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Most perfect Hero, tried in heaviest plight Of labours huge and hard, too hard for human wight!

He, sovran priest, stooping his regal head,
That dropt with odorous oil down his fair eyes,
Foor fleshy tabernacle entered,

His starry front low-rooft beneath the skies:
O, what a mask was there, what a disguise:

Yet more; the stroke of death he must abide, Then lies him meekly down fast by his brethrens' side.

These latest scenes confine my roving verse;
To this horizon is my Phœbus bound:

His god-like acts, and his temptations fierce,
And former sufferings, other where are found;
Loud o'er the rest Cremona's trump doth sound;
Me softer airs befit, and softer strings

Of lute, or viol still, more apt for mournful things.

Befriend me, Night, best patroness of grief;
Over the pole thy thickest mantle throw,
And work my flatter'd fancy to belief,
That Heaven and Earth are colour'd with my woe;
My sorrows are too dark for day to know:

The leaves should all be black whereon I write, And letters, where my tears have wash'd, a wannish white.

See, see the chariot, and those rushing wheels,
That whirl'd the prophet up at Chebar flood;
My spirit some transporting cherub feels,
To bear me where the towers of Salem stood,
Once glorious towers,
now sunk in guiltless
blood;
There doth my soul in holy vision sit,
In pensive trance, and anguish, and ecstatic
fit.

Mine eye hath found that sad sepulchral rock
That was the casket of Heaven's richest store,
And here though grief my feeble hands up lock,
Yet on the soften'd quarry would I score
My plaining verse as lively as before;

For sure so well instructed are my tears,
That they would fitly fall in order'd characters.
Or should I thence hurried on viewless wing
Take up a weeping on the mountains wild,
The gentle neighbourhood of grove and spring
Would soon unbosom all their echoes mild;
And I (for grief is easily beguil'd)

Might think the infection of my sorrows loud Had got a race of mourners on some pregnant cloud.

This subject the author finding to be above the years he had, when he wrote it, and nothing satisfied with what was begun, left it unfinished.

UPON THE

CIRCUMCISION.

Ye flaming powers, and winged warriors bright, That erst with music, and triumphant song, First heard by happy watchful shepherds' ear, So sweetly sung your joy the clouds along

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FAIREST flower, no sooner blown but blasted, Soft silken primrose fading timelessly, Summer's chief honour, if thou hadst out-lasted Bleak Winter's force that made thy blossom dry; For he, being amorous on that lovely dye

That did thy cheek envermeil, thought to kiss,

But kill'd, alas! and then bewail'd his fatal bliss.

For since grim Aquilo, his charioteer,
He thought it touch'd his deity full near,
By boisterous rape the Athenian damsel got,
If likewise he some fair one wedded not,
Thereby to wipe away the infamous blot
Of long-uncoupled bed and childless eld,
Which, 'mongst the wanton gods, a foul reproach
was held.

So, mounting up in icy-pearled car,

Through middle empire of the freezing air
He wander'd long, till thee he spied from far;
There ended was his quest, there ceas'd his care:
Down he descended from his snow-soft chair,

But, all unwares, with his cold kind embrace Unhous'd thy virgin soul from her fair hiding place.

Yet art thou not inglorious in thy fate;
For so Apollo, with unweeting hand,
Whilom did slay his dearly-loved mate,
Young Hyacinth, born on Eurotas' strand,
Young Hyacinth, the pride of Spartan land

But then transform'd him to a purple flower: Alack, that so to change thee Winter had no power!

'Written in 1625, and first inserted in edition 1673. He was now seventeen. WARTON.

Yet can I not persuade me thou art dead,
Or that thy corse corrupts in Earth's dark womb,
Or that thy beauties lie in wormy bed,
Hid from the world in a low-delved tomb;
Could Heaven for pity thee so strictly doom?
Oh no! for something in thy face did shine
Above mortality, that show'd thou wast divine.

Resolve me then, oh soul most surely blest,
(If so it be that thou these plaints dost hear ;)
Tell me, bright spirit, where'er thou hoverest,
Whether above that high first-moving sphere,
Or in the Elysian Fields, (if such were there;)
Oh say me true, if thou wert mortal wight,
And why from us so quickly thou didst take thy
flight?

Wert thou some star which from the ruin'd roof
Of shak'd Olympus by mischance didst fall;
Which careful Jove in Nature's true behoof
Took up, and in fit place did reinstall?
Or did of late Earth's sons besiege the wall [fled,
Of sheeny Heaven, and thou, some goddess
Amongst us here below to hide thy nectar'd head?

Or wert thou that just maid, who once before
forsook the hated Earth, O tell me sooth,
And cam'st again to visit us once more?
Or wert thou that sweet-smiling youth?
Or that crown'd matrons,age white-robed Truth?
Or any other of that heavenly brood

Let down in cloudy throne to do the world some good?

Or wert thou of the golden-winged host,
Who, having clad thyself in human weed,
To Earth from thy prefixed seat didst post,
And after short abode fly back with speed,
As if to show what creatures Heaven doth breed;
Thereby to set the hearts of men on fire

To scorn the sordid world, and unto Heaven aspire?

But oh why didst thou not stay here below
To bless us with thy heaven-lov'd innocence,
To slake his wrath whom sin hath made our foe,
To turn swift-rushing black Perdition hence,
Or drive away the slaughtering Pestilence,

To stand 'twixt us and our deserved smart?

For when as each thing bad thou hast entomb'd,
And last of all thy greedy self consum'd,
Then long Eternity shall greet our bliss
With an individual kiss;

And joy shall overtake us as a flood,
When every thing that is sincerely good
And perfectly divine,

With truth, and peace, and love, shall ever shine
About the supreme throne

Of him, to whose happy-making sight alone,
When once our heavenly-guided soul shall climb,
Then, all this earthy grossness quit,
Attir'd with stars, we shall for ever sit,
Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee,
O Time.

AT A

SOLEMN MUSIC.

BLEST pair of Sirens, pledges of Heaven's joy,
Sphere-born harmonious sisters, Voice and Verse,
Wed your divine sounds, and mix'd power employ
Dead things with inbreath'd sense able to pierce;
And to our high-rais'd phantasy present
That undisturbed song of pure consent,
Aye sung before the saphire-colour'd throne
To him that sits thereon,

With saintly shout, and solemn jubilee;
Where the bright Seraphim, in burning row, 10
Their loud up-lifted angel-trumpets blow;
And the cherubic host, in thousand quires,
Touch their immortal harps of golden wires,
With those just spirits that wear victorious palms,
Hymns devout and holy psalms
Singing everlastingly:

That we on Earth, with undiscording voice,
May rightly answer that melodious noise;
As once we did, till disproportion'd Sin
Jarı'd against Nature's chime, and with harsh din
Broke the fair music that all creatures made
To their great Lord, whose love their motion
In first obedience, and their state of good.
In perfect diapason, whilst they stood [sway'd
O, may we soon again renew that song,
And keep in tune with Heaven, till God ere long
To his celestial consort us unite,

But thou canst best perform that office where To live with him, and sing in endless morn of

thou art.

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light!

AN

EPITAPH

ON THE

MARCHIONESS OF WINCHESTER'.
THIS rich marble doth inter

The honour'd wife of Winchester,
A viscount's daughter, an earl's heir,
Besides what her virtues fair

She was the wife of John marquis of Winchester, a conspicuous loyalist in the reign of king Charles the first, whose magnificent house or castle of Basing in Hampshire withstood an obstinate siege of two years against the rebels, and when taken was levelled to the ground, because in every window was flourished. Aymes Loya ute.

Added to her noble birth,

More than she could own from earth.
Summers three times eight save one
She had told ; alas! too soon,
After so short time of breath,

To house with darkness, and with death.
Yet had the number of her days
Been as complete as was her praise,
Nature and Fate had had no strife
In giving limit to her life.

Her high birth, and her graces sweet,
Quickly found a lover meet;
The virgin quire for her request
The god that sits at marriage feast;
He at their invoking came,

But with a scarce well-lighted flame;
And in his garland, as he stood,
Ye might discern a cypress bud.
Once had the early matrons run
To greet her of a lovely son,
And now with second hope she goes,
And calls Lucina to her throes;
But, whether by mischance or blame,
Atropos for Lucina came;
And with remorseless cruelty
Spoil'd at one both fruit and tree :
The hapless babe, before his birth,
Had burial, yet not laid in earth;
And the languish'd mother's womb
Was not long a living tomb.

So have I seen some tender slip,
Sav'd with care from Winter's nip,
The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck'd up by some unheedy swain,
Who only thought to crop the flower
New shot up from vernal shower ;
But the fair blossom hangs the head
Side-ways, as on a dying bed,
And those pearls of dew, she wears,
Prove to be presaging tears,
Which the sad Morn had let fall
On her hastening funeral.

Gentle lady, may thy grave.
Peace and quiet ever have ;
After this thy travel sore

Sweet rest seize thee evermore,
That, to give the world increase,
· Shorten'd hast thy own life's lease.
Here, beside the sorrowing
That thy noble house doth bring,
Here be tears of perfect moan
Wept for thee in Helicon ;

And some flowers, and some bays,
For thy herse, to strew the ways,
Sent thee from the banks of Came,

Devoted to thy virtuous name;

Whilst thou, bright saint, high sitst in glory,

Next her, much like to thee in story,
That fair Syrian shepherdess,

Who, after years of barrenness,
The highly favour'd Joseph bore
To him that serv'd for her before,

And at her next birth, much like thee,
Through pangs fled to felicity,
Far within the bosom bright
Of blazing Majesty and Light:
There with thee, new welcome saint,
Like fortunes may her soul acquaiut,
With thee there clad in radiant sheen,
No marchioness, but now a queen.

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And in our lives and in our song

May keepe in tune with Heaven, &c. In the second draught he describes "the harsh discords" of sin by a technical term in music:

By leaving out these harsh CHROMATIC jarres

Of sin that all our music marres:

Ver. 19. As once we could, &c.

Ver. 28. To live and sing with him in endlesse morne of light.

MISCELLANIES.

ANNO ÆTATIS XIX.

AT A VACATION EXERCISE IN THE COLLEGE, part Latin, part English. The Latin speeches ended, the English thus began. '

HAIL, native Language, that by sinews weak Didst move my first endeavouring tongue to speak,

And mad'st imperfect words with childish trips, Half unpronounc'd, slide through my infantlips,

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 trea-

sure,

Not those new-fangled toys, and trimming slight
Which takes our late fantastics with delight;
But cull 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,
Before thou clothe my fancy in fit sound:
Such, where the deep transported mind may

soar

Above the wheeling poles, and at Heaven's door
Look in, and see each blissful deity
How he before the thunderous throne doth lie,
Listening to what unshorn Apollo sings

To the touch of golden wires, while Hebe brings
Immortal nectar to her kingly sire:

Then passing through the spheres of watchful fire,

1 Written 1627. It is hard to say why they did not first appear in edition 1645. They were first added, but inisplaced in edit. 1673. WARTON.

And misty regions of wide air next under,
And hills of snow, and lofts of piled thunder,
May tell at length how green-ey'd Neptune

raves,

In Heaven's defiance mustering all his waves;
Then sing of secret things that came to pass
When beldam Nature in her cradle was;
And last of kings, and queens, and heroes old,
Such as the wise Demodocus once told
In solemn songs at king Alcinous' feast,
While sad Ulysses' soul, and all the rest,
Are held, with his melodious harmony,
In willing chains and sweet captivity.

But fie, my wandering Muse, how thou dost stray!
Expectance calls thee now another way;
Thou know'st it must be now thy only bent
To keep in compass of thy predicament:
Then quick about thy purpos'd business come,
That to the next I may resign my room.

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,
The faery ladies danc'd upon the hearth;
Thy drowsy nurse hath sworn she did them spie
Come tripping to the room where thou didst lie,
And, sweetly singing round about thy bed,
Strew all their blessings on thy sleeping head.
She heard them give thee this, that thou shouldst
still

From eyes of mortals walk invisible:

Yet there is something that doth force my fear;
For once it was my dismal hap to hear
A Sibyl old, bow-bent with crooked age,
That far events full wisely could presage,
And in Time's long and dark prospective glass,
Foresaw what future days should bring to pass;
"Your son," said she,(" nor can you it prevent)
Shall subject be to many an Accident.
O'er all his brethren he shall reign as king,
And those, that cannot live from him asunder,
Yet every one shall make him underling;
Ungratefully shall strive to keep him under;
In worth and excellence he shall out-go them,
Yet, being above them, he shall be below
them;

From others he shall stand in need of nothing,
Yet on his brothers shall depend for clothing.
To find a foe it shall not be his hap,
And Peace shall lull him in her flowery lap;
Yet shall he live in strife, and at his door
Devouring War shall never cease to roar;
To harbour those that are at enmity.
Yea, it shall be his natural property
What power, what force, what mighty spell, if
Your learned hands, can loose this Gordian
knot?"

[not

The next Quantity and Quality spake in prose; then Relation was called by his name.

RIVERS, arise; whether thou be the son
Of utmost Tweed, or Oose, or gulphy Den,
Or Trent, who like some Earth-born giant,
spreads

His thirty arms along the indented meads;
Or sullen Mole, that runneth underneath;
Or Severn swift, guilty of maid en's death;

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ON THE ADMIRABLE DRAMATIC Poet W.Shakspeare.'
WHAT needs my Shakspeare, for his honour'd
The labour of an age in piled stones?
Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid
[bones,
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
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,
Thy easy numbers flow; and that each heart
Hath, from the leaves of thy unvalued book,
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took;
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving,
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;
And, so sepulcher'd, in such pomp dost lie,
That kings, for such a tomb, would wish to die.

ON THE

UNIVERSITY CARRIER,

Who sickened in the time of his vacancy, being
forbid to go to London, by reason of the plague.
HERE lies old Hobson; Death hath broke his girt,

And here, alas! hath laid him in the dirt;
Or else the ways being foul, twenty to one,
He's here stuck in a slough, and overthrown.
'Twas such a shifter, that, if truth were known,
Death was half glad when he had got him down;
For he had, any time this ten years full,

Dodg'd with him betwixt Cambridge and The

Bull.

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HERE lieth one,

who did most truly prove

513

So hung his destiny, never to rot
While he might still jog on and keep his trot,
Made of sphere-metal, never to decay
Until his revolution was at stay.

Time numbers motion, yet (without a crime
'Gainst old truth) motion number'd out his time:
And, like an engine, mov'd with wheel and weight
His principles being ceas'd, he ended straight.
Rest, that gives all men life, gave him his death,
And too much breathing put him out of breath;
Too long vacation hasten'd on his term.
Nor were it contradiction to affirm,
Merely to drive the time away he sicken'd,
Fainted, and died, nor would with ale be quick-
en'd;
[stretch'd,
"Nay," quoth he, on his swooning bed out-
"If I mayn't carry, sure I'll ne'er be fetch'd,
But vow, though the cross doctors all stood hear-

ers,

For one carrier put down to make six bearers."
Ease was his chief disease; and, to judge right,
He died for heaviness that his cart went light:
His leisure told him that his time was come,
That even to his last breath, (there be that say't)
And lack of load made his life burdensome,
As he were press'd to death, he cried, "More
weight;"

But, had his doings lasted as they were,
He had been an immortal carrier.
Obedient to the Moon he spent his date
Link'd to the mutual flowing of the seas,
In course reciprocal, and had his fate
Yet (strange to think) his wain was his increase &

His letters are deliver'd all and gone,
Only remains this superscription.

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Must now be nam'd and printed heretics
By shallow Edwards and Scotch what d'ye call:
But we do hope to find out all your tricks,
Your plots and packing worse than those of
Trent,

That so the Parliament

That he could never die while he could move; 'Birch, and from him doctor Newton, asserts, that this copy of verses was written in the twenty-shops-gate-street, where his figure in fresco, with second year of Milton's age, and printed with the an inscription, was lately to be seen. Poems of Shakspeare at London in 1640. It first Peck, at the end of his Memoirs of Cromwell, has printed appeared among other recommendatory verses, Hobson's will, which is dated at the close of the prefixed to the folio edition of Shakspeare's year 1630. He died Jan. 1, 1630, while the plays in 1632. But without Milton's name or plague was in London. This piece was written initials. This therefore is the first of Milton's that year. The proverb, to which Hobson's caprice, pieces that was published. founded perhaps on good sense, gave rise, needs not to be repeated. LI

* Hobson's inn at London was the Bull in BiVOL. VII.

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