fruits soever on the eorth remain,
Are tributary to man's Lordly reign.
Man is the emblem of a divine nature,
And lively picture of his live creator.
All creatures pore on earth man's sublime face
Behold's his maker, he is filed with grace
And divine beauty, their terrestrial m
•
nd
Mind earthly things▪ man, only man's, inclined
To heavenly wisdom, his infused spirit
Is most ambitious glory to inherit.
Mans understanding and heroic sense
Above all other hath preeminence.
A nat'ral sense, beasts have as well as we,
They touch, they taste, they feel, they hear, they see,
Man's head is termed the understanding's thrown,
The intelectual pow'rs meet there in one.
There madam Reason is enthron'd, her grace
Reignes like an Empress in the highest place.
My lady Will, resideth in the brain;
The Judgment there, there doth Minerva reign,
Light of the Micro-cosm our eyes are, we
The glory of the Lord by them do see.
Three humors do belong unto our eyn,
The White, the Viteral, and the Christaline,
Six Coates, as many Musckles arteries,
Tendons, and Nerves attend upon our eyes,
May not our eyes be very well d
•
fin'd
The Looking-glass of Nature, and the mind.
Our eyes are twinkling Lamps, what is our sight?
But
•
ristall-Casements for to let in light,
The Optick sinews, or the Optick strings,
Dr
•
w in the sight of sublunary things.
The eyes, our anger, and our love, do show,
Strike fire in hatred, and in love they glow,
One while they sparkle with Idalian fire,
One while they glance; ano
•
her while admire!
They bolt in boldness, and in reverence sink,
They smile in laughter, and in grief they wink:
In love they flatter, and in wrath seem froward,
They show
•
he glad, the sad, the bold, the coward,
They well can put a difference between
Such objects as are either foul or clean.
Our cy-lids like Appentices prevent
A world of dangers, which are incident
Unto our eyes, our eyes bright shining balls
Are Bull-wark'd round about with fleshly walls.
Man's nose is like a sink by which the brain
Doth purge itself of phlegm, the nose doth drain
All slimy Excrements, and doth convey
Them (never to return again) away.
By it we breath and smell; 'tis that doth grace
The man, and wonderously become the face.
The ay'r doth in the nose the smelling stop
Which else from out the nose would forthwith drop
Our ears the minds informers do go round
With winding mazes, evr'y kind of sound
They can distinguish, at the shril, the flat,
The acute, the gentle, and the aspirate.
The ear's the dainty'st sense, it doth descry
Base jarring Music, from pure harmony:
By these we move the brain, the brain by these
Is rid of chol'rick superfluities.
It is by these we (as it were) discern
And let in knowledge, 'tis by these we learn
All kinds of noise we'r taught to know th'rough these
Mechanic Arts, and learned Siences.
God gave one mouth, two ears, two eyes, that we
Might little speak, though much we hear, and see,
The mouth, the stomach's portal is, and by it
We unto nature let in nat'ral diet.
Two folding doors of corral do convene
Lest in the teeth deform'ty should be seen
Our Iv'ry Teeth the feeling sense have got,
Can tell you what is cold, and what is hot,
They are the bull-warks of the tongue (to tame
Th' unruly member), tis by them we frame
And fashion out our words; foreteeth, and hind
We use; they shred our food, and these do grind:
Our teeth are busy Cooks (which without question)
Makes our food ready for the first digestion.
Our tongue and palate by their tasting power
Distinguish every relish sweet from sour.
It is our tongue that's vocal, on our tongue
The Lutes and Vials of our speech are hung:
What thing soe graceful to a man as hair?
How sliek! how comely does it show! how fair!
The pillar of our head's, the neck; near kin
Unto the nether lip's, the dimpling chin.
The greatest strength that man enjoys, consists
Most in his shoulders, in his arms, and fists;
How necessary are our hands, our hands
Are handmaids to the body; man commands
All kind of things by them, nature imparts
Unto our hands, the Mastership of arts.
With pliant joints our fingers are upheav'd
Apt to receive and k
•
ep the things received.
The servants of the mind they are, and do
What is her pleasure to command them to:
The left hand (u
•
experienced) stands and serves
The right hand b'ing a skillful artist carves:
Nerves join our bones, our bones do represent
The timber of our fleshly Tennement.
The main-spporting pi
•
lar of the frame
Is called the c
•
ine, the chine doth prop the fame
Our thighs are placed beneath our hips and fl
•
nk
N
•
xt Hams, the Calfs, below the knees the, shank,
And in the Lesk, but just below the groine,
(O shame to name!) our privities do join.
Our feet are useful dangers for to baulk,
One while to stand another while to walk.
They are the bodies moving ground-work, all
The f
•
brick (were it not for them) would fall.
M
•
ns outward parts are shown, I'
•
e now begin
To rip him up, and see what is within.
His lungs, like bellows, are they which receive
Contracted air, and the same regives;
They puff up, at their taking air in,
And shrink when they do let it out again,
The pory lungs doth with it's spungie fan
Refrigerate the heart: The heart of man
Is made Triangular, the heart doth give
L
•
fe to each part, without it none can live.
Th' hearts motion doth our bodies motion breed,
The vital spirits from the heart proceed;
She, she the conduit of our blood convays
Her Crimson bounty thorough clear blew-ways.
She mitigates the coldness of the spleen,
And in the body regulates as Queen;
If not by her, whence do our pulses beat,
From her we do derive our nat'ral heat.
She is the center of the body, whence
All creatures draw their lives circumference.
This pearl absconded in a C
•
sket lies,
Is the first living, and the last that dies.
Man's stomach is a pot, wherein the m
•
at
Is reco
•
cocted, he before did eat.
The Mesaraick veins suck and deliver
The Chile of what we eat through pipes, to th' liver.
The belly is a buttery, wherein
(Within the cupbo
•
d of th
•
bowels skin)
The grosser offals, that the stomach leaves
Of its digestion adhers and cleav
•
s.
Wh
•
re t
•
ey rem
•
ine, un
•
il dame-nature pl
•
ase
For to exonerate such filthy lees.
When God h
•
d framed man with wondrous art,
He after made his soul the nobler part;
He did his dross with sacred fire refine
And breathed in him a soul. a soul divine.
A soul immortal; death with all its power,
Nor Satan
•
fiery darts cannot it devour.
God to the soul eternal essence gave,
It had b
•
ginning, but no end shall have.
Wit, Understanding, Memory, and Will,
The pa
•
lace of the soul inhabit still:
How circular, how speedy is hir motion?
She
•
oundeth in a trice the Heaven, Earth, Ocean:
She scal
•
s heavens tower with her E
•
gles wings;
Finds out th'obst
•
uce Originals of things;
As
•
aine, hail, snow, ice, winds, nor doth she wonder
At fl
•
sh of lightning, nor at claps of thunder.
When thus his Image, man, the Lord had made
Each way complete, within himself he said
It is not good, nor doth it please me well
That man alone without an aid doth dwell:
I will therefore make him one, his joy, his c
•
ear,
His D
•
ve, his solace, his beloved dear.
With that the Lord, whose actions are so deep
Past finding out, cast
Adam
fast a sleep;
Seal'd up his eyes, and from his fruitless side
Took ou
•
a rib, and of that rib a Bride
He fashioned out; and did so nea
•
lie dearn
The cl
•
ft, that none the opening might discern.
T
•
e w
•
man made, God gave her unto man,
And he (awe
•
ke out of his sleep) began
T'express his joy unpar
•
lelled favor;
I have an helper, the Almighty gave her
To be my wife; Lo two, are made of one,
Flesh of my flesh, and of my b
•
ne the bone.
And since the Lord from out my sides did frame her
She shall be woman, woman will I name her.
(Nor is'
•
a wonder why he called her so;
For unto MAN at last, she proved a WOE.)
For this cause shall a man his parents leave,
And to his wife, his dear, adhere, and cleave.
So they were naked seeking no redress,
Nor did they blush, at this their nakedness.
The sixth day left a universal shade,
And heaven was pleased with the works he made.
An Appendix
-
Of
- God's resting day.
- Eden garden.
-
Man's
- happiness before his fall.
- misery after his fall.
The Argument.
Six days expired, the seventh day
God rests, and doth his works survey.
Eden is pl
•
nted, man in Eden
May taste all fruits, but one forbidden,
SECT. 9.
When the great Architect had furnished all
The upper Regions; and the lower Ball,
He ceased from his works, and sanctified
Unto himself, forever to abide.
The seventh day his glory it invested,
And from h
•
s works, his works so great, he rested.
The Lord of sabboths, hath this sabbath blest,
As a
•
rue Type of that eternal rest.
Ke
•
t in hav'ns blis ull Kingdom, to the praise
Of him that is the ancientest of days.
By his examples, he would have us do
The like, and rest from worldly I bour too.
This day of rest; our Savior will come in
Unto our souls, if we let out our sin.
He sets wide ope, the port
•
ls, of his ears;
To entertain, (a
•
guests,) our praise, our prayers.
This day is God's, on let us then adore him,
And in his reverence, fall down before him;
That so we may here after be posses'd
Of that true Sabbath, that eternal rest,
Prepar'd for saints▪ and joyful R
•
quiem
•
sing,
Before our great, and everl
•
sting K
••
g.
Six days are freely ours, bu
•
one, in seven,
Is challenged as a holy-day, by heaven;
And yet how little of that day we spend
Upon th
•
servic
•
of so great a friend!
Alas! a
•
as! how apt are we to think▪
That God beholds not, and his eyes do wink
A
•
our negl
•
cts; but patience ab
•
s'd
Turnes fury: ah! can, can we be excused,
That thus transgress? no we have cause to fear,
T'his leeden fe
•
t, God's iron hands are near.
Within the radient borders of the East,
Where early
Titan
as a welcome guest
Findes entertainment, God a garden planted
For Man's sole use, wherein there nothing wanted
To make it truly glorious, in it, he
The worlds abrig'd Epitomie might see;
Unfathom'd love spontaneously bestowing
A paradise with milk and honey flowing:
Upon a man, an animated Clod
Must n
•
eds advance
•
he goodness o
•
our God.
Here is the true Elizium indeed,
Whose choice variety of objects seed
The greedy eye; seest here a divers hieu,
Crimson, Carnation, Green, and joyfu
•
l blew.
This soil bears fruit, all seasons in the year,
You c
•
nnot name the thing, but what is there.
See here cool A
•
bors, mark how bubbling Brooks
Do g
•
ntly glide along in winding nooks:
Here'
•
speckled ammel beautifies the ground:
And heaven se
•
t Manna, every morn is found.
Th
•
•
re
•
ty birds (by nature taught) do sing
M
•
lodious n
•
t
•
s, to their mellifluou
•
King.
How fr
•
grantly li
•
e-breathing Z
•
phyr blows
H
•
s
•
we
•
-heart
Flora,
g
•
n'rously bestrowes
The smiling Earth, with oderiferous flowers,
'Gainst
Adam
's wedding; pearly-dropping showers
Enrich the grass; withou
•
the help of ploughs
Tellus
partu
•
iates; on the laden bou
•
hs
The m
•
llow fruits do dangle, and do stand
Ambit
•
ous (as
•
t were) to kiss the hand.
O what a lovely luster doth adron
The balmy ai
•
! the Ama
•
thean horn
Is given to
Adam
(not to
Hercules)
Gemifluous Phi
•
on, golden Eu
•
hra
•
es
Silver-wav'd Hiddekel, Crystal-ey'd
•
i
•
on,
Water this heavenly earth, this earthly Zion.
Cloath'd are the Trees in g
•
een; the stately P
•
ne,
And tow'ring Cedar, lovingly combine,
A Bow'r with bending arches to compose:
The shame faced Lily, and the red-cheek'd Rose,
Strive for priority: how all things smile
And e'ne luxuriate! Oh delightf
•
l soil!
Amongst the trees wherewith th' Eternal graced
This prime plantation, in the midst he placed
Two special t
•
ees (both inordain'd for food,
But seals the one of life, of knowledge good
And evil was the second; to th' intent
That
Adam
's life should not be idly spent
Trine-une
Jehovah
did his steps direct
To this blest Bow'r, and spake to this effect.
Of all the trees that in the O
•
chard be
I set them for thy use, one only tree
S
•
all be my rent; that tree thou shalt not taste,
Which in the center of the garden's placed
The rest are freely thine, by my permission,
Rent-free: but yet on an implied condition:
What I enjoin be studious to fulfill,
Touch not the tree of knowledge, good, and ill;
For by my sacred majesty, I vow,
And by my venerable name, if thou
Break but thy Lease, "thy v
•
ry lips that shall
"Let in this fruit, shall let in death withal.
But if thou please me well, this tree shall be
A sacred pledge between thy God, and thee.
My Vice-Roy shalt thou be, thy seed I will bless,
Thy seed forever shall the land possess.
Be thou obsequious thou shalt find me mild,
I will be thy father, thou shalt be my child.
He said no mo
•
e:
Adam
did: hen express
His loyal duty, and his thankfulness.
Glorious, and great, who hast insta
•
'd me K
•
ng
Of th
•
s vast Orb, and Lord of ev'y thing
Within its large dementions: Gratious Lord
Thou gavest me all, nay of thine own accord.
Ah Lord! what merit? what deserts in me
(To claim such hig
•
-bred f
•
vours could
•
t thou see)
O bounteous love! oh love that is extended
Beyond all bounds! O love uncomprehanded!
Ah! shall thy mercies overflow my banks?
And shall I ebb, in the returns of thanks?
Thou givest me life, and rare enjoyments too,
To tell them out is more then I can do.
And shall I not acknowledge thee? ah! sure
No senseless stone can e're be so obdure.
Take partial thanks, for as for to express
Love to the life I cannot, I confess:
Accept my mite, to praise I will persevere
Thine holy name, forever, and forever
Ah! far be it from me to countermind
What thou prohibit'st▪ shall th
•
lib'ral hand
Heap blessings on me? thou afford'st me all,
Thy self reserv'st but one, and shall I fail
To keep from thee thy right? shall my transgression
Displease the Land-lord of my free possession.
O no, I will obey, one only Tree
Shall put no varience 'twixt my God and me.
Should I attempt so foul a fact, I were not
Worthy to live; might then
•
ods j
•
stice spare not
To vulnerate my soul, Oh might I feel
Th' imprinted strakes of his revengeful steel.
Great God! Oh may I rather cease to be,
Then live tooffend, so good a God as thee?
The Sun shall sooner cease, for to display
On tender plants, his bright enlivning R
•
y:
Sooner shall sun-burnt India grow cold,
And Icy Zealand hot, and heavens grow old.
E're I from my first principles retreat,
And disobey my God, so good, so great.
Thus
Adam
lived in favor with the Lord,
Enjoying all the joys earth could afford.
On while he walks along the bordred Alleys,
Now up the hillocks, down anon, the valleys,
And now by whisp'ring Brooks, takes sweet reposes
On beds of L
•
llies, and anon on Roses.
The Argument.
The Devil in the Serpent's form
Tempteth to sin the woman first:
She man; so done, the Lord doth storm,
The Serpent, Eve, and Adam's cur'st.
SECT. ult.
Proud Lucifer, through vain ambition strove
To equalize himself with God above:
But of his power Angelic
•
l bereaven,
He tumbled head-long down the courts of heaven:
From a bright Palace to a sulph'ry Cell,
Made Monarch of (the land of darkness) Hell.
Thus stripped of all his quondam pleasures, he
Greatly envieth man's felicity:
Man is his eye-sore, man's supernal state
The Object is of his insernal hate:
He finding opertunity, began
Sl
•
lie to work, the overthrow of man:
His guil
•
s and wiles he palliates, and is
Turn'd int' a snake, strange Metamorphosis!
His toils he spreads, and covertly he waits
To catch poor
Adam,
by his golden baits:
And's plot the better to acom
•
lish, he
G
•
es wriggling up on the forbidden tree:
Assaults the woman, with his baited gin,
And thus he draws the sily woman in.
Serpent.
Great Emp
•
ess of the world: I humbly sue
To be resolved of a doubt, which you
Can satisfy me in: have you indeed
Your apetite restrained? what manyit you feed
One evr'y pleasant fruit? why so? doth God
Limit your p
•
w'r? if so, 'tis very odd.
Eve.
Of all the trees that scited are in Eden,
There is but one, no more th
•
n one forbidden.
The tree thou se
•
st, there in the middle placed.
We m
•
st▪ on pain of death, not touch, nor taste.
That God reserv's unto himself, for what
I know not, but 'tis death to taste of that.
Serpent.
P
•
sh, P
•
sh you shall not die, deaths bended Bow
Shall never harm you; you shall never know
What doth belong to death; death cannot slay you,
You are immortal; fear not death I pray yo
•
;
Touch, take, and taste, (believe m
•
) and your eyes
Shall straight be op'ned; you will be as wise
As he that made you; be but ruled, and ye
As God's, both knowing good and ill shall be.
Fear not, (fair Lady) eat, I as a friend
Advise you not for any Private end,
Or self-resp
•
ct; you shall be deifi'd:
Ambitious
Jove,
no equals can abide.
Coy woman taste, behold their beautiful,
And cherry cheeks, coy woman do but pull.
Cannot those mellow-delicates, invite
Your wat'ring palate, to an appetite?
Methinkes they should, taste, and you shall have skil,
To know the diference 'twixt good, and ill.
Why draw'st thou back? To the possessed Snake,
The cre
•
'lous woman this reply did make.
Eve.
Wisest of beasts, all that you sp
•
ak is true,
You counsel for the best, all thanks be due,
For your great love your love wh
•
ch doth transcend
All mer
•
it of mine, thanks to my loyal friend:
My life's to small to hazard for your ease,
Freind I could giveit, your speeches do so please.
This fruit is marv'lous pleasing to the eye;
And questionless, 'tis to the taste: I will try.
And eat thereof and give my husband
Adam.
Serpent.
They bow to serve you, at your pleasure, Madam.
Eve.
Ah! how delitious is this fruit, how sweet!
A finer Apple I did never eat.
Husband, my love, come sit thee down by me,
And taste the virtue of this sov'reign Tree.
Say, say my love, did e're thine eye behold
A Tree so fair, so rare as this; be bold,
As was thy
Eve;
and venter on it; for why?
Come what come will, thou wilt fare no worse then I.
Ah! hadst thou known my dearest what a bliss
Attends the eating, thou hadst eat e're this.
What? frowns my
Adam?
wilt thou not draw nearer,
And taste my love, then whom my life's not dearer
For
Eves
sake eat, and know both good and ill.
Adam:
Seeing thou invit'st me eat, my joy, I will.
Ah! we have sinned in meddling with this Tree,
This cursed Tree; Oh whither shall we flee?
Undone! undone! we know not what to do,
What course to take, Oh whither shall we go?
Lo we are naked, and we must confess
Asham'd we are, of this our
•
akedness,
And blush to think on it, were not we of late
All clothed in glory? but where's now our state?
What have we got by our presumptious pride?
But shame, which if we could, fain would we hid
•
.
Strange change! we have exchange'd, sad thing to tell,
God for an apple, and a heaven for hell.
My conscience tells me what a gracious God
We have offended; now methinks his rod
He shakes in fury, now methinks his ire
Threatens to burn us, with consuming fire:
What thinkest thou, may not these leaves hard by
Make aprons wife, for naked thee, and I:
Quick, let's these broad Fig-leaves together sew,
And hide the shame, we are ashamed to show.
Experience tells us that the things which tend
To greater bliss, prove dang'rous in the end.
The fruit that's pleasing, is not always sound;
Untoothsome Clerus is in honey found.
That man-betraying Scorpion, did bring
Honey in's mouth, but in his tail a sting.
The fruit that seemed best, proved worst of all:
Sweet in the mouth, but in digestion gall.
Eve.
Hark! hark! methinks I hear (too true I fear)
A thundering voice come rounding in mine ear.
I' me sure I hearit. I prithee
Adam
cease
Thy querulous complaints, peace, husband peace.
Ah me! vile wretch, '
•
is God, undon! undon!
We have transgressed, 'tis therefore time to run;
Let's hide us in the Woods I fear, I fear,
That he will catch us, naked, as we are.
A poor defense God-wot, what brazen Tower
Can keep us safe from his all-ba
•
'ring power.
Such as do strive, by hiding of their sin,
To shut God out, do let the Devil in.
The case is ours: the more we would conceal
Our sins, alas! the more we them reveal.
What place can us secure? where can we lie
Absconded from his all-beholding eye?
Dye, die we must, no ways of our contriving
Can save us harmeless? can we gain by str
•
ving?
Are our bones Brazil, or our flesh of S
•
eel?
Can we imagine that we shall not feel,
The worst of his displeasure? dare we stand
In opposition to th' Almighty's hand?
Or rather shall we with submissive tears
Beg hard for pardon, w'have a W
•
lfe by th' ears.
The bellows, of our sins, have blown the coals
Of flaming vengeance to devour our souls.
Adam.
P
•
ace, peace, I hear him too; he thunders now,
Where art thou
Adam,
tell me, where art thou.
Adam.
Great God! thy voice, thy dreadful voice, I heard
Rush in the garden, and I was affray'd:
It was my shameful nakedness, did move
Me to seek shelter in this shady grove.
God.
Naked? who told thee thou we
•
't naked? hast
Thou eat the fruit, forbidden thee to taste.
God's mercies
Adam
having thus
•
bus'd,
Accus'd the woman, but himself excused.
Adam.
All-glorious Lord, she whom thou gavest me, gave
The fruit unto me, and I eaten have.
God.
Nefandious woman, ah! what hast thou done,
That thus my awful presence thou dost shun?
Eve.
Lord, I confess that my offense is great;
The Serpent tempted me, and I did eat;
The Rhet'rick of his tongue, did so delight
Mine ears, that I obeyed mine appetite.
Thus did his Oratorious delusion
Lead me along, unto my sad confusion.
The Serpent's curse.
Because thou hast fallitiously deceived
The silly woman; thou shalt be bereaved
Of future happiness; thou, thou, the worst
Of all the beasts: shalt not be least acurs'd,
Dust shalt thou eat, and since thou hast done so,
For ever shalt thou on thy belly go,
Abhorred of all; moreover I will disperse
Debate, and variance 'twixt thy seed, and hers.
Her seed shall bruise thy head: And poysnous thine
Shall bruise her heel, and round her heel entwine.
Eves curse.
And thou, nefarious bride, who hast betrayed
Thy husbands trust, and wickedly obeyed
The Serpents words; I will inflict on thee
As bad a curse, as any curse can be.
In pain bring forth thou shalt; greifs shall encumber
Thy tortured soul; thy torments shall out number
The minutes of thy life; ten thousand woes
Shall plague thy spirit; and thrice as many throes
Shall rack thy body, this disast'rous chance
Shall cling to thee till thy deliverance.
With all submission: thou, vile creature, thou,
Thy servile neck, shalt to thine husband bow:
He, shall rule over thee, and thou shalt stand
As loyable, to his severer hand.
Adam's Curse.
Apostatized wretch, because thou hast
Giv'n audience to thy wife, to boldly taste
The bitter sweets of this reserved Tree,
From which (on pain of death,) I warned thee.
Curs'd be the earth, and all her smiling pleasures,
Her grateful plenty and exub'rant Treasures:
Curs'd for thy sake, b' earth's amiable face,
Let thorns, and thistles, grow in every place.
And thou, for this abominable deed,
Shalt feed on herbs; I will make thee get thy bread,
With a laborious hand: thy sweetened meat
Must now have sower sauce: thy toilsome sweat
Shall stand in furrows, on thy bubbling brow,
Earning thy living at the pai
•
efull plough.
Thus shalt thou live; till death the thread divide
Of thy frail life, thy sorrows shall abide.
A number of diseases shall attend
Thy loathed life; sins offspring, death, shall send
His Harbingers abroad, which shall annoy thee,
And never leave thee, till they quite destroy thee.
The never missing dart of death shall slay
The bri
•
tle Casket of thy soul, and lay
Thy earth-ta'ne body in an earthly urne;
For dust thou art and shalt to dust return.
Be gone; base Caitiffe, from this garden, flee,
Such rare enjoyments sha'nt belong to thee.
Be gone: be gone: no longer shalt thou please
Thy del'cate palate with such ca
•
es as these:
Worse fare shall serve thy turn: with ploughs go wound
Thy native soil go dig, and delve the ground.
1 Tim, 1, 17.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
,
To the reverend, his much Honored Freind, M r FRANCIS TAILOUR Anagr. AL VAIN FOR C(H)RIST.
With Paul ALL VAINE FOR C(H)RIST you do account. So shall you to the height of glory mount.
Honored SIR,
THe Series of your favors did invite
Mine unfleg'd Muse, to take a sudaine flight,
On
Peg'sus
wings, 'twas that which did infuse
A quickening life into my dying Muse.
Can
Helicon
want lucid streams! can I
Be dry of matter, you
Mecenas
by?
I hate to be ungratef
•
ll, if I should
Not make a verse the Rocks and Mountains would:
The s
•
questration of two hours time
From serious Studies, I employ'd in Rhime.
Yet Nothing went about, with what I drew
From Nothing, Nothing, I present to you.
Dress'd in a rude, yet in a sober, style,
Hoping you will at my endeavors smile.
You hate (as well as I) these dang'rous times,
To cast your eyes on vain and wanton Rhimes.
And I could gladly spend my flitting days
In penning Sonnets to my makers praise.
To your protecting wings I therefore fly
For shelter: ah! but when my serious eye
Darts on your worth, and on myself looks down,
I fear the wrath of a condemning frown.
Juditious Sir, if that you please t' affect
These embrio-lines 'tis more then I expect.
But yet, I know your candour will excuse,
Since 'tis an ev'ning, not a morning muse.
I crave not praise, but pardon. I have got
Mountains of praise if you disdain me not.
O may you live unto grand Nestor's day
With silver age, and honor cown'd: so prays
Your humble servant, whose unbou
•
d d
•
sire
Is Phenix like, to burn in duties fire:
Whose life's too small to hazard for your ease,
Sir, I am yours, command me when you please.
N B.
Wickham-brooks June 5, 1657.
The Praise of Nothing:
The prince of Poets, wrote of Frogs, and Mice:
Uirgil
of Gnats: and
Henisius
of Lice:
Witty
Erasmus,
Folly's praise did write
And
Drayton,
did upon Madge-Owl endite.
On Hazle-Nuts smooth
Ovid
versifies:
And some do treat of Maggots, and of flies.
One hath such stateliness t' a bald-pate given,
That there is scarce an hair 'twixt it and heaven.
This lauds brave Bag-Puddings: whilst he composes
The admirable honor of Red-Noses,
And such poor petty things, and shall no story
Be pen'd in honor of great Nothings glory
Shall she, from whence all things a being have,
Lye dead, and buried, in oblivious grave?
My muse shall praise her, though she cannot comp
•
le
Fine silken words, nor in ornated style
Blazon great Nothing, for she seems to be
A Theam, more fit for
Hom
•
r,
then for me.
I ma
•
'l to her, men did not Temples fr
•
me,
Like that at Ephesus, to
Dianas
name.
Had I a world of eloquence I know
Twere scarce enough all nothings worth to sh
•
w
I stand astun'd, (not knowing what does ail me)
Mine eyes do dazzle, and my thoughts e'ne fail me.
For to conceive her seenless parts, and Name,
My words are wan
•
ing to express the sam
•
.
I will summon her toappear in her own praise;
(Though tongueless) yet imagine that show says
Upon a stage, amidst a gazing throng
Of glad Spectators, this triumphal song.
Kind auditors, be pleased to incline
Your willing ears, to this poor speech of mine.
Although that All-things in my place do stan
Mine age (as right) may claim the upper hand.
Isit fit the Daughter, should her duty smother,
And yield no rev'rence toher decripit Mother?
Does it become her well? ought she to owe
No more respect? is this a seemly show?
Where is her storgie 'what, doth she not mind
The empty womb that bare her? oh unkind!
Ney had it been a friend, that should deceive me
An ordinary friend, it never had greev'd me:
But that my child, mine own dear child, should seem
To own me not is more then most ext
•
eam.
Had I a mother, I should judge all honor,
And love, too little to bestow upon her.
She's grown so burlie, and I am so small,
That I can hardly be discerned at all.
The black spot on a beane, a Flea, a Fly,
An Ant, a Nitt is not so small as I.
All little things are pretty, and the taller
Are more deformed, then me there's nothing smaller.
Small as I am, yet of my shapeless feature
God framed the world; and what (but God) is greater.
No father had I, neither did I come
From out the Closet of a mothers womb.
I was, and was not, substance have I none,
No flesh, no blood, no sinews, nerves, nor bone.
Nor can I justly styled be trub-hody,
For I have neither hinder parts nor body.
I am clo
•
th'd in emptiness, transparent clothing
As thin as Air; I do repast on Nothing,
Chamelion like; and as a vestal Nun
So chaste am I, all company I shun.
I lead a solitary life, for where
The least thing is, be sure I am not there.
Could you but try me, you would lighter find.
Then Ce
•
phus tost with ev'
•
y gust of wind.
I lived (though dead) from all eternity,
What was there (can you tell) but God and I?
Out of mere love hath not th' Eternal framed
All things of me that are, unnam'd, are named?
Go ask the starry gal'ties if they be
Deriv'd of any but of God and me,
By us those Squtchions, thick as
Argus
eyes
Hang out and twinckle in the Marble Skies.
Even as bright
Phebe's
borrowed rays do shine
By
Titan, Titan
does by God's, and mine.
Ask but the earth, if she did ever crown
Her front, and put on an embroidred gown,
'Bout her gross waste, if ever she did ware
Such fruits, like pendant-Jewels in her ears?
If the blew heavens like braclets did her deck,
Or stars, like beads, encompassed her neck
Before I was: ask her and if her Globe
Was circumvested, with a Sea-green Robe.
Ask her all this, and if that she denies
Apparent truth; in flat and plain, she lies.
Teli her from me, from me arise her Bowers:
I filled her lapp, with oderiferous flowers.
The war-used Cornel, and the Mast-full Beach,
The fun'rel Cypress, and the velvet Peach,
The downy Poplar, the piramidal Pear
The tow'ring Cedar and call Pine did rear
Their heads from me: from me, a golden tindge
Ceres
received: a Jasper color'd frindge
Embellished the Meddows, Pastures, Land,
All diapar'd with spangled Dazies stand.
All Birds, B
•
asts, F
•
shes, rarest gems rich m
•
nes,
From out my fruitful loyn
•
s, derive their lines.
I am Alpha, and Omega; from me springs
Both the beginning, and the end, of things.
When the rebellious world, for sin was drowned
Then only
Noah
's Ark and I was found.
When flashing fire, and stifeling B
•
imstone, rained
On Sodom, and Gomorrah, I remaind.
Rome's Capitol, and Troy's Palladium,
Carthag, and Athens, are to nothing come.
Where's Thebs brag, of her hundred gates but lately?
The Tow'rs of Babylon? where be the stately
Long Obelisks? the Piramid's? where's now
Mausolus Tomb? can any tell me how
The Temple built to
Diana
's shrine
Doth stand? did they not all to me resign.
Say where is
Pharo
's Tow'r? can you behold
Jove
's simelachre, rich for burnish'd gold?
Gold-pav'd Jerus'lem is, alas! bereft
Of all her pomp, and she hath no
•
hing left?
Nothing is left, that is for something good;
Grass grows where brave Dae
•
all
•
an buildings stood
Nay heavens shall melt, the universal frame
Return to nothing, from the whence it came;
Is Hercules alive; can he be glorious
Sudbu'd by me? Th
•
nk you that the victorious
Undaunted Caesar, and great Pompey too,
Two thunder-bolts of War, exploits can do?
Now they are dead? could the great
Alexander
Who weep'd, in that he could not be commander
Of many worlds? could his brave acts and glory
Keep him from being Nothing? could the hoary
Age of grand Nestor save him from the Urne,
When dust he was, and must to dust return.
Blind
Homer,
solid
Virgil,
none sets eye on
Wise
Cato
's gone, the Dolphin caryd
Arion;
Stout
Hector,
am'rous
Paris,
Troy-bane
Helleu,
Subtile
Ulisses,
are to Nothing fell in.
Where is
Amp
•
ion,
at whose Musicks sound
The Theban walls were raised from the ground?
The eared Oaks, shall never anymore
Dance after
Orpheus
pipes as heretofore.
Caonean Doves, in the Dodonian grove,
Shall ever cease more Oracles to move.
Who will believe that
William
once again
Can conquer Saxons? he and all his men
Alas! where are they? are they not returned
From whence they came, and into nothing spurn'd?
Where's bloody
Mary,
and
Elizabeth,
Of blessed memory, but killed by death.
Where's now pacif'cal
lames,
misguided
Charles?
How many worthies, Nobles, B
•
rons, Earls,
Lord's, Knights & Gentle-men were there, that have
Took full possession of the gaping grave.
What are the rich but dust, as well as they
That beg? Death is a debt which all must pay.
Can
Essex
l
•
ad an Army, when to Leed
His body is confined;
Vantrump
is dead,
And the Armodo sunk, and its design
Was crossed in eighty eight, and thirty nine.
All things of nothing made, to nothing tend,
And what hath a beginning must have end.
In time of dearth, there's nothing to be found
But sapless stalks, upon the fruitless ground,
Nothing but singults, mixed with hearty tears
Can scale the fortress, of th' Almighty's ears,
Nothing so merciful as God, he moans
Repentant sinners, when he hear's their gaoans.
Nothing but grace, conducteth unto glory,
Then which there's nothing more untrans
•
tory.
More could I say, but the descending Sun
Takes off my Pen, with Nothing I have
done.
I am design tibia versus.
Divine Ejaculations.
1.
MY God which art a brazen wall,
A Bul-warke of consuming fire,
Guard me and let my foe-men fall,
Who; causleslly my fall conspire.
Oh let thy favor be my shield,
So shall my soul maintain the field.
2.
Oh thou which givest thine Angels charge,
To guide thy servants in their wars,
Do thou protect me, and enlarge
My straightened heart, to sound thy praise,
If with thy favor, thou surround me,
No hell-borne malice shall confound me.
3.
Thou which thy children from
•
he fire,
And D
•
niel from the Lions Den,
Hast freed? Oh free me from the ire
Of bloody and malicious men.
Thy grace can chase an host of evils,
And Legions of infernal Devils.
4,
When dang'rous waves on me did roll,
By thy right hand, I saved have been:
Thou heard'st the pantings of my soul.
And when I knocked didst let me in.
Thy court of mercy; nay thine ears,
Were prone to hear my silent tears:
5.
Although the tot'ring heavens quiver,
And earth her loosened limbs do shake,
Yet hast thou promised to deliver,
Who, thee their hope, and Anchor, make.
And thou to thine a gracious God,
Abscond'st them from thy flaming rod.
6.
Thou from the chambers of the earth,
From gates of hell, and shades of death,
Hast power to save, and givest birth.
Unto a body-bannish'd breath.
O let thy quickening grace shine in
My breethless soul, when dead to sin.
7.
When as the clouds of thy displeasure
(Portending storms) together gather,
Oh let thy fury know a measure,
Remember th' art a loving Father.
Though I am a disobedient child,
Make me as good as thou art mild.
8.
In wisdom thou chastizest thine,
And in the furnace of affliction,
Their drossy souls thou dost refine;
And by thy Judgments, stamp conviction.
If thy corrections thou dost lengthen,
Accordingly be pleased to strengthen.
9.
Will he persist in wrath? and never
Admit of thoughts of mercy? can
The Lord abandon his forever?
O
•
no, for he is God, not man.
He vows, (and will his vows perform)
His fury shall not always storm.
10.
O happy he whom God corrects,
Therefore his chastening do
•
not shun;
The Lord afflicts whom he affects,
As doth a father, his loved Son.
Nor doth he always fury like,
For he doth stroke, as well as strike.
11.
Who would not willingly endure
A minutes time
•
, little pain;
If after that he might be sure
Ten thousand years of cas
•
to gain?
Afflictions light, and transitory,
Yeild an eternal weight of glory.
12.
Cleanse me from soul infecting sin,
And purely purg away my dross,
O do thou take from me my Tin;
(And make me joy in such a loss,)
O Lord my crooked ways reform,
And be my pilot in a storm.
13.
If thou affliction please to send
To try my frailties, and weak graces;
Make me look up, and learn to mend,
That thou mayest hug me with embraces.
"The Law is rough, the Gospel calm,
"Be that the Launce, and this the Balm.
14.
Whither thy favor thou display,
Or dost with flaming fury glow;
O let me with the faithful say,
I do by good experience know,
All things shall work for good to those
Who God affect, whom God hath chose:
15.
As my affliction Lord abounds
So let m
•
consolation,
Pour Balsam in my bleeding wounds,
And hide m' in thy pavilion.
Although I
•
ail yet I shall stand
Supported by thy helping hand.
16.
Great God! though my offenses urge
Thy heavy hand, yet Lord refrain,
My Savior's blood hath power to purge
My sca
•
let sins, though died in grain.
One drop can scour, and make them full
As bright as snow, as white as wool.
17.
Thy
•
rowning Justice storms do bring,
But thy clear mercies them do stop:
I will be content with a wet spring,
So I may have a joyful crop.
Comforts will troops of grief destroy,
Who sow in tears shall reap in joy
18.
My God, my Rock, my Shield, my Tower,
My health, my strength, deliver me,
From those three foes, that would devour,
Ah! I shall fall unheld by thee.
Thou only hast the power to quell
Pernitious foes, Sin, Death, and Hell,
19.
Thou Lord wilt lay no more on me
When my weak back can bear no longer
Either my burden light shall be,
Or else my feeble faith grow stronger.
O let my well, prepared breast
With what thou send'st contented rest.
20.
The judgments of the Lord are just;
Why should his judgments then dismay me?
I in my God will put my trust,
Although my God should please to slay me.
O Lord before thee do I stand,
As clay within the potters hand.
21.
In time of want, grant I may live
By faith, and on thy promise seed;
Thou, Lord more ready art to give,
Then I to ask, when I do need.
O heavenly Father, make it still
My meat,
•
nd drink, to do thy will.
22.
O may I first thy Kingdom seek,
And righteousness which flows from thee▪
(So shall I be confirmed though we
•
k.)
And other things shall added be.
Ah Lord! shall I presume to trust
Thee for a Kingdom, not
•
crust.
23.
In poverty
••
•
ho
•
my w
••
lth,
May I fear thee, and esche will,
It shall be
••
my n
•
vil
•
he
•
lth;
And my dry
〈◊〉
with marrow
••
ll▪
In thee it lies for to res
••
es
••
The fainting spirit, and trembling fresh:
24.
O Lord, uphold
〈◊〉
in my w
•
ll,
For ah! my
•
ee
•
are
〈…〉
stumbl
•
;
Chain thou my tongue
〈◊〉
sinful
〈◊〉
,
In all conditions make
••
e humble?
O give me gr
••
e
•
o must i
•
thee,
So shall, it them go well with me.
The Birth of CHRIST.
To be propitious to him, while he sings,
The mean'st of Poets oraves the best of Kings.
GReat God of lights, be pleased to infuse
Celestial light, into mine infant Muse.
Be thou to me an unseal'd fountain, whence
I may suck joyful streams; transport my sense,
Above this Mole-hill earth, do thou distill
Into the concave of my trembling Quill,
Those lucid drops of divine Oratory,
From thy full Lembick, to set out the story
Of thy Son's condescension. I shall stray,
If thou assist not, O be thou my way.
Lord I am weak at best, direct my youth,
That I may nothing write, but what is truth.
O teach thou me though tender, and unripe,
To play upon this slender Oaten pipe:
Soe tune it Lord that I may breath upon it
And sound thy praises, in a lasting Sonner.
I care not for (so thou but guid my Quill)
Swet
Helecon,
nor yet Parnasus hill.
Make me an instrument to sing thy praise
I crave a crown of glory, not of Bayes.
It was the time when in the morning ruddy
The thrice three sisters flocked into my study,
And having played upon their Ivr'y Lyre
Such Rapsodies as Phebus did inspire.
One of the nine (the other held their tongue)
Caliope
stood up and thus she sung.
(The rest gave audience, by my desk I sit,
And what she spake in Characters I writ.)
All you whose tear-bedewed eyes espy
The ill shap'd visage of your sins, draw nigh,
Mark! and consider what the Lord hath done,
To save lost sinners he hath sent his Son.
And you whose eyes could never yet let fall
A tear in earnest for your sins; come all,
Come, and in heart-proceeding tears behave you,
And do not doubt, a Christ is borne to save you.
"How can your frozen gutters choose but run,
"That feel the warmth of such a glorious Sun.
Now Rosy-f
•
c'd
Aurora
does unfold
Her purple Curtains, all b
•
fring'd with gold.
And from the pillow of his saffron bed,
Don-Phebus
rouse
•
h his refulgent head.
He newly leaving th' Oriental streams
O
•
Thitis,
brandisheth her trembling beams,
Lo now bright
Phospher
doth abroad display
His early fulgor. ush'ring in the day
Of welcome joy: Now is the golden morn,
Wherein the Savior of the world is born.
Borne, and of whom? a virgin, what is stranger?
Where, in a Stable? and in what, a manger?
O wondrous meekness I he that might be born
In a rich palace, thought it not a scorn
To rest upon a Cratch, and lay him down
On locks of straw, and not on beds of down
This child of glory (with his locks of Amber)
Grac'd a poor stabl
•
, not a princely chamber.
His Mother in her travail had of Lawn
No sheets; no vallents, nor no curtains drawn.
Nor could she there (as she deserved) behold
Brave Tapstry-hangings, all enriched with gold?
No Scarle
•
blankets did enwrap her child,
Unspotted, holy, harmless, undefiled;
O object of delight! how amiable
Are thy rare virtues! and how vile the stable
In which they are enclosed! there art thou lain,
Thou whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain.
O groundless depths of thy humility!
What? room for swearers, and no room for the
•
For to be entertained? ah! hadst thou been
As bad as they, thou mightest have had an Inn.
Foxes have holes, and every bird their nest,
But Christ had not whereon his head might rest.
Blesit Son if God, oh! how hast thou debas'd
Thy glorious self,
•
h! why wouldest thou be placed
In such a homely bow'r; wasit not that we
Might by thy pattern learn humility?
Art thou advanced unto the highest pitch
Of fortune? be not proud, Christ was not rich.
Art thou involved in gulfs of Poverty?
Remember Christ was poor as well as thee.
He's poor without, but all enriched within,
Like other men in all things, saving sin.
Our mediator, and our advocate,
Is born but meanly, not in regal state.
And all for sinners, oh! th' abounding love
Of a sweet Savior! he that was above
Angels in glory; and might still inherit
Investest honor, bears an humble spirit,
And to b' as low, as low can be, hath chose;
The inundation of his love over flows,
Our thoughts conceptions thou dost expand
Pure love; ah! what deserve we at thy hand
But fire and brimstone? ah! what moves thee thus
Dear Lord! what goodness dost thou find in us?
Lord! what is man, that thou shouldest mindful be
To save from torment, such awretch as he.
Towards froward sinners he his
•
avour turn
•
s;
Oh! how our God in his affection burns.
O love un par
•
lel'd! uncom
•
rehend
•
d!
Great God!
•
h! whither is thy love extended!
Cheare up poor sin-
•
ick soul;
•
rt thou op
•
rest,
And heavy laden, Christ will give thee rest?
Rouz thee from sinful sleep, ere break of day,
Mark w
•
at the Ang
•
l did to th' Shepards say?
He
•
aies to thee f
•
ar not; lo now I bring
Tidings of joy; for unto you a King
A S
••
iour is born, is bo
•
ne today,
Where princel, David did the scepter sway:
The wise-men see, conducted by a star
A Sun-shine, brighter then the Sun by far.
O may we all unanimously run
To view the rising of so clear a Sun.
Lord let us not with Herod and the Jews,
Hearing thy birth be troubled at the news.
But joy in th
••
thou comest to restore
And save us sinners, who were lost before.
This, this is he concerning whom 'twas said
The wom
•
ns seed shall break the Serpents head.
This, this is he, whose rays cast such a fire,
As should enflame our amorous desire.
Who can behold so sweet a babe as this is,
And not embrace him with a thousand kisses!
Before his sight, the purest Lamp seems dim,
And light is darkness, if compared to him.
If he but show the Sun-shi
•
e of his eye
We do revive, i
•
he withdraw we die.
W
•
by the splend
•
ur of his rays, have been
Freed from the darksome dungeon of sin.
Lo
•
d how inscrutable! oh how profound
A
•
e thy way
••
! oh! how deeply are we bound
T
•
praise, and please thee, and
•
o be inclined
To love▪ thee with our souls, our strength, & mind!
Shine Sun of glory, let thy beams divine
Revive our spirits, Shine, Sun of glory shine.
Life of our s
•
uls, mo
•
e glorious to behold
Then fruitful Ophir's best refined gold;
Do thou me in thy lovely arms embrace,
And help me varnish thy atracting grace,
With sacred Rhetoric; if on my tongue
The Lutes, and Vials of the Angels, hung,
Those Sonnets I could sound in endless days,
Would not be correspondent to thy praise.
O let thy lips, in a diviner story
Declare thy graces, and divulge thy glory
As Angels did, glory be to thee still,
Peace on the earth, and unto men, good will.
Be glad my soul whilst all the world records,
With one cosent:
Salvation is the Lord's.
Th' eternal God, hath sent his only Son
To die for us; we by his loss are won.
To
Ela
's note let us our voices raise,
And touch our Organs on their
•
owder keyer,
To us, is b
••
n, to us, i
•
sent from heaven,
The Lord of
••
fe; to us a Son is given.
To us, that are
〈◊〉
lesser then the least▪
Of mercies, this great mercy i
•
expressed.
With th
••
Cal
•
iope
spreads out her wings,
And
•••
ck (as did the rest) a way she springs.
Then for the present, rapture
•
lef
•
nay head,
Inventio
•
vanished, and my
••
ncy
〈◊〉
.
In Natalim Christi.
Acrosticon.
Men's digesta cupit claruM resonare triumphuM
Vulnifico exemit ChristVs nos Ditis ab ictV
Numine dexter, ades spleNdescat pectore lumeN
Divinum Deus;
•
r
••
Diet
〈◊〉
••
bar ill
•
D
Icta chelys, mutil I feriat laque
•
ri
•
Cae
•
I
Sol petit Antipodas aul
•
Stellantis AlumnuS
Alloquitur pecudum PAstor
••
, p
•
ndit e
•
altA
Lux micat, en! mundi
•
sa Lvator, Justitiae SoL
Virginis e gremio exeritVr, (
••
irabile dictV
Amgelicis concuss A
•
remunt
〈◊〉
Terra Choros agitaT; Nympha cū Tethyde saltanT
Ore Chaos gemit hOrrendo; reparabilis EcchO
Rugit, et auratus s
•
R
•
pitu confunditur aeth
•
R
I am soboles divina De
•
, pro crimin
•
〈◊〉
I
Excelsà astrigeri
•
o E
•
li delab
•••
r are
E
Sumit et humanaS, indu
•
us corpore formaS
Vita Salus, mihi sis LaVs, Gloria
•
ulcit JesV
Sic meo plectra tuas, re Son
••
at pector
•
LaudeS
A Hymn in Commemoration of the Gun-powder Treason.
NOw the grisly God of Hell,
With his
•
onsters, fierce and fell,
Which in pitchy Cev
•
rns dwell
Enter into consultation:
And the Devil's Imp
•
th
•
[Pope,]
And the Catholics which grope
In the dark
•
, do greatly hope
For to see our desolation.
E're our Queen
Elizabet
•
Had resigned her latest
〈◊〉
Men and Devils undern
〈…〉
Met to hatch a horrid treason.
Garnet
moves the King of Spain
To invade: King
James
his reign
New begun makes him refrain
That design b'ing ruled by reason.
Seditious
Catesby
he recit
•
s
To
Winter,
what he had as lights,
From
Parsons
and the J
•
sui
•••
,
On which the Powder-plo
•
was grounded.
These Ca
•
alms with their c
•
mplices
(Foes to virtue,
〈◊〉
to
〈◊〉
)
Swear to hide
••
e
•
n
•••
prizes
Which sh
•
ll be to them propounded.
Powd
•
r-Barreis thirty six;
(Billet-wood and faggot sticks
For to color it) they fix,
In a Cellar that was void.
This conspired to overthrow
King and Kingdom at a blow,
What to do they fain would know,
Faux
a villain they employed.
A letter sent to th' Lord
Mounteagle,
To discontent did him inveigle,
The King, like a Majestick Eagle,
Saw with his ju
••
men
•
s piercing eye;
And
〈◊〉
•
he
〈…〉
•
and
(
〈…〉
the word
•
ha
•
wisely scan'd)
The
〈◊〉
c
•
u
•
d not understand,
The
〈◊〉
sense he did disery.
The King commands, they search about,
For to remove suspicious doubt;
At last they find the traitor out,
With a dark lanthorn in his h
•
nd.
The plo
•
's revealed, and all their aims
His gracious goodness God proclaim
•
,
In saving thus our soveraine
James
And all the Nobles of the land,
Oh what for us the Lord hath wrought,
He, he hath rescu'd us, and brought
All our foes fond atempts to naught?
Bloody minds have bloody ends.
In the secret-hidden snare,
Which for us they did prepare,
They themselves entangled are;
Powder plotters powder rends.
They that did our deaths conspire,
And did very much desire
We might dance in shets of fir
•
,
Their plots found out, they fled our coasts.
Some of them did a halter stretch,
Guy Faux▪
a brazen-faced wretch,
Had's head er
•
cted on a cratch:
Glory be to the Lord of Hosts.
Thrice blessed be this day, may not
Th
•
unaccomplish'd Powder-plot,
By any Christians be forgot.
O joyful joyful holy day!
Let Bells in every Steeple ring,
And every sort of people sing,
And boys their squibs and crackers fling,
And bone-fires bea
•
ny light display.
Let all of us with one accord
Extoll and magnify the Lord;
Who to this Island did afford
So great, so straing deliverance!
O sing we all ways to his praise,
Sweet Sonnets Hymns and Lirick-Lays,
Who doth preserve his Church always,
Praise God my soul, his praise advance.
GENETHLIACON, OR A Birth-song, in honor of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ his coming into the World.
1.
FRom the skies Night slideth down;
Cloathed in a sable gown;
And her drowsy head doth crown,
With a Poppy Coronet:
Muffling up her scar-crow face;
Holding forth a Leeden Mace;
Thus she over the world doth trace;
With bright Sentinells beset.
2.
Now the Magi from a far
From the Eastern borders are
Lead by th' luster of a Starr,
To the place where Jesus lay:
They, soon e're they him behold,
Present presents manifold,
Myrrh and frankincense, and gold,
And in praises spend the day.
3.
And it happened thus, that near
Unto Bethlehem, there were
Faithful Shepherds, who with care
Tended on their fleecy fold:
Least that their flock-leading Rams,
And the pretty baing Lambs,
Should be whoried with their dams,
For the Foxes were too bold.
4.
Suddenly, a glorious light,
Chas'd away the purblind night;
And from Heaven an Angel bright
To the Shepherds did appear;
W
•
hile their fleecy people graz'd,
At this prodigy they gaz'd,
And no little were amazed,
For their hearts did shake with fear.
5.
From the bosom of a cloud,
Heavens Herald did unshroud,
This Embassy out aloud,
Fear nor shepherds; Lo this morn.
The glad tidings which I bring,
Shall give you just cause to sing,
For to you, to you, a King,
And a blessed Savior's born:
6.
There, where princly
David
swayed
He which the worlds ground-work laid,
Born is of a Mother-Maid,
And involved in swad'ling clouts:
Ever after shall all nations,
In succeeding generations,
Fill the heavens with acclamations,
And the earth with joyful shouts.
7.
He which is inestemable,
And to do all things is able,
Is enclosed within a stable,
Cradled in a silly manger:
Where the stalled Ox hath fed,
There your Savior lays h
•
s head,
And a lock of straw's his bed,
Go Swains, entertain the strang
8.
When the Angel held his tongue,
An heavenly Hoast of Angels sung,
(That the valted Regions rung)
For they warb'led out most shrill,
This harmonious mellody:
Glory be to God on high,
Peace unto the earth be nigh,
And unto mankind good will.
9.
Praised be God's holy name,
Let the world his praise proclaim,
Happy time, wherein we came
For to tend upon our fold:
We are now redeemed from hell,
We that from our maker sell,
We, cursed we, that did rebel,
Was there better news e're told.
10.
Pretious Balm from Gilead springs,
Unto us a Savior brings,
Healing in his balmy wings;
Unto us a Son is given.
We will carol songs of praise,
Eucha
•
ists, and Roud-delaie
•
,
On her Ho-boies all our days.
To the Emperor of heaven.
11.
What we with our ears have heard,
Hath unto our eyes appeared,
And shall be abroad decalr'd,
By our mouths. O blessed birth!
O! what God for us hath done,
He hath sent his only Son,
By whose loss we shall be won!
Here is cause indeed of mir
•
h.
12.
Glory be to thee the Lord,
Who according to thy word,
Such rich mercy dost afford,
As is treasured up in Jesus,
O how doth our joy abound,
May'
•
in every corner sound,
We are lost, but shall be found,
We are pained, but Christ will ease us!
Soul.
A Savior is born;
And is he born for me?
Me; what? for me forlorn?
O love beyond degree!
Christ.
These sides shall feel the spear;
Blood shall my sides run down:
Soul,
I the cross will bear;
And thou shalt wear the crown.
Soul.
Though the dull earth aspire,
And sprightly flames descend:
Yet shall my heart my Lyre,
Praise thee without AN END
The four Ages of the World.
1 The Golden Age.
TIme was (and pity that it flew away)
When peaceful
Saturn
did the Septer sway
Of heaven and earth, there was no need of Laws,
Nor jangling Lawyers. to pro
•
ogue a cause;
The riggid Plough, earths bowels need not tear,
The earth until'd spontaneously did bear
Fecundious witnesses: no Lab'rours toil
Need dress the Vineyards, or manure the soil,
Plump
Baccus
to full bowls of sparkling Nectar
Invites each p
•
ssenger; fair
Flora
decked her
With her embroidred Robes, sets open wide
Her flower-furnishd shop; with painted pride
Makes every month to swell, her golden trammels
Hold each beholding eye, she richly enamels
The smiling meads,
Zephyrus
ever calm
Bathes her in kisses of Arabian balm.
On lovely-checked
Pomana
's curled Tresses,
Hang lovely ornaments; Bright
Ceres
dresses
The naked a'er with her locks, which sborn
Like
Hidra
sprout again; the ripned corn
Prick up their golden ears, listening unto
Soft wisp'ring
Zephyrus
his language, who
Tenders his humble service, and do
•
h stand
Ambitious to defend them, and command
Blastings to come not near; their thanks to show
Their humble heads, the grateful corn-fields bow.
All things were plenty:
Terminus
no bound
As yet assigned, unto the common ground:
The world was but one field; each man content
Enjoy'd those lavish gifts dame Nature sent.
The yoke was stranger to the idle Bull:
The sheep went clothed in her natural wool,
The Taratant'ra Trump, nor rumbling Drum.
Nor Sword nor Helmite in the world was come.
Mars
had no Sons, tway-faced
Jannus
kept
His temple bar'd while every motion sl
•
pt
On slumb'ring feather beds of peace and quiet:
Green herbs, and accorns was their chiefest dy
•
t
Rivers of Nector flowed in liquid gold,
Hyblcan Honey-merchants were enroul'd.
'Twas always spring, O what hirmonious notes
The Birds did warble from their mus'call throats:
Rocking the winds asl
•
ep, their charming Song
Entic'd the silver streams to da
•
ce along.
Men rude and void of Arts no Citye
•
build,
Contented with such houses woods did yield.
The hollow of the hands were cups at first,
Water was Nectar, to allay their thirst. &c.
2 The Silver Age.
Saturn
b'ing banished his supposed throne,
(Seldom comes better when the old one's gone)
Days Halcionian ceased, the Silver Age
With beardless
Jove,
came mounting on th
•
stage.
Jove
did contract the pleasures of the Spring,
And the year into four Quarters bring.
Gray Winter sbiv'ring comes, and sheets of Snow
Upon this universal Bed doth strow.
The ways are chained, Glaz'd are the silver floods;
White Periwigs adorn the bald-pate woods.
Extreamity of weather now compels
Men to build houses, and procure them cells:
Thick shrubs and barks of Trees they join together
And make some briero's against wind weather.
The earth displeased at this mutation, breeds
The downie Thistle, and such usless weeds.
No Wheat is reaped, nor no Barley mown,
But what by the industrious hand is sown.
The yoked Oxen groan, the lab'our
•
brows
Rain sweaty showers down: the boyst'rous ploughs
Because until'd, earth would no longer bear
For very madness do her bowels tear.
3 The Brazen Age.
THe golden and the silver age is gone,
Next by succession, comes a brazen one.
Man's nature now is grown more fierce, and cruel,
The fire of war, is nourished by the fuel
Of quarelsome debate, and such like crimes
As
Titan
never beheld.
Reciduous times!
4 The Iron Age.
The last, and worst of all, the Iron Age,
Acts its last part; who with unbridled rage▪
Sly fraud, hid witchery, hostile deceit,
Hearr-gnawing envy, and pestif'
•
ous hate;
Claw-back de
•
raction, clu
•
ch-fist Avarice,
Loathed Oppression, and what ever vice
Can well be thought on; gather to a head,
And through the hospitable world do spread.
Monumentum Exequiale OR Lasting sorrow for the death of the Reverend, Pious, and Eminently-learned, Mr Tho Horn, late School-master of Eaton College.
Oh I am drowned in grief, a Borean blast
Hath torn my tackling, tumbled down my mast
My Anchor's lost, my Cable is undone,
And I, poor I, upon the quick-sands run:
Could I command the gold in India shines,
Arabian Mountains, and American Mines,
What e're beaths from Pancha
•
a's spicy woods,
What costly Gems enrich Idaspes floods:
All would I give to him that could impart
The least of ease to my corroded heart.
Stormes have their calms, flowings their ebs, but I
Am the Charybdi
•
of perpiexity
Ah me! ah me!
Melpomene
lament▪
This common loss, till all thy tears be spent.
Lock not thy thoughts in silence: clothe thy mind
In aiery garments: while the blust'ring wind
Of grief, doth agitate thy yielding breast,
Oh how canst thou expect a minuts rest!
Groan thunder then: salute the deaf
•
ed skies
With integrated sobs: let thy swoln eyes
Be Islands, circled with a Sea of tears:
And in thy Readers hospitable ears
Lodge thy lamenting sounds: that they may flow
As well as thee: and empty out their woe.
What strange confused fragor's this proclaims
That
Helicon
's disturbed? the Thespian dames
Send to the groaning air, their hideous shreiks,
Contunde their breasts, and lacerate their cheeks
With Adamantine palms, like Beldams tear
Their Amber-locks, the Music that I hear
Are Bag-pipe sighs and loud O ganick moans
Mov'd by the weights of grief, see, see the stones
Even m
•
lt away in tears: the Chapel's hung
In mourning vestments: every eye and tongue
Rings, rings, elegious Sonnets out, the Pewes
Are drench'd in briny puddles. ah! what dew
Fall from the glazed pictures. how the Leed
Doth seem to run abroad now he is dead!
Greif, Aqua-fortis lik
•
, corrodes the bars,
And in his ashes rakes up glitt'ring stars:
The earth is proud (O honorable thing!)
To wear so rich a jewel in her Ring,
And we, sad we, his Pupils, run about
His Tomb, and weep until our eyes be out:
Why weep we so? alas! our pearly tears
Can only deck his Herse, not in his ears
Drop an enliv'ning power; let's then condole
Our folly in lamenting him, whose soul
Calcined soul, quitting this earth is flown
Into the bosom of the Trine in One:
Where we will leave him, still to be possess'st
Of heavenly glory, and eternal rest.
Vivit post funera virtus.
His Epitaph:
Tender hearts bedew your eyes,
Here, beneath this Marble lies
One was spir'tually discerned,
Meek, wise, pious, virtuous, learned;
And whose understanding parts
Stor'd up all the lib'rall Arts.
He distilled wholesome truths,
On your hearts, Etonian youths;
Rouze your Muses to his praise,
Never dying pillars raise.
Terra Pilae fimilis.
MEmphis conticeat Pyramidum decus;
Chaldoei, sileant et Babiloniae;
Urbem coctilbus maenibus inclytam;
Nec fanum Trivia tollat honoribus
Vulgus mirificis: non variabile
Mansoli tumulum Cares in aëre
Pe
•
dentem vacuo, nive superbiant:
Sublimem statuam mitis Apollinis
Laudabunt alii: jactitat et labor
Thebas centifores: et Pharos insula
Miratur: merito dignus honoribus
Rerum nonne opifex tergeminus Deus?
Cujus mirabili terra potentia
Perpinguis vaeno pendet in a
•
re
Libra
•
am remanens ponderibus suis?
Tellurem in speciem conglomerat pilae
Ne non sideribus circuit aureis.
Vita Principis censura.
Principe plebs minor est, minor est ut numine princeps
Principis illa subest legibus, ill Dei.
Saxa gravem Chalybem post se Borealia ducunt,
Regis amat nutus aemula turba sequi.
Non magis agnus ovem sequitur, levis arbutus Austrum
Nec magis à vitreis os simulatur aquis.
Reg
•
hilari gaudet, flet si rorantur Ocelli,
Quod tulit, illa tulit, quod facit, illudagit.
Ejus deliciae plebis sunt sola voluptas,
Arbitrio vulgus statque caditque suo.
Tertullus Apolos.
Gratiae dulces, lepidaeque voces,
Sermo facundus, locuplesque vena,
Et lepos blandus domini beata
Munera celfi.
Suada, non castis animis inhaerens
Clara, persuasit mala perpetrare,
Profit ast vera pietate Suada
Concatinata.
In Equum quendam atate consumptum hand veloci pede promoventem Hexasticon
Non ego sum Trojanus equus, nec inutile lignum,
Sed postis gradiens cum gravitate tamen:
Qui velit insideat, liceat recreare; quid obstat?
Nam bis millenis ictibus ire queam
Ipse mihi dominoque salus, en! astra relucent
Sublatus: in gremio Marspiter ipse meo.
Englished thus:
I am no Trojan Horse, nor fruitless stock,
To tell the truth I am a grave-walking block.
Any, that will, may
•
ide me for their pleasure,
Two thousand stripes may make me go by leisure:
I mind mine own, and Masters health, lo: Stars
My sides reflect: I brood the God of wars.
Or thus
I am no Art-made Horse, nor wood th
•
tos waste,
But a staid foot-pace, making no great hast.
For recreation sake thou mayest (why not?)
Com ride me: blows enough may make me tro
•
.
Well fare myself, and rider, in these sides
Starrs shine: Oh! in my lap Gradivus hides.
Inanis jactatio per hypotypofin.
Bacchus ad arma vocat socios; sic unus et alter
Obstrepit illius (reboant cellaria) potu:
Nos erimus bello fortes, pia turba sororum
Tartareis oritur a locis, crinita Megara
Invida Tisyphone, nec non insignis Alecto
(Crinibus in nodum contortis more Sycambri)
Ignibus accensis adsunt sonuere flagello.
Ibimus illaesi, metuenda per agmina fortes
Contra pugnaces animos conjungere dextras,
Num metuent? manibus pedibus{que} conabimur omnes
Debellare hosts, nostris adversa potestas
Viribus inferior, quàm despicabilis illa est!
Flenda cruorifluis lace
•
ari terga flagellis
Vidimus, en! humerósque premi sub ponder lass
•
s
Tamburlanus ego video mihi,
•
ùque tricorpor
Geryon, simulachra Jovis, Solisque colossus
Postica Equus Cacipars antica virfuit ecce
Est lupus in fabula, tuque es Antaeus arena,
Tu lapides Turnus jacias, tu Monychus Ornos
Hic Brontes Steropesque simul nudusque Pyrachmon
Fulmina discutiant contortuplicantia bombis
Telum, clava tridens insignia framea thyrsis
Sint Jovis Alcidis, Neptuni, Martis, Iacchi.
Talia praeteria et dimittit fulgura pelvis,
Adjuvet ignovomis flamis nos Ae
•
na chimera;
Uesbius et Lipare strigens, Peta Crinon & Alps
Supp
•
ditant niveas pilas sic Sisyphus ingens
Increpat, et Stentor furibundo litigat ore,
N
•
c mora pugnator Corribantes araque pulsant
Dumque tube resonant victoria nulla potita est.
Querimonia de Solario.
Absconde Titan purpureae facis
Flaminas et obfusca nitidum jubar,
Solarium hand luce fruatur,
Abbrevians celerisque lusus.
Non pullulabant tot nova guttura
Lerne Chelidro, quot mala protulit
S
•
larū hujus manch nator
Fallere tempor a non sinentis
Non visceribus Colchis inhospita
Tum triste tulit virus in abditis:
Horae advocant duri
•
fugaces
Innocuos pueros libellis.
Eheu! rapaces (phro lachrimabile!)
Labuntur horae, Bosphoreos sinus.
Mercat
•
r horrescit Charibdim
Cyaneas trabe Scyllam
•
t atram.
Vuip
•
m dolosam mittis ovis fugi
•
Caute eolumbe morsibus anguium
Servantur, inprovisa at hora
Japeti genus omne fallit.
Humilitas Triumphans, Seu de Regina Suecorum, coronam sibi abrogante.
VIrtus munditiis culta suis nitit
Excellens, Pario est marmore purior:
Haec est ad superos strata rosis via:
Felix qui po
•
uit dulcia temnere
Contentus minimis lucra divitiis.
Thebanum Historiae laudibus evehunt
Cratem, qui liquidum proijcit in mare
Numorum cumulum non minimum se qui
Anfractus Sophiae, c
•
straque Palladis.
Quis non Phocionem tollat honoribus
Claris
•
ximium, munera Persica
Peleo à juvene allataque spreverat?
Agros Democritus deseruit suos
Dives, fecit eos publica pascua:
Expers muneribus Scipio publicis
Pr
•
vatim usque diem vixit ad ultimum.
Horum perspicua est
•
n pietas virum!
At multo his superat faemina nobilis,
Regina indomita, et Gloria, Laus, Honor
Suecorum; capi
•
i deposuit suo
Iunctos Laureoles▪ & Diademata
Dat consanguineo: non juvat aureis
Ostantare suum stemma palatiis,
Gaudet nec animos stringere in hosticas
Junctis in cuneos Quadrupedantibus
Turmas et valido milite consequi
Victorum innumeris nomina mortibus:
Nec calcat variis classibus aequora.
Non vestis Tyrio mur
•
ce tingitur
Auri nec poculis, vinaque Lesbia
Scintillant: cumulos despicit aureos.
Contenta haec proprijs usibus aggerat
Quantum sufficiat copiarumque opum.
In Hortos.
Laudabunt alij Lucani, et Adonidis hortos,
Alcinoi, fulvos Hesperidumque trium.
Sunt quibus, unum opus est patulis radiantia ramis
Aurea carminibus pomasonare suis.
Oxoniae, omnigenis herbis at nobilis hortus
Nos juvat, Hippocriti Pharmaca cuncta f
•
rus
Aspice plantam humil
•
m pudibunda dat oscula terra
Coutrahit et ramos tactilis herbae suos.
Hic viridi recubare queas sub tegmine buxi,
Fessaque floriferis sternere membera toris.
Clara viri ingenui Waddhamia maenia et hortis
Archimedeum cui c
•
dit ingenium.
Parte tripartitus pelvis m
•
dia effluit amnis
Virginis en niveae pro
•
uit unda genas.
Pictaque festivos tellus expirat odores,
Et florum partu visicolore tumet.
Aeolus insequitur ventos, hic orbe resedent
Vertibili, glauco vest recinctus
•
rat.
Eucharasticon, in pluviam post solennes preces feliciter donatam.
Anno 1653.
IAm scelus Angliacum pulsaverat ostia coeli
Horrentes strepitus imbibit aure Deus:
Nec mora, non parvas dignas Jove concipit iras
Dent ait hi poenas quas meruere pati.
Sol calet et subito viridantia pascua flavos
Induerant vultus, et decus omne fugit.
Moesta Cor
•
s imbres sitibundo gutture flagra
Nullaque cael
•
sti roar madescit humus
Angiica gens, liquido lachrimarum fonte resedit
Abluat ut sordes voice rogatque Deum.
Tum D
•
us a
•
nuerat, reserat cava viscera nubis
Telluris siccas proluit unda g
•
n
•
s.
Quae nova jam rerum facies? laetantur agclli,
Gau
•
et et effuso Nectare terra madens.
Laetantur pccudes, et onusti floribus horti
Purpureis rident; ridet et alma Ceres.
Largius en! niveae tondent nova gramina vaccae
Et referunt mulctris ubera tenta suis.
Lucifer Eoâ sulget laetissimus arce,
Et Veneris sparso purpurat igne genas.
Dulcis odoratae Zephyrus dat basia Florae,
Et tr
•
mulos ramulos mitior aura quatit.
Nocte sub humenti Nymp
•
ae, Satirique bicornes
Exercent agiles laeta per arva choros:
T
•
mpora su
•
ilibus gaudent redimire corollis,
Lampsa
•
io carpunt Lilia grata Deo.
Aspice laeti
•
ijs laetentur ut omnia miris
Festivos ducat laeta Thalia sonos.
Noster Io Paean, sint carmina sancta canamus
Gloria in excelsis pax sit, et alma solo.
Imbremque pluviamque polo deducis ab alto,
Nostraque muneribus vota minora tuis.
De Arietis ante Electionem Etonensem (pro more) venatione.
ARgolici juvenes Colchi frigentis ab oris
Auratum vellus surr
•
spuisse ferunt.
Ecce school teneri nos Etonensts alumni,
Corniger herbiferis vir gregis adstat agris;
Currite vos juvenes, madefactos sanguine fustes
Portate invicti, vellieris usus eat.
Casta Diana'juvet, si non superare potestis
Vos nemorum Dive, vos Driadumque chori.
Quid fugis? ah demens frustra vitare laboras
Lethiferum vulnas, mors properata venit.
Turba juvenilis coeunt, mortemque minantur,
Captus non bumili vindice caesus cris.
Succumbens ari
•
s non uno est verbere victus
Herculeis ictus fustibus ecce cadit.
Corpus panicea sandapila jam coquus abdat
Convivi vivis condite Sarcophagis.
Quaerimonia Etonensium de spe fere frustraneâ.
Suggere moerorem ludi Etonensis Alumnis
Melpomine tristes tristia verba decent.
Quisque suos casus lachrymarum gurgite plangat.
Induat atratam nostra Thalia togam
Solvimur in rivulos, moesti rorantur Oeelli
Flumine suspirij pectora nostra tument?
Cura facit canos nos (heu!) juvenilibus annis,
Collapsts macies errat ubique genis.
Navita contrarijs ventis et fluctibus actus,
Tandem exoptatam puppe retinget humum,
Cogimur (heu!) longum duros sufferre labores,
Atque evadendi copia nulla datur.
Si causam rogites, Regina pecunia desit
Nobis, O solum pondera pondus habent!
Olim si terras moerens Astraea reliquit
Certus sum n
•
stro non reditura solo.
Nummatis juvenes Academica dona beatunt
Cum nihil atulerit nudus am
•
cus eat
Aurum si saliat laeva de parte mamiliae
Nil saliat, satis est, crimina pauper habet.
Saxa trahunt post terga sequens Magnetica ferum
Capreoli sanguis durum Adamanta domat.
O utinam traberent regalia tecta pot
•
nti
Nos dextra, et socii mollia corda ferant!
An Acrostick Elegy upon the death of the late Reverend, and Famons Divine,
Mr.
Is he then dead? hoW soon pays he his dEbt?
Oh were it not (If God saw good) As yet;
Surely this sa—Cred man, is gone to Take
Eternity by th' hand; hE means t—O make
Perp
•
tual hap—Piness his Couch, oN which
He may secu-Rely lie, in glory riCh.
Sound were his
wOrds, his life & conversatiOn
Yeilded a fragrant fVme; his contemp Lation
Most heavenly was; On earth (unparaLel'd
Others in gift—Sand graces he excEll'd:
Now grieving for This loss, poor
Eton
Dyes,
Discharging volleys Of sad Ele—Gies;
Saies she, alas! For me he spent his brEath,
He dies, yet lives;
Virtue surviveth death,
In obitum Dom. THO: WEAVER: M. A. Etonensis Coll. Socij: Acrostico-Epicedium.
Tertres Pierides TexToris funera flerunT
Hoc facimus pueri, CHorusōis clamitat, ah, aH
Omnes deflemus n—Ostro Textore peremptO
Me miserū miserum{que} ChoruM! dum flemus ademptuM
Actionae socium▪ p—Atrem{que} gemente querelA
Singult{us} potius, quā verSus edimus apto—S
Victa jacet gravitas Weaveri condita vultV
Vincitur a fatis virt Vs (miserabile dictV
Ecce jacet, simul ecc Ejacet gens musica MusaE
Alliciunt cantus, cal Amos{que} dolente MinervA
Vixit ut Hippolit—Vscaelebs, sine conjugis usV
Extinctos cineres▪—En! Divae templa MinervaE
Respiciunt, animus peRcaeli sidera ferta—R
On Ambition.
AMbition is a Giant, which aspires
No higher then the heavens; it desires
Reach at priority, she scorns to be
O'retop'd, nay more, she will not, no not she:
Honor 's her aim, 'tis honor is the thing
That mounts her thoughts imp'd to an Eagles wing
She climbs on Pelion, if that will not do,
On Pelion's back, she'll through mount Ossa too:
Why not? says she, why may not I inherit
What others have, since my transcending merit
Eclipses thei
•
s? what e're it cost me, I
By right, or wrong, will get priority.
I am no mungrel brat, but freely born
To no mean fortunes, slavery I scorn:
Be he a King, or whatsoever he be
I have as much right to be rich as he.
I will rout out all the black-coats, if I can,
The greatest Clerk is not the wisest man:
Of such new light my spirit hath discerning,
As they cannot attain for all their learning.
My fingers itch to pull the Clergy down,
And strike the Sarrs with my advanced crown.
A wise forecast! but what if men do wonder
At young designs? know there's a God of thunder,
Can crush your Giant-like assaults; his power
Weakens the proud; remember Babels Tower.
Ambious
Phaeton
his fond desire
Ruin'd himself, and set the world on fire.
Icarus
flies, but
Icarus
his wings
Are cing'd, and cold, and head-long ruin brings.
Aspiring
Pharo
perished through pride.
And
Bellisarius
begged before he died.
Nebucadnezar
striving to be full
Of honor is become a belowing Bull.
While the Philosopher his eyes did pitch
Up to the Starrs, he fell into a dich.
Claudius
would be a God, yet doth he dread
The voice of thunder underneath his bed,
Strange kind of Diety! his head he hides,
Vanting
Sosostrates
in's Chariot rides,
Drawn by those Kings he to subjection brought.
So highly of himself King
Hero
thought,
He would be brother to the Sun and King
Of Kings: proud
Soppho
learned the Birds to sing,
The great god
Sappho
for to rule alone
Constantine drave his mother from her throne.
Brave blades! but what, save Monuments of shame,
Left they behind? our Levellers which claim
An interest in other men's estates.
Shall, notwithstanding their projecting pates,
Be c
•
ushed in the shell; and their intrusion
Upon themselves, not others bring confusion:
And though a
•
government they loudly baul,
Both civil, and Eclesiasticall;
Blow Paul's down at a breath they may as soon
As work their overthrough: Dogs at the Moon
May bark, but canno
•
bite; The curstest Cow
Hath shortest horns; Their stouter hearts shall bow
Our upstart Zealots, and aspiring Elves,
Striking at learning, shall strike down themselves.
EVCharIstICon, In PsaLMos IessaeI natI sVaVIsonos, FranCIsCo RoVs Generoso (Etonae PraesVLe) Paraphraste nVper eXCVsos. A o MCCCCCLLXWWWVIIIIIIII.
Enl nova prela ferunt cultu limata Britanna
Carmina fatidici noble Regis opus.
Dulcis Apollineas Spiras Francisee Camenas
Suecing at nive as Laurea serta comas.
*" Sacro
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
finis cursu, Philomela Poema;
Finibus Angliacis sit sine fine sonus.
* Ana Franciscus Rousius, gramma.
* Ana Sacro 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 finis cursu. gramma.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
:
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉
.
Anna FRANCIS ROVSE, gramma.
Anna RISE CAR OF SVN. gramma.
RISE CAR OF SVN,
convey thy purer light
Into our souls, so shall they know no Night.
IS
Nestor
then revived? was ever Realm
So blest as this, had ever any Helme
So wise a Steersman? dost thou ask what Be
Drew Honey from the Fathers? this is he.
Here's
Davia
's spirit just, each Psalm, each line
Seemes no Translation, but genuine.
My soul take this
Sybilla
's golden branch
To clear thy way so shalt thou safely launch
Through troublous Seas. Grave Sir (in whose rare mind
The Sept'agint resides) when you refined
The drossy English Psalms, upon your tongue
The Angels sacred Lutes and Vials hung.
I see a Phenix; whensoe're I look
Upon your
•
are inesteemeable book;
If mercy by a golden chain e're drew
His hearers by the ears, w'are drawn by you.
Your College-crowning gifts, content us more
Then richest Jewels on the Indian shore.
Will the Majestick Eagle stoop so low
As look upon poor sily fly
•
s? although
The Eagle will not, yet you shine upon us.
Bestowing Honey-dropin
•
favou
••
on us.
Your floods, we see do ove
•
flow the banks
Of our deserts, and can we ebb in thanks?
Scarce Atlas back is b
•
g enough to bear
Your goodness fi
•••
am
•
t: supose there were
No Sun to gild ou
•
Hem
••
phe
•
, we quite
Should not be blind, t
•
y psalm▪book is our light.
Why gild I gold? The m
•
r
•
I do endeavor
T'aproach your worth, I am
•
further of then ever.
Go on blest Sir, your Honorable
•
ame
Shall always stretch, the vocal cheeks of fame.
FINIS.
A CENTURIE OF HISTORICAL APPLICATIONS, With a Taste of Poetical Fictions: Being the fruits of some spare Hours.
BY N.B. E.C.A.
LONDON.
Printed for Robert Crofts, and are to be sold at his Shop at the Crown in Chancery Lane, under Sergeants Inn, 1658.
To his Honored Uncle, Mr John Wooton one of the Commissioners for the County of Hereford.
SIR,
Benefits bestowed oblige the receiver, thanks returned engage the giver: by the first I am made hopeless of requital: by the second you will be the more encouraged to continue your benevolence. To suppress the remembrance of favors is impious, Ingratum dixeris, omnia dixeris; & to express them as I should is more then I can do, and I know is more then you expect. Indeed though words (as it is in the Proverb) will butter no Parsnips, yet I confess a verbal acknowledgment is something, and a partial satisfaction better then none at all. This hath encouraged me to send you (as a test of my real thank fullness) these unfledgd birds; hatched (to say the truth) in the dark, and brought to light when I could see none (scalding Rheums and Distilations for a great while together overclouding mine eye-sight) which may render their blemishes, wants, and imperfections, a little the more pardonable and excusable, with the judicious; such a one I assure myself you are, and therefore my humble Muse falling flat at the feet of your clemency, craves so much favor at your hands, that you would please to honor this tender Fry of hers, so far as to brood them under the wings of your protection; she bringing you them as a small present-from, Sir,
Aug. 12. 1657.
Your dutiful and most obliged kinsman NIC. BILLINGSLY.
To the Reader.
Reader,
Whoever thou art, I here present thee with a Gallimawfery, a Moretum, a Hodge-podge, a Compound of many Simples; how well it will relish with thy palate I cannot tell: if thou likest it well and good, if not, there is I hope no harm done: I have no more to say to thee, only this; I bid thee farewell, resolving to remain
Thine, as thou deservest. N. B.
Historical Applications,
1.
It is pretty sport to see the Cobtines stride
Upon a Hobby-horses back, and ride.
Insip
•
d Idiots! O prepostrous deeds!
Steeds do not carry them, they carry Steeds.
Pleasures are Reeds, which yield us infant play;
Reader, we ride on Reeds as well as they.
2.
The Alc'ran says, (which who will may believe)
The Moon descended into
Mahomet
's sleeve:
'It is strange! yet God doth his loves lamp impart
T'a more coarcted room, what's that? the heart.
O may the luster of those rays divine
Be always sparkling in this heart of mine!
That I, enlightened by thy light may see,
Great God! more clearly to discover thee.
3:
The Tibaren's affix unto the Cross
Those they love best; triumphing in their loss.
But we to part with darling fins are sorry:
Though we may gain thereby a crown of glory.
4.
Th' Arabians instead of worser wood
Feed Corm'rant Vulcans jaws with fragrant spices
But ah! we choose what's bad, refuse what's good,
Offend the Lord of life with loathsome vices.
My soul when zeal to kindle prayer begins.
Cast out the filthy rubish of thy sins.
5:
Chimerians think there is no Sun,
Because it is debarred their sight:
The dark'ned soul doth groping run,
If God absent his glorious light,
Lord turn, with thy corruscant rays,
My darksom nights to lightsome days.
6.
At the Cape of good hope the rib-made Sex
With chains of greasy tripes adorn their necks.
Even so those sins which in our eyes seem fair,
In God's, which are most pu
•
e, deformed are.
What God abhors that mostly doth arride us,
Disgrace we grace, and in our shame we pride us.
7.
Amongst the Series (O had we less store)
Is neither Thief, nor Murderer, nor Whore.
8.
If glass-wall'd Baumgar be a Court for Cats,
Small entertainment's there for Mice, or Rats,
Those noted thieves; 'tis dang'rous for a Mouse
To seek for shelter in a Mouzer's house.
For
•
warned (they say) fore-armed, if that I were
A Mouse, I will warrant you I'd never come there.
9.
Pheniceans slay their only sons toasswage
And mitigate their angry Demon's rage;
They their Directo's do fall down before.
Such love God's well who senseless ones adore.
10.
The Pegusi, to stave off further evil,
Throw meat behind their backs to feed the Devil
And think such puppy-dogs as come and eat
Are the Devil's Caterers to bring him mear,
Lord! when I offer up to thee my prayers,
Let me behind my back cast
mundane
cares
Fill thou my soul with grace and on mine ill
The Devil may feed and surfeit if he will.
11.
Uulcan
they say is lame, and reason good;
For fire cannot go forward without wood.
12.
The Turks rewards to their tormentors bring,
Esteem the whip, O 'tis
•
pious thing.
Lord when thou scourgest let not me repine▪
But kiss the Rod, because the Rod is thine.
Give me to know that my
•
ffences urge,
That so with patience I may bear thy scorge:
And if thou please to stroke, or please to strik
•
,
O may I love both equaly all
•
ke.
13.
In Turkey the Adulterers head is dressed
With the full paunch of a new slaught'red beast;
And so, in pomp, is carried up and down,
Through
•
he thronged streets of the admiting town.
As wholesome laws with us are instituted,
But ah! so strictly are not executed.
Why maynit an
A
•
or the Adulterers laud,
Be a front-mark, as well as
B
for Baud?
Would all our Letchers, and each light-skirt Trull
Were ship'd for Turkey, or the great Mogull.
Or else ways used here their lusts to t
•
me
So as to make them be ashamed of shame.
14.
Men-e
•
ting Lestrigons all men will blame
But ah! Oppressors do the very same:
They grind the faces of the poor, and put
In bags the chinck squeez'd from the hungry gut:
They rob the Spittle, lab'ri
•
g most of all
To raise themselves by their untimely fall.
But let such know goods so unjustly got
Shall prove a curse, and in their purse shall rot.
15.
Midas
his wish obtains, his touch behold
A fruitful Alchimy turn all to gold.
In tract of time that man may have, which be
•
rs
Midas his wealth,
Midas
his Asses e
•
rs.
How fond are our desires! we wish
•
'enjoy
The things which do within a moment cloy.
Rash
Midas
wished, but
Midas
did not think
T'except from Generals his meat and drink.
Midas
may say experiencedly,
More hard to fill the belly then the eye.
Gold buyeth all things, but were all things gold,
Food would be wanting, and our comfort cold.
Art thou a muck-worm? go take
Midas
store;
Midas
was but an Ass and thou no more.
16.
Least they pollute pure water in Batenter,
To wash their hands the people wont toadventure:
Lord I am worse then they; my soul forbears
To purge her foulness with repentant tears.
17.
The wound-restoring Balm is said to grow
Within the fruitful vale of Jericho:
Nor will it set its foot on every ground:
Even so in every heart grace is not found.
That Balm for sin-sick souls, the Lord doth plant it
Jn humble vales, when lofty Mountains want it.
Lord plant thy grace in my hearts bord'red ally
To beat such fruits make me a lowly valley:
Let Gileads Balm my sin-sick soul recover,
And over me thy Balmy pinions hover:
The grace of true repentance pour thou in
Into my soul, and that will eat out sin.
18.
The mouth-less Attom
•
s by the aicr do
•
live,
And scent of odors; Lord be pleased to give
Thy quickening spirit and loves fragranci
•
,
Unto my soul that I may live to thee.
19.
Best in the night the Owl-ey'd Albans see;
And in the day of grace how blind are we!
20.
Our love to God is cold and hot by turns,
Now cole as Alps, anon like E
•
na burns.
21.
A wonder Epimenides hath been
To many, who have longer slept in sin.
22.
Cyrus
knew, by their names, his Soldiers all,
To mind his own,
Corvinus
could not call;
Thy names in all thine attributes make known,
To m
•
, dear Lord, though I forget mine own.
23.
Dice, Bal
•
s, and Chess, first to the I
•
dians came in;
Occasion'd by a body-pining f
•
mine:
Th'Inhabitants finding no other way
Lay open to redress, did fall to play
Their empty belly
•
to beguile; for easing
Our saturated bodies, games are pleasing.
24.
None, can in all felicity abound,
Vntoothsom Clerus is in honey found.
25.
Th' Esseni, neither lust nor money know,
I am sure, with us, there
•
s none can say, tis so.
Heathens are chaste, content where are you come,
You will find it otherwise in Christendom.
26.
The Persians affect a temp'rate Diet,
Hate what the Parthians love, excess, and Ryot
Though bodies meanly fare, let the full bowls.
Of thy Nectarean word fill full our souls.
27.
In Turkey, fools, and Lunaticks are deemd
The only saints and who so much esteemed?
And here in England, some account for holy.
Fanatick Quakers, and the sons of Fo
•
lie:
28.
The Barb'rous Issedon's, their dead devo'ur
Their drinking boul
•
are skulls all gilded over.
So are our natures most inclind unto.
T
•
e things which lest th
•
y should delight to do.
29.
Closs sinners, their offenses cloke with night.
And like the Blattae hate the till-tale Light.
30.
God's favoure shins on us but we ('tis pity)
Are like the blind-eyd Chalc
•
donian city.
We take no notice, what our God hath done,
But shut our eyes, and say there is no Sun.
31.
An Ape resembles man, some men and Apes
In gesture are alike as well as shapes.
Nay our Pragmaticks m
•
ny a task do set,
Un followd by the busy marmoset.
32.
Christ is our Esculapius, when to sin.
We l
•
veless are he quickens us agin.
33.
Lord grant this boon (what e're thou else denyst)
I may ha
•
e faith to build myself in Christ.
So shall the lofty structures I shall raise
Ge
•
more then C
•
esiphon or Philon's, Praise.
Di
•
nas fane, and Athens Arsenall.
Are slep'd in ruin, mine shall
•
ver fall.
34.
Christ's the true A
•
las, his vnshrinking shoulders
Are our off
•
nces Firmamen
•
s upholders.
35
Sweet Jesus land me at th
•
banks of Zion.
Be thou m
•
Dolphin I will be Arion,
To sound thy praises on my warbling Liar
In emulatioh of that heavenly Choir.
And Caroll sonnets, sonnets
••
whose sound
The Hills may echo, and the Dales rebound.
36.
Gainst Satan's grand assaults, Lord make my breast▪
Impenetrable as the Halcyons nest.
And when the Arrows of Temptation fly.
Against me, Oh!
•
e pleased to put them by;
O may it not be said his fi'ry dart
Hath got the better of my yielding heart.
When he malli
•
iously takes aim to throw
His venom'd shafts from his loud sownding Bow;
Ah me! O may they (falling on the ground)
Make no Impression, nor no rag
•
ed wound▪
37.
Not long before great
Julius Caesar
's death,
A sheep (having no heart) was found drew breath.
But Hipocrites, and those that flatter do,
Have, like the Pamphlagonian Partridg, two.
38.
We wisely can avoid Bosphorean shelvs.
While on the Rocks of sin we split ourselves.
39.
Lord grant that I a
Dedalus
may be,
To build a stately edifice to thee:
The heigh
•
of my Ambition is to fram
•
Within my heart a mon'meant of thy name.
40.
Like the Saguntian Child from th'
•
arth we come,
And shall return into our mothers womb.
O
••
fleshly walls, and bony
•
imber must
Turn out their Tenant, th
•
n return t
•
dust
Our breath is God's, if he but take away
The breath he lent us what are we but clay?
Clay at the best, our matter and their forms
Wh
•
n dead, are thorough fares for crawling worms
41
What wasit a clock,
Pompilius
would know,
A
•
d dy
•
s▪ with me why may it not be so?
Bef
•
re thy g
•
im-faced messeger thou send,
O mak
•
me wise to know my latter end.
Dea
•
h stays
•
or no
•
e, may I be ready still
Prepared, and then come he when he will.
42.
Wit
•
poysnous sins, let us not h
•
ste our
•
ate,
Last we, Domi
•
ius-like, repent too late.
43.
Many have died with grief, but over joy
Did
Sophocles
and
Panacrete
destroy.
Dangers enwrapd in every sudden passion;
It often puts the sense
•
s out of fashion
Then moderate thy joy, and when grief wounds
Thy soul, besure to lim
••
i
•
with hounds.
Observe a mean, and let thy footsteps be
In the mid-road, avoid
Obliquitie.
44.
Jove's bird to th'Wren will not be reconciled,
Because he's Regulus, a Kingling stild:
Let Sovereignty be kep'd, then the
•
's no odds,
There must be no plurality of God's.
Our God comands it so, nay jealous he
Will have no rivalls, to the fourth degree
He'le soundly punish, the successive race
Of Polytheists who bow to Idols base:
But as for thousands, that observe his ways,
Mercy shall them encompass all their days.
45.
All the day long
Gymnosophists
will stand
(Admired patiencel) in the scalding Sand.
On their alternate legs, and glare upon
With eyes, unapt to wink, the scorching Sun.
O Sun of God teach us toapply this story,
And make us constant to behold thy glory.
46.
Lord tune my heart turn griefs to songs of praise
And troublous Nights to Halcyonian days.
47.
If thou my sins Shouldst number by my hair
Lord make my head (like the
Myconian's)
bare.
48.
The swallowing down an hair? how poor a thing!
And yet to prove an instrument to bring.
Death to the Roman Fabius. may not we.
Depart as soon, who are as frail as he?
Dangers Vnsen
•
for oftentimes do skip.
Betwixt the sparkling cup, and upper lip.
49.
Lord grant that as the Heliotrop Apollo.
My heart the Sun of rightiousness may follow.
50.
Lord raise up holy fear in me to flee
From sin as creatures do the Linden-tree.
51.
The Heathen Brachmens do contemn and scorn
The fear of death, with hopes to be reborn.
Small is that Christians faith who dreads to die,
When life is promised; and eternity!
Happy that soul which dieth unto sin,
And unto righteousness is born agin.
This death's a pregnant womb, regeneration
First-born to life, and heir unto salvation.
Death is the Turn-key, for to let thee in
The gate of life if thou be dead to sin.
So live to die, that thou mayest die to live;
And wear the crown God shall the faithful give.
52.
God angles, Souls unwilling to be took,
Glanis like, bite the bait, leave bare the hook.
53.
The Ch
•
nois dreaming that they shall be born.
To heaven up by their locks, will not be shorn:
Is he'vens hand short'ned? can th'almighty save not
If he you
•
length'ned hair to hold by have not?
Rebellious
Abs'lom
wore the like, yer he
Was not caught up to heaven, but to a Tree.
Although upon the ground you traile your hair,
Heavens high; short may you come, of coming there,
God cant' a Glorious throne advance thy soul
Although th' hast not an heir upon thy poul
If to the eyes of God my heart seem fair,
What care I for such excrements as hair
54.
The Nabatheans so n
•
glect their dead
That their Kings are in dunghills buried
Lord make me faithful to the death, that I,
May wear a crown of life if that I die;
To live to thee I would not wish to have
A fair inscription, on a gaudy grave
If so my soul unto her mak
•
r fly
It makes no matter where my body lie.
55.
At
Bemavis
sick people like to dy
All night, before an idle Idol lie:
Fond people! think you that that senseless stones
Can ease your sorrows, or regard your moans?
My soul, when sick,
•
cq
•
in
•
the grand physitan
Of heaven and earth, with thy deplor'd condition
B
•
g hard for mercy at the thron of grace.
And he will give audience, and and at length embr
•
ce
Thee in his circling arms. Oh who'd not cr
•
ue
Upon such easy terms, but ask and have
Nay, he is readier to give by far.
Then thou to ask, Oh his indulgent care!
Ask but in faith besure thou shalt reciue,
Thou canst not crave the thing he cannot give
Fear not if God but undertake the cure,
Soon done, as
•
aid, of health thou shalt be sure
Can heaven be false? hath he not promised rest,
Unto th
•
heavy laden, and oppressed?
Mans help is vain, God is a Help indeed,
I wish no better help in time of need.
56.
The Hirpian witches, with uncindged soles
On mount Soracte walk on burning coal
•
;
So those that in security excel,
Walk as it were amidest the flames of hell
57.
Ther's difference in climes, D
•
cembers thunder
Is not to the Italian a wonder.
Lord when so'ere thy thundering judgments rattle.
About mine ears let me prepare
•
' embattle
Against my sins, not count thy voice a crime.
N
•
r sent in an unseasonable time.
58
The Marsian Bears do fashion out their young,
By licking rhem all over with their tongue,
And we with Bears in this one thing agree,
We put a gloss on our deformity.
59.
Aeschyl was killed by a Tortise-shell,
Which from the tallons of an Ea
•
le fell;
His fate foretold, into the op
•
n ay'
•
He gets; God's judgments find us everywhere.
60.
I read man only laughs, and sheddeth tears,
And wanteth power alone to shake his ears:
But sure I am, when discontent is bred,
He needs must shake his ears that shakes his head.
61.
Dame Martia was her infants living Tomb,
When lightning killed it within her womb
Before sins come into their birth 'twere well
If God would crush the Hydra in the shell.
62.
Great
Judah
's Lion is as mild to those
Who do submit. as furious to his foes.
Sampson, that knocked so many to the ground,
Within the carcass of a Lion found
Sweet combs of Honey: the tender Spouse doth s
••
In Christ, the fruits of the mellifluous Be.
His love is ve
•
y pleasing to her taste,
He, he alone is his dear-hearts repaste.
He is the Be, the Honey, and the Hive,
To active souls; the Drones away must drive.
63.
If wisdom lies in beards, a Goat would be
Plato, full out as wise, as grave, as thee.
64.
Th' Antaei into wolves transformed were,
And Ants tur
•
'd men, at Ae
•
c
•
s his prayer.
If so, no mar'l they are bloodily encl
•
nd,
And these laborious. Cat after kind.
65.
L
•
mpido was both daughter, wife, and mother,
Unto a King; Queen Ann
•
was such another.
Is not the Church the daughter of the High'st?
Is not the Church the
•
ender spouse of Christ?
Is not the Church the Mother of us all?
None dare denyit, I hope nor never shall.
But are we kings? God and his Son I know
Are Kings, and gre
•
t ones to, the Kings below.
Are mean too them and but subordina
•
e.
But where's our crown? we reign with Christ in state
Thus then to God, to Christ to Saints (no other)
The Church a Daughter is, a wife, a mother.
66.
Kissing at first came in, that men might know
If their wives drank Temetum wine or no
To find her out, the jealous husband sip
•
The reeking sent from the good woman's lips
Thus 'tis with us for sinister intents
We use a cloak of courtly compliments
67.
Diomedean
birds, have teeth to bite
Yet fawning looks, such is a parasite.
Friend me no friends, for if thou go bout
To bite at me would all thy teeth were out.
68.
The
Gymeco-cratumens,
are born
•
The Object of im
•
erious women's scorn
•
Obeying husbands and comanding w
•
ues
Both equally do lead vnnat'rall lives.
I doubt not but there's many could
•
fford
To wear the breeches would you s
•
y the word;
We
•
't not for shame, I will lay a brace of groats
More breeches would be worn, and fewer coats
Give shrowes the reins, if men will be such fools,
How purely will they scold, they need no schools,
To Learn them, or to train them up there
•
o.
No that (God knows) they naturally can do
Their tongu
•
s run gl
•
b, and clutter out as thick
As any hops th
•
ir dwelish Rhetoric.
Such as will not believe this sex can prate
Go vex the Oyster wives at Billing's gate
69
No males belong unto the modest Chainy,
Some females are so Chast that they love many
They hate and love you in a trice, the while
They'l frown upon you in their hearts they smile
And when their tongues do bid you not come near
You may conclude your presence then doth cheer
O how they love to work contrary still,
Thrust off, pull on, unwill the things they will;
Now hard, anon, as pliable as war;
A fair Encomium for th'inconstant sex.
70.
Great men are multipl
•
'd, but good men are
As is the D
•
ephanis exceeding rare;
Were there as many men as good as great
Virtue would more advance, and vice retreat.
71.
The g
•
gling of a goose, how poor a thing?
And yet so strange deliverance to bring
The Roman Capitol: oft great events
Are brought about by weakest instruments.
•
n
Sampson
's hand the Jaw-bone of an Ass
Did slaughter thousands; purp'ling over the grass.
The Rock yields water smote with
Moses
rod;
The smalest means prevails, if blest by God.
72.
The Shrimp only for food waits one the Nacre,
So we to serve our turns do serve our maker.
How servile are we? we affection bear
To God not so much out of love as fear.
73.
Like Quails, and Roe-bucks we love poison, that
Which most we should avoid doth make us fat.
Sin is a cut-throat, yet it is our will.
To count him friendliest, when he means to kill.
74.
I would not wish, so I be fair within,
For Chios earth to beautify my skin.
While ceruss'd faces unto sin allure,
May my chaste soul b'unseperably pure:
I care not how the world esteem of me,
So I be lovely only unto thee,
Nothing can make me fine I must confess.
O Savior but thy robes of righteousness.
75.
Our hearts all vice, as Amphitane gold draws,
The Load-stone iron, as the Amber staws.
76.
A chillis-like god which inflicts the wound.
In justice, can in mercy make it sound.
The law is as a lance to cut the bile,
The gosple pours in balm an healing oil.
O may that make me sensible of sin.
And this revive, when I to sink begin.
78.
I Tortoise-like, wish neither Te
•
th nor Tonge.
Rather then have them instruments of wrong.
Abusive language may I always shun,
By their lewd bab'lings many are undone.
Silence is laudable; my judgment's such,
Better to have no tongue, then one too much.
79.
We like L
•
ertes, and Augeas, Kings,
Who dung'd their grounds, mind only earthly things.
W
•
pore still downwards, and are groveling still
Below, like muke-worms, never look up the hill,
The pleasant Zion; let the things of heaven
Or sink, or swim, t
•
ey'r left at six and seven.
May I, who Christianity profess,
Mind God and heaven more, and trifles less.
80.
To three M's the Philosopher assigns
Th'earths rich
•
s, Mettals, Minerals, and Mines▪
81.
Poor
Cincimatus,
he which held the plough
So lately, is become dictator now.
Fortune on Peasants sometimes casts renown,
Raises the humble, kicks the lofty down.
Joy is the consequent of dull-brow'd sorrow,
A subject now, may be a King tomorrow.
The active spirits of our age do climb
By gradual steps to dignities sublime:
I speak in rev'rence to his Highness, who
By Martial Valour hath attained unto
The power now in his hands, whom God doth bless
With matchless and unparralel'd success:
The Honor
•
ble title of a King,
How modestly refused he? under's wing
We are protected from the boiling rage
Of home-bred foes in this rebellious Age
Blessed be God, that under our own vine,
We have the liberty to sup, and dine.
82.
Support my faith with thy confirming hand,
So shall it firm, like unmov'd Milo, stand.
If thou withdraw and leave me but an hour
Unto myself, how feeble is my power.
But by thy sinewy arm, great God upheld,
The day is mine, my foe-men needs must yield.
83.
Christ's our Nepenthe, enemy to sadness
Dispersing sorrow; and reversing gladness.
Art thou, my soul, at any time cast down?
O think on him; and thou wilt smile, not frown;
Drink in, by faith, the Julips of his blood,
Oh that's a Cordial, thou wilt say 'tis good,
O what can more refocilate the soul,
Then streaming merits in a lib'ral boul.
84.
The Prognean swallow, the cold country leaves,
Hasts to a warmer one: a false friend cleaves,
Fast in the Summer of prosperity.
Let adverse Winter come, then farewell he.
85.
God's word, like to Sybilla's golden branch
Can make us through all difficulties lance.
Soul t
•
k
•
it with thee, when thou wouldst oppose
The storming fury of thy spiritual foes,
As sin, and death: nay it hath power to quell
The Devil, and drive him to the gates of hell.
86.
On the pure Elements, four things live sole,
Chamelion, Herring, Salamander, Mole.
Tobacc
•
nists, Pot-Leaches, Lechers, Misers,
Of Air, and Water, Fire, and Earth are prizers.
The fi
•
st makes the Tobacco pipe his dugg,
And sucks the smoke of the burnt Indian drugg.
The second, he, for his part, c
•
nnot live
Without full flagons: And the third doth grieve
If any step between and stop the flame
Of his lust
•
oward
•
an alluring Dame;
Whores are his hackneys, he is always dull,
But wh
•
n he's sporting with his pamp'
•
ed Trull.
As for the fourth, the M
•
ser to be sure,
Wereit not for gold he could not long endure.
S
•
then this one, and that another likes;
Wedded to that their own opinion strikes.
87.
The Indian women, in a foolish spite,
Will black their teeth because that dogs be white:
As for the sparkish gallants of our Nation,
They'r French-men's Apes in each fantastik fashion.
88.
Wouldst thou repair thy memory? I think
Thou mayest, if thou'l
•
look Mneme fount, then drink.
89.
Zizka
commands his skin be made a drum,
That the Bohemians still might overcome.
Who, while he lives, is over sin victorious,
After his death he shall not be in-glorious.
90.
Malice inflicts on men more dang'rous wounds
Then Porc'pines quills on the pursuing hounds.
How sedulous are some to purchase woe
For other men, what will not malice do?
91.
The ebbs and flows of, Egipts plowman, Nile,
Do make a barren, or a fruitful soil:
Grace is this river, and the more it flows
The more good fruit; if less, the lesser grows.
92.
Panthers have crabbed looks though speckled skins,
And fairest out-sides join to foulest sins.
93.
Anaxarete,
whilst on the Rack he hung,
Did in the Tyrants face spit out his tongue.
To have no tongue it is the lesser evil,
Then to recant byit, and so please the Devil.
94.
Soul, though the flames should for a while subdue thee
Like the Pyrrhean grove, God can renew thee.
95.
Le
•
t I be like the Hirecinyan wood,
Lord lop my sins, and in the room graft good.
Since the Creation that was never lop'd,
Till renovation we do stand untop'd.
Lord if thou hew us, hew us not in ire,
Nor make us bundles for eternal fire
To feed upon: our names are in thy rouls,
And wilt thou cast out our immortal souls.
96.
Taprobans, (not respecting persons) fling
To merc'less Tigers their offending King.
How happy were we if we could command
Our head-sins, go, to the Arch-Tyrants land.
97.
The B
•
udmes fight unarm'd, the Sword, the Spear,
They are the only weapons that they bear:
Right Combatants of
Mars
they scorn to throw
Cowardly Arrows from the springing Bow.
My life a warfare is, Lord, let thy word
Thy d
•
eadful word, be as a two-edgd Sword
To wound mine en'mies, O be thou my S
•
ear,
And it an Hoast besiege me I will not fear.
98.
Hold water in their mouths, forceing their wives
The men of Burami lead quiet lives.
A better way then this there may be found
For both their ease, as this I shall propound.
It argues wisdom when the wife doth scold,
And clap her fists, the prudent husband hold
His passion in, and when the husband chides,
A wise wife her unruly member hides
'Twixt double doors: this well observed infrindges
No Nuptial love, but keps them on their hindges.
99.
Ignatius Leiola,
the first Jesuit
As ever I did read of, did delight
In giggling laughter, and why did he so?
His teeth (it may be yellow) for to show:
A Jesuit I would not wish to be,
Unless mine actions with my name agree:
Laughter is Cou
•
en-Germane unto folly,
Better is the extreme of Malencholly:
To too much Mirth it is not safe to lean;
Nor too much Grief: There is a golden mean.
O grant, dear Lord, I may be always glad
In thee, my God, or make me always sad:
If I must needs be p
•
oud, p
•
rmit not me
To pride in anything, great God, but thee;
Unfold my lips, for to agn
•
ze my sin;
Let me be foul w
•
thout, so, fair within.
100.
The
Alc'ran
tells us there's a Bird named
Ziz,
(I think more fabulous then true it is)
So large, that when his wings abro
•
d are hurled
They hide the Sun and darken all rhe world,
Thou
•
h li
•
le credit unto this be due
Yet shall it's application be true.
Sin is this monstrous bird, which doth obscu
•
c
God's Sun-like face: 'tis sin that doth immure
Our souls from saith, 'tis sin that puts a screen
And walls of separation between
God and the soul; 'tis sin that hath the power
To clothe, in shades, this Micro-cosm of our:
Thou which from darkness didst deduce the day,
Banish such mists, let thy coruscant ray
Break through the clouds of my opposing sin;
That so thou mayest enlighten me within.
Poetical Fictions.
1.
On Jupiter.
IN Creta,
Jupiter
was born, of
Ops;
And
Saturn
nourished on Ida's tops,
By the self-gelding Corribants, who plaid
So loudly on their brazen drums, and made
Such
•
inkling sounds, and such obsteperous noise,
That
Saturn
might not hear his infants voice:
The cheated god (thinks to secure his throne)
Instead of
Jupiter,
devours a stone,
Who was, no sooner grown to man's estate,
But seeing how his father did await
To drink his blood, tumbles him headlong down,
And he himself usurps the Regal Crown:
The conquered god in Latium hides for shame,
The land of Latium hence derives her name.
2
On Apollo.
Latona
's son in fioating Delos born,
Vast
Cyclops
flew, his god-head lost, forlorn
Wanting employment sits him down to keep
Thessal
•
an Admetus fleecy sheep;
Mercury
gave to him his Harp; the Spear,
Lyre, Buckler, on his Image painted were.
The Muses father, Poets chiefest power,
Au
•
hor of Music in the upper Bower;
Sol
was he called,
Bacchus
in earth, in hell
Known by the name
Apollo,
he could tell
Things long before they were, he first did know
The Ar
•
of Phisick, from his radiant bow
His golden-footed messengers doth send
Whose rapid force sing to their journeys end;
In love with
Hi
•
cynth,
and
Daphne,
he
Turnes him into a Flower, her a Tree.
The Laurel, Ol
•
ve, and the Juniper,
Unto
Apollo
consec
•
ated were;
The Princely Cock, the Herald of the day,
The griping Goshauk▪ greedy of his prey,
The silver Swan, and Crow, which can divine,
Is off'red up unto
Apollo's
shrine.
4
On Bacchus.
Jove
's thigh-borne, Ivy crowned B
•
cchus nursed
By Juno and the Nymphs, invented first
The use of wine, and over all the world
He rides, fell Tigers and fierce Linces whirld
His Chariots rapid wheels, he did subdu
•
Innu
•
enable Nations, and embrew
His hands in tawny Indians blood, he taught
The Art to buy and sell, the first that sought
Triumphall honor, he his Temples bound
With Regal Diadems, and triumphs sound.
The browsing G
•
at, and slugish Ass are proud
For to be styled his, see what a crowd
Of wanton Satyrs, and Sileni, comes,
Rending the air with their Kettl
•
-drums;
Loud b
•
llowing sounds, the Menedes his Priests
His Orgis, and his Bacchanalian feasts,
With such vociferations celebrate,
As would tire Fabius for to relate
Their mad confused fragors: seem to mix
The burning Axle with the frigid Styx.
5
On Mercury.
GReat
Atlas
Nephew,
Jove
and
Maias
son,
Th' embassador of heavenly powers puts on
His Stag-like feet, and golden head, his wings,
Quits the bright Court: with him along he brings
His snake-ingitted-soporiferous Rod,
Because that men should know he is a god,
Addicted much to exercise and motion
Swims swiftly thorough the aerial Ocean:
No sennuy force could weapons swifter fling
From Scythian bows, or Balearick string,
Then he doth scud along: Merchants to trade
Instructeth how, tells Thieves for to evade
As he (a thievish god) by slight of Art
Was wont, when he did steal Apollo's dart;
He quickly took (and was as quickly gone)
Neptune
's Mace,
U
•
lcan
's tongs, & golden Zone
Of rose-cheek'd
Uenus,
king
Admetus
drove
And would have robbed the bolts from thund'ring
Jove
What e're he saw he made, what could there be
Secur'd from his light-finger'd Dietie?
This active nimble god from heaven came,
Was Author, first, of the Palestrick game;
The use of the shrill sounding Lute out found,
And on mount Caucasus,
Prometheus
bound,
Hundred-eyd
Argus
in a conflict slew,
Freed captive
Mars,
and on a golden clue
Let down by pulleys, from his fluent tongue,
The ears of his atentive hearers hung.
Cylenius,
in Egypt worshipped is,
In the shape of Dog-headed
Anubis;
Of him and
Venus,
an Hermaphrodite
Of either sex was born, then from the sight
Of the prodigious Gvants, having fled,
He in toa Stork was Metamorphosed.
6
On Mars.
THe war-like god, great
Jove,
and
Juno
's son
Caused the seed of discontent to run
Throughout the hospitable world, fierc
•
anger
With flaming eyes, a strange confused clangor,
Deafning the heavens, mad fury, pallid fear,
Rageing oppression, jarring discord were
His sad concomitants; with bloody rod,
Bellona
waits upon this impious god,
Unto this all-devouring Diety:
In Lemnoe men were sacrifiz'd, the Py
That cheating bird, the watchful Dog, & brood—
—Destroying Vulture, the stout Cock, and blood—
—Carowsing Wolf, (true combatants of
Mars)
Were dedicated to the god of wars.
The Romans brag that they derive their line
From him, make him their patron, and assign
To him his Salij, and do dedicate
The years first Month, oh what inver'rate hate
Bears he to
Pallas?
for his missile darts
At
Jove-
born wisdom fly, and lib'ral Arts
Him
Vulcan
with his spouse a bed espies,
And (angry) in a net doth them surprise:
Keeps them close p
•
is'ner from captivity.
Till
N
•
ptune
by intrea
•
ies set them free.
7
On Uulcan.
The sooty god of
Jove
and
Juno
sprung,
For his deformity from heaven flung,
Fell down into the Island Lemnos, with
The fall grew lame; made of the gods the Smith:
There sets up trade. On sulphry Aetn
•
e's top,
And L
•
para sometimes he sets up shop;
Where, with the one-
•
yd mo
•
strous
Cyclopes,
Broontes, Pyrachmon▪
and huge
Steropes,
Jove's
thunder armor for the gods he made
Against those Giants which would heaven invade:
To him the Lion, te
•
ri lest of beasts
Was consecrated; in his honor feasts,
And sacrifices, celebrated were
Called Protervia, what meat they spare
They burn: Gentiles with blazing torches run
And when the wick is spent their race is done.
At Juno's suit he made Aenea's shield,
At Thetis did Pelides armor yield,
The potent Queen of riches and the air
He chaineth fast unto a golden chair;
His wife and
Msrs
he in adultery found,
And them in Adamantine fetters bound.
8
On Cibele.
Cibele,
mother of the God's called
Ops,
From helpful wealth, and
Vesta
fair with crops
Of golden eared-labor-crowning crown,
She clothes the fields; and doth her lap adorn
With verdent grass, choice herbs, green trees, sweet flowrs
Wife was she to the ancient'st of all powers:
This antique Matron wears a branched gown,
And bears, upon her head, a Tower-like crown;
Her right hand helds a Mace, her left a Key;
To her, as Emblems of fertility,
The teeming Sow is sacrificed, then comes
(Beating their brazen hollow-sounding drums)
A train of self-dissected Coribants,
And round about the street for money dance,
To please their great
Cybele,
she that found
Out rural pipes, and first did Cymbals sound.
9
On Juno.
The sceptred Queen of heaven, to thundering
Jove
Sister, and wife of marriage doth approve
Goddess of riches, ever counted mild
And helpful unto woman great with child;
Saturn,
and
Ops,
her parents; she was bred
Up by the Flowrs, and by the Sea-Nymphs fed.
Faire
Iris, Ledeas
twins, and Nymphs twice seven
Fidelious service, to the Qu
•
en of heaven,
Duly perform, and daily wait upon her,
Respecting her according to her honor;
In a rich Chariot, stately to b
•
hold,
Of beaten silver and of burnish'd gold,
A yoke of yellow Lions draw her round
Her vast dominions; spangled star pa
•
'd ground.
The tail-proud Peacock, and the vigilant Goose,
And ravenous Raven's sacred to her use:
Her parties, to be married, off'rings bring,
And do the gall behind the Altars fl
•
ng:
Her Temple open-roofed was, to enter
Therein, no whore by
N
•
ma
's law might venture.
Her co
•
djutor, who is wont to tie men
To females, known is by the name of
Hymen.
This hand a Torch, and that a red veil holds,
Therewith she modest blushing Brides enfolds;
Juno
did shed her milk, rather then she
A nurse unto fierce
Herculee
would be:
Thence
Lillius
had their Alablaster look,
From thence▪ the milky way its whiteness took:
This hand holds a Pomegranate, there doth stand
A
•
uckow on her other sceptered hand.
10.
On Uenus.
LOv
•
s Goddess, thrice more radient then the morne
Of
Cetus
test
•
cles, and Sea froth born,
Wi
•
h Rosy Chaplets her fair Templ
•
's boun'd,
And sometimes with the peaceful Mir
•
le crowned;
Light Torches bears, and needle-pointed A
•
rows,
Prodromes of love, a yoke of lecherous Sparrows
Sometimes do draw her Chariots, now she loves
To couple silver Sw
•
ns, then spotless Doves;
Facundious
Merc'ry,
and the bounteous Graces,
Perswasive
Pytho,
in their several places,
W
•
ite on her honor; who was said to sails
To flow'ry Paphos, in a shell, a veil
Of sorrow-boading
Cyperus
she wore,
When she Bore-k
•
l'd
Adonis
did deplore.
Sometimes a wanton Goat she rides upon,
And doth house-carrying tongueless snails tread on,
Mars
into Seas of wantonness did st
•
ere her,
And reeling
Bacchus
was her Armor-bearer.
Paris
assigned unto the Queen of love,
The golden Apple which fall from above:
Juno
prevails not though she proffers treasure,
Pallas
her gifts are slighted, it is pleasure
Load-stone to vice, attracts the wanton eye
Of injuditious
Paris,
wit may lie
And starve, for him rich
Juno
is neglected;
And
Vinus,
who but
Venus,
is respected?
Hellen
is rap'd, he
H
•
llen
doth enjoy,
A ten years war ends in the fall of Troy:
O d
•
re effects of love! by
Vulcan
's jaws
Troy was devoured, but
H
•
llen
was the cause.
11
On Mix
•
rva.
JOve
's brain-bred girl, the president of war
Princess of peace drawn in a fiery Carr,
To her the Owl (To show her clear discerning
Of obstruse secrets) sacred was of learning.
Of Arts of wisdom, she inven
•
'ress was;
Her Target (Egis called) though smooth as glass,
Did bear a Snake-hair'd
Gorgon
's head, thereon
Who ever looked was turned into a stone;
She on a Dragon treads, gripes in her hand
A Crow a Cock doth on her Helmet stand;
A long Cloake (Peplum called) she used to wear,
And in the air wave her glit'ring Spear;
Terror and fear her waiting maids stood by her,
Tutor'd by her,
Prometheus
stole fire,
From
Titan
's burning Chariot, by which thing,
He many Arts did to perfection bring:
Her heaven-sent Image, the Paladium
Was by the vestal Virgins kept at Rome:
The Trojans loosing, this their City, lost,
Which in a Sea of stormy wars was tos'd?
Olives to her were sacred, for she found
The use of Oil, her the
Athenians
crowned
With decent Chaplets, made of Olive leaves;
Her new-sound use of wool, she spins, and weaves,
A golden lamp to her was dedicated,
At her March feasts the Mistresses awaited
Upon their serving Maids, as Masters tended
Upon their Men, till the Saturnal's ended.
Jove
's thunder she could use, and had the power
To raise a storm, and qualify a shower.
Her heavenly seat is next to
Jupiter,
She went up into
Diomedes
Carr,
In
Orcus
pi
•
chy Helmet hid (so sly)
That she was undiscerned, by
Mars
his eye:
Palas, Arachne
turned into a Spider,
Ambition loves no equals live beside her.
12.
On Diana.
Apollo
's sister daughter unto
Jove,
And fair
La
•
ona,
loves in woods to rove;
And on the swelling hills: from her sure bow
Her Arrows (messengers of death) doth throw,
At swift-foot Dears, and tim'
•
ous Hares, which hast
For life, but meet with death;
Diana
chaste
Goddess of d
•
ncing, unto virgins mild:
Propitious unto women great with child:
An eye of watchfulness, this Goddess sets,
Over the Fishers and the Hunters nets.
The dancing Satyrs. Syl
•
an Dryades,
Nymphs▪ Ham
•
dryades, and Orades.
Do in her figh
•
delight; in Heaven, Earth, Hell,
Luna▪ D
••
na, Proserpine,
do dwell;
One and the same, Triform'd, and Trivis named.
Because, where three ways m
•
t there she was famed
This winged Godness easily restra
•
ns
Fierce Lion
•
force, and speck'led Leopards reins:
The all-united force of milk-white Stags,
Through Marble plains her silver Chariot drags;
Because, with horns, she looketh beautiful,
Men sac
•
ifized unto her a Bull;
Nay more (while they
Diana
did invoke)
With human fl
•
sh her frequent Altars smoke.
13
On Ceres and Proserpine,
Corn crowned
Ceres Saturn
and fair
Ops
Faire Off-spring smiles, upon her gold
•
n crops
Holds wealthy
Plutus,
who at her command
Scatters his bounty with a liberal hand.
Plenty and Honey-mouthed peace remain
Linck'd fast together by a silken chain
None to her sacrifice at any time
Could ent'rance find, if conscious of a crime
Faire Venu
•
, Juno and Minerus to;
Did on a certain time a Maying go,
Proserpine bare them company, who while
She gathered Popy, with a pleasing toil
Tricking her bosom, with delightful flowers
Grim Pluto whirld her to his pitchy Bowres
For his Tartarian Chariots, Cerb
••
ous sings
And fell Erynnis Scorpions have nor stings,
Ixions wheel stood still, Promtheus heart
Feeles no corroding Vipers, Flouds impart
Theire liquor unto thirsty Tantalus,
The stone affordeth rest to Sisyphus:
The lab'ring Belides have leave to play
And solemnize this joyful marrage day
Now
Ceres
mother takes a flaming Pine
And sorrowing seeketh for her Proserpine
And kindly entertained by Celeus
Taught them how
•
o sow corn;
Triptolemus
His Son by day, with milk, by night with fire,
She nourished; while
Celius
did inquire
Too curiously in this, him
Ceres
slew.
Triptol'mus
Chariot winged Dragons drew,
Circling the world
Triptolemus
to men
First taught the use of Corn; from Dis, his den
Proserpine
could not redelivered be
Because she, of a fare Pomegranate tree
(Which did in Pluto's Oachard grow) did taste;
Yet she obtained such savor, at the l
•
st,
As to continue (after she was found)
Six months above, as many under ground;
Halfe a year here, as long assigned to dwell
Black Pluto's Queen, in the low Countries, Hell:
Witches to Hecate, their Goddess, come;
Unto her offered are the Hecatombe.
To show th' inconstancy of wealth and store,
Halfe moons upon their shoes the Romans wore.
14
On Pluto.
Saturn
's three sons shar'd his estate, heaven fell
To
Jove,
to
Neptu
•
e
Sea; to
Pluto
H
•
ll.
And all earth's golden entrails appertains,
His triple-headed
Ceberus
bound in chains
Of Adamant, holding a bunch of keys,
Before the pitchy Palace kennel'd lies;
Horrible for his snakey hares, keeps cent'ry
To guard hell's Monarch; Sybil in this entry
(Which with a vig'lant eye he used to ke
•
p)
D
•
d by her wisdom, lul him fast asl
•
ep;
Thence
Herc'les
dragged him, light doth make him spew,
And of his foam the poys'nous Wolf-bane grew;
The raiging Futies, the life-measuring Fates,
Rapacious Harpies, wait within the gates
Of gr
•
sly
Dis,
with Fun'rall Cypres crowned,
Who, galloping on his black Steeds, is found
By fraud'
•
ent Cheaters, cursed Perjurers,
Oppressors, Liars, and Extortioners:
But very slowly halteth from his den,
To honest, godly, conscionable men.
He cometh creeping when he wealth doth bring,
Departing, fli
•
teth with an Eagles wing.
Who e're put on Pluto his Helme
•
, he,
Became invisible, and from danger free:
With this same Helme
•
coverd, Wisdomes Queen
Fought against Troy, and was, by
Mars
unseen.
How
Pluto
ravished his
Proserpine,
I lately told and shall not telit again.
15
On Charon.
The squalid son of
Erebus
and Night
Old, but not weak, most terrible for sight;
Vigorous, furious, covetous, and sad,
With greasy, sordid, ragged garments clad:
In his old rotten, feeble, brittle wherry,
Men's souls to the Elizium he doth ferry,
Over the scalding Lakes of Phlegethon:
Mournful
Cocytus,
joyless
Acheron,
Hateful
Styx,
(by which the God's did swear)
Obl
•
vion; causing
Lethe,
for his fare,
Each Passenger a half-penny must carry
In his s
•
ut mouth, or else for passage tarry:
None but the dead tohis boat admitted be,
Yet was
Eneas,
for his piety,
Took in alive;
Herc
•
le
•
en
••
ance found,
Theseus
by strength,
Or
••••
us
by's musicks sound;
Alive, and with no fa
•••
these Champions come,
Into the pitchy Realms of
Bara
•
hrum.
16
On Mines, Eacus, Rhadamanthus,
Just
Min
•
s,
husband to the beautiful
Pasiphas,
who entirely loved a Bull:
Into a wooden Cow, which he did frame.
Her,
D
•
d'lus
puts, the Minotaur thence came.
No sooner was this known to
Minos,
but
He
Dedaelus
and his Son Icarus shut
With that same M
•
n-Bull Monster fed with men)
Within his self-m
•
de Labyrinth, and then
H
•
veing obtained the savor of a clue
Of thread, they made evasion, and flew
From
Cretae
's Isle, with Artificial plumes,
While unadvised
Icarus
presumes
Too high a fl
•
ght, his wax
•
n wings did melt,
And straightway failed, when they no sooner f
•
l
•
The
•
corch
•
ng f
•
rce of
Titan
's fiery beams
He fell and christened the Icarian streams.
Theseus
the man-d
•
stroying Monster slew,
And scaped, helped out by
Ariadne
's clue.
•
ove
his three Sons to be hell's judges sent,
Who in their way (by him directed) went
Thorough a flow'ry Meadow, which was thought
The field of truth, poor naked souls were brought
To these impartial Judges, who were strict
In dealing righteous judgment, and t' inflict
Deserved punishment upon▪ offenders,
Furies, and evil Genii, their atenders,
With thund'ring whips of steell are ready still,
To execute these righteous Judges will,
On conscious souls; as bloody murderers,
Adulterers, hollow-hearted fl
•
t
•
rers,
Claw bac'd detractors, glozing Sycophants,
He which hath store of guilt no torment wants.
Aeacus, Rhadamonthus,
sit by one
Another lovingly,
Minos
alone.
Wh
•
n as
Aegina
was unpeopl'd then
At
Eacus
prayers,
Jove
turned the Ants to men;
His timely Orizons delivered Greece,
From the devouring plague, which did increase,
And feast itself on fl
•
sh, carowsing bowls
Of the infected blood of dying souls.
17
Eumenides.
THe snake-hair'd furies, born of Night and
Dis.
Eumen'des
named by an Antiphrasis;
In heaven
Dirae
and in earth they be
Call'd
Harpiae,
and in hell the
Furiae,
She Stygian Dogs of
Pluto; Alecto
With bloody-burning Pine, runs too and fro;
Envious
Megaera
riseth from her chair,
And with her poysnous breath infects the air;
The surnace of her mouth (beseig'd with fire)
Contagious vapors casts her whip of wir
•
M
•
d drunk with blood, makes such a dreadful soun
•
As though the heaven, & earth, it would confound
Spightful
Tes
•
peone
with Scorpions stings
Offenders, and her horror-boding wings
She stearnly shakes, and makes the guilty
•
e
•
l
Th' imprinted strokes of her revengful steel.
These sisters, dredful for their brazen feet;
Snake-hairs, loud-sounding scourges have their se
•
t
With
Apollo
's sacred Temple porch,
Dismaly tining their infestuous Torch;
Worship'd they were, that they no hurt might do,
Who into their Achaian Temple go,
Guilty of murder, incest, theft, or acted.
Much like enormities, d
•
d grow distracted
18
On the Harpies, Stryges, and Lamiae.
Aello, Celero,
and
Ocypete,
The names of
•
he rapac
•
ous Harpies be;
Who did, the me
•
t upon b
•
nd
Phen
•
us
table
Pollute, and then devour (as runs the Fable)
Their flat'
•
ing coun
•
enance, and maiden fac
••
,
Do seem to promise and p
•
rtend embraces;
Their Dragons tails, and tallons of an Eagle,
Threat ruin unto those whom they inveigle.
When as tra'luce
•
t
Phebe
doth appear,
The
Striges
and the
Lamie
domineer,
Suck children's blood, with
Hecat
•
an
charms,
Hurt C
••
tle, therefore from such noxious harms
They
Carne
to protect them do invoke,
And with their sacrifices Altars smoke.
19
On Chimera.
Three shap'd
Chimera,
that much hurt had done,
At last was killed by
Belerophon,
A Lions head he had, his gulf-like throat
Breaths fire, the belly of a wanton goat
No
•
wanting was to him, and least he fail
Of spite, he had the poys'nous Dragons tail.
20
On the Fates.
TH' inexorable
Parce,
borne of Hell,
And night, three Sisters were assigned to dwell
Within a pitchy cavern, nature binds
Their souls in peaceful union:
Cloth
•
winds
Flax on the D
•
staff, and the thread of life
Is spun by
Lachesis,
the fatal knife
Of
Atropos
divideth it in twain,
Which done it cannot be conjoin'd again.
The Series of things,
Jupiter
's scribes
Will not divert, no, for a world of bribes:
Cresus
his store, the wealth that
Midas
treasured,
Cannot prorogue the life that they have measured:
Th'intreats of virtue, nor the threats of vice,
Melts them to mercy; neither prayer nor price
Wring out compassion, no fire can thaw
Their frozen hearts, nor can affliction draw
Their thoughts to pity, they regard no m
•
nes,
Nor thunder of ingemenated groans.
Noah stormy sighs, nor silent-pleading tears,
Can force the rocky portals of their ears;
They'r clothed in white, having their temples crowned
An Adamantine distaff held, which round
The spacious orb encircled, their extent
And solid stableness, thereby was meant.
By these three Fates is understood, by some,
Time past, time present, an
•
the time ro come.
FINIS.