Poems By the most deservedly Admired Mrs Katherine Philips: The matchless Orinda. To which is added Monsieur Corneille's Pompey & Horace Tragedies. With several other Translations out of French |
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Upon Mrs. K. Philips her Poems.
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 | Poems |  |
Upon Mrs. K. Philips her Poems.
[1.]
We allow'd you beauty, and we did submitTo all the tyrannies of it.
Ah cruel Sex! will you depose us too in Wit?
Orinda does in that too reign,
Does man behind her in proud triumph draw,
And cancel great Apollo's Salick Law.
We our old Title plead in vain:
Man may be Head, but Woman's now the Brain.
Verse was Love's fire-arms heretofore:
In Beauties Camp it was not known,
Too many arms beside that Conquerour bore.
'Twas the great Cannon we brought down,
T'assault a stubborn Town.
Orinda first did a bold sally make,
Our strongest quarter take,
And so successful prov'd, that she
Turn'd upon Love himself his own Artillery.
2.
Women, as if the Body were the wholeDid that, and not the Soul,
Transmit to their posterity;
If in it sometimes they conceiv'd,
Th' abortive Issue never liv'd.
'Twere shame and pity, Orinda, if in thee
A spirit so rich, so noble, and so high,
Should unmanur'd or barren lie.
But thou industriously hast sow'd and till'd
The fair and fruitful field:
And 'tis a strange increase that it doth yield.
As when the happy Gods above
Meet all together at a Feast,
A secret joy unspeakably does move
In their great Mother Cybeles contented breast:
This thy no less immortal Progeny,
And in their Birth thou no one touch dost find,
Of th' ancient Curse to Woman-kind;
Thou bring'st not forth with pain,
It neither Travel is, nor Labour of thy Brain.
So easily they from thee come,
And there is so much room
In the unexhausted and unfathom'd womb;
That, like the Holland Countess, thou might'st bear
A Child for ev'ry day of all the fertile year.
3.
Thou dost my Wonder, would'st my Envy raise,If to be prais'd I lov'd more than to praise.
Wheree're I see an excellence,
I must admire to see thy well-knit Sense,
Thy Numbers gentle, and thy Fancies high,
Those as thy Forehead smooth, these sparkling as thine Eye.
'Tis solid, and 'tis manly all,
Or rather, 'tis Angelical:
For, as in Angels, we
Do in thy Verses see
Both improv'd Sexes eminently meet;
They are than Man more strong, and more than Woman sweet.
4.
They talk of Nine, I know not who,Female Chimæras, that o're Poets reign;
I ne're could find that Fancy true,
But have invok'd them oft I'm sure in vain.
They talk of Sappho, but, alas! the shame
Ill Manners soil the lustre of her fame.
Orinda's inward Vertue is so bright,
That, like a Lantern's fair enclosed light,
It through the Paper shines where she doth write.
Of things for which we were not born,
(Things that can only by a fond disease,
Like that of Girles our vicious stomacks please)
Are the instructive subjects of her Pen.
And as the Roman Victory
Taught our rude Land arts, and civility,
At once she overcomes, enslaves, and betters men.
5.
But Rome with all her arts could ne're inspireA Female Breast with such a fire.
The warlike Amazonian Train,
Which in Elysium now do peaceful reign,
And Wit's mild Empire before Arms prefer,
Hope 'twill be settled in their Sex by her.
Merlin the Seer (and sure he would not lie
In such a sacred Company)
Does Prophecies of learn'd Orinda show,
Which he had darkly spoke so long ago.
Even Boadicia's angry Ghost
Forgets her own misfortune and disgrace,
And to her injur'd Daughters now does boast,
That Rome's o'recome at last by a Woman of her race.
Abraham Cowley.
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