Sleek Panope with all her sisters play'd.
It was that fatal and perfidious bark,
Built in th' eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark,
That sank so low that sacred head of thine.
Next Camus, reverend sire, went footing slow, His mantle hairy, and his bonnet sedge,
Inwrought with figures dim, and on the edge. Like to that sanguine flower inserib'd with wo. "Ah! who hath reft" quoth he, 66 my dearest pledge?"
Last came and last did go,
The pilot of the Galilean lake;
Two massy keys he bore of metals twain,
(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain),
He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake:
"How well could I bave spar'd for thee, young
swain,
Enow of such, as for their bellies' sake
Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold?
Of other care they little reck'ning make,
Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast,
And shove away the worthy bidden guest;
Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A sheep-hook, or have learn'd aught else the least That to the faithful herdman's art belongs:
What recks it them? What need they? They are sped;
And, when they list, their lean and flashy songs
Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,
But swoln with wind, and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly and foul contagion spread:
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing said:
But that two-handed engine at the door
Stands ready to sinite once, and smite no more.
Return, Alpheus, the dread voice is past,
That shrunk thy streams; return, Sicilian Muse,
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast
Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues.
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks,
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks,
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes,
That on the green-turf suck the honied showers,
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,
The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet,
The glowing violet,
The musk-rose, and the well-attir'd woodbine,
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,
And every flower that sad embroidery wears:
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed,
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears,
To strew the Laureat hearse where Lycid lies.
For, so to interpose a little case,
Let our frail thoughts dally with false surmise.
Ay me! whilst thee the shores and sounding seas
Wash far away, where'er thy bones are hurl'd,
Whether beyond the stormy Hebrides,
Where thou perhaps under the whelming tide
Visit'st the bottom of the monstrous world;
Or whether thou, to our moist vows denied,
Sleep'st by the fable of Bellerus old,
Where the great vision of the guarded Mount,
Looks tow'rd Namancos and Bayona's bold;
Look homeward, Angel, now, and melt with ruth;
And, O ye dolphins! waft the hapless youth.
Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more,
Lor Lycidas, your sorrow, is not dead,
Sunk though he be beneath the watery floor;
So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed,
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky:
So Lycidas sunk low, but mounted high, Through the dear might of Him that walk'd the waves,
Where other groves and other streams along,
With nectar pure bis oozy locks he laves,
And bears th' unexpressive nuptial song,
In the bless'd kingdoms meek of joy and love,
There entertain him all the saints above,
In solemn troops, and sweet societies,
That sing, and, singing, in their glory move,
And wipe the tears for ever from his eyes.
Now, Lycidas, the shepherds weep no more;
Henceforth thou art the Genius of the shore,
In thy large recompense, and shalt be good
To all that wander in that perilous flood.
Thus sang the uncouth swain to' the oaks and rills, While the still morn went out with sandals gray, He touch'd the tender stops of varions quills, With eager thought warbling his Doric lay : And now the sun had stretch'd out all the hills, And now was dropp'd into the western bay; At last he rose, and twitch'd his mantle blue : To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new.
THE NEW FORCERS OF CONSCIENCE
Under the Long Parliament.
BECAUSE you have thrown off your Prelate-Lord,
And with stiff vows renounc'd his Liturgy,
To seize the widow'd whore Plurality
From them whose sin ye envied, not abhorr'd ;
Dare ye for this abjure the civil sword
To force our consciences that Christ set free,
And ride us with a classic hierarchy,
Taught ye by mere A. S. and Rotherford?
Men, whose life, learning, faith, and pure intent,
Would have been held in high esteem with Paul,
Must now be named 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 May, with their wholesome and preventive shears, Clip your phylacteries, though balk your ears, And succour our just fears, When they shall read this clearly in your charge, "New Presbyter is but Old Priest writ large."
THE FIFTH ODE OF HORACE, LIB. I.
WHAT slender youth, bedew'd with liquid odours,
Courts thee on roses in some pleasant cave,
Phyrra? For whom bind'st thou
In wreaths thy golden hair,
Plain in thy neatness? O, how oft shall he
On faith, and changed gods, complain; and seas
Rough with black winds, and storms
Unwonted shall admire!
Who now enjoys thee credulous, all gold,
Who always vacant, always amiable,
Hopes thee, of flattering gales
Unmindful. Hapless they,
To whom thou untried seem'st fair! Me, in my vow'd
Picture, the sacred wall declares to have hung,
My dank and drooping weeds
To the stern god of sea.
FROM GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH.
BRUTUS thus addresses DIANA in the Country of
Leogecia.
GODDESS of shades, and huntress, who at will
Walk'st on the rolling spheres, and through the deep;
On thy third reign, the earth, look now, and tell
What land, what seat of rest, thou bidd'st me seek,
What certain seat, where I may worship thee
For aye, with temples vow'd and virgin quires.
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