The Hesperides & Noble Numbers Part 76

Love is a syrup; and whoe'er we see Sick and surcharg'd with this satiety, Shall by this pleasing trespa.s.s quickly prove _There's loathsomeness e'en in the sweets of love_.

950. LEAVEN.

Love is a leaven; and a loving kiss The leaven of a loving sweetheart is.

951. REPLETION.

Physicians say repletion springs More from the sweet than sour things.

952. ON HIMSELF.

Weep for the dead, for they have lost this light: And weep for me, lost in an endless night.

Or mourn, or make a marble verse for me, Who writ for many. Benedicite.

953. NO MAN WITHOUT MONEY.

No man such rare parts hath that he can swim, If favour or occasion help not him.

954. ON HIMSELF.

Lost to the world; lost to myself; alone Here now I rest under this marble stone: In depth of silence, heard and seen of none.

955. TO M. LEONARD WILLAN, HIS PECULIAR FRIEND.

I will be short, and having quickly hurl'd This line about, live thou throughout the world; Who art a man for all scenes; unto whom, What's hard to others, nothing's troublesome.

Can'st write the comic, tragic strain, and fall From these to pen the pleasing pastoral: Who fli'st at all heights: prose and verse run'st through; Find'st here a fault, and mend'st the trespa.s.s too: For which I might extol thee, but speak less, Because thyself art coming to the press: And then should I in praising thee be slow, Posterity will pay thee what I owe.

956. TO HIS WORTHY FRIEND, M. JOHN HALL, STUDENT OF GRAY'S INN.

Tell me, young man, or did the Muses bring Thee less to taste than to drink up their spring, That none hereafter should be thought, or be A poet, or a poet-like but thee?

What was thy birth, thy star that makes thee known, At twice ten years, a prime and public one?

Tell us thy nation, kindred, or the whence Thou had'st and hast thy mighty influence, That makes thee lov'd, and of the men desir'd, And no less prais'd than of the maids admired.

Put on thy laurel then; and in that trim Be thou Apollo or the type of him: Or let the unshorn G.o.d lend thee his lyre, And next to him be master of the choir.

957. TO JULIA.

Offer thy gift; but first the law commands Thee, Julia, first, to sanctify thy hands: Do that, my Julia, which the rites require, Then boldly give thine incense to the fire.

958. TO THE MOST COMELY AND PROPER M. ELIZABETH FINCH.

Handsome you are, and proper you will be Despite of all your infortunity: Live long and lovely, but yet grow no less In that your own prefixed comeliness: Spend on that stock: and when your life must fall, Leave others beauty to set up withal.

_Proper_, well-made.

960. TO HIS BOOK.

If hap it must, that I must see thee lie Absyrtus-like, all torn confusedly: With solemn tears, and with much grief of heart, I'll recollect thee, weeping, part by part; And having wash'd thee, close thee in a chest With spice; that done, I'll leave thee to thy rest.

_Absyrtus-like_, the brother of Medea, cut in pieces by her that his father might be delayed by gathering his limbs.

961. TO THE KING, UPON HIS WELCOME TO HAMPTON COURT. SET AND SUNG.

Welcome, great Caesar, welcome now you are As dearest peace after destructive war: Welcome as slumbers, or as beds of ease After our long and peevish sicknesses.

O pomp of glory! Welcome now, and come To repossess once more your long'd-for home.

A thousand altars smoke: a thousand thighs Of beeves here ready stand for sacrifice.

Enter and prosper; while our eyes do wait For an ascendent throughly auspicate: Under which sign we may the former stone Lay of our safety's new foundation: That done, O Caesar! live and be to us Our fate, our fortune, and our genius; To whose free knees we may our temples tie As to a still protecting deity: That should you stir, we and our altars too May, great Augustus, go along with you.

_Chor._ Long live the King! and to accomplish this, We'll from our own add far more years to his.

_Ascendent_, the most influential position of a planet in astrology.

_Auspicate_, propitious.

962. ULTIMUS HEROUM: OR, TO THE MOST LEARNED, AND TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE, HENRY, MARQUIS OF DORCHESTER.

And as time past when Cato the severe Enter'd the circ.u.ms.p.a.cious theatre, In reverence of his person everyone Stood as he had been turn'd from flesh to stone; E'en so my numbers will astonished be If but looked on; struck dead, if scann'd by thee.

963. TO HIS MUSE; ANOTHER TO THE SAME.

Tell that brave man, fain thou would'st have access To kiss his hands, but that for fearfulness; Or else because th'art like a modest bride, Ready to blush to death, should he but chide.

966. TO HIS LEARNED FRIEND, M. JO. HARMAR, PHYSICIAN TO THE COLLEGE OF WESTMINSTER.

When first I find those numbers thou dost write, To be most soft, terse, sweet, and perpolite: Next, when I see thee tow'ring in the sky, In an expansion no less large than high; Then, in that compa.s.s, sailing here and there, And with circ.u.mgyration everywhere; Following with love and active heat thy game, And then at last to truss the epigram; I must confess, distinction none I see Between Domitian's Martial then, and thee.

But this I know, should Jupiter again Descend from heaven to reconverse with men; The Roman language full, and superfine, If Jove would speak, he would accept of thine.

_Perpolite_, well polished.

967. UPON HIS SPANIEL TRACY.

Now thou art dead, no eye shall ever see, For shape and service, spaniel like to thee.

This shall my love do, give thy sad death one Tear, that deserves of me a million.

968. THE DELUGE.