A PAEAN triumphal. COMPOSED FOR THE SOCIETY OF the Goldsmiths of London: congratulating his highness magnificent entering the City.  
To the Majesty of the King.  
By MICHAEL DRAYTON.  
Dicite io paean, io bis dicite paean.  
LONDON  
Printed for JOHN FLASKET, and are to be sold at his shop  
Paul's Churchyard at the sign of the black Bear. 1604.   

A Paean Triumphal.  
TO the vast skies whilst shouts and cries rebound,  
And buildings echo with reverberate sound,  
Struggling to thrust out of the peopled throng,  
Panting for breath flies our elaborate song.  
That time the day broke from her wont guise,  
The Sun in haste before his hour did rise,  
And drove the fleet-foote posting hours so fast,  
Which were afeard young Phaeton that was cast  
From his Siers Chariot, reobtained the Car,  
To set the neighbouring Elements at war.  
But whilst sweet Zephyre gently spreads his wings,  
Curls the sleek bosoms of th'enamoured springs.  
With Baulmie spices so perfumes each place,  
Breathing such odours in the morning's face,  
That the day seemed all former days to scorn,  
And (to compare it) ever should be borne.  
Saturn whose grim face clad in Icy hair,  
Thrust his bleak visage through the Northern air,  
That long had low'rd upon the drooping spring,  
With Frosts, hails, snows and Tempests minacing,  
Suddenly calmed, and his harsh rage resigns  
To smooth Favonius and mild Libick winds, 
The south and south-west wind.   
Whilst Temples stand even trembling as afeard,  
To see proud Pageants on their Arches reared  
Above their Turrets, whilst the concourse meet,  
Like boisterous tides in every public street.  
Windows of eyes, the houses scorned their glass,  
On every side their Majesties should pass:  
Rooms with rich beauties furnished about,  
Arras but serves to hang the walls without.  
Who loved in works of ancient times to pry,  
Hangings complete with curious imagery,  
Glutting his eyes here lively might behold,  
Faces whose numbers figures never told,  
Walling the houses, in whose several eyes  
joy shows itself in more varieties,  
Then be their minds, the objects that they see,  
Which are as various as their features be.  
The hie-reard spires shake with the people's cry,  
Bending their tops seem wondering to espy  
Streets paved with heads, for such the numbers be,  
The loftiest Tower no ground at all can see.  
Banners, Flags, Streamers, in such numbers borne,  
And stood so thick that one might soon have sworn,  
Nature of late some novelty had brought,  
Groaves leaved with silk in curious manner wrought,  
Bearing such fruit th' Atlantides did keep, 
The daughters of Atlas.   
By that fierce Dragon that did never sleep.  
When now approached glorious Majesty,  
Under a gold-wrought sumptuous Canopy.  
Before him went his goodly glittering train,  
Which though as late washed in a golden rain.  
All so embraudered that to those behold,  
Horses as men, seemed to be made of Gold:  
With the fair Prince, in whom appeared in glory,  
As in th'abridgement of some famous story,  
Every rare virtue of each famous King  
Since Norman William's happy conquering:  
Where might be seen in his fresh blooming hopes,  
Henry the fifth leading his warlike troops,  
When the proud French fell on that conquered land,  
As the full Corn before the labourer's hand.  
Ushering so bright and Angelic a Queen,  
Whose gallant carridge had but Cynthia seen,  
She might have learned her silver brow to bear,  
And to have shined and sparkled in her sphere,  
Leading her Ladies on their milky Steeds,  
With such aspect that each beholder feeds,  
As though the lights and beauties of the skies,  
Transcending dwelled and twinkled in their eyes.  
Here might you see what passion wonder wrought,  
As it invades the temper of the thought:  
One weeps for joy, he laughs and claps his hands,  
Another still and looking sadly stands:  
Others that seemed to be moved less,  
show'd more than these in action could express.  
None there's could judge a witness of this sight,  
Whether of two did take the more delight,  
They that in triumph rode or they that stand,  
To view the pomp and glory of the land,  
Each unto other such reflection sent,  
Either so sumptuous, so magnificent:  
Nor are the duties that thy subjects owe,  
Only comprised in this external show.  
For hearts are heaped with those innumered hoards,  
That tongues by utterance cannot vent in words:  
Nor is it all Invention here devices,  
That thy high worth and Majesty comprizes,  
And we not last of those glad hearts that prove,  
To show our Sovereign our unspotted love.  
The first a majors name worthily did grace, 
john Stow Survey.   
Marrying that title and Praetorian place,  
Was of our freedom, purchasing thereby  
That primate honour to our Livery.  
Native our love as needful is our trade,  
By which no kingdom ever was decayed,  
To bring slight gauds and womanish devices,  
Of little use and of excessive prices,  
Good home-made things with trifles to suppress,  
To feed luxurious riot, and excess,  
Sound-Bullion is our subject, whose sure rate  
Scaled by his selfeworth, such the Goldsmith's state,  
Which peace and happy government doth nourish,  
And with a kingdom doth both fade and flourish.  
Nature's perfection, that great wonder Gold,  
Of which the first note of our name we hold,  
Phoebus his God that triply doth imply,  
To medicen, Music, and sweet Poesy,  
To us his high divinity imparts,  
As he is known and glorified in Arts:  
For that invention study doth befit,  
That is the crown and purity of wit,  
What doth belong and's proper to the muse,  
We of all other mysteries do use,  
Moulds and insculpturs framing by the head,  
Forms and proportions strangely varied.  
The lump as likes the workman best to frame,  
To wedge, to ingot, or what other name,  
That by the sight and knowledge of our trade,  
Into rich Plate, and Utensils is made  
Within thy land, for ornament doth stay,  
Angels have wings and fleeting still away,  
And by eschanging virtuously doth fly  
That cankered, base, and idle Usury:  
For when the bank once subtly is placed,  
Th'exacted use comes hourly in so fast,  
That whilst the lender on the borrower prays,  
Good and industrious faculty decay.  
Fowl Avarice that triple Dog of Hell,  
That when Ioues son emperiously did quell,  
And from his hand received that fatal wound,  
His poisoned foam he driu'ld on the ground,  
From which they say as in the earth's despite,  
Did spring that black and poisoned Aconite:  
For they by fire that metals use to try,  
And find wise Nature's secrecies thereby,  
When they prepare industriously to shed  
Silver, disposed adulteratly with lead,  
Prove this base Courser from the other fine,  
Being so clear and aptly feminine,  
Steals from her pureness in his boisterous fixure,  
By the corruption of his earthly mixure,  
Which if Gold helping her enfeebled might,  
As a kind brother in his sister's right,  
By him her spirit is perfect and compacted,  
Which that gross body enviously detracted.  
Conscience like Gold which Hell cannot entice,  
Nor win from weak man by his avarice:  
Which if infused such virtue doth impart,  
As doth conform and rectify the heart.  
For as the Indians by experience know,  
That like a Tree it in the ground doth grow,  
And as it still approacheth to the day,  
His curled branches bravely doth display,  
Then in the bulk and body of the mine,  
More neat, contracted, rarified, and fine:  
So truth from darkness spreading doth appear,  
And shows itself more luculent and clear.  
Dunstan our Patron that religious man, 
In Cate●● Episcop●●   
(That great and famous Metropolitan,  
That in his time ascended by degrees,  
To Worster, London, Canterbury's Sees,  
That was in ancient Glastenbury bred,  
Four Saxons reigns that living flourished,  
Whose deeds the world unto this time containeth,  
And sainted in our Calendars remaineth  
Gave) what not time our Brotherhood denies,  
Ancient endowments and immunities:  
And for our station and our general heap,  
Resides in Lombard or in goodly Cheap.  
We have an Adage which though very old,  
'tis not the worse that it hath oft been told,  
(Though the despising ancient things and holy,  
Too much betrays our ignorance and folly)  
That England yields to goodly London this,  
That she her chief and sovereign City is:  
London will grant her goodly Cheap the grace,  
To be her first and and absolutest place:  
●are I proclaim then with a constant hand,  
Cheap is the Star and jewel of thy land.  
The Trophy that we rear unto thy praise,  
This gold-droped Laurel, this life-giving bays,  
No power lends immortality to men,  
Like the high spirit of an industrious pen,  
Which stems times tumults with a full-spread sail,  
When proud reared piles and monuments do fail,  
And in their cinders when great Courts do lie,  
That shall confront and justle with the sky:  
Live ever mighty, happily, and long,  
Living admired, and dead be highly sung.  
FINIS.