Poemata sacra :: :: University of Virginia Library

As in a tablet where an Artists quill
Hath learn'dly travell'd to unload his skill,
Till to more constant being he hath brought
Which had but flitting essence in his thought;
Then to court admiration sets it forth
Till that some ruder pencill spoil the worth,
Till time with shadows darken it; and then
Draws cobweb curtains over it; some men

That finde this piece of art, and would enquire
Into this curious relique, will desire
To wipe off dustie yeares or strive to draw
Times envious traverse by, untill they saw
If any beautie were alive that might
Speak for the rest to their ambitious sight:
Thus fares't with man: for on the walls of clay
God did his exc'lent divine feature lay,
Yea hung it in this room of flesh: but sinne
That fair unvalu'd picture did begin
Soon to deface and blemish; we scarce spie
Any complexion of divinitie.
Yet we are busie wiping man decaid:
Some part looks fresh, the Picture is betraid.

Chap. II.

God in the [illeg.] he drew upon man, excells the following art of men in presenting themselves.

Gods tablet was a Soul; in that he drew,
None but the intellectuall eye could view:
Mans is a bodie: then this difference spie;
God paints to th'intellect, weak man to th'eye.

God did no other colours use but white;
And that was innocence, temper'd with bright
Rayes of his Deitie: man mixes black:
Mans colours do some of Gods colour lack.

God did his picture without shadow make;
His pencill shed no darknesse: man doth take
Most glory to shade well: then God is said
To excell man as substance doth a shade.

God's good, and like himself did he limme man:
Man's sinfull, and limme like himself he can:
So in comparing is this difference had;
God's the good Painter, sinfull man the bad.

Thus pictur'd God his beauty on the soul:
Mans body to this Venus was the mole.

The Riddles.

My pen mounting on wing, one did appeare,
And whisper'd me these Riddles in my eare;
Mortall, saith he, I see what thou wouldst have:
Search for a dead mans spirit in his grave:
Go forth in shade of darkest night, and say
Thy bus'nesse is to look about for day:
Walk in December to heare linnets sing,
To pluck the youthfull posie of a spring:
Look in thy Ladies mirrour for her face,
While she is flitting to some other place:
Follow the nimble dove, and pointing say
Where she did wing't through the diaphane way:
Go trace the fishes path, tell where they have
Stept on the fluid surface of a wave:

Go up and shew me where the lightning stood
After the first bright kisse upon a cloud:
Shew me the leaves of stone th'Almighties pen
First writ on in the flaming mount; and then
Measure the path to Euphrates sad banks:
Ask for the garden at those weeping tanks;
Then for the tree and the unluckie bough
Where the first sin hung and was pluckt: And now
Gaze up to see the starre the heav'ns did hatch
To light the Eastern wisdome to the cratch:
Do these, I shall beleeve there's one that can
Shew me the Picture of a God in man.

Chap. III. A representation of God in man.

I see the Sunne when he admiring stood
His face in the smooth mirrour of a cloud:
I lookt upon the cloud, and I did say,
There shines a Sunne, but with a watrish ray.

Then did I think mans clearer soul it was
To the Almighties count'nance as a glasse;
On which he looking, glimmering graces sent,
Till the soul faintly did his God present.

To make a compleat mirrour, there is laid
Pellucide clearnesse on an opake shade:

So body terminated soul; and why?
To do the service of opacitie.

Chap. IV. The Image of God in man.

God had an Image before man was known
Or quick'nd out of dust, that wore his own
Feature of Deitie, one whom he bred
Out of his own Divinitie, and shed
From his indivisible essence, who
Was coindivisible with him too,
Who shar'd with him his autousie, and was
His most indistant Image, more then as
The Sonne of man: he did communicate
Himself all infinite to him; his date
Was from eternitie, who after knit
Another essence to his own: from it
Resulted that hypostasis. Man's made
According to his image. Who can wade
With pen to the first image, and betray
The true representation? let me stay,
And waken'd from a rapture cry, A blisse
Too infinite, too finite I for this.
Yet we have shadows: thus a Schoolman paints,
Though his weak pencill on his paper faints.
Gods Image, as the kings, is in his Sonne,
Who's of his own specifick essence, one

With him a sharer of himself: but man
Is like his coin, upon whose face he can
Stamp his own character: they differ much;
In form and essence it presents none such.

Chap. V. Gods Picture not in the bodie of man.

Think not the structure of a man that part
Which God did fashion with a meaner art:
For to the soul he did assemble all
The Senate of Divinitie, did call
A meeting of his Inf'nite self. Who can
Fancie that this same earthy part of man
Was like a God? God hath his eares, his eyes;
His back parts Moses saw them and descries.
Is there a soul yet so concrete with sense,
So stupid with a bodies influence?
To think these so, man onely doth expresse
Thus, 'cause he knows no spirits nakednesse,
Sees not their operation; so he gives
To them a conjunct state in which he lives.
When one the picture of an Angel brings,
A naked youth fann'd with two golden wings,
I know these plumes are emblemes of his speed,
Whose motion's instantanie: yet we need
Expresse it thus by wings, because we know
Most motions to the volatile are slow.

Farre be from God a corporall essence: he
Is too incircumscriptible to be
Figur'd: no other Archetype we finde
But that eternall figure of his minde.

Chap. VI. Gods Picture in the soul, and what it is.

The image is the Soul, a spirit made
Fit to present a Deitie, who's said
To be a spirit too. Oh could the eye
That intellectuall ray reflect, and spie
The exc'lence of it self, and in that state
Wherein it first took being, fortunate,
Had it been longer liv'd! Oh what a day
Of graces brighten'd it! it body'd lay
Like a rich gemme shut in a crystall case,
Through whose transparent walls broke every grace.
The intellect saw God, and could advance
To heav'n at pleasure in a blessed trance:
Which like a holy torch did scatter light
To guide the will, who else would sit in night
As blinde as dark: each facultie obey'd
And did them service: nimble senses strayd
Never abroad to court their objects so
As to forget their God; they did all know
Him wheresoe're they travell'd: Deity
Gave them white liveries of integritie

To wait on him: none labour'd to betray
Their Lady to a sinfull or dark way.
Mans eyes mov'd to good objects: you would think
That God did some intelligences link
To manage their swift motion: at his eares
Enter'd no harmonie, unlesse the sphears
Whisper'd their musick or some better note,
An Hallelujah from an Angels throat:
His breath, his words were like refined aire,
As holy as the incense of a prayer.
This was mans holier state; here ye might see
Gods Picture in this rare conformitie
To him; each active member seem'd to move
Nimble to grace, trembling with fear and love;
As though God breathing upon Adams face,
Had blown in every arterie a grace.
But oh how is this picture ruin'd! where
Lives there so much of God, one may say, Here
Was he presented once? yet we have juice
That from a sacred side dropt; we make use
Of this so rich a colour to redeem
Gods thus decay'd complexion, till it seem
As fresh as at the first. Oh may I see
Such a fair Picture so reviv'd in me!

FINIS.