Poetical works (1908) :: :: University of Virginia Library

If Mammon empty all his baggs, to store
The greedy mind, (as Seas heap sands on shore)
If earth with Heaven vie Angels for her lovers,
And every star with golden Pieces covers;
If Plenty, hills of wealth, and mountains heaps,
And what it largely gives, as safely keeps;
The dropsie soul still whines, still thirsts, and pants
For earth, and feels not what it has but wants.
When God the mouth, the throat, the skin hath cram'd
With gold, the heart still gapes, and gasps as clam'd.
Nor earth, nor seas, nor heaven can quench this drouth:
As hell it ever yawns, ne're shuts the mouth.
What rein, what curb can bridle lustful fires?
And manage them in pace of just desires?
When all the gifts which from free Heaven came
Are but as oyl, and fuel to the flame.
He never can be full who feeds on ayre;
He never can be rich, who dreams he's poor, and bare.

Boetius. Libr. 4. Metr. 2.

Those earthly Gods you trembling view
Mounted on starry thrones,
Array'd with Heaven (in spangled blue)
Guarded with armed drones,
With raging hearts, and lightning browes,
Storming with thundring mouths,
Could you unlace their vain attires,
And peep into their brest,
With chains, with gyves, with tortures, fires
Th' Oppressors lye opprest.

334

Clos'd in that shew, and Heav'n-like shell
You'l find the kernel hell.
Distracting lusts with cruel twitches
Rack the disjoynted Ghost:
Hope backs the heart, and spurrs, and switches
Wrath, anger, fear, and rost:
Hate, Envy scourge with snaky wreath;
Griefs, pressing, squeese to death.
When then so many Tyrant Lords
Reign in one single brest;
How can it (bound with self-will'd cords)
Do what it self thinks best?
He that rules men, serves lust, 's a thing,
Much greater slave, than King.

Boetius. Libr. 3. Metr. 7.

All Pleasures ride with spurs: they goar the heart,
And drive it first to run, and then to smart.
Pleasures are Bees; Bees have their bag, and sting;
Those drops of sweet, these streams of torment bring.
The bag flies with the Bee; the sting remains:
How flitting are our joyes? how lasting pains?
He that in honied Hive of Pleasure dwells,
Soon dies to Heav'n, lives to a thousand hells.

Boetius. Libr. 3. Metr. 8.

When Ignorance leads fools (both blind) they stray.
How should they hitt, or miss their end, or way?
We seek not grapes on thorns, on thistles figgs:
Who gathers pearls from Vines, or gold from twiggs?
He that would feast his guests with Lenten dishes,
Draggs not dry Mountains, nor thin Ayer fishes.
He that with Ven'son would his palate please,
Swims not his Hounds in Brooks, or hunts the Seas.
Tethis black Closets (hid with dark deep floods)
Men search, know, rifle, ransack all her goods.

335

Where brightest Pearls she hoords in Oyster cells,
Where Coral grafts, where stores her purple shells:
They know her Markets, Fairs, where, when to buy
Each kind of Fish; where Crabs, where Lobsters lye;
But where that good, which makes man blessed, lyes,
They have no ears to hear, to see, no eyes.
On earth fools hunt, which far transcends the poles:
They tear, dig, delve, (oh are they men, or moles?)
What curse deserve such Bedlams? blindfold wretches
Tir'd let them still pursue their honours, riches,
And prest with false goods, give them eyes to view
The dross of false, the glory of the true.

Boetius. Libr. 3. Metr. 10.

Come, hither come (poor Captives) you whose minds
With dust (cast in your eyes) Lust cheating blinds,
And to base earth with willing fetters binds:

Come weary souls, here rest, here quiet bide,
Come, anchor, here's your Port, here safely ride:
Your guilt in this close Sanctuary hide.

Nor Golden Tagus, nor bright He[r]mus streams,
Nor India's self, whose womb Sols hotter beams
Fill with rich seed, red, white, green glittering gems,

No sparkling Pearls your quenched snuff can tine:
The more ye cleave to their deceitful shine,
The more y' are buried in their Dungeon mine.

Their glistering rayes, which kindle fond desire,
Are earthly, and beget but fatuous fire;
Shine but in night: they rise, and set in mire.

But this Eternal Sun (whose splendour bright
Rules, quickens all, gives you both life, and light)
The eye that wistly views with fixed sight,
Will swear the Starrs, the Moon, the Sun it self is night.

336

Boetius. Libr. 3. Metr. 12.

Thrice happy soul, that turns his Sphere of sight
To that great Sun, and Fount of goodness bright;
Thence fills his waining Orb with true, eternal light.

Happy! who loosing his clogg'd feet, and hands
From pressing earths, and hells oppressing bands,
Mounts, soaring up to Heaven, and at that haven lands.

Once Orpheus plaining at his Spouses bier,
Gave Rocks a weeping eye, and listning ear;
Brooks staid their hasty stream; woods left their roots to hear.

But when no Muse his wounded heart could plaister,
Songs fann'd his fires, and flames brake out the faster,
His verses pleasing all, but easing not their Master,

Weary of life, to hell he desperate flings,
There fits his sweetest voice to sweeter strings,
And into pitty Lords of Shades, and darkness sings.

There what his Mothers spring, there what his eyes,
(Griefs double fountain) what (which both out-vies)
Lost-longing love affords, he to stern Ghosts applyes.

Hells bauling Dog pricks up his thrice two ears,
To houl, to bark, to snarl, to whine he fears:
Haggs still their hissing snakes; and Furies melt in tears.

Then first Ixion, and his wheel take rest;
Tantale neglects his tast, his ear to feast;
The Vulture, full of verse, scorns Titius loathed brest.

Dis yields, and with this law restores his Love,
Till hell be left, his sight back must not move.
Who gives Love laws? alas! Loves only law is love.

Now past black Stix, near to the verge of Skies,
Forc'd by desire, turning his longing eyes,
Euridice (at once) he saw, he lost, he dies.

This Fable looks to thee, who tir'd with night
Desir'st to draw thy soul to life, and light
On that Eternal Sun set, fasten, fix thy sight.

337

If you turn back on hellish Shades to pore,
Thou ever losest what thou wan'st before:
Thy soul more barr'd from Heav'n, in hell implunged more.

Boetius. Libr. 2. Metr. 4.

If safe thou wouldst, and quiet dwell,
Refuse a Palace, chuse a cell.
Wouldst thou burn out thy fenced light
In peace, when winds, storms, tempests fight?
Wouldst thou despise the curl'd-head waves,
And laugh, when gaping Neptune raves?
Let not thy house on mountains soar,
Trust not the swilling, spewing shore.
There envious winds, and spiteful blasts
Reign, rage, and tear: there nothing lasts.
Here sinking earth, and bibbing sands
Betray the weight: here nothing stands.
Climb not aloft to seek fresh ayer,
Or pleasant seat: build sure, not fair.
The lowly Rock make thy foundation;
A strong, a lasting situtation.
When thundring storms with ruins fill
The pleasant shore, and mounting hill,
Lodgd in thy trenches, safely lying,
Fierce winds, and foming seas defying,
Safe maist thou mock the angry skie,
And quiet live, and quiet dy.

Boetius. Libr. 3. Metr. 6.

I

The stock of man, the Root, the body, Boughs,
(Whose breadth or'e-spreads the earth, height tops the skies)
One Parent hath; he Sire, and Dam; he plowes,
Plants, waters: he our birth, growth, all supplies.
He fills the Sun with Seas of flowing beams;
Surrounds, and drains the Moon with changing streams.

338

II

He peoples Seas with fish, the Heaven with Stars,
Plants ayer, and earth with living Colonies.
He pounds mans God-like Spirit in fleshly bars,
And by that spirit earth to himself allies.
Men are of high descent: their Petigree
Mortals derive from great Eternitie.

III

Boast ye of Sires? and Grandsires? search ye earth
For Heaven? Heavens Register will shew your race.
Heavens King your Sire: from Heaven, in Heaven your birth
A noble, royal line. No man is base
But such, as for base earth Heavens birthright sell,
By vice cut off from Heaven, and grafted into Hell.

Boetius. Libr. 5. Metr. 5.

I.

Into what different moulds doth Gods wise hand
Cast his wet clay? and to their various forms
Their divers postures fitts? some sweep the sand
Drawn out at length; as tottering boats in storms
They mount, and fall, dragging their lazy trains
They plow long furrowes on the dusty plains.

II.

Some (light as ayer) mounted on liquid sky
Spread to the gentle winds their featherd sails;
Swimming with plumed oars through Heavens fly:
Some shod with hoofs, some frosted with sharp nails
Through woods and forrests, plains, and mountains trace,
And set their prints upon th' earths scarr'd face.

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III.

Yet though their various shapes, and gate betray,
How far their natures differ each from other,
All meet in this: All gaze upon the clay
From which they spring, and stare upon their Mother.
Prest down with earthy Yoke, their dullard sight
Pores on dark shades; they use, not view the light.

IV.

Man only rears aloft his honour'd head:
His body stands, and walks upright: his eyes
Transport his soul, where it was highly bred,
To keep acquaintance with his neer Allies.
On earth his down-cast look he never places,
But when he stoops, and lofty head abases.

V.

If then thou art not beast, or earth; if man,
Thy body guides the soul, thy eye the mind:
Thy flesh looks where it tends, not wher't began,
Oh shall the Heaven-born soul forget his kind?
Shall heavenly minds mind earth? while earthy eyes
Eye Heaven? soar up my soul: transcend the skies.
Else while thy body lives, thy spirit dies.