University of Virginia Library

Great Queen of change and mutability,
As false as faire fickle Deity,
Were't not a sin, I'de doubt what Poets sing,
And boldly swear from th' sea thou didst not spring,
But from some silent grove, or bower of blisses,
Where Turtle-billing Lovers hide their kisses;
Thou wert begot in some Love-covering shade,
And not of glassie Thetis crispt froth made,
For then the bold imperious surges might
Have been control'd by thee, then hadst thou right,
To quiet the proud billowes, and to chain
In its prefixed bounds, the gadding maine,
Which now contemnes thy idle blast, and roare
For all thy threats, and rages more and more:
Now stubborn Triton mounted on a Whale,
Refus'd to hark to thy neglected call,
And at thy slight commands he stoutly scorne,
To sound retreating with his bugle Horne,
Or give the flouds a signall to retire,
But joyn'd Æolus to swell them higher;
Revenge this Cytherea, else who shall
Adore, or let one graine of Incense fall
Upon thy Altars, sacred Nymph arise,
The Rebell-rout of Sea-gods to chastise,
But legally, let Mercury be sent,
To summon a celestiall Parliament,
Exclude the common crew, deny the rude
Fierce Hydra which we call the multitude,
To sit with thee in Councell, or debate,
To redresse grievances ith' Lovers state;
Admit no vulgar gods, for they will be
Like Tinkers, mending one hole they'l make three:
Dispatch thy ayre-dividing Messenger
With sealed Writs, and summon to appeare,
Hymen, Thalassius, and Raucina too,
The sacred Nuptiall Deities which doe
Tye hearts in knots, and mutually twists
In holy chaines, the soules of Amorists.
The Quiver-bearing Wag, whose potent Bow
Nor sex, nor age evades, nor high, nor low,
The Goddesses so debonaire, and free
Aglaia, Thalia, Euphrosyne,
Esteem'd by men for their heart-easing mirth,
Whom thou (faire Cytherea) at one birth
Bore to the Ivie-crowned God of Wine.
Egeria, at whose adored shrine
The youthfull teeming females doe implore
The Goddesse ayde, to these and divers more
Direct thy summons, when they all
Be congregated at great Joves White-Hall:
(Divinest Queen of Love) perswade them still,
To grant thy just demands, and passe this Bill,
That whereas hoary Thetis did not chaine,
(According as she ought) the boyling Maine.

But traiterously did joyne with Dione
And Malicerba to disturbe the Sea,
When he (whose fame shall drop from many a pen,
When Heralds shall want coates to sell to men,
Whose Armes and Arts his glorious name shall raise,
Alike to wreathes of Pallas Oakes and Bayes)
Did furrow the great deep, and gently glide
Over the bubling face of th' hasty tide,
Bound for Clorindas armes (that happy port,
That true Elizium, Queen pleasures Court)
So that Clorinda (a bright Nymph to whom
We grant priority, being overcome
By her rare feature, alas she misses
Those enthusiastick raptures, Lovers blisses;
It's this day ordered by the joynt consent,
Of the sublime Ætheriall Parliament,
That Phœbus (whom terrestialls doe
Adore, and yearly pay a tribute to)
For ten nights next ensuing shall not rest
His drowsie head in Rebell Thetis brest,
But in Clorinda's lap should we assigne
A longer date, the Sun would never shine,
We should have short dayes, Sol would never rise
From her lap, but to gaze upon her eyes,
And whereas Boreas did let loose his breath,
And Æolus threat nothing under death,
And set the waves at variance with the skie,
And made among the Flouds a mutiny:
Its further order'd that for ten dayes the
Fairy paire of jarring brothers cloysterd be,
In slender Bottles; its decreed they both
With th' Marine Deities shall take this Oath.