 | Electra of Sophocles |  |
TO THE MOST EXCELLENT PRINCESSE THE LADY ELIZABETH, On my Friends Dedication of ELECTRA.
Great Madam,All the Muses humbly bow,
And kneel (not to the Ordinance) but You:
And mine stoops low, as Persians to the sky,
Low as their arrogance is bold and high
Who have enacted, that the Hat and Knee
The Hinge of Honour be forgot to thee.
Now though You are depos'd in those poor parts,
You're still the same Great Princesse in our hearts.
Souls make your Train and Court, which is no lesse
Now, than when all Your Pallace was a presse.
State, Pomp, obsequious throngs, and such gay things
Are Complements, and make but tapstry Kings.
The Princesse, not so by the Fathers Veyns
Alone, but Virtues, which are such they'l Wooe
You Realms and Subjects where so er'e you go.
You own a Word, a Look, a Touch will smooth,
Unfiled Indians to Obedient Love.
See Forreign Princes Crowd, and presse to lay
Their Kingdoms by thy side, and next age may,
See the score of thy Royall Parents wrongs,
Reveng'd by Kings which now sleep in thy Loynes.
You and the Duke are all our Hold and Fort,
Henry presents the Camp, and You the Court.
The Royall Widow with her beauteous Sky
Of Lady's, are Seen in Your Cheek and Eye:
And in Great Glo'sters little self Alone,
The Father breaths, and Brother is at Home.
Then leave us not, Dear pair, least that we throw
Our selves down where dead plumbets use to go.
It is your innocence does Counter-mand
Destruction, and bids Fire and Brimstone, Stand;
And when the rowling Mountains would come On,
You like those little Seeds bid 'em, Be gone.
Madam, alone, keeps green up in the Bay;
The Poet here presents Electra's eye
A Christall for to dresse your Cypresse by,
To set your Veyl, and fighs, and what you wear
Instead of Pearl, each Orientall tear.
And while you sit in those shades of your dresse,
And Gloom of your attyre, a Tragick verse:
Moving with pensive gate, and reverend feet,
May to your eye a smooth admittance Meet:
If that it passe the Guard, and die not there,
For Forreign Spy, or Charles'es Messenger.
H. P.
| Electra of Sophocles | |