Their dull and sleepy streams are not at all, Like other floods, poetical;
They have no dance, no wanton sport, No gentle murmur, the lov'd shore to court. No fish inhabit the adulterate flood,
Nor can it feed the neighbouring wood; No flower or herb is near it found, But a perpetual winter starves the ground. Give me a river which doth scorn to show An added beauty; whose clear brow May be my looking-glass, to fee
What my face is, and what my mind should be!
Here waves call waves, and glide along in rank, And prattle to the smiling bank; Here sad king-fishers tell their tales, And fish enrich the brook with filver scales. Daifies, the first-born of the teeming spring, On each fide their embroidery bring; Here lilies wash, and grow more white, And daffodils, to fee themselves, delight. Here a fresh arbour gives her amorous shade, Which Nature, the best gardener, made. Here I would fit and fing rude lays,
Such as the nymphs and me myself should please. Thus I would waste, thus end, my careless days; And robin-red-breasts, whom men praife For pious birds, should, when I die,
Make both my monument and elegy.
YRIAN dye why do you wear, You whose cheeks best scarlet are? Why do you fondly pin Pure linen o'er your skin, (Your skin that 's whiter far) Cafting a dusky cloud before a star? Why bears your neck a golden chain? Did Nature make your hair in vain, Of gold most pure and fine ? With gems why do you shine? They, neighbours to your eyes, Shew but like Phosphor when the fun doth rife.
I would have all my mistress' parts, Owe more to nature than to arts; I would not wooe the drefs, Or one whose nights give lefs Contentment than the day.
She's fair, whose beauty only makes her gay.
• For 'tis not buildings make a court, Or pomp, but 'tis the king's refort: If Jupiter down pour Himself, and in a shower Hide fuch bright majesty, Less than a golden one it cannet be.
ON THE UNCERTAINTY OF FORTUNE.
E AVE off unfit complaints, and clear
From fighs your breast, and from black clouds
When the fun shines not with his wonted cheer, And fortune throws an adverse cast for you ! That fea which vext with Notus is, The merry Eaft-winds will to-morrow kifs.
The fun to-day rides drowsily, To-morrow 'twill put on a look more fair: Laughter and groaning do alternately Return, and tears' sports nearest neighbours are. 'Tis by the gods appointed so,
That good fare should with mingled dangers flow. Who drave his oxen yesterday,
Doth now over the noblest Romans reign, And on the Gabii and the Cures lay
The yoke which from his oxen he had ta'en Whom Hesperus saw poor and low,
The morning's eye beholds him greatest now.
If Fortune knit amongst her play But seriousness, he shall again go home To his old country-farm of yesterday, To fcoffing people no mean jest become;
And
And with the crowned axe, which he
Had rul'd the world, go back and prune some tree; Nay, if he want the fuel cold requires, With his own fafces he shall make him fires.
IN COMMENDATION OF THE TIME WE LIVE UNDER, THE REIGN OF OUR GRACIOUS KING CHARLES.
URST be that wretch (death's factor sure) who brought
Dire swords into the peaceful world, and taught Smiths (who before could only make
The spade, the plow-share, and the rake)
Arts, in most cruel wise Man's life t' epitomize!
Then men (fond men, alas!) ride post to th' grave, And cut those threads which yet the Fates would fave;
Then Charon sweated at his trade,
And had a larger ferry made;
Then, then the filver hair, Frequent before, grew rare.
Then Revenge, married to Ambition, Begat black War; then Avarice crept on; Then limits to each field were strain'd, And Terminus a god-head gain'd. To men, before, was found, Besides the sea, no bound.
In what plain, or what river, hath not been War's story writ in blood (fad story!) seen ? This truth too well our England knows: 'Twas civil flaughter dy'd her rose; Nay, then her lily too
With blood's loss paler grew.
Such griefs, nay worse than these, we now should feel, Did not just Charles filence the rage of steel;
He to our land blest Peace doth bring,
All neighbour countries envying. Happy who did remain
Unborn till Charles's reign!
Where, dreaming chemicks! is your pain and cost? How is your oil, how is your labour loft!
Our Charles, blest alchemist! (though strange,
Believe it, future times!) did change
The iron-age of old
Into an age of gold.
UPON THE SHORTNESS OF MAN'S LIFE.
ARK that swift arrow! how it cuts the air, How it out-runs thy following eye! Use all perfuafions now, and try If thou canst call it back, or stay it there.
That way it went; but thou shalt find No tract is left behind.
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