TO THE REVEREND DOCTOR WILKINS, WARDEN OF WADHAM COLLEGE IN OXFORD. SIR, SEEING you are pleased to think fit that these papers should come into the public, which were at first designed to live only in a desk, or some private friend's hands; I humbly take the boldness to commit them to the security which your name and protection will give them with the most knowing part of the world. There are two things especially in which they stand in need of your defence: one is, that they fall so infinitely below the full and lofty genius of that excellent poet, who made this way of writing free of our nation: the other, that they are so little proportioned and equal to the renown of that prince on whom they were written. Such great actions and lives deserving rather to be the subjects of the noblest pens and divine fancies, than of such small beginners and weak essayers in poetry as myself. Against these dangerous prejudices, there remains no other shield, than the universal esteem and authority which your judgment and approbation carries with it. The right you have to them, sir, is not only on the account of the relation you had to this great person, nor of the general favour which all arts receive from you; but more particularly by reason of that obligation and zeal with which I am bound to dedicate myself to your service: for, having been a long time the object of your care and indulgence towards the advantage of my studies and fortune, having been moulded as it were by your own hands, and formed under your government, not to entitle you to any thing which my meanness produces, would not only be injustice, but sacrilege: so that if there be any thing here tolerably said, which deserves pardon, it is yours, sir, as well as he, who is, your most devoted, and obliged servant, THO. SPRAT. POEMS OF BISHOP SPRAT TO THE HAPPY MEMORY OF THE LATE LORD PROTECTOR. "TIS true, great name, thou art secure From the forget.ulness and rage Of Death, or Envy, or devouring Age; Thou canst the force and teeth of Time endure: Will live beyond thy breath, beyond thy hearse, That do remain alone Alive in an inscription, Remember'd only on the brass, or marble-stone. 'Tis all in vain what we can do: All our roses and perfumes And pious nothings to such mighty tombs. Their costly numbers, and their tuneful feet: That need not be embalm'd, which of itself is sweet. We know to praise thee is a dangerous proof For when the Sun and fire meet, And yet the other never is more bright. Will lose themselves in that ambitious thought; [them, Though thou want not our praises, we But thinly scatter'd here and there; All one continued light, of undistinguish'd day; seen, Scarce any common sky did come between: Thou may'st in double shapes be shown Like Jove, sometimes with warlike thunder, and In what thy head, or what thy arm hath done, All that thou didst was so refin'd, So full of substance, and so strongly join'd, So pure, so weighty gold, That the least grain of it, If fully spread and beat, Would many leaves and mighty volumes hold. Before thy name was publish'd, and whilst yet Thou only to thyself wert great, Whilst yet the happy bud Was not quite seen or understood, It then sure signs of future greatness show'd: Did tell the world what it would be, When a full spring should call it forth: Have the same colours, the same red and white, The Sun doth only show That they are bright, not make them so. So whilst but private walls did know 'Tis true thou was not born unto a crown, Thy sceptre's not thy father's, but thy own: And private thoughts took up thy private years: On meaner things with equal mien.` That soul, which should so many sceptres sway, To whom so many kingdoms should obey, Learn'd first to rule in a domestic way: So government itself began From family, and single man, Was by the small relation first Of husband and of father nurs'd, And from those less beginnings past, But when thy country (then almost enthrall'd) 'Twas time for thee to bring forth all our light. Thy country wounded was, and sick, before As if thy country shou'd Be the inheritance of Mars and blood: The husbandmen no steel shall know, With a destructive red, 'Twas but till thou our Sun didst in full light appear. When Ajax dy'd, the purple blood, That from his gaping wound had flow'd, Had on it wrote his epitaph: Which thou by fate of times wert led Letters and learning rose, and arts renew'd: And like the Romans, whate'er thou Was, that a holy island hence might grow. Though they at first may seem To carry all away with an enraged stream; But all the filth and mud to scour, To give a birth to a more happy power. In fields unconquer'd, and so well Thou didst in battles and in arms excel; As if uncertain Victory Had been first o'ercome by thee; As if her wings were clipt, and could not flee: Before thou hadst what first thou didst deserve, As yet in a more large and higher sphere: And mighty troops contain'd in one. But yet thy sword did more than his, Not only guarded, but did make this land a Paradise. Thou fought'st not to be high or great, Thy fire was kindled from above alone: Which did before the Persian armies go, Though Fortune did hang on thy sword, |