THE GLASS OF TIME, IN THE two first Ages.  
Divinely handled, By Thomas Peyton, of Lincoln's Inn, Gent.  
LONDON, Printed by Bernard Alsop, and are to be had at Laurence Chapman's shop overagainst Staple Inn. 1620.   

TO THE ILLUSTRIOUS PRINCE Charles, Prince of Wales.  

MOst hopeful Prince, Europa's richest gem,  
Successor to these famous western Isles,  
 Olive Branch, descended of that Stem,  
Whose, what he hath, all on thy fortune smiles:  
Inheritor to such a Potent King▪  
As no Age yet, his Like could ever bring.   

Brave Pearl of men, within whose lovely Face,  
The sacred Muses learned Arts combine,  
And all Heaven's gifts from great Apollo's Race,  
Apparent seem within thy Brows to shine,  
Thy Fathers Doran, kingly works of State,  
This more than needs, as borne but out of date.   

Yet Royal Prince, let but thine eyes behold,  
This lofty Subject in these Rural Rhymes,  
'Twill more encourage than Earth's purest gold,  
To make my Muse to all succeeding times,  
Blaze forth thy parts and high deserved Fame,  
That thy rare worth may all the World inflame.   

As in a Garden of sweet fragrant flowers,  
Where each man takes what to his mind seems best,  
Then sits him down within their pleasant Bowers,  
Peruseth all, and for a Time doth Rest,  
Contented, Joyed (Admiring) to have found;  
So great a change, in one small piece of Ground.   

So dearest Prince, within thy Father's works,  
What Poesies sweet, Grave sentences divine,  
Sad moral matter in each Subject lurks?  
To draw thy youth to trace him line by line,  
Whilst this may chance to recreate thy mind,  
As glimmering Luna in Sols absence shined.   

Persist go on, and as thy Virtues won,  
The Loyal Love of every faithful heart,  
So to the end, thy course (directly) run,  
And winged Fame shall from thee never start,  
But scale the Clouds and mount the lofty Skies,  
To sound thy worth as fare as India lies.   
Your Highness in all humbleness, Thomas Peyton.   

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE, FRANCIS Lord Verulam, Lord Chancellor of England.  

MOst Honoured Lord,  
within whose reverend face,  
Truth, Mercy, justice, Love and all combine,  
Heaven's dearest Daughters of jehovahs' Race,  
Seem all at full within thy Brows to shine,  
The King himselefe (T'immortalize thy fame)  
Hath in thy Name Foretiped out the same.   

Great Verulam, my Soul hath much admired,  
Thy Courtly carriage in each comely part,  
Worth, Merrit, Grace, when what the land desired,  
Is poured upon thee as thy just desert,  
Grave liberal mind contending with the rest,  
To seat them all in thy judicious breast.   

Thrice noble Lord, how dost thou prise of gold,  
Wealth, Treasures Money and such Earthly cash?  
For none of them thou hast thy justice sold,  
But held them all as base (infected) trash  
To snare, allure, out from a dunghill wrought,  
The seared conscience of each muddy thought.   

Weigh but my cause, refer me not to those,  
That from the first were partial in my right,  
Ah this is more than once thine Honour knows,  
Thou seest mine own hath now undone me quite,  
Whilst by a trick they got me in their paw,  
Against the Order of thy Court and Law.   

If I were such as some would have thee think,  
I mean my Foes which utterly defame,  
Mine Innocence and all together link  
To wound my state, and blemish much my name:  
Yet justice wils, what in their hands hath lain,  
Thus to my loss should be restored again.   

Ah, dearest Lord, hold but the Scales upright,  
Let Court nor favour oversway my cause,  
To press me more than is beyond my might,  
Is but their Reach to cross thy former Laws,  
Let me have Peace, or that which is mine own,  
And thy just worth shall o'er the World be blown.   
Your Lordships in all humbleness, Thomas Peyton.   

TO THE READER, The Title described.  

Unto the Wise, Religious, Learned, Grave,  
judicious Reader, out this Work I send,  
The tender sighted that small knowledge have,  
Can little lose, but much their weakness mend:  
And generous spirits which from heaven are sent,  
May Solace here, and find all true content.   

A Paradise (presented) to each eye,  
Within the Vinnet of the Title page,  
Where justice, Mercy, Nature, Love, do lie,  
Beforeth ' Almighty in the first found Age.  
Time stands betwixt, and Truth his daughter bears  
His train behind, a world of Aged years.   

Fierce Nemesis she mounts (within the Air)  
On Pegasus, that winged Horse of Fame,  
And by her side a Sword all naked bare,  
Grave justice sits, a (sable) lowering Dame,  
Under her feet the world's most spacious Globe,  
And weighs men's Actions in a scarlet Robe.   

This may denote the goodly glorious worth,  
The precious Value, Majesty and Grace,  
Of all the Sisters (Glory of this Earth)  
God's dearest daughters in their several place,  
Above the world, heaven's crown their brows adorn,  
To show (at full) how they do (bribing) scorn.   

Peruse it well for in the same may lurk,  
More (obscure) matter in a deeper sense,  
To set the best and learned wits on work,  
Then hath as yet in many Ages since,  
Within so small a little Volume been,  
Or on the sudden can be found and seen,   

Urania (dear) attired in her silk,  
To draw thee on with more attentive heed,  
The weaker sort she sometime feeds with milk,  
All guilty men's damned vices up to weed:  
Th'envious Momes that her chaste Muse doth touch,  
She hopes to mend, but cares not for them much.   
Thine to his power, Tho. Peyton.   


HONI SOIT QVI MAL Y PENSE  
Beati Pacifici.    

THE GLASS OF TIME, IN THE FIRST AGE.  
The Argument.  

The Author first, doth God's assistance crave,  
Throughout the work that he his help may have;  
The sacred Sabbaoth, Satan's envious gall,  
The Woman framed, and Man's most dismal fall;  
The Tree of Life protected from the Brute,  
The Tree of Knowledge with her fatal Fruit:  
For fear the World should finally be ended,  
God's dearest Daughters down in haste descended,  
The flaming Sword the Tree of Life which guarded,  
The Cherubins upon the walls that warded.  
The Land of Eden is described at large,  
Heaven's judgement just to all men's future charge.   

SInce true examples in Gods holy Book,  
Are found of those that in it love to look,  
Of men whose Image, portraiture and soul,  
Have been transformed to monstrous shapes and foul.  
According as their lives have pleasing been, 
Gen. 19, 26   
To him whose sight their secret thoughts hath seen,  
And as his goodness sacred is that some, 
Dan. 4. 30   
Should be examples for these times to come:  
His Church to comfort, Pagans to appall,  
To teach to us what did to them befall;  
Within the stories of the new and old, 
Rom. 15 4   
Of many more than can by me be told.   

And since that Ovid in a pleasing verse,  
Doth pretty Tales and Metaphors rehearse,  
Of men to birds, and then again to beasts,  
To make you parley at your welcome feasts:  
Whose fabled fictions warbled in that age,  
The infancy and sacred pupill-age  
Of the Religion which we hear maintain,  
Under our Sovereign's thrice most happy reign;  
May seem from Moses and the rest divine,  
In's Metaphors to trace them line by line;  
In some I mean, and not in all his work,  
For pleasant folly couched, therein may lurk,  
Yet the allusion, and the meaning sure,  
May reference have unto the Scripture pure,  
And though it shines as Titan's western rays,  
By some 'tis held but wanton in our days.   

But most of all the ripeness of these times,  
The heavenly works up to the clouds that climbs:  
The envious eye which overlookes our deeds,  
When each man's taste on sundry dishes feeds:  
The snarling cur at every thing that bites:  
The slandering Mome which no good work endites:  
The monster cursed with his vile forked tongue,  
That from Hell's vault up to the earth first sprung,  
With Hydra heads, and janus' double face,  
To fawn before, then wound to our disgrace:  
Hath made my Muse unwilling here to sing,  
As loathe herself upon the stage to bring  
To each man's view, and her own painful toil,  
But that the sight may many vices spoil.   

When sin we see unmasked brought to light,  
And damned offences naked to our sight:  
Like lezabel that did the Clouds aspire, 
1. Kin. 4. 18, 19 Chap. 19 2 Cham 21. 10, 23   
In rustling silks and glorious brave attire,  
Under a holy outward form and rite,  
God's chosen flock are fleeced and murdered quite,  
But once unmasked, the Minions of her court  
Hurl heri'th dirt, pash out her brains in sport:  
And as a foul misshapen painted monster, 
2. Kin 9 30, 33 35, 37.   
Conceit of her as all the world doth construe:  
Then is she seen disrobed, disranked of all,  
The map of folly in her sudden fall,  
Her cup with poison, damned Envy fills,  
Her cursed eyes have seen those seven built hills,  
Where all the Saints, Apostles, Martyrs stood,  
With crimson colours all imbrued in blood.   

O glorious God inspiror of my Muse,  
Grant that thy Word my soul may daily use,  
And that what learning painfully it got,  
Still from the truth may never swerve a jot.  
That in her spring, beginning, and her bud,  
May sing thy glory to the Churches good,  
And in foul folly none asleep I rock,  
Nor give offence to any of thy flock:  
But that my speech as general to all,  
May like a Sermon in the Pulpit fall:  
And not to wade in curious questions deep,  
But feed thy flock, and edify thy sheep,  
That none at all may have a just excuse,  
By such examples as I shall produce-  
And all that see their faults, their lives may mend,  
That to thy glory I this Work may end.   

Then shall the world with admiration see,  
Her face unmasked to all eternity;  
The famous actions heretofore lay dead,  
Shall then be roused out from Oblivion's bed.  
And all the noblest kingdoms ever known,  
Will be revived, within my verse be shown,  
Their manners, customs, nature and their state,  
Their end, beginning, fortune and their fate,  
From Adam first throughout in every age,  
Shall here be mustered on this public Stage,  
In Rural Robes to give the earth content,  
How heretofore the ages past we spent.   

O that my Muse might once but rest in peace,  
Then would she sing divinely, never cease,  
But work out Truth within her holy Rhymes,  
Gliding along descending to our times,  
And dear Urania Sovereign of my verse,  
Should here the glory of this world rehearse,  
Vnfoulding still to God's immortal glory,  
The heavenly sweetness of a sacred story.   

What may we think of all the judgements just,  
Of great jehovah buried in the dust;  
Beside all those in holy Scriptures penned,  
Which humane wit as yet could never mend,  
Nor all the Rabbis in their learned fame;  
Can ever tell how to correct the same:  
Shall we go on, and still be bold to think,  
he'll punish them, and on us always wink;  
For some of them the earth itself did gape,  
How can we know that we are sure to scape,  
The Angels which against the Lord did swell,  
He quite cashiered, and cast them down to hell:  
Where being bound eternally in chains,  
They feel the torments of ten thousand pains,  
Fare more than can expressed be in ink,  
And all the world, and sinful man can think.   

Adam what made thee, wilfully at first,  
To leave thy offspring, to this day accursed;  
So wicked, foul, and over grown with Sin;  
And in thy person all of it begin?  
That hadst thou stood in Innocenie framed,  
Death, Sin, and Hell, the world and all thou hadst tamed.  
Then hadst thou been a Monarch from thy birth;  
Gods only Darling both in heaven and earth:  
The world and all at thy command to bend,  
And all heaven's creatures on thee t'attend.  
The sweetest life that ever man could live;  
What couldst thou ask but God to thee did give?  
Protected kept thee like a faithful Warden,  
As thy companion in that pleasant Garden▪  
No cankered malice once thy heart did move:  
 thou hadst endued from him above:  
What couldst thou wish, all world's content and more?  
The best Divine that ere the Earth yet bore,  
God's only Son, the Prince of Peace except,  
For thy sad fall how oft mine eyes have wept.   

Alas weakeman, hadst thou in honour stood  
How heavenly blest, thrice happy been thy blood?  
And all thy aged issue to this day  
Had lived secure, as in the Month of May.  
What need had we, that any should have died  
Upon the Cross, our sinful souls revived?  
And that Messiah, God himself the Son,  
Should here descend to put our nature on,  
To live dejected, poor, contemned, forlorned,  
Derided, beat, tossed upside down and scorned.  
And more, to bear for this thy woeful fall,  
Then ever man which lived upon this ball.  
Cursed be that Devil that first thy sense belied;  
If thou hadst lived, than we had never died.  
Oh God to purchase with that bloody cost,  
Our souls redeemed when they were fully lost.  
Here is a love which fare surmounts the skies,  
My senses rapts, and dazzles both mine eyes.   

But tell me Adam, what might be the cause  
That thou shouldst break thy holy Maker's laws.  
When of a thousand which might make us weep,  
In all the world thou hadst but one to keep,  
And that but light? Alas couldst thou not see,  
But touch and taste that one forbidden tree,  
Which in the midst of all the garden grew,  
An ill known tree to make thy offspring rue?  
What pleasant taste or relish had the same?  
How were thy senses dimmed and much to blame,  
That had the Garden sole at thy command,  
And all the fruits within thy sight to stand:  
Fare better, pure, more daintier every way,  
Then such an Apple painted like a gay:  
Fit for a woman, or some liquorish fool,  
A silly child, or one that goes to school.   

Thy wilful, foul, absurd, and gross abuse,  
Against thy God, admits no just excuse,  
'tis not the loss of one poor Apple missed,  
That thou didst grapple in thy sinful fist,  
Can be the cause his anger to procure,  
Fierce heavy wrath eternal to endure.  
It was not that he did so much respect,  
But thy foul error, wilful, bad neglect:  
Contempt of Him, rebellion, treason, pride;  
And all the sins within the world beside,  
That linked were within thy fault at first,  
Chained to thy Act, and in thy folly nursed.   

What may we think of that ambitious Pope,  
Which dared to scoff under heavens glorious Cope,  
Against that God, that in his sacred frown  
Turns up his heels, and hurls his pride soon down?  
When having missed a simple childish toy,  
A Peacock bird which seemed his only joy.  
Distempered much began in heat to chide,  
That few men could his holy presence bide.  
And afterward ashamed of what was past,  
To show his choler not long time did last;  
Excused himself, that he might angry be,  
As well for that, as was the Trinity.  
When discontented for an Apple lost,  
Both Eve and Adam to their pain and cost,  
From Paradise were thrust quite out and beaten,  
And much disgraced for one poor Apple eaten.   

Now tell me Rome, that thinkest thyself the minion,  
Christ's only Vicar in thine own opinion?  
And shouldst his sheep still to this day have fed:  
Where was thy Church when julius was thy head?  
Thy Papacy I may not here dispute,  
As yet my tongue must of that thing be mute.   

And back to Adam whence I last digressed,  
Too fortunate my Muse had been and blest,  
Had it but sung thy first estate and all,  
And never known the horror of thy fall.  
A greater love on man was never shown,  
Nor on the earth as yet was ever known,  
Then all the world to be at thy command,  
Still to this day to serve thy turn and stand:  
All that again, for this he did require,  
To keep the Garden that was his desire.  
At other times to his immortal fame,  
That thou shouldst praise his glorious holy Name.   

Here was thy calling (Adam) naught; beside,  
His own example must thy actions guide.  
Six days to work, to till that holy ground;  
And in the seventh, thy Maker's praises sound.  
For as at first, thou wast a body framed;  
So time and place himself he hath ordained,  
Designed, appointed for his service pure,  
Not for a day, but ever to endure.  
By this thou knowst that he thy person blest,  
To give thee then his holy sacred Rest,  
And sanctify the Sabaoth to thy good;  
Ay to be kept in all thy future blood.  
Those that refuse to keep his Sabaoth holy,  
Gods own example may convince of folly.   

But soft, I hear some Laodicean make, 
Reu. 3. sinon inventor of the horse of Troy.   
Even Sinon like, the ground of all to shake.  
To stay my pen with such a question strange,  
As first from Rome, now o'er the world doth range.  
How God could Rest, which never wrought as yet,  
For he that works, his labour must be great  
To frame a matter of so huge a worth,  
As is the Fabric of the spacious Earth,  
The Sea and Heavens, the Firmaments and all,  
Which ever yet within thy sight could fall.   

Oh righteous God that sinful man should make,  
Within his mouth thy holy word to take:  
And by the same thy sacred actions tax,  
To wring them now like to a Nose of Wax. 
simile.   
Too make a doubt and question of that Rest,  
Which to the world for ever thou hast blest.   

'tis true, I know when God first framed the world,  
The waters all within their limits curled,  
The firmaments and every living thing,  
Out from the dust he then did Adam bring:  
Made him a man, a demigod in birth,  
Placed him his Viceroy here upon the earth.   

And by his power all sacred and divine,  
So framed the world as if he had wrought by line,  
Set all in order working in their time,  
Like to the wheels within a clock or chime,  
To serve the turn of Adam and his race,  
And all these made but full in six days space.   

Then did he rest and sat him down to view,  
And to the heavens up again he flew:  
And from the work which by his word he wrought,  
In six days space, and seeing none▪ was nought,  
But from creating any further matter,  
He only ceased, and lest the same might scatter,  
And so return to what it was at first,  
His providence his works hath ever nursed:  
Ay by his power, his wisdom, and his might,  
The heavens and earth are governed aright.  
He worketh still preserving what was made,  
Far more than can by any man be said:  
His arms supporting all this weighty ball,  
Else would the same dissolve again and fall.   

O God, thy Rest hath ever been admired,  
Seen of thy Saints, and of my soul desired!  
The Pagan people to this day that slept  
In ignorance, have yet a Sabaoth kept. 
Exod. 16. 23. 26. Num. 15. 32. Eze. 20. 13. 20. 24.   
The jew at first with Manna wondrous fed,  
His Sabaoth kept by thy example led:  
Though now in error great he snores and sleeps,  
The Saturday his Sabaoth still he keeps.   

No Christian state is so uncivil rude,  
But keeps thy Rest as thou hast him endued:  
With grace and goodness from the Prince of peace,  
The Sunday he from all world's works doth cease,  
Led thereunto by that all rising Son,  
On Easter day, that rose again and won  
The eternal crown in Paradise first lost,  
A bloody prize to his great pain and cost.  
Besides the examples of thy dearest Saints,  
Thine institution and the holy plaints,  
Of all th' Apostles, famous men and Martyrs,  
In all the world within her utmost quarters:  
Which ever used to preach thy word and pray,  
And sanctify the sacred Sabaoth day.   

The Ethiopian, lest he should offend  
To break thy Rest in superstition penned,  
The Saturday and Sunday both he keeps,  
And in those days he often prays and weeps,  
That thou wouldst pardon all his former sins,  
There is his Rest, his happiness gins:  
In childish toys, in gaming, sports and plays,  
He spends small time but keeps his Sabbaths days.   

Their royal Queen which came so many miles,  
(With cunning questions, witty speeches, wiles) 
1. Kin. 10. 1. to the 11. 2. Chr. 9 1.   
To tempt, to hear and see the courtly guise,  
The wit and words of Solomon the wise,  
May rise in judgement at that dreadful hour,  
When Christ may also on our faces lower,  
That more respect our pleasures work and play,  
Then him to serve upon his sacred day.   

What shall we think when Christ the Lord of life, 
Luk. 11. 31.   
Which shed his blood to end our mortal strife?  
Shall speak these words out of his holy lips,  
And not a word as yet that ever slips:  
But still hath been most weighty powerful round,  
One jot thereof hath never fell to th'ground.  
When he himself shall thus pick out their Prince,  
To warn us all our follies to convince,  
May we not think aswell he meant her land,  
Now at this day as it is known to stand,  
Shall like wise rise at his last trump and call,  
To stain our lives and shame our actions all.   
 

Father of Lights, which dwellest in a Light,  
That fare exceeds our Owely bleared sight:  
What will become of all our learned wit,  
When jesus Christ at thy right hand shall sit,  
To make our peace and step 'twixt thee and us,  
And we in Vice to run our course on thus,  
To anger thee so good and just a God,  
Not once afraid of thy revenging Rod:  
But in the day that thou didst early rise,  
Of death and hell to get th'immortal prize,  
In which we were partakers of thy blood  
And body both unto our sovereign good.  
And when we should repent us of our sins,  
By true contrition, which thy mercy wins:  
Engrafted made the members of that head,  
Whose precious blood our souls but then hath fed,  
Relieve the poor, examine well our fall,  
In meditation spend the day and all,  
And when we should thy sacred praises sing,  
To make thy people all the while to ring,  
Whilst we at Bowls shall sometimes curse and fret,  
And all for threepences which we cannot get,  
And shall maintain our sinful deeds in Churches,  
And run ourselves to gather up the Lurches:  
Those that behold us with repentant eyes,  
We call them fools and Puritants precise;  
And when the best our company do shun,  
Home to their house we send for them and run.   

Pardon us Lord, forgive our great misdeeds,  
Cull out thy Wheat, and pluck out all the weeds,  
Which wrong thy people by their ill example,  
The truth neglectin ugly vice to trample:  
Though our Religion we may seem to halve,  
Like to the jews which made the golden calf: 
simile. Exod. 32. 4. 5, 6, 10.   
In Aaron's time, and on their holy day,  
Did eat and drink, and rose again to play,  
If these men by their rude uncivil sport,  
Thy Majesty did anger in such sort,  
That had not Moses knowing of their fall,  
In zeal besought them they had perished all,  
His great desire thy fury could not stay,  
But that three thousand fell within one day,  
Their guerdon just no living man can tell,  
But very like they had gone down to hell,  
All quick alive amongst the damned bad,  
The punishment which after Korah had, 
Num. 16. 32.    

We see (alas) both grace and goodness lurks, 
scal. & li. 5.   
Within the hearts of fierce and cruel Turks,  
Of Saracens and Pagan people rude,  
Which with thy truth were never yet endued,  
Before such time as their seducer nursed,  
By Sergius help most dangerously at first,  
A baneful poison to infect their blood,  
O'erflows the earth much like to Noah's flood:  
Yet these alone by thy example led,  
Or by the light of Nature in them bred,  
Have ever kept the Friday in that worth,  
Long time before the most untimely birth,  
Of Mahomet that Antechrist indeed,  
Who found it so and left it to their seed.   

Besides a world of other people more,  
That here I could produce in ample store,  
Which ever kept a holy resting day,  
abstaining then from all rude works and play,  
The Indian people have a rest aloud, 
Ind. Hist. gasp. Balb. guin. dis. 〈◊〉 ●d. ●cot.   
And those of java that to Idols bowed,  
The Negro black and rich Peguan left,  
Have each of them a several Sabaoth kept,  
The sacred Sibyls, with their frantic mother,  
Have still preferred one day before another.   

We have great God that which these never knew,  
Thine own example and the scriptures true,  
Thy all divine and holy moral law, 
Ex. 20. 8, 9 10 Cham 31. 14, 15 Cham 34. 1. 21.   
Which these as yet have never heard or saw,  
Engrossed in Sinah writ twice by thy hand,  
To show the same for evermore should stand▪  
Both in the Law and in the Gospels' light,  
To come to Church and praise thy name aright,  
Else how should we thy glorious worth extol,  
But like to Swine live all at home and loll:  
And never think how thou at first didst take,  
A little earth and so our bodies make,  
Our souls infuse in Paradise us placed  
Till for our sins we soon from thence were cast,  
‛ Gav'st us this world Christ jesus sent beside,  
Which wrought our life out from his bleeding sides.   

But soft I here that some upon this clause,  
Have ventured fare to abbrogate the laws,  
The holy rest a jewish Sabaoth call,  
Have us live free, tied to no law at all:  
But then (alas) what would become of us,  
That sift God's actions, tempt his highness thus,  
Of all the laws that to the jews he gave,  
But ten of them in all the world we have,  
And those reduc'st for fear they may be lost,  
May be compiled but into two at most:  
These fare more weighty ponderous than the rest,  
Were by his glorious sacred mouth expressed,  
And Christ himself that death and hell did tame,  
Hath not abolished but confirmed the same;  
Else what meant he when oftentimes he said,  
The heavens and earth, the sea and all shall fade,  
Before such time that God's eternal Word,  
One jot or tittle shall thereof be stirred,  
Did this his coming breed a doubt and flaw,  
Still to destroy, and not fulfil the law?  
Have not the Prophets told long since before,  
Of this our Sabaoth which we now adore?   

'tis true that some even in our christian Law,  
Which have the arts and learned Muses saw,  
Yet have alleged as their assertion,  
Upon this place anticipation,  
Affirming Moses when those words were writ,  
In Genesis and still are extant yet, 
Gen. 2. 3.   
Then knew the rest and Sabaoth of the jews,  
But this to me seems rather uncouth news:  
For can we think that Moses did intent,  
When first of all that Genesis was penned,  
These should forgo and be inserted best,  
As an introduction to the Sabbaths rest,  
That the command cannot be firm and strong,  
Unless these words did guide it all along,  
Upon this place still trained up and nursed,  
As grounding it on God's example first.   

What can they say to all the ancient men,  
The Patriarches and holy fathers then,  
Before the law which lived long and blessed,  
Yet ever kept a sacred seemly rest,  
To serve their God to give him thanks and pray,  
That late preserved them from that lowering day,  
In which the world and all therein was found,  
Besides the Ark were washed away and drowned.   

And to the jews that were with Manna fed,  
Over the mountains forty years were led:  
Which in the Arabian vasty deserts wear,  
Type of our Church that God himself did rear,  
Out of affliction, hunger, heat and cold,  
O'er hills and dales and highest mountains rolled,  
Until at length with wand'ring hither, thither,  
Like sheep dispersed fouled all at last together.   

When oft they murmured, much repined and grieved,  
Until their God their bodies had relieved,  
By sending Quails more thick than any hail,  
Upon their fields quite over hill and dale:  
And showering down a pearly dew at need,  
In show much like to Coriander seed,  
Six days together did this Manna fall,  
And in the seaventh was sent them none at all:  
But in the day before the Sabbaths Rest,  
Full twice so much as other days at least,  
They gathered up, and till the morrow kept,  
In which they eat, and prayed to God (and wept)  
To pardon those which on that sacred day  
Durst seek the fields to find the same and play.   

But yet admit the holy Law be past,  
And that in Christ the same away be washed:  
Yet the Apostles instituted sure,  
A sacred day, a holy Rest and pure:  
The Church of God they planted well and watered,  
And but the day they only changed and altered,  
In which the flock they trained along and fed them,  
As God above in's holy Spirit led them.  
And ever since the Christians kept that day,  
To hear the word, to come to Church and pray:  
For God is good, and willbe mocked of none,  
His glorious face the Saints behold alone.   

Paul the Apostle that was after called,  
When jesus Christ was in th' heavens installed: 
1. Cor. 16. 13. Heb. 4. 9   
Both with the word and holy Spirit anointed,  
The Christian Sabaoth in God's Church appointed:  
To meet together, hear his voice divine,  
The Scriptures search, to trace them line by line;  
To preach and pray, to lay up for the poor,  
For all the Saints to open wide the door.   

That sweet Disciple whom the Lord of life 
joh. 21. 7. 20. 33.   
More dear loved, than any faithful wife  
(Which ever yet upon the earth was bred)  
Can seem to show unto her spouse and head.  
The last of all more loving than the rest,  
Which leaned at supperupon Christ his breast,  
And stayed behind his holy Church to guide:  
His fellows thought he should have never died.   

When by Domitian's spiteful cruel word, 
Vit. Sanct.   
o'er all the world hot persecution stirred:  
Though often times before he had scaped the paws,  
Of barbarous Tyrants, and their cursed Laws.  
Lived still secure, as not afraid of fire,  
Sword, famine, murder, in their devilish ire.  
Yet at the length, at his most damned command,  
Again he's caught, subjected to their hand;  
And in a Tun of hot and scalding Oil,  
He hurls his body o'er the fire to boil.  
But seeing that could do no good at all,  
Worse than a Devil, most treacherously doth fall  
To stratagems, inhuman actions vile,  
To banish him in Pathmos wand'ring Ile,  
Mongst savage beasts which lurk in every bower,  
With open mouth his body to devour.   

Where solitary in that unked place,  
Christ jesus showed his glorious burnished face, 
Reu. 1. 9 10. 11. 13. 14.   
Whose feet like Brass, and eyes as flames of fire;  
Ravished john's spirit, made his soul admire  
To see the Lord, which for our sins late died.  
His Christian Sabaoth from the jews divide,  
By that all powerful sharp two edged sword,  
His glorious holy mild Majestic word:  
His own example to th' Apostles all,  
That on this day was ever seen to call,  
To come amongst them, and to show his face,  
To distribute his goodness and his grace.  
This great Apostle to heavens potent Prince,  
The Lords day he hath called it ever since.   

'tis writ i' th' Hebrews if the law be ceased,  
That to God's people there remains a Rest, 
Heb. 4 9   
From sin to cease his holy name to praise,  
Together flock, our meditations raise  
Above the clouds, to that commanding king,  
Which out of darkness did our senses bring.  
Dispersed the Truth, and by his sacred might  
Placed all our thoughts w'thin the Gospel's light.  
O let it never sink within my breast,  
That to God's people should remain no Rest:  
But toil and travel painful work always,  
And Hoddy Loddy, Topsy-Turvy play.   

'tis true they say, that Constantine the Great,  
First Emperor of all the Christian Seat:  
A learned, wise, religious Council called, 
First Nicene Counsel.   
Himself amongst them in his Robes installed,  
An Order set, abuses foul corrected:  
Reformed the Church which Arrians infected,  
Established Peace, adored the Royal Law;  
Made Penalties to keep them more in awe. 
jam. 2. 8.   
And by his power as head of all the Earth,  
Christ's government was now but in her birth:  
According to the word and Scriptures pure,  
Confirmed our Sabaoth ever to endure.   

In every Age since first the world was made,  
God showed his judgements on those men which wade  
Beyond the Truth, profanely still device  
To break his Rest, and publish wicked lies.  
As for example, though I could produce  
A multitude, that none might plead excuse  
(Before his justice) at that dreadful bar,  
For leading others in a maze so fare.  
And yet of them, but three in all I'll cite,  
As fitting to the times wherein I writ:  
To show how God hath ever hated, cursed,  
The very place that Sabaoth breakers nursed.   

The ancient jews which in Arabia walked 
Exod. 13. 16.   
Before the Law, when God with Moses talked,  
And bade him warn the people all, that none  
Should dare to gather (every one alone)  
More than a Omer of that blessed food  
Which fell from heaven unto their sovereign good.  
And in the day before the Sabbaths rest,  
Two Omers full (as is before expressed)  
Should then be gathered, roasted, baked and sod,  
But in the rest mind nothing else but God.   

How hath that food relieved the lingering mind,  
Of those his people, whom true love did bind  
In awful fear, divinely wondrous fed,  
And only in the light of nature led?  
Those which abused his sacred Rest and grace,  
How did it then infect the air and place  
With putrefaction, loathsome, deadly, rank,  
In noy some manner o'er the earth it stanke,  
Until such time that God above did please,  
To clear the air and send them better ease:  
Caused all that was so lewd profanely got,  
To waste, dissolve, consume away and rot.   

The next example, of his judgements great,  
Was in those days that Babylon did beat  
The chosen people, and the holy Nation, 
jer. 17: 21. to the last.   
With such a scourge, as since the world's foundation,  
Was never heard as yet in any land;  
To feel the weight of his most heavy hand:  
For profanation of his sacred Day,  
In carrying burdens, toiling work, and play  
In revel rout, and such fantastic sport;  
Even from the greater to the meaner sort.  
All run from Church to damned offences foul,  
Neglecting still the danger of their soul.   

But God above although he often manned,  
Their chosen Host by his victorious hand,  
Brought them from Egypt through the red seas wave▪  
When mighty Neptune foams aloft and raves:  
And in despite of envious Fortune's fate,  
Great powerful rivals and their deadly hate,  
Led them at length with all their venturous host,  
And placed their feet upon the promised coast.  
Yet for their foul abusing of his rest,  
In all those things which are above expressed,  
He sends the Plague, pale Famine, Sword and Fire, 
jer. 52. 67   
Four furious foes to execute his Ire,  
Razed down their walls their temple desolated,  
Their City sacked and Land depopulated:  
That for the space of threescore years and ten,  
It lay untilled, and had her rest as then.   

O holy God, was ever thing more plain  
Than these thy judgements on thy flock again, 
2. Chr. 36. 21   
Upon thy land? what stony heart but fears,  
To give them now a Sabbaoth just of years,  
For all their foul abuses, wicked, lewd,  
As in my work shall more at large be showed.   

The third example of his wrathful frown,  
Was lately showed upon Geneva town:  
The Imperial goodly Christian City chaste, 
R▪ johnson   
Within the Duke of Savoy's country placed,  
Whose people wise, religious, sober, true,  
Not given to wine with drunken Bacchus' crew:  
Nor to those foul abuses which abounds,  
Within our land, and o'er the earth now sounds;  
But ever been of civil chaste behaviour▪  
Neat in attire, and of a comely favour:  
So decent in the actions which they wrought,  
That every man which saw their city thought,  
jerusalem before it was abated,  
Had been divinely to that place translated.   

And yet these men which have the rest outstripped,  
In one thing still themselves have overslipped,  
Upon God's rest, his sacred Sabbaoth Day,  
To shoot in Guns about the fields and play;  
Until a custom in a lawful pleasure,  
Upon that day grew far beyond all measure:  
So that their Churchmen, reverend Preachers grave,  
Let them alone careless their souls to save.   

But God above to show his anger just,  
Upon these people for their lawless lust,  
In violating of his sacred rest,  
A fury sent their country to moiest:  
Fierce horrid war now thunders on their land,  
The Pope, the Spaniard, and the French King stand,  
All linked alike, to undermine her wall,  
Expecting thus a conquest by her fall.   

Alas (Geneva) how art thou beset,  
With three such foes as in Europa yèt,  
Were never known so strongly to combine,  
To sack a town, extracted from their line?  
What can thy shooting in those Guns avail,  
If God for sakes thee, how thy foes prevail?  
Weakens thy strength, abateth much thy store,  
Mews up thy Camp, and makes thee extreme poor,  
Ransacks thy Country all thy land belurches,  
And brings thee now to be relieved in Churches.  
These eyes of ours have seen the worst and best,  
And judgement passed for breaking of his rest.   

That Antechrist which in the scriptures pure,  
Is prophesied to come amongst us sure,  
Began to show his cursed face on earth,  
Six hundred years after the glorious birth,  
Of that sweet Babe the Man, God, Christ and King,  
Which came on earth, our souls to Heaven to bring,  
By the Alcoran on his Sabbaoth day:  
Discardeth quite all gaming, sports and play,  
Denounceth judgement on the heads of all;  
Which on that day in those offences fall:  
And brands the Devil an actor in all games,  
Void of Religion yet such sports he blames,  
As good for little but to swear, and cup,  
Fit Instruments to bring new quarrels up.   

The parrable of Christ upon the earth,  
Is of such weight, and glorious heavenly worth, 
Mat▪ 13▪ 3. to 44.   
Which by the sea to multitudes he spoke,  
What living man but at the same must wake,  
To see how God like to a husbandman,  
Works up his ground as well as e'er he can,  
Winnowes the seed, and sifteth every grain,  
In hope at harvest by the same to gain,  
But that the Diuelli'th instant follows hard,  
Whose cursed seed the goodly field hath marred;  
Throws round about as much as in him dares,  
In every place to sow his wicked tares.   

How can we think to scape Gods judgementiust,  
Fond men (alas) that are but earthly dust:  
Weak silly worms when he shall on us lower,  
Then are we but a Winter's withered flower,  
That such conceits within our hearts should lurk,  
To tempt his love, examine thus his work,  
And what himself from heaven above hath taught,  
To slight it over, and hold it idle naught.   

Although most true in Paradise at first,  
His own example hath the Sabaoth nursed,  
The Patriarcks and all the holy men,  
Before the law observed their Restas then:  
And his command to keep us more from sinning,  
Hath a Memento in the first beginning,  
The heathen men even from the worst to best,  
In every age still kept a seemly Rest,  
And all the Saints, Apostles, men, and Martyrs,  
Throughout the world, in all her utmost quarters,  
The general counsels, learned father's grave,  
Those God above elected hath to save,  
The greatest Kings, and noblest personages,  
Throughout the world, in all her former ages,  
The fearful judgements, on that holy Land,  
Which he did plant against all foes to stand,  
The Lord of life, Christ jesus on the earth,  
(Than all before we prise him better worth,)  
Ordained himself our Rest upon this day,  
To come to Church, to hear the Word and pray,  
Yet we contemn and not respect the least,  
But others lead to break the Sabbaths rest.   

Grant heavenly God that ever more my heart,  
May upright be, and from thee never start,  
But that my soul the purest of my thought,  
May be with love, like to an Anvil wrought,  
To make a conscience of thy sacred day,  
To read thy word, within the Church to pray,  
That all my life until my glass be run:  
Be not offensive to thy dearest Son,  
Which sits triumphant fare above the skies,  
Grant that I may behold him with mine eyes,  
And when I shall appear before thy face,  
Then may I find thy mercy goodness, grace,  
And not thy justice for offences past,  
But let thy Love be ever on me cast:  
Even in the day that some men dream of least,  
Place him betwixr us, give my soul her Rest.   

And yet great God, thou hast not so restrained  
Our liberty, but that thou hast ordained, 
1▪ Cor. 10. 31. 1. Pet▪ 4. 11.   
At vacant times from serious meditations,  
To ease ourselves in honest recreations,  
Such that all others to no vice allure,  
Nor in our minds shall add a thought impure:  
But that our sports, our actions, and our plays,  
May praise thy name the Rest of all our days.   

The Puritan, he is again as nice  
As these uncivil in their clamorous vice, 
1. Cor. 6. 12. 2. Cor. 3. 13. 17 Gal. 3. 11. Gal. 2. 14. 16. 17.   
That all the week with superstition fed,  
To good conceits of others scarce are led:  
Adopted sons, elected brethren wise,  
To think all damned beside their sect precise:  
Pure hypocrite under a formal cloak,  
That on God's Rest must draw the jewish yoke,  
And walk to Church as if his steps he told,  
To make no fire but sup his broth up cold:  
And many things which if I here should tell:  
I might too long upon the matter dwell.   

But whither is my Muse transported now,  
Beyond her compass fare away▪ and how  
Comes it to pass that she hath rambled thus  
About the earth these questions to discuss,  
In every Age her sacred holy Rhymes,  
To walk along descending to our times,  
And tax the world of unbeseeming plays,  
To reprehend the abuses of these days.   

And all this while is Adam still alone  
In Paradise, and company hath none,  
Unless sometimes God comes himself, and sallies?  
Before his eyes within those pleasant Allies. 
Simile.   
Then is he glad, his heart doth leap for joy,  
He runs and skips much like a little boy  
That goes to school, all weary at his book,  
Is glad to peek in every bush and look  
(With those his fellows) for some bird or nest,  
Their company his mind still pleaseth best.   

So art thou Adam when thou art all alone,  
Then dost thou grieve, complain, and make thy moan  
Unto the Earth, the Air, the Winds and trees,  
But God above thy present want that sees,  
Comes down himself to give thee all content,  
One of thy ribs out of thy body rend,  
And made a creature of such wondrous fame,  
That heaven and earth have since admired the same.   

To be thy solace in his absence pure,  
And glad thy heart, binding thy love more sure,  
To him at first without thine own direction,  
Gave thee a Phoenix of such rare perfection. 
Simile.   
So sweet an eye, and pretty pleasing look,  
Like Adamant and glittering sugared hook.  
She draws thy love to mind her speeches more,  
Then God himself that gave thee her in store.   

Now art thou complete (Adam) all beside  
May not compare to this thy lovely bride,  
Whose radiant tress in silver rays to wave,  
Before thy face so sweet a choice to have,  
Of so divine and admirable mould,  
More daintier fare than is the purest gold,  
And all the jewels on the earth are borne,  
With those rich treasures which this world adorn.   

Though God at first this earth for thee hath made,  
The creatures all at thy command to trade:  
The Sun and Moon ordained to be thy light,  
The Stars and all unto their utmost might,  
The world itself and Paradise the place,  
Where still his love hath ever given thee grace:  
Yet all of them compared in every part,  
Cannot content and satisfy thy heart,  
Until thy God even with his sacred Rest,  
Had given thee this to make thee perfect blest.   

For presuppose as then thou stoodst before,  
Though all the world thou hadst in ample store,  
Plenty of wealth and gold at thy command,  
And all the creatures in the earth to stand,  
Before thy face subjected to thy will,  
And thou the Lord of Paradise yet still.  
No man besides which dare oppose thy power,  
Hemmed in with Angels in that sacred tower,  
And God himself within that holy place,  
Unmasked his brows to show his glorious face:  
Yet at the best that ever wit can scan,  
Thou lead'st thy life but like a single man.   

But now thy God hath perfect made thy state,  
Linked thee in marriage with so choice a mate,  
Himself the Priest which brought her to thy hand,  
And knit the knot that ever more must stand,  
Ringed her with virtue, glorious beauty chaste,  
Upon thyself and no man else to waste,  
Made her the Type our senses all to rouse,  
Of Christ himself, and of the Church his Spouse:  
And charged the Angels for thy fence and guard,  
Of nothing now, but one thing thou art bard.   

As the two lights within the Firmament, 
simile.   
So hath thy God his glory to thee lent,  
Compozed thy body exquisite and rare,  
That all his works cannot to thee compare,  
Like his own Image, drawn thy shape divine,  
With curious Pencil shadowed forth thy line:  
Within thy Nostrils blown his holy breath,  
Impaled thy head with that inspiring wreath,  
Which binds thy front, and elevates thine eyes,  
To mount his throne above the lofty skies,  
Summons his Angels in their winged order,  
About thy brows to be a sacred border:  
Gives them in charge to honour this his frame,  
All to admire, and wonder at the same.   

But Lucifer that soared above the sky,  
And thought himself to equal God on high,  
Envies thy fortune, and thy glorious birth, 
Wis. 2. 24.   
In being framed but of the basest earth,  
Himself compacted of pesteferous fire,  
Assumes a Snake to execute his ire,  
Winds him within that winding crawling beast,  
And enters first whereas thy strength was least.   

Damned wicked Devil what made thee thus to spite,  
Our grandam Eve and holy Adam's Right,  
What hurt have they or either of them said,  
That thou a trap and secret snare hast laid?  
To bane their youth and undermine their wall,  
To gain a curse upon their woeful fall:  
Thy false proceed in thy actions best,  
How doth the world thy cunning sleights detest?  
Which since that time in many ages past,  
In every corner of the earth are cast,  
How hast thou mallist one that hurt thee not?  
When all thy envy upon job was shot,  
Transforming thus thy cursed scourge and rod, 
job. 16.   
Into the shape just of the child of God.   

At other times thy nimbleness and slight, 
Ephe. 2. 2. Rom. 12. 7. 9   
Above the clouds will be an Angel bright,  
And through the air close in a fiery Wagon,  
Thou'lt sometimes mount as monstrous as a Dragon,  
And when thou list thou any shape canst take,  
Even from an Angel to an ugly Snake.   

The four main wheels on which thy cart doth move,  
Are Ravine, Lust, and want of grace and love,  
The sable horses which thy chariot led,  
Have been at Rome or else near Tiber bred,  
For first Ambition with a lofty pace,  
Then cursed Envy with a pale lean face,  
And Cruelty that tramples best in blood,  
The next is Guile which never yet did good,  
Appostacy that will his faith renounce,  
A stony heart by all of these will bounce,  
The Coachmen which do drive them with their rod,  
Are treason oft and want of fear of God.   

In these and such like shapes thou liest in weight, 
Mat. 4. 1 to the 12.   
To gull the world as with a poisoned bait,  
That being ta'en man's vital life strait baines,  
Infects his blood, and runs through all his veins,  
And as thou art, dost cousin lie and lurch,  
Transformed sometimes into a man i'th' Church, 
Mar. 8. 33.   
Under that holy habit, mask, and guise,  
Thou setst abroach thy cankered venomed lies.   
 

And thus thou camstunto our grandam Eve, 
Gen. 3. 1.   
And as a Devil into her thoughts dost dive,  
Seeming a Serpent crawling on thy breast,  
Much like a simple foul misshapen beast, 
simile.   
Just in the midst of all the garden fair,  
Thou singlest forth, the happy blessed pair.   

And watching Time, when Adam stepped aside,  
Even but a little from his lovely Bride,  
To pluck perhaps a Nut upon the Trees,  
Or get a comb amongst the honey Bees:  
Or some such thing to give his welcome Spouse,  
Even just to Eve thou dost thy body rouse,  
And questions with her, of much idle prattle,  
As women they delight to talk and tattle,  
What they may not, and what it is they eat,  
And what is best, within that pleasing seat,  
What Tree it is that was to them forbidden,  
They dare not eat, for fear they may be chidden.   

Then Eve again, which thought no hurt at all,  
Or once suspect the venom of thy gall,  
As a kind woman full of pleasing love,  
Told thee indeed that God in heaven above,  
Had licensed them to eat of every Tree,  
Beast fish and foul, with all that they can see,  
Within the compass of the spacious air,  
And that were living in the garden fair:  
Only the tree that was before their eyes,  
They might not touch and taste in any wise,  
For in the day that they thereof should eat,  
Their God in Heaven would both their bodies beat,  
Plague them with pain, and punishment extreme,  
Subject to Sickness, Choler, Pangs, and Phlegm,  
Cashier them both out of that lovely place,  
To dye a deathin miserable case.   

But thou again that ever didst device,  
In nothing else but execrable lies,  
Strait told the woman that they need not fear,  
To eat the fruit that pleasant tree did bear:  
For in the day that they should thereof eat,  
The Gods themselves they would indeed defeat.  
Attain much knowledge, fare above man's reach,  
And all the Gods in many things would teach.  
To think of death they need not fear at all,  
For why, their eyes should opened be withal:  
The goodly fruit would breed this wondrous odds,  
Never to die, but ever live as Gods.   

O cursed, damned, execrable Devil,  
Delighting best in that thing which is evil!  
What made thee now thy baneful speech to blow,  
Out of that cankered venomed mouth below?  
Thus to entice by thy allurements working,  
Within so sly an ugly creature lurking.  
That Eve must reach, and in her hand to grapple  
So fair a fatal cursed bewitching Apple:  
And not content herself thereof to eat,  
But reached another as a dainty meat;  
And in her sweet delightful lovely hands,  
Runs to her Lord, where all alone he stands  
Plaining and grieving that he her had missed,  
Takes her in's arms, and both together kissed.   

Then she began (in smiling wanton sort)  
To show that Apple, which before in sport  
She late had taken from that fatal tree,  
The better now to make her eyes to see▪  
And in the hands of her beloved Lord▪  
The same she put, according to her word,  
And mild persuasions, gentle speeches plain,  
In hope much knowledge by the same to gain.  
The gaudy looks and curious pleasing sight,  
She takes the same and so of it doth bite.   

Oh cursed, oh cruel, woeful, fearful deed,  
What hast thou done now Adam to thy seed?  
Baind all thy offspring in thy folly nursed,  
And left them all still to this day accursed.  
What canst thou be even at thy very best,  
But little better than the vilest beast?  
How is thy sight (which thought to pierce the skies)  
Dazzled and dimmed oft times in both thine eyes,  
Before thou canst to fifty years attain,  
Diseases, Rheums, do in the same remain?  
Out of thy head such slimy stuff doth fall,  
That oftentimes thou canst not see at all.  
What hath thy knowledge purchased to thy race?  
Thy nakedness thou feast before thy face.  
The thorny Brambles all thy skin beschratches,  
Now thou canst tell to make a woman breaches.   

How hath the fruit yet to this day amazed  
The wand'ring minds of curious men that gazed,  
So fare above the top of that same tree,  
That still the wood for trees they cannot see?  
In every corner of this spacious ball,  
To name the tree that thus made Adam fall.   

Alas, weakeman; what can it do thee good  
To know the tree that thus hath baind thy blood?  
What can the sight of that all dismal fruit,  
But discontent, and make thee much more bruit?  
Thou feast the world in wand'ring strange opinions,  
And every land within her own dominions,  
Still to this day maintaining errors plain,  
To tell the fruit that thus themselves did bane.   

The jews this day, that Cabalists are called, 
Rich Epit. de Talmud.   
The highest Rabbis in their art installed:  
They still affirm, and for a truth do tell,  
That Adam's sin (when first from God he fell)  
Was nothing but the sweet delicious wine,  
Extracted from the sprawling crawling Vine,  
That all Eues faults and foul offensive scapes,  
Was nothing but the wring forth of grapes:  
Within her hand unto her husband dear,  
That supped it up in stead of wholesome beer,  
The which no sooner had the brains assailed,  
But that his wit and memory both failed:  
His senses drowned with such a sottish feast,  
God comes himself and finds him like a beast.   

The Saracens, and all the Turks this day, 
Bosk▪ ara coeli▪ lib. 5. c. 4. & Alcar●n.   
From Mahomet in every age do say,  
The fruit that Eve and Adam both did eat,  
Was but an Ear of perfect Indian Wheat,  
Which Adam plucked and rubbed it in his hand,  
Smiling on Euah that hard by did stand.  
Two grains whereof he did unto her give,  
Eat two himself to make him ever live.  
And that remained which was but one in all,  
Away he took out of the garden wall,  
And fare in India where he rambled long,  
The desert fields and savage beasts among:  
This as the cause (main object) of his shame,  
He hide i'th'ground, and that brought forth the same.   

The Southern people, and the Indian Bold,  
Do still affirm and oftentimes have told,  
That near to Indus and brave Ganges stream,  
Which yield all sorts of excellent fish and bream:  
Is to be seen a gallant tree this day,  
Under whose shade a thousand men may play.  
The fruit thereof not very pleasant pure,  
But as it is, it will long time endure,  
Much like to Olives both in shape and taste:  
The Indian birds this famous fig doth waste,  
That on this tree doth grow the very meat,  
And only food which Eve and Adam eat.   

The ancient jew and Arabian borne,  
They still do think that Adam well might scorn  
To taste the fruit that grows on Ganges shore,  
The which but late I told you of before,  
And that more like and probable it is:  
If that their judgements do not err amiss,  
The dainty tree that in their country grows,  
And twice a year his pleasant fruit that shows,  
Yielding a fragrant and a lovely sent,  
If but the same be either crushed or rend:  
A Cucumber much like it is in show,  
Of pleasing taste, and sweet delightful hue.  
If with a knife the fruit in two you reave,  
A perfect cross you shall therein perceive:  
The spacious leaves are full a fathom long▪  
In breadth three spans, that I may do it wrong,  
If in this place their error I should blame,  
But much admire and wonder at the same,  
By which the Christians in those parts that dwell,  
Persuaded are, and for a truth it tell:  
That this indeed was that delicious fruit  
Which Eve brought Adam: whose enticing suit,  
The Opal colour and perfumed sent,  
Made him do that which all of us repent.   

And other countries in their roving sits,  
Their lofty, proud, and high aspiring wits,  
Have laboured much upon this point to write,  
To show the fruit that Adam ill did bite.  
As though themselves in Paradise had been,  
And at the first the very tree had seen,  
That bore this cursed ever dismal fruit,  
Which make our souls still to this day to ruite:  
Let them seek still to find the same and moan,  
I'll sit me down and let them all alone.   

And yet the place I must not thus forget,  
Wherein at first our parents both were set:  
Whose glorious worth and ever during fame, 
Gen. 28.   
These rural lines can but obscure the same.  
Oh Paradise, where is thy lovely seat?  
Whilom so famous, wondrous, rich, and neat;  
That all the stately buildings, curious things,  
And goodly prospects, of the greatest kings:  
The pomp and pleasures various decking rare,  
In all the world cannot to thee compare.  
The Lords of these have still in every age,  
As carried in their holy furious rage,  
Adventured forth with admiration, grace,  
But to behold thy ancient sacred face,  
And none of them as yet have ever found,  
Or came in sight of thy most heavenly ground:  
Which fare in Eden in the orient lies,  
Unfit for man to see with sinful eyes.   

Some men there be which are persuaded plain, 
Papists Bellermine: and others.   
That real place doth to this day remain:  
Where holy Enoch, dear Elias pure,  
And john the Saint, shall till doom's day endure,  
In far more pleasures than can be expressed,  
Their bodies living with their souls at rest,  
Transported safe within that sacred wall,  
But in what climate of this spacious Ball,  
The same should be, far in the air have gazed,  
Their learning, knowledge, wits, and all amazed,   

The goodly Region in the Sirian land, 
Esay. 7 3. julian Tzet ad ●uo pag. 100 Hier●com. in Eze. lib. 8   
Is thought the place wherein the same did stand,  
Where rich Damascus at this day is built,  
And Abel's blood by Cain was after spilt:  
The wondrous beauty of whose fruitful ground,  
The great content which some therein have found,  
The sweet increase of that delightful soil,  
Yielding a world with little care and toil,  
The damask Roses, and the fragrant flowers,  
The lovely fields, and pleasant arboured bowers,  
And every thing that in abundance breed,  
Have made some think this was the place indeed,  
Where God at first did on the earth abide,  
With holy Adam and his lovely Bride.   

And some there be that in the Orient waded, 
Barbasa▪   
Which to this day are certainly persuaded,  
The goodly land that fare in India lies,  
Whose rich renown through all the world now flies,  
Under the Line and famous Zeilan called,  
On every side with mighty Neptune walled,  
May be the place where first our Parents stayed,  
The earth itself with all heaven's gifts arrayed.   

Besides the treasures of that pleasant land, 
Linschotten An Corsali▪   
The fruitful regions in the same which stand,  
The goodly rivers and brave mounting hills,  
Sweet temperate air on every side that fills,  
The downy plains with such a fragrant smell,  
As winged fame unto our ears doth tell:  
The spicy Trees, and brave delightful flowers,  
The dainty walks, and guilt aspiring towers,  
And all things else that man can well desire,  
Or discontent of nature may require:  
Long life of days, plenty of cates and cheer,  
All which she pours as on her daling dear,  
Within her lap hath placed a wonder strange,  
For every man which to that place shall range;  
Persuading all that ever saw the same,  
That Eve and Adam forth from thence first came.   

Just the midst of this delicious land,  
Within the centre of the same doth stand  
A lofty mount, whose top doth pierce the skies,  
And round about on every side there lies  
The goodliest plain which ever man beheld▪  
That four foot deep with water fresh is filled,  
And eighteen miles in breadth the same is over, 
Simile.   
Much like the Sea, from Calis strand to Dover.   

Upon the top of this admired hill, 
Maffrus. lib. 5.   
Stands yet a Table fixed firmly still,  
Of solid stone that long time there hath been,  
In which the form of Adam's foot is seen,  
The Moors believing, that that stamp and print  
Was first by him indented on the flint,  
The mount itself Pyramid like is built;  
Upon whose top are stately buildings guilt:  
Plenty of wealth, of rarest jewels store,  
The height thereof full twenty miles and more,  
The people all on every side which dwell,  
Have still affirmed, and for a truth do tell,  
That this indeed was Paradise at first,  
Whose fatal fruit made all of us accursed.   

And to this day hath superstition led, 
Vertoman▪ lib. 3. Chap. 4   
A world of Pilgrims, with blind error fed,  
By Mahomet, that antichristian beast,  
Which Paradise placed in the radiant east,  
Whose fond conceits of this religious place,  
Made some men come three thousand miles apace:  
With great devotion, extreme labour, pain,  
To wash their sins within this miry plain,  
Thinking the water in this valley lies,  
Distilled at first from Eve and Adam's eyes;  
When great with grief, and far surcharged with tears,  
They shed so much as all the ground here bears:  
In woe bewailing of their wilful sins,  
The joyful end where true content gins.   

From sin first washed, then up the hill they climb,  
With labours great, in prayers spend their time,  
And sacrifice to Mavors God their fill,  
Which placed their feet upon this holy hill,  
Though their mistake may be wailed and blamed,  
Yet Adam's hill, the lofty mount is named.   

And that which better may confirm their hope,  
That this indeed under heaven's starry cope,  
Of all the earth may be the likeliest place,  
Where Adam first received his great disgrace:  
Not fare from hence is seen a flaming hill,  
Of every man called Balananus still,  
Which sends forth smoke and hideous brands of fire,  
Threatening the clouds and elements to tyre:  
Much like the sword the tree of life did guard,  
As if with heaven the earth and all it ward.  
This makes them think confirms their fancies more  
Than all the rest I told you of before.   

But if in India on this famous mount,  
Adam at first received his sacred count,  
And so from thence his fruitful spawn at last,  
Upon the face of all the earth are cast.  
What may we think of that renowned hill,  
Whose matchless fame full all the world doth fill:  
Within the midst of Ethiopia framed,  
In Africa and Amara still man'd,  
Where all the Gods may sit them down and dine,  
Just in the East, and underneath the line.  
Pomona, Ceres, Venus, juno, chaste,  
And all the rest their eyes have ever cast  
Upon this place so beautiful and neat,  
Of all the earth to make it still their seat:  
A crystal river down to Nilus purled,  
Wonder of Nature, Glory of this world.   

Dear Amara, thy amorous name doth cite  
My lowly pen thy lofty praise to write.  
If all the world and all therein were mine,  
All were to weak to match themselves with thine.  
In all the earth, and all the rest to lose,  
Thy seat to love instead of all I'd choose.  
There are the Temples covered all with guilt,  
The Palaces, and glorious buildings built,  
A Library so famous rich and round,  
As that the like on earth was never found.  
There are the Muses and the learned Nymphs,  
The royal issue, and the best borne Imppes':  
The seed of kings upon thy body nursed,  
The Preet himself kept long within the first.   

Admired mount, how hast thou in all ages  
Been still renowned for rarest personages,  
Thy treasures rich beyond compare that lies,  
Within thy walls may dazzle both mine eyes.  
Two famous Queens in Majesty and grace,  
With Laurel boughs have much adorned thy face,  
As if themselves with Nature did combine,  
To wreathe thy brows with sacred work divine.   

The first of those was fair Magueda called,  
Brave gallant Queen within thy tower installed: 
1. King. 10. to 11.   
That let the rest and wenther self to see, 
2. Chro. 9 1.   
If Solomon could well compare with thee.  
But when she saw, and glutted had her eye,  
With sight of that which fare and wide did fly:  
Alone she leaves his glorious Temple guilt,  
His stately Court, and all that ere he built.  
His pleasant land, and curious deckings fine,  
As all not worth for to compare with thine.  
And so returns within short space again,  
Within thy walls a royal Queen to reign:  
Gods true Religion in those days professed,  
Away she brought and placed it in thy breast.   

The other Queen that hath adorned thy brows,  
With Laurel crown of sacred Christian bows, 
Act, 8. 27.   
Was Candace great Empress of such fame,  
As Envy still cannot obscure her name,  
When Indica her loyal Eunuch went  
To jewry land upon Ambassage sent:  
Homewards returning on his weary way,  
In pilgrimage strait forced was to stay  
By God himself, which by the faithful bide,  
And Philip sent to be his only guide.   

O matchless Queen, brave pearl of women kind,  
Renowned fame shall thy chaste temples bind,  
Which by thy means as old Records yet saith,  
Converted all unto the Christian faith:  
Baptised thyself within that sacred fount,  
Which stands still firm upon thy holy mount:  
And in that Church whereas the God of love  
Descended down in shape of flaming Dove.   

All sacred hill, how can I choose but wonder,  
To see the God of lightning flames, and thunder,  
That rends the rocks, and all to powder pashes  
The sturdy mounts with sudden sulphery flashes!  
Descend himself upon thy glorious head,  
When all thy Princes were baptised and fed.  
With that true Manna that from heaven was showered,  
When Christ his blood upon thy brows was poured:  
Within that Temple of immortal fame,  
That till doom's days shall ever bear his name,  
And which before his dearest blood was spilt.  
Unto the Son was consecrate and built.   

O Amara which thus hast been beloved,  
Still to this day thy foot was never moved:  
But in the heat of most tempestuous wars,  
God hemmed thee in with strong unconquered bars.  
Protected safe, and kept thy feet upright,  
Against the world, the flesh, and all to fight.   

No marvel then since man at first was humbled  
Upon thy head hath fall'n himself and stumbled,  
In admiration of thy gifts divine,  
When Nature, Arts the Gods and all combine,  
To cull thee out in fare abundant measure;  
And on thy brows to shower their dearest treasure.  
If in thy walls as some this day have thought,  
Adam and Eve by God himself were brought,  
And placed secure in pleasures wondrous well,  
Till from thy top for wilful sin they fell.   

Some men again more fare than these are wide,  
Whose large conceits in Eden cannot bide:  
Fond, frantic men the sacred truth to reach,  
And Paradise o'er all the world to stretch. 
Wolfangus. Wissenburg. Soropius. Vadianus.   
The land of Eden of that spacious worth,  
To think it went quite over all the earth.  
The lofty walls which hemmed the same in round,  
To be the Spheres that in their utmost bound.  
On every side about the world do pass,  
And seem to us much like a wall of Brass.  
The flaming Sword that guards the tree of life  
From sinful Adam and his likorish wife,  
Have presupposd in all the world alone,  
To be the hot and horrid burning Zone,  
That man's exile by cursed envious fate,  
Was nothing but the changing of his state;  
When at the first from God above he fell,  
To be entombed within the grave and hell.   

In ancient times when people were besotted, 
Patricius van 10, lib. 20.   
Not in that vice which some of us us call potted,  
But in blind error of the heavenly light,  
Till God by Christ enlightened had their sight,  
Persuaded were that Paradise at first,  
In which old Eve and Adam both were nursed,  
A real place upon this earth was set,  
Until for sin the world itself was wet:  
With such a shower on every side and round,  
That all therein were quite consumed and drowned.   

Then Paradise his own peculiar seat, 
Gen. 7. 1. To Thelaste.   
A pleasant place, delightful, sweet, and neat,  
For fear the flood which o'er the earth did flow,  
When Noah's Ark did on the water's row,  
Should ruinated the goodly sacred place,  
And bring the walls just in the self same ease,  
That Henoch City in those days was found,  
When all the world, and all therein was drowned:  
Transported it within a instant quite,  
Far from the earth, and reach of this our sight,  
And placed the same even in a moment soon,  
Within the circle of the lofty Moon.   

And some there be as far as Rome have rambled, 
The Manichees origen. Rom. familestes ad Renegaoes'.   
Which back again, for want of means have ambled,  
Like ugly Bat the monster of his kind,  
That vice can see, but yet to goodness blind;  
Happy were we when first they ran from hence,  
Casting a mist upon the Scriptures sense,  
To think the place where Adam first did fall,  
Was but a tale, and no such place at all,  
That holy Moses in his sacred work,  
Hath little true but only fictions lurk.   

Damned wicked man, the child of unbelief, 
Esa. 33. 15, 16, 17.   
The Word distrust, and thus to play the thief,  
God's Church to rob, his chosen flock to fleece,  
The truth to blur, and here to pick a piece;  
Wring the same▪ or as we use to squeeze,  
A Sponge with water or such kind of Leese: 
Simile.   
The Scriptures true, and heavenly Hebrew Story,  
Converting all into an allegory.   

Thou soarest high, here is thy lofty flight, 
Gen. 2. 8. 2. King▪ 19 12▪   
False hearted Rome, which canst not see the light  
That shineth clear, within the Scripture lies,  
The truth itself hath bleared both thine eyes:  
Like to the Bird thou beareth in thy crest,  
That seldom times upon the earth can rest,  
But mounts aloft with proud aspiring wings. 
Simile. The Eagle.   
Till base desires down to the ground him brings,  
As if the light he could no more endure,  
But falls and stoops unto a carrion lure.   

The Sodomites which in the days of Lot,  
About the walls where groping very hot, 
Gen. 19 11.   
To find the Angels that his house possessed,  
Till fearful blindness stayed their course to rest,  
Were beaten down with horrid sulphery smoke,  
That instantly their cursed breath did choke:  
Transformed their towns in less than half an hour,  
When God but once upon their vice did lower;  
With fire and brimstone strange unwonted thunder,  
Of all the world the sad and fearful wonder,  
Amazing all which at this day behold it:  
To see how God hath up to nothing rolled it.  
Made it a puddle and infectious sink,  
Not fir for man once of her source to drink.   

Even so thy wilful cursed unbelief,  
Profane abusing of the scriptures chief,  
Thy Sabaoth breaking, covetousness and pride,  
With all the sins within the world beside,  
Have made thee blind to find that lovely place,  
Where Adam first was in his greatest grace:  
About the walls thou canst not find the door,  
To come withinland view the plenteous store;  
Thy brains confuzed as in a maze are led,  
Dark unbelief thy cloudy sense hath fed,  
The heavenly light thou canst not well discern,  
From Sodom first to lose thyself dost learn,  
In all the earth that ever eye did see,  
How well these men we may compare to thee.   

But stay; whilst they about the world are seeking, 
Paradise described.   
To find the Garden Adam had in keeping,  
My sacred Muse with lofty nimble flight,  
On Paradise the place itself doth light:  
From Rome transported tyrant of the west:  
To Nimrods' Tower within the orient east,  
Near Eden placed within Assiria land,  
On Euphrates and Tigris goodly strand,  
By Babylon first Empress of the earth,  
Mother of Arts most glorious in her birth,  
Whose towering fame as Monarch of the world,  
Where golden floods in silver streams have purld;  
My senses wrapped in admirations wonder,  
To think how she hath all the world brought under,  
Making her seat the glory of her time, 
Franciscus. junius. Curtius. Plinui. Solinus.   
Brave star of Fortune, subject of my Rhyme.   

Hear was the seat the likeliest place indeed,  
Where Even at first did of the Apple feed,  
By learned judgement of those worthy men,  
Whose high desert, fame's lofty quill doth pen,  
Which far and near about the world have ventured,  
And but at last within her walls have entered.   

O Paradise, that first our Parents stayed, 
Ptol Geor lib 65. chap. 20 strabo lib. 16   
Until such time Gods will they disobeyed;  
How far my pen doth of thy worth come under,  
Mirror of earth, of all the world the wonder.  
Where sacred Thetis from her lovely lap,  
Hath powered her treasures, much enriched thy hap,  
Which Euphrates and Tigris hath combined,  
Their Source divided in four parts, to wind  
About thy borders, as heaven's dearest work,  
Within thy bowels glide along and lurk;  
Venting such jewels as were never found,  
A welcome tribute to thy holy ground.   

Nature herself hath much impald thy head, 
plin. lib. 2 Chap. 1●6   
And wreathed thy brows as fortune hath her led,  
With such a ridge of rocky mountains small,  
To hem thee in as with a sacred wall,  
Upon the top toward the east still there stands,  
A smoky hill which sends forth fiery brands,  
Gfburning oil, from hell's infernal deep,  
Much like the sword the tree of life did keep.   

Divinest land the sun hath ever seen,  
How fortunate thrice happy hast thou been,  
To have that God which framed the world and all,  
Frequent thy walks before thy fearful fall:  
Yet as thou art and as thou dost remain,  
The total earth on on every side dost stain:  
Where can a man in all this world below,  
Find Bdelium that pleasant tree to grow,  
Whose fragrant branches, sweet delightful fruit,  
And lofty height hath made my senses mute,  
The Onyx stone and other things to bide,  
In all the earth scarce in one place beside.   

How is thy ground exceeding rich and fair▪  
A region seasoned with a temperate air,  
Thy channels crawling full of golden Ore,  
The fruitful'st soil that e'er the earth yet bore:  
Neptune himself with four great rivers greeing,  
To deck the bosom which gave Adam being,  
Upon thy temples all their treasures poured,  
And all their wealth at once upon thee showered.  
After the flood when all the world was killed,  
In Noah's time there man began to build,  
When having rambled in the sacred keel,  
About the world, on every side did feel  
Thy fragrant scent so pleasing rich and neat,  
Of all the earth, to make thy Throne their seat.   

Hear was religion planted in her prime,  
The golden age and infancy of time,  
When man's worst actions like the Turtle Dove,  
In all the world was little else but love:  
Dear Paradise, how famous was thy name?  
When God himself erected first thy frame,  
Endued thy Land with such things in it set,  
As time for ever never can forget.   

The fabling Praises of Elysium fields,  
The Turks, Utopia nothing to it yields,  
The Paradise of Rome's fantastic brain,  
Is but a jest a little wealth to gain,  
And Aladeules with his place of pleasure,  
Comes far behind and still is short of measure,  
Worth honour, grace, when brought into compar●  
With this so rich and glorious garden rare.  
The persian fancies of their heavenly land,  
In sight of this not able is to stand,  
The world itself and all that is therein,  
I could forsake that very place to win,  
And all the greatest Kingdoms ever found,  
But dung and trash to that most holy ground.   

The lofty walls were all of lasper built,  
Lined thick with gold, and covered rich with gui  
Like a quadrangle seated on a hill,  
With twelve brave gates the curious eye to fill,  
The sacred lustre as the glistering Zone,  
And every gate framed of a several stone:  
On stately columes reared by that hand,  
Which graved, the world and all that in it stand;  
The Chalsedony, and the jacinth pure,  
The Emerald green, which ever will endure,  
The Sardonix, and purple Amethyst,  
The Azurd burnished Saphire is not missed,  
The chrysolite, most glorious to behold,  
And Tophaze stone, which shines as beaten gold,  
The Chrisophrasus of admired worth,  
The Sardius, Berill seldom found on earth,  
The doors thereof of silvered Pearl most white,  
Do show that none by wrong oppression might  
Be crossed, by cunning, wring, wresting guile,  
By wicked plodding in all actions vile,  
By foul offences like base envy fast,  
Can pass the doors but those are pure and chaste.   

That sweet Disciple which the Gospel wrote, 
Reu. 21. 10. to ihe 6. verse of the 22. chap.   
And lent at supper, (when Christ lesus sat)  
Upon the bosom of his Lord and King,  
He from the heavens this Paradise did bring,  
Perused the walls, and viewed the same within,  
Described it largely all our loves to win.  
The crystal river with the Tree of Life,  
God's dearest lamb, and sacred Spouse his wife,  
The various fruits that in the garden grows,  
And all things else which in abundance flows:  
Hath rapt my sense to think how God at first,  
Framed all for Adam and his offspring cursed.   

To come within how can we but admire,  
Why should our minds to view the same a spire,  
It being sacred type of heaven itself,  
Our sinful thoughts worse than the vilest pelf,  
That all divine by God himself first wrought,  
Above the Clouds, and then by Angels brought, 
Simile.   
Like to an Infant in his timely birth,  
Into the Church, and placed upon this earth:  
The midwife there which did attend the same,  
Was dear Urania that brave noble Dame,  
Whose glorious worth my weakness can't rehearse,  
Queen of the Muses, Sovereign of my verse.   

But yet Urania be not bold to pry,  
Into the secrets of this treasury,  
Locked up from us and bard from all to enter,  
Where none but thee may without danger venture,  
Lest thy great God thou tracest in thy step,  
Should from the Heavens down on a sudden leap,  
As if from sleep he had been roused and waked,  
And find thyself like Eve and Adam naked.   

Adam, what made thee fearfully to hide?  
Entangled in the allurement of thy bride,  
Thyself from God, who by his sacred voice,  
Amongst the Trees within the garden choice;  
Repaired now as oftentimes before,  
To recreate and view the various store,  
Even in the cool and dawning of the day,  
The winds before him ushering of his way,  
Thinking to find as heretofore he found,  
Thine innocency upright, perfect, sound;  
But contrary, thou lurkest in a bush,  
Until thy God did near unto thee rush,  
And starting of thee as thou than wast loath,  
He takes thy spouse and thee all naked both.   

Adam (quoth God) why dost thou hide thy face?  
What is the cause thou art so poor and base?  
That thou shouldst thus with simple shifts begin,  
Ashamed of me to cover now thy skin,  
How hast thou known in less than half an hour,  
To lurk so close within this secret bower,  
And sew those leaves to patch them so together,  
To hide thy shame and keep thee from the weather?  
The Tree of Knowledge in this pleasant seat,  
I do believe that thou thereof didst eat,  
Which▪ I commanded on deaths dismal pain,  
Thou shouldst not touch the juice thereof to gain,  
Hast thou now eat of that delicious fruit.  
I am afraid thy offspring all will rue it.   

O heavenly God (than Adam answered straight) 
Gen▪ 3. 12.   
I was entrapped with such a pleasing bait,  
That made my reason, sense, and all to yield;  
My strength but weak within so strong a field:  
For why, the woman which thou gavest me,  
A help most meet and comfort sweet to be.  
She of that tree did pluck but one in all,  
And brought it to me as a sacred ball:  
The sight whereof by her persuasion moved,  
Whom more than gold and all the world I loved.  
Strait in my arms began for to embrace,  
And she entreating with her smiling face,  
Gave me that Apple in her lovely hand,  
Which makes me thus before thy sight to stand,  
All naked, poor, lamenting of my fall,  
As loath to speak when thou at first didst call.  
She, she it was which gave me of that meat,  
By her enticements only I did eat.  
If I have broke thy holy heavenly laws,  
Blame her (not me) for being first the cause?   

Then God (again) unto the woman said,  
Why hast thou thus most treacherously betrayed  
Thy loving husband and thy darling dear,  
Whom to displease thou oughtest in conscience fear?  
He is thy head, thy Sovereign, Lord, and King,  
Why dost thou thus his feet in bondage bring,  
Ensnaring him, thyself and Issue all,  
In woeful danger of your souls to fall?   

Sweet God (quoth she) a foul misshapen beast,  
The ugly Serpent crawling on his breast,  
When but a little that I stepped a side,  
From my dear husbands best beloved side:  
A goodly fruit presented to my view,  
That in the midst of all the garden grew:  
Persuaded much the only taste of it,  
Would fare increase my simple woman's wit:  
The touch thereof would sight and knowledge give,  
Never to die, but still as Gods to live▪   

By which enticements snared in his trap,  
He shaked the tree, and up I held my lap:  
That Plum alone which fell into the same,  
I kept it safe, and to my husband came.  
But yet before his presence well I saw,  
Not thinking once of thine eternal Law.  
By fresh allurement of that Snaky wit,  
I viewed the same, and so of it did bite.  
The which when as that I the deed had done,  
Away he crawls, and leaves me all alone:  
Mine eyes i'th'instant woefully did see  
The murrain Elf had first beguiled me.   

Like to a Mouse not fare off from her muse,  
So is a woman sild without exscuse. 
Simile▪   
When on a sudden God himself descends,  
The winged clouds on every side he rends:  
All foggy mists of darksome errors quite,  
He doth disperse and brings the Truth to light.  
That all the world his Wisdom may admire,  
To see how soon he finds the devil a liar.   

justice herself with grim and frowning eyes, 
justitiae descriptio.   
Descendeth down beneath the lofty skies:  
That ever lours and holdeth in her hand  
A pair of Scales to weigh both sea and land▪  
The secret actions infinite to name,  
Which ever yet were hatched upon the same.   

But at her back there oftentimes attends, 
Misericordiae discriptio▪   
A noble Dame to many a one that bends:  
Of smiling cheer and sweet delightful face,  
Borne of the Muses in their royal Race.  
Whose silver tresses as heavens glorious Queen,  
The goodliest creature ever eye hath seen:  
In all her robes she sits at God's right hand,  
Descends to some, but by his side doth stand.  
In secret corners of the heart she lurks,  
God's Mercies great are fare beyond his Works:  
In heaven and earth, and all that in them are,  
None may come near, much less to her compare.   

Alone she sits, and sendeth justice down  
To God himself, that in a sacred frown  
Summons the Serpent to appear in place,  
Whose accusation laid before his face,  
Without demur and wresting of the Law,  
His heinous crime before his eyes he saw,  
And standeth mute without exscuse at all,  
When God above to judgement once doth fall.   

Accursed devil, thrice damned is all thy race,  
Thy wicked plots and secret actions base: 
Gen. 3. 14.   
What made thee wind within this winding Snake,  
The shape of Serpent in thy mind to take?  
Why hast thou sat on Adam's sacred skirt,  
To harm a man which never did thee hurt:  
And wrong a woman with mischievous guile,  
By envious plodding in a deed so vile?   

Can it not serve that first thou goest about  
To scale my throne, from heaven to shut me out?  
But this my work▪ which more I did admire  
Then all the Angels framed of burnished fire:  
The heavenly lights and all that ever were,  
Within the compass of the spacious air.  
The man himself in whom I took delight;  
Placed him in Eden by my powerful might.  
That thou shouldst thus with all the devils combine,  
In spite to me his person undermine.  
To creep to Eve as if she were thy Ant,  
And fawn on others like a Puritan.  
What hast thou got for all thy villainy?  
A beast thou livest, worse than a beast thou'lt dye.   

And yet not die, for everduring pain,  
(For this thy treason) shalt be sure to gain.  
The fire of my just wrath will make thee gurne,  
As burning Brass thy bowels scorched shall burn. 
Simile.   
The worm of Conscience shall torment thee ever,  
And like a Vulture▪ feed upon thy Liver. 
Simile▪   
That still in death, a horrid fearful smart,  
Shalt dying live, to overloade thy heart.  
Grind all to powder thy damned wicked rout,  
With coals of fire, which never shall go out.   

Thy tongue shall be a sure and certain token,  
How false to woman thy cursed mouth hath spoken;  
For in the same a forked sting shall be,  
That after times may still thy envy see:  
And all her race shall thee torment and vex,  
And thou again shalt scare her fearful Sex,  
Lurking in dens and secret holes obscure,  
To trap the just with baneful breath impure.   

Thy hide bepainted with a peckled varnish,  
Thy venomed carcase in thy pride shall barnish:  
An ugly creature shalt thou be uncouth,  
Thy teeth all black within thy lying mouth.  
Out of that hollow irksome vast abyss,  
Upon thy belly shalt thou crawl and hisse.  
Dust shalt thou eat, and cankered be thy skin,  
Thy body swollen with poison all within.  
Thy viperous seed in ugly envy borne,  
To all the world shall be the hateful scorn.  
In every path, and out of every hedge,  
Their poison fell in humane flesh shall wedge:  
That when they time and place to purpose feel,  
Their venomed tongue shall bite them by the heel.  
Thus till the earth shall mould away and fall,  
Where men least think there shall they lie and crawl.   

The Woman's seed in just revenge again,  
Thy head shall break, and cursed actions bane,  
When that sweet Babe shall to the world be borne,  
That heaven and earth with glory shall adorn.  
Then shall he trample on thy cursed hide,  
And on the clouds▪ with winged fame shall ride.  
Before his face shall rattling cracks of thunder,  
Amaze thy sense, and reasons false bring under.  
To see when he shall on the earth descend,  
How thou in chains and fetters shalt be penned:  
Tormented in those pains no tongue can tell,  
Scorched all to cinders with dam'd devils in hell.  
Cursed is thy life, thrice cursed is thy race,  
Void of all goodness, mercy, love, and grace:  
Here is thy doom upon thy Snaky head▪  
That others with thee hast to sin mislead.   

Scarce these last words were spoke by God himself,  
Of his sad judgement 'gainst this cursed Elf:  
And but beginning of Eve's dismal speech,  
When suddenly she 'gan to cry and screech:  
When in the instant from the lofty skies, 
Miscricordia.   
Mercy comes down and into Eden hies;  
Prostrated falls upon her bended knees,  
But God himself his daughter dear that sees,  
With weeping eyes before his face to crave,  
That but on Eve he would compassion have:  
Began to stay his mind, to alter clean,  
And to the woman now began to lean:  
But that hard by stood justice in the place,  
And urged him much to prosecute the case:  
When all the reason Mercy well could render,  
Was that herself was of the female gender.   

Whilst both of these each other do oppose, 
justitia & Misericordia.   
Loath each of them their humble suit to lose:  
Contending still as advocates at Bar,  
Or combatants in furious fearful War:  
And altogether judgement speedy fears, 
Natura.   
God's eldest daughter in the place appears.   

Nature divine, like to Aurora faced,  
A noble Lady, beautiful and chaste: 
Simile. Naturae descriptio.   
Brave famous Queen, a royal person borne,  
Whom heaven and earth and all therein adorn.  
Her hair disheveled, trailing to the ground,  
And in the same the rarest secrets bound,  
Without all art in curious manner curled,  
And in her hand the Globe of all the world:  
Ten thousand colours in her gown are seen,  
Wrought by herself upon a ground of green.   

In all her jewels of admired gain,  
With four brave Ladies bearing up her train: 
The Elements   
She sober enters in that sacred place,  
And down she falls before the Almighty's face.   

Father, said she, dear Father here behold, 
Oratio.   
Give me but leave to be a little bold,  
Finding my sister's jarring never cease,  
To reconcile and set them both at Peace:  
A holy work which thou hast ever loved,  
Myself thereto by charity first moved.  
One of my dear affected sisters sweet,  
That from this place to heaven did lately fleet,  
Brought me such news when at the first we met,  
Till all dissolve I never shall forget.   

And like it is this massy weighty ball  
Which hangs so even just in the midst of all:  
Would soon return to what it was at first,  
If all thereon for this one fault were cursed.   

Behold this Fabric here within my hand,  
The mighty Globe of all the world doth stand:  
What will become of all thy Noble works,  
This goodly frame, and all that ever lurks  
Within the compass of the heaven and earth,  
If now destroyed within their prime and birth,  
All will consume and utterly decay,  
If justice once thy Mercy oversway.   

justice I know doth urge thy sacred word,  
Which from the Truth as yet hath never stirred:  
Thy penalty on Adam and his Race,  
For foul offending in this holy place.   

The execution of thy Law divine,  
In the least tittle of each Statute line:  
Which hath ordained that in that dismal day,  
In which the woman did the devil obey;  
To taste the fruit and suck it with her breath,  
That both of them should die a fearful death.   

Mercy again as being full of Love,  
Pity, compassion from thy throne above  
Presents herself before thy sacred face,  
Imploring Goodness, Majesty, and Grace:  
To be a means to mediate a peace,  
And that for once all further judgement cease,  
When by the Envy of a viperous tongue,  
Hatched by the devil this cursed malice sprung:  
And their offence to take it at the worst,  
By justice weighed will yet be found the first.   

O then dear Father let me speak my mind,  
Be lust and Loving, Merciful and Kind:  
Punish all sin according to thy word,  
The Truth preserve, that none at justice gird:  
But yet let Mercy at thy right hand sit,  
Thy noble works in sacred holy writ,  
Shall then be blazed unto their utmost worth,  
And thou be known a God upon this earth.  
Then shall large volumes with thy praises swell.  
Thy Mercy drop to infant souls in hell,  
Which never have offended much thy mind,  
But borne in sin and never known unkind,  
Whose cursed parents crossed thy heavenly will,  
The sperm of those that live in error still.   

Thy sentence passed cannot again be called,  
And truth must stand before thy face installed,  
That very day according to thy word,  
In which the tree of Knowledge first was stirred,  
By Eve and Adam's wilful treachery,  
Both of them then a cruel death should dye:  
If mercy now had not come down in haste,  
And at thy feet her humble suit had cast;  
Before this time that judgement had been given,  
Both of their lives might well have been beriven.   

O then what would become of all this frame,  
And all thereon, too infinite to name,  
The famous actions by thy spirit nursed,  
All must return to what it was at first.  
One day with thee is as a thousand years,  
The hour of death Incertain full of fears.  
First save the seed and let them live in awe,  
Then die a death for breaking of thy Law;  
So is thy word confirmed, my sister's pleased,  
The world remain and judgement somewhat eased,  
Then shall thy creatures in all ages stand,  
The work divine of thy all powerful hand,  
And every thing that on the earth is bred,  
Shall show thy glory both alive and dead:  
That all may stand to all eternity,  
Thy only Son offers himself to dye.   

But silenced once by God's commanding Word,  
The jarring sisters never after stirred,  
But satisfied, and resting well content,  
They spent the time in hapless merriment,  
And God above to judgement doth proceed,  
With fearful Evah and her timorous seed,  
Her naked husband that himself excuzed,  
And said his wife his love had much abused.   

O silly woman to be thus beguiled, 
God's judgement on Euah.   
In sorrow now that shalt bring forth thy child,  
A hard conception with an extreme pain,  
Sick loathsome vomits at my hands shall gain,  
Thy husband now shall overrule thee still,  
Thy fond desires be subject to his will:  
A constant love shall▪ hardly once be found,  
Within the breast of any on this ground,  
And from this day the most of all unkind,  
Fickle, uncertain as the wavering wind;  
Tossed too and fro with every blast that blows,  
Entangled strait with gaudy curious shows,  
That most of you your husbands will forsake,  
A golden bribe or liquorish thing to take.   

Heaven's glorious judge to Adam also said, 
God's judgement on Adam   
Because thy wife thou hast an I doll made,  
To trace her steps which lead to deadly sin,  
Thou dost but now to feel thy woe begin,  
Cursed is the earth, and cursed is for thy sake,  
The fruit thereof accursed will I make;  
In great vexation, extreme labour pain,  
Toil, sweat and dust, thou shalt much sorrow gain,  
The earth henceforth shall now no more endure,  
Unless thou till, and much her sides manure,  
And when thou thinkest thy barns top full to fill,  
Thy Vintage stored with plenty at thy will,  
In monstrous Mows to pile a wondrous heap,  
Then thistles, thorns instead thereof thou'lt reap,  
Much like the beast which on his belly feeds,  
So shalt thou live by herbs and garden seeds,  
Till thou return unto the earth again,  
And that therein thy limbs all cold be lain,  
This is the mother that thy body nursed,  
Out from the same thou taken waist at first,  
Sorrow and sickness shall thy body burn,  
For dust thou art, to dust thou shalt return.   

O heavenly God, here is a judgement past,  
Throughout this world eternally to last,  
No writ of error can the same revoke,  
When as the words by thine own mouth are spoke:  
Hear is a sentence with a sacred seal,  
No inhibition can thy law repeal,  
Nor all the tricks, devices subtle shifts,  
Of greedy Lawyers with their bribes and gifts,  
Can once dissolve a knot so surely knit,  
With all their brains and cunning peevish wit▪  
But that the same for evermore must stand,  
A just decree by heaven's divinest hand,  
Drawn up above in Eden ratified,  
With all the Angels in the world beside,  
And all the powers of firmament and all,  
To this decree consented at thy call;  
Heavens dearest Babe whose fame shall perish never,  
Hath with his blood confirmed the same for ever.   

The Register that up this order drew, 
Tempus & veritas ear▪ descriptio.   
Was Time itself clad all in Azure blue,  
Winged like an Angel, shadowed with a veil,  
And Truth his Daughter bearing up his trail,  
Nobly attended with a Lady kind,  
More quick and nimble than the swift foot hind.  
Within his mouth a lofty Trump doth stand,  
And a sharp sith or sickle in his hand.  
A glass of sand continually that runs,  
Within his way no living thing he shuns,  
Locked long before his head, behind all bald,  
To show what's past can never be recalled.   

O Time, preserver of all ages past,  
How are men's eyes on all thy actions cast,  
Thou shouldst be true and constant in thy course,  
Why should base gold thy mind to ill enforce,  
Allure thy sense and reasons temporize,  
Altar an order daub up both thine eyes,  
When God the King and all the Lords decree,  
A judgement just to all eternity,  
In open court pronounce the same at large,  
Commit it safe to thy sole care and charge;  
Yet for a bribe within thy griping fist,  
Thou'lt add, subtract and set down what thou list.   

Princes and peers, grave judges of the Land,  
Let ever justice in your actions stand,  
Look well to time, for time itself doth call,  
It may deceive and go beyond you all:  
Dispatch the poor▪ and hear the widow's cause,  
Let not the Orphan perish by your laws,  
The Innocent is oftentimes undone,  
But in defending of a suit begun:  
By mighty foes that over dares his youth,  
And lies suggest instead of naked truth,  
Then is he posted too and froin hast,  
His life, lands, living, all he hath to waste:  
And never left so long as worth a groat,  
His weary limbs oft times in prison rot,  
All by delays when golden angels hover,  
Within the fist of every servile lover,  
That but attends and comes before your face,  
By bribing lives unto your foul disgrace,  
O to be swayed with every glistering fee:  
This is injustice in the worst degree.   

But you are wise, to you a word is more,  
Then all the works to this day kept in store,  
Can be to those that little understand,  
And more respect, some feeling in their hand.  
Trace that great God in all your actions out,  
Let him be still to bring the day about:  
Your only star sole level and your square,  
The several frames of all your works to rear,  
But you are men your memories may fail,  
Let not your servants set your worth to sail;  
justice and Mercy, Time and all for gold,  
'Gainst Natures laws outright are bought and sold,  
And why should man thus to base bribing fall,  
There is a God which takes account of all?  
And oftentimes what by the devil is got,  
Under his feet he treads it till it rot.   

And yet what reason have we to complain,  
When England thou hast got the richest gain, 
jacobus Rex▪   
The dearest treasure and the welcomest fee,  
That ever any land attained but thee,  
A royal King derived from the race,  
Of Eden's Monarch in her greatest grace,  
Within whose face true Majesty doth shine,  
justice and Mercy in his brows combine,  
His temples chaste with laurel boughs are wreathed,  
The sacred Muses in his breast have breathed,  
Upon his head three famous crowns do stand,  
God's dearest book is ever in his hand.   

Whose Angels still his person hath protected,  
And all his daughters him for King elected,  
Too weak (alas) I must myself confess,  
O that my Muse could but his worth express,  
Though in this place I do but give a glance,  
Of that which after in my work may chance,  
His fame renown shall ever flourish green,  
Sire to a Prince, and father to a Queen.   

So shall the fame of his illustrious son, 
Carolus Princeps.   
Mount up the air, in Phoebus' chariot run,  
About the earth on every side shall sound,  
As far as Eden and the Indian ground,  
And still his Glory all the world shall pass,  
And be engraven in monuments of brass,  
That Time for ever shall his worth adorn,  
The greatest prince that ever yet was borne.   

Brave Prince of peace from heaven itself descended,  
How hath this land been by thy birth befriended,  
To have a spirit of such noble wit,  
hereafter sway within her lap to sit,  
When England thou mayst joy, delight and court thee,  
Under his wings mayst sit thee down and sport thee,  
Solace thy labours with a glad content,  
And give God thankes that him to thee hath lent:  
Whilst other lands have not so rich a pawn,  
About succeession out their sword is drawn,  
Nothing but blood, confusion, shrieks and scars,  
As late was seen within thy civil wars.   

Hear could I stay and sit me down and pause, 
Nobilitas.   
And view thy court and all thy reverend laws,  
Admiring all the nobles of thy Lands,  
How with devotion all their service stands,  
Prove ever pressed to reattend thy will,  
To run and go as thou command'st them still,  
Whose worth and merit, every one in order,  
Should all be ranked within this sacred border:  
But that to Adam I must post apace,  
And tell what fell upon his fowl disgrace,  
Mean while when Time shall work unto my mind,  
Then shall my Muse their several virtues find.   

Adam no sooner had his judgement past,  
But God his Mercy on his darlings cast,  
As one that never both of them forsakes,  
For one sole fault but mild compassion takes,  
Pities their want, and wails their fowl abuse,  
Tenders their good admits a weak excuse:  
Like to a father of a loving heart, 
Simile.   
Loath with his son and daughter both to part,  
Though much provoked by their folly mere,  
Still  them well & makes them of't good cheer:  
So God above whose love doth fare surpass,  
The greatest love as yet that ever was,  
For all their faults and fowl enormous sins,  
Yet  them warm, in well furred coats of skins. 
Gen. 3. 2. 1.    

And thus attired as in a mantle curled, 
Simile:   
From Eden now they come into this world,  
For justice urged unto their sinful face,  
They might not stay within that sacred place,  
For fear that Adam and his longing wife,  
Should take and eat but of the tree of Life,  
And so for ever both of them should live,  
To think the fruit did life unto them give:  
Like to a man when publicly detected, 
Simile.   
But for one fault is still of more suspected.   

O Holy God, here is a mystery,  
The Tree of life what it doth signify,  
But that dear Lamb out of whose bleeding heart,  
Our souls were held much to his pain and smart.  
The time indeed when Eve the fruit did gripe,  
The tree of Life was not then fully ripe,  
But long time after in his glorious birth,  
Just in the midst and centre of the earth,  
It flowrisht green on sacred Zion sat,  
Till 'twas cut down by cursed envious fate.   

Now winged Time God's speedy messenger, 
Tempus.   
A nimble hasty posting passenger,  
That hard by stood recording what was past,  
Up to the skies his eyes i'th' instant cast,  
Spied Eve and Adam standing in the place,  
Thus clothed both before the almighty's face:  
When but commission from that sacred lip,  
He had obtained, let's no advantage slip,  
But mild and gently takes them by the hand,  
Shows them the gate that to the east doth stand,  
Leads them along lamenting of their fall,  
For all their cries, sets them without the wall;  
Bars up the door with such an iron lever,  
As none alive that once can enter ever.   

(Alas poor Adam) now thou feelest thy hurt,  
The air all cold doth make thy body smart,  
Weakness thy limbs, benumbeth much thy strength,  
And makes thee glad to fall to work at length.  
Thy wand'ring first, and losing of thy wife,  
Thy penance then and toiling weary life,  
With all the rest that did to thee befall,  
Before thy sad and sacred funeral:  
Within this place I must forbear to tell,  
For fear my book would to a volume swell,  
And prove more big than any of the rest,  
Like one great dish 'mongst many at a feast.   

And yet a word (though Time again do call)  
To answer that which in my way doth fall:  
Amongst some men there is a question made,  
Of those that love before their time to wade,  
How long it was in innocency first.  
That Adam lived before he grew accursed,  
How many weeks, years, months, or count of days  
Were passed before Eve fell to foolish gayes:  
And how long after that they were detected,  
They stayed in Eden all with sin infected.   

Some men there be which are of this opinion,  
Even in our days within our own Dominion:  
That in the day when Adam was created,  
The diuelli'th instant strait his fortune hated:  
Envied his glory, sought his ruin more,  
As in my work I told you of before.  
'tis very like that when Aurora blushed,  
The morning clear, and all were calm and hushed:  
That Adam then and his sweet spouse were made,  
But ere that Titan fare from home did wade,  
In western Seas his weary coursers ducked,  
And heavens wide curtain o'er the earth was plucked.  
It may be true that he might fall again,  
And be expulsed out of that sacred plain:  
For some there be that heretofore did say,  
Man never stayed in honour yet a day.   

Others there be that cannot think it true,  
Their punishment did instantly ensue:  
But that long time they lived in the place,  
Enjoying favour, countenance and grace.  
That God himself did oftentimes descend  
To Eden land, like to a loving friend.  
After the man had lived long alone,  
He framed the woman of his left side bone:  
Brought them together, as before you heard,  
Whose foul offence the godly Garden marred.   

O heavenly God why should we here below  
Trouble ourselves thy secrets past to know:  
When thy dread word which thou from heaven hast sent,  
The world and all can give us scarce content,  
But still we strive, and at thy secrets aim,  
Till thou our Reason in our Sense dost maim.  
Here is the glory of th'eternal Crown,  
Man's earthly wisdom utterly thrown down:  
Though in God's book we love to pry and peek,  
In things divine sometimes we are to seek.   

But Time again to God himself retiring, 
Tempus.   
Where all his daughters were with joy admiring,  
To see the devil damned to the lowest hell,  
Adam expulsed, themselves contented well▪  
After a gentle kind respectful awe,  
Before his eyes that all men's actions saw,  
Takes sacred justice by her reverend hand,  
That nobly, grave, within that place did stand,  
Leads her along in mild majestic state, 
justitia descrip.   
Placed both her feet upon the Eastern gate.  
In Scarlet robes down to her Ankles trailing,  
A Crown of gold her brows all chaste impaling.   

Her hands are clean, not carried with a tale,  
Her modest eyes are covered with avail.  
Out from her mouth as heaven's eternal crier,  
There streams a blade of purest burnished fire,  
A Sword (which shakes) that up wards down wards curled,  
Like blazing stars amazing all the world. 
Simile.    

Just by her side (at her right hand) Time places  
The goodliest Dame 'mongst all the Nymphs and Graces  
The sweet borne Maid, and noblest Cherubin,  
That ever Nature at her best could limb:  
Brave peerless Queen, most Angel▪ like thy face, 
Misericordia.   
The Saints in heaven thy very name embrace.  
There thou dost stand by justice reverend side,  
Till all be ended thou by her must bide,  
And she again at God's divinest word,  
Doth guard thy person with her flaming sword.   

Not long before (if you remember well)  
When Adam first with Eve his darling fell, 
Charitas.   
And both all naked justly for it blamed,  
Love's bashful Lady was thereof ashamed:  
And as offended in that sacred place,  
Mounts up the clouds with discontented face,  
Bewails man's fall with tears, bedews her cheeeks,  
Most lovely looks, and round about she seeks,  
If she can find with all her toil a friend,  
To set all right, and past offences mend.  
When she had passed to silver Cynthia fair,  
Through the cold Region of the liquid Air,  
And crossed the way that Phaeton begun,  
With his proud Team about the world to run,  
Above the stars and fiery regions hot,  
With extreme labour pain and travel got.   

On every side through danges great had ventured,  
Yet at the last within heaven's walls she entered,  
Where she beheld a goodly glorious sight,  
Ten thousand candles all the world to light,  
Carried in course about the earth to reel,  
And Nature nobly turning of their wheel.   

After those kind embraces ever used  
Twixt Ladies fair, dame Nature smiling, mused  
To see her sister with her lovely face  
Thus rapt alone within that sacred place,  
To pass the clouds and fiery frozen Air,  
The earth to leave, unto her to repair:  
Even in an instant at that happy time,  
What heaven so high but love divine will climb?  
Scale up the throne of God himself above,  
Thrice noble Lady full of grace and love.  
Nature amazed as wondering what it meant,  
To see thy looks bewray a discontent.  
Inquires the cause that makes thy face so sad,  
The news below she thinks is worse than bad.   

But when she heard and understood the cause,  
That Eve and Adam broke their Maker's laws,  
Incurred a curse on all their future seed,  
She thought the world and all therein would bleed,  
And that God's anger for so foul offence,  
Would not be pleased unless she went from thence.  
Not staying now to hear the matter scanned,  
She takes her sister by her lovely hand,  
Descending both in all their rich attire,  
Down the hot region of heaven's burnished fire,  
Through the cold Air beneath the Moon they dived,  
And at the last in Paradise arrived.   

Here she stood by and saw God's judgement past,  
And oftentimes forth from her eyes she cast  
A Sea of salt and dreary briny tears.  
Her love (alas) was ever full of fears,  
To make her venture in the heat and cold,  
And mount the skies, as even but late I told:  
Bring Nature down in speedy postapace,  
To appease God's justice in that sacred place.   

Time spies her forth, and takes her by the hand,  
Which lovely there within that place did stand:  
And as before he used each other Sister,  
So now this Lady first of all he kissed her.  
Then leads her forth much like a lovely Queen,  
Spangled in jewels, wrought with gold in green:  
Brings her to justice, placed her by her side,  
In future ages evermore to bide.  
That till this world by power divine shall stand,  
These sisters both should be on either hand,  
To guide the earth and keep her feet upright,  
And govern all under the Prince of might:  
When Mercy, justice both from Love do flow,  
The Scarlet garment seems as white as Snow.   

Time back retires as heretofore he did,  
When now the place was of the Ladyesrid,  
And on a Dame of Noble birth doth light,  
Called Truth his daughter clothed all in white: 
Veritas.   
He takes her gently by her lily hand,  
Wherein God's book did at that instant stand.  
Brought her along (as all the rest before)  
Over the gate upon the sacred door,  
In all her robes with comely pomp and grace,  
And placed her right before dame justice face,  
O heavenly God, may I not well resemble 
justicia.   
The flaming Sword which made the earth to tremble,  
When all the world thy sacred justice saw,  
To dear Elias living in the Law,  
Rapt up a live within a flaming Cart,  
His coat imblazde might be a bleeding heart. 
2. Kin. 18. 40. 2. King. 1. 10. 2. Kiug. 2. 11.   
When jesabel the monster of her sex,  
His harmless soul upon the earth did vex:  
Her Prophet's false to Babylon that ran,  
He quite consumed, and scarcely left a man  
To carry news of that un wont fire,  
Which fell upon them at his just desire.   

That Cherubin upon the right hand placed, 
Misericordia   
Which time himself hath with his favour graced,  
In all the world how well I may compare,  
To aged Henoch walking in the Air,  
Within whose days when God his body rapt  
Above the clouds in innocency leapt,  
Before such time as Moses Law was gaved,  
By Mercy only all the world was saved   

The other damsel which my pen doth limb, 
Charitas.   
The sweetest fast and loveliest Cherubin,  
That Time himself upon the left hand set,  
And which my Muse can never well forget.  
If that we read the holy sacred Book,  
How near her person (all divine) doth look,  
To that Disciple which the rest survived,  
In Pathmos I'll into the heavens a rived:  
Ravished in spirit on a sacred day,  
Within a coffin did his body lay,  
And round about a light there shined bright,  
The coffin caught quite out of all their sight.   

The lesson still that he did ever preach,  
Both in his life, and by example teach,  
In all his works like to the Turtle dove,  
Throughout his books was little else but love.   

That Cherubin which stood before the face 
Veritas.   
Ofsacred justice in that reverend place:  
Like to an infant that his Nurse doth wean,  
Whose face is smiling, fingers ends are clean.  
All full of Truth, not knowing how to feign,  
Dissemble falsely all the world to gain.  
How well I may compare her settled look,  
To Gods eternal ever blessed book.   

These Cherubins all glorious to behold,  
Surpassing fare the purest burnished gold:  
The radiant splendour of whose sacred rays,  
Resemble those adored within our days,  
justice's divine, much like to God himself, 
justitia.   
That scorneth bribing and all ill got pelf,  
And shows by judgements fearful past examples,  
How all the world under his feet he tramples,   

Mercy again much like to Christ his son, 
Miserecordia.   
That hath the crown of glory for us won,  
And from the heavens descended to the earth,  
To make us happy in his welcome birth,  
Whose panting soul had never minutes rest,  
Suffering those torments not to be expressed,  
Surpassing fare the greatest learned wits,  
To see how he at God's right hand now sits,  
Triumphing over sin, world, death and hell,  
In joys eternal which no tongue can tell,  
Thrice ever blessed be his glorious name,  
It was his mercy made him do the same.   

Then Charity much like the God of love, 
Charitas.   
I mean no Cupids which to folly move,  
But that great spirit ere the world was made,  
Upon the waters through the deep did wade, 
Gen. 1. 2 Mat. 1. 13. 20.   
By whom the Virgin happily conceived,  
To bring forth him that justice wrath appeased,  
When afterwards by Iordans silver sides,  
From Libanon to Sodoms' lake that glides,  
Along the plains where jesus was baptised,  
The holy Ghost in shape of Dove disguised, 
Mat. 3. 15, 16, 17.   
Heaven's windows open, thus speaketh in their sight,  
This is my Son in whom I take delight.  
When all was finished, and to Heaven Christ went,  
Then down came he to give us all content:  
As justice, Mercy, both with Love are linked, 
Simile.   
So God is one, the Persons three distincked.   

These altogether as the heavens decreed, 
justitia. Misrecordia. Charitas. Veritas.   
The Tree of Life protect from Adam's seed,  
The World itself with wonderment they fill,  
Their meat is known to do their father's will,  
Who all this while is with their sister sweet, 
Natura.   
His eldest daughter as 'twas ever meet.  
When Time had done, discharged full his due,  
Above the clouds up to the Heaven's God flew,  
Where he remains leaving the world and all,  
Which ever yet was known upon this ball;  
To the protection of that noble Dame,  
That to the earth with love her sister came,  
So well affected, labouring what she can,  
That all her care is but for sinful man,  
Let him his mind to goodness always bend,  
And Nature ever is his loving friend.   

Great God of Heaven, now is thy justice shown,  
Thy Love and Mercy with thy Nature known,  
Time hath thy Face and glorious brows unmasked,  
And thus at first my Rural Muse hath tasked,  
Hear brought forth Truth from her hath never stirred:  
Revealed the same wrapped in thy holy Word,  
Of Paradise the sacred curtain drawn,  
The Sabaoth showed, on no man's vice doth fawn,  
Of all the world hath sung the first beginning,  
Told Adam's faults, and Eve's offensive sinning,  
Their seed defaced in breaking of thy laws,  
And here I'll stay, and sit me down and pause.   
The end of the first Age.   

THE GLASS OF TIME, IN THE second Age.  
Divinely handled, By Thomas Peyton, of Lincoln's Inn, Gent.  
Seen and allowed.  
LONDON, Printed by Bernard Alsop, for Laurence Chapman, and are to be sold at his shop over against Staple Inn. 1620.   


HONI SOIT QVI MAL Y PENSE  
Beati Pacifici.    

THE GLASS OF TIME, IN THE SECOND AGE.  
The Argument.  

The sacred Muse by envious Foes is crossed,  
Adam and Eve how each from other lost,  
Their first borne son by cursed malice led,  
Unkindly wounds his dearest Brother dead,  
Apostasy the cause of all this ill,  
The total World on every side doth fill;  
With Blood, Oppression, Cruelty and Hate,  
To waste, consume, and wind each others state,  
The Church derived from the third borne child,  
Is stained, polluted, with Cain's Race defiled,  
So that the World and all there in was found,  
Besides the Ark were washed away and drowned.   

VRania Sovereign of the Muses nine,  
Inspire my thoughts with sacred work divine,  
Come down from Heaven, within my Temples Rest,  
Inflame my heart and lodge within my Breast.   

Grant me the story of this World to sing,  
The Glass of Time, upon the Stage to bring,  
Be Ay within me by thy powerful might,  
Govern my Pen, direct my speech aright,  
Even in the birth and infancy of Time,  
To the last Age, season my holy Rhyme:  
Oh lead me on, into my Soul infuse,  
Divinest Work, and still be thou my Muse,  
That all the World may wonder and behold,  
To see Times pass in Ages manifold,  
And that their wonder may produce this end,  
To live in love their future lives to mend.   

Then shall thy looks with sacred lustre shine,  
The Muses all within thy Brows combine,  
Richly adorned with all the Nymphs and Graces,  
Shall sound thy praise with lovely pleasing faces,  
joying to see thy glorious heavenly hap,  
The golden Ball cast down into thy lap;  
To thy delight and great contentment more,  
Then if the World were only thine in store.   

Though cursed Envy on thy Fortune frown,  
Yet thy chaste Brows shall wear heaven's laurel crown,  
In future Ages as the Muse's Queen,  
Thy Temples wreathed, shall ever flourish green.  
And what if Hymen something do annoy  
Thy tender Fruit, yet shalt thou live in joy:  
And when pale death shall close up both thine eyes,  
Thy fame shall mount above the lofty skies.   

And yet Urania how canst thou be glad,  
To see this Age wherein we live so bad,  
All overgrown far worse than at the first,  
Bemired in sin as if it were accursed,  
Nothing but blood, contention, Brides and brawls,  
The Serpent still upon his belly crawls,  
And round about on enery side doth wind,  
With cunning sleights the Infant's face to grind.   

Nay thouthy self, noble Urania dear,  
Since first thy landing and arrival here,  
Hast thou not been on every side turmoiled,  
Tossed too and fro, by Envy ouertoyled?  
Whose viperous tongue within a sacred place,  
Hath belched her venom, aimed at thy disgrace;  
Like to the Devil in Paradise at first, 
Simile.   
That baneful poison in his Breast hath nursed,  
To wrong thy person, weaken much thy state,  
every himself to satisfy his hate,  
took all advantage working on thy youth,  
Suggested lies instead of naked truth:  
Locked thee up close (Immured) within a Wall,  
When not a Groat was due to him at all;  
But by the order of this noble Land,  
He in that place for debt to-thee should stand.   

Great God of Heaven it makes▪ me weep and wail,  
To see juiustice oftentimes prevail;  
To domineer and catch into her hand,  
When Innocence must at her mercy stand,  
Then doth she squeeze, wring▪ wrist, extort and lurch,  
When seldom times oppression comes at Church,  
Dear friends persuasion once can ne'er prevail,  
To work a peace till all be set to sail,  
Then swallows all into a griping purse,  
Not satisfied, continues ten times worse,  
Vowing to waste and Ruin all thy state.  
Oh cursed malice hatched by envious fate,  
When thy false heart hath made the act thy worst,  
What art thou then more than a beast accursed:  
Nay fare more worse, for thou must count at large,  
For every soul committed to thy charge,  
If by thy fault the least of them be lost,  
Thy soul in hell the price of it will cost.   

But yet my Muse, unfold to me the cause,  
Why thou didst fall into the treacherous paws  
Of hateful foes, devouring Tigers fierce,  
False hearted friends which in thy state did pierce,  
That thou shouldst thus be tossed on every side,  
Compelled oft times to be from home and ride,  
To see if Envy with her viperous face,  
Hath foisted lies in sacred justice place.   

I know no cause, nor could I ever tell,  
Why she should thus against thee always swell,  
Winding herself, her malice best to smother, 
jer. 23. 12. 10. 11. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.   
Into the habit of thine elder brother.  
One thou hast loved, enough to make me dote,  
To see vice lurk under a formal coat.  
And thou thyself that yet didst never hurt,  
To harm a child, or throw a worm i'th'durt,  
Or take delight to glory in the fall  
Of any one, much less thy tongue to gall.  
By't, scandal, blur, to Injury, defame,  
The worth of any in their goods or name:  
By wicked ways the Infant's face to grind,  
Nor in thy hands thy neighbours living wind,  
But to thy power hast showed thy best endeavour,  
To love the Saints withal thy heart for ever.   

Urania (dear) thy very case is mine,  
How did my Foes still to this day combine,  
Back sliding friends (much like to slippery Eels)  
Have undermined, to turn up both mine heels:  
With fawning terms my company have sought,  
Inverted that (which yet) I never thought;  
Reported words, the which were never spoke:  
Let every man by this a warning take,  
And careful be whom they converse withal,  
The Bird oft times in Fowler's nets doth fall:  
Even when (Alas) not any hurt she thinks,  
Then is she caught, under their burden Sinkes.   

How oftentimes have I been tossed and tired,  
Plunged in the deep and all with dirt bemired,  
Tossed too and fro by those in Ambush lay,  
With secret Gins to trap me in my way,  
Vowed my destruction, all my state to bane:  
Much to my Trouble, Injury, and pain,  
Swallowed my goods within a griping purse,  
Have I not cause all Roman wolves to curse,  
When all I have can scarcely give content,  
Unless my life and living both be spent.  
Were it for debt or title of my Land,  
That thus my foes did in their fury stand:  
If possibly they could me more abuse,  
Yet in some sort I would then here excuse.   

Dear Muse, the cause why I am thus perplexed,  
Turmoiled about on every side and vexed,  
To waste my state, and pass through dangers many,  
Is not for wrong that I have done to any:  
But by  Envy hatched in hell below,  
In Eden nurc't, now o'er the Earth doth flow.   

When Adam lest suspected her intent,  
Then was her mind on mischief fully bend,  
And ever since hath laboured what she may,  
Eve's seed to bane her secret traps to lay:  
But all the spite against me she can use,  
May waste my State, and hinder thee my Muse.   

For this alone, by her I am misused,  
Hurried about▪ by slanderous tongues abused,  
Kept long from home, unto my great expense,  
Weakened my Lands and living ever since,  
On all sides crossed (by Greatness) over swayed,  
By guile and cunning (treacherously) betrayed,  
Of smooth faced friends abandoned and forsaken,  
And all God knows, but for a Word mistaken.   

Nay had I been sole Author of that thing,  
Which some untimely to my hands did bring,  
And blazed it forth, why should I thus be blamed,  
When no man (living) in the same is named,  
Nor any scandal in those words alone,  
Intended are but by a man i'th' Move,  
Yet I turmoiled against all right and reason,  
Am used by some, as if it were High Treason.   

Sacred Religion brought from Heaven above,  
Thou shouldst be constant, full of Grace and Love,  
From God (himself) thou hast a holy task,  
O let not vice (under a Surplice) mask,  
By this alone Christ's Flock are scattered all,  
O'er all the Earth, in every place do fall,  
Some run to Rome and some renounce their Creed, 
Simile.   
And come again, like to a stinking Weed▪  
That bears a Flower a woman's Love to win,  
But yet the seed contagious all within.   

All powerful God, when both by Night and Day,  
Incessantly my Heart to thee did pray,  
To ease my Grief, and if it were thy will,  
To send me Peace to walk up Zion hill,  
That in thy House where all thy Saints do meet,  
My Soul might sing and offer Odours sweet,  
To hear thy Word come purling from the Rock,  
Feeding thy Sheep and building up thy Flock,  
Where none at all should have a cause to fall, 
Simile.   
Christ's Coat was woven without a Seam at all:  
In stead of Peace which I desired in haste,  
Thou sent'st me down a lovely Virgin chaste,  
Noble Urania soberly attired,  
Which when I saw, (with joy) I much admired,  
Finding a Friend (copartner) thus to be,  
A fit Companion in my misery,   

Great God of Heaven upon my bended knees,  
Before that Face which every actions sees,  
Let me but know what good I ever wrought,  
That thou in Mercy thus on me hast thought?  
Or have I not offended much thy will,  
That thou my Br●st dost with Urania's fill,  
Sending her Down as thou didst send thy Son,  
To save those sheep which from thy Fould did run.   

Eternal God, what shall I give to thee,  
For thy great Love and Favour showed to me?  
If all the World within my power did stand,  
And all therein were sole at my command:  
If all the waves within the Seas which boil,  
And all the Rivers on this Earth were oil:  
With all those things that ere I did behold  
Under Heaven's Cope were framed of beaten gold,  
In Thankfulness for all thy Mercies sweet,  
I'd all Surrender, lay them at thy feet.   

But soft my Muse, whilst thee and I am plaining,  
Each others griefs, and still but little gaining:  
Time posts away, as if it had forgot  
What Adam did (after the Gates were shut)  
In Paradise, I mean that sacred door,  
Which in my Work I told you of before.   

Adam and Eve about the glistering walls  
Of Paradise, with mournful cries and calls,  
Repenting sore, lamenting much their Sin,  
Longing but once to come again within,  
In vain long time about the walls did grope,  
Not in Despair as those are out of hope:  
But all about, in every place did feel,  
His loving Wife still following at his heel,  
To find the Door with all their care and pain,  
To come within, their former state to gain.   

Like to a man that in a Palace built 
Simile.   
Of jasper stone, and covered rich with guilt,  
One every side lined with a golden wall,  
And no Town near, nor any house at all,  
In such a place suppose one should abide,  
Be entertained like to a lovely bride.  
Yet in the night for some abuse absurd,  
Perchance for drink or some distasteful word.   

If he should be fast by the shoulders caught,  
Led forth a doors and set by all at naught,  
Hailed all along (even in the Evening late)  
Between his foes, and thrust quite out of gate,  
In no place near, hearing a Dog to bark,  
All comfortless wanders about i' th' dark:  
Gropes every where, if he can find a door  
And enter in, he will offend no more.   

Or like a man that venter's for a prize, 
Simile.   
Hoodwinked, and made stark blind in both his eyes,  
Wheels round about, in every place doth reel,  
At every post and corner house doth feel,  
To find the door where he should enter in,  
With all his toil his Wager for to win.   

Even so is Adam in that uncked place,  
The flaming Sword still blazing in his face;  
On every side the glistering walls to shine,  
The Sun himself just underneath the line.  
The radiant Splendour of those Cherubims,  
Dazzles, amates, his tender eye sight dims. 
Simile.   
Like to a man that gazeth at the Sun,  
Is then unfit, fare any way to run,  
Lest whilst his looks above the Clouds he pitch,  
He chance to fall and tumble in a ditch,   

Such is the state of Adam and his Wife,  
And every Man within this mortal life,  
To wander, Grope, as in the dark be lost,  
And farthest off from that they aim at most:  
The sacred lustre of God's Word divine,  
The Gospel's truth which o'er the Earth doth shine,  
The Son of Peace (Christ jesus) being borne,  
Whose glorious Light doth all the World adorn:  
Have made Man blind and dazzled both his eyes,  
To see that joy which in the Scripture lies.   

When many days were passed away and spent,  
Finding at last they missed of their intent:  
And that their toil and travel to their pain,  
Was frustrate quite, their labour still in vain:  
Much discontented for their sad mishap,  
Yet once again upon the walls they rap,  
Then weep and howl, lament, yearn, cry, and call,  
But still no help, nor answer had at all.  
Perplexed in mind, and dazzled with the light,  
With grief and care, distempered in their sight,  
Amazed both just as the wind them blue,  
To Paradise they bade their last adieu:  
Like those are Moapt with wand'ring hither, thither, 
Simile.   
From thence they went, themselues they knew not whither   

The Crosses, griefs, vexations, troubles, care,  
Befell them after, with their hungry fare,  
Straggling about, abiding in no place,  
And Discontent, upon their late disgrace,  
The angry Heavens, for many days that lowered,  
The sable clouds which sulphury showers down poured:  
The very Earth combining with them both,  
Strange hideous sights, of irksome Lights uncouth,  
The Elements, as all together bend,  
Against man's Sin, themselves in sunderrent.  
The Sun ashamed, the inconstant angry Moon  
Began to wane, sending a Night at Noon,  
Surcharged with Sorrows, no where now to rest:  
Their griefs more great, then can be well expressed.   

The discontent some say which Adam found, 
Comment. in Cabalist vidi Reuch. lib. 1.   
Being expulsed out of that holy Ground,  
By Eve's foul error to be thus disgra'ste,  
Made Him, the World, his Wife, and all distaste:  
And like a Hermit in his wand'ring weeds, 
Simile.   
On little else but grief and sorrow feeds,  
Repentant thoughts are harboured in his breast,  
His Mind impatient, finds no place to rest,  
But to the East from Paradise doth run,  
Towards the rising of the morning Sun.   

Hear, here (Alas) his tender dazzled sight,  
With the great splendour of that glorious light,  
Whose matchless grace when up to Heaven it enters, 
Simile.   
Much like a Queen forth from her Chamber venter's,  
Climes up the Skies, and tramples on the Air,  
With cheerful looks in glittering Robes most fair,  
Prances about, in no place long it bides,  
Views all the World on every side it rides,  
The radiant Rays which sparkled in his face,  
Made Adam think that God was in that place.   

With this conceit, he tarries in no coast,  
But on he goes, and all in haste doth post,  
o'er Hill, and Dale, with toil, vexation, pain,  
Like Sisyphus, that labours still in vain, 
Simile.   
To roll a stone against a monstrous Mount,  
His grief more great than any man can count,  
Finds to his cost his travel to no end,  
His weary works all to no purpose tend:  
So on he runs, on nothing else doth dream,  
Until he came at Ganges watery stream,  
And as before, o'er many a little River,  
He made a way up to his Heart and Liver,  
So in this stream, hoping the same to win,  
He enters bold, and wades up to his chin.   

Hear is a Bar in superstions way,  
Too deep a rub to make his fury stay,  
For all his haste he can no further pass,  
By Ganges coast, like to a Wall of brass, 
simile.   
Where he is forced, to try his utmost skill,  
Against the stream, he strives and labours still:  
Until by Practice with his active limbs,  
A Mile or two upon the waves he swims,  
But yet too fare in absence of his Wife,  
May breed a scar and hazard so his life.   

Thus discontented, with that watery wall,  
The grief conceived of his dismal fall;  
The loss of her that late before he lost,  
When as he thought to pass to God in post,  
Himself alone bewailing of his sins,  
To true Repentance faithfully gins:  
And as some say did Circumcize himself,  
Washed all his Skin, (bemired) in dirty pelf,  
Forsakes the World, for certain days did stand,  
Within the stream, and never came at land,  
Until his flesh from top to toe was seen,  
With cold and froth, all overgrown with green.   

Then God which late upon his fault did frown,  
Now smiles again, and sendeth Raziel down,  
One of the three in sacred Robes of Light,  
That ever stand before the most of might,  
Since Sathiel one of their number fell,  
From highest Heavens unto the lowest Hell,  
Michael, Gabriel, this Raziel stood,  
Still to this day the sole Archangels good.   

This noble Angel brings those tidings glad,  
And cheers the Man to be no more so sad,  
Tells him that God is not with him offended,  
But with the Devil which first his Reason blinded,  
That his Repentance purchased hath his peace,  
From further Penance wiled him to surcease,  
Although of Sin he hath been once detected,  
Yet his good will was in the Heavens accepted,  
Bade him go seek and comfort up his Wife,  
People the World and live a joyful Life.   

The Messenger that from the Heavens descended,  
To bring these tidings up again Ascended, 
simile.   
Like to a flame of pure celestial light,  
So vanished he from earthly Adam's sight,  
Yet some do think he tarried in those parts,  
And taught the man the liberal learned Arts:  
Was his Companion as a friendly guide, 
jews and Turks.   
That ever kept by Adam's fearful side,  
When he went seeking to his care and pain,  
With extreme toil to find his Wife again,  
For many years within the stream did stand,  
Whilst Eve was wand'ring in the Nubian Land,  
His faithful Angel, in all storms and weather,  
Until such time he brought them both together.   

At Araffe hill within Arabia ground,  
This was the place where Eve her husband found,  
Hear at this Mount they both together met,  
And each with (joy) their lovely eyes did wet,  
With such a shower of pearly crystal tears,  
Distilled in Love's pure Limbeck, full of fears,  
That one the other finally had missed,  
Hear once again they smile, embrace and kissed.   

Still to this day the reverend fear and awe,  
Of those which yet the Mount have ever saw,  
The great respect that Superstition wins,  
'Mongst men denout in pardon of their sins;  
The World's conceit by Mahomet late nursed,  
That Eve and Adam here repenting first,  
Found Peace with God unto their soul's content,  
Built them a House in which their lives they spent,  
Hath made the Hill admired to this day,  
For Turkish Pilgrims ever more to pray,  
The sacred Skirts with goodly plains are walled,  
And at this day the Mount of Pardons called.   

No less admired is that Renowned stream,  
By Bengala which makes all Asia dream,  
And fills the World with superstitious guile,  
From Eastern India to th' Atlantike I'll   

Brave Ganges flood how dost thou draw together?  
Fierce warlike Nations mustering hither thither,  
Captiu'st them all fettered within thy banks,  
To wade within thee, yield thee humble thankes,  
For staying Adam in thy silvered flood,  
When he neglected all his future blood,  
Lost wilfully his nearest dearest wife,  
Careless of all endangring much his life.   

This may be true, and yet I cannot think, 
Confutation of the former opinion.   
That those whom God in Paradise did link,  
Brought them together by his powerful might,  
Should thus be parted each from others sight,  
Eve in the South, by fearful Negro Land,  
Adam i'th' East, on Ganges goodly strand,  
Between both these a wondrous weary space,  
For two to travel in so poor a case:  
Vnshod, all bare, 'mongst horrid thunder dints,  
Through woods to walkeupon the thorns and flints:  
He in a maze, not knowing where to find  
His loving Wife: like to a man stark blind, 
Simile.   
Toils out himself for that he never saw,  
To find a needle in a heap of straw;  
She all alone wand'ring she knew not whether,  
Blown every where much like unto a Feather, 
simile.   
Inconstant light (and wavering) apt to vex,  
As is the Nature of her timorous sex.   

It is not like in all men's judgement sound,  
They rambled fare from Eden's fruitful ground,  
Or that but two so kind and tender hearted,  
In all their lives should for a year be parted:  
Besides the opinion of the learned wits,  
Grave ancient fathers evermore that sits,  
Revolving of the highest deepest works,  
That in God's Book divinely lies and lutkes:  
The sacred stories of all Ages past,  
Which evermore eternally shall last,  
Have made it clear for every man to tell,  
That in this place our Parents both did dwell,  
Lived long secure, about the Garden kept,  
Joyed with the sight, yet for their fall they wept,  
Though they were bard to come again within,  
By reason of their fowl contagious sin,  
Yet they desired for all their past disgrace,  
But for to live near to that lovely place.   

Hear first with boughs, and such like broken stuff,  
They built a House, under a simple Ruff,  
Then like a couple that but late did wed,  
With Pelts and leaves, they make a homely Bed,  
Where they enjoyed more pleasure, true content,  
Then in the Courts of greatest Kings are spent:  
Himself all naked in a Sheep's skin curled,  
The sole Commander of this total World,  
Is glad to work to pass his time in peace,  
To serve his God from further sin to cease.   

Thus overjoyed, upon a time it fell,  
The circumstance I must forbear to tell,  
Playing with 〈◊〉 within that shady bower,  
And in his arms his loveliest sweetest flower,  
Embracing, toying, smiling, kissing sweet,  
The sports most chaste unto a Spouse bed meet,  
Thinking the time he had with her beguiled,  
Forgets himself, and she conceives with child.   

Strange is the change she in herself doth find,  
An extreme Passion working in her mind,  
Longing oft▪ time's some sops in Tar to lick,  
Her bodies altered, and her stomach sick,  
Black ugly Berries, fulsome unripe Plums,  
And every thing that in her way next comes,  
The goodly fruits which are within the walls,  
Of Paradise, she to her husband calls,  
Desires, entreats him, as he love's his Wife,  
Forth with to hast, and fetch to save her life.   

Full forty weeks she lived in this case,  
Feeding on toys and greenest drugs most base,  
On Dirt and Trash, on Ashes, Hips and Haws,  
She finds she's ill, and yet she knows no cause,  
At length it fell whilst he was forth of doors,  
Chase the Deer, hunting the furious Boars,  
To get some Venison, or such dainty dish,  
To satisfy his Wives desired wish:  
Like Hercules that in a strange disguise, 
Simile.   
Retired home with such a welcome prize,  
Finds his dear Darling full of mirth and joy, 
Cain borne.   
And in her arms a goodly infant Boy.   

Th' Admiration, wondrous great content,  
To see a Child thus fortunately sent,  
Sweet living Picture module of himself,  
The World and all he now esteems as pelf,  
With joy o'er cloyed, upon the face doth gaze:  
Like to a man astonished in amaze, 
Simile.   
All mute he stands not knowing what to think,  
No Reason yet, into his head can sink,  
How it can be conceived in the breast,  
Of Eve (sweet woman) whom he loved best.   

When once revived out of that pleasing trance,  
The tender Babe he in his arms doth dance,  
Smiles on his face and questions with his Wife,  
How first was sent thus to prolong his life;  
The Child she said, to her immortal fame,  
She knew not well how first to her it came,  
But that she thought although her sense was weak,  
This was the Seed the Serpent's head should break,  
Told him in words and gentle speeches mild,  
That by the Lord she had conceived that Child. 
Gen. 4, 1.    

True are thy words dear Eve, most true thy heart,  
Why should a Man thy meaning pure I nuert,  
It cannot sink into thy sacred thought,  
How of thyself an Infant thou hast brought,  
As well might Adam in thy senses seem,  
To bear a Child, for aught that thou canst deem,  
When of the World 'twas in the early morn,  
And the first Babe that ever yet was borne,   

How damned profane are those accursed lips, 
Renegado proselytes .  
Which in God's Church shall make such dangerous slips,  
Within the same to belch to thy disgrace,  
Even in a sacred and most public place,  
Behind thy back when thou art dead and past,  
And canst not answer what their mouth out cast,  
Thus to be lie men's souls to sin allure,  
Wresting thy speech with baneful breath impure:  
Not terrified with Heavens all threatening Rod,  
But dares to teach (that thou didst swear by God 
Gen. 4. 1.   
Thou hadst a Child) and oftentimes to speak it,  
If it were true, unto the world to break it,  
Is worse than was that Serpent damned accursed,  
In Paradise which wronged thy Person first.   

Ah thus we see the cursed envious Snake, 
Simile.   
That sleeps to goodness, but to evil doth wake,  
To lurk all close under the sweetest flower,  
When Goddess Flora all her pride doth pour,  
Upon the Earth within the midst of May,  
To suck fell poison from the holesom'st gay,  
When the dear painful wise laborious Bee,  
Ten thousand ways about heaven's blossoms flee,  
On every flower within the Garden sits,  
And out from them the wax and honey gets,  
Conueys it safely to her well wrought Hive,  
To pleasure Friends, and keep herself alive.   

Let Serpent snake, and all the viperous seed  
That ever Envy in her womb did breed,  
Hatched in the Bowels of th'infernal vault,  
Where none but Devils and damned Atheists haut:  
Twixt God and Belial still thy speech oppose,  
Yet shall thy words smell as the fragrant Rose▪  
Or like those Flowers in Paradise were plaunted 
Simile.   
By God himself, when he the Garden haunted.   

Dear Eve, thy worth I ever must admire,  
Thou sit'st above within the Angel's Choir,  
Tuning thy voice unto their sacred lays,  
To sound forth Glory to the Prince of praise. 
Simile.   
Like Gods own Daughter (whom he love's most dear)  
Warbling sweet Music in th' Almighty's ear,  
Or that pale Virgin with her glimmering lamp,  
That lights the world under heavens starry Camp,  
The Virtues which within thy breast were bred,  
Shall near be stained by any viperous head,  
So long as Fame can sound thy glorious worth,  
 Paragon, the richest gem on Earth.   

Take all the Ladies breathing on this Ball,  
The sweetest faced, the noblest borne, and all  
The famous Queens and Monarches of the World,  
Which on the wheel of Fortune have been hurled,  
That ever lived upon this earthly frame:  
Now gone and passed too infinite to name,  
The saints themselves and all the blessed troop,  
Those that now live within heaven's burnished hoop▪  
Though thou art blamed as Author of their fall,  
Yet art thou still the mother to them all.   

Like to the Vine so is thy fruitful Womb, 
Psal. 128. 3. Simile▪   
Thy speech more sweet than is the honey comb:  
Thy Breath all pure, which from thy lips comes out,  
Thy Brows impalde with Chasteness round about:  
From thee at first were peopled every land,  
Like O live Plants thy tender Infants stand 
simile.   
About thy Table, in a seemly sort,  
To over-ioy and make thee gladsome sport.   

But why should I run farther in thy praise,  
Upon Fame's wings thy living name to raise,  
Blazing thy parts, maintaining of thee still,  
And fowl▪ detraction aims to work thy ill.  
Ay to deface thy modest speeches pure,  
With scandals vile, for ever to endure:  
When as thy worth exceeds the learnedst thought,  
That by thy means into the world is brought,  
And still the Truth convinceth brings to light,  
The actions false, obscured, in envies night, 
1. Cor. 3. 12.   
Dissolves to naught the mortar made of clay,  
The buildings framed of stubble, trash, and hay,  
The good from bad, the sheep from wolves doth sever,  
And brands the devil in his false tongue for ever.   

And yet we see, the sacred Truth not free  
From viperous tongues, gnawn in the worst degree, 
simile.   
Taxed oftentimes, and squeezed like a Sponge,  
By Romish Tigers at her sides that hung,  
Inverting, stretching, construing all her words,  
With error, falsehood, damned ways and girds.  
Chaste virtuous Eve, now she is past and dead,  
The Serpent's seed must break the Woman's seed.   

But in the heavens th' eternal God of power,  
At justice's bar will on their faces lower▪  
And on their heads thunder his judgements down,  
When Eve shall stand adorned with a Crown:  
Then shall their actions in his dreadful ire,  
Be purged all, and tried as gold i'th' fire.  
The wickeds words their envious tongue hath spoke,  
To her disgrace, shall make them yearn and quake:  
And in the end the sword shall just divide,  
The good from those which have her worth belied,  
Whose feet shall totter on hell's fatal wheel,  
And headlong down to damned devils shall reel:  
Whilst Eve shall sit triumphant on the skies,  
Viewing their fall, hearing their moans and cries,  
joying to see the sacred Truth prevail,  
Her meaning cleared, her foes to weep and wail.   

And yet dear Eve I must not leave thee there,  
But bring thee down, more children for to bear:  
If but with one thou hadst begun and ended,  
Yet had the World been by thy means befriended.  
But to replenish with thy fruitful spawn,  
From Sols first rising where his team doth dawn,  
The total earth on every side and round,  
Here is a love the like was never found,  
Within the breast of any woman kind,  
Our thoughts, hearts, actions, all our zeal to bind,  
In true devotion to thy reverend name,  
Much to admire so sweet a noble Dame▪  
When thy first child into the world was borne,  
Strait he began to take delight in Corn,  
In large possessions working up the soil,  
Near Paradise with painful labour toil,  
Tilling the ground, and planting of the grain,  
His name thereby was fitly, called Cain.  
Whilst thou again conceivest a second child,  
A sweet borne babe of countenance more mild:  
And after that, about some threescore more  
Of sons and daughters which thy body bore,  
All nursed by thee after their timely birth,  
To fill the world, and people all the earth.   

Thus with thy husband (in that arboured Tent)  
Thou spentst thy days in wondrous great content,  
In true Religion, Sacrifices, Rites,  
Such as thy heart unto thy God indites,  
joying in him, and he again in thee,  
The sweetest life that ever eye could see,  
When as together in your children small,  
You train them up on Eden's God to call:  
And teach them young by your own steps allure,  
Them to all good, chaste, honest actions, pure,  
The golden ground, the heavenly star, and guide,  
From which but few do ever after slide.   

Happy, thrice happy are those children borne,  
A crown of Glory shall their brows adorn,  
Whose infant years are by their parents first,  
With the pure milk of true Religion nursed:  
In riper days when blustering blasts assail,  
The mountains high, that overtops the dale,  
Their Faith stands firm as fixed, upon a Rock,  
Not easily stirred by every waving shock:  
But constant bides, most permanent and sure,  
The assaults of Satan strongly to endure.   

In Elder Time when Age doth threaten death  
At latest gasp, even when our vital breath  
Gins to fail, in hastening on our end;  
And kinsfolks, friends, upon us all attend,  
With sad lamenting, discontented eyes,  
To see our Soul how up to heaven it flies,  
Forsakes the Earth, willing the world to lose,  
Encumbered with a thousand cares and woes,  
That in this life daily attend the sheep,  
Until with Christ above the clouds they keep.  
O than the comfort▪ sweet delight and joys,  
When all things else seems to their sense but toys.  
There the good shepherd in his arms embraceth,  
All those that love him, wondrously he graceth,  
With this kind welcome, Come ye blessed Souls,  
Come drink the Nectar kept in Crystal bowls,  
Eat this Ambrosia as a sacred token,  
That for thy sin my body once was broken:  
Receive heavens crown th' eternal kingdom kept,  
For all those (Saints) which from the world have slept.   

But soft my Muse, what mak'st thou now above  
Out of this world, thus on a sudden move  
Adam to leave his fruitful wife, and all  
His pleasures, joys, and both his children small,  
Even in the spring and glory of their birth,  
Weary of all, thus to forsake the Earth,  
As if thou tookst more pleasure, true delight  
Within the heavens, then in their sinful sight.   

Stay yet a while, and as thou hast begun,  
So to the end thy course directly run:  
Leave them not thus; O do not now surcease,  
Till thou hast brought them to their graves in Peace:  
Show all their lives, the chief of every thing,  
Their Crosses, Griefs, do thou (divinely) sing,  
But yet (at first) tell how in loving sort,  
The Brothers lived, and made their Parent's sport.   

Those that long time without a child have been,  
And never issue of their own have seen,  
But without kindred, friends, and those which may  
With some content succeed at latter day.  
If these (I say) when least of all they thought,  
Should children have so fortunately brought,  
To prittle, prattle every word by chance,  
And up and down about the house to dance:  
With many toys that in their minor years  
Gives great content, the Parent's love endears.  
Let these men speak, but with a judgement sound,  
What high content themselves have often found,  
In the like sports of tender Infants sweet,  
That hardly▪ yet can crawl upon their feet;  
The fame we may of Eve and Adam think,  
And ten times more than in our heads can sink,  
How in their Babes they joyed and took delight,  
And never well when they were out of sight.   

Cain in the blossoms of his blooming youth,  
As 'tis recorded in the sacred truth,  
Takes much delight in planting of the seeds,  
The fruitful Vine, and all that Nature breeds,  
The choicest, rarest, daintiest, and the best  
That ever yet she bore upon her breast.   

Walks all about, and views the richest ground,  
By Paradise on every side and round,  
With shou'ls and spades he tumbles up the earth,  
His chiefest aim to be a man of worth,  
And Lord it o'er his other brethren all,  
That they may bow, within his presence fall:  
To that intent he labours, works and toils,  
In sweat and dust, i'th'durt (oft times) he mules,  
Like a mere worldling spends his youthful days,  
His mind (oft runs) a thousand kind of ways:  
If he can find some new contrived trick,  
To ease himself, the soil up clean to strick,  
And bring the same in temper for the grain,  
That he may play and yet possess the gain.   

Industry, Reason, all the Arts conspire,  
To frame an Engine fiercest horse to tyre;  
The Oxen, Cattle, and the strongest Wanes  
That ever wrought upon the fertile plains:  
Himself and all (in labouring with) this plough,  
His joints grow stiff, and brawny hands all rough,  
Yet in the same he finds so much content,  
That his best days in this hard work are spent.   

His brother Habell doth not idly live,  
But to some Art his toward mind doth give,  
Whose chief delight is in the harmless sheep,  
The bleating flocks upon the downs to keep,  
To follow them when oftentimes his eyes  
Are upwards fixed towards the lofty skies,  
Observing thus a thousand several things,  
That heavenly matter to his senses brings,  
Their number, Order with their great increase,  
And quiet life, spending their days in peace,  
By faith perceiving hidden mysteries,  
The sum of that which in the Scripture lies: 
Esa▪ 53. 67.   
How from the fouled a Lamb shall forth be taken,  
Which would be one day of the rest forsaken,  
That he should be the sacrifice and guide,  
Sole Ransom full for all the world beside.   

Thus these two brothers lived, and spent their days  
Oft times in work, sometimes in sport and plays:  
In as much love, delight, content and all,  
As ever two that breathed upon this Ball.  
If you should ramble over the total Earth,  
You'll hardly find two brethren from their birth,  
Throughout the world in all the Ages spent,  
In true bred Love an evener course that went,  
At Bed, at Board, at Home, abroad i'th' weather,  
They seldom part but always keep together:  
Walk, talk, discourse, even all the day and night,  
They are not well but one i'th' others sight.   

All the week long delightfully they pass  
The time away in browzing up the grass,  
In husbandry and such as I have told,  
But on Gods Rest pins them within a fold,  
Or ground well fenced on every side about,  
That they may feed, but yet not wander out▪   

Upon which Day, when once out of their bed,  
By the example of their Parents led,  
They altogether meet, to Rest and Pray,  
To sanctify the sacred Sabaoth day,  
To think on God, crave pardon for their sins,  
Where Adam then to teach them all gins,  
Instructs them well in true Religion first,  
Tells them the cause which made them thus accursed,  
To use their wits, to labour work and toil,  
In the wide fields to spend their days and moil,  
To keep the sheep and by their cunning sleight,  
To frame an Engine of such wondrous weight,  
Whereas God knows before their fearful fall,  
In Paradise they needed none at all,  
Wills them to love entirely, void of strife,  
The Heavenly way unto the Tree of Life.   

This is their work and holy practice pure,  
Sweet exercise for ever to endure,  
Thus they continue running of their race,  
Whilst shearing day and Harvest comes apace,  
Then they bestir them; toil it out all day,  
Inning their corn making the new Mown Hay,  
And in the end they altogether feast,  
So give God thanks, and from their labour Rest:  
When the next Sabaoth clad in seemly suits,  
They Sacrifice the first of both their fruits,  
In show of thanks for all the plenteous store,  
That flocks and fields to their content hath boar.   

Habell gins to show his grateful mind,  
Seeks all the flock the chiefest Lambs to find,  
The first fall'n fruits, the goodliest fat and fair,  
That all the World cannot with them compare,  
The golden prize that jason brought to Greece,  
From C●●ch●s Isle was not so fine a fleece,  
As each of these upon their backs did bring,  
To fleede and cloth in Earth the greatest King.   

He brings them freely with a willing heart,  
Even glad with them and all the rest to part,  
And lays them down before the God of might,  
Both in his fathers and his brother's sight,  
Offering them up a sacrifice most pure,  
Unspotted clean his sinful soul to cure,  
Implores th' eternal praying ever still,  
For to be pleased thus to accept his will,  
As a mere figure and a (sacred) Type,  
Of that dear Lamb whose blood away shall wipe,  
The scarlet sins that in the Earth shall flow,  
With Isop wash, cleanse them as white as Snow.   

The Prayers, speeches, heavenly grateful words,  
The inward heart and meaning all accords,  
The ascending savour, sweet perfuming scent,  
With that pure Lamb which in the same is meant:  
Climes up the Air and mounts to God above,  
An Offering free, (accepted) full of Love,  
Which thing to show that he was partly pleased,  
His anger past, and all his wrath appeased,  
Just at that instant down from Heaven did shine,  
A burning fire and sacred light (divine)  
Which in their sight conveyed the Sacrisice,  
Of from the Earth, up to the lofty skies,  
" When presently a voice was downward cast,  
" This I accept for thine offences past.   

Cain more for show then either Love or zeal,  
To God, Religion or his own soul's weal,  
Stands by beholding of the sacred light,  
And voice (divine) down from the Prince of might,  
Expecting that his formal sacrifice,  
Stuffed with all Guile, Hypocrisy and Lies,  
Ambition, Pride, base Covetousness accursed,  
Yet thought his gift should he accepted first,  
As coming from the eldest first borne Peer,  
The Son and Heir, whom Adam loved dear.   
 

Medusa (damned) in foul black ugly ,  
That all the world most deadly hates and loathes,  
Swollen (like a Toad) her looks cast down to hell,  
Where none but fiends, and hateful monsters dwell,  
Whose cursed hair about her shoulders falls,  
Powdered with Serpents full of poisoned Galls,  
Hissing and crawling round about her head,  
Hatched by a Viper in her womb that bred,  
Rends up the Earth ascendeth like a Ghost,  
Conueyes herself into the promised coast,  
By Paradise where Cain was sacrificing,  
Some of his corn his double heart disguising,  
Watches the Time when as she thought most best,  
And winds her close in his dissembling breast.   

No sooner she was in his heart acquainted,  
But his best blood was with her venom tainted,  
His veins swollen up and all his body puffed,  
His Head, Heart, Lungs (infectuously) were stuffed,  
With Envy, Malice, Wrath and deadly Rage,  
Nothing could now his stomach fell assuage,  
Finding no ease, his countenance falls down,  
His cankered mind discerned by his frown,  
Now Father, Mother, Brother, none he brooks,  
That Heaven itself takes notice of his looks.   

Since first the light from darkness was discovered,  
Or that the Clouds within the Air have hovered,  
The Heavens and Earth, the Sea and all begun,  
And Phaeton his endless Race hath run,  
About the World in twice twelve hours right,  
Or silver Cynthia showed her pale faced light,  
Never was seen a more delightful day,  
The glittering Sun in burnished bright array,  
Nor Heaven (it self) more pleasing ever smil'de,  
Then when the brothers on Loves Altar piled,  
The Sacrifice before their Father's face,  
To God above within that holy place.   

But when Medusa from Hell's deepest vaults,  
Began but once to spy man's secret faults,  
And from her Den in dark Oblivion penned,  
The bowels of her Mother Earth had rend,  
To come aloft into the open Air,  
With her foul breath, infectious poisoned hair,  
And Rags (most base) as late before I told,  
To seat herself in Cain's securest hold.   

Then Heaven and Earth, and all began to change,  
The winged clouds about this Ball to range,  
The burning lamps within the firmament,  
Seemed for to wink as if their oil were spent,  
The glorious Sun to hide his glistering face,  
Ashamed of Envy in a sacred place:  
And all at once most fearfully to lower,  
To threaten tempests or some sudden shower,  
When instantly on Cain's dissembling head,  
A sable cloud from all the rest out shed,  
Began to stand himself and all just under,  
Hearing this voice out from a dreadful thunder.   

" False Hippocrite, how canst thou simulize,  
" Before my face thy actions fowl disguise, 
Gen. 4. 6. 7.   
" To think that I which all the World adorn,  
" Would thus be fed with riff-raff of thy Corn,  
" Or yet in blood to satiate myself,  
" To live as thou by base and Earthly pelf,  
" And not conceive that Holy thing is meant,  
" Within the same which gives me full content?  
" Why is thy Soul thus pestered with a sore,  
" Rankled, bespaked, like a rotten core, 
Simile.   
" Thy conscience, deeds, false envious mind so bad,  
" Thy looks cast down, and countenance so sad?  
" Dost thou not know that if thy heart be right,  
" Thy actions good and pleasing in my sight,  
" That thou shalt be accepted best and more,  
" That other wise sin lieth at thy door?   

" Think on my Words, halt not within my sight,  
" I am that God which brings the Truth to light  
" Amend thy life, at cursed Envy hisse,  
" Repent thyself of what is done amiss,  
" Let her not once be harboured in thy breast,  
" Nor in thy Heart her baneful poison rest,  
" Redeem the Time, behold the lofty skies,  
" Where Love and Mercy for offences lies.  
" One comfort more than thou deservest I give,  
" Thy Brother yet shall at thy service live:  
" Thou like a Lord shalt overrule him still,  
" And his desire according to thy will,  
" Shall subject be, devoted ever stand,  
" To run and go with (joy) at thy command,  
" But yet take heed, do not too high aspire,  
" Go (sinne no more) and add no coals to fire. 
Caveat.    

The Heavenly voice down from the Clouds descending,  
In these sad words sweetly divinely ending,  
The day cleared up, and Sol began again,  
To show his face upon the sacred Plain:  
The Air all still, the lofty Winds quite calm,  
Adam and Abel singing of a Psalm;  
Cain's sacrifice alone upon the ground,  
Untouched at all still to their view they found,  
Whereat (with joy) to see the God of power,  
To smile on one, and on the other lower:  
To veil his face unto their sinful sight,  
Hearing his voice out from the dreadful light,  
Home they depart in wonderment and peace,  
Minding a while from further work to cease▪  
Whilst Cain alone retireth discontent,  
Forsakes his God, and to the field he went,  
His envious mind still runs on his disgrace, 
First Apostasy in Caine.   
False to be found before his father's face,   

All working Power, deep searcher of the Reins,  
Discerner of the in ward heart and Veins,  
What secret Art can from thy sight be hid?  
Thine Eye still saw what either Brother did,  
How just art thou and full of mercies sweet,  
The eyes of all are cast down at thy feet;  
The greatest men and Monarches of the earth,  
The first borne seed, and noblest in their birth,  
The proud Commanders in their formal coats,  
The homebred Sheep thou dost divide from Goats:  
The eldest Brother, youngest in thy sight,  
Are both alike, so that their hearts be right,  
No outward form can make thee partialize,  
Thou look'st upon the inward sacrifice,  
Beholding Abel's willing gtatefull gift,  
Which thou art pleased up to the Clouds to lift;  
When Cain false hearted, though he was first borne,  
Him thou forsak'st, leaving his Gift forlorn.   

O woeful, fearful, is the dangerous state,  
Of every man so overswolne with Hate,  
Whom God by this cannot to good convert,  
But gives quite over to a storry Heart,  
Apostasy making a man to quake,  
God, Father, friends all utterly forsake:  
Prince, Country, Kingdom, all the Land in hope,  
To run perhaps unto the Turk or Pope,  
In discontent, for conscience, gain or pelf,  
To sell their souls unto the Devil himself▪   

Some to their shame have had small cause to boast, 
Mat. 12. 31. Luke 12. 9 10. Mar. 3. 29. Pro. 26. 11.   
Of this foul sin against the Holy Ghost,  
Accursed and damned of all that ever fell,  
But few I know, but quick went down to hell,  
Amongst the Devils in everlasting pains,  
Loaden with Bolts of heavy burning chains;  
Whilst those returned like to a Dog that gurnes, 
Simile.   
That back again unto his vomit turns,  
Or beastly Sow bemired in dirty tilth, 
simile.   
Clear water shuns to scour away her filth,  
But in a ditch with some unsavoury Boar,  
She lays her down far worse than ere before.   

How can we think or well conceive in heart,  
That those which once do from their country start,  
And shall distaste the grounds wherein at first,  
With Pastor's pure they were trained up and nursed, 
Heb. 6 4, 5, 6.   
That do renounce their Faith and every thing,  
Their Oath Allegiance to the State and King,  
And in this sin without Repentance fall?  
How of that man can there be hope at all,  
When as his case what show so ere he gain,  
Is but the same with cursed envious Cain?   

I must confess Repentance is a work, 
Repentance   
Of God's great love, which caunot lie and lurk,  
Within the Heart, but that it forth must shine,  
Like to a Light upon a Hill divine, 
Simile.   
Kindled by faith, a conscience clean and pure,  
That cannot once her former ways endure;  
But by good works doth blaze the same abroad,  
Without all Guile, Hipocricy or Fraud,  
Full of true Love, avoiding babbling suits,  
A Tree that's good is ever knownebi'th fruits. 
Mat. 12. 33    

But yet for him that from the Church is sold,  
And in his Heart is neither hot nor cold, 
Reuel. 3. 16.   
With God and Mammon can with both indent,  
Whose mind on mischief is full set and bend,  
That what he can into his hands doth get,  
And all is Fish which cometh to his net.  
That doth forsake his own Religion first,  
The same I mean wherein he hath been nursed,  
Inconstantly another shall embrace,  
What ere he think he is in woeful case.  
Well may one judge his conscience may be panged,  
For that one thing how many have been hanged:  
And he again that in his ripest years,  
Forsakes the same, as plain by Cain appears,  
And both of them he hath distasted quite,  
May be in's Age demned Pagan right.   

Besides examples in the Scriptures pure,  
Which aye shall last, eternally endure,  
Of cursed Atheists in their bitter gall,  
That julian like from God and Christ did fall,  
The Monster vile within the Gospel cursed,  
Which hanged himself, when all his bowels burst:  
And diverse others tedious here to name,  
Whose ends have showed just judgements to their shame: 
Act▪ 1. 14.   
Hath not Experience in this Age of ours,  
Branded Apostates of the heavenly powers,  
With fearful Vengeance woeful to behold,  
Upon the earth for being (impious) bold:  
As amongst many, infinite to write,  
But one near us in stead of all I'll cite,  
Whose scandal foul about the world is blown,  
His Story rife amongst us all well known.   

Faustus by name, by birth a German bred, 
The story of D. Faustus.   
Whose minor years were with Religion fed,  
In liberal Arts his mind but young did wade,  
A school Divine and Doctor after made,  
Trained up as well as ever man could be,  
In learning's Lore, and sweet Divinity:  
So was this Cain, the like was judas fell,  
All three no doubt with damned devils in hell.  
The foremost two with bolld their hands defiled,  
But this a man, which never hurt a child.  
How with a knife made he his veins to bleed,  
Then with his blood to write the devil a deed,  
Conveying Soul and Body by the same,  
To be tormented in eternal flame,  
Never repenting till it was too late,  
Damned, woeful, fearful, in a desperate state:  
Cursing the hour of his untimely birth,  
By God for saken, taken from the Earth,  
With exclamations, hideous fearful cries,  
Spirits, Ghosts, and devils about the house there flies:  
His brains thrashed out on every post and wall,  
Sad spectacle, dire, mournful, fearful fall,  
When soul, life, learning, all at once he lost,  
A woeful purchase to his painful cost:  
His bowels mangled carrion like (and tore)  
Imbrued in filth, and stinking poisoned gore:  
Next day tormented in this case, was found  
(By devils) cast out upon a dunghill ground.   

When once the Prince of darkness in the deep,  
By power divine, enjoined was to keep,  
And that the Serpent hateful and accursed,  
Was in the centre of the Earth down thrust:  
Their ugly spawn then hatched the vilest Elf  
That ever crawled, besides the devil himself,  
Fowl furious Envy, as but late I told,  
With viperous snakes about her head all rolled:  
And she again outfrom their baneful breath,  
Hath brought an Imp like ghastly fearful Death▪  
Limb of the devil still worse than all the rest,  
misshapen, vile, base Antichristian beast,  
Monster of Nature, false in every part,  
Apostasy with crablike crawling heart: 
simile.   
Contagious, fell, most dangerous in her tongue,  
From whom all treasons in this world first sprung:  
The hateful deeds which some have patched together,  
Under Religion, may be brought all hither;  
The secret actions infinite that lurk,  
Which in man's heart and gall together work:  
The poison, murders, every cursed rape,  
For whom this Earth doth yawn her mouth, and gape,  
Seeking to swallow, in her jaws devour  
Within the midst of her dark womb, to pour  
The actors damned under oblivions night,  
Not fit to breath, or to behold heaven's light:  
Base scum and dregs, the works of darkness first,  
Proceeding from Apostasy at first.   

But what make I with damned Atheists vile,  
My sacred verse with Antechrist defile,  
To rouse from hell tormented hideous spirits,  
Fowl ghastly Ghosts which all the world affrights:  
That my dear Muse should thus by friends be crossed▪  
From heaven of late within the deep be tossed.  
Hell's ugliest Monster to unmask, and lay  
All open thus, falling within my way,  
That little taste to every Palate yields.  
And all this while Cain wanders in the fields  
With passions working in his hateful breast,  
Sad, discontent, may in his face be guest:  
Revenge all bloody, with a poisoned dart, 
Revenge.   
Starts up from hell, enters within his hart:  
Base cursed Fury hatched by Envy first▪  
Apostasy this damned heil hound nursed:  
The masked train that all her life befriend her,  
Are Guile, Deceit, and Falsehood to attend her.   

This monster, Cain close in his breast did hide,  
With all the rest of that damned rout beside:  
And home returns as if he had forgot,  
The discontent of his discovered blot:  
The blur late made in his Religious cote,  
As out of mind he seems not now to note,  
But full of form and outward compliment,  
As if his mind was all to goodness bend;  
With much respect unto his father first,  
And duty showed to her his body nursed:  
Upon his brother (fawningly) he looks,  
And learns him then to make the shepherd hooks,  
To catch a sheep running with all her speed,  
And he again helps him his land to weed.  
Thus Cain continues for a certain space,  
Before his fathers and his mother's face,  
In outward guise, formality and speech,  
As if his heart had had no further reach:  
Until that Act▪ foul barbarous deed befell,  
Which makes me mute, almost afraid to tell:  
But that from God the same at first I heard,  
Described plain in his dread sacred Word. 
Gen. 4. 3.    

Cain but few nights in this bad meaning slept,  
For Fire in Flax can but a while be kept:  
And not long after as may well be guest,  
When father, friends, and all suspected least,  
Even than he takes Occasion by her lock,  
Singles forth Habel from his harmless flock,  
With flattering words trains him along to walk,  
The fragrant fields, holds him on still with talk,  
Until at last (Inhuman wretch) unkind,  
Base Villain cursed he stayed a while behind,  
To find a Leaver that he late had laid,  
Within the corn which wondrous heavy weighed.   
 

This on his shoulders up from thence he takes,  
His fatal way to his dear brother makes,  
Who all this while lay in a slumber sweet,  
Upon the grass resting his weary feet,  
Thinking no hurt, full of all Peace and Love,  
His mind in Heaven walking with God abouc;  
Which when the Caitiff (varletvile) had spied,  
No longer than he could his Envy hide,  
But with a blow on Abel's head down right,  
With both his hands, and all his main and might,  
The Leaver laid him in that woeful case,  
That Blood and Brains flew round about the place:  
And lest his deed might afterwards be found,  
He takes his body, rakes it up i'th' ground.   

Damned Miscreant, unworthy that thine eyes,  
Should once behold the clearness of the skies,  
What hast thou done unto thy brother dear?  
That thou shouldst thus about the corn fields leer,  
And watch a time to work that fearful fact,  
For which 'ttwere pity but thy neck were cracked.  
What art now the better to have seen,  
His crimson blood bedew'e the ground all green,  
His Body mangled, Skull to pieces beat?  
How canst thou (Vengeance) from the Heaven's defeat?  
Dost thou not see that all gins to lower,  
The Clouds to wrack, upon thy head to pour  
Down sulphery flames of hot consuming fires,  
The Sun for shame his glorious face retires;  
All to grow dark, the singing birds to weep,  
To see man brought thus to his latest sleep,  
The Furies lose the Devils from Hell to roll,  
Above the Earth gaping for this thy Soul?  
How canst thou think to hide thy cursed deed,  
When as the Fowls within the Air which breed,  
The creatures all presented to thy sight,  
Will murders show and bring the truth to light. 
Nemesis the Goddess of Revenge. Acts 28. 4.    

Great Nemesis the Lady of the skies,  
Without a Mask before her nimble eyes,  
On Pegasus the Horse of Fame doth ride,  
With justice Sword close to her valiant side,  
Scours through the Air just at that instant time,  
When as the steam of Abel's blood did climb,  
Up to the Heavens like to a smoke ascending, 
simile.   
The Clouds in sunder all betearing, rending,  
Casts down her looks upon his crimson blood,  
Beholds the gore like to a streaming flood:  
No longer stays but mounteth up the Throne, 
Simile.   
Of God above making a fearful moan,  
Tells all the cause discovereth this thy deed,  
Desires just judgement on thyself and seed,  
Imploreth all the sacred powers divine,  
That they would now but with herself combine,  
And grant her leave to take Revenge on this,  
So foul a murder as thy fact now is.   

Behold a voice down from the God of might,  
Revenger of the poor man's cause and right, 
Rom. 12. 19   
That seldom sleeps but in the Heavens he hears,  
The wrongs, oppressions, mournful cries and tears,  
Of Innocents' by greatness overswayed,  
By Guile and Treason oftentimes betrayed,  
Brought to their ends by the malicious guilt,  
Of Envious men that others blood have spilt,  
Wasted their State, consumed their lands and life,  
Swallowed their goods, contending still in strife.   

The sacred voice out from a thunderclap,  
Of dreadful lightnings at that hard mishap,  
Thus spoke to Cain hard by that fat all place,  
Where Abel's blood lay covered in that case,  
With clods and moulds as even but late I told,  
By that vile Wretch over his body rolled,  
" Come tell me Cain the thing I shall demand,  
" Seek not to hunt, on no excuses stand,  
" Halt not before me as of late thou didst,  
" When a false heart under thy coat thou hidst,  
" What mad'st thou here thus wand'ring all alone,  
" Where is thy brother, whither is he gone?  
" What is become of Habel▪ loved thee dear,  
" That next thy Parents was to thee more near,  
" Then all the World, and all that therein moved,  
" Whos's faithful mind thy presence ever loved.   

The graceless Villain impudently bold,  
As if he scorned of God to be controlled,  
Or asked a question from that heavenly lip,  
This answer strait out of his mouth let slip:  
I cannot tell, for what have I to do,  
To take account of Habell yea or no,  
Or in his presence to be tied to stay,  
Within the fields as heretofore to play,  
'tis like enough if that the Sun had shined,  
About the folds you might him chance to find,  
It may be that he's feeding of his sheep,  
Upon the downs or fallen fast asleep,  
Or else you may go look a little deeper,  
How can I tell, am I my brother's keeper,   

" Blasphemous Wretch, what hast thou done, quoth God,  
" Art not afraid of my revenging Rod,  
" But thus to spill thy dearest brothers blood,  
" Upon the ground in thy inhuman mood?  
" Why (Varlet) hast thou to my face belied,  
" How canst thou think thy fact from me to hide,  
" When as the blood of this thy Brother shed,  
" For Vengeance just upon thy murdering head?  
" Cried from the Earth making afearefull moan,  
" With piteous shrieks ascended up my throne,  
" That down I came from heaven above with speed,  
To give thee judgement for thy damned deed.   

" Cursed therefore art thou in thy chiefest worth,  
" Cursed from the heavens, and cursed from all the Earth,  
" That kindness showed her mouth hath opened wide,  
" Within her womb thy brother's blood to hide,  
" Hereafter now when thou the ground shalt till,  
" It shall not yield not yet thy barns shall fill:  
" With that increase which heretofore it gave,  
" To thy content that thou desirdst to have.  
" A vagabond upon the spacious face  
" Of all the earth, Roaming from place to place  
" With every Rascal thou shalt now cologue,  
" Base Runagate, no better then▪ a Rogue,  
" Thy days shall waste, thy glass shall hourly run,  
" Until the thread of this thy life be spun,  
" Content with peace, quiet, thou shalt have never:  
" A Scared conscience shall torment thee ever:  
" And in the end even in thy fearful sight,  
" Hell's Furies cursed before thy face shall light,  
" The damned devils with all their hideous rout,  
" Shall wind thee in, hemming thy Soul about,  
" Attending on thee till thine eyes be shut,  
" And so devour thee in their greedy gut.   

The sturdy villain with these last words stroke,  
In woeful fear his heart is well-nigh broke,  
Despairing quite of any help at all,  
To this sad speech doth (most profanely) fall.  
O who shall rid me from these torments fell,  
Hatched in the Bowels of the deepest Hell,  
Nurc't in my breast, harbourde within my hart,  
That now I feel much to my pain and smart,  
The Furies (damned) about my head I hear,  
My punishment is more than I can bear.  
A vagabond I am cast out this day,  
Both from the earth, and from thy face for ay,  
I shall be hid from all the world beside,  
Wretch that I am, which know not where to bide:  
My Father, friends, will ever after hate  
The foul disaster of my envious fate,  
And whosoever finds me one or other,  
Will murder me, as I have done my brother.   

The voice (Divine) left him not thus alone  
In Desperation, making of his moan;  
But from the Clouds, yet once again it spoke,  
Perchance for Habel, or his Father's sake:  
Go where thou wilt, for he that dares to lay  
Revenging hands upon thy head, for aye,  
Upon the earth, to murder, slay or kill,  
Which in his wrath shall seek thy blood to spill,  
That damned wretch both in his goods and fame,  
In life and death, and all that thou canst name;  
Even in his lands, his basket and his store:  
That man (I say) I'll punish seven times more.  
Because thou shalt not need that thing to fear,  
My badge (divine) for ever thou shalt wear,  
A fearful Sign, which whosoe'er shall eye  
But in thy face, my dreadful judgements spy,  
Shall see and know that I have marked thy hide,  
And branded thee from all the world beside.   

Great (powerful God) Creator of this Ball,  
The heavens and earth the firmaments and all,  
How good art thou, in every action just?  
Thou Abel's blood beholdest in the dust;  
Comest down below, examinst first the deed,  
To judgement than thou dost at large proceed;  
And lest the same might chance neglected be,  
Thou dost thyself the execution see:  
Searing cain's conscience, body, heart and liver  
And marking him (as now I told) for ever.  
Yet (holy Father) let us know the pith,  
The Badge and Sign that thou didst brand him with.   

Some men there be which think the mark of Cain,  
Was that foul, horrid▪ irksome, fearful pain,  
Scabbed Leprosy, or woeful falling Evil,  
As if possessed with some spirit or Devil:  
Or shivering, shaking of his sturdy joints,  
That every way his body reels and points,  
Fears, quavers, trembles in that dreadful case,  
As most of us have seen before our face:  
Or some such thing apparent to each eye,  
That every man may his foul fact espy,  
Yet what it was, who sound this  abbisse,  
When Reason blind leads every man amiss.   

'tis true, the▪ world in every State's Dominion,  
Is now of this, and then of that opinion;  
For none alive (which on the Earth do well)▪  
Can show what 'twas, or yet for certain tell,  
But by conjecture (likeliest) to be guest,  
The ground and sum of all men's judgements best,  
Revealed by study in the Arts divine,  
To all the Sisters, learned Muses nine,  
That cain's most fearful punishment and mark,  
For raking up his brother in the dark▪  
Was that his skin was all to blackensse turned,  
Like to a Coal within the fire half burned. 
simile.    

Ah cursed Cain the scourge of all thy Race,  
Now thou hast got a black and murdering face,  
For God above (in justice) hath ordained,  
Thy offspring all should to this day be stained,  
Unto the grief and terror of their Souls.  
For laying Habel in could dusty moulds:  
No other cause the world could ever tell,  
To make them look as if they came from hell,  
Amongst the devils at every step to start,  
The fatal place where thou (vile wretch) now art.   

Some have alleged out of their brains and wit, 
Alex Prob. Celius Rhod.   
The Sun himself to be the cause of it,  
That in the hot and torrid burning Zone,  
Under the line there Phaeton alone  
Must drive his Cart and team a little hire,  
Or else again the world would be on fire,  
The heat extreme their bodies doth inflame,  
Their flesh it parches, and their stomaches tame,  
Their blood it dries, their humours all adust,  
As if their skin were overgrown with rust:  
If this be true, how is it that there be  
In Africa, America, to see  
Under the line both people white and fair,  
As many men that now in Europe are,  
There borne and bred by courteous Nature's laws,  
A pregnant Sign that cannot be cause.   

Again, the Sun with labour great and pain,  
If that the line but once he doth attain,  
Though to the Earth he seemeth somewhat nigher,  
Yet in his Sphere he mounted fare more higher,  
More temperate there, the people live and well,  
Then do the men under the Tropics dwell,  
And twice a year he useth there to burn,  
When once a year (i'th' Tropics) serves his turn.   

And other men have other Reasons found,  
To show the cause which to like purpose sound:  
There be that say, the dryness of the Soil,  
May be the cause that doth their body's foil,  
To make them look worse than a Collier's Elf, 
simile.   
Much like the Devil and cursed Cuine himself,  
From top to toe, from head unto the foot,  
As if▪ with grease they were besmeared and soot.   

Unto such men I would but know and try,  
If the Libyan deserts be not far more dry,  
Whose people parched, the very Sun doth roast,  
Yet are they white or tawny at the most,  
The want of water with the Sun and Sand,  
May be the cause that they so much are tanned:  
But yet in Negro land the people have,  
Of water store in every ditch and Cave:  
For Niger great, even from his very source,  
Just through the midst hath ever kept his course,  
And all the land on every side and round,  
Even like to Nilus overflows the ground,  
The dryness of their Reason we may wave,  
Because 'tis known they water plenty have.   

Those that ascribe it proper to the Earth,  
And see us there even from our very birth,  
How we and they are borne within one place,  
And we are white, and they are black and base,  
May sit them down and well may take a pause,  
To think with us that cannot be the cause.   

And some there be which to this day affirm,  
That 'tis the blackness of the Parents sperm,  
To be the cause and for a ground it take,  
But how came they so close a search to make?  
If it be black, which some men have denied,  
How came it so Imprinted on their hide,  
That in their youth just in their prime and bud,  
Then is their skin as red as any blood▪  
And in their age when perished is their sight,  
From top to toe they are all yellow quite,  
And if you try to throw one in a ditch,  
To wash him white, he'll be as black as pitch.   

Others there be above the clouds do fly,  
To search the secrets of their destiny,  
Whose wits and learning sure must wander fare,  
To a Constellation or some fixed Star,  
I would the cause they would unto us teach,  
And not to fly to fare above our reach,  
Until which time I shall be well content,  
To think it was Gods righteous punishment,  
On cursed Cain, and all his offspring lewd,  
For doing that which I before have showed.   

I must confess upon the upper face,  
Of this wide Ball almost in every place,  
Variety we see in strange attire,  
Complexion, Colour, Nature and Desire,  
Shape, gesture, face, the belly, limbs and back,  
But none more differ then the white from black,  
The Indian borne there where the Sun doth rise,  
Is palefast (Ashey) with red flaming eyes,  
The American which we but late have seen,  
Is Olive coloured of a sad french green,  
The Libyan dusky in his parched skin,  
The More all tawny both without and in,  
The Southern man, a black deformed Elf,  
The Northern white like unto God himself:  
And thus we see, even still upon the earth,  
God shows his works both in our lives and birth.   

The fatal place where Abel's blood washed, 
Esay. 7. 8.   
Is called Damascus, Aram's chiefest head,  
gem of the Earth, the eye of all the East,  
Pearl of the World, where jupiter did rest,  
In Syria Land, the goodliest City seen,  
And sister to (jerusalem) the Queen, 
Eze. 23. 4   
Sweet Paragon, a royal Empress borne,  
That all the World with glory didst adorn,  
Until the second Habels dearest blood,  
Ran down thy streets like to a crimson flood, 
Simile. Titus in josep. & Adri. Aelius.   
Then was thy fields with blood and slaughter died,  
And made the Stage to all the World beside,  
Whereon fierce Tyrants in their barbarous hearts,  
With murdering minds have acted all their parts.   

So hath Damascus seldom been at rest,  
Whose fatal name betrays her bloody breast,  
When Benhadad, Hazael, Rezin, fierce, 
2. King 16 9   
The scarlet sinews of her Heart did pierce,  
There were the Titans murdered by the Blade,  
Of jupiter, that all their army laid,  
In such a sleep as till the Earth be shaked,  
By power divine will never more be waked,  
Great Babylon, the Tyrant of the East,  
The Saracens and Egypt in her pierced,  
Brave Pompey won it in sad mournful sort,  
And Tamburlaine, he made them all amort;  
jerusalem, which loved her dearly well,  
Even in her streets hath told her passing Bell.  
Haalon, the Tartar in his lowering war, 
Ch. Adricom. Theatrum ●ter sanct.   
Within her bowels made a fearful scar:  
The Persian, Grecian, Christian, Roman last,  
The cruel Turks have all their fortunes cast,  
And filled the Air with piteous shrieks and groans,  
Piling up heaps of dead men's Skulls and bones,  
As if the place where Abel's blood was laid,  
The burial ground of all the World were made.   

Even as the blood of dear Adonis slain, 
Simile.   
By cruel Mars, fair Venus' love to gain,  
Stained all the ground, bedyde the crimson grave,  
That powers divine willing his worth to save,  
From dark Oblivions black forgetful night;  
Which smothers all in silence from the light,  
With Nature joined to bring forth such a sign,  
As shall for ever to all Ages shine,  
In memory of that detested fact,  
Which murdering Mars did in his fury act:  
Upon the body of that lovely youth,  
Though some perhaps will hardly think it truth,  
But rather by the ancient Poets feigned,  
Yet they I say have to this day ordained,  
That from the blood of dear Adonis young,  
The Safron▪ flowers of all the Earth first sprung▪   

So may I say that from the scarlet blood  
Of Habel shed, like to▪ a crimson flood  
Within the midst of rich Damascus plains,  
When Cain unkindly pashed out all his brains.  
It pleased God to his immortal Fame,  
That still the Soil should testify the same  
With fragrant flowers, adorning all the ground,  
As no where else in all the world is found:  
That some have thought by this vile deed accursed,  
The Damask Rose sprang from his grave at first.   

Ah dearest Muse, here in this world of woes,  
Mongst Tigers fell, and cruel barbarous foes,  
Prodigious men, (Inhuman) in their minds,  
Devouring Beasts that all to powder grinds  
The Infant's face, the Innocent to hurt,  
The Lamb to tear, and throw him in the dirt.  
How blessed are we, which have such wholesome laws,  
To keep us safe out from the murdering paws  
Of rancorous men, that in their deadly rage  
Would (else no doubt) strait shorten all our age,  
By macerating blows to wound and brain,  
And spill our blood, as did that damned Caine.   

But yet we cannot say, that we live free  
From as fowl sins, and hateful treachery:  
Now Murders, Treasons, envious deeds begun,  
Must close be kept, and privately be done.  
We dive to Hell and sound the deepest pits,  
Ransack the Graves, and use our utmost wits  
To find a Devil, or some small sugared Gall▪  
To witch a friend, or poison him withal:  
Or else perchance, if we do hap to fail▪  
As some there be, will not set all to sale▪  
Yet that which curbs them from this damned use,  
I mean the Law, how do they it abuse,  
Making the same the poor man's feet to tie,  
The instrument of all their villainy?   

How are some men by greatness over swayed,  
Their Lives, Lands, Goods, and all they have betrayed:  
The Football made, tossed up and down by foes,  
Turmoiled and vexed, plunged in a world of woes,  
Never at Peace, forced all their state to sell,  
Unfortunate by envious men to dwell:  
Clapped up in Prison, all their days to spend  
In wrangling, jangling, brangling to no end.  
There is the Law where Purses well are lined,  
To wrong the weak to satisfy their mind,  
The loving Wise, the self same course must run,  
The Children small all utterly undone.  
When once man's heart infected is with gall,  
How doth it then to all foul vices fall?  
Baines the whole house, leaving them all forlone,  
Much better fare if they were never borne:  
Then here to live (subjected) toiled with pain,  
But near the door to some fell envious Cain▪   

Yet sacred Muse, even in this mortal life,  
The judgement, just of those delight in strife:  
Thou often seest upon their heads to fall,  
Some break their necks off from their horse and all,  
And some there be which wanting of their will,  
Have sought themselves their own heart blood to spill,  
With Poison strong hastened their way to death,  
Or with a Rope strangled their cruel breath:  
Used all ill means to make away their lives  
To children's grief and terror of their wives,  
Raving, invoaking, all the Damned fiends,  
That all the world takes notice of their ends.   

Others there be that touched before their death,  
With some remorse lie languishing in breath:  
Out of this life cannot at all depart,  
Till they have craved forgiveness from their heart,  
To ease their soul their conscience over panged,  
Have sent for those whom they before have wronged  
Confessed the Truth desired them all to pray  
To God above for to be pleased to lay  
No further torments, (judgements) full of fear,  
Upon their backs then they can well-nigh bear.   

Those that run on their current with the tide,  
And all their life in envious courses bide:  
Dear Muse thou know'st their lowering day is near,  
When pale faced death shall to their eyes appear.  
Then shall the devil take them within his power,  
With ghastly looks even at that dismal hour:  
Torturing their souls in everlastling woes,  
Heaven's just Reward for all damned envious foes.   

Mean while the joys that are laid up above,  
For those delight in quiet Peace and Love,  
Which have been wronged with Patience much enurde  
Earth's stormy brunts have to their pain endured,  
That yet do live suffering the woeful smart,  
Vexation, grief, trouble of mind and hart,  
And to their end like Christian Martyrs bold,  
Hold on their Race, as I before have told,  
How is there in the Heavens above the line,  
A sacred Crown of purest gold most fine,  
inlaid with gems and orient Pearls of worth,  
More richer fare than all upon this Earth, 
jam. 1. 12. Reu. 2. 10.   
Preserved for those, and laid up safe in store,  
When all theirfoes must stand without the door,  
In endless pains with all the Devils of hell,  
And they with God above the clouds shall dwell,  
Possessing there this conquering crown of life,  
Free from all care, vexation, trouble, strife▪   

To muster here upon a Sacred stage,  
The Murders, Treasons, Plots in every age,  
Injurious dealings, treacherous actions, base,  
Sly cunning traps to grind the poor man's face,  
Vexations, wrongs, fell viperous projects vile,  
As bad and worse than those which do defile,  
Their fowl black hands in Christian crimson blood,  
Waste others State to do themselves no good:  
The damned rout of hell spurred Furies cursed,  
That from Cain's fact took all beginning first,  
Would tyre my Muse, and weary all your ears,  
Amaze your thoughts, and fill you full of fears:  
With Wonder strike you as a man half dead,  
And set your hair upright upon your head,  
To see since first this world by God was framed,  
The envious deeds not fitting to be named:  
But Time divider of each day from night,  
Will all disclose and bring the Truth to light,  
Successively shall lay them open all,  
Just as Occasion in my way may fall.   

Mean while (dear Muse) let us retire again,  
To show the life of cursed envious Cain:  
And tell what course after this deed he took,  
How round about on every side his look  
Was fearful gazing, lest his father's eye  
Might glance that way, and so the fact espy,  
And see God's judgement on his branded skin,  
His black foul face for this vile murdering sin.   

Ashamed, and shameless barbarous wretch unkind,  
From thence he goes, leaves Habel dead behind:  
Steals out away, and pries in every nook,  
For fear his fact should be bewrayed by's look:  
At length by chance as he was lingering late,  
He finds his sister by his father's gate,  
Takes her away, even in the evening dark, 
simile.   
As doth a Kite a simple harmless Lark,  
And when (Alas) she could not well descry  
His foul black colour by her clouded eye.   

His speech she knew, which made her willing more  
To leave her jewels, kindred, and her store,  
And go with him then all the rest beside:  
She little thought his hands with blood were died. 
Simile.   
All night they walked, talking of this and that,  
She lovely fair, he like an ugly Bat  
That shuns the light, is neither bird nor beast,  
Of both partakes, (a monster) at the least:  
Or like to those that in our days do high,  
From us to Rome, from thence again do fly,  
And little care so they may have their will,  
men's Souls, their Lives, their State and all to spill,  
As was the case of that damned murdering rout,  
Which from Hell's bowels brought their treasons out,  
Until at last with wand'ring weary grown,  
And want of sleep together both lay down,  
Whilst he even then, lays open all his mind,  
Tells her his love he minds with hers to bind,  
That she shall be the Object of his eye,  
His darling dear from her to never fly,  
By means of which adulterous flattering wild,  
Incestuously he gets her there with child.   

But when Aurora, glory of the World,  
Heaven's candle bright about the Earth had purld,  
And but began to show a burnished face  
Upon these two, in that polluted place:  
From slumbering sleep his Sister sudden waked,  
Starts up and cries, most fearfully she quaked,  
So foul a sight by her was never seen,  
Thinking the devil in shape of Cain had been:  
Upright she stands, her hair upon her head,  
Roused in the light from her adulterous bed,  
Feign would she run (wishing herself at home)  
Cursing the Time when she from thence did come,  
And glad would be no longer here to stay,  
But that from thence she knew not well the way.   

Like to a Lady in an evening dark, 
〈◊〉.   
Walking alone within her pleasant Park,  
Thinking to meet her loving husband dear,  
Her father, brother, or some welcome Peer;  
Is by a villain suddenly surprised,  
In shape, speech, gesture all of them disguised:  
Carried away, trained on a long to walk,  
Misdoubts no hurt in all his treacherous talk,  
But freely spends the sable lowering night,  
Her joys, toys, pleasures in her love's delight,  
Until the morning of the day appears,  
Draws wide heaven's Curtain, all the skies it clears,  
And makes her see how she hath been misled,  
By folly, guile, brought to an unknown bed:  
Weeps, mourns, laments, teareth her Amber hairs,  
Raves, frets, and grieves, as one distracted stairs.  
That once her body lovely chaste and pure,  
Should now be stained thus by a wretch impure;  
And that her corpses when Heavens bright Candle winked,  
Should be but found close to a Monster linked.   

So may we judge was this young Virgin's case,  
Trained (as I told you) from that lovely place,  
Where father, friends, acquaintance all she had,  
To cast her fortunes on a Varlet bad:  
Damned homicide, dame Natures ugliest mark,  
To be betrayed thus treacherously i'thdarke:  
The unblown Rose defended by the thorns,  
Vermilion blush that both her cheeks adorns,  
Chaste, modest thoughts to give the soul content,  
When these shall be all each in sunder rend,  
Deflowered, defaced, by treason cropped and stained,  
To have i'th'end none but a Mongrel gained.   

Thus in a maze astonished all the while,  
Cain looketh up, and on her face doth smile,  
Gently entreats, persuades her not to fear,  
The Sun burned colour that his skin did bear:  
Tells her his face was nothing else but tanned,  
With walking much about his new plow'd land:  
And that the colour on his face which lay,  
Would clean be washed and scoured all away.   

She him believes, and so from thence they went,  
Like Vagabonds without a passport sent: 
Simile▪   
Roaming about, until at last they found,  
A pleasant, sweet, delicious, dainty ground,  
Just to the East, hard to the lowering face  
Of sacred justice in that Orient place,  
Far from their Friends, their Country, Church, and God,  
To live with ease within the Land of Nod,   

Hear first they stayed, and to secure their state.  
They built a house of timber, stones and slate,  
Turf; Mortar, Dirt, and every thing they find,  
They pile up close to keep off showers and wind,  
And at the length as if they were afraid,  
That after wards their lives might be betrayed,  
By savage beasts, in humane monsters feil,  
Such as himself hath hatched below in Hell,  
Revengeful Tyrants, murdering men and all,  
About his house he builds a spacious Wall,  
And in the same he life's for many years,  
His conscience stuffed with horror, dread and fears,   

At length his Wife brings forth her first borne child,  
A bloody Elf, deformed fowl and wild,  
Like to the Sire, so is his picture drawn, 
Simile.   
Brought up to swear, cheat, cozen lie and fawn,  
No God to know, his tongue to curse and fret,  
With envious face, for like doth like beget,  
And he again his sister rude doth take,  
Makes choice of her to be his only make,  
That she and he and all the rest beside,  
Which in that place within the walls did bide:  
The cursed spawn of Cain's adulterous race,  
Did in short time sooverswarme the place,  
With multitudes of that incestuous rout.  
Polygamy from this vile Race sprangout,  
That in seven hundred twenty years and ten,  
Their hateful stock grew to a world of men,  
This was this Age that Cain did live some say, 
Genebrard ●x Rab. sol.   
When then began his fatal lowering day,  
For justice always in man's life or death,  
Will yet at length her flaming sword, unsheathe,  
Lamech the fifth, from his own blood descended,  
With one hard blow his vital life strait ended:  
Just judgement of the Highest ever still,  
To make the blind to execute his will,  
That though man runs unpunished all his days,  
Yet in the end he pays him many ways,  
And when the least of all his time he thinks,  
Then is he caught, under God's vengeance sinks.   

For as the rabbis of the jews do tell,  
This monster Cain about these parts did dwell,  
And was the first that ever City built,  
Led thereunto by his fowl murdering guilt,  
More to secure him in so strong a Wall,  
And shun the curse then any thing at all,  
Even where sin most of all the earth was bred,  
He lays him down and makes that place his bed,  
There wallows, tumbles, spends his aged days,  
In wicked works ten thousand kind of ways;  
When at the last he for a beast was slain,  
By Heaven's just Act in treacherous Tubal-Caine,  
Guiding the hand of Lamech being blind,  
To murder Cain against his father's mind,  
And Tubalcaine had his just Guerdon paid,  
For Lamech struck him that all dead he laid,  
His bleeding corpse upon the cold green ground,  
What they wrought others, they themselves have found.   

The City Cain by Henocks name did call,  
His eldest Son whom most he loved of all,  
Some say the same by Libanus was framed,  
But afterwards by others (Oenus named)  
And some affirm the building jesca lead,  
Great jebab Mauly were his only deed,  
And Tehe, Celet, Cities six in number,  
Were razed by him with such a world of lumber,  
As in our days those that behold the place,  
May see their ruins in Cain's woeful case.   

You Cities all, how were you framed at first?  
But in the sin of wicked Cain accursed,  
Was not your Mortar tempered with the blood,  
And slaughter vile of righteous Abel good?  
Is not the Earth her bowels rend and torn,  
Your walls to build and lofty towers adorn?  
Great Thetis lap is all besliced and cut,  
To bring forth treasures in your wombs to put;  
The lofty Ceders, Timber Trees of worth,  
Are hacked down flat, and levelled with the earth,  
Base gold and silver that man's mind appalls,  
Where doth it rust but in your cankered walls?  
How are your streets with Parricides bepestered,  
With noisome Air (contagious) foully festered,  
So banesull grown, that from you, all or some,  
Hell's Antechrist the Prince of Devils shall come.   

So Babylon the tyrant of the earth, 
Dan. 7. 8.   
And Rome Usurper since her Popish birth,  
How were they built but in the crimson gore,  
Of thrice ten millions of men's souls and more,  
Nimrod the hunter of God's fearful flock,  
First razed that Tower which seemed the heavens to mock  
By tyrannising on the feeble weak,  
As in my work heereafrer I shall speak,  
And Romulus the monster of his age  
How did he murder in his barbarous rage,  
His brother Remus, in whose scarlet blood▪  
Rome first was built by Tiber's treacherous flood,  
And since the sink of superstition made,  
For every wretch within her walls to trade,  
Idol of Nature sprang at first from hell,  
As afterwards I shall have cause to tell,   

But what make we (deareMuse) within the walls,  
Oftraiterous Towns and Cities full of brawls,  
Where nothing savours wholesome, sweet and fair,  
But earthly bad to putrify the Air,  
Let us retire into the country coats,  
To hear heavens birds to chirp ten thousand notes,  
About the woods on every side along,  
Sweet Nightingales to warble forth their song,  
The Jennet, Lark, the Blackbird, Thrush and all,  
How night and day their smooth sweet tunes do call,  
Melodiously unto the God offame,  
To sound forth praises to his glorions name,  
And where our Grandsire Adam last was left,  
When Cain his brother of his life bereft.   

Whether the Soul of Abel's body slain,  
By the cursed hand of treacherous damned Cain,  
His Genius spirit Angel, blood, or Saint,  
Or God himself did Adam first acquaint,  
With the sad news of this so vile a deed,  
Or that suspicion in his breast might breed,  
Abroad he walks, and finds the bleeding quarre,  
Of Habell slain under a fatal star,  
Weeps and laments▪ grieves to have lost his son,  
Cain, Daughter, Brother all of them undone,  
He loving Father piles a wondrous heap,  
(Colossus like,) of massy stones not cheap, 
Simile.   
And with much care his dying name to save,  
Builds a huge Mount upon his crimson grave,   

From thence as one distracted for the time,  
With deep conceit of this so foul a crime,  
Surcharged with sorrow, overgrown with grief,  
He hates the place as Author of it chief,  
And with his Wife and all his children left,  
He bids adien unto the ground and wept,  
Travels along like to a Pilgrim poor,  
Or as a Hermit with small litlle store; 
Simile.   
Till at the last, it was their chance to stay,  
In Canaan, and there their bones to lay,  
As in this rugged, ragged, rural verse,  
I hope ere long (divinely) to rehearse.   

But sacred Muse, here we must stay awhile, 
seth borne.   
And with Seth's birth the posting time beguile,  
That sweet borne Babe of Heaven itself befriended,  
From whom the Church is lineally descended,  
Just as a hundred twenty years and ten,  
Of Adam's age into this world of men,  
He was begat, Type of that promised Lamb,  
To save the World, into the World first came,  
Preaching Repentance all our lives to mend,  
Whose Government shall never earthly end,  
Until the Trumpet in the skies shall sound,  
To summon souls from their dead sleep i'th' ground:   

How did the Heavens even in his infant birth,  
Rejoice and dance about the Ball i'th' earth,  
Melodiously their sacred Organs went,  
To see young Seth into the World thus sent,  
In Minor years their fortunes on him showered,  
And on his head their dearest blessings poured,  
Enduing him with towardness and wit,  
That on his temples all the Arts did sit;  
About his Brows the Laurel wreath have wound,  
As the first man that ever letters found,  
How did the Saints at this thy Fortune smile,  
" True Israelite in whom there is no guile. 
joh. 1. 47.    

Thy manly▪ days they were not overswayed, 
Gen. 4. 26. Chap. 5. 34.   
With fond conceits but in Religion stayed,  
Envy, Opression, Lust, and Rauine base,  
Within thy heart could never find a place,  
Nor yet the thought of any deed unkind,  
Can once be found to harbour in thy mind,  
But full of peace like to thy father dear,  
Or God himself in all his works most clear; 
Simile.   
So art thou blest to bring forth such a Son,  
From whom the Church successively must run,  
True Picture of thy Body Mind and Thought,  
Enoch the man to God himself that brought, 
Enoch borne.   
thou sacred flock which wand'ring almost lame,  
And taught them first to call upon his Name,  
By prayer, preaching, Heaven blessed dearest Muse,  
Which on the Sabaoth they did daily use.   

Yet some do say the Church again did fall,  
In this man's days to wicked vices all, 
Brough. Mart. Luther. Caluin▪ Tremelius. Perecius upon Gen. 4. 26.   
That Sethes great son, and all his future Race,  
Did now begin (dumb Idols) to embrace,  
And that their rites and sacrifices slain,  
Were all intended unto Charles his wain,  
The Sun and Moon▪ the Stars about this border,  
As blind Devotion led them out of order.   

Yet Enoch dear, my Muse can hardly think,  
Nor can it once within my Brains to sink,  
But that the Plant from whence rose Christ his flock,  
Did yield forth fruit according to the stock,  
And that the line from whence the Church is sprung,  
But that must be unspotted, chaste and young,  
Clean, undefiled, pure in every part,  
In Ages all according to the Hart:  
Even in the time when Adam and Wife,  
Lived both in peace, devoid of care and strife,  
And Seth their Son though all the rest were bad,  
Yet he the knowledge of the Godhead had,  
And taught it thee to leave unto thy seed,  
By which thy soul did hourly on it feed:  
Until the last of this thy Glass was run,  
Then didst thou dye and leftest it thy son,  
And so from thence in every Age it passed,  
Till Noah's Ark was on the waters cast,  
Successively from whence it after went,  
Till Christ himself upon the Earth was sent,  
And that the Cross (with crimson blood) was died,  
To pay the sins of all the world beside;  
With such a Ransom of eternal fame,  
As evermore must always blaze his Name,  
From whence the Church now in her latest night,  
In many a place yet hath her Candlelight.   

Full ninty years thou livedst at the least,  
When Kenan was conceived in the breast, 
Kenan born●▪   
Of thy dear Spouse and thou wast all the while,  
Quite out of hope, not seen at once to smile,  
In desperation as a man for lost,  
Till thy first Babe into the World was borne,  
Thy name bewraying of thy discontent,  
When Kenan be to glad thy heart was sent,  
And made thee Father of a thriving son,  
Whose actions all unto thy mind did run.   

He at the age of threescore years and ten, 
Psal. 90. 10, Mahalaieel. borne.   
(In David's days, the dying age of men)  
Did then beget great Mahalaleel young,  
A sweet faced Imp with nimble pleasing tongue,  
Whose whole delight was working ever still,  
To praise the Lord and execute his will:  
Whilst by examples void of envious guile,  
By smooth sweet preaching in a golden style,  
And beating down Oppression, Pride and Hate,  
The Church's eyes he did illuminate.   

Just at the age of four years and five,  
Adam and Eve yet being both alive,  
Great▪ Mahalaleel son of Kenan past,  
He ●ared brings into the world at last, 
Iared borne.   
Whose whole delights were all to goodness bend,  
As if that he was from the clouds down sent,  
To cheer up Eve and Adam in their Caves,  
And comfort them unto their happy graves.   

He long time life's the chastest man of all,  
Love's darts were thrown but at a brazen wall,  
Until at length it sank into his breast,  
The Church's Line upon his Race should Rest.  
Then doth he pause, and unto marriage go,  
Just at a hundred threescore years and two,  
And in the strength of this his body high,  
Begat a child which never lived to dye.  
Enoch the seventh that ever yet was bred, 
Enoch borne. Gen. 6. 24.   
From whom the Church doth now derive her head,   

But Enoch stay, I cannot but admire,  
The chaste condition of thy reverend Sire,  
To live so long within so prime an Age,  
When every object as a pleasing Page,  
Might ravish sense, allure the chastest eye,  
With looks more clear than is the purest dye,  
And when the Angels if the Book be true, 
Book of Enoch   
Came down from Heaven their beauties all to view.   

Great powerful God what can I think or speak,  
When all my wits are for this point to weak,  
But to conceive thy glorious Angels bright,  
How they can be entangled with the sight,  
And pleasing looks of this fond sinful sex,  
Though framed as 'ttwere out of the Virgin's wax.  
Yet drawn (entiste) to every thing is ill,  
Even as occasion works unto their will.   

I know some think their weak opinions sound, 
Viues Euseb. Lactan.   
That in those days few women chaste were found,  
But that Pride, Envy, Lust, Dissembling, Guile,  
Did their white hands with all foul things defile,  
And that the Devils with Lucifer which fell,  
From Hell arose with woman kind to dwell:  
By which their seed against (dame) Nature's laws,  
Prodigiously thus mixed was the cause,  
To bring forth Monsters in that fearful case,  
Huge Giants tall of Gog and magog's Race, 
Eze. 38. 23. Reuel. 20. 8.   
Such as not now can any where be found,  
For whom the world was shortly after drowned.   

Others there be that think the Angels bright, 
Tertullian. Sarazens l. 3. 5   
Which then stood pure before the most of might,  
With twelve great Princes of their royal band,  
Came down from Heaven, in lareds' days did stand,  
Upon the top of lofty Hermon Hill,  
There cursed and vowed for to obtain their will,  
Upon men's Daughters which their eyes had seen,  
Sweet lovely fair, delightful, young and green,  
And that the Mount from that time forth was named,  
The Hill of Hermon as not once ashamed,  
That their foul plot to this vile Hydra grown,  
Should by the name still to this day be known.   

Semixas great, which was their chiefest Prince, 
Book of Enoch jude. 6. 9 14.   
Dissuaded first from this foul cursed offence,  
Fearing the tortures of the Angels all,  
Their sins and shame upon his head would fall,  
Till by Arachiell and the rest all ten,  
That in this place my Muse is loath to pen:  
He gave consent, and so from thence all went,  
Even as their minds on Hermon hill were bend,  
But God above soon sendeth (Michael) down,  
Who binds Semixa with a sacred frown, 
Reu. 12. 7. 8, 9   
Chains him in hell and all his of-scum Race,  
Ties to the hills as Fairy Goblins base,  
The rest and all the self same cup do taste,  
Heavens four Archangels these foul fiends so waste,  
That all Earth's monsters sprung from hell at first,  
Must by the flood be washed away and cursed.   

A third opinion that our Age doth yield,  
In this large, goodly, ample, spacious field,  
Amongst the Arabian, Christian, Turk and jew,  
Which sounds to reason (likeliest) to be true.   

Is that Seths' issue from the Church derived,  
Though in the depth of learned Arts they dived,  
And seemed God's Sons (adopted) sweet of face,  
Yet linked themselves in Cain's adulterous Race,  
By which their Spawn from this vile mingle mangle,  
Began with Pride (contentiously) to brangle,  
With griping paws to satiate their fill,  
The harmless child's poor weak man's state to spill:  
Most barbarously to trample on the head  
Of the chaste Virgin to deflower her bed:  
To feed on gore (inhumanly) to tore  
Man's flesh in pieces, gnaw his bones all bare,  
And tyrannise, the great to wrong the less,  
To act those things which all the world may guess.   

Out from this Medley sprang those Giants first, 
Gen. 6. 4. 5. 12. 13.   
Monsters of men that made the Earth accursed,  
Base devilish minds with big aspiring looks,  
When as a man his neighbour hardly brooks,  
But sheds his blood squeeseth the flesh and gall,  
Licks up the gore worse than a Cannibal,  
Nature (prodigious) in their mongrel birth,  
Made them adored, yet demi Gods on earth:  
Whilst fear restrained the weaker men in awe,  
To Idolise against her sacred law,  
They spend their days to tread the self same trace,  
Or worse if may be in this barbarous case,  
That in the end with Brazen coats of mail,  
They tempt the heavens and seek the clouds to scale,  
To pull down God from his triumphant throne,  
By their damned Pride and hellish power alone.   

Thus whilst oppression overflows the world,  
The little men still by the greater hurled,  
Their states consumed, their lands and life's all spoiled,  
Their cause (though just) by greatness crossed and foiled,  
Themselves by others (basely) bought and sold,  
And hardly used as I before have told:  
Adam he grieves at this accursed Race,  
Eve she laments with discontented face,  
Both prostrate fall before the God of power,  
To take their souls and send them happy hour.   

So dearest Muse here in this mortal life, 
The Author.   
That swarms in troops of those delight in strife,  
Which never rest till all my state be spent,  
But at my Ruin all their aim is bend,  
How could I wish that my last days were come,  
Or that my foes were Cardinals of Rome,  
Or that my Peace which (almost) cost the best,  
Of Lands and Life, to live in quiet rest;  
Were granted me, I cared not which of all,  
But in my way would (fortunately) fall,  
So should I rest, no living man annoy,  
Or to the Heavens translate my soul with joy.   

But why do I cast stones against the wind,  
Thus to disclose the secrets of my mind,  
To wail my woes, lay open all my grief,  
My foes wish well as Authors of it chief,  
And all this while no comfort yet I have,  
But still fell Envy more and more doth rave,  
To wound my Soul with such inveterate hate,  
As murders all to swallow up my State.   

O pardon me, God may an Angel send,  
To work my Peace, or else some welcome friend,  
Convert my Foes, their Conscience touch with fears,  
Or bring my Cause unto my Sovereign's ears.  
Oh then how joyful shall that happy hour  
Be to my Soul, more sweet than sweetest flower:  
And glad me more than if I (treasures) found,  
The greatest Riches on this Earthly ground:  
My future life shall warble (sacred) lays,  
To sound my God, and then my Sovereign's praise.   

But Adam (yet according to thy mind)  
Thou dost God's love and all his favours find,  
Though in thy youth thou wastuntimely croft,  
When Paradise was by thy folly lost.  
Thy first borne sons before thine eyes both slain,  
Thy daughter stole, thy days to end in pain:  
And worst of all, that these vile Monsters base  
Should but descend and come from this thy Race:  
That thou shouldst live but to behold the sins,  
The wrongs, Oppressions, in th●…●…nd gins,  
The Horrors, Griefs, Vexations hourly fall  
Upon the heads of this thy of spring all:  
And last, these Giant's heavens blue veil to rend▪  
To tread in blood without all hope to mend,  
Made thee desire that thou thy wish might'st have,  
To come (in Peace) to this thy welcome Grave.   

God hears thy cry, and sends his Angels bright,  
Clad in white garments of heavens sacred light,  
Attired like Nymphs of chaste Diana's train,  
With glistering wings a Crown of life to gain,  
All to be spangled in rich costly gems,  
From the crowns top, unto their skirts and hems,  
With Laurels wreathd close to their Temples chaste:  
And Trumpets dangling by each lovely waste  
These all came down thy sorrows to assuage,  
In thine nine hundreth thirty years of Age,  
To guard the souls both of thyself and wife  
From this world's care, vexation, grief and strife:  
Of from the earth, up to the lofty skies,  
When they have cheered and clozd up both thine eyes.  
Then all their Trumpets in the air doth sound,  
From Heaven's blue wall down to the lowest ground,  
Melodiously about the clouds resounding,  
The hills and dales (with Echo) all rebounding,  
Till at the last they brought both safe and sure,  
Two welcome souls into God's presence pure.   

Seth yet survives, grieves for his parent's loss,  
Mourns, weeps, laments, at this sad heavy cross:  
So he conceives the Love of two such friends,  
From this world's point, unto herutmost ends:  
On every side of all the Earth and Round,  
Can hardly well be parareld and found.  
He sheds salt tears, down from his cheeks distilling,  
Plaining his woes, showing himself unwilling  
To part with both, stoops down (oft times) and kisses  
Their dead pale lips, and from his soul he wishes  
That his life's blood (dear tender hearted Seth)  
Had gone before, and but excused their death.   

His friends (come in) and brothers, sisters all,  
Some cheer him up, others to weeping fall;  
Even as we see the case (oft times) our own,  
The loss of friends to cast our courage down,  
Amate our minds, and makes us veil our face,  
Knowing that we must tread the self same trace.  
Then up they take their withered bodies dead,  
Imbalme them both, and wrap them close in lead  
But first with Nitre Orient spices meet,  
And Mummia, Cedar, fragrant, rich and sweet,  
They all perfume, and dress their bodies cold,  
Then wind them up as I (before) have told,  
And lay them (seemly) on a Sable Hearse,  
Sad heavenly sight, a bleeding heart to pierce,  
To see the Parents of the total world  
(Before their eyes) thus up to nothing curled.   
 

Four of Seths' brothers on their shoulders take,  
The Sable trunk, and so from thence they make  
Procession like, a solemn sacred way  
To calvary, upon our Lady day:  
For as the Church doth evermore begin.  
Since God heavens crown for all our sakes did win,  
Upon that day to count the Christian year,  
So some still say he did man's body rear,  
Out of the dust, just at that instant hour,  
The day and time in which himself did pour  
His holy Spirit in the Virgin's womb,  
And did therein the second Adam tomb▪  
And true it is that Adam (framed by God)  
Lived years complete, no months nor days as odd,  
By which we gather that that very day,  
They were both buried wrapped up cold in clay.   

The Ceremonies and the sacred Rites,  
The form and manner (all my Senses) cities;  
Which Seth then used and holy Henoch pure,  
Draws on my Muse (as with a golden lure)  
To sing the same unto all future times,  
In these rude, ragged, harsh, unpolished rhymes::  
But that my course another way must bend,  
As one that travels near his journey's end,  
And that my Muse may chance for to be cursed,  
When this shall grow and swell beyond my first.   

But yet one thing I may not overslip,  
And leave the Vales, up to the Mounts to skip:  
For certain 'tis that evermore the jew,  
Hath steadfast held his own opinion true,  
And he affirms the likeliest place of all:  
This goodly spacious, wide, delicious Ball,  
Where Adam's corpses was by his children laid,  
Was not i'th' mount, as late before I said,  
But in the sweet and dainty pleasant vale  
Of Hebron plain, hemmed in with such a Rale,  
And lofty border of brave mounting Trees,  
With fragrant Flowers to feed the honey Bees:  
And all Heaven's gifts upon this holy ground,  
As search the world the like was never found.   

Here afterwards was Sarahs' body laid,  
Both Abraham and his son Isaac stayed: 
Gen. 23. 12. 4. 7. 9 16. 17. 18. 19 20. Cha▪ 25. 9 10. Cham 35. 29. cha. 50. 13.   
Rebecca, jacob, Patriarches and all  
Were here interred (as in a Brazen wall)  
And many a jew wrapped up within this plain,  
That till Doom's day shall never rise again.  
This is the place that Abraham admired,  
Which more than gold his very soul desired,  
And made him purchase on his bended knee,  
That with his Fathers all his seed might be.  
And there remain until the trump shall sound,  
Then rise together from that holy ground,  
And so mount up the throne of God above,  
And scale the Heavens upon the wings of Love..   

But yet dear Muse amongst the dead men's graves,  
With piles of skulls in hollow vaults and caves,  
Ghast (fearful) sights, we must no longer stay,  
But post with speed to some more pleasing way,  
Though all the Earth be but the sink of sin,  
For Adam's Race to (tumble) wallowin:  
Yet is it better every way beside,  
With living men then with the dead to bide.   

Show therefore now what afterwards befell,  
How most men lived, worse than the devils of hell:  
In blood, oppression, feud and deadly hate,  
Base cruelty to waste each others state,  
Making no conscience of th' eternal Law,  
When Adam's dead, that kept yet some in awe:  
The Father, Mother, Sister Friends and Brother,  
Like treacherous Wolves devour up one th' other,  
Each▪ man cries out, the little ones as fishes,  
Can scarcely live to serve the great men's dishes,  
All sin abounds from poor to men of worth,  
Like to a Stream which overflows the Earth, 
Simile.   
Or general deluge from great Neptune's hand,  
That on a sudden overflows the Land,  
In such abundance with that powerful sway,  
That nothing now can this main current stay:  
But Heaven's great Maker of Earth's total frame,  
If he descend and but behold the same,  
When least of all the World shall thereof dream,  
Then may he Altar, turn their tide and stream.   

'tis true as then they had no Law beside,  
The Law of Nature in their Conscience died,  
Graved in their hearts, and stamped within their mind,  
By him whose Image in our Souls we find,  
The sin the less yet not to be excuzed,  
When God himself hath in our Breasts infused,  
Both in our birth succeeding infant youth,  
His holy Spirit to lead us in all Truth.   

But yet if God so sharp a judgement took,  
As shall be showed hereafter in this Book,  
Upon these men the monsters of their time,  
Whose haivous sins up to the Clouds did climb,  
What may we think of this last Age of ours:  
Wherein we live not many days nor hours,  
Yet we exceed the former Ages all,  
And God to judgement ready is to call,  
The Glass near run man's dated Time expired,  
Doom's fearful day when all things must befired,  
Draws near at hand Earth's candle light doth blink,  
When all the World must under justice sink;  
And give account of every action past,  
This Age of ours it cannot long time last.   

For now Oppression overflows the Earth,  
Fare more and worse than in her Infant birth,  
Fowl Cruelty, Extortion, Envious Pride,  
Hypocrisy and smooth faced sins beside,  
I etting and masking under formal Coats,  
That hard it is to know the Sheep from Goats,  
The Puritan which hates the name of Mammon, 
Act. 2. 44.   
Is yet content to hold men's goods in common,  
And all the rest in this my tedious task,  
When Time shall serve I hope for to unmask,  
Mean while Rome's Wolf hath entered in our Isle,  
Devoured some by Craft, Dissembling, Guile,  
Base Covetousness the monster of our Age,  
How doth she creep upon the Grave and Sage,  
When Money sways, and Charity is cold,  
What is it not, but some will do for gold?   

O Plague, O Poison, hatched in Hell below,  
Thy baneful Breath o'er all the World doth flow,  
The Earth itself within her bowels penned,  
Her proper womb is ripped for thee and rend,  
The (sacred) lap of Thetis cut and slic'st,  
Above the clouds with Beelzebub thou fliest,  
Thou gnaw'st the minds of holy men like Mice, 
jer. 6. 13 Chap. 3. 10. 2. Pet. 2. 3. Eclus 40, 12.   
Thy sight doth sting worse than the Cockatrice,  
How hast thou spoyl'de corrupted in all Ages,  
The purest minds of greatest Personages?  
Whose Servants painted with foul leprous Kibes,  
Now sell their souls and all they have for bribes.   

Like cursed Gehazies base polluted paws, 
simile▪ 2. King. 5. 22. 26▪ 27.   
Which wronged his God, and holy Master's laws,  
And runs apace to catch into his hands,  
A little gold to purchase Nabaoths lands,  
Perchance to hang upon his gaudy back,  
When Wife and Children starved at home may lack,  
Or else to spend in drinking drunk and play,  
'Mongst beastly Wbores to cast the same away.  
But God above that spies the inmost thought,  
Discerns the fact which is in secret wrought,  
Upon the top of damned gehazy's head,  
Showers down his judgements as Elisha said,  
And in an instant all his body o'er,  
From top to toe is pestered with a sore,  
An Irksome Scab upon his skin doth grow,  
A Leprosy as white as any snow,  
Nor this alone unto his body sticks,  
A mates his mind and seared conscience pricks,  
But all his kindred best acquainted friends,  
Forsake him quite and none unto him sends,  
And to this day his offspring and his Race,  
Are leprous tainted in that cursed case.   

Father of Lights, and God of Spirits all,  
Power down thy justice let thy judgements fall,  
Upon the hairy Scalps of those that wrist,  
Dishonestly their Friends or Neighbour's beast,  
Their goods, their Lands, their living or their life,  
Not satisfied, continue still in strife▪  
Great God that all the world may see thy good,  
Taint thou their Issue offspring and their blood,  
These are the Cankers of the common wealth,  
Base Caterpillars polling best by stealth;  
That never care so they may have their will,  
men's blood their lives their state and all to spill:  
If thy good pleasure says my prayers nay,  
Thy Will be done, Lord fat them for thy day.   

But holy God, what will become of those,  
Which in an open public place shall choose,  
To give occasion first to show their gall,  
Do call a man both this and that and all,  
And afterwards shall lie upon the catch,  
Their friend's estate, into their hands to snatch,  
By Deeds, Conveyance, Obligations, Bonds,  
To wring and wrest, to make them sell their Lands,  
Before such time as any thing is due,  
To clap up such with Cerberus his crew,  
In woeful prison sick to lie and rot,  
Not once to case, assawge their griefs a jot;  
And all the while in Equity and Right,  
There's nothing due but what is got by might,  
By Wrong, Oppression devilish traps and guile,  
And wicked plodding in such actions vile.   

Lord pardon them, forgive their great offences,  
Call once again, illuminate their senses,  
Waken their careless too secure a slumber,  
Forget their faults too infinite to number,  
Let them Restore what they have wrongly got,  
Else will those goods consume away and rot,  
And aye the Infant yet unborn will cry,  
For Vengeance just on their posterity.   

But let not us (good Lord) O let not us,  
Trace out their steps to give examples thus,  
Make us avoid to fall into the like,  
Lest suddenly thy judgements do us strike,  
With fare more terror on our bodies known,  
Then ever was upon Gehezi shown,  
Or all thy chosen people thou didst make  
A warning sad for us (in Time) to take,  
Besides the loss (eternal) of thy Grace,  
Where such a one shall never see thy face.   

But chaste Urania, Sovereign of my Muse,  
In whom the Heavens do their best gifts infuse,  
Why dost thou now thy love so fare engage,  
As to descend down to our times and Age,  
Leaving the world that at the first was drowned,  
To ramble out, beyond thy scope to sound?  
Damned Vice, unmask with those that wrist and lurch,  
And all this while (thus) to forget the Church.   

Retire again, and stay not with us long,  
Thou mayst be blamed for this thy wholesome song,  
For 'tis most true one hardly▪ 'scapes of▪ ten,  
That hunts the Fox too near the Lion's den.  
Avoid, begun, contend not much with these,  
For fear perhaps thou dost some men displease,  
And so incur some danger on thyself,  
For taxing those which are in love with pelf:  
Come to the Church dear Muse, where last of all  
Thou Henoch leftest upon this goodly Ball.  
There thou art tied; O do not much abound.  
Take sanctuary in their holy ground:  
And from these things till time shall serve surcease,  
Then shalt thou Rest and live in perfect Peace.   

Henoch the seventh from Adam's pupillage, 
Gen. 5. 21. jud. 14.   
At sixty five years of his manly Age,  
Begat a child whose like was never found,  
From this world's birth in all her spacious Round,  
That lived to see so many weeks of days  
As this man did, and yet no strength decays:  
Methuselah the wonder of his time,  
Whose age may claim of all the earth the prime,  
Which lived to see with Simeons' heart inflamed,  
The Ark of Noah before his death all framed; 
Luk. 2. 25. 26. 27.   
Type of that Church which from mount Zion purled,  
When Caesar's sceptre swayed the Western world.   

Methuselah both ancient, grave and sage,  
One hundred fourscore and seven years of Age,  
All chaste doth live, and then begets a Son,  
Upon whose death the world was quite undone,  
Lamech the father of that faithful child,  
Which saved sevens Souls, and all the rest beguiled,  
When that the Ark was by the waters heaved,  
O then they knew their wits were all deceived.   

Great Noah's self from lamech's loins descended,  
When full one hundred eighty years were ended,  
And that the Sun had four times crossed the line,  
Then is he borne, and in his birth did shine,  
Like to a glimpse of that all sacred light, 
Simile.   
Which in these days may dazzle all our sight:  
His name fore-tiping from his mother's breast,  
That he was borne to be the Churches Rest. 
joh 1. 19    

Five hundred years (or near upon) he passed  
His manly days both continent and chaste,  
And then espoused to his future Fame,  
A Noble, Fair, and courteous, lovely Dame,  
Some think the sister of great▪ Tubal-Caine, 
Genebrard. in Cron▪ jew Rab.   
Sweet Naamah his love at first did gain.  
Though from the Line of cursed Cain descended,  
Yet of the Heavens she was so highly friended,  
As that her Lot before the world was drowned,  
Fell lucky forth within the Church's ground.   

Oh God thy works are fare beyond our reach,  
The least of them may all our Senses teach:  
Thou hast thy sheep dispersed in every place,  
From henoch's, Seths' and Cain's proud envious Race:  
It is thy pleasure bad men's sins to pay,  
To save (some yet) and cast not all away,  
The Flowers oft times which do 'mongst Cockle grow,  
May smell more sweet than any plant we sow.  
And tender Seeds out from the Popish Seat,  
May yet at length prove Ears of perfect wheat,  
Chief when Noah God's husbandman shall till,  
And work the ground according to his will,  
With pruning, planting in that form and manner,  
As was the Church once under Caesar's Banner.   

So Abraham was out from Chaldee called, 
Gen. 12. 28. Chap. 12. 2. Cha▪ 41. 42. 43 44. job. 1. Exod. 2. 5. 6. 11. 13. 15. Hest. 2. 17. cha. 7. 6. 10.   
And joseph great in Egypt's Court installed:  
job in the land of Us amongst those men,  
Where so he lived that grieves my soul to pen:  
And Moses mild amongst the murdering sort,  
Was nursed, brought up within king pharoh's Court.  
Hester the Queen, that made her foes a scorn,  
Was married, (tide) unto a Pagan borne.  
And Paul them: elfth ' Apostle of us all,  
Yet first was bred within proud Tarsus wall:  
And diverse others which my Muse could name,  
Were trained up thus, and yet deserved no blame.   

For he that builds upon the slippery sand,  
Yet Time may serve to make his fabric stand,  
And these were such as from the rest reculde,  
The weaker sex are by the greater ruled,  
Though some (perhaps) have tried the same and mist,  
Yet wise men still do wind them as they list.  
As by example, from Noah's happy choice,  
This world of ours may ever just rejoice,  
To have a mother without blur or stain,  
When all were lost to store the Earth again.   

But what make we (dear Muse) with Noah's wife,  
Chaste Matron, grave preserver of our life?  
Whose Fame deserves heavens azurd richest gown,  
A garland decked and Laurel wreathed Crown,  
And in her lap the Frame of all to hold,  
I fall were made of solid beaten gold,  
What if she be derived from the Race,  
Of cursed Cain, yet hath she better face▪  
A Conscience clean, Religion in her breast,  
Within whose Soul Heaven's dearest gifts do rest,  
Type of the Church now to perfection wrought,  
Which was at first but out of darkness brought.   

Look back again, and post not one too fast,  
For fear thou be'st beyond thy compass cast:  
Tell what befell to Adam's issue left,  
What misdemeanours all his offspring kept,  
Each man his neighbour deadly hates and wounds,  
Sin overflows (in every place) abounds,  
The greater still devouring up the small,  
That in the end th' oppressed blood doth call  
For vengeance just unto the God of Powre,  
Who doth descend, and on the world doth lower,   

Reputes himself that ere he did begin,  
To frame the same thus poisoned all with sin,  
Whose true repentance from his eyes did draw,  
That stream of tears which woefully they saw,  
When all the Earth could scarce support, contain  
The Inundation of his furious rain;  
But sunk, shrank in, under the water diues,  
As loath to save the wicked treacherous lives,  
Of hateful men that never lived at Rest,  
But when they blood spilt on her (crimson) breast.   

This was the cause which made the Clouds to drop,  
Sad sudden showers (down) from Dame Nature's shop,  
And all the fountains of the greatest deep,  
To be broke up o'er all the Earth to creep, 
Gen. 7. 11.   
Heaven's Windows open, the rattling Air to sound,  
With fearful storms like to a Chaos drowned, 
simile.   
Rumbling and tumbling, jumbling all together,  
As we have seen in sudden sulphery Wether,  
God's voice to tear (Heaven's Curtain) to our wonder, 
Psal. 29. 23   
Out from a dark black horrid dreadful thunder.   

But yet before God doth to judgement pass, 
Esa. 40. 67 simile. 1. pet. 1. 24. psal. 90 56 simile.   
He meditates, and sees that man's but grass,  
Like to a flower that in the morning cut,  
Is yet ere night with their dead bodies put,  
Into the Grave, and so consume together,  
Even in a Moment changed hither thither,  
Dried up to nothing by Heavens altering time,  
When (yesterday) they flourished in their prime.   

God reascends, and lets the world alone,  
taketh Enoch up that lived therein to moan,  
Wail, grieve, lament, the abuses which he saw,  
Committed were against the conscience, law,  
Of noble Nature in that sinful age,  
Small hope to mend when all could not assuage,  
The furious current of their stream and tide,  
Too good (sweet Saint) with these foul men to bide.   

The Angels bright, and all the powers divine, 
Enoch taken up▪   
Before thy face in glittering Robes do shine,  
Their number more than are the stars and sands,  
With golden Censors in their pure white hands,  
Winged with Fame to mount the highest Heavens,  
Ranck it all in order mustering just by sevens,  
Descending sweetly on thy lovely Breast,  
To bring both soul and body to their Rest,  
By safe conveyance in a Chariot framed,  
Of burnished gold, the Horse with love inflamed;  
Mount up the Air with stately stomach fierce,  
And at the last the brazen Wall doth pierce:  
Where like a Prince that Paradise had gained,  
Of Eve and Adam thou art entertained,  
With fare more love within so brave a field,  
Then all the World and all therein can yield,  
There thou dost live when they are wrapped in dust, 
Gen. 5. 24 Judas 14.   
The seventh from them, Type of our Sabaoth just.   

Now thou art gone what can be here expected,  
But Envy, Hate, with all good deeds neglected,  
Pride, Cruelty, Extortion, overrules;  
Making the Earth Vermilion died with gules,  
And sable shows of foul inveterate spleen,  
Hatch it in Hell's vaults whose like was never seen,  
Before this time so strongly to abound,  
And overflow the Universal Round,  
As that small hope there is at all to mend,  
Till God to justice shall from Heaven descend,  
And view the world not as he made it first,  
But as it is polluted, stained accursed,  
Contagious, vile in Cain's adulterous race,  
And endeavoured with all damned actions base,  
When what we should not in our paws we get,  
As bad and worse as ere I told you yet.   

But cease dear Muse for thou at large hast laid,  
Their sins wide  and all their spite betrayed,  
Vnmask it the Brows of all that wicked Rout,  
Which dived to Hell to bring their plots about,  
The rest preserved I mean those Children dear,  
That live in Love and worshipped God in fear,  
Whose blood ascended, Mounted up the sky,  
And for just Vengeance at his Throne did cry.   

God hears their moan and re-descends again,  
And sees that Sin the total Earth did stain,  
In stead of Flowers and wholesome pleasing fruit,  
He finds but Weeds and barbarous actions bruit,  
The weak poor man still by the greater cast,  
In far worse case than when he viewed it last;  
Now Cruelty doth grind the Infant's face,  
To swallow all with griping projects base,  
Corruption, Bribes, the World itself doth fill,  
From Sodoms' Vale to Zions sacred Hill,  
Comes near the Church to enter in her walls,  
To fill it full of deadly poisoned galls.   

But one man living on this spacious Round,  
From Sols first sight till where his team is drowned,  
In all the Earth's large goodly plenteous scope,  
From Colmogro unto the Cape of Hope,  
That God could find to have an upright heart,  
Which from his Love could not be drawn to start,  
By ill examples of that froward Race,  
Which overswarm'd (the World) in every place,  
With Guile, Oppression, Cruelty and Hate,  
As in this Work I told you of but late.   

Him God selects and (graciously) culls out,  
From the rude Rabble of that murdering Rout, 
Gen. 19 16 24, 25 Psal. 34▪ 6, 7 19 22 Psal. 83. 35.   
As in the days when Sodom was destroyed,  
Just righteous Lot was not at all annoyed,  
But well brought forth by Angels safe and sure,  
Preserved was from their cursed hands impure,  
The harmless man may suffer extreme wrong,  
Amongst those men that are (perchance) too strong,  
In Wealth, Friends, Kindred, Combination, Coat,  
To draw sly oaths to cut the poor man's throat:  
Yet this may be a comfort to his soul,  
For all their tricks and treacherous actions foul,  
Damned Policies unto their utmost might,  
Although he fall, he shall not perish quite.   

So art thou just in all thy works O God,  
When the World feels the burden of thy rod,  
And heavy weight of thy all powerful hands,  
The upright man still (at thy mercy) stands,  
Although sometimes thou showst thy hinder part,  
To let him taste that which his mind thinks tart, 
Exo. 33. 23 1. Pet. 4. 12, 13, 14. Thes. 4. 6 Esay 26. 16, 17, 18, 19   
Yet as thy Word in many places saith,  
Thou dost but try to prove his utmost faith,  
And when (ofttimes) his courage fails and sinks,  
As brought near to their dangerous pits and brinks,  
Then dost thou keep him from their murdering power,  
Base, cruel, cursed, devouring, griping jaws,  
And full of Love, compassion, pity, grace,  
Vnuailsthy Brows to show thy glorious Face,   

(Ah dearest God) even whilst my Muse was working  
Upon this Place, how were my foes all lurking  
About my house, to undermine my state,  
With secret trains, close to my doors and gate.  
But thou didst wake when I was fast asleep,  
To make me know that thou dost always keep,  
Thy sheep from danger of a Wolf most fierce,  
Which in my blood (next to my state) would pierce  
Then didst thou give me at that instant hour,  
A Vision strange to show thy secret power,  
That in a dream when once my body waked,  
My inward thoughts and all my senses shaked;  
But Reason guides and sways me down her stream,  
To make me prise it 'bove an usual dream.   

Whereat I went, locked up my doors most sure,  
To keep me safe from treacherous paws impure,  
Which never yet in all my life was done,  
The hateful laws of cruel foes to shun;  
But (Heavenly God) when least I knew ofharme,  
How did they then about my house all swarm  
On every side, with raving speeches hot,  
Like Sodomites about the walls of Lot, 
Gen. 19 4, 5, 9, 10, 11.   
Till thou protectedst brought'st me safely out,  
From the cursed fury of that griping Rout;  
Struck them with blindness all like Tigers lay;  
While thou conveydst my body sure away,  
To sound thy praise, and blaze thy glorious name,  
To end (this work) to thy renowned fame.   

So dost thou now to make us all admire,  
Thy favour shown unto our reverend Sire,  
Descend to Noah the wonder of his Time,  
When Nemesis up to thy Throne did climb,  
To crave just Vengeance at thy hands for all,  
The blood shed, spilt, upon this spacious Ball,  
Told him an end of all men's barbarous lives,  
With the sad fall of their (incestuous) Wines,  
The cruel Race of monstrous Giants great,  
That like to Wolves (the flock) did tore and beat,  
And wound them so, as now not one was left,  
Besides himself, that from his birth had kept:  
His mind unspotted (Conscience) clean and pure,  
Not tainted, stained with every golden Lure,  
And every beast which on the earth doth feed,  
The fowls of Heaven that in the Air do breed,  
With all flesh living on this goodly frame,  
The young and old too tedious here to name,  
With those hard hearted which the weak annoyed,  
Should (by a flood) be all of them destroyed,  
And that himself would (altar) turn their glass,  
Before a hundred twenty years should pass,  
Those which repent in that time and space,  
Should respite have to find his love and grace,  
And all the rest within this boundless round,  
Should then be washed, consumed away and drowned.   

God wills him further to provide in time,  
Against the Flood that highest Mounts will climb,  
And frame an Ark for to secure his life,  
His children dear and tender hearted wife,  
From the fell furious raging tide, and streams,  
Of Neptune (proud) that undermines her seams,  
To pierce her joints and lay them open all,  
When blustering waves upon her sides do fall:▪ 
Maesia in Asia minor.   
Bids him go post to Maesia land with speed,  
And fell those Pines which now the world did need,  
whose wondrous height may dazzle all our sight,  
To see them grow two hundred foot upright  
Firm from the ground, and to be parted plain  
Into the three parts, and then unite again.  
Type of that Church, whose ground was laid by Paul,  
When three make one and one but all in all.   

So was the Ark divided into parts,  
To amaze the minds of true Religious hearts:  
Three stories high the same was fully framed,  
To hold the sorts of creatures wild and tamed,  
Made all of Pine, pitched both without and in,  
To suckor none that perished for their sin:  
And that the rest as God had just decreed,  
The Male and Female in the same should breed,  
To store the world, replenish it again  
With fruit more mild than first the earth did stain.   

The Ark once framed according to the form  
That God had laid before the furious storm,  
Fell crossly forth contrary to the mind,  
Of those great men, which did the weaker grind:  
They wondered all at this so huge a frame,  
Derided, scoffed, too bitter here to name,  
And at the last attempted barbarous rude  
Their hands polluted all with blood imbrued:  
To tear it down and make it but the scorn  
To all those men hereafter should be borne▪   

But God above perceiving that their pride,  
The total earth on every side had died,  
With crimson gore and that they meant outright,  
To spoil his Work, deface it utter quite,  
Pours down his judgements, sends those fearful showers  
That all the Air i'th' instant thunders lours,  
With sable clouds, and sulphery flames of fire.  
Tearing the Heavens, making the World admire:  
To see the Earth, the Air, Fire, Waters all,  
Flock altogether round about this Ball,  
join all as one even in an instant soon,  
To stop man's breath sending a night at noon▪  
Thatin a Moment all their lives are drowned,  
Their pride much like the Egyptian army found,  
That in the Sea upon the crimson sands,  
Against God's sheep heaved up their murdering hands,  
The Ark protected from their treacherous paws,  
Damned Envious fowl base cursed devouring jaws,  
Heaved from the Earth, upon the Water bides,  
Secure from hurt, when God her Pilot guides,  
Triumphant marches, in all storms it stands,  
Their unbelief bold impudence brands,  
With that just scourge, which if they had repent,  
All had been well, his judgements stayed and stented.   

Full sixteen hundred complete years were ended,  
And fifty six when God in sunder rended,  
The sable clouds, and made the Waters mount,  
To drown the World according to the count,  
Of all the Hebrews, glory of the Earth,  
Whose sacred stories of admired worth,  
Have purchased fame, and aye deserved well,  
Before the rest to bear away the Bell.   

Hear could I sing th' afflictions, sorrows, grief,  
Vexations, troubles, sundry mischiefs reif:  
That daily happened to Noah's sacred Ark,  
Tossed too and fro as is a little Bark.  
Upon the wings of (envious) Eol's rage.  
And some good men within this iron Age,  
The Surges, Waves, upon her sides all beat,  
The sturdy Rocks to split, her womb do threat,  
The Sands to choke, the storms to batter down,  
As all the Rest so she herself to drown.   

But still protected by God's powerful hands,  
Against the stream of all these rubs she stands,  
And on the Water's Waves, foul mischiefs all,  
She passes through, and views this spacious Ball,  
Until at last she chanced herself to ease,  
From the fell fury of the envious Seas,  
Upon the top of that admired Hill, 
Ararat. Gen. 8. 4.   
Whose worthy fame the total Earth doth fill,  
As more at large shall be described plain,  
In my next Book, when once (my peace) I gain,  
Mean time dear Muse, with Noah's sacred Pile,  
Let us but stay and rest ourselves a while.   
FINIS.