XXVII.

But fee the Virgin blest

Hath laid her Babe to rest,

Time is our tedious song should here have ending: Heaven's youngest teemed ftar

Hath fix'd her polish'd car,

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Her fleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending :

And all about the courtly stable

Bright-harneft Angels fit in order ferviceable.

E

REWHILE of mufic, and ethereal mirth,
Wherewith the stage of air and earth did ring,

And joyous news of heav'nly Infant's birth,

My Muse with Angels did divide to fing;
But headlong joy is ever on the wing,

In wintry folftice like the shorten'd light

Soon fwallow'd up in dark and long out-living night.

II.

For now to forrow muft I tune my fong,

And set my harp to notes of faddest woe,

Which on our deareft Lord did feize ere long,

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Dangers, and fnares, and wrongs, and worse than so, Which he for us did freely undergo:

Moft perfect Hero, try'd in heaviest plight

Of labors huge and hard, too hard for human wight!

III. He

III.

He fovran Priest stooping his regal head,
That dropt with odorous oil down his fair eyes,
Poor fleshly tabernacle entered,

His ftarry front low-rooft beneath the skies;
O what a mask was there, what a disguise!

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Yet more; the stroke of death he must abide, Then lies him meekly down fast by his brethren's fide.

IV.

These latest scenes confine my roving verse,
To this horizon is my Phoebus bound;
His Godlike acts, and his temptations fierce,
And former fufferings other-where are found;
Loud c'er the rest Cremona's trump doth found;
Me fofter airs befit, and softer ftrings

Of lute, or viol still, more apt for mournful things.

V.

Befriend me, Night, beft patronefs of grief,
Over the pole thy thickest mantle throw,

And work my flatter'd fancy to belief,

That Heav'n and Earth are color'd with my woe;
My forrows are too dark for day to know:

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The leaves fhould all be black whereon I write, And letters where my tears have wash'd a wannish

white.

35

VI.

See, fee the chariot, and those rushing wheels,

That whirl'd the Prophet up at Chebar flood,

My spirit fome tranfporting Cherub feels,

Te

To bear me where the towers of Salem stood,

Once glorious tow'rs, now funk in guiltless blood; 40 There doth my foul in holy vision fit

In penfive trance, and anguish, and ecftatic fit.

VII.

Mine eye hath found that fad fepulchral rock
That was the casket of Heav'n's richest store,
And here though grief my feeble hands up-lock, 45
Yet on the foften'd quarry would I score

My plaining verse as lively as before;

For fure fo well inftructed are my tears,

That they would fitly fall in order'd characters.

VIII.

Or fhould I thence hurried on viewless wing,
Take up a weeping on the mountains wild,
The gentle neighbourhood of grove and spring
Would foon unbofom all their echoes mild,
And I (for grief is eafily beguil'd)

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Might think th' infection of my forrows loud

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Had got a race of mourners on fome pregnant cloud.

This fubject the Author finding to be above the years he had, when he wrote it, and nothing fatisfied with what was begun, left it unfinish'd.

F

LY envious Time, till thou run out thy race,
Call on the lazy leaden-ftepping hours,
Whofe fpeed is but the heavy plummet's pace;
And glut thyself with what thy womb devours,
Which is no more than what is false and vain,
And merely mortal dross;

So little is our lofs,

So little is thy gain.

For when as each thing bad thou haft intomb'd,
And last of all thy greedy felf confum'd,

Then long Eternity shall greet our blifs

With an individual kifs;

And Joy fhall overtake us as a flood,

When every thing that is fincerely good

And perfectly divine,

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15

With truth, and peace, and love, fhall ever fhine

About the supreme throne

Of him, t' whofe happy-making fight alone

When once our heav`nly-guided foul shall climb,
Then all this earthy groffnefs quit,

Attir'd with stars, we fhall for ever fit,

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Triumphing over Death, and Chance, and thee, O Time.

VI. UPON

Y

VI.

UPON THE CIRCUMCISION.

E flaming Powers, and winged Warriors bright, That erft with mufic, and triumphant song, First heard by happy watchful shepherds' ear, So fweetly fung your joy the clouds along Through the foft filence of the lift'ning night; Now mourn, and if sad share with us to bear Your fiery effence can distil no tear, Burn in your fighs, and borrow

Seas wept from our deep forrow:

He who with all Heav'n's heraldry whilere
Enter'd the world, now bleeds to give us ease;
Alas, how foon our fin

Sore doth begin

His infancy to seize!

O more exceeding love or law more just!
Just law indeed, but more exceeding love!
For we by rightful doom remedilefs
Were loft in death, till he that dwelt above
High thron'd in fecret blifs, for us frail duft
Emptied his glory, ev'n to nakedness ;

And that great covenant which we still tranfgrefs
Entirely fatisfied,

And the full wrath befide

Of vengeful juftice bore for our excess,

And feals obedience first with wounding smart
This day, but O ere long

Huge pangs and strong

Will pierce more near his heart.

ΤΟ

VII. AT