Poems of Henry Vaughan, Silurist Part 19

ODE I.

Where reverend bards of old have sate And sung the pleasant interludes of Fate, Thou takest the hereditary shade Which Nature's homely art had made, And thence thou giv'st thy Muse her swing, and she Advances to the galaxy; There with the sparkling Cowley she above Does hand in hand in graceful measures move.

We grovelling mortals gaze below, And long in vain to know Her wondrous paths, her wondrous flight: In vain, alas! we grope,[63]

In vain we use our earthly telescope, We're blinded by an intermedial night.

Thine eagle-Muse can only face The fiery coursers in their race, While with unequal paces we do try To bear her train aloft, and keep her company.

II.

The loud harmonious Mantuan Once charm'd the world; and here's the Uscan swan In his declining years does chime, And challenges the last remains of Time.

Ages run on, and soon give o'er, They have their graves as well as we; Time swallows all that's past and more, Yet time is swallow'd in eternity: This is the only profits poets see.

There thy triumphant Muse shall ride in state And lead in chains devouring Fate; Claudian's bright Ph[oe]nix she shall bring Thee an immortal offering; Nor shall my humble tributary Muse Her homage and attendance too refuse; She thrusts herself among the crowd, And joining in th' applause she strives to clap aloud

III.

Tell me no more that Nature is severe, Thou great philosopher!

Lo! she has laid her vast exchequer here.

Tell me no more that she has sent So much already, she is spent; Here is a vast America behind Which none but the great Silurist could find.

Nature her last edition was the best, As big, as rich as all the rest: So will we here admit Another world of wit.

No rude or savage fancy here shall stay The travelling reader in his way, But every coast is clear: go where he will, Virtue's the road Thalia leads him still.

Long may she live, and wreath thy sacred head For this her happy resurrection from the dead.

N. W., Jes. Coll., Oxon.

FOOTNOTES:

[63] The original has _flight In raine; alas! we grope_.

TO MY WORTHY FRIEND, MR. HENRY VAUGHAN THE SILURIST.

See what thou wert! by what Platonic round Art thou in thy first youth and glories found?

Or from thy Muse does this retrieve accrue?

Does she which once inspir'd thee, now renew, Bringing thee back those golden years which Time Smooth'd to thy lays, and polish'd with thy rhyme?

Nor is't to thee alone she does convey Such happy change, but bountiful as day, On whatsoever reader she does s.h.i.+ne, She makes him like thee, and for ever thine.

And first thy manual op'ning gives to see Eclipse and suff'rings burnish majesty, Where thou so artfully the draught hast made That we best read the l.u.s.tre in the shade, And find our sov'reign greater in that shroud: So lightning dazzles from its night and cloud, So the First Light Himself has for His throne Blackness, and darkness his pavilion.

Who can refuse thee company, or stay, By thy next charming summons forc'd away, If that be force which we can so resent, That only in its joys 'tis violent: Upward thy Eagle bears us ere aware, Till above storms and all tempestuous air We radiant worlds with their bright people meet, Leaving this little all beneath our feet.

But now the pleasure is too great to tell, Nor have we other bus'ness than to dwell, As on the hallow'd Mount th' Apostles meant To build and fix their glorious banishment.

Yet we must know and find thy skilful vein Shall gently bear us to our homes again; By which descent thy former flight's impli'd To be thy ecstacy and not thy pride.

And here how well does the wise Muse demean Herself, and fit her song to ev'ry scene!

Riot of courts, the b.l.o.o.d.y wreaths of war, Cheats of the mart, and clamours of the bar, Nay, life itself thou dost so well express, Its hollow joys, and real emptiness, That Dorian minstrel never did excite, Or raise for dying so much appet.i.te.

Nor does thy other softer magic move Us less thy fam'd Etesia to love; Where such a character thou giv'st, that shame Nor envy dare approach the vestal dame: So at bright prime ideas none repine, They safely in th' eternal poet s.h.i.+ne.

Gladly th' a.s.syrian ph[oe]nix now resumes From thee this last reprisal of his plumes; He seems another more miraculous thing, Brighter of crest, and stronger of his wing, Proof against Fate in spicy urns to come, Immortal past all risk of martyrdom.

Nor be concern'd, nor fancy thou art rude T' adventure from thy Cambrian solitude: Best from those lofty cliffs thy Muse does spring Upwards, and boldly spreads her cherub wing.

So when the sage of Memphis would converse With boding skies, and th' azure universe, He climbs his starry pyramid, and thence Freely sucks clean prophetic influence, And all serene, and rapt and gay he pries Through the ethereal volume's mysteries, Loth to come down, or ever to know more The Nile's luxurious, but dull foggy sh.o.r.e.

I. W., A.M. Oxon.

CHOICE POEMS ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS.

TO HIS LEARNED FRIEND AND LOYAL FELLOW-PRISONER, THOMAS POWEL OF CANT[REFF], DOCTOR OF DIVINITY.

If sever'd friends by sympathy can join, And absent kings be honour'd in their coin; May they do both, who are so curb'd? but we Whom no such abstracts torture, that can see And pay each other a full self-return, May laugh, though all such metaphysics burn.

'Tis a kind soul in magnets, that atones Such two hard things as iron are and stones, And in their dumb compliance we learn more Of love, than ever books could speak before.

For though attraction hath got all the name, As if that power but from one side came, Which both unites; yet, where there is no sense There is no pa.s.sion, nor intelligence: And so by consequence we cannot state A commerce, unless both we animate.

For senseless things, though ne'er so called upon, Are deaf, and feel no invitation, But such as at the last day shall be shed By the great Lord of life into the dead.

'Tis then no heresy to end the strife With such rare doctrine as gives iron life.

For were it otherwise--which cannot be, And do thou judge my bold philosophy-- Then it would follow that if I were dead, Thy love, as now in life, would in that bed Of earth and darkness warm me, and dispense Effectual informing influence.

Since then 'tis clear, that friends.h.i.+p is nought else But a joint, kind propension, and excess In none, but such whose equal, easy hearts Comply and meet both in their whole and parts, And when they cannot meet, do not forget To mingle souls, but secretly reflect And some third place their centre make, where they Silently mix, and make an unseen stay: Let me not say--though poets may be bold-- Thou art more hard than steel, than stones more cold, But as the marigold in feasts of dew And early sunbeams, though but thin and few, Unfolds itself, then from the Earth's cold breast Heaves gently, and salutes the hopeful East: So from thy quiet cell, the retir'd throne Of thy fair thoughts, which silently bemoan Our sad distractions, come! and richly dress'd With reverend mirth and manners, check the rest Of loose, loath'd men! Why should I longer be Rack'd 'twixt two evils? I see and cannot see.

THE KING DISGUISED.

_Written about the same time that Mr. John Cleveland wrote his._

A king and no king! Is he gone from us, And stoln alive into his coffin thus?

This was to ravish death, and so prevent The rebels' treason and their punishment.

He would not have them d.a.m.n'd, and therefore he Himself deposed his own majesty.

Wolves did pursue him, and to fly the ill He wanders--royal saint!--in sheepskin still.

Poor, obscure shelter, if that shelter be Obscure, which harbours so much majesty.

Hence, profane eyes! the mystery's so deep, Like Esdras books, the vulgar must not see't.

Thou flying roll, written with tears and woe, Not for thy royal self, but for thy foe!

Thy grief is prophecy, and doth portend, Like sad Ezekiel's sighs, the rebel's end.

Thy robes forc'd off, like Samuel's when rent, Do figure out another's punishment.

Nor grieve thou hast put off thyself awhile, To serve as prophet to this sinful isle; These are our days of Purim, which oppress The Church, and force thee to the wilderness.

But all these clouds cannot thy light confine, The sun in storms and after them, will s.h.i.+ne.

Thy day of life cannot be yet complete, 'Tis early, sure, thy shadow is so great.

But I am vex'd, that we at all can guess This change, and trust great Charles to such a dress.

When he was first obscur'd with this coa.r.s.e thing, He grac'd plebeians, but profan'd the king: Like some fair church, which zeal to charcoals burn'd, Or his own court now to an alehouse turn'd.