And all that Youth can be, thou'rt yet!
So fully ftill doft thou

Enjoy the manhood and the bloom of Wit,
And all the natural heat, but not the fever too!
So contraries on Ætna's top confpire;

Here hoary froits, and by them breaks-out fire!
A fecure peace the faithful neighbours keep;
Th' embolden'd fnow next to the flame does fleep!
And, if we weigh, like thee,

Nature and Caufes, we fhall fee
That thus it needs muft be-

To things immortal, Time can do no wrong,
And that which never is to die, for ever must be

TRANGE and unnatural! let's stay and fee

This page at of a prodigy.

Lo, of themselves th' enliven'd Chefs-men move! Lo, the unbred, ill organ'd pieces prove

As full of art and industry,

Of courage and of policy,

As we ourselves, who think there's nothing wife but we!

Here a proud Pawn I admire,

That, ftill advancing higher,
At top of all became

Another thing and name;

Here I'm amaz'd at th' actions of a Knight,
That does bold wonders in the fight;
Here I the lofing party blame,

For thofe falfe 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 feem, whate'er philofophy
"And fenfe or reafon tell," faid I,

"These things have life, election, liberty;

""Tis their own wifdem moulds their ftate, "Their faults and virtues make their fate. "They do, they do," said I; but strait Lo! from my enlighten'd eyes the mifts and shadows fell,

That hinder fpirits from being visible;
And lo! I faw two angels play'd the Mate.
With man, alas! no otherwife it proves;
An unfeen hand makes all their Moves;
And fome are great, and fome are small,
Some climb to good, fome from good-fortune fall;
Some wife-men, and fome fools, we call;
Figures, alas! of speech, for Destiny plays us all.
Me from the womb the midwife Mufe did take:
She cut my navel, wash'd me, and mine head

With her own hand fhe fashioned; She did a covenant with me make, And circumcis'd my tender foul, and thus fhe spake: "Thou of my church fhalt be; "Hate and renounce," said she, "Wealth, honour, pleasures, all the world, for me. VOL. II.

"Content thyself with the small barren praise,
"That neglected verfe does raife.'
She fpake, and all my years to come

Took their unlucky doom.
Their feveral ways of life let others chufe,
Their feveral pleasures let them ufe,
But I was born for Love, and for a Muse.
With Fate what boots it to contend?
Such I began, fuch am, and fo must end.
The ftar that did my being frame,
Was but a lambent flame,

And fome fmall light it did dispense,
But neither heat nor influence.

No matter, Cowley! let proud Fortune fee,
That thou canst her defpife no less than the does

thee.

Let all her gifts the portion be
Of Folly, Luft, and Flattery,
Fraud, Extortion, Calumny,
Murder, Infidelity,

Rebellion and Hypocrify;

Do thou not grieve, nor blush to be,
As all th' infpired tuneful men,

And all thy great forefathers, were, from Homer down to Ben.

BRUTU S.

EXCELLENT Brutus! of all human race
The beft, till Nature was improv'd by Grace;
Till men above themfelves Faith raised more
Than Reafon above beafts before.
Virtue was thy life's centre, and from thence
Did filently and conftantly difpenfe

The gentle, vigorous influence
To all the wide and fair circumference;
And all the parts upon it lean'd so easily,
Obey'd the mighty force fo willingly,
That none could difcord or diforder fee

in all their contrariety:

Each had his motion natural and free, And the whole no more mov'd than the whole world could be.

As 'tis no wonder, fo,

If with dejected eye

In standing pools we feck the fky,

That ftars, fo high above, fhould feem to us below.

Can we ftand by and fee

Our mother robb'd, and bound, and ravifh'd be, Yet not to her aflance ftir,

Pleas'd with the strength and beauty of the ravifher?

Or fhall we fear to kill him, if before

The cancel'd name of friend he bore?
Ingrateful Brutus do they call?
Ingrateful Cæfar, who could Rome enthrall!
An act more barbarous and unnatural
(In th' exa& balance of true virtue try'd)
Than his fucceffor Nero's parricide!

There's none but Brutus could deferve

That all men elfe fhould wish to ferve,! And Cæfar's ufurp'd place to him fhould proffer; Nene can deferve 't but he who would refuse the offer.

I!! Fate affum'd a body thee t' affright, -And wrap'd itself i' th' terrors of the night: "I'll meet thee at Philippi," faid the fprite; "I'll meet thee there," faidit thou, With fuch a voice, and fuch a brow, As put the trembling ghoft to fudden flight; It vanish'd, as a taper's light

Goes out when fpirits appear in fight.

One would have thought 't heard the morning

crow,

Or feen her well-appointed flar Come marching up the Eastern hill afar. Nor durft it in Philippi's field appear,

But unfeen attack'd thee there :

Had it prefum'd in any fhape thee to oppofe, Thou fhould't have forc'd it back upon thy foes:

Or flain 't, like Cæfar, though it be

A conqueror and a monarch mightier far than he.

What joy can human thing; to us afford,
When we fee perish thus, by odd events,
Ill men, and wretched accidents,

The beft caufe and beft man thatever drew a fword?
When we fee

The falfe Octavius and wild Antony,

God-like Brutus! conquer thee?
What can we fay, but thine own tragic word-
That virtue, which had worship'd been by thee
As the moft folid Good, and greatest Deity,
By this fatal proof became

An idol only, and a name.
Hold, noble Brutus! and restrain
The bold voice of thy generous difdain:
Thefe mighty gulphs are yet

Too deep for all thy judgment and thy wit.
The time's fet forth already which shall quell
Stiff Reafon, when it offers to rebel;

Which these great fecrets fhall unfeal,
And new philofophies reveal:

A few years more, fo foon hadft thou not dy'd,
Would have confounded human Virtue's pride,
And fhew'd thee a God crucify'd.

TO DR. SCARBOROUGH.

[OW long, alas! has our mad nation been

Hof epidemic war the tragic feens,

When Slaughter all the while

Seem'd like its fea, embracing round the ifle,
With tempefts, and red waves, noise and aftrigh
Albion no more, nor to be nam'd from white.
What province or what city did it fpare?
It, like a plague, infected all the air,
Sure the unpeopled land

Would now untill'd, defert, and naked stand,
Had God's all-mighty hand

At the fame time let loofe Difeafes' rage
Their civil wars in man to wage.
But thru by Heaven wert fent
This defolation to prevent,

A medicine, and a counter-peifon to the age.
Scarce could the fword difpatch more to the gra
Than thou didst fave;

By wondrous art, and by fuccefsful care,
The ruins of a civil war thou doft alone repair!

The inundations of all liquid Pain,

And deluge Dropfy, thou doll drain. Fevers, fo hot that one would fay Thou might'ft as foon hell-fires allay (The damn'd fearce more incurable than they Thou doft fo temper, that we find, Like gold, the body but refin'd,

No unhealthful dros behind.

The fubtle Ague, that for furenefs' fake
Takes its own times th' affault to make,
And at each battery the whole fort does shake,
When thy trong guards, and works,it ip
Trembles for itself, and flies.
The cruel Stone, that reftless pain,

That's fometimes roll'd away in vain,
But ftill, like Syfiphus's ftone returns again,
Thou break'ft and meltet by learn'd juices' fo
(A greater work, though fhort the way appea
Than Hannibal's by vinegar!)
Oppreffed Nature's neceffary courfe
It tops in vain; like Mofes thou
Strik'ft but the rock, and ftrait the waters free
flow.

The Indian fon of Luft (that foul difeafe Which did on this his new-found world but late

feize,

Yet fince a tyranny has planted here,
As wide and cruel as the Spaniard there)
Is fo quite rooted-out by thee,
That thy patients feem to be
Reftor'd not to health only, but virginity.
The Plague itfelf, that proud imperial ill,
Which deftroys towns, and does whole armies &
If thou but fuccour the beficged heart,
Calls all its poifons forth, and does depart,
As if it fear'd no lefs thy art,
Than Aaron's incenfe, or than Phineas' dart.
What need there here repeated be by me
The vaft and barbarcus lexicon

From creeping mofs to foaring cedar thou
Doft all the powers and feveral portions know,
Which father-Sun, and mother-Earth below,
On their green infants here beftow:
Canft all thofe magic virtues from them draw,
That keep Difeafe and Death in awe;
Who, whilft thy wondrous skill in plants they fee,
Fear left the tree of life fhould be found out by thee.
And thy well-travel'd knowledge, too, does give
No lefs account of th' empire fenfitive;

Chiefly of man, whofe body is
That active foul's metropolis.
As the great artist in his fphere of glafs
Saw the whole fcene of heavenly motions pafs;
So thou know'ft all fo well that's done within,
As if fome living crystal man thou’dst seen.
Nor does this fcience make thy crown alone,

But whole Apollo is thine own; His gentler arts, belov'd in vain by me, Are wedded and enjoy'd by thee. Thou'rt by this noble mixture free From the phyficians' frequent malady,

Fantaftic incivility:

There are who all their patients' chagrin have,
As if they took cach morn worfe potions than
they gave.

And this great race of learning thou haft run,
Ere that of life be half yet done;

Thou fee'ft thyself still fresh and strong,
And like t' enjoy thy conquefts long.
The first fam'd aphorifm thy great master spoke,
Did he live now he would revoke,
And better things of man report;

For thou doft make Life long, and Art but short. Ah, learn'd friend! it grieves me, when I think That thou with all thy art must die,

As certainly as I;

And all thy noble reparations fink

Into the fure-wrought mine of treacherous

mortality.

Like Archimedes, honourably in vain,

Thou hold'st out towns that muft at last be ta'en,
And thou thyfelf, their great defender, flain.
Let's e'en compound, and for the present live,
Tis all the ready-money Fate can give;
Unbend fometimes thy reflefs care,
And let thy friends so happy be

Tenjoy at once their health and thee:

Some hours, at least to thine own pleasures spare: Since the whole ftock may foon exhausted be,

Beftow 't not all in charity.

Let Nature and let Art do what they please, When all's done, Life is an incurable difcafe.

LIFE AND FAME.

H, Life! thou Nothing's younger brother!
other!
What's fomebody, or nobody?

In all the cobwebs of the fchoolmen's trade,
We no fuch nice diftinction woven fee,
As 'tis" to be," or "not to be."
Dream of a fhadow! a reflection made

From the falfe glories of the gay refleted bow, Is a more folid thing than thou.

Vain, weak-built ifthmus, which doft proudly rife Up betwixt two eternities!

Yet cauft nor wave nor wind fuftain, But, broken and o'erwhelm'd, the endlefs ocean meet again.

And with what rare inventions do we frive
Ourfelves then to furvive?
Wife, fubtle arts, and fuch as well befit

That Nothing Man's no wit!-
Some with vaft cottly tombs would purchase it,
And by the proofs of death pretend to live.

"Here lies the great"-falfe marble! where? Nothing but small and fordid duft lies there.Some build enormous mountain-palaces,

The fools and architects to pleafe;

A lafting life in well hewn flone they rear:
So he, who on th' Egyptian fhore
Was flain fo many hundred years before,
Lives fill (oh Life! moft happy and most dear!
Oh Life! that epicures envy to hear!)
Lives in the dropping ruins of his amphitheatre,
His father-in-law an higher place does claim
In the feraphic entity of fame;

He, fince that toy his death,

Does fill all mouths, and breathes in all men's breath.

"Tis true, the two immortal fyllables remain;
But oh, ye learned men! explain
What effence, what existence, this,
What fubftance, what fubfiftence, what hypoftafis,
In fix poor letters is!

In thofe alone does the great Cæfar live,

"Tis all the conquer'd world could give.
We Poets, madder yet than all,

With a refin'd fantaftic vanity,

Think we not only have, but give, eternity.
Fain would I fee that prodigal,

Who his to-morrow would beftow,

For all old Homer's life, e'er fince he dy'd till now!

The foft clouds melted him away;

I pafs by th' arch'd magazines which hold
Th' eternal ftores of froft, and rain, and fnow;
Dry and fecure I go,

Nor fhake with fear or cold:

Without affright or wonder

I meet clouds charg'd with thunder,
And lightnings, in my way,

Like harmless lambent fires about my temples play.
Now into' a gentle fea of rolling flame
I'm plung'd, and still mount higher there,

As flames mount up through air:
So perfect, yet so tame,

So great, fo pure, fo bright a fire,
Was that unfortunate defire,

My faithful breaft did cover,

Then, when I was of late a wretched mortal lover.

Through feveral orbs which one fair planet bear, Where I behold diftinctly, as I pafs

The hints of Galileo's glafs,

I touch at last the fpangled fphere:
Here all th' extended sky

Is but one galaxy,

'Tis all fo bright and gay,

And the joint eyes of night make up a perfect day.

Where am I now? Angels, and God is here;
An unexhausted ocean of delight

Swallows my fenfes quite,

And drowns all What, or How, or Where!
Not Paul, who firft did thither pass,
And this great world's Columbus was,

The tyrannous pleasure could exprefs.

Oh, 'tis too much for man! but let it ne'er be lefs!

The mighty' Elijah mounted fo on high,
That fecond man who cap'd the ditch where all
The rest of mankind fall,

And went not downwards to the sky!
With much of pomp and show

(As conquering kings in triumph go)

Did he to heaven approach,

And wondrous was his way, and wondrous was

his coach.

'Twas gaudy all; and rich in every part Of effences, of gems; and fpirit of gold

Was its fubftantial mould,

Drawn forth by chemic angels' art.
Here with moon-beams 'twas filver'd bright,
There double giit with the fun's light;

And mystic shapes cut round in it, Figures that did tranfcend a vulgar angel's wit.

The horses were of temper'd lightning made,
Of all that in Heaven's beauteous paliures feed
The nobleft, fprightful'ft breed;

And flaming manes their necks array'd:
They all were fhod with diamond,
Not fuch as here are found,

But fuch light folid ones as fhine
On the tranfparent rocks o' th' Heaven-cryftalline.

Thus mounted the great Prophet to the skies;
Astonish'd men, who oft had seen stars fall,

Or that which fo they call,
Wonder'd from hence to fee one rife.

The fnow and frofts which in it lay
Awhile the facred footsteps bore;

The wheels and horfes' hoofs hizz'd as they paft them o'er!

He paft by th' moon and planets, and did fright All the worlds there which at this meteor gaz'd, And their aftrologers amaz'd

With th' unexampled fight.

But where he ftopp'd will ne'er be known,
Till Phoenix Nature, aged grown,

To' a better thing do afpire,

And mount herself, like him, to' eternity in fire.

If then, young Year! thou needst must come
(For in Time's fruitful womb

The birth beyond its time can never tarry,
Nor ever can mifcarry);

Chufe thy attendants well; for 'tis not thee
We fear, but 'tis thy company:

Let neither Lofs of Friends, or Fame, or Liberty,
Nor pining Sickness, nor tormenting Pain,
Nor Sadnefs, nor uncleanly Poverty,
Be feen among thy train:
Nor let thy livery be
Either black Sin, or gaudy Vanity:

Nay, if thou lov't me, gentle Year!
Let not fo much as Love be there;

Vain fruitless Love, I mean; for gentle Year!
Although I fear,

There's of this caution little need,

Yet, gentle Year! take heed
How thou doft make

Such a mistake:

Such Love I mean, alone,

As by thy cruel predeceffors has been shown;
For though I have too much cause to doubt it,

I fain would try for once if Life can live without it.

Into the future times why do we pry,
And feek to antedate our misery?

Like jealous men, why are we longing ftill
To fee the thing which only seeing makes an ill?
"Tis well the face is veil'd; for 'twere a fight

That would ev'n happiest men affright; And fomething still they'd spy that would deftroy The paft and prefent joy.

In whatsoever character

The book of Fate is writ,
'Tis well we understand not it;

We fhould grow mad with little learning there;
Upon the brink of every ill we did forefce,

Undecently and foolishly

We fhould stand shivering, and but flowly venture
The fatal flood to enter.

Since, willing or unwilling, we muft do it,
They feel leaft cold and pain who plunge at once

into it.

Because we heap up yellow earth, and fo
Rich, valiant, wife, and virtuous, feem to grow:
Because we draw a long nobility

From hieroglyphic proofs of heraldry,
And impudently talk of a pofterity,

And, like Egyptian chroniclers,

Who write of twenty thousand years, With maravedies make th' account, That fingle time might to a fum amount: We grow at laft by cuftom to believe,

That really we Live:

Whilft all these Shadows, that for Things we take, Are but the empty dreams which in Death's fleep we make.

But these fantastic errors of our dream
Lead us to folid wrong:

We pray God our friends' torments to prolong,
And with uncharitably for them

To be as long a dying as Met hufalem.

The ripen'd foul longs from his prifon to come; But we would feal, and fow up, if we could, the womb :

We seek to close and plaifter up by art
The cracks and breaches of th' extended fhell,
And in that narrow cell
Would rudely force to dwell

The noble vigorous bird already wing'd to part.

To the grave's fruitful womb,
We call here Life; but Life's a name
That nothing here can truly claim:

This wretched inn, where we fcarce stay to bait,
We call our dwelling-place;

We call one step a race: But angels, in their full enlighten'd state, Angels, who Live, and know what 'tis to Be; Who all the nonfenfe of our language fee; Who fpeak Things, and our words, their ill-drawn pictures, fcorn;

When, we, by' a foolish figure, fay, "Behold an old man dead!" then they Speak properly, and cry, "Behold a man-child

born!"

My eyes are open'd, and I fee
Through the transparent fallacy:
Becaufe we feem wifely to talk

Like men of bufinefs; and for business walk
From place to place,

And mighty voyages we take, And mighty journeys feem to make, O'er fea and land, the little point that has no fpace: Because we fight, and battles gain;

Some captives call, and fay," the reft are flain :"

THE THIRTY-FOURTH CHAPTER OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH.

AWAKE, and with attention hear,

Thou drowsy World! for it concerns thee

near;

Awake, I fay, and liften well,
To what from God, I, his loud prophet, tell.
Bid both the poles fupprefs their stormy noise,
And bid the roaring fea contain its voice.
Be ftill, thou fea; be ftill, thou air and earth,
Still as old Chaos, before Motion's birth:
A dreadful hoft of judgments is gone out,
In ftrength and number more

Than e'er was rais'd by God before, To fcourge the rebel world, and march it round about.

I fee the fword of God brandifh'd above,
And from it ftreams a difmal ray;
I fee the fcabbard caft away;

How red anon with flaughter will it prove!
How will it fweat and reek in blood!
How will the fcarlet-glutton be o'ergorg'd with
his food,

And devour all the mighty feaft!
Nothing foon but bones will reft.
God does a folemn facrifice prepare;
But not of oxen, nor of rams,
Not of kids, nor of their dams,
Not of heifers, nor of lambs:

The altar all the land, and all men in 't the victims

are.

Since, wicked men's more guilty blood to spare,