Leave it to the planets too,
What we shall hereafter do;
For the joys we now may prove,
Take advice of present love.
TO SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT,
UPON HIS TWO FIRST BOOKS OF GONDIBERT.1
THUS the wise nightingale that leaves her home,
Her native wood, when storms and winter come,
Pursuing constantly the cheerful spring,
To foreign groves does her old music bring.
The drooping Hebrews' banish'd harps, unstrung,
At Babylon upon the willows hung;
Yours sounds aloud, and tells us you excel
No less in courage, than in singing well;
While, unconcern'd, you let your country know
They have impoverish'd themselves, not you;
Who, with the Muses' help, can mock those fates
Which threaten kingdoms, and disorder states.
So Ovid, when from Cæsar's rage he fled,
The Roman Muse to Pontus with him led;
Where he so sung, that we, through pity's glass,
See Nero milder than Augustus was.
Hereafter such, in thy behalf, shall be
Th' indulgent censure of posterity.
To banish those who with such art can sing,
Is a rude crime, which its own curse doth bring;
Ages to come shall ne'er know how they fought,
Nor how to love, their present youth be taught.
'Sir William Davenant': Davenant fled to France in fear of the displeasure of the Parliament, and there wrote the two first cantos of Gondibert.
This to thyself.-Now to thy matchless book,
Wherein those few that can with judgment look,
May find old love in pure fresh language told,
Like new-stamp'd coin made out of angel-gold.
Such truth in love as th' antique world did know,
In such a style as courts may boast of now;
Which no bold tales of gods or monsters swell,
But human passions, such as with us dwell.
Man is thy theme; his virtue or his rage
Drawn to the life in each elaborate page.
Mars nor Bellona are not namèd here,
But such a Gondibert as both might fear;
Venus had here, and Hebe, been outshined
By the bright Birtha and thy Rhodalind.
Such is thy happy skill, and such the odds
Betwixt thy worthies and the Grecian gods!
Whose deities in vain had here come down,
Where mortal beauty wears the Sovereign crown;
Such as of flesh compos'd, by flesh and blood,
Though not resisted, may be understood.
TO MY WORTHY FRIEND, MR WASE,
THE TRANSLATOR OF GRATIUS.1
1 THUS, by the music, we may know When noble wits a-hunting go,
Through groves that on Parnassus grow.
2 The Muses all the chase adorn; My friend on Pegasus is borne;
And young Apollo winds the horn.
''Mr Wase': Wase was a fellow of Cambridge, tutor to Lord Herbert,
and translator of Gratius on Hunting,' a very learned man.
3 Having old Gratius in the wind, No pack of critics e'er could find, Or he know more of his own mind.
4 Here huntsmen with delight may read How to choose dogs for scent or speed, And how to change or mend the breed;
5 What arms to use, or nets to frame, Wild beasts to combat or to tame; With all the myst'ries of that game.
6 But, worthy friend! the face of war In ancient times doth differ far From what our fiery battles are.
7 Nor is it like, since powder known, That man, so cruel to his own, Should spare the race of beasts alone.
8 No quarter now, but with the gun Men wait in trees from sun to sun, And all is in a moment done.
9 And therefore we expect your next
Should be no comment, but a text
To tell how modern beasts are vex'd.
10 Thus would I further yet engage Your gentle Muse to court the age With somewhat of your proper rage;
11 Since none does more to Phoebus owe, Or in more languages can show Those arts which you so early know.
ON THE DIFFERENT SUCCESS OF THEIR LOVES.1
THRICE happy pair! of whom we cannot know
Which first began to love, or loves most now;
Fair course of passion! where two lovers start,
And run together, heart still yoked with heart;
Successful youth! whom love has taught the way
To be victorious in the first essay.
Sure love's an art best practised at first,
And where th' experienced still prosper worst!
I, with a different fate, pursued in vain
The haughty Cælia, till my just disdain
Of her neglect, above that passion borne,
Did pride to pride oppose, and scorn to scorn.
Now she relents; but all too late to move
A heart directed to a nobler love.
The scales are turn'd, her kindness weighs no more
Now, than my vows and service did before.
So in some well-wrought hangings you may see
How Hector leads, and how the Grecians flee;
Here, the fierce Mars his courage so inspires,
That with bold hands the Argive fleet he fires;
But there, from heaven the blue-eyed virgin2 falls,
And frighted Troy retires within her walls;
They that are foremost in that bloody race,
Turn head anon, and give the conqu'rors chase.
So like the chances are of love and war,
That they alone in this distinguish'd are,
In love the victors from the vanquish'd fly;
They fly that wound, and they pursue that die.
Their loves' supposed to be Alexander Hampden, involved with Wailer in the plot. See 'Life - Blue-eyed virgin': Minerva.
FAIREST piece of well-form'd earth!
Urge not thus your haughty birth;
The power which you have o'er us lies
Not in your race, but in your eyes.
'None but a prince!'-Alas! that voice
Confines you to a narrow choice.
Should you no honey vow to taste,
But what the master-bees have placed
In compass of their cells, how small
A portion to your share would fall!
Nor all appear, among those few,
Worthy the stock from whence they grew.
The sap which at the root is bred
In trees, through all the boughs is spread;
But virtues which in parents shine,
Make not like progress through the line.
"Tis not from whom, but where, we live;
The place does oft those graces give.
Great Julius, on the mountains bred,
A flock perhaps, or herd, had led.
He that the world subdued,2 had been
But the best wrestler on the green.
"Tis art and knowledge which draw forth
The hidden seeds of native worth;
They blow those sparks, and make them rise
Into such flames as touch the skies.
To the old heroes hence was given
A pedigree which reached to heaven;
''Zelinda': referring to a novel where the lady, a princess, refuses a lover, saying, 'I will have none but a prince! '
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