University of Virginia Library

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TO THE HAPPIE MEMORY of the most Renowned Prince, OLIVER LORD PROTECTOR, &c. Pindarick Ode.

1.

Tis true, Great name, thou art secure
From the forgetfulnesse and Rage
Of Death or Envie, or devouring age.
Thou canst the force and teeth of Time endure;
Thy Fame, like Men, the elder it doth grow,
Will of it selfe turn whiter too
Without what needlesse Art can do;

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Will live beyond thy breath, beyond thy Hearse,
Though it were never heard or sung in Verse.
Without our help, thy Memory is safe;
They only want an Epitaph,
That does remain alone
Alive in an Inscription
Remembred only on the Brasse or Marble Stone.
Tis all in vain what we for thee can doe,
All our Roses and Perfumes
Will but officious folly shew,
And pious Nothings to such mighty Tombes
All our Incense Gumms and Balm
Are but unnecessary duties here:
The Poets may their Spices spare
Their costly Numbers and their Tunefull feet:
That need not be Imbalm'd, which of it selfe is sweet.

2.

We know, to praise thee is a dangerous proof
Of our Obedience and our Love:
For when the Sun and Fire meet,

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Th' one's extinguish't quite;
And yet the other, never is more bright.
So they that write of Thee, and joyn
Their feeble names with Thine,
Their weaker sparks with thy Illustrious light,
Will lose themselves in that ambitious thought,
And yet no Flame to thee from them be brought.
We know, bles't Spirit, thy mighty name
Wants not Addition of another's Beam;
It's for our Pens too high, and full of Theam.
The Muses are made great by Thee, not thou by Them;
Thy Fame's eternall Lamp will live
And in thy Sacred Urne survive,
Without the food or Oyle, which we can give.
Tis true; but yet our Duty calls our Songs,
Duty Commands our Tongues,
Though thou want not our praises, we
Are not excus'd for what we owe to thee
For so men from Religion are not freed.

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But, from the Altars, Cloud must rise,
Though Heaven it selfe doth nothing need;
And though the Gods do'nt want, an Earthly Sacrifice.

3.

Great life of Wonders, whose each year
Full of new Miracles did appear!
Whose every Moneth might be,
Alone, a Chronicle or a History!
Others great Actions are
But thinly scatter'd here and there;
At best, all but one single Starr:
But thine the Milkie way,
All one-continued-light, and undistinguish't day.
They throng'd so close, that nought else could be seen,
Scarce any common Sky did come between.
What shall I say, or where begin?
Thou mayst in double Shapes be shown;
Or in thy Armes, or in thy Gown.
Like Jove sometime with Warlick Thunder, and
Sometimes with peacefull Scepter in thy hand,

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Or in the Field, or on the Throne;
In what thy Head, or what thy Arme hath done.
All that thou didst was so refin'd
So full of Substance, and so strongly joyn'd;
So pure, so weighty Gold,
That the least grain of it,
If fully spread and beatt,
Would many leaves, and mighty volumes hold.

4.

Before thy name was publish't, and whilst yet
Thou only to thy self wert great;
Whilst yet thy happy Bud
Was not quite seen, or understood;
It then sure signs, of future greatness shew'd;
Then thy domestick worth
Did tell the World, what it would bee
When it should fit occasion see,
When a full Spring should call it forth.
As bodyes, in the Dark and Night,
Have the same Colours, the same Red and White,

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As in the open day and Light;
The Sun doth only show
That they are bright, not make them so:
So whilst, but private Walls did know
What we to such a Mighty mind should owe:
Then the same vertues did appear
Though in a lesse, and more Contracted Sphear;
As full, though not as large as since they were.
And like great Rivers, Fountains, though
At first so deep, thou didst not goe;
Though then thine was not so inlarg'd a flood
Yet when 'twas Little, 'twas as cleer as good.

5.

'Tis true, thou wast not born unto a Crown,
Thy Scepter's not thy Fathers, but thy own.
Thy purple was not made at once in haste,
But, after many other colours past,
It took the deepest Princely Dye at last.
Thou didst begin with lesser Cares
And private thoughts, took up thy private years:

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Those hands which were ordain'd by Fates
To change the World, and alter States,
Practiz'd, at first, that vast design
On meaner things, with equal mind.
That Soul, which should so many Scepters sway
To whom so many Kingdomes should obay,
Learn'd first to rule in a Domestick way:
So Government, it self began
From Family, and single Man,
Was by the small relations first
Of Husband and of Father nurst
And, from those lesse beginnings past,
To spread it self, o're all the World at last.

6.

But when thy Country (then almost enthrall'd)
Thy vertues and thy courage call'd
When England did thy Armes intreat
And t'had been sinne in thee, not to be great;
When every Stream, and every Flood,
Was a true vein of Earth, and ran with blood

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When unus'd Armes, and unknown War,
Fill'd every place, and every Eare;
When the great stormes and dismal Night
Did all the Land afright;
'Twas time for thee, to bring forth all our Light.
Thou left'st thy more delightfull peace
Thy Private life and better ease;
Then down thy Steel and Armour took,
Wishing that it stil hung upon the hook;
When death had got a large Commission out
Throwing her Arrows, and her Stings about;
Then thou (as once the healing Serpent rose)
Was't lifted up, not for thy self, but us.

7.

Thy Country wounded 'twas, and sick before,
Thy Wars and Armes did her restore:
Thou knew'st where the disease did lye
And, like the Cure of Sympathy,
Thy strong and certain Remedy
Unto the Weapon didst apply.
Thou didst not draw the Sword, and so

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Away the Scabbard throw;
As if thy Country shou'd
Be the Inheritance of Mars and bloud;
But that when the great work was spunne
War in it self should be undone:
That peace might land again upon the shoare
Richer and better than before.
The husbandman no Steel should know
None but the usefull Iron of the Plow;
That bayes might Creep on every Spear.
And though our Skie was over-spread
With a destructive red,
'Twas but till thou, our Sun, didst in full light appear.

8.

When Ajax dyed, the purple blood
That from his Gaping Wounds had flow'd
Turn'd into Letters, every Leafe
Had on it writ, his Epitaph:
So from that Crimson Flood
Which thou by fate of times were led

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Unwillingly to Shed
Letters and Learning rose, and were renew'd.
Thou fought'st not out of Envy, Hope, or Hate
But to refine the Church and State
And like the Romans, what e're thou
In the Field of Mars didst mow,
Was, that a holy Island thence might grow.
Thy Wars, as Rivers raised by a Shoure
Which Welcome Clouds do poure;
Though they at first may seem
To carry all away, with an inraged Stream,
Yet did not happen, that they might destroy
Or the better parts annoy;
But all the filth and Mud to scower
And leave behind a Richer Slime,
To give a birth to a more happy power.
And make new fruits arise, in their appoynted time.

9.

In Field unconquer'd, and so well
Thou didst in battails, and in armes excell,

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That Steelly Armes themselves might be
Worn out in Warre, as soon as thee.
Successe so closse upon thy Troops did waite,
As if thou first hadst Conquered Fate;
As if uncertain Victory
Had been first overcome by thee;
As if her wings were clipt, and could not flee
Whilst thou didst only serve.
Before thou hadst what first Thou didst deserve,
Others by thee did great things do,
Triumph'st thy self, and mad'st them Triumph too:
Though they above thee did appear,
As yet in a more large and higher sphere
Thou the Great Sun, gav'st light to every Starre.
Thy self an Army wert alone
And mighty Troops contain'dst in one:
Thy only Sword did guard the Land
Like that, which flaming in the angel's hand
From Men God's Garden did defend:
But yet thy Sword did more than his,
Not only guarded, but did make this Land a Paradice.

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11.

Though Fortune did hang on thy Sword,
And did obey thy mighty word;
Though Fortune for thy side, and thee,
Forgot her lov'd Inconstancy;
Amidst thy Armes and Trophies Thou
Wert Valiant, and Gentle too;
Woundedst thy selfe, when thou didst kill thy Foe.
Like Steel when it much work hath past
That which was rough, doth shine at last;
Thy Arms by being oftner us'd, did smoother grow;
Nor did thy Battails make thee proud or high;
Thy Conquest rais'd the State, not thee:
Thou overcam'st thy selfe, in every Victorie.
As when the Sunne, in a directer line
Upon a polish'd Golden Shield doth shine,
The Shield reflects unto the Sun again his Light:
So when the Heavens smil'd on thee in Fight,

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When thy propitious God had lent
Successe and Victory to thy Tent;
To Heaven again the Victory was sent.

12.

England, till thou didst come,
Confin'd her valour home;
Then our own Rocks did stand
Bounds to our Fame, as well as Land;
And were t us, as well
As to Our Enemies, unpassable:
We were asham'd, at what we readd;
And blusht, at what Our Fathers did;
Because we came so farre behind the dead.
The Brittish Lyon hung his Main and droopt,
To slavery and Burthens stoopt,
With a degenerate Sleep, and Fear
Lay in his Den, and Languish't there;
At whose least voice before
A trembling Eccho ran, through every Shoare,
And shook the World at every Roare.

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Thou his subdued Courage didst restore
Sharpen'dst his Clawes, and in his Eyes
Mad'st the same dreadfull Lightning rise;
Mad'st him again afright the neighbouring Floods
His mighty Thunder sound through all the Woods.
Thou hast Our Military Fame redeem'd
Which once was lost, or Clouded seem'd;
Nay more, Heaven did by thee bestow
On us at once an Iron Age, and Happy too.

13.

Till thou Command'st, that Azure Chaines of Waves
Which Nature round about us sent
Made us to every Pyrat slaves,
Was rather burthen, then an Ornament.
Those fields of Sea that washt our Shores
Were plowgh'd and reap'd, by other hands then ours.
To us the Liquid Masse
Which doth about us run
As it is to the Sunne,
Only a bed to sleep in, was.

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And not, as now, a powerfull Throne
To shake and sway, the World there on.
Our Princes in their hand a Globe did shew,
But not a perfect one
Compos'd of Earth and Water too.
But thy Command, the Floods obey'd;
Thou all the Wildernesse of Water sway'd;
Thou didst but only Wed the Sea
Not make her equall, but a slave to thee.
Neptune himselfe did bear thy Yoke,
Stooped and Trembled at thy Stroke:
He that ruled all the Maine
Acknowledg'd thee, his Soveragne.
And now the Conquered Sea doth pay
More Tribute to thy Thames; then that, unto the Sea

14.

Till now our Valour did our Selves more hurt;
Our Wounds to other Nations, were a sport;
And as the Earth, Our Land produced
Iron and Steel, which should to teare ourselves be used.

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Our Strength within it selfe did breake,
Lkie Thundering Cannons-Crack,
And kill those that were neer;
While th' Enemies, secure and untouch't were.
But now Our Trumpets thou hast made to sound
Against our Enemies walls in Forraign-ground,
And yet no Eccho back on us returning found.
England is now the happy peacefull Isle,
And all the World the while
Is exercising Armes and Warrs
With Forrain or Intestine Jarrs.
The Torch extinguish't here, we lend to others Oyle;
We give to all, yet know our selves no feare,
We reach the Flame of ruine and of death
Where ere we please Our Swords t'unsheathe.
VVhilst we in calm & temperate Regions breathe:
Like to the Sunne, whose heat is hurl'd
Through every corner of the VVorld;
VVhose Flame through all the aire doth go
And yet the Sun himself the while, no fire doth know.

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15

Besides the Glories of thy peace
Are not in number, nor in value lesse;
Thy hand did Cure and close the Scarrs
Of our bloody Civill Warrs;
Not only Lanc'd, but heal'd the Wound;
Made us again, as healthy and as sound.
When now the Ship was welnigh lost
After the Storme upon the Coast,
By its best Mariners endanger'd most;
When they their Ropes and Helms had left
When the Plancks asunder cleft,
And Floods came roaring in with mighty sound;
Thou a safe Land, and Harbour for us found,
And saved'st those that would themselves have drown'd.
A work which none but Heaven & thee could do
Thou mad'st us happie whe're we would or no:
Thy Judgment, Mercy, Temperance so great
As if those vertues only in thy mind had seat.
Thy Piety not only in the Field but Peace
When Heaven seeemd to be wanted least.

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Thy Temples not like Janu's only were
Open in time of warr:
When thou hadst greater cause of feare
Religion and the Awe of Heaven possest,
All places and all times alike, thy breast.

16.

Nor didst thou only for thy age provide
But for the yeares to come, beside
Our after-times, and late posterity
Shall pay unto thy Fame, as much as we.
They too, are happy made by thee.
When Fate did call thee to a higher Throne,
And when thy Mortall work was done,
When Heaven did say it, and thou must be gon:
Thou him to bear thy burthen chose,
Who might (if any could) make us forget thy losse:
Nor hadst thou Him design'd,
Had he not bin
Not only to thy blood, but vertue Kinn;
Not only heire unto thy Throne, but Minde.

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Tis He shall perfect all thy Cures
And, with as fine a Thread, weave out thy Loom.
So, One did bring the Chosen people from
Their Slavery and Feares,
Led them through their Pathlesse Road,
Guided himselfe by God,
He brought them to the Borders: but a Second hand
Did settle and Secure them, in the promis'd Land.