From the dry ground to spring, thy thirst t' allay Cause light again within thy eyes to spring, His might continues in thee not for nought, 590 Sams. All otherwise to me my thoughts portend, That these dark orbs no more fhall treat with light, Nor th' other light of life continue long, But yield to double darkness nigh at hand: So much I feel my genial spirits droop, My hopes all flat, nature within me seems In all her functions weary of herself, My race of glory run, and race of shame, And I shall shortly be with them that rest. 595 Man. Believe not these suggestions which proceed From anguish of the mind and humors black, 600 That mingle with thy fancy. I however Must not omit a father's timely care To prosecute the means of thy deliverance By ransome, or how elfe: mean while be calm, To the body's wounds and fores, With maladies innumerable In heart, head, breaft and reins; But But must secret passage find 610 To th' inmoft mind, There exercise all his fierce accidents, And on her purest spirits prey, As on entrails, joints, and limbs, With answerable pains, but more intense, My griefs not only pain me 615 Thoughts my tormentors arm'd with deadly stings Dire inflammation, which no cooling herb Nor breath of vernal air from snowy Alp. Sleep hath forfook and giv'n me o'er 625 To death's benumming opium as my only cure: 630 Thence faintings, fwoonings of despair, And fense of Heav'n's desertion. I was his nurfling once and choice delight, His deftin'd from the womb, Promis'd by heav'nly message twice defcending. 635 Under his special eye Abstemious I grew up and thriv'd amain; He led me on to mightiest deeds Above the nerve of mortal arm Against th' uncircumcis'd, our enemies: 640 But now hath caft me off as never known, And to thofe cruel enemies, Whom I by his appointment had provok'd, 645 The subject of their cruelty or scorn. This one prayer yet remains, might I be heard, 650 The close of all my miseries, and the balm. Chor. Many are the sayings of the wife In ancient and in modern books inroll'd, Extolling patience as the trueft fortitude; And to the bearing well of all calamities, All chances incident to man's frail life, Confolatories writ 655 With study'd argument, and much persuasion sought Lenient of grief and anxious thought: But with th' afflicted in his pangs their found 660 Little prevails, or rather seems a tune Harsh, and of dissonant mood from his complaint; Unless he feel within Some source of confolation from above, Secret refreshings, that repair his strength, 665 And And fainting spirits uphold. God of our fathers, what is man! That thou towards him with hand so various, Temper'ft thy providence through his fhort course, Not ev'nly, as thou rul❜st 671 Th'angelic orders and inferior creatures mute, Irrational and brute. Nor do I name of men the common rout, That wand'ring loose about 675 Grow up and perish, as the summer flie, To fome great work, thy glory, And people's fafety, which in part they' effect: 680 Yet toward these thus dignify'd, thou oft Amidst their highth of noon (gard Changest thy count'nance, and thy hand with no re Of highest favors past 685 From thee on them, or them to thee of service. Nor only doft degrade them, or remit To life obfcur'd, which were a fair difmiffion, Butthrow'ft them lower than thou didst exalt them high, Too grievous for the trefpass or omiffion; 690 To dogs and fowls a prey, or else captiv'd; Or to th' unjust tribunals, under change of times, 695 And condemnation of th' ingrateful multitude. If these they scape, perhaps in poverty With fickness and disease thou bow'ft them down, Painful diseases and deform'd, In crude old age; Though not disordinate, yet causless suff'ring The punishment of diffolute days: in fine, For oft alike both come to evil end. 700 704 So deal not with this once thy glorious champion, The image of thy ftrength, and mighty minister. What do I beg? how haft thou dealt already? Behold him in this state calamitous, and turn His labors, for thou canft, to peaceful end. But who is this, what thing of sea or land? 710 With all her bravery on, and tackle trim, Sails fill'd, and ftreamers waving, Courted by all the winds that hold them play, 720 Her harbinger, a damfel train behind; Some |