The highly favour'd Joseph bore, SONG ON MAY MORNING. Now the bright morning-star, day's harbinger, Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing, Thus we salute thee with our early song, And welcome thee, and wish thee long. MISCELLANIES. ANNO ÆTATIS XIX. At a VACATION EXERCISE in the COLLEGE, part Latin, part English. The Latin speeches ended, the English thus began. Written in 1627. HAIL native language, that, by sinews weak, Didst move my first endeavouring tongue to speak, And madest imperfect words, with childish trips, Half unpronounced, slide through my infant-lips, Driving dumb silence from the portal door, Where he had mutely sat two years before : Here I salute thee, and thy pardon ask, That now I use thee in my latter task: Small loss it is that thence can come unto thee, I know my tongue but little grace can do thee, Thou need'st not be ambitious to be first, Believe me I have thither pack'd the worst: And, if it happen, as I did forecast, The daintiest dishes shall be serv'd up last; I pray thee then deny me not thy aid, For this same small neglect, that I have made : But haste thee straight to do me once a pleasure, And, from thy wardrobe, bring thy chiefest treasure; Not those new-fangled toys, and trimming slight, Which takes our late fantastics with delight, But call those richest robes, and gay'st attire, Which deepest spirits, and choicest wits desire : I have some naked thoughts, that rove about, And loudly knock to have their passage out; And, weary of their place, do only stay Till thou hast deck'd them in thy best array; That so they may, without suspect or fears, Fly swiftly to this fair assembly's ears; Yet I had rather, if I were to chuse, Thy service in some graver subject use; Such as may make thee search thy coffers round, How he before the thunderous throne doth lie, To the touch of golden wires, while Hebe brings Then, passing through the spheres of watchful fire, But fie, my wandering Muse, how thou dost stray! way, Thou know'st it must be now thy only bent Then Ens is represented as father of the Predica ments, his two sons, whereof the eldest stood for Substance, with his canons, which Ens, thus speaking, explains. Good luck befriend thee, son; for at thy birth, She heard them give thee this, that thou shouldst still, 1 Yet there is something that doth force my fear, And, in time's long and dark prospective glass, And peace shall lall him in her flowery lap; What power, what force, what mighty spell, if not The next, QUANTITY and QUALITY spake in prose, then RELATION was called by the same. RIVERS, arise: whether thou be the son Or Trent, who, like some earth-born giant, spreads Or sullen Mole, that runneth underneath, Or coaly Tine, or ancient hallow'd Dee; Or Humber loud, that keeps the Scythian's name; Or Medway smooth, or royal-tower'd Thame. [The rest was prose.] AN EPITAPH ON THE ADMIRABLE DRAMATIC POET, W. SHAKSPEARE.* WHAT needs my Shakspeare, for his honour'd bones, The labour of an age in piled stones? *This Epitaph is dated 1630, in Milton's own edition of his poems, in 1673. Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid, Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name? Thou, in our wonder and astonishment, Hast built thyself a live-long monument. For whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art, ON THE UNIVERSITY CARRIER, Who sickened at the time of his vacancy, being forbid But lately finding him so long at home, And thinking now his journey's end was come, In the kind office of a chamberlain, Show'd him his room, where he must lodge that night, ANOTHER ON THE SAME. HERE lieth one, who did most truly prove Hobson, the Cambridge carrier, died Jan. 1, 1630, while the plague was in London. + In Bishopsgate-street, London. |