Who in their hearts have purposed to be,
At least by imitation, such as He:
And ready to contribute, in His stead,
Due succours to all suppliants in their need.
It is a name of mercy and affection,
Which not alone engageth to protection,
But likewise to a strenuous opposition
Of tyrant's tyrannies and all oppression.
For to be called a Nation to protect
Implies (at least in some degree) the effect
Of every means which may be helpful to
Those works which God provided him to do;
And nobler is, in that respect, than those
Loud-sounding titles which our fathers chose.
THE FIRST ANNIVERSARY OF THE GOVERNMENT
UNDER HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE
IKE the vain curlings of the watery maze,
Which in smooth streams a sinking weight doth
raise,
So man, declining, always disappears
In the weak circles of increasing years;
And his short tumults of themselves compose,
While flowing time above his head doth close.
Cromwell alone, with greater vigour runs, (Sun-like) the stages of succeeding suns,
And still the day which he doth next restore,
Is the just wonder of the day before;
Cromwell alone doth with new lustre spring,
And shines the jewel of the yearly ring.
'Tis he the force of scatter'd time contracts,
And in one year the work of ages acts:
While heavy monarchs make a wide return,
Longer and more malignant than Saturn,
And they, though all Platonic years should reign,
In the same posture would be found again;
Their earthly projects under ground they lay,
More slow and brittle than the China clay;
Well may they strive to leave them on their son,
For one thing never was by one king done.
Yet some, more active, for a frontier town
Took in by proxy, begs a false renown;
Another triumphs at the public cost,
And will have won, if he no more have lost;
They fight by others, but in person wrong,
And only are against their subjects strong.
All other matters yield, and may be ruled,
But who the minds of stubborn men can build?
No
quarry bears a stone so hardly wrought,
Nor with such labour from its centre brought :
None to be sunk in the foundation bends,
Each in the house the highest place contends;
And each the hand that lays him will direct,
And some fall back upon the architect;
Yet all, composed by his attractive song,
Into the animated city throng.
When for his foot he thus a place had found, He hurls e'er since the world about him round;
And in his several aspects, like a star,
Here shines in peace, and thither shoots a war,
While by his beams observing princes steer,
And wisely court the influence they fear.
Unhappy princes, ignorantly bred,
By malice some, by error more misled,
If gracious Heaven to my life give length,
Leisure to time, and to my weakness strength,
Then shall I once with graver accents shake
Your regal sloth and your long slumbers wake,
Like the shrill huntsman that prevents the east,
Winding his horn to kings that chase the beast!
Till then my muse shall halloo far behind
Angelic Cromwell, who outwings the wind,
And in dark nights, and in cold days, alone
Pursues the monster thorough every throne,
Which shrinking to her Roman den impure,
Gnashes her gory teeth; nor there secure.
Hence oft I think, if in some happy hour
High grace should meet in one with highest power,
And then a seasonable people still
Should bend to his, as he to Heaven's will,
What we might hope, what wonderful effect
From such a wish'd conjuncture might reflect!
Sure, the mysterious work, where none withstand,
Would forthwith finish under such a hand;
Foreshorten'd time its useless course would stay,
And soon precipitate the latest day;
But a thick cloud about that morning lies,
And intercepts the beam to mortal eyes,
That 'tis the most which we determine can,
If these the times, then this must be the man ;
And well he therefore does, and well has guess'd,
Who in his age has always forward press'd
And knowing not where Heaven's choice may light,
Girds yet his sword, and ready stands to fight.
And thou, great Cromwell, for whose happy birth
A mould was chosen out of better earth,
Whose saint-like mother we did lately see
Live out an age, long as a pedigree,
That she might seem, could we the fall dispute,
To have smelt the blossom, and not eat the fruit,-
Though none does of more lasting parents grow,
Yet never any did them honour so.
Though thou thine heart from evil still sustain'd,
And always hast thy tongue from fraud refrain'd.
Thou, who so oft through storms of thundering lead
Hast borne securely thine undaunted head;
Thy breast through poniarding conspiracies,
Drawn from the sheath of lying prophecies,
The proof beyond all other force or skill,
Our sins endanger, and shall one day kill.
How near they fail'd, and in thy sudden fall,
At once assay'd to overturn us all!
Our British fury, struggling to be free,
Hurried thy horses, while they hurried thee;
When thou hadst almost quit thy mortal cares,
And soil'd in dust thy crown of silver hairs.
[10 ll.
But the poor beasts, wanting their noble guide,
(What could they more?) shrunk guiltily aside :
First winged fear transports them far away,
And leaden sorrow then their flight did stay.
See how they both their towering crests abate,
And the green grass and their known mangers hate,
Nor through wide nostrils snuff the wanton air,
Nor their round hoofs or curled manes compare;
With wandering eyes and restless ears they stood,
And with shrill neighings ask'd him of the wood. [14 M.
But thee triumphant, hence, the fiery car
And fiery steeds had borne out of the war.
For all delight of life thou then didst lose,
When to command thou didst thyself depose,
Resigning up thy privacy so dear,
To turn the headstrong people's charioteer ;
For to be Cromwell was a greater thing,
Than aught below, or yet above, a king:
Therefore thou rather didst thyself depress,
Yielding to rule, because it made thee less.
For neither didst thou from the first apply
Thy sober spirit unto things too high;
But in thine own fields exercisedst long
A healthful mind within a body strong,
Till at the seventh time, thou in the skies,
As a small cloud, like a man's hand didst rise.
What since thou didst, a higher force thee push'd
Still from behind, and it before thee rush'd.
Though undiscern'd among the tumult blind,
Who think those high decrees by man design'd,
'Twas Heaven would not that e'er thy power should
But walk still middle betwixt war and peace;
Choosing each stone, and poising every weight,
Trying the measures of the breadth and height,
Here pulling down, and there erecting new,
Founding a firm state by proportions true.
When Gideon so did from the war retreat,
Yet by the conquest of two kings grown great,
He on the peace extends a warlike power,
|