Why does each animated star Love the just limits of its proper sphere? With prudent harmony combine Man does with dangerous curiosity And studied lines and fictious circles draws: Lord of his new hypothesis he reigns. He reigns: how long? till some usurper rise And he too, mighty thoughtful, mighty wise, Studies new lines, and other circles feigns. From this last toil again what knowledge flows? Just as much, perhaps, as shows, That all his predecessor's rules Were empty cant, all jargon of the schools; That he on t'other's ruin rears his throne; And shows his friend's mistake, and thence confirms his own. On earth, in air, amidst the seas and skies, Mountainous heaps of wonders rise; Whose towering strength will ne'er submit To Reason's batteries, or the mines of wit: Yet still inquiring, still mistaking man, press: Each hour repuls'd, each hour dare onward Through either ocean, foolish man! That pregnant word sent forth again, Might to a world extend each atom there; star. Let cunning Earth her fruitful wonders hide; To trembling Calvary's astonish'd top; Low, reverently low, Make thy stubborn knowledge bow; Weep out thy reason's, and thy body's eyes; Deject thyself, that thou may'st rise; To look to Heaven, be blind to all below. ୮ Then Faith, for Reason's glimmering light, shall give And Grace's presence Nature's loss retrieve. With all their comments, never could invent To reach the Heaven of Heavens, the high abode, As was that ladder which old Jacob rear'd, TO THE COUNTESS OF EXETER,1 PLAYING ON THE LUTE. WHAT charms you have, from what high race you sprung, Have been the pleasing subjects of my song: 1 Anne, daughter of William Earl of Devonshire, and sister to the first Duke of Devonshire, widow also to Charles Lord Rich, was married to John Cecil Lord Burleigh, afterwards Earl of Exeter; she attended her lord upon all his travels, and was present when he died, August 29, 1700, at a village called Issy, near Paris, and surviving him till the 18th June, 1703, the remains of both were deposited at St. Martin, Stamford, where a magnificent monument, brought among other curious works from Rome, erected to their memory. Unskill'd and young, yet something still I writ, But when you please to show the lab'ring Muse, The Persians thus, first gazing on the sun, Admir'd how high 'twas plac'd, how bright it shone But, as his power was known, their thoughts were rais'd; And soon they worshipp'd, what at first they prais'd. And Cowley's verse keeps fair Orinda young. Strange force of harmony, that thus controls Our thoughts, and turns and sanctifies our souls: While with its utmost art your sex could move Our wonder only, or at best our love: You far above both these your God did place, That your high power might worldly thoughts destroy; 1 Imitated from Alleyne's Poetical History of Henry VII. "For nought but light itself, itself can show, And only kings can write what kings can do." That with your numbers you our zeal might raise, And, like himself, communicate your joy. When to your native Heaven you shall repair, And with your presence crown the blessings there, Your lute may wind its strings but little higher, To tune their notes to that immortal quire. Your art is perfect here; your numbers do, More than our books, make the rude atheist know, That there's a Heaven, by what he hears below. As in some piece, while Luke his skill exprest, Some cherub finishes what you begun, To burning Rome when frantic Nero play'd, Thine, like Amphion's hand, had wak'd the stone, And from destruction call'd the rising town: Malice to Music had been forc'd to yield; Nor could he burn so fast, as thou couldst build. |