Deo Opt. Max. S.
Qui huc usque auxiliatus est & in futurum mihi Providebit.
This Altar to Thy Name, Great God, I raise,
The Pious Labour of my too late Praise:
With Stones from Thine own sacred Quarry brought,
Tho by my Artless Hand but rudely wrought.
Artless and rude, tho its Traces be,
Methinks I by it clearly see,
My Past Supports, and Future care,
And what of both 'is my present share,
The Guidance of the Love Divine,
Making me call his Pleasure mine.
O let it in Thy Presence stand,
Inviolable from any Hand.
And when on it thou deignst to look,
Write down the Votary in Thy Book.
Who at its Foot, has his Dependance set,
And in th' Inscription thus proclaimes Thee Great;
To God, who hitherto has helpt; my only Trust,
And for the Future will provide, for He is Just.
Ad Psalmos, 1667.
[_]
The following Compositions and Translations
are therefore here Printed by the Authors consent
and allowance (suitable enough to the general
Title of RIMES, and he hopes not unbecoming
his Habit, tho done the most of them
long before his Admission into Holy Orders)
because they have (as to such of them at least,
which he could much rather have wished lost and
forgotten) by some too curious Collector of such
Trifles against his will and knowledg, been already
from very false Copies very falsly Published,
and he is not wholly out of danger for the
rest, as neither was he till now for a good number
of those above, whose Copies he doubts are in many Hands.
