Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Loves of Henry the Fourth and Gabrielle D'Estrees are too well known to render any prefatory account necessary—The King deserted Gabrielle, by the advice and intreaties of Mornay—Gabrielle sought him in vain, at length she gives way to her excessive grief, and writes to her seducer.

Ungrateful man! ah me, what fiend unkind,
Has drawn that sentence from my wand'ring mind;
Come, my bright hero, dissipate my gloom,
Come and arrest me from an early tomb:
Behold thy Gabrielle's sublime despair,
Assuage her grief, and subjugate her care.
Ah! whither has that manly bosom fled,
Where Gabrielle once could couch her guilty head?
Can souls so mighty bid our ills increase,
And wound the object when they've stole her peace;

Shorn of her honors, of each good bereft,
Can you disdain me who perform'd the theft?
Can Love desert his fainting victim's cause,
Who knew her error when she sign'd his laws?
Can Henry cease to be the man he ought,
Why will he yield me to the sting of thought?
Superior Greatness hails him as his own,
And Glory plac'd him on her choicest throne.
But yet I sigh, and he that sigh foregoes,
I seek his presence, and he flies my woes:
I breathe my sorrows, and he scoffs my fears,
I claim protection, and he shuts his ears.
Proscrib'd from happiness alone I live,
Pant to bestow, yet want the means to give:
While Mis'ry cheats my sense in ev'ry view,
And sickens nature with a deadly hue.

Ah my poor heart! what black ideas rise,
To rive thy core, and inundate my eyes!
Oft have I labour'd to defend thy seat,
From the rude pressure of unhallow'd feet:
Some nymph more favor'd feels within his arms,
Her o'ercharg'd bosom heave with Love's alarms;
Some beauteous hireling smiling, to betray,
Some Phryne rais'd, the mistress of a day!
Can Infamy have fetter'd in her den,
The first of lovers, and the best of men?
Can her base relatives have known the art,
To soil the chambers of so great a heart?

It must be thus, my spoiler's insincere,
Our faith remov'd, we fancy what we fear.
And can I bear so eminent an ill,
Should not my vengeance execute my will?
Oh gracious heaven! sanctify my thought,
Subdue the impulse Desperation wrought;
Impress thy canons on my troubled breast,
Compose my rage, and wed my soul to rest.

The lawless libertine may rove, and find
Some nymph more fair, but can he one so kind?
By soft attractions, and ingenious mirth,
I brought the transport ere his wish had birth;
Explor'd with industry the paths to please,
And sought his bliss by nice yet just degrees;
To meet his mind with real zeady I ran,
And lost the monarch, as I lov'd the man.

My daring will, in this perturbed state,
Rebels and doubts the equity of fate;
'Tis hard to act obedient to those laws,
Which makes th' event superior to the cause:
Religion's children bid me be resign'd,
But want the powers to enchain the mind.
Pour forth the moral with a lib'ral hand,
When all the passions war with their command;
Enforce my penitence, with holy zeal,
And prove, by reasoning, they could never feel.

Thus Sappho swept the melancholy lyre,
Who saw the embers of her hope expire;
When cruel Phaon fled the love-sick fair,
And left his weeping mistress to Despair.

In those detested fields where Mornay led,
My royal hero from his Gabrielle's bed;
Where Death and Horror fought by Mayenne's side,
Where bigots trembled, and where rebels died;
I'll seek my monarch, mid the din of war,
Upbraid his falshood, and assail his car;
Sing of my grief and shame to vulgar ears,
And wet his blooming laurels with my tears:
How I bestrew the features of my theme,
With words th' apparent issue of a dream!

Untoward Mis'ry leads my sense along,
Repels my wish, and amplifies my song:
For you, ungen'rous man, for you I've trod
On Honor's apothegms, and brav'd my God!

What has uprais'd a conduct so unkind,
Is Fortune faithless, or is Henry blind?
Say can he hear his Gabrielle implore,
And scorn the nymph who breathes but to adore?
Have I no advocate within his heart,
No kindred sylph to take a lover's part;
To touch with sympathy its tenderest chord,
And wake the memory of Gallia's Lord;
Who taught his slave variety of pain,
Madden'd my intellects, and bruis'd my brain.
Can Wit's suggestions square with Fate's decree,
When what should not is destin'd thus to be?
Oh strike me Death, while yet on Reason's brink!
While yet my mind retains the gift to think:

How oft has Henry sigh'd when Bellegarde came,
And fear'd my heart indulg'd a double flame;
His anxious dread of what could never be,
Assail'd his rest, but solac'd Love and me;
When recreant man can break Suspicion's chain;
The tears of Beauty gush and flow in vain;
Weak and half-fashion'd are the bosom's ties,
When Cupid's minion Jealousy defies;
The green-ey'd demon haunts th' impetuous youth,
To shake his quiet, but to prove his truth.

Tho' Bellegarde once could languish and admire,
The force of duty dampt his raging fire;
Mayenne's dread victor, who the traitor slew,
Warr'd with his will, and e'en himself o'erthrew:
Ere the warm summer of my life began,
I knew, I reverenc'd the god-like man;
From him I learn'd at gen'rous deeds to glow,
From him I gather'd all the good I know:
My eager fancy fed on all he taught,
Who prun'd th' exuberance of pregnant thought.

The wild ideas of my youth refin'd,
And blaz'd a heav'n-born sunshine on my mind!
Young, active, valiant, bound with Glory's meeds,
He saw, and strove to imitate your deeds:
Can you that favourite uncandid deem,
Who, copying Henry, won my warm esteem?
His pains, his pleasures, like a brother's came,
And touch'd the trembling system of my frame;
When the deep tale had summon'd joy or woe,
My bosom flutter'd, or the tear would flow:
'Twas Gratitude, not Love, that sped the dart,
Which smote the Guardians who defend my heart:
If this was weakness, be its stings no more,
The error's venial, and the cause is o'er:
But Charity should temper human skill,
Whene'er the Judgment scans the female will.

Thrice happy vassalage, exempt from pains,
When Passion's offspring smooth Affection's chains:
When Reason's more intent to serve than sway,
And all the birth of strife is who'll obey.

Oh ye, whose pure and enviable state,
Bears a broad shield against the ills of Fate;
Ye virgin sisterhood, whom Love unites,
Whom heaven approves, and Innocence delights,

Let Thought, for what I was, pervade each breast,
Implore your God to give me back to Rest.
Assail the throne of Mercy with your sighs,
That Peace may dry the riv'lets of these eyes:
That Faith may vindicate her hallow'd reign,
And still the fever of each throbbing vein.
While Commerce goads her babbling crouds along,
While Pleasure carols her tumultuous song;
Untouch'd by all the flatteries of the gay,
Serenely sweet, your beings pass away;
By pallid Care's rebellion unopprest,
As Time's Calm movements leads you to the blest;
No evil taints the tablets of your mind,
Tho' social anguish tortures human kind:
Thus Leman's glassy lake unsullied glides,
While the fierce Rhone runs roaring with his tides.

Ah me, my Henry—curse my truant sense,
That mocks my wish, and strengthens my offence!
Thy full-blown merits swim before my eyes,
Thy vision blots the axioms of the wise;
Imagination, with a keen delight,
Brings you incessantly to cheat my sight;
Oh! I remember, but that time is past,
The mighty joy was too sublime to last,
When you deny'd all bliss but Gabrielle's love,
And woo'd and won me like another Jove!
When subtle Cupids, to their mission true,
Remov'd the helmet from my hero's view;
Then on my panting breast would Henry sigh,
As mortal Vanity in tears past by;
Then would you give a licence to your thought,
And utter thus, what every Monarch ought.
My fever'd soul abhors the tented plain,
That's crimson'd o'er by Gallia's children slain:
I smite the land, I'm eager to protect,
With zeal implore them, and with pain correct:
Let by D'Aumale, they seek the hostile deed,
Oppose my standard, but opposing bleed:
Unhappy men, to combat with their peace,
And drown that voice, which bids their sorrows cease;

What tribute would you wish to prove my mind,
To Love to Henry I have all resign'd;
Bellona proudly combats by your side,
And Victory leads you like a ductile guide:
To both coequal in success and arms,
You raise, you regulate the wars alarms;
In that ensanguin'd, desolated field,
Where frantic myriads were taught to yield;
Where redd'ning Arrogance with Horror fled,
And haughty Lorraine, with his legions, bled;
Your firm battalions, with redoubted ire,
Prevail'd, by following their master's fire:
With godlike aims you spoke but to subdue,
And Treason trembled as her inmates flew,
Thy brilliant plume renerv'd the flying rear,
Thy manly voice exterminated Fear.
Thy charger foam'd along th' embattled plain,
And Egmont, limbless, found resistance vain;
E'en base-born Bussi, insolent and loud,
Rush'd mid the thickest of a recreant croud;

The lances glitter'd, and the cannons roar'd,
Dread shook the mighty, and the mean implor'd;
While the bleak sisters o'er the conflict hung,
And hell was jubilant, and Minos sung.

Oh! could I paint the triumphs of that day,
My lofty verse should rise o'er Maro's lay:
Alas! I feel my faculties opprest,
The theme's too dreadful for my tender breast;
But grateful France will all thy merits own,
And raise, and celebrate her Saviour's throne:
The willing Muses shall obedient sing,
And pleas'd, immortalise her patriot king.

Unhappy Gauls, apostatis'd from Good,
What ruthless Fury has debas'd your blood;
By Reason's beam may all their errors see,
For Henry proves a tyrant but to me:
May pitying wisdom purify their zeal,
And all the wounds of civil tumult heal;
Sedition's race enlighten or defeat,
And bring each ingrate to my hero's feet.
His spirit trembled as he dealt the blow,
Warm'd by Humanity, he fed the foe!
Renown'd Achilles, whose ferocious rage,
Resplendent lives in Homer's sacred page;

Or Persia's chief, or Macedonia's son,
Or the first Cæsar, by his pride undone,
Fade in the page, now Fame assumes the pen,
Tho' all were Monarchs, all were less than men.
Trajan's beneficence uplifts his mind,
He feels that kings are born for human kind:
August, yet wise, benevolent, yet brave,
His sword ne'er conquer'd to create a slave;
Impell'd by Equity, the strife began,
He rais'd his arm, to humanize the man.

Can Glory's laurell'd chief forget that day,
When first he left the battle's dread array,
And came, new trimm'd, by Cupids, in disguise,
To combat Gabrielle's honor with his sighs;
To wound the influence of moral truth,
To blot each prejudice of virtuous youth;
Then frolic Nature warm'd my youthful day,
And smooth'd the windings of the social way;
High mettled Mirth made ev'ry object seem
Like florid images, when poets dream.
Then was my peace untouch'd by ruthless kings,
Nor Woe's cold finger broke my mental springs.
Tho' clad by Terror, like the lowly hind,
Tho' Mars had half usurp'd thy ample mind,

Not half so beauteous was that Roman seen,
Whom Nepthe led to woo th' Egyptian queen;
Not beams more bright'ning grac'd that Angel's head,
Whom heaven deputed to the Patriarch's shed.
If you forget, ah me, that cannot I!
But man's great feature is inconstancy;
Weakly her plaints, your lowly victim pours,
As the white foam that washes Mona's shores.
Oh! had I Amphion's lute, I'd tune my moan,
Amphion, they say, could agitate a stone.
My mem'ry whispers when my virgin heart,
Imbib'd those pangs which never can depart;
When the poor flutterer trembled at your voice,
Ere Passion's regent taught it to rejoice;
Like streams dependent on the ocean's force,
When the rude earthquake shakes their steady course;
Thus my still pulses quicken'd at your strains,
Thus sense impell'd the burthen of my veins:
But Love soon bade the fierce convulsion end,
And Transport hail'd them like a jocund friend!

Ye spotless few, who croud in Virtue's train,
Obey her mandates, and surround her fane;
'Tis your's to follow the behests of peace,
'Tis your's to bid unhallowed wishes cease:
Measure the progress of my guilty fact,
If any guilt exists in such an act;
Then aw'd by Candor, to the world relate,
The folly mighty, but the motive great.

My recollection portrays all the past,
The bliss was sure too exquisite to last:
When Henry's supplication fill'd my days,
And every echo warbled Gabrielle's praise;
Train'd from my reason's dawn in noble deeds,
I sung of Virtue, and I sought her meeds:
My pliant fancy yielded to embrace
Those laws of honor, which upheld my race:
Oh! hesitate, ye generous nymphs, I pray,
Ere ye condemn the tenor of my lay.
Knew ye the sorcery that freights his tale,
Alas, you'd marvel not that men prevail!
A king, a hero, brilliant, wise and great,
Who seems the favor'd delegate of fate;
When such assail the melting virgin's breast,
Love is all-governing, and fear a jest.
With soft solicitude, with matchless charms,
He came, he woo'd, he won me to his arms!
So regal Jove his tender wishes told,
When the high ruler found Alcmena cold—
He swore his love should with his being last,
But scarce was sworn before that love was past:
Such vows, like poppies, mid the golden grain,
Tho' gay, are worthless, tho' alluring, vain:
When Passion's tides thro' mans' strong art'ries roar,
His heart resists them like a flinty shore;
But our frail frames, like mould'ring banks, give way,
Our mind's unhelm'd, our attributes decay—

His bright, his keen, his fascinating eyes,
Like wond'rous basilisks seduce their prize.
Go not, ye nymphs, you'll perish if you gaze,
For necromancy warms their weakest blaze!
If in the vortex of his arts you're found,
Your agency will die, your sense run round.
There Ruin's baneful circles never cease,
Till central potency ingulphs your peace!

Oh! woman, woman, alien to Controul,
Whom infidels deny the gift of soul;
But may not half their obloquy be right,
As heaven has made our fence of worth too slight;
That weak-wrought barrier, wily men survey,
Pierce thro' the texture and consume their prey.

Imagination's flame, which fed desire,
Rage has perverted to tartarean fire;
Fancy draws forth a half created beam,
Which flies Enjoyment, like a golden dream:
Celestial visions rush upon my view,
Tho' vast, aerial, and, tho' bright, untrue:
As Jugglers sleights, they vanish from the eye,
We scarce can wonder ere the Joy's gone by:
Thus, our frail yesterdays', like meteors gleam'd,
Their evil's realis'd, their beauties seem'd.

Where can I wander from the eye of Hate,
What shade of earth can hide a wretch from Fate?

Thought, like the keen-fang'd East, blights Life's young tree,
Predicting horrors that may never be.
Oh! lead me where the blue Soracte shrouds
His daring Countenance, in humid clouds,
Which dash their wombs against his rugged sides,
And deluge Ceres, with resistless tides:
As the rich vineyard to the fury yields,
They bear a tempest thro' etruscan fields.

When sweet Aurora, with her vivid ray,
Unfolds the roseate gates of ample day,
Tho' half our race, elate, the Goddess see,
Her bursting splendour brings no joys for me!
Tho' Onus smiles from his meridian height,
The fervid noon, for me, has no delight;
Tho' jocund Nature's rev'llings speak his praise,
I deprecate his force, and shun his blaze:
Nor Eve, grave Eve, with all her glist'ning dews,
Can waft a balm to solace, when I muse;
Save, when sad Philomel's oblivious strain,
Gives the still world the progress of her pain;
But sombrous Night more blissfully appears,
Who wets the Globe's vast mantle with her tears:
Then to fall'n Erebus I yield the moan,
Who listens as he flows, and gives me groan for groan.

Why was I born to feel o'erbearing ill,
Why was my honor subject to my will?
I know the man by whom I am undone,
That man's more radiant than the rising sun!

Oh with what pride did God create his frame,
When first he mark'd him as the food of Fame;
His boundless heart, which Sorrow's thirst allays,
No custom narrows, and no meanness sways.
There meek-ey'd Pity in her minion dwells,
Unlocks its springs and governs all its cells;
Yet doth his glory so o'ertop his size,
That gazing millions measure with their eyes:
And scarce believe his vast atchievements true,
But look, and think, and wonder, as they view:
Thus Scythia's iron sons could ne'er suppose,
That Ammon's arm could chain unnumber'd foes,
Their sight destroy'd the legend they were taught,
So much can Rumour aggrandize the thought!—
Oh, my great Henry! whither will you flee,
You're Fate, King, Lover, every thing to me:
A nobler subject never grac'd a song,
From Athens' bards, or bright Arcadia's throng;
Sweet as the cedar, lofty as the pine,
His voice is music, and his mien divine:
With him I'd climb the steep on Scylla's side,
Or stem the foaming of the Stygian tide.
Snatch the hot corslet from the cyclop's blows,
Or sweep from Caucausus its antient snows;
Reslay the Python, banish Envy's brood,
Or tear the famish'd tyger from his food.
Say, what is difficult, when feeling sways,
Who infelicitous that Love obeys?

Despairing Lovers can outstrip the wind,
And leap the bounds prescrib'd for human kind;
Not leaguing armies can repel their ire,
Or intercept the act from the desire.
Love, like th' imperial eagle, proudly soars,
Darts thro' each mist, and Phœbus' seat explores:
Tho' meaner Passions may invade the breast,
Love brings us nearer heaven than the rest.—

That hour will come, and hours unshackled glide,
Stealing some valued point from human pride,
When all thy errors shall thy sense pursue,
And stand arrang'd in congregated view.
When pallid Misery folds you in her arms,
And Death waits hunger'd to receive thy charms,
Then will you think of Gabrielle you've undone,
Then wish existence had not yet been spun!
But as my Henry dies, for die we must,
Selected cherubs shall receive his dust,
To no unworthy uses shall it turn,
But fill and consecrate a nation's urn,
To charm from pestilence this envied clime,
And rest coeval with the scythe of Time;

Then shall the muse of France uplift his name,
And summon all the relatives of Fame;
Her ablest ministry shall write his doom
And hang her greenest laurels o'er his tomb!

As blythe Valentinois, with choicest flowers,
Bedeckt the chosen seat of Anet's bowers,
To cheer her faithful but unhappy king,
Of whom we ponder and the minstrels sing;
E'en thus will I my crested Harry greet,
And strew the rose, to hail his war-worn feet;
Then seize my warrior to my aching breast,
Wipe off the dust, and teach him to be blest,
My eager lips shall gather dew from thine,
And all the rage of extacy be mine—
Oh! wayward fancy, why will you create
Such florid scenes to mock my wretched state?
No sportive frail ideas should restore,
Those joys, those revels, which, alas! are o'er;
That hope's deceas'd who gave my youth command,
The quivering pen forsakes my palsied hand;
Thick vapours circumvolve the vision's ray,
And Desperation vitiates my day:
My bosom bleeds, th' associate of Desire,
My thought is madd'ning, and my brain's on fire!
Oh Henry pity Gabrielle's distress,
Take heaven's example and be pleas'd to bless!

Tho' thus your adamantine will I prove,
Come, and receive the amnesty of Love!—
The last sad tears that glisten in my eye,
Expression's strugglings, and my final sigh,
I give most chearfully to Faith and You,
But come, ah come, and own thy Gabrielle's true!
Assuage the horrors of afflictive death,
Chear my last pang, and cheat me of my breath:
Then as I lay a lifeless heap of dust,
Bereft of being, to my fame be just;
Place my cold head upon your steel-clad knee,
And bathe with tears, that nymph who died for thee:
Hark! hark! what means that tumult in the field,
What mean those coursers, do the rebels yield?
See the meek dove, her milk-white wings expand,
Bearing her olive, o'er a woe-rent land;
The babbling trumpet rends its brazen throat,
And Echo hangs upon the martial note!
Such rapturous accents brought the ear delight,
When the Creator gave this planet light;
My fancy swims before the airy spell,
My heart throbs high, as if 'twould burst its cell.
Has Henry conquer'd, sure it cannot be,
Is he victorious, does he live—'tis he!
Be joyant Nature, let high Phœbus sing,
I see, I know the super-human king!
He comes, he comes, with more than mortal charms,
I feel, I faint, my God, I'm in his arms!