Pocula Castalia The Authors Motto. Fortunes Tennis-Ball. Eliza. Poems. Epigrams. &c. By R. B. [i.e Robert Baron] |
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| POEMS. |
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POEMS.
107
Upon Birth and Infancy.
1
Birth is a kind of Resurrection;For Man is buried ere he be brought forth.
Th'membrane that veiles the tender Embrion
Is first its winding sheet, then swadling cloath.
Death ushers in mans life, so that the wombe
Is both his genethliack Inne and Tombe.
2
Birth is a kind of Goal delivery.A Prisoner ere he knowes what's to be free
Man is. Thrice three Moneths doth he cloystered lie
In a maturnall Dungeon, after, he
Lives halfe in nights; whom Lucine forth doth let
Leaves not his darknesse, but exchanges it.
108
3
Gods Commissary Nature doth bestowThe inborn Principalls and Physicall
Dictates of Reason on him, this yee don't know.
And thus alone he proves he's rationall,
He wailes with cries which no salt teares do want
The Ignorance of which he's Ignorant.
4
His lives twilight, or dawning of the DayIn this same wheel or circular is spent,
He sucks, sleeps, cries, Tria sunt omnia.
As if he deem'd Death gain, Life punishment.
He's quiet but sleeping when in jeast he dies,
But when he wakes, and finds he lives, he cries.
5
He is beholding to (though he's by BirthThe Monarch of the whole creation)
Brute Animalls and hospitable earth
Both for his vestments and nutrition.
Being cloath'd he's lull'd asleep by his own cry,
So, ere he 'gins to live, he learns to die.
109
In Principem arma petentem. ------ Erit ille mihi semper Deus.
And weares his Highnesse Buffe? stir, Vulcan, stir
The coales, and forge bolts for Heavens Thunderer.
To naile his foes to earth with. Now assume
Celestiall Archer thy sure Bow, new plume
The Shaft that pierc'd the Python; Neptune bear
Thy Fork aloft and many maid thy Spear.
Sern Mars girt on thy sword and shake the Lance,
Thy knotty Club, great Hercules, advance.
Arm Gods, and Hero's arm, keep watch and ward
About his Person and be his Life Guard.
The coales, and forge bolts for Heavens Thunderer.
To naile his foes to earth with. Now assume
Celestiall Archer thy sure Bow, new plume
The Shaft that pierc'd the Python; Neptune bear
Thy Fork aloft and many maid thy Spear.
Sern Mars girt on thy sword and shake the Lance,
Thy knotty Club, great Hercules, advance.
Arm Gods, and Hero's arm, keep watch and ward
About his Person and be his Life Guard.
May evry Sun present him with fresh Bay,
May he ne'r know what tis to misse o'th' Day.
May's name (like Zisca's Drum) his foes affright,
May their hearts drop into their heeles at's sight;
And may our arms pave all the way he treads
With peacefull Olives, or bold Rebells heads.
May he ne'r know what tis to misse o'th' Day.
May's name (like Zisca's Drum) his foes affright,
May their hearts drop into their heeles at's sight;
And may our arms pave all the way he treads
With peacefull Olives, or bold Rebells heads.
Kind Jove give Fortune eyes, for could she see
Whom she attends upon, it could not be
That (to what place so e're he would betake him)
She should so hate her selfe, as to forsake him.
Whom she attends upon, it could not be
That (to what place so e're he would betake him)
She should so hate her selfe, as to forsake him.
TO That Darling of Virtue his dear Friend John VVroth, Esq
I love thee highly, but for what?
Is't for thy blood or Births sake? no
I'm not so fond to dote on that
Which ballanced no weight doth know,
Nor object to the eye doth bear,
But only fills the vulgar ear.
Is't for thy blood or Births sake? no
I'm not so fond to dote on that
Which ballanced no weight doth know,
110
But only fills the vulgar ear.
Nor for thy fortunes, since we know
They (sometimes) like the faithlesse sea
Ebb from the good, to th'impious flow,
And them with flattery betray:
Stealing, like to the theevish sands,
When most they grasp them through their hands.
They (sometimes) like the faithlesse sea
Ebb from the good, to th'impious flow,
And them with flattery betray:
Stealing, like to the theevish sands,
When most they grasp them through their hands.
From dead mens urnes and dust doth come
Gentilitie, but wealth doth take
Its rise yet lower, that's but scum
Of the sulphury boyling Lake.
These I respect, but what I love
In thee, is something from above.
Gentilitie, but wealth doth take
Its rise yet lower, that's but scum
Of the sulphury boyling Lake.
These I respect, but what I love
In thee, is something from above.
Vertue it is, which as a Star
In thy ennobled Soule doth shine
Fixed, as in its proper Sphear,
And making thee (like it) Divine.
For th'rest I honour thine Ancestours;
Greatnesse we borrow, Vertu's ours.
In thy ennobled Soule doth shine
Fixed, as in its proper Sphear,
And making thee (like it) Divine.
For th'rest I honour thine Ancestours;
Greatnesse we borrow, Vertu's ours.
111
To that emulated piece of Perfection the Lady Diana Willoby. With Sir Tho: Overbury's Wife.
Lady,
Here comes a Wife to kisse your hand
By whom both Death and Life her Parent got.
Yet she's not the worse to be entertain'd
Since th'first was her ill fate, the last her Plot.
Her chief fault (whereof all have some) that I
Find, is that hitherto she'th mist your eye.
By whom both Death and Life her Parent got.
Yet she's not the worse to be entertain'd
Since th'first was her ill fate, the last her Plot.
Her chief fault (whereof all have some) that I
Find, is that hitherto she'th mist your eye.
Your eye! ah! too too dark a word! our Sun
To which all Poets their braines-births should bring
There to be tri'd (as Eagles oft have done
Their young ones to the Planets glorious King;)
And banish those, as spurious from their Nest
That could no: 'bide your most judicious Test.
To which all Poets their braines-births should bring
There to be tri'd (as Eagles oft have done
Their young ones to the Planets glorious King;)
And banish those, as spurious from their Nest
That could no: 'bide your most judicious Test.
View her then (Madam) or rather your self view;
For she's your shaddow, you her substance are.
What he Lord wish't in her, yours find in you,
As you th'originall, she the coppy were.
Use her thereafter, if she welcom misse
You are harsh even to your selfe, for you she is.
For she's your shaddow, you her substance are.
What he Lord wish't in her, yours find in you,
As you th'originall, she the coppy were.
Use her thereafter, if she welcom misse
You are harsh even to your selfe, for you she is.
112
To my Honour'd Friend Benjamin Garfield Esq; Upon his excellent Tragi-comedy Entitled The Unfortunate Fortunate.
And is thy Sock on friend? ascend the Stage
And tell the Antimaskers of our Age
Thalia's harth shall Smoke yet; what though that
Pig-wiggin Satyrist makes the poor Presse sweat
With dull invectives 'gainst her Comick train?
Pox, tis 'cause he wants ears to hear her straine.
And tell the Antimaskers of our Age
Thalia's harth shall Smoke yet; what though that
Pig-wiggin Satyrist makes the poor Presse sweat
With dull invectives 'gainst her Comick train?
Pox, tis 'cause he wants ears to hear her straine.
We find (such surfet th'Iron Age hath tane)
More moralls at a Theater than some Fane,
Our Brittish Turks exhort us there with heat
With Poleaxes into mens heads to beat
Their new Capricio's, this Enigma there,
To obey Kings by opposing, is call'd cleer.
These are the truest Playes, those we stile so
Teach us in jeast in earnest what to do.
They're Sermons in disguise, a good Play is
A Lecture of humanity. So is This.
Thy Muse, the goodliest of the Iove-born Quire,
(From whose Syrenious voyce and mellow Lyre
Orpheus might learn to tune the chiming Sphears)
Unto a Musick Banquet calls ours ears,
Where ('cause best melody in Discords dwell)
Countrey and Court our hearing Organs fill.
First Balaam's Asses bray, beasts set on end,
Soules drown'd in lumps of flesh that downwards tend.
Yet 'mong these walking clods thine Effre showes
Like one of Venus team trooping with Crowes.
She thus disguiz'd is no more blemished
Than a rich Diamon'd that's set in Lead.
Of their Rusticitie she partaked lesse
Than th'scaly Tribe do o'th' seas brackishnesse.
So Danube scornes with Sava's muddy tyde
To mix though both through the same channel glide.
Thus the coy River Arethusa ran
Piercing the bowells of the Ocean
Some hundred Leagues, and then forth issued
Free from salt Tincture as at her springs head.
Thou tell'st us how one Dart struck two together,
Plum'd with a Turtles, not a Sparrows feather.
But oh the frownes of chance that Lovers meet!
“'Lesse 't had sowre sawce Love were too sweet a meat.
Now a foule Dungeons eccho must reply
Their itterated vowes of constancy.
Yet nor this storm of Fate, nor cage them moves,
But here like Nightingales they chant their Loves.
“A great mind, maugre usurpt Power, or thrall,
“Is free in Carisbrook as in Whitehall.
At length their Innocence breakes forth like Day
And chase black Nights suspicious clouds away.
“Fortune's like Proteus the changling Kern,
“But kick and she'l to her true shape return.
Thy Lovers fortitude in hard assays
Got them the Nuptiall Garland, thee the Bayes,
In which ere verdant wreath no branch of Vine
I spie, its dew'd with Helicon, not Wine.
With strenuous sinewie words that CAT'LINE swells
I reckon't not among th'Men-miracles.
How could that Poem heat and vigour lack
When each line oft cost Ben a glasse of sack?
“When brisk Canary flowes with Castaly,
“Wits torrent swells, and the proud floud boiles high.
If you mixt ought with th'Aganippe floud,
'Twas but an Heritiques, not God Bacchus's bloud,
The Hop's the Heritique, yet thou art he
Bring'st Truth of Poesie out of Heresie.
If such things flow from th'fat, a Brewers horse
I'l yoak with Medusean Pegasus.
The Grape and Hop in the same scale I'l put.
Now, now, the Hoghead's equall with the Butt.
More moralls at a Theater than some Fane,
Our Brittish Turks exhort us there with heat
With Poleaxes into mens heads to beat
Their new Capricio's, this Enigma there,
To obey Kings by opposing, is call'd cleer.
These are the truest Playes, those we stile so
Teach us in jeast in earnest what to do.
They're Sermons in disguise, a good Play is
A Lecture of humanity. So is This.
Thy Muse, the goodliest of the Iove-born Quire,
(From whose Syrenious voyce and mellow Lyre
Orpheus might learn to tune the chiming Sphears)
Unto a Musick Banquet calls ours ears,
Where ('cause best melody in Discords dwell)
Countrey and Court our hearing Organs fill.
First Balaam's Asses bray, beasts set on end,
Soules drown'd in lumps of flesh that downwards tend.
Yet 'mong these walking clods thine Effre showes
Like one of Venus team trooping with Crowes.
113
Than a rich Diamon'd that's set in Lead.
Of their Rusticitie she partaked lesse
Than th'scaly Tribe do o'th' seas brackishnesse.
So Danube scornes with Sava's muddy tyde
To mix though both through the same channel glide.
Thus the coy River Arethusa ran
Piercing the bowells of the Ocean
Some hundred Leagues, and then forth issued
Free from salt Tincture as at her springs head.
Thou tell'st us how one Dart struck two together,
Plum'd with a Turtles, not a Sparrows feather.
But oh the frownes of chance that Lovers meet!
“'Lesse 't had sowre sawce Love were too sweet a meat.
Now a foule Dungeons eccho must reply
Their itterated vowes of constancy.
Yet nor this storm of Fate, nor cage them moves,
But here like Nightingales they chant their Loves.
“A great mind, maugre usurpt Power, or thrall,
“Is free in Carisbrook as in Whitehall.
At length their Innocence breakes forth like Day
And chase black Nights suspicious clouds away.
“Fortune's like Proteus the changling Kern,
“But kick and she'l to her true shape return.
Thy Lovers fortitude in hard assays
Got them the Nuptiall Garland, thee the Bayes,
In which ere verdant wreath no branch of Vine
I spie, its dew'd with Helicon, not Wine.
With strenuous sinewie words that CAT'LINE swells
I reckon't not among th'Men-miracles.
How could that Poem heat and vigour lack
When each line oft cost Ben a glasse of sack?
“When brisk Canary flowes with Castaly,
“Wits torrent swells, and the proud floud boiles high.
114
'Twas but an Heritiques, not God Bacchus's bloud,
The Hop's the Heritique, yet thou art he
Bring'st Truth of Poesie out of Heresie.
If such things flow from th'fat, a Brewers horse
I'l yoak with Medusean Pegasus.
The Grape and Hop in the same scale I'l put.
Now, now, the Hoghead's equall with the Butt.
Go, forth, and live, great Master of thy Pen,
And share the Lawrell with thy namesake Ben,
Whose Genius thou hast as well as name,
And as your wits are equall, May your Fame.
And share the Lawrell with thy namesake Ben,
Whose Genius thou hast as well as name,
And as your wits are equall, May your Fame.
It rests, but that I wish the Actors may
As well as thou hast written, make the Play.
“Playes written are not finished, made they are
“I'th' study first, next on the Theater.
As well as thou hast written, make the Play.
“Playes written are not finished, made they are
“I'th' study first, next on the Theater.
ERYNIS,
OR, Discords Speech in a private Presentment.
Hoop, Hoop me, or I burst! to what a fear'd
Stupendious height I have my Trophies rear'd?
Though yet my Power and wishes be not even
My head at each step tilts 'gainst stars in Heaven,
In Heaven, where onely Jove me rule denies,
But as he hath me from above the skies
I've banish'd him beneath; so of the tripple
World he but one part holds, but I a couple.
Far, as the messe of jarring Brothers I
Do puffe my severing breath, if they swell high
And stiffely plead their claimes to th'airy throne
In Thunder that hoarse Stentors base doth drowne,
These my officious wormes as loud have hist,
And prest from Hæmus top Mars to assist
Their rage, with artificiall claps that mock
Joves idle terrors, and his Region shake.
If they disigning to invade the skie
Throw christal mounts on mounts to scale thereby;
And from their Potgun throats belch gusts that teare
(Granado like) the Houses of the air,
In this my knotty bunch worse stormes each Snake
Can raise, which down at last in red showres break.
Stupendious height I have my Trophies rear'd?
Though yet my Power and wishes be not even
My head at each step tilts 'gainst stars in Heaven,
In Heaven, where onely Jove me rule denies,
But as he hath me from above the skies
115
World he but one part holds, but I a couple.
Far, as the messe of jarring Brothers I
Do puffe my severing breath, if they swell high
And stiffely plead their claimes to th'airy throne
In Thunder that hoarse Stentors base doth drowne,
These my officious wormes as loud have hist,
And prest from Hæmus top Mars to assist
Their rage, with artificiall claps that mock
Joves idle terrors, and his Region shake.
If they disigning to invade the skie
Throw christal mounts on mounts to scale thereby;
And from their Potgun throats belch gusts that teare
(Granado like) the Houses of the air,
In this my knotty bunch worse stormes each Snake
Can raise, which down at last in red showres break.
Thanks dutious Son, more sage than Machiavel
(Though the joke saies he scarce is match'd in Hell)
Thanks for abusing the aspiring traine
Their easie faith with, but Divide and Raigne.
To their hopes scene now longing court they me
Where I make them toyle for their Tragedie.
Thus gull'd, they find no Raign, but that of blood,
And Plagues high swelling as Ducalions Floud.
Whilst I and Spoyle, like mercenary Bands
Quell them that call us in, and share their Lands.
Thus Slaves crowd in, whilst I with smiling chear
But clap my hands and cry fight Dog fight Beare.
Successe thus makes th'Oraculous sentence good,
Divide and Discord Raign, shee's understood.
(Though the joke saies he scarce is match'd in Hell)
Thanks for abusing the aspiring traine
Their easie faith with, but Divide and Raigne.
To their hopes scene now longing court they me
Where I make them toyle for their Tragedie.
Thus gull'd, they find no Raign, but that of blood,
And Plagues high swelling as Ducalions Floud.
Whilst I and Spoyle, like mercenary Bands
Quell them that call us in, and share their Lands.
Thus Slaves crowd in, whilst I with smiling chear
But clap my hands and cry fight Dog fight Beare.
Successe thus makes th'Oraculous sentence good,
Divide and Discord Raign, shee's understood.
116
An Anniverse on the fifth of November.
You that derive your far-fetch'd Pedigree
From mighty Brute, from th'Son of Saturne He,
Sing Io, Io, and fill the sportfull skies
With songs, for joy you tore them not with cries.
From mighty Brute, from th'Son of Saturne He,
Sing Io, Io, and fill the sportfull skies
With songs, for joy you tore them not with cries.
This is the Day (meant for your Day of Doom)
In which to Babell, rather than to Rome
Your Commons, Peers, your Prince, your Queen, and King
Were all intended a burnt-offering.
The Pyle was built, the sulphurous train was laid
Which had but one Squib of a Nation made;
Had the least spark but lent it breath't had driven
In bright Elijahs Chariot to Heaven
Princes and Prophets; tattred limbs had fill'd
The air, where bloud had in red showers distill'd.
Quick Death had given no time to fear his spight,
The active flame had seiz'd ere had the fright.
The coward Dame had cut threads unprepar'd,
And wounded men ere they could wake to ward.
Who ere were those unfortunate male contents
That of this dire Treason were Instruments,
The Author was that subterranean Fiend
The common Enemy of Man, his end
A scandall and an odium to bring
Upon those People whom their peacefull King
So strongly guards from all his other harms.
And to cast dirt he meant by traytrous charmes
On their Religion, that she might here
As foule as she doth fair in Heaven appear.
The Powder Plot, a Monster Hell did hatch,
Was such, for which no story has a Match.
In which to Babell, rather than to Rome
Your Commons, Peers, your Prince, your Queen, and King
Were all intended a burnt-offering.
The Pyle was built, the sulphurous train was laid
Which had but one Squib of a Nation made;
Had the least spark but lent it breath't had driven
In bright Elijahs Chariot to Heaven
Princes and Prophets; tattred limbs had fill'd
The air, where bloud had in red showers distill'd.
Quick Death had given no time to fear his spight,
The active flame had seiz'd ere had the fright.
The coward Dame had cut threads unprepar'd,
And wounded men ere they could wake to ward.
Who ere were those unfortunate male contents
That of this dire Treason were Instruments,
The Author was that subterranean Fiend
The common Enemy of Man, his end
A scandall and an odium to bring
Upon those People whom their peacefull King
So strongly guards from all his other harms.
And to cast dirt he meant by traytrous charmes
117
As foule as she doth fair in Heaven appear.
The Powder Plot, a Monster Hell did hatch,
Was such, for which no story has a Match.
FINIS.
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