The better part with Mary and with Ruth To fill thy odorous Lamp with deeds of light. Hast gained thy entrance, Virgin wise and pure. TO THE LADY MARGARET LEY (1644-5) DAUGHTER to that good Earl, once President Killed with report that old man eloquent, ON THE DETRACTION WHICH FOLLOWED UPON MY WRITING CERTAIN TREATISES (1645-6) A BOOK was writ of late called Tetrachordon, A title-page is this!"; and some in file Stand spelling false, while one might walk to MileEnd Green. Why, is it harder, sirs, than Gordon, Colkitto, or Macdonnel, or Galasp? Those rugged names to our like mouths grow sleek That would have made Quintilian stare and gasp. Thy age, like ours, O soul of Sir John Cheek, Hated not learning worse than toad or asp, When thou taught'st Cambridge and King Edward Greek. ON THE SAME I DID but prompt the age to quit their clogs When straight a barbarous noise environs me Which after held the Sun and Moon in fee. But this is got by casting pearl to hogs, That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood, And still revolt when Truth would set them free. Licence they mean when they cry Liberty; For who loves that must first be wise and good: But from that mark how far they rove we see, For all this waste of wealth and loss of blood. ON THE NEW FORCERS OF CONSCIENCE BECAUSE you have thrown off your Prelate Lord, To force our consciences that Christ set free, Taught ye by mere A. S. and Rutherford? By shallow Edwards and Scotch What-d'ye-call! May with their wholesome and preventive shears When they shall read this clearly in your charge: TO MR. H. LAWES ON HIS AIRS HARRY, whose tuneful and well-measured song To after age thou shalt be writ the man That with smooth air couldst humour best our tongue. Thou honour'st Verse, and Verse must lend her wing ON THE RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF MRS. CATHERINE THOMSON, MY CHRISTIAN FRIEND, DECEASED DEC. 16, 1646 (1646) WHEN Faith and Love, which parted from thee never, Of death, called life, which us from life doth sever. ON THE LORD GENERAL FAIRFAX AT THE SIEGE OF COLCHESTER (1648) FAIRFAX, whose name in arms through Europe rings, Victory home, though new rebellions raise (For what can war but endless war still breed?) TO THE LORD GENERAL CROMWELL, ON THE PROPOSALS OF CERTAIN MINISTERS AT THE COMMITTEE FOR THE PROPAGATION OF THE GOSPEL (1652) CROMWELL, our chief of men, who through a cloud Guided by faith and matchless fortitude, To peace and truth thy glorious way hast ploughed, And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud Hast reared God's trophies, and his work pursued, While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued, And Dunbar field, resounds thy praises loud, And Worcester's laureate wreath: yet much remains To conquer still; Peace hath her victories No less renowned than War: new foes arise, Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains. Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, whose Gospel is their maw. TO SIR HENRY VANE THE YOUNGER (1652) VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old, Than whom a better senator ne'er held The helm of Rome, when gowns, not armis, repelled The fierce Epirot and the African bold, Whether to settle peace, or to unfold The drift of hollow states hard to be spelled; In all her equipage; besides, to know Both spiritual power and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learned, which few have done. The bounds of either sword to thee we owe: F ་ HC IV |