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TO A LADY,

FROM WHOM HE RECEIVED THE COPY OF THE POEM ENTITLED 'OF A TREE CUT IN PAPER,' WHICH FOR MANY YEARS HAD BEEN LOST.

NOTHING lies hid from radiant eyes;

All they subdue become their spies.
Secrets, as choicest jewels, are
Presented to oblige the fair;

No wonder, then, that a lost thought

Should there be found, where souls are caught.

The picture of fair Venus (that

For which men say the goddess sat)
Was lost, till Lely from your book
Again that glorious image took.

If Virtue's self were lost, we might
From your fair mind new copies write.
All things but one you can restore;
The heart you get returns no more.

TO THE QUEEN, UPON HER MAJESTY'S
BIRTHDAY,

AFTER HER HAPPY RECOVERY FROM A DANGEROUS SICKNESS. 1

FAREWELL the year! which threaten'd so

The fairest light the world can show.
Welcome the new! whose every day,
Restoring what was snatch'd away

'Dangerous sickness': the Queen of Charles II. These verses belong to the year 1663.

By pining sickness from the fair,
That matchless beauty does repair
So fast, that the approaching spring
(Which does to flow'ry meadows bring
What the rude winter from them tore)
Shall give her all she had before.

But we recover not so fast

The sense of such a danger past;

We that esteem'd you sent from heaven,
A pattern to this island given,

To show us what the bless'd do there,
And what alive they practised here,
When that which we immortal thought,
We saw so near destruction brought,
Felt all which you did then endure,
And tremble yet, as not secure.
So though the sun victorious be,
And from a dark eclipse set free,
The influence, which we fondly fear,
Afflicts our thoughts the following year.

But that which may relieve our care
Is, that you have a help so near
For all the evil you can prove,
The kindness of your royal love;
He that was never known to mourn,
So many kingdoms from him torn,
His tears reserved for you, more dear,

More prized, than all those kingdoms were!
For when no healing art prevail'd,

When cordials and elixirs fail'd,

On your pale cheek he dropp'd the shower,
Revived you like a dying flower.

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TO MR KILLIGREW,1

UPON HIS ALTERING HIS PLAY, 'PANDORA,' FROM A

TRAGEDY INTO A COMEDY, BECAUSE NOT APPROVED

ON THE STAGE.

SIR, you should rather teach our age the way

Of judging well, than thus have changed your play;
You had obliged us by employing wit,

Not to reform Pandora, but the pit;

For as the nightingale, without the throng
Of other birds, alone attends her song,
While the loud daw, his throat displaying, draws
The whole assemblage of his fellow-daws;
So must the writer, whose productions should
Take with the vulgar, be of vulgar mould;
Whilst nobler fancies make a flight too high
For common view, and lessen as they fly.

TO A PERSON OF HONOUR,

UPON HIS INCOMPARABLE, INCOMPREHENSIBLE POEM, ENTITLED, THE BRITISH PRINCES.'

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SIR! you've obliged the British nation more
Than all their bards could ever do before,
And, at your own charge, monuments as hard
As brass or marble to your fame have rear'd;
For, as all warlike nations take delight

To hear how their brave ancestors could fight,

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Mr Killigrew': a gentleman usher to Charles II., and one of the playwrights of the period. The British Princes': an heroic poem, by the Hon. Edward Howard, was universally laughed at. See our edition of Butler.'

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You have advanced to wonder their renown,
And no less virtuously improved your own;
That 'twill be doubtful whether you do write,
Or they have acted, at a nobler height.
You of your ancient princes, have retrieved
More than the ages knew in which they lived;
Explain'd their customs and their rights anew,
Better than all their Druids ever knew;
Unriddled those dark oracles as well

As those that made them could themselves foretell.
For as the Britons long have hoped, in vain,
Arthur would come to govern them again,
You have fulfill'd that prophecy alone,
And in your poem placed him on his throne.
Such magic power has your prodigious pen
To raise the dead, and give new life to men,
Make rival princes meet in arms and love,
Whom distant ages did so far remove;
For as eternity has neither past

Nor future, authors say, nor first nor last,
But is all instant, your eternal Muse
All ages can to any one reduce.

Then why should you, whose miracles of art

Can life at pleasure to the dead impart,
Trouble in vain your better-busied head,

T'observe what times they lived in, or were dead?
For since you have such arbitrary power,

It were defect in judgment to go lower,

Or stoop to things so pitifully lewd,
As use to take the vulgar latitude;

For no man's fit to read what you have writ,
That holds not some proportion with your wit;
As light can no way but by light appear,
He must bring sense that understands it here.

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TO A FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR,

A PERSON OF HONOUR, WHO LATELY WRIT A RELIGIOUS BOOK, ENTITLED, HISTORICAL APPLICATIONS, AND OCCASIONAL MEDITATIONS, UPON SEVERAL SUBJECTS.'1

BOLD is the man that dares engage

For piety in such an age!

Who can presume to find a guard

From scorn, when Heaven's so little spared?

Divines are pardon'd; they defend

Altars on which their lives depend;

But the profane impatient are,

When nobler pens make this their care;
For why should these let in a beam
Of divine light to trouble them,

And call in doubt their pleasing thought,
That none believes what we are taught?
High birth and fortune warrant give
That such men write what they believe;
And, feeling first what they indite,
New credit give to ancient light.
Amongst these few, our author brings
His well-known pedigree from kings.2
This book, the image of his mind,

Will make his name not hard to find;
I wish the throng of great and good
Made it less eas❜ly understood!

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'Several subjects': supposed to be Lord Berkeley. It contained testimonies of celebrated men to the value of religion.—2 Pedigree from kings': the Earl of Berkeley was descended from the royal house of Denmark.

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