VERS E S

WRITTEN. ON

SEVERAL OCCASIONS*.

CHRIST'S

PASSION,

Taken out of a Greek Ode, written by Mr. Mafters of New-College in Oxford.

E

NOUGH, my Mufe! of earthly things,

And infpirations but of wind ;

Take up thy lute, and to it bind

Loud and everlasting strings;

And on them play, and to them fing,

The happy mournful stories,

The lamentable glories,

Of the great crucified King.

Mountainous heap of wonders! which doft rife

Till earth thou joineft with the skies! Too large at bottom, and at top too high,

To be half feen by mortal eye!

How

*Thiefe verfes were not included among those which Mr. Cowley himself ftyled "Mifcellanies;" but were claffed by Bishop Sprat under the title by which they are here diftinguished. N.

How fhall I grasp this boundless thing? What shall I play? what shall Ising? I'll fing the mighty riddle of mysterious love, Which neither wretched men below, nor blessed spirits With all their comments can explain; [above,

How all the whole world's life to die did not disdain!

I'll fing the fearchlefs depths of the compaffion Divine,
The depths unfathom❜d yet

By reafon's plummet and the line of wit;
Too light the plummet, and too short the line!
How the eternal Father did bestow

His own eternal Son as ranfom for his foe,

I'll fing aloud, that all the world may hear
The triumph of the buried Conquerer,
How hell was by its prifoner captive led,
And the great flayer, Death, flain by the dead.

Methinks I hear of murdered men the voice,
Mixt with the murderers' confused noise,
Sound from the top of Calvary ;
My greedy eyes fly up the hill, and fee

Who 'tis hangs there the midmost of the three;

Oh, how unlike the others he!

[the tree!

Look, how he bends his gentle head with bleffings from
His gracious hands, ne'er ftretch'd but to do good,

Are nail'd to the infamous wood!
And finful man does fondly bind

The arms, which he extends t' embrace all human-kind.

Unhappy

Unhappy man! canft thou stand by and fee

All this as patient as he ?

Since he thy fins does bear,

Make thou his fufferings thine own,

And weep, and sigh, and groan,

And beat thy breast, and tear
Thy garments and thy hair,

And let thy grief, and let thy love,

Through all thy bleeding bowels move.
Doft thou not fee thy prince in purple clad all o'er,
Not purple brought from the Sidonian fhore,
But made at home with richer gore ?

Doft thou not fee the rofes which adorn
The thorny garland by him worn ?
Doft thou not fee the livid traces
Of the sharp fcourges' rude embraces?
If yet thou feeleft not the smart
Of thorns and scourges in thy heart;

If that be yet not crucify'd ;

Look on his hands, look on his feet, look on his fide!

Open, oh! open wide the fountains of thine eyes,
And let them call

Their stock of moisture forth, where'er it lies!

For this will ask it all.

'Twould all, alas! too little be,

Though thy falt tears come from a fea.

Canft thou deny him this, when he

Has open'd all his vital springs for thee?
Take heed; for by his fide's myfterious flood

May well be understood,

That he will still require fome waters to his blood.

OD F

WE

O DE

ON ORINDA'S POEMS.

'E allow'd you beauty, and we did submit
To all the tyrannies of it;

Ah! cruel fex, will you depofe us too in wit?
Orinda* does in that too reign;

Does man behind her in proud triumph draw,
And cancel great Apollo's Salic law.
We our old title plead in vain,

Man may be head, but woman 's now the brain.
Verse was Love's fire-arms heretofore,

In Beauty's camp it was not known;
Too many arms befides that conqueror bore
'Twas the great cannon we brought down
T'affault a ftubborn town;

Orinda firft did a bold fally make,
Our strongest quarter take,

And fo fuccessful prov'd, that she
Turn'd upon Love himself his own artillery.

Women, as if the body were their whole,
Did that, and not the foul,
Transmit to their posterity;

If in it fometime they conceiv'd,

Th' abortive iffue never liv'd.

"Twere fhame and pity', Orinda, if in thee

* Mrs. Catharine Philips.

}

A fpirit

A fpirit fo rich, fo noble, and fo high,

Should unmanur'd or barren lie.

But thou industriously haft sow'd and till'd
The fair and fruitful field;

And 'tis a strange increase that it does yield.
As, when the happy Gods above
Meet all together at a feast,

A fecret joy unspeakable does move

In their great mother Cybele's contented breast :
With no lefs pleasure thou, methinks, fhould fee,
This, thy no less immortal progeny.

And in their birth thou no one touch doft find,
Of th' ancient curfe to woman-kind :

Thou bring'st not forth with pain;
It neither travail is nor labour of the brain :
So easily they from thee come,

And there is so much room

In th' unexhausted and unfathom'd womb, That, like the Holland Countefs, thou may'st bear A child for every day of all the fertile year.

Thou dost my wonder, wouldft my envy, raise, If to be prais'd I lov'd more than to praise : Where'er I fee an excellence,

I must admire to see thy well-knit sense,

Thy numbers gentle, and thy fancies high;

Those as thy forehead smooth, these sparkling as thine

'Tis folid, and 'tis manly all,

[eye.

Or rather 'tis angelical;

For,