University of Virginia Library

A Carroll.

Awake dull Soul, and from thy fold of Clay
Receive the blessed Tydings of the Day:
Not of a Foxes Cubb, whose guile might be
A promise of successive Tyrannie.
Nor o'th' Victorious Eagles farr-spread wing,
The chiefest of the Worlds parts covering:
But of a Lamb that's yean'd, a Childe that's born,
No Spectacle of Glory, but of Scorn;
For in the house of bread, This Bread of life,
For us, is come to Ioseph and his wife:
And though the City David's were, therein
His Son no Throne Possesses, but an Inn.
There thou maist finde him, at whose mean, low birth,
The mightiest Potentates of all the Earth,
Nay Oracles, are silenced and gon,
Nor longer serve the Devils delusion.
The Delphian Fiend confesses, He's o'rcome.
And by an Hebrew-born-Childe stricken dumb.

Dion, Suidas, Nicepho.

The Letters of th' Old Law effaced are,
Down falls the Statue of great Jupiter,
With th' Twins, and their nursing Beast: which shour
Of Prodigies, rouse up the Emperour,
Who thus farr in the dark could see, t'erect
In honor of th' Almighty Architect,
An Altar in the Capitoll to's Son.
First-born, with the sole dedication.
If Light thus thorow darkness shone, why is't,
That thou who hast the Gospels beams, the mist
Of errors canst not dissipate, but still
Becom'st Idolater in doing ill?
How doth thy Pride and Envie hatch deceit,
And fond Ambition raise thee in conceit
Of thine own worth, when all such honors can
But dress thee up more stately Beast, no Man?
The Serpents brood like Twins doe alwayes Pare,
Which by Thy beastly humors fostered are:
Thy tongue no more thy hearts cross-row doth spell,
Than if thou were't an Other Oracle:
Be silent then, nor longer more prophane
That Holy Temple, for which thou art tane;
But let the Lambs blood wash away the stains
And Characters were written in thy veins
By thy first Parents, and which sithence thou hast
By thy Endevours into Volumes cast,
Throw down thy self for Him who meekly came
Into the world for thee, a Childe, a Lamb,
Born to be Slain for thee, yet slain before,
To make the Victory and Conquest more.
Humility's a Childe; a Giant, Pride;
Goliah from the hand of David dide:
So though like Foes, thy ill Affections grow
Unto immensity, a Powerfull throw,
Out of the Sling of Faith, of Hope, and Love,
May all that Monstrous-uncouth-brood remove.
Then maist thou raign without suspition, free
As Pharaoh did, till this Nativitie:
Then shall Thy Conscience Oraclise thy Fate,
Than was Augustuses more Fortunate;
Nor in the Capitoll, but in thy Hart
Erect an Altar to Him, let each Part
Express thou art awake, and seeing canst tell,
That now Salvation's come to Israel.