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ON THE SAME.

I DID but prompt the age to quit their clogs
By the known rules of ancient liberty,

When straight a barbarous noise environs me
Of owls and cuckoos, asses, apes, and dogs;
As when those hinds that were transformed to frogs
Railed at Latona's twin-born progeny,

Which after held the sun and moon in fee. But this is got by casting pearl to hogs, That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood,

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And still revolt when truth would set them free. Licence they mean when they cry Liberty; II For who loves that must first be wise and good: But from that mark how far they rove we see, For all this waste of wealth and loss of blood.

ON THE NEW FORCERS OF CONSCIENCE UNDER
THE LONG PARLIAMENT.

BECAUSE you have thrown off your Prelate Lord,
And with stiff vows renounced his Liturgy,
To seize the widowed whore Plurality
From them whose sin ye envied, not abhorred;

Dare ye for this adjure the civil sword

To force our consciences that Christ set free, And ride us with a classic hierarchy, Taught ye by mere A. S. and Rutherford? Men whose life, learning, faith, and pure intent,

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Would have been held in high esteem with

Paul,

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Must now be named and printed heretics By shallow Edwards and Scotch What-d'ye-call! But we do hope to find out all your tricks, Your plots and packing, worse than those of Trent;

That so the Parliament

May with their wholesome and preventive shears Clip your phylacteries, though baulk your ears, And succour our just fears,

When they shall read this clearly in your charge: New Presbyter is but old Priest writ large.

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TO MR. H. LAWES ON HIS AIRS.

HARRY, whose tuneful and well-measured song
First taught our English music how to span
Words with just note and accent, not to scan
With Midas' ears, committing short and long:
Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the throng,
With praise enough for Envy to look wan:
To after age thou shalt be writ the man
That with smooth air couldst humour best our

tongue.

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Thou honour'st verse, and verse must lend her wing To honour thee, the priest of Phœbus' quire, 10 That tun'st their happiest lines in hymn or

story.

Dante shall give Fame leave to set thee higher
Than his Casella, whom he wooed to sing,
Met in the milder shades of Purgatory,

ON THE RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF MRS. CATHARINE THOMSON, MY CHRISTIAN FRIEND, DECEASED DEC. 16, 1646.

WHEN Faith and Love, which parted from thee

never,

Had ripened thy just soul to dwell with God,
Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load

Of death, called life, which us from life doth

sever.

Thy works and alms and all thy good endeavour 5 Stayed not behind, nor in the grave were trod; But as Faith pointed with her golden rod, Followed thee up to joy and bliss forever. Love led them on; and Faith, who knew them best Thy handmaids, clad them o'er with purple beams

ΙΟ

And azure wings, that up they flew so drest, And speak the truth of thee on glorious themes Before the Judge; who henceforth bid thee rest,

And drink thy fill of pure immortal streams.

ON THE LORD GENERAL FAIRFAX, AT The siege
OF COLCHESTER.

FAIRFAX, whose name in arms through Europe rings,

Filling each mouth with envy or with praise,

And all her jealous monarchs with amaze,

!

And rumours loud that daunt remotest kings, Thy firm unshaken virtue ever brings

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Victory home, though new rebellions raise Their hydra heads, and the false North displays

Her broken league to imp their serpent wings. O yet a nobler task awaits thy hand

(For what can war but endless war still breed?)

Till truth and right from violence be freed, And public faith cleared from the shameful brand Of public fraud. In vain doth Valour bleed, While Avarice and Rapine share the land.

ΙΟ

TO THE LORD GENERAL CROMWELL,

MAY, 1652.

ON THE PROPOSALS OF CERTAIN MINISTERS AT THE COMMITTEE FOR PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL.

CROMWELL, our chief of men, who through a cloud
Not of war only, but detractions rude,
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude,

To peace and truth thy glorious way hast
ploughed,

And on the neck of crownèd Fortune proud

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Hast reared God's trophies, and his work pur

sued,

While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued,

And Dunbar field, resounds thy praises loud, And Worcester's laureate wreath: yet much remains

To conquer still; peace hath her victories

ΙΟ

No less renowned than war: new foes arise, Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains. Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

TO SIR HENRY VANE THE YOUNGER.

VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old,
Than whom a better senator ne'er held

The helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms,
repelled

The fierce Epirot and the African bold, Whether to settle peace, or to unfold

The drift of hollow states hard to be spelled; Then to advise how war may best upheld Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold, In all her equipage; besides, to know

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Both spiritual power and civil, what each

means,

ΙΟ

What severs each, thou hast learned, which
few have done.

The bounds of either sword to thee we owe:
Therefore on thy firm hand Religion leans
In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son.

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