Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham Part 33

Here lies Charles Ca'ndish; let the marble stone That hides his ashes make his virtue known.

Beauty and valour did his short life grace, The grief and glory of his n.o.ble race!

Early abroad he did the world survey, As if he knew he had not long to stay; Saw what great Alexander in the East, And mighty Julius conquer'd in the West; Then, with a mind as great as theirs, he came To find at home occasion for his fame; 10 Where dark confusion did the nations hide, And where the juster was the weaker side.

Two loyal brothers took their sov'reign's part, Employ'd their wealth, their courage, and their art; The elder[2] did whole regiments afford; The younger brought his conduct and his sword.

Born to command, a leader he begun, And on the rebels lasting honour won.

The horse, instructed by their general's worth, Still made the king victorious in the north. 20 Where Ca'ndish fought, the Royalists prevail'd; Neither his courage nor his judgment fail'd.

The current of his vict'ries found no stop, Till Cromwell came, his party's chiefest prop.

Equal success had set these champions high, And both resolved to conquer or to die.

Virtue with rage, fury with valour strove; But that must fall which is decreed above!

Cromwell, with odds of number and of fate, Removed this bulwark of the church and state; 30 Which the sad issue of the war declared, And made his task, to ruin both, less hard.

So when the bank, neglected, is o'erthrown, The boundless torrent does the country drown.

Thus fell the young, the lovely, and the brave;-- Strew bays and flowers on his honoured grave!

[1] 'Charles Cavendish': younger son of the Earl of Devonshire, and brother of Lady Rich; slain in 1643 at Gainsborough, fighting on the king's side, in the twenty-third year of his age.

[2] 'The elder': afterwards Earl of Devonshire.

EPITAPH ON THE LADY SEDLEY.[1]

Here lies the learned Savil's heir, So early wise, and lasting fair, That none, except her years they told, Thought her a child, or thought her old.

All that her father knew or got, His art, his wealth, fell to her lot; And she so well improved that stock, Both of his knowledge and his flock, That wit and fortune, reconciled In her, upon each other smiled. 10 While she to every well-taught mind Was so propitiously inclined, And gave such t.i.tle to her store, That none, but th'ignorant, were poor.

The Muses daily found supplies, Both from her hands and from her eyes.

Her bounty did at once engage, And matchless beauty warm their rage.

Such was this dame in calmer days, Her nation's ornament and praise! 20 But when a storm disturb'd our rest, The port and refuge of the oppress'd.

This made her fortune understood, And look'd on as some public good.

So that (her person and her state, Exempted from the common fate) In all our civil fury she Stood, like a sacred temple, free.

May here her monument stand so, To credit this rude age! and show To future times, that even we Some patterns did of virtue see; And one sublime example had Of good, among so many bad.

[1] 'Lady Sedley': daughter of Sir Henry Savil, provost of Eton, and who married Sir John Sedley.

EPITAPH, TO BE WRITTEN UNDER THE LATIN INSCRIPTION UPON THE TOMB OF THE ONLY SON OF THE LORD ANDOVER.[1]

'Tis fit the English reader should be told, In our own language, what this tomb does hold.

'Tis not a n.o.ble corpse alone does lie Under this stone, but a whole family.

His parents' pious care, their name, their joy, And all their hope, lies buried with this boy; This lovely youth! for whom we all made moan, That knew his worth, as he had been our own.

Had there been s.p.a.ce and years enough allow'd, His courage, wit, and breeding to have show'd, 10 We had not found, in all the num'rous roll Of his famed ancestors, a greater soul; His early virtues to that ancient stock Gave as much honour, as from thence he took.

Like buds appearing ere the frosts are past, To become man he made such fatal haste, And to perfection labour'd so to climb, Preventing slow experience and time, That 'tis no wonder Death our hopes beguiled; 19 He's seldom old that will not be a child.

[1] 'Lord Andover': the eldest son of the Earl of Berkshire.

EPITAPH UNFINISHED.

Great soul! for whom Death will no longer stay, But sends in haste to s.n.a.t.c.h our bliss away.

O cruel Death! to those you take more kind, Than to the wretched mortals left behind!

Here beauty, youth, and n.o.ble virtue shined, Free from the clouds of pride that shade the mind.

Inspired verse may on this marble live, But can no honour to thy ashes give--

DIVINE POEMS.[1]

OF DIVINE LOVE.

A POEM IN SIX CANTOS.

Floriferis ut apes in saltibus omnia libant, Sic nos Scripturae depascimur aurea dicta; Aurea! perpetua semper dignissima vita!

Nam divinus amor c.u.m coepit vociferari, Diffugiunt animi terrores.... _Lucretius_, lib. iii.

Exul eram, requiesque mihi, non fama, pet.i.ta est, Mens intenta suis ne foret usque malis: Namque ubi mota calent sacra mea pectora Musa, Altior humano spiritua ille malo est.

OVID. _De Trist_. lib. iv. el. I.

ARGUMENTS.

I. a.s.serting the authority of the Scripture, in which this love is revealed.--II. The preference and love of G.o.d to man in the creation.-- III. The same love more amply declared in our redemption.--IV. How necessary this love is to reform mankind, and how excellent in itself.-- V. Showing how happy the world would be, if this love were universally embraced.--VI. Of preserving this love in our memory, and how useful the contemplation thereof is.

[1] These were Waller's latest poems, composed when he was eighty-two.

CANTO I.

The Grecian Muse has all their G.o.ds survived, Nor Jove at us, nor Phoebus is arrived; Frail deities! which first the poets made, And then invoked, to give their fancies aid.

Yet if they still divert us with their rage, What may be hoped for in a better age, When not from Helicon's imagined spring, But Sacred Writ, we borrow what we sing?

This with the fabric of the world begun, Elder than light, and shall outlast the sun. 10 Before this oracle, like Dagon, all The false pretenders, Delphos, Ammon, fall; Long since despised and silent, they afford Honour and triumph to th'Eternal Word.

As late philosophy[1] our globe has graced, And rolling earth among the planets placed, So has this book ent.i.tled us to heaven, And rules to guide us to that mansion given; Tells the conditions how our peace was made, And is our pledge for the great Author's aid. 20 His power in Nature's ample book we find, But the less volume does express his mind.

This light unknown, bold Epicurus taught That his bless'd G.o.ds vouchsafe us not a thought, But unconcern'd let all below them slide, As fortune does, or human wisdom, guide.

Religion thus removed, the sacred yoke, And band of all society, is broke.