As their small gallies may not hold compare With our tall ships, whofe fails employ more air: So does th' Italian to your genius veil,
Mov'd with a fuller and a nobler gale.
Thus, while your Muse spreads the Venetian story, You make all Europe emulate her glory:
You make them blush, weak Venice fhould defend The cause of heaven, while they for words contend; Shed Christian blood, and populous cities rase, Because they're taught to use some different phrase. If, liftening to your charms, we could our jars Compose, and on the Turk discharge these wars; Our British arms the facred tomb might wrest From Pagan hands, and triumph o'er the east: And then you might our own high deeds recite, And with great Tasso celebrate the fight.
* VERSES TO DR. GEORGE ROGERS, On his taking the Degree of Doctor in Physic at Padua, in the Year 1664
WHEN as of old the earth's bold children strove,
With hills on hills, to fcale the throne of Jove; Pallas and Mars stood by their fovereign's fide, And their bright arms in his defence employ'd:
*This little Poem (firft inferted among Waller's Works in 1772) was printed, together with several others on the fame occafion, by Dr. Rogers, along
While the wife Phoebus, Hermes, and the reft, Who joy in peace, and love the Mufes beft, Defcending from their fo distemper'd seat, Our groves and meadows chofe for their retreat. There first Apollo try'd the various use
Of herbs, and learn'd the virtues of their juice, And fram'd that Art, to which who can pretend A juster title than our noble Freind;
Whom the like tempeft drives from his abode, And like employment entertains abroad? This crowns him here; and in the bays fo earn'd, His country's honour is no lefs concern'd; Since it appears not all the English rave, To ruin bent: fome study how to fave; And as Hippocrates did once extend His facred art, whole cities to amend;
So we, brave Freind, fuppofe that thy great skill, Thy gentle mind, and fair example, will, At thy return, reclaim our frantic ifle,
Their fpirits calm, and peace again shall smile. EDM. WALLER, Anglus.
with his inaugural exercise at Padua; and afterwards in the fame manner re-published by him at London, together with his Harveian Oration before the College of Physicians, in the year 1682, while Mr. Waller was yet living. Though the above verfes were first printed in 1664, they feem to have been written before the Retoration, as appears from the lines towards the conclufion. STOCKDALE.
YLAS, oh Hylas! why fit we mute, Now that each bird faluteth the spring? Wind up the flacken'd ftrings of thy lute, Never canst thou want matter to fing: For love thy breast does fill with such a fire, That whatfoe'er is fair moves thy defire.
Sweeteft! you know, the sweetest of things Of various flowers the bees do compose: Yet no particular taste it brings
Of violet, woodbine, pink, or rose : So, love the refult is of all the graces Which flow from a thousand feveral faces.
Hylas! the birds which chaunt in this grove, Could we but know the language they ufe, They would inftruct us better in love,
And reprehend thy inconstant Muse:
For love their breafts does fill with fuch a fire, That what they once do chufe, bounds their defire.
Chloris! this change the birds do approve, Which the warm season hither does bring:
Time from yourself does further remove
You, than the winter from the gay spring:
She that like lightning fhin'd while her face lafted, The oak now resembles which lightning hath blasted.
In Answer of Sir JOHN SUCKLING's Verses.
STAY bere, fond youth, and ask no more; be wife, Knowing too much, long fince loft Paradife.
And, by your knowledge, we should be bereft Of all that Paradife which yet is left.
The virtuous joys thou haft, thou wouldst should fill Laft in their pride: and wouldft not take it ill If rudely, from fweet dreams, and for a toy, Thou wak'd? he wakes himself that does enjoy. PRO.
How can the joy, or hope, which you allow Be ftyled virtuous, and the end not so ? Talk in your sleep, and shadows still admire! 'Tis true, he wakes that feels this real fire; But---to fleep better: for whoe'er drinks deep® Of this Nepenthe, rocks himself asleep.
Fruition adds no new wealth, but deftroys; And while it pleaseth much, yet fill it cloys. Who thinks he should be happier made for that, As reasonably might hope he might grow fat By eating to a furfeit: this once paft, What relishes? ev'n kisses lofe their taste.
Bleffings may be repeated, while they cloy: But shall we starve, 'cause furfeitings destroy? And if fruition did the tafte impair
Of kiffes, why should yonder happy pair, Whofe joys juft Hymen warrants all the night, Confume the day too in this lefs delight?
Urge not 'tis necessary; alas! we know The homelieft thing that mankind does, is fo. The world is of a large extent we fee, And must be peopled, children there must be.- So muft bread too: but fince there are enough Born to that drudgery, 'what need we plough? PRO.
I need not plough, fince what the stooping hine Gets of my pregnant land, muft all be mine: But in this nobler tillage, 'tis not fo;
For when Anchifes did fair Venus know, What intereft had poor Vulcan in the boy, Famous Æneas, or the prefent joy?
Women enjoy'd, whate'er before they've been, Are like Romances read, or scenes once feen: Fruition dulls, or spoils the Play, much more Than if one read, or knew, the plot before. PRO.
Plays and Romances, read and feen, do fall In our opinions: yet, not feen at all,
« SebelumnyaLanjutkan » |