Poems Written During theCIVIL War and theProtectorate1642-1658When the Assault Was IntendedTo the City(november, 1642)
¶CAPTAIN, or colonel, or knight in arms,Whose chance on these defenceless doors may seize,If deed of honour did thee ever please,Guard them, and him within protect from harms.He can requite thee, for he knows the charmsThat call fame on such gentle acts as these,And he can spread thy name o'er lands and seas,Whatever clime the sun's bright circle warms.Lift not thy spear against the Muse's bower;The great Emathian conqueror bid spareThe house of Pindarus, when temple and towerWent to the ground; and the repeated airOf sad Electra's Poet had the powerTo save the Athenian walls from ruin bare.
To a Virtuous Young Lady(1644)
¶LADY! that in the prime of earliest youthWisely hast shunned the broad way and the green,And with those few art eminently seen,That labour up the Hill of Heavenly Truth,The better part with Mary and with RuthChosen thou hast, and they that overween,And at thy growing virtues fret their spleen,[79]No anger find in thee, but pity and ruth.Thy care is fixed, and zealously attendsTo fill thy odorous Lamp with deeds of light.And Hope that reaps not shame; therefore be sure,Thou, when the Bridegroom with his feastful friendsPasses to bliss at the mid hour of night,Hast gained thy entrance, Virgin wise and pure.
To the Lady Margaret Ley(1644-5)
¶DAUGHTER to that good Earl, once PresidentOf England's Council and her Treasury,Who lived in both unstained with gold or fee,And left them both, more in himself content,Till the sad breaking of that ParliamentBroke him, as that dishonest victoryAt Cha:ronea, fatal to liberty,Killed with report that old man eloquent,Though later born than to have known the daysWherein your father flourished, yet by you,Madam, methinks I see him living yet:So well your words his noble virtues praiseThat all both judge you to relate them trueAnd to possess them, honoured Margaret.
¶ON THE DETRACTION WHICH FOLLOWED UPON
My Writing Certain Treatises(1645-6)
¶A BOOK was writ of late called Tctrachordon,And woven close, both matter, form, and style;The subject new: it walked the town a while,Numbering good intellects; now seldom pored on.Cries the stall-reader, "Bless us! what a word onA title-page is this!"; and some in fileStand spelling false, while one might walk to Mile-End Green. Why, is it harder, sirs, than Gordon,Colkjtto, or Macdonnel, or Galasp?Those rugged names to our like mouths grow sleek[80]That would have made Quintilian stare and gasp.Thy age, like ours, O soul of Sir John Cheek,Hated not learning worse than toad or asp,When thou taught'st Cambridge and King EdwardGreek.
On the Same(1645-6)
¶I DID but prompt the age to quit their clogsBy the known rules of ancient liberty,When straight a barbarous noise environs meOf owls and cuckoos, asses, apes, and dogs;As when those hinds that were transformed to frogsRailed at Latona's twin-born progeny,Which after held the Sun and Moon in fee.But this is got by casting pearl to hogs,That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood,And still revolt when Truth would set them free.Licence they mean when they cry Liberty;For who loves that must first be wise and good:But from that mark how far they rove we see,For all this waste of wealth and loss of blood.
On the New Forcers of ConscienceUnder the Long Parliament(1646)
¶BECAUSE you have thrown off your Prelate Lord,And with stiff vows renounced his Liturgy,To seize the widowed whore Plurality,From them whose sin ye envied, not abhorred,Dare ye for this adjure the civil swordTo force our consciences that Christ set free,And ride us with a Classic Hierarchy,Taught ye by mere A. S. and Rutherford?Men whose life, learning, faith, and pure intent,Would have been held in high esteem with PaulMust now be named and printed hereticsBy shallow Edwards and Scotch What-d'ye-call![81]But we do hope to find out all your tricks,Your plots and packing, worse than those of Trent,That so the ParliamentMay with their wholesome and preventive shearsClip your phylacteries, though baulk your ears,And succour our just fears,When they shall read this clearly in your charge:New Presbyter is but old Priest writ large.
To Mr. H. Lawes on His Airs(1646)
¶HARRY, whose tuneful and well-measured songFirst taught our English music how to spanWords with just note and accent, not to scanWith Midas' ears, committing short and long,Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the throng,With praise enough for Envy to look wan;To after age thou shalt be writ the manThat with smooth air couldst humour best ourtongue.Thou honour'st Verse, and Verse must lend her wingTo honour thee, the priest of Phoebus' quire,That tunest their happiest lines in hymn or story.Dante shall give Fame leave to set thee higherThan his Casella, whom he wooed to sing,Met in the milder shades of Purgatory.
¶ON THE RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF MRS. CATHERINE
Thomson, My Christian Friend,Deceased Dec. 16, 1646(1646)
¶WHEN Faith and Love, which parted from thee never,Had ripened thy just soul to dwell with God,Meekly thou didst resign this earthly loadOf death, called life, which us from life doth sever.Thy works, and alms, and all thy good endeavour,Stayed not behind, nor in the grave were trod;But, as Faith pointed with her golden rod,[82]Followed thee up to joy and bliss for ever.Love led them on; and Faith, who knew them bestThy handmaids, clad them o'er with purple beamsAnd azure wings, that up they flew so drest,And speak the truth of thee on glorious themesBefore the Judge; who henceforth bid thee rest,And drink thy fill of pure immortal streams.
On the Lord General Fairfax at theSiege of Colchester(,648)
¶FAIRFAX, whose name in arms through Europe rings,Filling each mouth with envy or with praise,And all her jealous monarchs with amaze,And rumours loud that daunt remotest kings,Thy firm unshaken virtue ever bringsVictory home, though new rebellions raiseTheir Hydra heads, and the false North displaysHer broken league to imp their serpent wings.O yet a nobler task awaits thy hand(For what can war but endless war still breed?)Till truth and right from violence be freed,And public faith cleared from the shameful brandOf public fraud. In vain doth Valour bleed,While Avarice and Rapine share the land.
¶TO THE LORD GENERAL CROMWELL , ON THE PROPOS ALSO F CERTAIN MINISTERS AT THE COMMIT T E E FOR THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL
(1652)
¶CROMWELL, our chief of men, who through a cloudNot of war only, but detractions rude,Guided by faith and matchless fortitude,To peace and truth thy glorious way hast ploughed,And on the neck of crowned Fortune proudHast reared God's trophies, and his work pursued,While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued,[83]And Dunbar Held, resounds thy praises loud,And Worcester's laureate wreath: yet much remainsTo conquer still; Peace hath her victoriesNo less renowned than War: new foes arise,Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains.Help us to save free conscience from the pawOf hireling wolves, whose Gospel is their maw.
To Sir Henry Vane the Younger(1652)
¶VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old,Than whom a better senator ne'er heldThe helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms, repelledThe fierce Epirot and the African bold,Whether to settle peace, or to unfoldThe drift of hollow states hard to be spelled;Then to advise how war may best, upheld,Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold,In all her equipage; besides, to knowBoth spiritual power and civil, what each means,What severs each, thou hast learned, which few havedone.The bounds of either sword to thee we owe:Therefore on thy firm hand Religion leansIn peace, and reckons thee her eldest son.
On the Late Massacre in Piemont(1655)
¶AVENGE, O Lord, thy slaughtered Saints, whose bonesLie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold;Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old,When all our fathers worshiped stocks and stones,Forget not: in thy book record their groansWho were thy sheep, and in their ancient foldSlain by the bloody Piemontese, that rolledMother with infant down the rocks. Their moansThe vales redoubled to the hills, and theyTo heaven. Their martyred blood and ashes sow[84]O'er all the Italian fields, where still doth swayThe triple Tyrant; that from these may growA hundredfold, who, having learnt thy way,Early may fly the Babylonian woe.
On His Blindness(1655)
¶WHEN I consider how my light is spentEre half my days in this dark world and wide,And that one Talent which is death to hideLodged with me useless, though my soul more bentTo serve therewith my Maker, and presentMy true account, lest He returning chide,"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"I fondly ask. But Patience, to preventThat murmur, soon replies, "God doth not needEither man's work or his own gifts. Who bestBear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His stateIs kingly: thousands at his bidding speed,And post o'er land and ocean without rest;They also serve who only stand and wait."
To Mr. Lawrence(1656)
¶LAWRENCE, of virtuous father virtuous son,Now that the fields are dank, and ways are mire,Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fireHelp waste a sullen day, what may be wonFrom the hard season gaining? Time will runOn smoother, till Favonius reinspireThe frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attireThe lily and rose, that neither sowed nor spun.What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice,Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may riseTo hear the lute well touched, or artful voiceWarble immortal notes and Tuscan air?He who of those delights can judge, and spareTo interpose them oft, is not unwise.
To Cyriack Skinner(1656)
¶CYRIACK, whose grandsire on the royal benchOf British Themis, with no mean applause,Pronounced, and in his volumes taught, our laws,Which others at their bar so often wrench,To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drenchIn mirth that after no repenting draws;Let Euclid rest, and Archimedes pause,And what the Swede intend, and what the French.To measure life learn thou betimes, and knowToward solid good what leads the nearest way;For other things mild Heaven a time ordains,And disapproves that care, though wise in show,That with superfluous burden loads the day,And, when God sends a cheerful hour, refrains.
To the Same(1655)
¶CYRIACK, this three years' day these eyes, though clear,To outward view, of blemish or of spot,Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot;Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appearOf sun, or moon, or star, throughout the year,Or man, or woman. Yet I argue notAgainst Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jotOf heart or hope, but still bear up and steerRight onward. What supports me, dost thou ask?The conscience, friend, to have lost them overpliedIn Liberty's defence, my noble task,Of which all Europe rings from side to side.This thought might lead me through the world's vainmaskContent, though blind, had I no better guide.
On His Deceased Wife(1658)
¶METHOUGHT I saw my late espoused saintBrought to me like Alcestis from the grave,Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband gave,Rescued from Death by force, though pale and faint.Mine, as whom washed from spot of childbed taintPurification in the Old Law did save,And such as yet once more I trust to haveFull sight of her in Heaven without restraint,Came vested all in white, pure as her mind.Her face was veiled; yet to my fancied sightLove, sweetness, goodness, in her person shinedSo clear as in no face with more delight.But, oh! as to embrace me she inclined,I waked, she fled, and day brought back my night.