Forth from their flaming eyes dread lightnings went ; heir gaping mouths did forked tongues, like thunderbolts, present. Some of th' amazed women dropt down dead With fear, some wildly fled About the room, some into corners crept, Where silently they shook and wept: All naked from her bed the passionate mother leap'd, To save or perish with her child; She trembled, and she cry'd; the mighty infant smil'd: The mighty infant seem'd well pleas'd At his gay gilded foes; And, as their spotted necks up to the cradle rose, In vain they rag'd, in vain they hiss'd, In vain their armed tails they twist, And angry circles cast about; Pindar's unnavigable song Like a swoln flood from some steep mountain pours along; The ocean meets with such a voice, So Pindar does new words and figures roll Which in no channel deigns t'abide, To carve in polish'd verse the conqueror's images; Black blood, and fiery breath, and poisonous Whether the swift, the skilful, or the strong, soul, he squeezes out! With their drawn swords In ran Amphitryo and the Theban lords; With doubting wonder, and with troubled joy, Laugh, and point downwards to his prey, Where, in death's pangs and their own gore, they folding lay. When wise Tiresias this beginning knew, To their great offspring here below; In their harmonious, golden palaces; Walk with ineffable delight Be crowned in his nimble, artful, vigorous song; Such mournful, and such pleasing words, As joy to his mother's and his mistress' grief af. fords He bids him live and grow in fame; For little drops of honey flee, And there with humble sweets contents her int dustry. THE RESURRECTION. Nor winds to voyagers at sea, Through the thick groves of never-withering light, Nor showers to earth, more necessary be, And, as he walks, affright The Lion and the Bear, Bull, Centaur, Scorpion, all the radiant monsters there, THE PRAISE OF PINDAR. IN IMITATION OF HORACE'S SECOND ODE, B. IV. Pindarum quisquis studet æmulari, &c. The phenix Pindar is a vast species alone. What could he who follow'd claim, VOL. VII. (Heaven's vital seed cast on the womb of Earth That never will decay Till Heaven itself shall melt away, Begin the song, and strike the living lyre; All hand in hand do decently advance, K Then all the wide-extended sky, And he himself shall see in one fire shine Figures, Conceits, Raptures, and Sentences, in a well-worded dress; And innocent Loves, and pleasant Truths, and useful Lies, In all their gaudy liveries. Mount, glorious queen! thy travelling throne, And bid it to put on; For long, though cheerful, is the way, And life, alas! allows but one ill winter's day. Rich Nature's ancient Troy, though built by Where never foot of man, or hoof of beast, hands divine. Whom thunder's dismal noise, And all that prophets and apostles louder spake, Could not, whilst they liv'd, awake, When dead t' arise; And open tombs, and open eyes, Back to their ancient home; And, where th' attending soul naked and shivering stands, Meet, salute, and join their hands; The mountains shake, and run about no less confus'd than they. Stop, stop, my Muse! allay thy vigorous heat, Kindled at a hint so great; Hold thy Pindaric Pegasus closely in, Which does to rage begin, And this steep hill would gallop up with violent course; 'Tis an unruly and a hard-mouth'd horse, Fierce and unbroken yet, Impatient of the spur or bit; Now prances stately, and anon flies o'er the place; But flings writer and reader too, that sits not sure. THE MUSE. Go, the rich chariot instantly prepare; Let the postillion Nature mount, and let And let the airy footmen, running all beside, The passage press'd; Where never fish did fly, And with short silver wings cut the low liquid sky; Row through the trackless ocean of the air; Where bird with painted oars did ne'er Where never yet did pry The busy Morning's curious eye; The wheels of thy bold coach pass quick and free, Is all thy plain and smooth uninterrupted way! known, Thou hast thousand worlds too of thine own. Thou speak'st, great queen! in the same style as he; And a new world leaps forth when thou say'st, "Let it be." Thou fathom'st the deep gulf of ages past, The years which thou dost please; Like shipwreck'd treasures, by rude tempests With an unwearied wing the other way on high, Through the firm shell and the thick white, dost spy Years to come a-forming lie, Close in their sacred fecundine asleep, Till hatch'd by the Sun's vital heat, And, ripe at last, with vigorous might Break through the shell, and take their everlasting flight! And sure we may The same too of the present say, If past and future times do thee obey. Thy certain hand holds fast this slippery snake: Thy verse does solidate and crystallize, Nay, thy inmortal rhyme TO MR. HOBBES. VAST bodies of philosophy Whether the fair idea thou dost show This I dare boldly tell, 'Tis so like truth, 'twill serve our turn as well. As firm the parts upon their centre rest, Long did the mighty Stagyrite retain Saw his own country's short-liv'd leopard slain; And in the school-mea's hands it per.sh'd quite at [last: [ty air! And those all barbarous too: It perish'd, and it vanish'd there; The life and soul, breath'd out, became but empThe fields, which answer'd well the ancients' plough, Spent and out-worn, return ǹo harvest now; And boast of past fertility, The poor relief of present poverty. We break-up tombs with sacrilegious hands; To walk in ruins, like vain ghosts, we love, We search among the dead Whilst still the liberal Earth does hold The Baltic, Euxine, and the Caspian, And nothing sees but seas and skies, Thou great Columbus of the golden lands of new philosophies! Thy task was harder much than his; Not only found-out first by thee, But thy eloquence and thy wit, Has planted, peopled, built, and civiliz❜d it. I little thought before, (Nor, being my own self so poor, That all the wardrobe of rich Eloquence Could have afforded half enough, Of bright, of new, and lasting stuff, To cloathe the mighty limbs of thy gigantic Sense Thy solid reason, like the shield from Heaven To the Trojan hero given, Too strong to take a mark from any mortal dart, Then, when they 're sure to lose the combat by't. Nor can the snow, which now cold Age does shed Upon thy reverend head, Quench or allay the noble fires within;, But all which thou hast been, And all that youth can be thou 'rt yet! Enjoy the manhood and the bloom of Wit, Here hoary frosts, and by them breaks out fire! Nature and causes, we shall see To things immortal, Time can do no wrong, Here a proud Pawn I admire, That, still advancing higher, Another thing and name; Here I'm amaz'd at th' actions of a Knignt, Here I the losing party blame, For those false moves that break the game, That to their grave, the bag, the conquer'd pieces bring, And, above all, th' ill-conduct of the Mated king. "Whate'er these seem, whate'er philosophy And sense or reason tell," said I, "These things have life, election, liberty; 'Tis their own wisdom moulds their state, Their faults and virtues make their fate. They do, they do," said I; but straight, Lo! from my enlighten'd eyes the mists and shadows fell, That hinder spirits from being visible; An unseen band makes all their moves; Some wise-men, and some fools, we call; Figures, alas! of speech, for Destiny plays us all. Me from the womb the midwife Muse did take: She cut my navel, wash'd me, and mine head With her own hands she fashioned; She did a covenant with me make, [spake: And circumcis'd my tender soul, and thus she "Thou of my church shalt be; Hate and renounce," said she, [me. "Wealth, honour, pleasures, all the world, for Thou neither great at court, nor in the war, Nor at th' exchange, shalt be, nor at the wrangling bar: Content thyself with the small barren praise, Their several ways of life let others chuse, With Fate what boots it to contend? And some small light it did dispense, No matter, Cowley! let proud Fortune see, Let all her gifts the portion be Of Folly, Lust, and Flattery, Rebellion and Hypocrisy ; Do thou not grieve, nor blush to be, As all th' inspired tuneful men, [thee. But as her beams reflected pass Through our own Nature or Ill-custom's glass: As 'tis no wonder, so, If with dejected eye In standing pools we seek the sky, Our mother robb'd, and bound, and ravish'd be, The cancell'd name of friend he bore? There's none but Brutus could deserve offer. Ill Fate assum'd a body thee t' affright, And wrap'd itself i' th' terrours of the night: "I'll meet thee at Philippi," said the sprite; "I'll meet thee there," saidst thou, With such a voice, and such a brow, As put the trembling ghost to sudden flight; It vanish'd, as a taper's light Goes out when spirits appear in sight. One would have thought 't had heard the morn ing crow, Or seen her well-appointed star Come marching up the eastern hill afar. Nor durst it in Philippi's field appear, But, unseen, attack'd thee there: And all thy great forefathers, were, from Homer Had it presum'd in any shape thee to oppose, down to Ben. BRUTUS. EXCELLENT Brutus! of all human race The best, till Nature was improv'd by Grace; Each had his motion natural and free, world, could be. Thou would'st have forc'd it back upon thy foes: [sword?' Ill men, and wretched accidents, The best cause and best man that ever drew a When we see The false Octavius and wild Antony, God-like Brutus! conquer thee? What can we say, but thine own tragic word— These mighty gulphs are yet Too deep for all thy judgment and thy wit. From thy strict rule some think that thou didst The time's set forth already which shall quell Stiff Reason, when it offers to rebel; A few years more, so soon hadst thou not dy'd, TO DR. SCARBOROUGH. How long, alas! has our mad nation been Of epidemic war the tragic scene, When Slaughter all the while Albion no more, nor to be nam'd from white! Sure the unpeopled land Would now untill'd, desert, and naked stand, At the same time let loose Diseases' rage But thou by Heaven wert sent ▲ med'cine, and a counter-poison, to the age. Scarce could the sword dispatch inore to the grave Than thou didst save; By wondrous art, and by successful care, The inundations of all liquid pain, And deluge Dropsy, thou dost drain. (The damn'd scarce more incurable than they) The subtle Ague, that for sureness' sake And at each battery the whole fort does shake, That's sometimes roll'd away in vain, [seize, The Indian son of Lust (that foul disease Restor'd, not to health only, but virginity. If thou but succour the besieged heart, Than Aaron's incense, or than Phineas' dart. At thy strong charms it must be gone Though a disease, as well as devil, were called Legion. From creeping moss to soaring cedar thou On their green infants here bestow : Canst all those magic virtues from them draw, That keep Disease and Death in awe; Who, whilst thy wondrous skill in plants they see, Fear lest the tree of life should be found out by thee. And thy well-travell'd knowledge, too, does give That active soul's metropolis. As the great artist in his sphere of glass There are who all their patients' chagrin have, As certainly as I; [tality. And all thy noble reparations sink Unbend sometimes thy restless care, T' enjoy at once their health and thee: Some hours, at least, to thine own pleasures spare: Since the whole stock may soon exhausted be, Bestow 't not all in charity. Let Nature and let Art do what they please, What's somebody, or nobody? In all the cobwebs of the schoolmen's trade, Vain weak-built isthmus, which dost proudly rise Yet canst nor wave nor wind sustain, But, broken and o'erwhelm'd, the endless oceans meet again. And with what rare inventions do we strive |