The Complete Works of Richard Crashaw Volume I Part 44

OUT OF THE ITALIAN.

Love now no fire hath left him, 1 We two betwixt us have divided it.

Your eyes the light hath reft him, The heat commanding in my heart doth sit.[80]

O that poore Love be not for ever spoyled, 5 Let my heat to your light be reconciled.

So shall these flames, whose worth Now all obscured lyes: --Drest in those beames--start forth And dance before your eyes. 10 Or else partake my flames (I care not whither) And so in mutuall names Of Love, burne both together.

OUT OF THE ITALIAN.

Would any one the true cause find 1 How Love came nak't, a boy, and blind?

'Tis this: listning one day too long, So th' Syrens in my mistris' song, The extasie of a delight 5 So much o're-mastring all his might, To that one sense, made all else thrall, And so he lost his clothes, eyes, heart and all.

VPON THE FRONTISPEECE OF MR. ISAACKSON'S CHRONOLOGIE.[81]

Let h.o.a.ry Time's vast bowels be the grave 1 To what his bowels' birth and being gave; Let Nature die, (Phoenix-like) from death Revived Nature takes a second breath; If on Time's right hand, sit faire Historie, 5 If from the seed of emptie Ruine, she Can raise so faire an harvest; let her be Ne're so farre distant, yet Chronologie (Sharp-sighted as the eagle's eye, that can Out-stare the broad-beam'd daye's meridian) 10 Will have a perspicill to find her out, And, through the night of error and dark doubt, Discerne the dawne of Truth's eternall ray, As when the rosie Morne budds into Day.

Now that Time's empire might be amply fill'd, 15 Babel's bold artists strive (below) to build Ruine a temple; on whose fruitfull fall History reares her pyramids, more tall Than were th' Aegyptian (by the life these give, Th' Egyptian pyramids themselves must live): 20 On these she lifts the world; and on their base Showes the two termes, and limits of Time's race: That, the creation is; the judgement, this; That, the World's morning; this, her midnight is.

NOTE.

As explained in preceding Note, I add here the poem so long misa.s.signed to CRASHAW.

ON THE FRONTISPIECE OF ISAACSON'S CHRONOLOGIE EXPLAINED.

BY DR. EDWARD RAINBOW, BISHOP OF CARLISLE.

If with distinctive eye, and mind, you looke 1 Vpon the Front, you see more than one Booke.

Creation is G.o.d's Booke, wherein He writ Each creature, as a letter filling it.

History is Creation's Booke; which showes 5 To what effects the Series of it goes.

Chronologie's the Booke of Historie, and beares The just account of Dayes, Moneths, and Yeares.

But Resurrection, in a later Presse, And New Edition, is the summe of these. 10 The Language of these Bookes had all been one, Had not th' aspiring Tower of Babylon Confus'd the tongues, and in a distance hurl'd As farre the speech, as men, o' th' new fill'd world.

Set then your eyes in method, and behold 15 Time's embleme, Saturne; who, when store of gold Coyn'd the first age, devour'd that birth, he fear'd; Till History, Time's eldest child appear'd; And Phoenix-like, in spight of Saturne's rage, Forc'd from her ashes, heyres in every age. 20 From th' Rising Sunne, obtaining by just suit, A Spring's ingender, and an Autumne's fruit.

Who in those Volumes at her motion pend, Vnto Creation's Alpha doth extend.

Againe ascend, and view Chronology, 25 By optick skill, pulling farre History Neerer; whose Hand the piercing Eagle's eye Strengthens, to bring remotest objects nigh.

Vnder whose feet, you see the Setting Sunne, From the darke Gnomon, o're her volumes runne, 30 Drown'd in eternall night, never to rise, Till Resurrection show it to the eyes Of Earth-worne men; and her shrill trumpet's sound Affright the Bones of mortals from the ground.

The Columnes both are crown'd with either Sphere, 35 To show Chronology and History beare, No other Culmen than the double Art, Astronomy, Geography, impart.

AN EPITAPH VPON MR. ASHTON,

A CONFORMABLE CITIZEN.[82]

The modest front of this small floore, 1 Beleeve me, Reader, can say more Than many a braver marble can; _Here lyes a truly honest man._ One whose conscience was a thing, 5 That troubled neither Church nor King.

One of those few that in this towne, Honour all Preachers, heare their owne.

Sermons he heard, yet not so many As left no time to practise any. 10 He heard them reverendly, and then His practice preach'd them o're agen.

His Parlour-Sermons rather were Those to the eye, then to the eare.

His prayers took their price and strength, 15 Not from the lowdnesse, nor the length.

He was a Protestant at home, Not onely in despight of Rome.

He lov'd his Father; yet his zeale Tore not off his Mother's veile. 20 To th' Church he did allow her dresse, True Beauty, to true Holinesse.

Peace, which he lov'd in life, did lend Her hand to bring him to his end.

When Age and Death call'd for the score, 25 No surfets were to reckon for.

Death tore not--therefore--but sans strife Gently untwin'd his thread of life.

What remaines then, but that thou Write these lines, Reader, in thy brow, 30 And by his faire example's light, Burne in thy imitation bright.

So while these lines can but bequeath A life perhaps unto his death; His better Epitaph shall bee, 35 His life still kept alive in thee.

OUT OF CATULLUS.[83]

Come and let us live my deare, 1 Let us love and never feare, What the sowrest fathers say: Brightest Sol that dyes to day Lives againe as blith to morrow; 5 But if we darke sons of sorrow Set: O then how long a Night Shuts the eyes of our short light!

Then let amorous kisses dwell On our lips, begin and tell 10 A thousand, and a hundred score, An hundred and a thousand more, Till another thousand smother That, and that wipe of[f] another.

Thus at last when we have numbred 15 Many a thousand, many a hundred, Wee'l confound the reckoning quite, And lose our selves in wild delight: While our joyes so multiply, As shall mocke the envious eye. 20

WISHES.

TO HIS (SUPPOSED) MISTRESSE.[84]

1. Who ere she be, 1 That not impossible she That shall command my heart and me; 2. Where ere she lye, Lock't up from mortall eye, 5 In shady leaves of Destiny;

3. Till that ripe birth Of studied Fate stand forth, And teach her faire steps tread our Earth;

4. Till that divine 10 Idaea, take a shrine Of chrystall flesh, through which to shine;

5. Meet you her, my wishes, Bespeake her to my blisses, And be ye call'd, my absent kisses. 15

6. I wish her, beauty That owes not all its duty To gaudy tire or glistring shoo-ty.