University of Virginia Library

THE PHILOSOPHERS FIRST Satyre of the Sunne.

Great heart, of this great world, that do'st inspire
Each vegetable, with a vitall fire:
Monarch of mines, confessor to the day.
By whom the rheumes of night dissolue away
By their Cimmerian pennance; that bids good morne
To euery wren that sings, or man that's borne:
Thou, that bestow'st a pension of thy light,
(Like a true noble master, to whose might
An actiue will concurrs) to euery groome,
That serues in office of a Planets roome:
Thou, whose attendants, are fixt radiant stars,
Well quallified; not enuious followers
Of thy great fortunes, more then they admire
The vertues, not the greatnesse of thy fire:
Vnlike most great-men, poore in rich degrees;
When their men loue his fortunes; more his fees:
And most attend (as doth a weathercockes vaine)
A gale of sutes, then a right noble traine:
Such as the glorious Sunne (the worlds bright eie),
Rides circuit, with his guard of maiestie:
Which since his Kingly beames all things create,
Of Kings weele sing, and moralize his state:
If busie Bees, in Hieroglyphicks sing,
Platoes great common-wealth: and teach a King,
The politicks of state, that from their hiue,
Distill sweet maximes, how great Kingdomes thriue,
Their stinglesse King, that raignes in sweete increase,
Swarming in Nectard prouinces of peace:
Which when his honie-grace, in progresse flies,
A busie guard, with Argus iealous eies,
Attends their dailie-King: in which we see,
Kings supreame heads, what subiects ought to bee:
If then this sillie emblem, in disguise,
And more sententious clouds can moralize,
Such high occurrences, and intricate,
To tutor Solon in affaires of State:
What fearefull palsie should my pen confine,
Since the sunne's like a King: Kings, Sunne-like shine?
For, marke; the more this kingly planet goes
To his meridian Zenith, the more he throwes
His warmth vpon vs; and the more erect,
In his bright Noone-carreer, he doth reflect
His beames in double lines, the more doth spring
And prosper Mines, Plants, each vegetiue thing:
Likewise to Kings, such vertue we applie,
Whose Royall progresse of true Regencie,
In his meridian lustre, is desir'd
Still to runne higher, and to rule admir'd,
Not fear'd, but lou'd; a happie prop of state;

Cic. Odimus quos timemus

Loue ties allegeance; feare, (but to God) is hate:
Yet godly feare and loue to Kings we owne;
Who feares not them, for iustice can loue none:
Eu'n Apes at full-moone dance; then why not more,
Subiects at fuller glory, Kings adore:
He whose fox't sense, of innouations dreames,
May he wish lightlight; but die in darke extreames:
No longer shall our peacefull shadowes runne,
When in an equall circle, rides our Sunne:
Which, while there is a Sunne to measure time,
May our Sunne shine, within this Brittish Clime:
And with his Royall race, run through the Signes
Of Enuy and blacke treason, of the times:
As at his birth, Dame nature hath exprest,
Bearing the Signe of Leo in his Crest:
For by old sawes in prophecies foretold
The comming of this Northerne Lion bold:
The Signe of Scorpio, and the Vipers-brood,
Gowries blacke treason euer shal make good:
And that, which last, this fatall signe doth tell,
Was that Sulphureous practice, hatcht in hell,
Which since our Sun hath past; swimme Peters keies
In Tibers flood of your damn'd treacheries.
Since in the voice of God, the people crie,

Uox populi vox Dei.

Liue still our radiant Sunne of Maiestie:
And measure out the Autum, Winter, Spring,
In Libra's Signe: 'tis Iustice crownes a King:
Giue light and motion, vnto each degree,
Onely retaine thy influence vprightly.
But those, like Artelesse masters, doe commence
Masters of Art, though not Arts excellence:
Yet, like the Sunne, Kings may their beames disperse,
With generall freenesse to the vniuerse:
And shine on common weedes, and fragrant flowers,
Poore ruin'd houses: and more loftie Towers:
Giue life to insect creatures, and create,
Of things corrupted, things to generate:

Corruptio vnius, generatio alterius.

There's not a Flie, a Waspe, a Scarabee,
But shares the Sunne, with Cæsars maiestie:
Since then, the Sunne-beames are diffus'd to all,
And to the barbarous Moore, and Christian fall
In direct equall lines: what foole, precise,
Can question his free beautie how to rise:
If Oracles on Socrates bestow
A golden Triuet: who dare answere no.
Princes are Oracles, from whom no cause,
Can be demanded, onely willes are lawes:
Sunnes vnconfin'd, to shine where they shall please,
To hide-scorcht Indians: or the Antipodes:
Yet were they Gods, and infinite to sense,
Vntide to circles; or circumference
Of mortall limitation: being diuine,
Yet there are some things, that eu'n them confine
From absolute freedome: as not to haue a will,
To couet contradictions, or doe ill;
Both which, so stint the vniuersall grace
To perfect actions: that it leaues no place
To vnproportion'd freedome: which in Kings,
Infinite in power, finite conditions brings:
Besides; the Sunne, doth grace this Hemispheare
With Orientall beautie, bright and cleare:
So, when our Brittish Sunne, rose from his East,
His Kingly beames, with triple honours blest,
Burnisht our mufled darknesse, with such rayes,
As gaue a spritefull length, to our blacke dayes:
The troubled ayre, ingrost with Icie-feares,
Daun'st at the musick, of the iocund Spheares:
That then, if er'e Pythagoras did not lie,
In Diapasons, kept true harmonie:
Full constellations, in his issue shine,
Whose sweete reflection, euen to wealthie Rhine:
So dazels admirations feeble sense,
As if the Sunne paid vse for influence
From this bright treasure: and so, bankrout, runne,
That yeeres, and daies, exchang'd for such a Sunne:
Whose beames, so, furnisht forraine climes with light,
That there our morning-starre, chaste vgly night

The beautious Princesse Elizabeth.

To his first blacke confusion: and the morne
Laught with a roasie-cheeke: when first was borne
Light, from our light: still may our new hopes shine,
Like fixed starres orbd in the Palatine:
Here could my Muse turne Courtier, and direct,
Her motion, to their motion and aspect:
And with a glozing quill insinuate,
Into the breast of greatnesse, and of state:
And (Ianus-like) with complementall grace,
Gaze on these sunne-beames, with a dubble face.
But that my dutie, bids me shew my hart;
Ladies, not Subiects faces, studie Art:
Which in this zealous Morall, I haue done,
By Iacobs-staffe, to looke on Iacobs Sonne:
But from the King of light I now decline,
To sing of lights, that by his lights doe shine:
Lest in this ticklish point of State I treade
To much: such feares saue many a noble head.