Select Works of the British Poets

“Cease, man of woman born, to hope relief “Amicted Israel shall sit weeping down, From daily trouble and continued grief;

Fast by the stream where Babel's waters run; Phy hope of joy deliver to the wind,

Their harps upon the neighboring willows hung, Suppress thy passions, and prepare thy mind; Nor joyous hymn encouraging their tongue, Free and familiar with misfortune grow,

Nor cheerful dance their feet; with toil oppress'd, Be us'd to sorrow, and inur'd to woe ;

Their wearied limbs aspiring but to rest. By weakening toil and hoary age o'ercome, In the reflective stream the sighing bride, See thy decrease, and hasten to thy tomb; Viewing her charms impair'd, abash'd, shall hide Leave to thy children tumult, strife, and war, Her pensive head; and in her languid face Portions of toil, and legacies of care ;

The bridegroom shall foresee his sickly race, Send the successive ills through ages down, While ponderous fetters vex their close embrace. And let each weeping father tell his son,

With irksome anguish then your priests shall mourn That deeper struck, and more distinctly griev'd, Their long-neglected feasts' despair'd return, He must augment the sorrows he receiv'd. And sad oblivion of their solemn days.

“The child to whose success thy hope is bound, Thenceforth their voices they shall only raise, Ere thou art scarce interr'd, or he is crown'd, Louder to weep. By day, your frighted seers To lust of arbitrary sway inclind,

Shall call for fountains to express their tears, (That cursed poison to the prince's mind!) And wish their eyes were floods; by night, from Shall from thy dictates and his duty rove,

dreams And lose his great defence, his people's love; Of opening gulfs, black storms, and raging flames, Ill-counsell’d, vanquish’d, fugitive, disgrac'd, Starting amaz'd, shall to the people show Shall mourn the fame of Jacob's strength effac'd; Emblems of heavenly wrath, and mystic types of woe. Shall sigh the king diminishd, and the crown The captives, as their tyrant shall require With lessen'd rays descending to his son; That they should breathe the song, and touch the Shall see the wreaths, his grandsire knew to reap

lyre, By active toil and military sweat,

Shall say : •Can Jacob's servile race rejoice, Pining, incline their sickly leaves, and shed Untun'd the music, and disus'd the voice ? Their falling honors from his giddy head ; What can we play,' (they shall discourse,) 'how sing By arms or prayer unable to assuage

In foreign lands, and to a barbarous king ?
Domestic horror and intestine rage,

We and onr fathers, from our childhood bred
Shall from the victor and the vanquish'd fear, To watch the cruel victor's eye, to dread
From Israel's arrow, and from Judah's spear; The arbitrary lash, to bend, to grieve,
Shall cast his wearied limbs on Jordan's flood, (Outcast of mortal race!) can we conceive
By brother's arms disturb'd, and stain'd with kin- Image of aught delightful, soft, or gay?
dred blood.

[race, Alas! when we have toil'd the longsome day, “ Hence laboring years shall weep their destin'd The fullest bliss our hearts aspire to know Charg'd with ill omens, sullied with disgrace. Is but some interval from active woe, Time, by necessity compell’d, shall go

In broken rest and startling sleep to mourn, Through scenes of war, and epochas of woe. Till morn, the tyrant, and the scourge, return. The empire, lessen'd in a parted stream,

Bred up in grief, can pleasure be our theme? Shall lose its course

Our endless anguish does not Nature claim ? Indulge thy tears: the Heathen shall blaspheme; Reason and sorrow are to us the same. Judah shall fall, oppress'd by grief and shame, Alas! with wild amazement we require, And men shall from her ruins know her fame. If idle Folly was not Pleasure's fire ?

• New Egypts yet and second bonds remain, Madness, we fancy, gave an ill-tim'd birth A harsher Pharaoh, and a heavier chain.

To grinning Laughter, and to frantic Mirth.' Again, obedient to a dire command,

" This is the series of perpetual woe, Thy captive sons shall leave the promis'd land. Which thou, alas! and thine, are born to know. Their name more low, their servitude more vile, Illustrious wretch! repine not, nor reply: Shall on Euphrates' bank renew the grief of Nile. View not what Heaven ordains with Reason's eye ; “These pointed spires, that wound the ambient Too bright the object is; the distance is too high. sky,

The man who would resolve the work of Fate, (Inglorious change!) shall in destruction lie May limit number, and make crooked straight : Low, levell’d with the dust; their heights unknown, Stop thy inquiry then, and curb thy sense, Or measur'd by their ruin. Yonder throne, Nor let dust argue with Omnipotence. For lasting glory built, design'd the seat

'Tis God who must dispose, and man sustain, Of kings for ever blest, for ever great,

Born to endure, forbidden to complain. Remov'd by the invader's barbarous hand, Thy sum of life must his decrees fulfil; Shall grace his triumph in a foreign land.

What derogates from his command, is ill; The tyrant shall demand yon sacred load And that alone is good which centres in his will Of gold, and vessels set apart to God,

“ Yet, that thy laboring senses may not droop, Then, by vile hands to common use debas'd, Lost to delight, and destitute of hope, Shall send them flowing round his drunken feast, Remark what I, God's messenger, aver With sacrilegious taunt, and impious jest.

From him, who neither can deceive nor err. “Twice fourteen ages shall their way complete ; The land, at length redeem'd, shall cease to mourn Empires by various turns shall rise and set; Shall from her sad captivity return. While thy abandon'd tribes shall only know Sion shall raise her long-dejected head, A different master, and a change of woe,

And in her courts the law again be read. With down-cast eye-lids, and with looks aghast, Again the glorious temple shall arise, Shall dread the future, or bewail the past. And with new lustre pierce the neighboring skies

truss'd up,

The promis'd seat of empire shall again

The squire, whose good grace was to open the Cover the mountain, and command the plain ;

scene,
And, from thy race distinguish'd, one shall spring, Seem'd not in great haste that the show should
Greater in act than victor, more than king

begin :
In dignity and power, sent down from heaven, Now fitted the halter, now travers'd the cart,
To succor Earth. To him, to him, 'tis given, And often took leave, but was loth to depart.
Passion, and care, and anguish, to destroy.

Derry down, &c.
Through him, soft peace, and plenitude of joy,
Perpetual o'er the world redeem'd shall flow;

“What frightens you thus, my good son ?" says No more may man inquire, nor angel know.

the priest : “Now, Solomon! remembering who thou art,

“ You murder'd, are sorry, and have been confest."
Act through thy remnant life the decent part. “O father! my sorrow will scarce save my bacon ;
Go forth : be strong : with patience and with care For 'twas not that I murder'd, but that I was taken."
Perform, and suffer: to thyself severe,

Derry down, &c.
Gracious to others, thy desires suppress'd,
Diffus'd thy virtues ; first of men! be best.

“ Pugh! pr’ythee ne'er trouble thy head with Thy sum of duty let two words contain ;

such fancies: (O may they graven in thy heart remain !) Rely on the aid you shall have from Saint Francis: Be humble, and be just." The angel said :

If the money you promis'd be brought to the chest, With upward speed his agile wings he spread ;

You have only to die : let the church do the rest.
Whilst on the holy ground I prostrate lay,

Derry down, &c.
By various doubts impell’d, or to obey,

“ And what will folks say, if they see you afraid ?
Or w object; at length (my mournful look
Heaven-ward erect) determin'd, thus I spoke :

It reflects upon me, as I k.ew not my trade :

Courage, friend; for to-day is your period of sorrow; “ Supreme, all-wise, eternal Potentate! Sole Author, sole Disposer of our fate!

And things will go better, believe me, to-morrow."
Enthron'd in light and immortality,

Derry down, &c.
Whom no man fully sees, and none can see !

“To-morrow!" our hero replied, in a fright: Original of beings! Power divine !

“ He that's hang'd before noon, ought to thing of toSince that I live, and that I think, is thine !

night."Benign Creator! let thy plastic hand

“Tell your beads," quoth the priest, “and be fairly Dispose its own effect; let thy command Restore, Great Father! thy instructed son;

For you surely to-night shall in Paradise sup." And in my act may thy great will be done!"

Derry down, &c. “Alas !" quoth the squire, “howe'er sumptuous

the treat,
THE THIEF AND THE CORDELIER,

Parbleu! I shall have little stomach to eat;
A BALLAD:

I should therefore esteem it great favor and grace.

Would you be so kind as to go in my place.”
To the Tune of King John and the Abbot of Canterbury. Derry down, &c.
Who has e'er been at Paris, must needs know the

"That I would,” quoth the father, "and thank
Grève,
The fatal retreat of th' unfortunate brave;

you to boot ;

But our actions, you know, with our duty must suit
Where Honor and Justice most oddly contribute

The feast I propos'd to you, I cannot taste ;
To ease heroes' pains by a halter and gibbet.

For this night, by our order, is mark'd for a fast.”
Derry down, down, hey derry down.

Derry down, &c.
There Death breaks the shackles which Force had
put on,

Then, turning about to the hangman, he said, And the hangman completes what the judge but " Dispatch me, I pr'ythee, this troublesome blade ; begun;

For thy cord and my cord both equally tie,
There the squire of the pad, and the knight of the And we live by the gold for which other men die.
post,

Derry down, &c.
Find their pains no more balk'd, and their hopes

no more crost.
Derry down, &c.
Great claims are there made, and great secrets
are known;

[own;

A SONG
And the king, and the law, and the thief, has his

IN vain you tell your parting lover,
But my hearers cry out, " What a deuce dost thou
ail?

You wish fair winds may waft him over.
Cut off thy reflections, and give us thy tale."

Alas! what winds can happy prove,

That bear me far from what I love?
Derry down, &c.

Alas! what dangers on the main
'Twas there then, in civil respect to harsh laws, Can equal those that I sustain,
And for want of false witness to back a bad cause, From slighted vows, and cold disdain ? •
A Norman, though late, was obliged to appear;
And who to assist, but a grave Cordelier!

Be gentle, and in pity choose
Derry down, &c.

To wish the wildest tempests loose :

That, thrown again upon the coast
Where first my shipwreck'd heart was lost,
I may once more repeat my pain;
Once more in dying notes complain
of slighted vows, and cold disdain.

THE GARLAND.

The pride of every grove I chose,

The violet sweet and lily fair, The dappled pink, and blushing rose,

To deck my charming Chloe's hair.

At morn the nymph vouchsaf'd to place

Upon her brow the various wreath ; The flowers less blooming than her face,

The scent less fragrant than her breath. The flowers she wore along the day :

And every nymph and shepherd said, That in her hair they look'd more gay

Than glowing in their native bed.
Undrest at evening, when she found

Their odors lost, their colors past;
She chang'd her look, and on the ground

Her garland and her eye she cast.
That eye dropt sense distinct and clear,

As any Muse's longue could speak, When from its lid a pearly tear

Ran trickling down her beauteous cheek.

The reason of the thing is clear,
Would Jove the naked truth aver.
Cupid was with him of the party,
And show'd himself sincere and hearty;
For, give that whipster but his errand,
He takes my lord chief justice' warrant:
Dauntless as Death, away he walks ;
Breaks the doors open, snaps the locks;
Searches the parlor, chamber, study;
Nor stops till he has culprit's body.

“Since this has been authentic truth,
By age deliver'd down to youth ;
Tell us, mistaken husband, tell us,
Why so mysterious, why so jealous ?
Does the restraint, the bolt, the bar,
Make us less curious, her less fair ?
The spy, which does this treasure keep,
Does she ne'er say her prayers, nor sleep?
Does she to no excess incline?
Does she fly music, mirth, and wine ?
Or have not gold and flattery power
To purchase one unguarded hour ?

“Your care does further yet extend :
That spy is guarded by your friend.-
But has this friend nor eye nor heart?
May he not feel the cruel dart,
Which, soon or late, all mortals feel ?
May he not, with too tender zeal,
Give the fair prisoner cause to see,
How much he wishes she were free ?
May he not craftily infer
The rules of friendship too severe,
Which chain him to a hated trust;
Which make him wretched, to be just ?
And may not she, ihis darling she,

Youthful and healthy, flesh and blood,
Easy with him, ill us'd by thee,

Allow this logic to be good ?"

“Sir, will your questions never end ? I trust to neither spy nor friend. In short, I keep her from the sight Of every human face.”—“She'll write.". “From pen and paper she's debarr’d.". “Has she a bodkin and a card ? She'll priek her mind.”—“She will, you say : But how shall she that mind convey ? I keep her in one room : I lock it: The key, (look here,) is in this pocket."“The key-hole, is that left ?"-"

Most certain." “She'll thrust her letter through, Sir Martin."

“Dear, angry friend, what must be done ?
“Is there no way ?"-" There is but one.
Send her abroad : and let her see,
That all this mingled mass, which she,
Being forbidden, longs to know,
Is a dull farce, an empty show,
Powder, and pocket-glass, and beau;
A staple of romance and lies,
False tears and real perjuries :
Where sighs and looks are bought and sold,
And love is made but to be told :
Where the fat bawd and lavish heir
The spoils of ruin'd beauty share;
And youth, seduc'd from friends and fame.
Must give up age to want and shame.
Let her behold the frantic scene,
The women wretched, false the men :
And when, these certain ills to shun,
She would to thy embraces run,

Dissembling what I knew too well,

“ My love, my life,” said I, “explain This change of humor: pr'ythee tell :

That falling tear-what does it mean ?”

She sigh'd ; she smil'd; and, to the flowers

Pointing, the lovely moralist said : "See, friend, in some few fleeting hours,

See yonder, what a change is made!

" Ah, me! the blooming pride of May,

And that of Beauty, are but one: At morn both flourish bright and gay;

Both fade at evening, pale, and gone.

" At dawn poor Stella danc'd and sung ;

The amorous youth around her bow'd : At night her fatal knell was rung;

I saw, and kiss'd her in her shroud.

Such as she is, who died to-day ;

Such I, alas! may be to-morrow : Go, Damon, bid thy Muse display

The justice of thy Chloe's sorrow."

AN ENGLISH PADLOCK.

Miss Danaë, when fair and young,
(As Horace has divinely sung.)
Could not be kept from Jove's embrace
By doors of steel, and walls of brass.

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* Lady Catharine Hyde, now Duchess of Queensberry. 1 The Earl of Essex married Lady Jane Hyde.

My softest verse, my darling lyre,

Upon Euphelia's toilet lay; When Chloe noted her desire, That I should sing, that I should play

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise,

But with my numbers mix my sighs ; And, whilst I sing Euphelia's praise,

I fix my soul on Chloe's eyes.

Fair Chloe blush'd : Euphelia frown'd;

I sung, and gaz'd; I play'd and trembled : And Venus to the Loves around

Remark'd, how il} we all dissembled.

THE LADY'S LOOKING-GLASS.

In imitation of a Greek Idyllium.
Celia and I, the other day,
Walk'd o'er the sand-hills to the sea:
The setting Sun adorn'd the coast,
His beams entire, his fierceness lost :
And, on the surface of the deep,
The winds lay only not asleep:
The nymph did like the scene appear,
Serenely pleasant, calmly fair :
Soft fell her words, as flew the air.
With secret joy I heard her say,
That she would never miss one day
A walk so fine, a sight so gay.

But, oh the change the winds grow high ; Impending tempests charge the sky;

The lightning flies, the thunder roars,
And big waves lash the frighten'd shores.
Struck with the horror of the sight,
She turns her head, and wings her flight:
And, trembling, vows she'll ne'er again
Approach the shore, or view the main.

"Once more, at least, look back," said I,
Thyself in that large glass descry:
When thou art in good-humor drest;
When gentle reason rules thy breast;
The Sun upon the calmest sea
Appears not half so bright as thee :
'Tis then that with delight I rove
Upon the boundless depth of Love :
I bless my chain; I hand my oar;
Nor think on all I left on shore.

“ But when vain doubt and groundless fear
Do that dear foolish bosom tear;
When the big lip and watery eye
Tell me the rising storm is nigh;
'Tis then, thou art yon angry main,
Deform'd by winds, and dash'd by rain ;
And the poor sailor, that must try
Its fury, labors less than I.

Shipwreck'd, in vain to land I make, While Love and Fate still drive me back : Forc'd to dote on thee thy own way, Ichide thee first, and then obey. Wretched when from thee, vex'd when nigh, I with thee, or without thee, die."

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Livros

Select Works of the British Poets: In a Chronological Series from Ben Jonson ...