Nor are his blessings to his banks confin'd,
But free and common as the sea or wind;
When he to boast or to disperse his stores,
Full of the tributes of his grateful shores,
Visits the world, and in his flying towers
Brings home to us, and makes both Indies ours;
Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants,
Cities in deserts, woods in cities, plants.
So that to us no thing, no place, is strange,
While his fair bosom is the world's exchange.
Oh, could I flow like thee! and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme:
Though deep, yet clear; though gentle, yet not dull;
Strong, without rage; without o'erflowing, full.
The stream is so transparent, pure, and clear,
That had the self-enamour'd youth gaz'd here,
So fatally deceiv'd he had not been,
While he the bottom, not his face, had seen.
LXXVI. COLONEL RICHARD LOVELACE. 1. TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON.
When love with unconfined wings,
Hovers within my gates,
And my divine Althea brings,
To whisper at my grates;
When I lie tangled in her hair,
And fettered with her eye,
The birds that wanton in the air,
Know no such liberty.
When flowing cups run swiftly round,
With no allaying Thames,
Our careless heads with roses bound..
Our hearts with loyal flames;
When thirsty grief in wine we steep,
When healths and draughts go free,
Fishes that tipple in the deep,
Know no such liberty.
When linnet like confinéd, I
With shriller tone shall sing,
The mercy, sweetness, majesty,
And glories of my king;
When I shall voice aloud, how good
He is, how great should be,
The enlarged winds that curl the flood.
Know no such liberty.
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage,
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage.
If I have freedom in my love,—
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone, that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.
Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind,
That from the nunnery
Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind
To war and arms I fly.
True, a new mistress now I chase,
The first foe in the field;
And with a stronger faith embrace
A sword, a horse, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such,
As you too shall adore:
I could not love thee, dear, so much,
Loved I not honour more.
LXXVII. ANDREW MARVEL.
1. SONG OF THE EXILES.
Where the remote Bermudas ride,
In the ocean's bosom unespied,
From a small boat that row'd along,
The list'ning winds receiv'd their song.
“What should we do, but sing His praise
That led us through the wat'ry maze,
Unto an isle so long unknown,
And yet far kinder than our own'
"Where he the huge sea-monsters racks,
That lift the deep upon their backs:
He lands us on a grassy stage,
Safe from the storms and Prelates' rage.
"He gave us this eternal Spring
Which here enamels every thing,
And sends the fowls to us in care,
On daily visits through the air.
"He hangs in shades the orange bright,
Like golden lamps in a green night,
And in these rocks for us did frame
A temple where to sound his name.
"Oh! let our voice His praise exalt
Till it arrive at Heaven's vault,
Which then perhaps rebounding may
Echo beyond the Mexique bay."
Thus sang they in the English boat,
A holy and a cheerful note,
And all the way, to guide their chime,
With falling oars they kept the time.
2. TO HIS COY MISTRESS.
Had we but world enough and time,
This
coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down, and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges' side
Should'st rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love
you ten
years before the flood;
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow.
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast;
But thirty thousand to the rest :
An age at least to every part:
And the last age should show
your heart.
For, lady, you deserve this state;
Nor would I love at lower rate.
3. PICTURE OF A LADY IN A PROSPECT OF FLOWERS.
See with what simplicity
This nymph begins her golden days!
In the green grass she loves to lie,
And there with her fair aspect tames
The wilder flowers, and gives them names; But only with the roses plays,
What colour best becomes them, and what smell. Who can foretell for what high cause
This darling of the gods was born?
See this is she whose chaster laws
The wanton Love shall one day fear,
And, under her command severe,
See his bow broke and ensigns torn.
Happy who can
Appease this virtuous enemy of man!
O then let me in time compound,
And parley with those conquering eyes;
Ere they have tried their force to wound,
Ere with their glancing wheels they drive
In triumph over hearts that strive,
And them that yield but more despise.
Let me be laid
Where I may see the glory from some shade.
Meantime, whilst every verdant thing
Itself does at thy beauty charm,
Reform the errors of the spring:
Make that the tulips may have shar
Of sweetness, seeing they are fair;
And roses of their thorns disarın;
Thy violets may a longer age endure.
But oh, young beauty of the woods,
Whom nature courts with fruits and flowers,
Gather the flowers, but spare the buds ;
Lest Flora, angry at thy crime
To kill her infants in their prime,
Should quickly make the example yours;
And, ere we see,
Nip in the blossom all our hopes in thee.
LXXVIII. JOHN DRYDEN.
1. ALEXANDER'S FEAST.
'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won,
By Philip's warlike son:
Aloft in awful state
The god-like hero sate
On his imperial throne:
His valiant peers were plac'd around :
Their brows with roses and with myrtle bound;
So should desert in arms be crown'd,
The lovely Thais by his side.
Sat, like a blooming eastern bride,
In flower of youth and beauty's pride:
Happy, happy, happy pair:
None but the brave, none but the brave,
None but the brave deserve the fair.
Timotheus, plac'd on high,
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touch'd the lyre;
The trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above,
Such is the power of mighty love!
A dragon's fiery form bely'd the god :
Sublime on radiant spheres he rode,
When he to fair Olympia press'd,
And stamp'd an image of himself, a sov'reign of the world.
The list'ning crowd admire the lofty sound
A present deity! they shout around;
A present deity! the vaulted roofs rebound:
With ravish'd ears the monarch hears,
Assumes the god, affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
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