Licenced, March 10. 1678/ 9  
ROG. L'ESTRANGE.   

Order and Disorder: OR, THE WORLD MADE AND UNDONE. BEING MEDITATIONS UPON THE CREATION and the FALL; As it is recorded in the beginning of GENESIS.  
LONDON, Printed by Margaret White for Henry Mortlock at the Phoenix in St. Paul's Churchyard, and at the White Hart in Westminster Hall. 1679.   

The PREFACE.  
THese Meditations were not at first designed for public view, but fixed upon to reclaim a busy roving thought from wand'ring in the pernicious and perplexed maze of humane inventions; whereinto the vain curiosity of youth had drawn me to consider and translate the account some old Poets and Philosophers give of the original of things: which though I found it, blasphemously against God, and bruitishly below the reason of a man, set forth by some, erroneously, imperfectly, and uncertainly, by the best; yet had it filled my brain with such foolish fancies, that I found it necessary to have recourse to the fountain of Truth, to wash out all ugly wild impressions, and fortify my mind with a strong antidote against all the poison of humane Wit and Wisdom that I had been dabbling withal. And this effect I found; For comparing that revelation, God gives of himself and his operations, in his Word, with what the wisest of mankind, who only walked in the dim light of corrupted nature and defective Traditions, could with all their industry trace out, or invent; I found it so transcendently excelling all that was humane, so much above our narrow reason, and yet so agreeable to it being rectified, that I disdained the Wisdom fools so much admire themselves for; and as I found Icould know nothing but what God taught me, so I resolved never to search after any knowledge of him and his productions, but what he himself hath given forth. Those that will be wise above what is written, may hug their Philosophical clouds, but let them take heed they find not themselves without God in the world, adoring figments of their own brains, instead of the living and true God.  
Lest that arrive by misadventure, which never shall by my consent, that any of the pudled water, my wanton youth drew from the profane Helicon of ancient Poets, should be sprinkled about the world, I have for prevention sent forth this Essay; with a Profession that I disclaim all doctrines of God and his works, but what I learn out of his own word, and have experienced it to be a very unsafe and unprofitable thing for those that are young, before their faith be fixed, to exercise themselves in the study of vain, foolish, atheistical Poesy. It is a miracle of grace and mercy, if such be not deprived of the light of Truth, who having shut their eyes against that Sun, have, instead of looking up to it, hunted glowworms in the ditch bottoms. It is a misery I cannot but bewail, that when we are young, whereas the lovely characters of Truth should be impressed upon the tender mind and memory, they are so filled up with ridiculous lies, that 'tis the greatest business of our lives, assoon as ever we come to be serious, to cleanse out all the rubbish, our grave Tutors laid in when they taught us to study and admire their inspired Poets and divine Philosophers.  
But when I have thus taken occasion, to vindicate myself from those heathenish Authors I have been conversant in, I cannot expect my work should find acceptance in the world, declaring the more full and various delight I have found in following Truth by its own conduct; Nor am I much concerned how it be entertained, seeking no glory by it, but what is rendered to him to whom it is only due. If any one of no higher a pitch than myself, be as much affected and stirred up in the reading, as I have been in the writing, to admire the glories and excellencies of our great Creator, to fall low before him, in the sense of our own vileness, and to adore his Power, his Wisdom, and his Grace, in all his dealings with the children of men, it will be a success above my hopes; though my charity makes me wish every one that hath need of it the same mercy I have found.  
I know I am obnoxious to the censures of two sorts of people: First, those that understand and love the elegancies of Poems, They will find nothing of fancy in it; no elevations of stile, no charms of language, which I confess are gifts I have not, nor desire not in this occasion; for I would rather breathe forth grace cordially than words artificially. I have not studied to utter any thing that I have not really taken in. And I acknowledge all the language I have, is much too narrow to express the least of those wonders my soul hath been ravished with in the contemplation of God and his Works. Had I had a fancy, I durst not have exercised it here; for I tremble to think of turning Scripture into a Romance; and shall not be troubled at their dislike who dislike on that account; and profess they think no poem can be good that shuts out drunkenness, and lasciviousness, and libelling satire, the themes of all their celebrated songs. These, (though I will not much defend my ownweakness) dislike not the Poem so much as the subject of it.  
But there are a second sort of people, whose Genius not lying that way, and seeing the common and vile abuse of Poesy, think Scripture profaned by being descanted on in numbers; but such will pardon me when they remember a great part of the Scripture was originally written in verse; and we are commanded to exercise our spiritual mirth in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs; which if I have weakly composed, yet 'tis a consenting testimony with the whole Church, to the mighty and glorious truths of God which it not altogether impertinent, in this atheistical age; and how imperfect soever the hand be, that copies it out, Truth loses not its perfection, and the plainest as well as the elegant, the elegant as well as the plain, make up a harmony in confession and celebration of that all-creating, all-sustaining God, to whom be all honour and glory for ever and ever.   
MEDITATIONS ON THE CREATION, As recorded in the First Chapter of Genesis.  


MY ravished soul, a pious ardour fires,  
To sing those mystic wonders it admires,  
Contemplating the Rise of every thing  
That, with Time's birth, flowed from th' eternal spring:  
And the no less stupendious Providence  
By which discording Natures ever since  
Have kept up universal Harmony;  
While in one joint obedience all agree,  
Performing that to which they were designed  
With ready inclination; But Mankind  
Alone rebels against his Maker's will, 
Es. 10. 5, 6, 7, etc.   
Which though opposing he must yet fulfil.  
And so that wise Power, who each crooked stream  
Most rightly guides, becomes the glorious theme  
Of endless admiration, while we see,  
Whatever mortals vain endeavours be,  
They must be broken who with Power contend, 
Eccl. 6. 10.   
And cannot frustrate their Creator's End, 
Es. 27. 4.   
Whose Wisdom, Goodness, Might and Glory shines 
Gen. 45. 4, 5.   
In guiding men's unto his own designs. 
Act. 2. 23.    

In these outgoings would I sing his praise, 
Gen. 50. 20.   
But my weak sense with the too glorious rays  
Is struck with such confusion, that I find  
Only the world's first Chaos in my mind,  
Where Light and Beauty lie wrapped up in seed,  
And cannot be from the dark prison freed,  
Except that Power, by whom the world was made,  
My soul in her imperfect struggle aid,  
Her rude conceptions into forms dispose,  
And words impart, which may those forms disclose.   

O thou eternal spring of glory, whence  
All other streams derive their excellence, 
Jam. 1. 17.   
From whose Love issues every good desire,  
Quicken my dull earth with celestial fire,  
And let the sacred theme that is my choice,  
Give utterance and music to my voice,  
Singing the works by which thou art revealed. 
Rom. 1. 19   
What dark Eternity hath kept concealed  
From mortals apprehensions, what hath been  
Before the race of Time did first begin,  
It were presumptuous folly to inquire. 
Deut. 29. 29.   
Let not my thoughts beyond their bound aspire,  
Time limits mortals, and Time had its birth,  
In whose Beginning God made Heaven and Earth. 
Gen. 1. 1.    

God, the great Elohim, to say no more,  
Whose sacred Name we rather must adore  
Than venture to explain; for He alone 
Job 11. 7.   
Dwells in himself, and to himself is known. 
1 Tim. 6. 16. & 1. 17.   
And so, even that by which we have our sight,  
His covering is, He clothes himself with light. 
Ps. 104. 2.   
Easier we may the winds in prison shut,  
The whole vast Ocean in a nutshell put,  
The Mountains in a little balance weigh, 
Es. 40. 12.   
And with a Bulrush plumm the deepest Sea,  
Than stretch frail humane thought unto the height  
Of the great God, Immense, and Infinite,  
Containing all things in himself alone, 
Job 38.   
Being at once in all, contained in none.  
Yet as a hidden spring appears in streams,  
The Sun is seen in its reflected beams,  
Whose high embodied Glory is too bright,  
Too strong an object for weak mortal sight;  
So in God's visible productions, we 
Rom. 1 20.   
What is invisible, in some sort see; 
Heb. 11. 27.   
While we considering each created thing,  
Are led up to an uncreated spring,  
And by gradations of successive Time,  
At last unto Eternity do climb, 
Esai. 44. 6.   
As we in tracks of second causes tread  
Unto the first uncaused cause are led;  
And know, while we perpetual motion see  
There must a first self-moving Power be,  
To whom all the inferior motions tend, 
Rom. 11. 36.   
In whom they are begun, and where they end.  
This First eternal Cause, th' Original 
Act. 17. 24, 26, 28.   
Of Being, Life, and Motion, GOD we call;  
In whom all Wisdom, Goodness, Glory, Might,  
Whatever can himself or us delight  
Unite, centring in his Perfection,  
Whose Nature can admit but only One: 
Eph. 4. 5.   
Divided Sovereignty makes neither great,  
Wanting what's shared to make the sum complete.   

And yet this sovereign sacred Unity 
The Trinity.   
Is not alone, for in this one are three,  
Distinguished, not divided, so that what 
1 Joh. 5. 7.   
One person is, the other is not that; 
Mat. 28. 19  
Mat. 3. 16, 17.   
Yet all the three, are but one God most High,  
One uncompounded, pure Divinity,  
Wherein subsist so, the Mysterious three,  
That they in Power and Glory equal be;  
Each doth himself, and all the rest possess 
Joh. 14. 10.   
In undisturbed joy and blessedness. 
Prov. 8. 22, 30.   
There's no Inferior, nor no Later there, 
Jo. 1. 1.   
All Coeternal, all Coequal, are. 
Phil. 2. 6.   
And yet this Parity Order admits. 
Joh. 5. 18.   
The Father first, eternally begets,  
Within himself, his Son, substantial Word 
Joh. 1. 14.   
And Wisdom, as his second, and their third 
1 Cor. 1. 14.   
The ever blessed spirit is, which doth 
Joh. 16. 13, 14.   
Alike eternally proceed from both.  
These three, distinctly thus, in one Divine, 
Joh. 15. 16.   
Pure, Perfect, Self-supplying Essence shine:  
And all cooperate in all works done 
Joh. 5. 17.   
Exteriorly, yet so, as every one,  
In a peculiar manner suited to  
His Person, doth the common action do.  
Herein the Father is the Principal, 
Heb. 12. 19   
Whose sacred counsels are th' Original  
Of every Act; produced by the Son, 
Es. 42. 4.   
By'the Spirit wrought up to perfection. 
Joh. 5. 26.  
1 Cor. 8. 6.   
I'the Creation thus, by'the Fathers wise decree, 
Joh. 5. 19   
Such things should in such time, and order be, 
Eph. 1. 11.  
2 Tim. 1. 9   
The first foundation of the world was laid. 
Jo. 1. 3.   
The Fabric, by th' Eternal Word, was made 
Heb. 1. 2.   
Not as th' instrument, but joint actor, who 
Joh. 5. 19, etc.   
Joyed to fulfil the counsels which he knew.  
By the concurrent Spirit all parts were 
Gen. 1. 2.   
Fitly disposed, distinguished, rendered fair, 
Job 26. 13.   
In such harmonious and wise order set,  
As universal Beauty did complete.  
This most mysterious Triple Unity,  
In Essence One, and in subsistence Three,  
Was that great Elohim, who first designed,  
Then made the Worlds, that Angels and Mankind  
Him in his rich out-goings might adore, 
Rev. 4. 11.   
And celebrate his praise for evermore; 
Psal. 147, & 148.   
Who from Eternity himself supplied, 
Act. 17. 24.   
And had no need of any thing beside,  
Nor any other cause that did him move  
To make a World, but his extensive Love,  
Itself delighting to communicate;  
Its Glory in the creatures to dilate,  
While they are led by their own excellence  
T' admire the first, pure, high Intelligence, 
Job 33. 12.   
By all the Powers and virtues which they have, 
Psal. 95. 3.   
To that Omnipotence who those Powers gave; 
Rev. 19 6.   
By all their glories and their joys to his,  
Who is the fountain of all joy and bliss; 
Ps. 16. 11.   
By all their wants and imbecilities, 
Gen. 17. 10.   
To the full magazine of rich supplies,  
Where Power, Love, Justice, and Mercy shine  
In their still fixed heights, and ne'er decline.  
No streams can shrink the self-supplying spring,  
No retributions can more fullness bring 
Job 35. ●.   
To the eternal fountain, which doth run 
Psal. 16. 2.   
In sacred circles, ends where it begun, 
Rev. 1. 8.   
And thence with inexhausted life and force 
Esa. 41. 4.   
Begins again a new, yet the same course  
It instituted in Time's infant birth,  
When the Creator first made Heaven and Earth. 
Gen. 1. 1.    

Time though it all things into motion bring 
Time.   
Is not itself any substantial thing, 
Be resheth   
But only Motions measure; As a twin 
In Capite, Principio.   
Born with it; and they both at once begin  
With the existence of the rolling sphere,  
Before which neither time nor motion were.  
Time being a still continued number, made  
By the vicissitude of Light and Shade,  
By the Moon's growth, and by her waxing old,  
By the successive Reign of heat and cold,  
Thus leading back all ages to the womb  
Of vast Eternity from whence they come,  
And bringing new successions forth, until  
Heaven its last revolutions shall fulfil,  
And all things unto their first state restore,  
When Motion ceasing, Time shall be no more; 
Rev. 10. 6.   
But with the visible Heavens shall expire  
While they consume in the world's funeral fire; 
2 Pet. 3. 12.   
Th' invisible Heavens being still the same, 
Heb. 12. 27, 28.   
Shall not be touched by the devouring flame.  
Treating of which, let's wave Platonic dreams  
Of Worlds made in Idea, fitter themes  
For Poet's fancies, than the reverend view  
Of Contemplation, fixed on what is true  
And only certain, kept upon record  
In the Creators own revealed word,  
Which when it taught us how our world was made,  
Wrapped up th' invisible in mystique shade.   

Yet through those clouds we see, God did create 
Heaven.   
A place his presence doth irradiate.  
Where he doth in his brightest lustre shine; 
Heb. 11. 10.   
Yet doth not his own Heaven, him confine:  
Although the Paradise of the fair world above, 
Es. 66. 1. Mat. 5. 34.   
Each where perfumed with sweet respiring Love, 
1 King. 8. 27.   
Refreshed with Pleasures never shrinking streams,  
Illustrated with Lights unclouded beams, 
Luk. 23. 43.   
The happy land of peace and endless Rest 
1 Cor. 13. 13.   
Which doth both soul and sense with full joys feast, 
1 Joh. 4. 16.   
Feasts that extinguish not the appetite  
Which is renewed to heighten the delight. 
Psal. 16. 11.   
Here stands the Tree of life, decked with fair fruit, 
Rev. 20. 5. Heb. 4. 9   
Whose leaves health to the nations contribute. 
Rev. 14. 13.   
The spreading, true celestial Vine 
Rev. 22. 2.   
Where fruitful grafts and noble clusters shine. 
Joh. 15. 1.   
Here Majesty and Grace together meet;  
The Grace is glorious, and the Glory sweet.  
Here is the Throne of th' universal King 
Rev. 21. 25, 26.   
To which the suppliant world addresses bring.  
Here next him doth his Son in triumph sit,  
Waiting till all his foes lie at his feet. 
Ps. 1 10   
Here is the Temple of his Holiness, 
Ex. 15. 17, 18.   
The Sanctuary for all sad distress.  
Here is the Saints most sure inheritance 
Rev. 7. 17.   
To which they all their thoughts and hopes advance. 
1 Pet. 1. 4. Col. 3. 1, 2, 24.   
Here their rich recompense and safe rest lies,  
For this they all th' inferior world despise; 
Heb. 12. 2.   
Yet not for this alone, though this excel,  
But for that Deity who here doth dwell;  
For heaven itself to Saints no heaven were 
Psal. 73. 25.   
Did not their God afford his presence there;  
But now, as he inhabits it, it is  
The treasure-house of everlasting bliss,  
The Father's house, the Pilgrim's home, the Port 
2 Tim. 4. 8. Joh. 14 2.   
Of happiness, th' illustrious Regal Court, 
Heb. 11.   
The City that on the world's summit stands, 
Psal. 15. 1. & 122. 3.   
United in itself, not made with hands;  
Whose Citizens, Walls, Pavements are so bright 
Heb. 12. 22.   
They need no Sun in Gods more radiant Light. 
2 Cor. 5. 1.   
The pure air being not thickened with dark clouds, 
Rev. 21. 23.   
No sable night the constant glory shrowds;  
Nor needs there night, when no dull lassitude  
Doth into the unwearied soul intrude;  
New vigour flowing in with that dear joy  
Whose contemplation doth their lives employ.  
This heaven, the third to us within, 
2 Cor. 12. 2.   
The first, if from the outside we begin,  
Is incorruptible, and still the same,  
Confirmed by him who did its substance frame: 
1 Pet. 1. 4.   
No time its strong foundations can decay,  
It's renewed glory fadeth not away.  
The other heavens which it doth enfold, 
Joel 2. 30.   
In tract of time as garments shall wax old, 
Esa. 34. 4.   
And all their outworn glory shall expire 
Ps. 102. 26. 1 Pet. 3. 7, 12.   
In the world's dreadful last devouring fire;  
But this shall still unchangeable remain,  
While all the rolling Spheres which it contains  
Shall be again into their Chaos whirled  
At the last dissolution of the world.  
For God, who made this blessed place to be  
The habitation of his Sanctity,  
Admitting nothing into it that's vile, 
Rev. 21. 27.   
Nothing that can corrupt, or can defile,  
Never withdraws his gracious presence thence  
But is on all the Glory a defence. 
Es. 4. 5.   
Nor are his Gates ere shut by night or day,  
His only dread keeps all foes far away.   

He not for need, but for Majestic state, 
Angels.   
Innumerable hosts of Angels did create  
To be his outguards, in respect of whom  
He doth his name El-tzeboim assume. 
Esa. 48. 2.   
These perfect, pure Intelligences be, 
Mat. 26. 53.   
Excel in Might, and in Celerity, 
2 Sam. 14. 17.   
Whose sublime natures, and whose agile powers,  
Are vastly so superior unto ours, 
2 Thes. 1. 7.   
Our narrow thoughts cannot to them extend, 
Dan. 9 21. Es. 6. 6.   
And things so far above us comprehend,  
As in themselves, although in part we know, 
Col. 2. 18.   
Some scantlings by appearances below,  
And sacred Writ, wherein we find there be  
Distinguished Orders in their Hierarchy; 
Rom. 8. 38.   
Arch-Angels, Cherubims, and Seraphims, 
1 Thes. 4. 16.   
Who celebrate their God with holy Hymns.  
Ten thousand thousand vulgar Angels stand 
Ps. 103. 20, 21.   
All in their ranks, waiting the Lords command, 
Gen. 3. 24.   
Which with prompt inclination of their will, 
Dan. 7. 10. Mat. 6. 10.   
And cheerful, swift obedience they fulfil;  
Whether he them to save poor men employ,  
Or send them armed, proud rebels to destroy; 
Psal. 91. 11, 12.   
Whether he them to mighty Monarches send, 
2 King. 19 35.   
Or bid them on poor Pilgrim Saints attend,  
Whether they must in heavenly lustre go, 
Gen. 32. 1. Luk. 2. 13, 14.   
Or walk in mortal mean disguise below:  
So kind, so humble are they, though so high, 
Gen. 32. 1, 2.   
They do it with the same alacrity. 
Gen. 19 1.   
Why blush we not at our vain pride, when we 
Psa. 104. 4. Lu. 16. 20.   
Such condescension in Heavens Courtiers see,  
That they who sit on heavenly thrones above,  
Scorn not to serve poor worms with fervent Love?  
And joyful praises to th' Almighty sing,  
When they a mortal to their own home bring?  
How gracious is the Lord of all, that He 
Mat. 13. 39   
Should thus consider poor mortality,  
Such powers for us, into those powers diffuse,  
Such glorious servants, in our service, use?  
Who whether they, with Light, or Heaven, had  
Creation, were within the six days made.  
But leave we looking through the vail, nor pry  
Too long on things wrapped up in mystery,  
Reserved to be our wonder at that time, 
Heb. 12. 22.   
When we shall up to their high mountain climb.  
Besides th' Empyrean heaven we are told  
Of divers other heavens which we behold  
Only by Reason's eye, yet were not they  
If made at least distinguished the first day.  
Then from the height we cannot comprehend,  
Let us to our inferior world descend.   

The Earth at first was a vast empty place, 
Earth's Chaos.   
A rude congestion without form or grace,  
A confused mass of undistinguished feed, 
Gen. 1. 2.   
Darkness the deep, the Deep the solid hid:  
Where things did in unperfect Causes sleep,  
Until God's Spirit moved the quiet deep,  
Brooding the creatures under wings of Love,  
As tender birds hatched by a Turtle Dove.   

Light first of all its radiant wings displayed,  
God called forth Light: that word the creature made. 
Gen. 1. 3, 4, 5.   
Whether it were the natures more divine,  
Or the bright mansion where just souls must shine,  
Or the first matter of those Tapers which  
The since-made firmament do still enrich,  
It is not yet agreed among the wise:  
But thus the day did out of Chaos rise,  
And casts its bright beams on the floating world,  
O'er which soon envious night her black mists hurled,  
Damping the new born splendour for a space,  
Till the next morning did her shadows chase:  
With restored beauty and triumphant force,  
Returning to begin another course,  
An emblem of that everlasting feud  
'Twixt sons of light, and darkness still pursued; 
Joh. 3. 19, 20, 21.   
And of that frail imperfect state wherein  
The wasting lights of mortal men begin; 
Col. 1. 12, 13.   
Whose comforts, honours, lives, soon as they shine 
1 Pet. 1. 24.   
Must all to sorrows, changes, death resign;  
Even their wisdoms and their virtue's light  
Are hid by envies interposing night.  
But though these splendours all in graves are thrown,  
Wherever the true feed of light is sown,  
The Powers of Darkness may contend in vain, 
Psa. 97. 11.   
It shall a conqueror rise and ever reign.  
For when God the victorious morning viewed,  
Approving his own work he said 'twas good:  
And of inanimate creatures sure the best,  
As that which shows and beautifies the rest,  
Those melancholy thoughts which night creates  
And seeds in mortal bosoms, dissipates:  
In its own nature subtle, swift and pure,  
Which no polluted mirror can endure.  
By it th' Almighty Maker doth dispense  
To earthy creatures, heavenly influence;  
By it with angels swiftness are our eyes,  
Exalted to the glory of the skies.  
In whose bright character the light divine,  
Which flesh cannot behold, doth dimly shine.  
Thus was the first Day made; God so called Light,  
Severed from Darkness, Darkness was the Night.    

Canto II.  

AGain spoke God; the trembling waters move, 
Gen. 1. 6.   
Part fly up in thick mists, made clouds above,  
Part closer shrink about the earth below, 
The Firmament.   
But did not yet the mountains dry heads show.  
Th' allforming Word stretched out the Firmament,  
Like azure curtains round his glorious Tent, 
Psal. 104. 2, 3.   
And in its hidden chambers did dispose  
The magazines of Hail, and Rain, and Snows,  
Amongst those thicker clouds, from whose dark womb 
Job 38. 22, 23.   
Th' imprisoned winds, in flame and thunder come.  
Those Clouds which over all the wondrous Arch  
Like hosts of various form creatures march,  
And change the Scenes in our admiring eyes;  
Who sometimes see them like vast mountains rise.  
Sometimes like pleasant Seas with clear waves glide,  
Sometimes like Ships on foaming billows ride,  
Sometimes like mounted warriors they advance,  
And seem to fire the smoking Ordinance.  
Sometimes like shady Forests they appear,  
Here Monsters walking, Castles rising there.  
Scorn Princes your embroidered Canopies,  
And painted roofs, the poor whom you despise  
With far more ravishing delight are fed,  
While various clouds sail o'er th' unhoused head,  
And their heaved eyes with nobler scenes present  
Than your Poetic Courtiers can invent.  
Thus the exalted waters were disposed, 
2 Pet. 3. 5.   
And liquid Skies the solid world enclosed,  
To magnify the most almighty hand,  
That makes thin floods like rocks of crystal stand, 
Job 37. 18.   
Not quenching, nor drunk up by that bright wall  
Of fire, which neighbouring them, encircles all.  
The new built Firmament God Heaven named,  
And over all the Arch his windows framed.  
From whence his liberal hand at due time pours  
Upon the thirsty earth refreshing showers; 
Ps. 147. 16, 17, 18.   
And clothes her bosom with descending Snow  
To cherish the young seeds when cold winds blow: 
Job 26. to the end.   
Hence every night his fattening dews he sheds, 
Ps. 18. 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14.   
And scatters Pearls amidst th' enamelled beds.  
But when presumptuous sins the bright arch scale,  
He beats them back with terrifying hail: 
Job 38. 27, etc.   
Which like small shot amidst his foes he sends,  
Till flaming Thunder, his great Ordnance, rends  
The clouds, which, big with horror, ready stand  
To pour their burdens forth at his command. 
Ex. 9 2.   
But th' unpolluted air as yet had not  
From mortals impious breath infection got,  
Enlightened then by a superior ray  
A serene lustre decked the second day.   

Th' inferior Globe was fashioned on the third,  
When waters at the all-commanding word 
Gen. 1. 10, etc.   
Did hastily into their channels glide, 
Psa. 104. 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.   
And the uncovered hills as soon were dried.  
In the same body thus, distinct, and joined,  
Water and earth, as flesh and blood, we find.  
The late collected waters God called Seas.  
Springs, Lakes, streams, and broad Rivers are from these  
Branched, like life-feeding veins, in every land,  
Yet wheresoever they seem to flow or stand,  
As all in the vast Ocean's bosom bred, 
Eccl. 1. 7.   
They daily reassemble in their head,  
Which through secret conduits back conveys  
To every Spring, the tribute that it pays.  
So ages from th' Eternal bosom creep, 
Eccl. 1. 4.   
So lose themselves again in that vast deep.  
So Empires, so all other humane things,  
With winding streams run to their native springs.  
So all the goodness mortals exercise 
Rom. 4. 22.   
Flows back to God out of his own supplies. 
Eph. 2. 6.    

Now the great fabric in all parts complete,  
Beauty was called forth to adorn the seat;  
Where Earth, fixed in the Centre, was the ground, 
Ps. 102. 25.   
A mantle of light air compassed it round; 
Job 26. 7.   
Then first the watery, than the fiery wall,  
And glittering heaven last involving all.  
Earth's fair green robe vied with the azure skies,  
Her proud Woods near the flaming Towers did rife.  
The valleys Trees, though less in breadth and height,  
Yet hung with various fruit, as much delight. 
Gen. 2. 9   
Beneath these little shrubs and bushes sprung  
With fair flowers clothed, and with rich berries hung,  
Whose more delightful fruits seemed to upbraid  
The tall trees yielding only barren shade.   

Then sprouted Grass and Herbs and Plants  
Prepared to feed the earth's inhabitants, 
Ps. 104. 14.   
To glad their nostrils, and delight their eyes,  
Revive their spirits, cure their maladies.  
Nor by these are the senses only fed,  
But th' understanding too, while we may read  
In every leaf, lectures of Providence,  
Eternal Wisdom, Love, Omnipotence.  
Which th' eye that sees not, with Hell's mists is blind,  
That which regards not, is of brutish kind.  
The various colours, figures, powers of these  
Are their Creators growing witnesses,  
Their glories emblems are, wherein we see 
Ps. 90. 5, 6.   
How frail our humane lives and beauties be.  
Even like those flowers which at the Sun-rise spread  
Their gaudy leaves, and are at evening dead. 
Job 14. 2.  
Es. 40. 6, 7, 8.   
Yet while they in their native lustre shine,  
The Eastern Monarches are not half so fine  
In richer robes God clothes the dirty soil 
Mat. 6. 28, 29, 30.   
Than men can purchase by their sin and toil. 
Jam. 1. 10, 11.   
Then rather Fields than painted Courts admire,  
Yet seeing both, think both must feed the fire:  
Only God's works have roots and seeds, from whence 
Job 14. 7, 8.   
They spring again in grace and excellence,  
But men's have none, like hasty lightning, they  
Flash out, and so for ever pass away. 
1 Cor. 3. 15.   
This fair Creation finished the third day,  
In whose end, God did the whole work survey,  
The Seas, the Skies, the Trees, and less plants viewed,  
And by his approbation made them good;  
In all the plants did living seeds enclose,  
Whence their successive generations rose; 
Gen. 1. 12.   
Gave them those powers which in them still remain,  
Whereby they man and beast with food sustain.   

Thrice had the day to gloomy night resigned, 
The fourth day.   
And thrice victorious o'er the darkness shined,  
Before the mediate cause of it, the Sun  
Or any star had their creation,  
For with th' Omnipotent it is all one  
To cause the day without, or by the Sun.  
God in the world by second causes reigns,  
But is not tied to those means he ordains.  
Let no heart faint then that on him depends, 
Hab. 3. 17, 18.   
When the means fail, that lead to their wished ends.  
For God the thing, if good, will bring about  
With instruments we see not, or without.  
The fourth Light having now expelled the shade  
God on that day the Luminaries made,  
And placed them all in their peculiar spheres 
Gen. 1. 14. etc.   
To measure out our days, and months, and years,  
Which by their various motions are renewed,  
And heat and cold have their vicissitude:  
So Springs and Autumns still successive be,  
Till ages lose them in Eternity.   

The Sun whom th' Hebrews Gods great servant call, 
Sun.   
Placed in the middle Orb, as Lord of all,  
Is in a radiant flaming chariot whirled,  
And daily carried round about the world 
Psal. 19 4, 5, 6.   
By the first Movers force, who in that race  
Scatters his light and heat in every place,  
Yet not at once. Now in the East he shines,  
And then again to'the Western deep declines,  
Seeming to quench his blazing taper there  
While it enlightens the other Hemisphere.  
Thus he their share of day and night divides  
Unto each world in their alternate tides.  
But then its Orb by its own motion rolled,  
Varies the seasons, brings in heat and cold,  
As it projects its rays in a strait line,  
Or more obliquely on the Earth doth shine.  
And thus doth he to the low world dispense  
Life-feeding and engendering influence.   

This Lord of Day with his reflected light 
Moon.   
Guilds the pale Moon the Empress of the night,  
Whose dim Orb monthly wastes and grows,  
Doth at the first sharp pointed horns disclose,  
Then half, than her full shining Globe reveals,  
Which waning she by like degrees conceals.   

The other glittering Planets now appear 
Stars.   
Each as a King enthroned in his own Sphere;  
Then the eighth heaven in fuller lustre shines  
Thick set with stars. All these were made for signs  
That mortals by observing them might know  
Due times to cultivate the earth below,  
To gather fruits, plant trees, and sow their seed,  
To cure their herds, and let their fair flocks breed,  
Into safe harbours to retire their ships, 
Act. 27. 10.   
Again to launch out into the calm deeps,  
Their wand'ring vessels in broad seas to guide,  
When the lost shores no longer are descried;  
Physicians to direct in their great art,  
And other useful knowledge to impart.  
Nor were they only made for signs to show  
Fit opportunities for things we do,  
But in their various aspects too we read  
Various events which shall in time succeed,  
Droughts, inundations, famines, plagues and wars,  
By several conjunctions of the Stars,  
At least shown, if not caused, through the strong powers  
And workings Astral bodies have on ours,  
Which as above they variously are joined,  
So are their subjects here below, inclined  
To sadness, mirth, dread, quiet, love or hate,  
All that may calm, or trouble any state.  
Yet are they but a second cause, which God  
Shakes over sinners as a flaming rod,  
And further manages in his own hands,  
To scourge the pride of all rebellious lands;  
Falsely and vainly do blind mortals then,  
To them impute the fates and ills of men,  
When their sinister operations be  
Only th' effects of men's iniquity,  
Which makes the Lord his glittering hosts thus send  
To execute the just threats they portend. 
Judg. 5.   
Nor are they characters of wrath alone,  
They sometimes have God's grace to mankind shown,  
Such was that new Star which did heaven adorn, 
Mat. 2.   
When the great King of the whole word was born.  
Such were those stars that fought for Israel  
When Jabins vanquished host, by God's host fell.  
Even those Stars which threaten misery and woe  
To wicked men, to Saint's deliverance show:  
For when God cuts the bloody Tyrant down, 
Lu. 22. 28.   
He will their lives with peace and blessings crown.  
Thus the fourth evening did the fourth day close,  
And where the Sun went down, the Stars arose.   

New triumph now the fifth day celebrates,  
The perfumed morning opes her purple gates,  
Through which the Sun's Pavilion doth appear 
Psal. 19   
And he arrayed in all his lustre there,  
Like a fresh Bridegroom with majestic grace,  
And joy diffusing vigour in his face,  
Comes gladly forth, to greet his virgin bride,  
Tricked up in all her ornaments and pride;  
Her lovely maids at his approach unfold  
Their gaudy vests, on which he scatters gold,  
Both cheering and enriching every place,  
Through which he passes in his glorious race.  
But though he found a noble Threatre,  
As yet in it no living creatures were;  
Though flowery carpets spread the whole Earth's face,  
And rich embroideries the upper Arch did grace,  
And standards on the mountains stood between  
Bearing festoones like pillars wreathed with green,  
The velvet couches and the mossy seats,  
The open walks and the more close retreats  
Were all prepared; Yet no foot trod the woods,  
Nor no mouth yet had touched the pleasant floods;  
No weary creature had reposed its head  
Among the sweet perfumes of the low bed;  
The air was not respired in living breath,  
Throughout a general stillness reigned, like death.  
The King of day came forth, but unadmired,  
Like unpraised gallants blushingly retired;  
As an uncourted beauty, Night's pale Queen,  
Grew sick to shine where she could not be seen.  
When the Creator first for mute herds calls,  
And bade the waters bring forth animals:  
Then was all shellfish and each Scaly race 
Gen. 1 20, etc.   
At once produced, in their assigned place,  
The crooked Dolphins, great Leviathan,  
And all the Monsters of the Ocean,  
Like wanton kids among the billows played, 
Job 41.   
Nor was there after on the dry land made  
Any one beast of less or greater kind  
Whose like we do not in the waters find;  
Where every greater fish devours the less,  
As mighty Lords poor Commoners oppress.   

Next the Almighty by his forming Word  
Made the whole plumy race, and every bird  
It's proper place assigned, while with light wings  
All mounted heaven, some o'er the lakes and springs,  
Some over the vast Fens and Seas did fly,  
Some near the ground, some in the cloudy sky,  
Some in high trees their proud nests built, some chose  
The humble shrubs for their more safe repose,  
Some did the marshes, some the rivers love,  
Some the Cornfields, and some the shady grove.  
That silence which reigned every where before,  
It's universal Empire held no more,  
Even night and darkness its own dear retreat  
Could not preserve it in their reign complete:  
The Nightingales with their complaining notes,  
Ravens and Owls with their ill-boding throats,  
And all the birds of night, shrill crowing Cocks  
Whose due kept times, made them the world's first clocks,  
All interrupted it, even in the night,  
But at the first appearance of the light  
A thousand voices, the green woods whole choir  
With their loud music do the day admire;  
The Lark doth with her single carol rise,  
To welcome the fair morning in the skies;  
The amorous and still complaining Dove,  
Courts not the day, but woes her own fair love;  
The Jays and Crows against each other rail,  
And chattering Pies begin their gossip's tale:  
Thus life was carried on, which first begun  
In growth of plants, in fishes motion,  
And next declared itself in living sound,  
Whilst various noise the yielding air did wound.  
Various instincts the Birds by nature have,  
Which God to them in their creation gave,  
That unto their observers do declare  
The storms and calms approaching in the air,  
That teach them how to build their nests at spring,  
And hatch their young under their nursing wing,  
To lead abroad and guard their tender brood,  
To know their hurtful and their healing food,  
To feed them till their strength be perfect grown,  
And after teach them how to feed alone.  
Could we the lessons they hold forth improve,  
We might from some learn chaste and constant love,  
Conjugal kindness of the paired Swans,  
Paternal Bounty of the Pelicans,  
While they are prodigal of their own blood  
To feed their chickens with that precious food.  
Wisdom of those who when storms threat the Sky,  
In thick assemblies to their shelter fly,  
And those who seeing devourers in the air,  
To the safe covert of the wing repair.  
The gall-less doves would teach us innocence, 
Mat. 10. 16.   
And the whole race to hang on Providence;  
Since not the least bird that divides the air 
Mat. 8. 26. & 10. 19   
Exempted is from the Almighty's care,  
Whose bounty in due seasons, feeds them all,  
Prepares them berries when the thick snows fall,  
clothes them in many coloured plumes, which vain  
Men borrow, yet the Peacock's gaudy train  
More beautifully is by nature dressed,  
Than art can make it on the Gallants crest.  
This privilege these creatures had to raise  
Their voices first in their great Maker's praise,  
Which when the morning opes her rosy gate  
They with consenting music celebrate;  
Again with hunger pinched to God they cry,  
And from his liberal hand receive supply,  
Who them and all his watery creatures viewed,  
And saw that they in all their kinds were good.  
Then blest them that for due successions they  
Might multiply. So closed he the fifth day.   

And now the Sun the third time raised his head  
And rose the sixth day from his watery bed, 
Gen. 1. 2   
When God commands the teeming earth to bring  
Forth great and lesser beasts, each reptile thing  
That on her bosom creeps, the word obeyed,  
Immediately were all the creatures made.  
Like Hermits some made hollow rocks their Cell,  
And did in their prepared mansions dwell.  
The vermin, Weazils, Fulmots and blind Moles,  
Lay hid in clefts of trees, in crannies and in holes.  
The Serpents lodged in Marshes and fens,  
The savage beasts sought thickets, caves and dens.  
Tame herds and flocks in open pastures stayed,  
And wanton kids upon the mountains played.  
Here life almost to its perfection grew  
While God these various creatures did endue  
With various properties, and various sense,  
But little short of humane excellence,  
Save what we in the Brutes dispersed find,  
Is all collected in man's nobler mind,  
Who to the high perfection of his sense,  
Hath added a more high intelligence.  
Yet several Brutes have noble faculties,  
Some apprehensive are, some subtle, wise,  
Some have invention and docility,  
Some wonderful in imitation be,  
Some with high generous courage are endued,  
With kindness some, and some with gratitude,  
With memory some, and some with providence,  
With natural love, and with meek innocence:  
Some watchful are, and some laborious be,  
Some have obedience, some true loyalty.  
Among them too we all the passions find,  
Some more to love, some more to hate inclined.  
The musing Hare and the lightfooted Deer  
Are under the predominance of fear;  
Goats and hot Monkeys are with lust possessed,  
Rage governs in the savage Tiger's breast;  
Jealousy doth the hearts of fierce Bulls move  
Impatient of all rivals in their love.  
Some sportive, and some melancholy be,  
Some proner to revenge and cruelty.  
The Kingly Lion in his bosom hath  
The fiery seed of self-provoking wrath,  
Joy is no stranger to the savage breast,  
As oft with love, hate and desire possessed,  
Through the aversion and the appetite  
Which all these passions in their hearts excite.  
God clothed them all in several woells and hair,  
Whereof some meaner, some more precious are,  
which men now into garments wove and spin,  
Nor only wear their fleeces, but their skin;  
Besides employ their teeth, bones, claws, and horn,  
Some Medicines be, and some the house adorn.  
A thousand other various ways we find,  
Wherein alive and dead they serve mankind,  
Who from th' obedience they to him afford  
Might learn his duty to his Sovereign Lord. 
Es. 1. 3.     

Canto III.  

NOW was the glorious Universe complete  
And every thing in beauteous order set,  
When God, about to make the King of all,  
Did in himself a sacred council call;  
Not that he needed to deliberate,  
But pleased t' allow solemnity and state,  
To wait upon that noble creatures birth  
For whom he had designed both heaven and earth: 
Psal. 8. 6.   
Let us, said God, with sovereign power endued: 
Gen. 1. 26, etc.   
Make man after our own similitude,  
Let him our sacred impressed image bear 
Eph. 4. 24.   
Ruling o'er all in earth, and sea, and air. 
Psal. 8.    

Then made the Lord a curious mould of clay,  
Which lifeless on the earth's cold bosom lay,  
When God did it with living breath inspire,  
A soul in all, and every part entire,  
Where life ris ' above motion, sound and sense  
To higher reason and intelligence;  
And this is truly termed life alone,  
Which makes life's fountain to the living known.  
This life into itself doth gather all  
The rest maintained by its original,  
Which gives it Being, Motion, Sense, Warmth, Breath,  
And those chief Powers that are not lost in death.   

Thus was the noblest creature the last made,  
As he in whom the rest perfection had,  
In whom both parts of the great world were joined,  
Earth in his members, Heaven in his mind;  
Whose vast reach the whole Universe comprised,  
And saw it in himself epitomised,  
Yet not the Centre nor circumference can 
Eccl. 3. 11.   
Fill the more comprehensive soul of Man,  
Whose life is but a progress of desire,  
Which still enjoyed, doth something else require,  
Unsatisfied with all it hath pursued  
Until it rest in God, the Sovereign Good. 
Mat. 11. 25.    

The earthly mansion of this heavenly guest  
Peculiar privileges too possessed.  
Whereas all other creatures clothed were  
In Shells, Scales, gaudy Plumes, or Wools, or Hair,  
Only a fair smooth skin o'er man was drawn,  
Like Damask roses blushing through pure Lawn.  
The azure veins, where blood and spirits flow,  
Like Violets in a field of Lilies show.  
As others have a down bend counténance,  
He only doth his head to heaven advance,  
Resembling thus a Tree whose noble root 
Ps. 144. 12.   
In heaven grows, whence all his graces shoot.  
He only on two upright columns stands,  
He only hath, and knows the use of hands,  
Which Gods rich bounties for the rest receive,  
And aid to all the other members give.  
He only hath a voice articulate,  
Varied by joy, grief, anger, love and hate,  
And every other motion of the mind  
Which hereby doth an apt expression find.  
Hereby glad mirth in laughter is alone  
By man expressed; in a peculiar groan,  
His grief comes forth, accompanied with tears,  
Peculiar shrieks utter his sudden fears.  
Herein is Music too, which sweetly charms  
The sense, and the most savage heart disarms.  
The Gate of this God in the head did place, 
Prov 15. 1.   
The head which is the bodies chiefest grace,  
The noble Palace of the Royal guest  
Within by Fancy and Invention dressed,  
With many pleasant useful Ornaments  
Which new Imagination still presents,  
Adorned without, by Majesty and Grace,  
O who can tell the wonders of a face!  
In none of all his fabriques' more than here  
Doth the Creator's glorious Power appear,  
That of so many thousands which we see  
All humane creatures like, all different be;  
If the Front be the glory of man's frame,  
Those Lamps which in its upper windows flame,  
Illustrate it, and as days radiant Star,  
In the clear heaven of a bright face are.  
Here Love takes stand, and here ardent Desire 
1 Joh. 2. 26.   
Enters the soul, as fire drawn in by fire, 
Mat. 5. 28.   
At two ports, on each side, the Hearing sense 
1 Pet. 2. 14.   
Still waits to take in fresh intelligence,  
But the false spies both at the ears and eyes,  
Conspire with strangers for the souls surprise,  
And let all life-perturbing passions in, 
Jam. 5. 11.   
Which with tears, sighs and groans issue again.  
Nor do those Labyrinths which like brest-works are,  
About those secret Ports, serve for a Bar  
To the false Sorcerers conducted by  
Man's own imprudent Curiosity. 
Pro. 1. 10, 11, 12.   
There is an Arch i'the middle of the face  
Of equal necessary use and grace,  
For there men suck up the life-feeding air,  
And panting bosoms are discharged there;  
Beneath it is the chief and beauteous gate,  
About which various pleasant graces wait,  
When smiles the Ruby doors a little way  
Unfold, or laughter doth them quite display,  
And opening the Vermilion Curtains shows  
The Ivory piles set in two even rows,  
Before the portal, as a double guard,  
By which the busy tongue is helped and barred; 
Pro. 25. 11.   
Whose sweet sounds charm, when love doth it inspire,  
And when hate moves it, set the world on fire. 
Eccl. 12. 11.   
Within this portals inner vault is placed 
Jam. 3. 6.   
The palate where sense meets its joys in taste;  
On rising cheeks, beauty in white and red  
Strives with itself, white on the forehead spread  
Its undisputed glory there maintains,  
And is illustrated with azure veins.  
The Brows, Love's bow, and beauty's shadow are,  
A thick set grove of soft and shining hair  
Adorns the head, and shows like crowning rays,  
While th'airs soft breath among the loose curls plays.  
Besides the colours and the features, we  
Admire their just and perfect Symmetry,  
Whose ravishing resultance is that air  
That graces all, and is not any where;  
Whereof we cannot well say what it is,  
Yet Beauty's chiefest excellence lies in this;  
Which mocks the Painters in their best designs,  
And is not held by their exactest lines.  
But while we gaze upon our own fair frame  
Let us remember too from whence it came,  
And that by sin corrupted now, it must  
Return to its originary dust. 
Job 4. 19   
How undecently doth pride then lift that head  
On which the meanest feet must shortly tread?  
Yet at the first it was with glory crowned, 
Eccl. 7. 29.   
Till Satan's fraud gave it the mortal wound.  
This excellent creature God did Adam call  
To mind him of his low Original,  
Whom he had formed out of the common ground  
Which then with various pleasures did abound.   

The whole Earth was one large delightful Field,  
That till man sinned no hurtful briers did yield,  
But God enclosing one part from the rest,  
A Paradise in the rich spicy East 
Gen. 2. 8.   
Had stored with Nature's wealthy Magazine,  
Where every plant did in its lustre shine,  
But did not grow promiscously there,  
They all disposed in such rich order were  
As did augment their single native grace,  
And perfected the pleasure of the place,  
To such a height that th' apelike art of man,  
Licentious Pens, or Pencils never can  
With all th' essays of all presuming wit,  
Or form or feign aught that approaches it.  
Whether it were a fruitful Hill or Vale,  
Whether high Rocks, or Trees did it impale,  
Or Rivers with their clear and kind embrace  
Into a pleasant Island formed the place,  
Whether its noble situation were  
On Earth, in the bright Moon, or in the Air,  
In what forms stood the various trees and flowers,  
The disposition of the walks and bowers,  
Whereof no certain word, nor sign remains,  
We dare not take from men's inventive brains.  
We know there was pleasant and noble shade  
Which the tall growing Pines and Cedars made,  
And thicker coverts, which the light and heat 
Gen. 3. 8.   
Even at noon day could scarcely penetrate,  
A crystal River on whose verdant banks 
Gen. 2. 10.   
The crowned fruit-trees stood in lovely ranks,  
His gentle wave through the garden led,  
And all the spreading roots with moisture fed.  
But past th' enclosure, thence the single stream  
Parted in four, four noble floods became;  
Pison whose large arms Havilah enfold; 
Gen. 2. 11.   
A wealthy land enriched with finest gold,  
Where also many precious stones are found;  
The second river Gihen, doth surround 
ver. 13.   
All that fair land where Chus inhabited,  
Where Tyranny first raised up her proud head,  
And led her bloodhounds all along the shore,  
Polluting the pure stream with crimson gore.  
Eden's third river Hiddekell they call,  
Whose waters Eastward in Assiria fall.  
The fourth Euphrates whose swift stream did run 
ver. 14.   
About the stately walls of Babylon;  
And in the revolution of some years  
Swelled high, fed with the captived Hebrews tears.  
God in the midst of Paradise did place  
Two trees, that stood up dressed in all the grace, 
Gen. 2. 9   
The verdure, beauty, sweetness, excellence,  
With which all else could tempt or feast the sense:  
On one apples of knowledge did abound,  
And life-confirming fruit the other crowned.   

And now did God the new created King  
Into the pleasures of his earthly palace bring:  
The air, spice, balm, and amber did respire,  
His ears were feasted by the Sylvan Choir,  
Like country girls, grass flowers did dispute  
Their humble beauties with the high born fruit;  
Both high and low their gaudy colours vied,  
As Courtiers do in their contentious pride,  
Striving which of them should yield most delight,  
And stand the finest in their Sovereign's sight.  
The shrubs with berries crowned like precious gems,  
Offered their supreme Lord their Diadems  
Which did no single sense alone invite,  
Courting alike the eyes and appetite.  
Among all these the eye-refreshing green,  
Sometimes alone, sometimes in mixture seen,  
O'er all the banks and all the flat ground spread,  
Seemed an embroidered, or plain velvet bed.  
And that each sense might its refreshment have,  
The gentle air soft pleasant touches gave  
Unto his panting limbs, whenever they  
Upon the sweet and mossy couches lay.   

A shady Eminence there was, whereon  
The noble creature sat, as on his throne, 
ver. 19, etc.   
When God brought every Fowl, and every Brute,  
That he might Names unto their nature's suit,  
Whose comprehensive understanding knew  
How to distinguish them, at their first view;  
And they retaining those names ever since,  
Are monuments of his first excellence,  
And the Creator's providential grace,  
Who in those names, left us some prints to trace;  
Nature, mysterious grown, since we grew blind,  
Whose Labyrinths we should less easily find  
If those first appellations, as a clue,  
Did not in some sort serve to lead us through,  
And rectify that frequent gross mistake,  
Which our weak judgements and sick senses make,  
Since man ambitious to know more, that sin  
Brought dulness, ignorance and error in.   

Though God himself to man did condescend, 
Society.   
Though his knowledge to all natures did extend;  
Though heaven and earth thus centred in his mind,  
Yet being the only one of his whole kind,  
He found himself without an equal mate,  
To whom he might his joys communicate,  
And by communication multiply.  
Too far out of his reach was God on high,  
Too much below him brutish creatures were,  
God could at first have made a humane pair,  
But that it was his will to let man see  
The need and sweetness of society;  
Who, though he were his Maker's Favourite,  
Feasted in Paradise with all delight,  
Though all the creatures paid him homage, yet  
Was not his unimparted joy complete,  
While there was not a second of his kind,  
Endued with such a form and such a mind,  
As might alike his soul and senses feast:  
He saw that every bird and every beast  
It's own resemblance in its female viewed,  
And only union with its like pursued.  
Hence birds with birds, and fish with fish abide,  
Nor those with beasts, nor beasts with these reside:  
According to their several species too,  
As several households in one City do,  
So they with their own kinds associate:  
The Kingly eagle hath no buzzard mate;  
The ravens, more their own black feather love,  
Than painted pheasants, or the fair-necked dove.  
So Bears to rough Bears rather do incline  
Than to majestic Lions, or fair kine.  
If it be thus with brutes, much less than can  
The brutish conversation suit with man.  
'Tis only like desires like things unite:  
In union likeness only feeds delight.  
Where unlike natures in conjunction are,  
There is no product but perpetual war,  
Such as there was in Nature's troubled womb,  
Until the severed births from thence did come,  
For the whole world nor order had, nor grace  
Till severed elements each their own place  
Assigned were, and while in them they keep,  
Heaven still smiles above, th' untroubled deep  
With kind salutes embraces the dry land,  
Firm doth the earth on its foundation stand;  
A cheerful light streams from th'etherial fire,  
And all in universal joy conspire.  
But if with their unlike they attempt to mix,  
Their rude congressions every thing unfix;  
Darkness again invades the troubled skies,  
Earth trembling, under angry heaven lies;  
The Sea, swollen high with rage, comes to the shore  
And swallows that, which it but kissed before;  
Th' unbounded fire breaks forth with dreadful light,  
And horrid cracks which dying nature fright,  
Till that high power, which all powers regulates,  
The disagreeing natures separates,  
The like to like rejoining as before,  
So the world's peace, joy, safety doth restore.  
Yet if man could not find in bird or brute  
That conversation which might aptly suit  
His higher nature, was it not sublime  
Enough, above the lower world to climb,  
And in Angelic converse to delight,  
Although it could not reach the supreme height?  
No; for though man partake intelligence,  
Yet that being joined to an inferior sense,  
Dulled by corporeal vapours, cannot be  
Refined enough for angel's company:  
As strings screwed up too high, as bows still bend  
Or break themselves, or crack the instrument;  
So drops neglected flesh into the grave,  
If it no share in the souls pleasures have.  
Man like himself needs an associate,  
Who doth both soul and sense participate.  
Not the swift Horse, the eager Hawk, or Hound,  
Dogs, Parrots, Monkeys amongst whom Adam found  
No meet companion, thinking them too base  
For the society of humane race,  
Though his degenerate offspring choose that now  
Which his sound reason could not then allow,  
But found himself amongst them all alone.  
Whether he begged a mate it is not known,  
Likely his want might send him to the spring;  
For God who freely gives us every thing,  
Mercy endears by instilling the desire,  
And granting that which humbly we require:  
Howe'er it was, God saw his solitude 
Ez. 36. 37.   
And gave his sentence that it was not good.  
Yet not a natural, nor a moral ill, 
Gen. 2. 18.   
Because his solitude was not his will  
Opposing his Creator's End, as they  
Who into caves and deserts run away,  
Seeking perfection in that state, wherein  
A good was wanting when man had no sin.  
For without help to propagate mankind  
God's glory had been to one breast confined,  
Which multiplied Saints, do now conspire  
Throughout their generations to admire. 
Heb. 12. 23.   
Man's nature had not been the sacred shrine,  
Partner and bride of that which is divine;  
The Church, fruit of this union, had not come  
To light, but perished, stifled in the womb.  
Again 'tis not particularly good  
For man to waste his life in solitude,  
Whose nature for society designed  
Can no full joy without a second find,  
To whom he may communicate his heart, 
Eccl. 4. 8, etc.   
And pay back all the pleasures they impart;  
For all the joys that we enjoy alone,  
And all our unseen lustre, is as none.  
If thus want of a partner did abate  
Man's happiness in man's most perfect state,  
Much more hath humane nature, now decayed,  
Need of a suitable and a kind aid:  
It is not good, virtue should lie obscure,  
That barren rocks, rich treasures should immure,  
Which our kind Lord to some, for all men gave, 
1 Cor. 12. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12.   
That all might share of all his bounties have.  
Not good, dark Lanterns should shut up the light 
Mat. 5. 16. 15.   
Of fair example, made for the dark night.  
Not good, experience should her candle hide,  
When weak ones perish, wanting her bright guide.  
Not good, to let unactive graces chill,  
No lively warmth receive, no good instil  
By quickening converse. Thus nor are the great,  
The wise, and firm, permitted to retreat,  
Betraying so deserted innocence,  
To which God made them conduct and defence.  
Nor may the simple and the weak expose  
Themselves alone, to strong and subtle foes;  
Men for each others mutual help were made,  
The meanest may afford the highest aid.  
The highest to necessity must yield,  
Even Princes are beholding to the field. 
Eccl. 5. 9   
He that from mortal converse steals away  
Injures himself, and others doth betray,  
Whom Providence committed to his trust,  
And in that act, nor prudent is nor just.  
For sweet friends both in pleasure and distress,  
Augment the joy, and make the torment less.  
Equal delight it is to learn and teach,  
To be held up to that we cannot reach,  
And others from the abject earth to raise  
To merit, and to give deserved praise.  
Wisdom imparted like th' increasing bread,  
Wherewith the Lord so many thousands fed,  
By distribution adds to its own store, 
Mat. 15. 36.   
And still the more it gives it hath the more.  
Extended Power reaches itself a crown,  
Gathering up those whom misery casts down.  
Love raiseth us, itself to heaven doth rise,  
By virtues varied mutual exercise.  
Sweet love, the life of life, which cannot shine, 
Rom. 13. 9, 10.   
But lies like Gold concealed in the Mine,  
Till it through much exchange a brightness take  
And Conversation doth it current make. 
1 Cor. 13.   
God having showed his creature thus the need  
Of humane helps, a help for man decreed:  
I will, said he, the man's meet aid provide.  
But that he from his waking view might hide  
Such a mysterious work, the Lord did keep  
All Adam's senses fast locked up in sleep.  
Then from his opened side took without pain 
Gen. 2. 21, 22.   
A clothed rib, and closed the flesh again,  
And of the bone did a fair virgin frame  
Who, by her Maker brought, to Adam came  
And was in matrimonial Union joined,  
By love and nature happily combined.  
Adam's clear understanding at first view  
His wives original and nature knew;  
His will, as pure, did thankfully embrace,  
His father's bounty, and admired his grace.  
And as her sweet charms did his heart surprise  
He spoke his joy in these glad ecstacies,  
Thou art my better self, my flesh, my bone,  
We late of one made two, again in one 
ver. 23, 24.   
Shall reunite, and with the frequent birth  
Of our joint issue, people the vast earth.  
To show that thou wert taken out of me  
Isha shall be thy name; As unto thee  
Ravished with love and joy my soul doth cleave,  
So men hereafter shall their father's leave,  
And all relations else, which are most dear, 
Eph. 5. 31.   
That they may only to their wives adhere; 
Mat. 19 5.   
When marriage male and female doth combine  
Children in one flesh shall two parents join.   

Lastly, God, who the sacred knot had tied,  
With blessing his own Ordinance sanctified,  
Increase, said he, and multiply your race,  
Fill th' Earth allotted for your dwelling place,  
I give you right to all her fruits and plants, 
Gen. 1. 28, etc.   
Dominion over her inhabitants;  
The fish that in the floods deep bosom lie,  
All Fowls that in the airy region fly,  
Whatever lives and feeds on the dry land,  
Are all made subject under your command.  
The grass and green herbs let your cattle eat,  
And let the richer fruits be your own meat,  
Except the Tree of knowing good and ill,  
That by the precept of my Sovereign will  
You must not eat, for in the day you do,  
Inevitable death shall seize on you.   

Thus God did the first marriage celebrate  
While man was in his unpolluted state, 
Gen. 2. 22.   
And th' undefiled bed with honour decked, 
Heb. 134.   
Though perversemen the Ordinance reject,  
And pulling all its sacred Ensigns down 
Prov. 18. 22.   
To the white Virgin only give the crown.  
Nor yet is marriage grown less sacred since  
Man fell from his created excellence,  
Necessity now raises its esteem,  
Which doth mankind from deaths vast jaws redeem,  
Who even in their graves are yet alive,  
While they in their posterity survive.  
In it they find a comfort and an aid,  
In all the ills which humane life invade.  
This curbs and cures wild passions that arise, 
Psa. 127. 3, 4, 5.   
Repairs times daily wastes, with new supplies;  
When the declining mothers youthful grace  
Lies dead and buried in her wrinkled face,  
In her fair daughters it revives and grows,  
And her dead Cinder in their new flames glows.  
And though this state may sometimes prove accursed,  
For of best things, still the corruption's worst,  
Sin so destroys an institution good,  
Provided against death and solitude.   

Eve out of sleeping Adam form thus  
A sweet instructive emblem is to us,  
How waking Providence is active still 
Psa. 121. 3, 4, 5.   
To do us good, and to avert our ill,  
When we locked up in stupefaction lie, 
Job 33. 15, 16, 17, etc.   
Not dreaming that our blessings are so nigh.  
Blessings wrought out by providence alone  
Without the least assistance of our own. 
Deut. 32. 36.   
Man's help produced in deathlike sleep doth show, 
Rom. 4. 19   
Our choicest mercies out of dead wombs flow.   

So from the second Adam's bleeding side  
God formed the Gospel Church, his mystique Bride, 
Joh. 19 34.   
Whose strength was only of his firmness made, 
1 Joh. 5. 6.   
His blood, quick spirits into ours conveyed: 
Tir. 5. 5.  
Phil. 4. 13.   
His wasted flesh our wasted flesh supplied, 
2 Cor. 12. 9   
And we were then revived when he died. 
Joh. 5. 2.   
Who waked from that short sleep with joy did view 
Eph. 2. 1, 5, 6, etc.   
The Virgin fair that out of his wounds grew, 
2 Tim. 1. 10.   
Presented by th' eternal Father's grace  
Unto his everlasting kind embrace: 
Es. 53. 5.   
My spouse, my sister, said he, thou art mine; 
Act. 20. 28.   
I and my death, I and my life are thine; 
Eph. 5. 25, 26, 27, etc.   
For thee I did my heavenly Father quit 
Rev. 5. 19   
That thou with me on my high throne mayst sit, 
Joh. 17. 9, 10.   
My mother's humane flesh in death did leave  
For thee, that I to thee might only cleave, 
Psal. 2. 8.  
Cant. 2. 16. & 4. 10.   
Redeem thee from the confines of dark hell,  
And evermore in thy dear bosom dwell: 
1 Cor. 3. 22, 23.   
From heaven I did descend to fetch up thee, 
Joh. 6. 38, 39   
Rose from the grave that thou mightst reign with me. 
Rev. 5. 9, 10.   
Henceforth no longer two but one we are,  
Thou dost my merit, life, grace, glory share: 
Phil. 2. 9   
As my victorious triumphs are all thine, 
Joh 19 27.  
Col. 2. 13, 14, 15.   
So are thy injuries and sufferings mine,  
Which I for thee will vanquish as my own, 
1 Cor. 15. 54, 55, 21, 22.   
And give thee rest in the celestial throne: 
Joh. 17. 23, 24. & 14. 3. Eph. 4. 9, 10, etc. Rom. 8. 17, 18. 2 Tim. 2. 12. Col. 1. Eph. 1. Joh. 1. 16. Act. 9 4. Mat. 25. 34. and forward.   
The Bride with these caresses entertained 
Heb. 4. 13. & 10. 19, 20.   
In naked beauty doth before him stand,  
And knows no shame purged from all foul desire  
Whose secret guilt kindles the blushing fire. 
1 Pet. 1. 2.  
Heb. 13. 12.   
Her glorious Lord is naked too, no more  
Concealed in types and shadows as before. 
1 Pet. 1. 10, 11, 12.   
So our first parents innocently did 
Eph. 3. 9, 10.   
Behold that nakedness which since is hid, 
Heb. 8. 5.   
That lust may not catch fire from beauty's flame 
2 Pet. 2. 14.   
Engendering thoughts which die the cheeks with shame, 
Mat. 5. 28.    

Thus heaven and earth their full perfection had, 
Gen. 2. 1.   
Thus all their hosts and ornaments were made,  
Armies of Angels had the highest place,  
Bright starry hosts the lower heaven did grace,  
The Mutes encamped in the waters were,  
The winged troops were quartered in the air,  
The walking animals, as th' infantry  
Of th' Universal Host, at large did lie  
Spread over all the earth's most ample face,  
Each regiment in its assigned place.  
Paradise the head quarter was, and there  
The Emperor to his Viceroy did appear, 
ver. 16.   
Him in his regal Office did install,  
A general muster of his hosts did call, 
ver. 19   
Resigning up into his sole command  
The numerous Tribes, that fill doth sea and land.  
As each kind severally had before  
Blessing and approbation, so once more,  
When all together God his works reviewed,  
The blessing was confirmed and renewed.  
And with the sixth day the Creation ceased. 
Gen. 1. 31.    

The seventh day the Lord himself did rest,  
And made it a perpetual Ordinance then 
Gen. 2. 2, 3.   
To be observed by every age of men, 
Ex. 20. 8.   
That after six days honest labour they  
His precept and example should obey,  
As he did his, their works surcease, and spend  
That day in sacred rest, till that day end,  
And in its number back again return,  
Still consecrated, till it have outworn  
All other time, and that alone remain,  
When neither toil, nor burden, shall again  
The weary lives of mortal men infest,  
Nor intermit their holy, happy rest.   

Nor is this Rest sacred to idleness,  
God, a perpetual Act, sloth cannot bless.  
He ceased not from his own celestial joy,  
Which doth himself perpetually employ  
In contemplation of himself, and those 
Pro. 8. 22, 30, 31.   
Most excellent works, wherein himself he shows; 
Mat. 3. 17.   
He only ceased from making lower things, 
Joh. 5. 17, 20, 21.   
By which, as steps, the mounting soul he brings  
To th' upmost height, and having finished these  
Himself did in his own productions please, 
Jer. 9 24.   
Full satisfied in their perfection,  
Rested from what he had completely done; 
Psal. 104. & 147. & 145.   
And made his pattern our instruction,  
That we, as far as finite creatures may  
Trace him that's infinite, should in our way  
Rest as our Father did, work as he wrought,  
Nor cease till we have to perfection brought 
Eccl. 9 10.   
Whatever to his glory we intent, 
Heb. 6. 1.   
Still making ours, the same which was his end: 
Phil. 3. 19   
As his works in commands begin, and have  
Conclusion in the blessings which he gave, 
1 Cor. 10. 30.   
So must his Word give being to all ours; 
1 Joh 5. 3.   
And since th' events are not in our own powers, 
Ps. 119. 9   
We must his blessing beg, his great name bless,  
And make our thanks the crown of our success.  
As God first heaven did for man prepare,  
Men last for heaven created were,  
So should we all our actions regulate, 
Mat. 6. 33.   
Which heaven, both first and last, should terminate, 
Col. 3. 1.   
And in whatever circle else they run,  
There should they end, there should they be begun,  
There seek their pattern, and derive from thence  
Their whole direction and their influence.  
As when th' Almighty this low world did frame,  
Life by degrees to its perfection came,  
In Vegetation first sprung up, to sense 
Heb. 5. 12, 13, 14.   
Ascended next, and climbed to reason thence,  
So we, pursuing our attainments, should  
Press forward from what's positively good,  
Still climbing higher, until we reach the best,  
And that acquired for ever fix our rest.  
Our souls so ravished with the joys divine  
That they no more to creatures can decline.  
As God's Rest was but a more high retreat  
From the delights of this inferior seat,  
So must our souls upon our Sabbaths climb,  
Above the world, sequestered for that time,  
From those legitimate delights, which may 
Es. 58. 13.   
Rejoice us here upon a common day.  
As God, his works completed, did retire  
To be adored by the Angelic Choir,  
So when on us the seventh days light doth shine,  
Should we ourselves to God's assemblies join,  
Thither all hearts, as one pure offering, bring 
Job 1. 6.   
And all with one accord adore our King. 
Heb. 10. 25.   
This seventh day the Lord to mankind gave,  
Nor is it the least privilege we have. 
Mat. 2. 27.   
And ours peculiarly. The Orbs above 
Ez. 20. 12.   
Aswell the seventh as the sixth day move,  
The rain descends and the fierce tempest blows,  
On it the restless Ocean ebbs and flows:  
Bees that day fill the hive, and on that day  
Ants their provisions in their store-house lay,  
All creatures ply their works, no beast  
But those which mankind use, share in that rest:  
Which God indulged only to humane race,  
That they in it might come before his face  
To celebrate his worship and his praise,  
And gain a blessing upon all their days.  
O wretched souls of perverse men, who slight  
So great a grace, refuse such rich delight,  
Which the inferior creatures cannot share,  
To which alone their natures fitted are,  
And whereby favoured men admitted be 
Heb. 4. 9 & 12. 22.   
Into the angels blest societle.  
Yet is this Rest but a far distant view  
Of that celestial life which we pursue,  
By Satan oft so interrupted here,  
That little of its glory doth appear,  
Nor can our souls sick, languid appetite  
Feast upon such substantial, strong delight.  
As music pains the grieved aching head,  
With which the healthful sense is sweetly fed;  
So duties wherein sound hearts full joys find, 
Am. 8. 5.   
Fetters and sad loads are to a sick mind,  
Till it thereto by force itself mure,  
And from a loathing fall to love its cure.   

God for his worship kept one day of seven,  
The other six to man for man's use given;  
Adam, although so highly dignified,  
Was not to spend in idle ease and pride  
Nor supine sleep, drunk with his sensual pleasures,  
Profusely wasting th' Empire's sacred treasures,  
As now his fallen sons do, that arrogate  
His forfeited dominion, and high state;  
But God his daily Business did ordain  
That Kings, hence taught, might in their Realms maintain  
Fair order, serving those whom they command,  
As guardians, not as owners of the land, 
Rom. 13. 3, 4.   
Not being set there, to pluck up and destroy  
Those plants, whose culture should their cares employ.  
Nor doth this precept only Kings comprise, 
1 Thes. 4. 11.   
The meanest must his little paradise  
With no less vigilance and care attend 
1 Tim. 5 8.   
Than Princes on their vast enclosures spend.  
All hence must learn their duty, to suppress  
Th' intrusions of a sordid idleness. 
Pro. 19 15. & 10. 26.   
Who formed, could have preserved the garden fair  
Without th' employment of man's busy care,  
But that he willed that our delight should be  
The wages of our constant industry,  
That we his ever bounteous hand might bless  
Crowning our honest labours with success,  
And taste the joy men reap in their own fruit,  
Loving that more to which they contribute  
Either the labour of their hands or brains,  
Than better things produced by others pains.  
Led by desire, fed with fair hope, the fruit  
Oft-times delights not more than the pursuit.  
For man a nature hath to action prone,  
That languishes, and sickens finding none.  
As standing pools corrupt, water that flows,  
More pure, by its continual current, grows,  
So humane kind by active exercise,  
Do to the heights of their perfection rise,  
While their stocked glory comes to no ripe growth,  
Whose lives corrupt in idleness and sloth  
Which is not natural, but a disease,  
That doth upon the flesh-cloyed spirit seize.  
Where health untainted is, than the sound mind  
In its employment doth its pleasure find.  
But when death, or its representer sleep  
Upon the mortals tired members creep,  
This during its dull reign doth life suspend,  
That ceasing action, puts it to an end.  
Lastly since God himself did man employ  
To dress up Paradise, that moderate joy  
Which from this fair creation we derive,  
Is not our sin but our prerogative,  
If bounded so, as we fix not our rest 
1 Tim. 4. 4, 5.   
In creatures which but transient are at best, 
1 Joh. 2. 17.   
Yet 'tis sin to neglect, not use, or prize, 
1 Cor. 7. 31, 20.   
As well as 'tis to waste and idolise.    

Canto IU.  

GOod were all natures as God made them all, 
Gen. 1. 31.   
Good was his Will permitting some to fall, 
Rom. 9 21, 22, 23.   
That th' rest renouncing their frail strength might stand  
Humble and firm in his supporting hand, 
Rom. 11.  
Rom. 3. 6.   
His wisdom and omnipotence might own, 
Gen. 18. 25.   
When his Foes power and craft is overthrown,  
Seeing his hate of sin, might thence confess 
Rom. 11. 33.   
His pure innate and perfect Holiness, 
1 Cor. 10. 12.   
And that the glory of his Justice might 
Rom. 16. 20.   
In the Rebels torturing flames seem bright.  
That th' ever blessed Redeemer might take place 
Psal. 2.   
To illustrate his rich mercy and free grace 
Jos. 24. 19  
Psal. 5. 4, 5, 6. & 7. 11. etc. & 11. 5, 6.   
Whereby he fallen sinners doth restore  
To fuller bliss than they enjoyed before;  
That Virtue might in its clear brightness shine  
Which like rich o'er concealed in the mine 
1 Pet. 1. 10.   
Had not been known, but that opposing vice 
Eph. 1. 4, 11.   
Illustrates it by frequent exercise. 
Joh. 3. 16. Eph. 2. 5. Rom. 8. 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 Rom. 5. 5, etc. 1 Pet. 4. 12, 13, 14.   
If all were good, whence then arose the ill?  
'T was not in Gods, but in the creatures will,  
Averting from that good, which is supreme,  
Corrupted so, as a declining stream 
Eccl. 7. 29.   
That breaks off its communion with its head, 
Judas 6.   
By whom its life and sweetness late were fed, 
Joh. 8. 44.   
Turns to a noisome, dead, and poisonous Lake,  
Infecting all who the foul waters take:  
Or as a Branch cut from the living Tree,  
Passes into contempt immediately,  
And dies divided from its glorious stock;  
So strength disjoined from the living rock,  
Turns to contemned imbecility,  
And doth to all its grace and glory die. 
Jer. 2 13.    

Some new-made Angels thus, not more sublime 
Devils.   
In nature, than transcending in their crime,  
Quitting th' eternal fountain of their light,  
Became the firstborn sons of woe and night, 
Eph. 2. 2.   
Princes of Darkness, and the sad Abyss, 
Act. 26. 18.   
Which now their cursed place and portion is, 
Mat. 25. 41.   
Where they no more must fee God's glorious face  
Nor ever taste of his refreshing grace, 
Rev. 20. 10.   
But in the fire of his fierce anger dwell,  
Which though it burns, enlightens not their Hell.  
But circumstances that we cannot know  
Of their rebellion and their overthrow  
We will not dare t' invent, nor will we take  
Guesses from the reports themselves did make  
To their old Priests, to whom they did devise  
To inspire some truths, wrapped up in many lies;  
Such as their gross poetic fables are,  
Saturn's extrusion, the bold giant's war,  
Division of the universal realm,  
To Gods that in high heaven steer the helm,  
Others who all things in the Ocean guide,  
And those who in th' infernal Court preside,  
Who there a vast and gloomy Empire sway,  
Whom all the Furies and the Ghosts obey.  
But not to name these foolish impious tales,  
Which stifle truth in her pretended veils,  
Let us in its own blazing conduct go,  
And look no further than that light doth show;  
Wherein we see the present powers of hell,  
Before they under God's displeasure fell,  
Were once endued with grace and excellence,  
Beyond the comprehension of our sense, 
Lu. 10. 18.   
Pure holy lights in the bright heaven were  
Blazing about the throne, but not fixed there; 
Judas 6.   
Where, by the Apostasy of their own will,  
Precipitating them into all ill,  
And Gods just wrath, whose eyes are far too pure 
2 Pet. 2. 4.   
Stained and polluted objects to endure, 
Hab. 1. 13.   
They fell like lightning, hurled in his fierce ire, 
Lu. 10. 18.   
And falling, set the lower world on fire: 
Jam. 3. 6.   
Which their loose prison is where they remain, 
Joh. 8. 44.   
And walk as criminals under God's chain; 
Jud. 6.   
Until the last and great assizes come,  
When Execution shall seal up their doom. 
1 Cor. 6. 3.   
Thus are they now to their created light, 
Mat. 8. 29.   
Unto all Truth, and Goodness opposite, 
Gen. 3. 15.  
1 Pet. 5. 8.   
Hating the Peace and Joy that reigns above, 
Job 1. 7, etc.   
Vainly contending to extinguish love,  
Ruin God's sacred Empire, and destroy 
Rev. 12. 10.   
That blessedness they never can enjoy.  
A Chief they have, whose Sovereign power and place  
But adds to'his sin, his torture, and disgrace. 
Mark 3. 22, 24, 25, 26.   
An order too there is in their dire state, 
Rev. 20. 10.   
Though they all Orders else disturb and hate.  
Ten thousand thousand wicked spirits stand,  
Attending their black Prince, at his command, 
Luk. 8. 30.   
To all imaginable evils pressed,  
That may promote their common interest.  
Nor are they linked thus by faith and love,  
But hate of God and goodness, which doth move  
The same endeavours and desires in all,  
Lest civil wars should make their Empire fall. 
Mat. 12. 25, 26.   
An Empire which the Almighty doth permit,  
Yet so as he controls and limits it. 
Rev. 20. 2, 7, 8.   
Suffering their rage sometimes to take effect,  
Only to be the more severely checked; 
Job 2. 6.   
When he produces a contrary end, 
Col. 2. 14, 15.   
From what they did maliciously intend,  
Befools their wisdom, crosses their designs, 
Heb. 2. 9, 14.   
And blows them up in their own crafty mines, 
Luk. 22. 3.   
Allows them play in the entangling net, 
2 Tim. 2. 25, 26.   
So to be faster in damnation set, 
Eph. 6. 11, 12, etc.   
Submits them to each others tyrannies, 
1 Pet. 5. 8.   
Who did Gods softer sacred bonds despise,  
Le's them still fight, who never can prevail, 
Rev. 12. 12.   
More cursed if they succeed, than if they fail,  
Since every soul the Rebels gain from God,  
Adds but another Scorpion to that rod,  
Bound up, that they may mutual torturers be, 
Lu. 16. 24.   
Tormented and tormenting equally. 
Rev. 14. 10, 11.   
As a wise General that doth design 
Mat. 25. 41.   
To keep his Army still in discipline,  
Suffers the embodying of some slighter foes,  
Which he at his own pleasure can enclose,  
And vanquish, that he justly may chastise  
Their folly, and his own troops exercise,  
Their vigilance, their faith and valour prove;  
Endearing them thereby to his own love,  
As he alike endears himself to theirs, 
Luk. 22. 31, 32.   
By his continual succours and kind cares:  
So the Almighty gives the Devil's scope, 
Joh. 17. 20.   
Who though they are excluded from all hope 
Mat. 4.   
Of e'er escaping, no reluctance have, 
Heb. 2. 18. & 4. 15. & 7. 25.   
But like the desperate villain they make brave,  
To death pursue their bold attempts, that all 
Rom. 16. 20.   
O'er whom they cannot reign, with them may fall.  
And tho' God's watchful guards besiege them round  
That none can pass their strict prescribed bound,  
Yet make they daily sallies in their pride, 
Rev. 12. 7, 8.   
Which still repulsed the holy host deride. 
Mat. 4. 11.   
Their malice in itself and its event, 
Judas 9   
Being equally a crime and punishment.  
Thus though sin in itself be ill, 'tis good  
That sin should be, for thereby rectitude  
Through opposed iniquity, as light  
By shades, is more conspicuous and more bright.   

The wonderful creation of mankind,  
For lasting glory and rich grace designed,  
The blessed angels looked on with delight,  
Gladded to see us climb so near their height; 
Lu. 15. 10. & 16. 22.   
Above all other works, next in degree,  
And capable of their society. 
Heb. 12. 22.   
But 'twas far otherwise with those that fell  
Man's destined heaven, increased their hell,  
While they burned with a proud malicious spite  
To see a new-made, earthborn favourite, 
Joh. 8. 44.   
For their high seats and empty thrones designed;  
Therefore both against God and man combined,  
To hinder God's decree from taking place,  
And to divest man of his Maker's grace;  
Which while he in a pure obedience stood, 
1 Pet. 3. 13.   
They knew, not all their force nor cunning could,  
But if they could with any false pretence  
Inveigle him to quit his innocence,  
They hoped death would prevent the dreaded womb  
From whence their happier successors must come.  
Wherefore th' accursed Sovereign of hell  
Thinking no other Devil could so well  
Act this ill part, whose consequence was high 
Gen. 3. 1, etc.   
Enough to engage his hateful majesty,  
Himself exposes for the common cause,  
And with his hellish kingdoms full applause,  
Goes forth, putting himself into disguise,  
And so within a bright scaled serpent lies,  
Folded about the fair forbidden tree,  
Watching a wished for opportunity,  
Which Eve soon gave him, coming there alone  
So to be first and easier overthrown;  
On whose weak side, th' assault had not been made  
Had she not from her firm protection strayed;  
But so the Devil then, so lewd men now  
Prevail, when women privacies allow,  
And to those flattering whispers lend an ear 
2 Tim. 3. 6.   
Which even impudence itself would fear  
To utter in the presence of a friend,  
Whose virtuous awe our frailty might defend.  
Though unexperience might excuse Eves fault,  
Yet those who now give way to an assault,  
By suffering it alone, none can exempt  
From the just blame that they their tempters tempt,  
And by vain confidence themselves betray,  
Fond secure in a known desperate way.  
As Eve stood near the tree, the subtle beast,  
By Satan moved, his speech to her addressed  
Hath God, said he, forbid that you should taste  
These pleasant fruits, which in your eyes are placed,  
Why are the tempting boughs exposed, if you  
May not delight your palates with your view?   

God, said the woman, gives us liberty  
To eat without restraint of every tree  
Which in the garden grows, but only one;  
Restrained by such a prohibition,  
We dare not touch it, for when e'er we do  
A certain death will our offence ensue.   

Then did the wicked subtle beast reply,  
Ah simple wretch, you shall not surely die,  
God enviously to you this fruit denies,  
He knows that eating it, will make you wise,  
Of good and ill give you discerning sense,  
And raise you to a godlike excellence.   

Eve quickly caught in the foul hunter's net,  
Believed that death was only a vain threat,  
Her unbelief quenching religious dread  
Infectious counsel in her bosom bred,  
Dissatisfaction with her present state  
And fond ambition of a godlike height.  
Who now applies herself to its pursuit,  
With longing eyes looks on the lovely fruit,  
First nicely plucks, then eats with full delight,  
And gratifies her murderous appetite;  
Poisoned with the sweet relish of her sin,  
Before her inward torturing pangs begin,  
The pleasure to her husband she commends,  
And he by her persuasion too offends,  
As by the serpents she before had done.  
Hence learn pernicious councillors to shun. 
Pro. 1. 10, etc.    

Within the snake the crafty tempter smiled  
To see mankind so easily beguiled,  
But laugh not Satan, God shall thee deride,  
The Son of God and Man shall scourge thy pride,  
And in the time of vengeance shall exact 
1 Joh. 3. 8.   
A punishment on thee, for this accursed fact. 
Joh. 16. 11.    

Now wrought the poison on the guilty pair,  
Who with confusion on each, other stare,  
While death possession takes, and enters in  
At the wide breach, laid open by their sin. 
Rom. 5. 12.   
Sound health and joy before th' intruder fled,  
Sickness and sorrow coming in their stead.  
Their late sweet calm did now for ever cease,  
Storms in all quarters drove away their peace;  
Dread, guilt, remorse in the benighted soul, 
Esa. 48. 22.   
Like raging billows on each other roll;  
Death's harbingers waste in each province make,  
While thundering terrors man's whole Island shake.  
Within, without, disordered in the storm,  
The colour fades, and tremble change the form,  
Heat melts their substance, cold their joints benumbs,  
Dull languishment their vigour overcomes.  
Grief conquered beauty lays down all her arms,  
And mightier woe dissolves her late strong charms, 
Psa. 39 11.   
Shame doth their looks deject, no cheerful grace,  
No pleasant smiles, appear in their sad face,  
They see themselves fooled, cheated, and betrayed,  
And naked in the view of heaven made;  
No glory compasses the drooping head,  
The sight of their own ugliness they dread,  
And curtains of broad, thin Fig-leaves devise  
To hide themselves from their own weeping eyes;  
But, Ah, these cover were too slight and thin  
To ward their shame off, or to keep out sin,  
Or the keen airs quick piercing shafts, which through  
Both leaves and pores into the bowels flew.  
While they remained in their pure innocence  
It was their robe of glory and defence:  
But when sin tore that mantle off, they found  
Their members were all naked, all uncrowned;  
Their purity in every place defiled,  
Their vest of righteousness all torn and spoiled.  
Wherefore, through guilt, the late loved light they eat,  
And into the obscurest shadow run;  
But in no darkness can their quiet find, 
Ps. 1 39 11.   
Carrying within them a disturbed mind,  
Which doth their cureless folly represent,  
And makes them curse their late experiment;  
Wishing they had been pure and ignorant still,  
Nor coveted the knowledge of their ill.  
Ah thus it is that yet we learn our good,  
Till it be lost, but seldom understood,  
Rich blessings, while we have them, little prize.  
Until their want their value magnifies,  
And equally doth our remorse increase  
For having cast away such happiness.   

O wretched man! who at so dear a rate  
Purchased the knowledge of his own frail state,  
Knowledge of small advantage to the wise,  
Which only their affliction multiplies, 
Eccl. 1. 18.   
While they in painful study vex their brain,  
Pursuing what they never can attain;  
And what would not avail them if acquired,  
Till at the length with fruitless labour tired,  
All that the learned and the wise can find  
Is but a vain disturbance of the mind,  
A sense of man's inevitable woes,  
Which he but little feels, who little knows;  
While mortals, holding on their error, still  
Pursue the knowledge both of good and ill, 
Prov. 1. 7.  
Psal. 11●. 10.   
They neither of them perfectly attain,  
But in a dark tumultuous state remain; 
1 Cor. 1. 20, 21. & 2. 14.   
Till sense of ill, increasing like night's shade,  
Or hath a blot of good impressions made, 
Jam. 3. 15, 16, 17.   
Or good, victorious as the morning light,  
Triumph over the vanquished opposite.  
For both at once abide not in one place,  
Good knowledge flies from them who ill embrace.  
So were our parents filled with guilt and fear,  
When in the groves they Gods approaches hear,  
And from the terror of his presence fled;  
Whether their own convictions caused their dread,  
For inward guilt of conscience might suffice  
To chase vile sinners from his purer eyes;  
Or nature felt an angry God's descent,  
Which shook the earth, and tore the firmament,  
We are not told, nor will too far inquire.  
Lightnings and tempests might speak forth his ire.  
For at the day of universal doom  
The great Judge shall in flaming vengeance come;  
An all-consuming fire shall go before, 
Ps. 97. 3, 4.   
Whirlwinds and thunder shall about him roar, 
Es. 9 5. & 66. 15, 16.   
Horror shall darken the whole troubled skies,  
And bloody veils shall hide the world's bright eyes, 
1 Thes. 1. 8.   
While stars from the dissolving heaven drop down, 
2 Pet. 3. 12.   
And funeral blazes every Turret crown.  
The clouds shall be confounded with the waves, 
Rev. 1. 7.   
The yawning earth shall open all her graves, 
Joel 3. 15, 16.   
Loud fragors shall firm rocks in sunder rend,  
Cleft mountains shall hells fiery jaws distend, 
Mat. 24. 29.   
Vomiting cinders, sulphur, pitch, and flame,  
Which shall consume the world's unjointed frame,  
And turn the Paradises we admire  
Into an ever-boyling lake of fire. 
Rev. 19 20.   
But God then, in his rich grace, did delay  
These dismalterrors, till the last great day.  
Yet even his first approach created dread,  
And the poor mortals from his anger fled;  
Until a calmer voice their sense did greet.  
Love even when it chides is kind and sweet. 
Heb. 12. 11.   
The sense of wrath far from the feared Power drives, 
Psal. 89. 31, 32, 33.   
The sense of Love brings home the fugitives.  
Souls flying God into despair next fall, 
Gen. 4. 14.   
Thence into hate, till black hell close up all.  
But if sweet mercy meet them on the way, 
Act. 9   
That milder voice, first doth their mad flight stay,  
And their ill-quitted hope again restore, 
Psal. 130. 7, 4.   
Then love that was forsaking them before  
Returns with a more flaming strong desire  
Of those sweet joys from which it did retire,  
And in their absence woe and terror found, 
Lam. 3. 1, etc.   
And all those plagues that can a poor soul wound.  
While thus this love with holy ardour burns,  
The bleeding sinner to his God returns, 
Mat. 27. 46.   
And prostrate at his throne of grace doth lie,  
If death he cannot shun, yet there to die. 
Job 13. 15.   
Where Mercy still doth fainting souls revive, 
Host 6. 1, 2, 3.   
And in its kind embraces keep alive  
A gentler fire, than what it lately felt  
Under the sense of wrath. The soul doth melt,  
Like precious Ore, which when men would refine  
Doth in its liquefaction brightly shine;  
In cleansing penitential melt so  
Foul sinners once again illustrious grow,  
When Christ's all-heating softening spirit, hath  
Their Furnance been, and his pure blood their Bath. 
Mal. 3. 2, 3.  
Rev. 1. 5.   
Now though God's wrath bring not the sinner home,  
Who only by sweet love attracted come, 
Rome 12. 1.   
Yet is it necessary that the sense  
Of it, should make us know the excellence, 
Joh. 16. 9, 10.   
And taste the pleasantness of pardoning grace, 
Mat. 11. 28.   
That we may it with fuller joy embrace;  
Which when it brings a frighted wretch from hell  
Makes it love more, than those who never fell: 
Luk. 7. 47.   
But mankind's love to God grows by degrees, 
1 Joh. 4. 10.   
As he more clearly Gods sweet mercy sees,  
And God at first reveals not all his grace,  
That men more ardently may seek his face,  
Averted by their folly and their pride,  
Which makes them their confounded faces hide.  
As still the Sun's the same behind the clouds,  
Such is God's love, which his kind anger shrouds, 
Lam. 3. 22, 23.   
Which doth not all at once itself reveal,  
But first in the thick shadows that conceal  
Its glory, doth attenuation cause;  
Then the black, dismal curtain softly draws,  
And lets some glimmering light of hope appear,  
Which rather is a lessening of our fear, 
Lam. 3. 26, 29, etc.   
Than an assurance of our joy and peace, 
Host 2. 15.   
A truce with misery, rather than release.   

Thus had not God come in mankind had died  
Without repair, yet came he first to chide,  
To urge their sin, with its sad consequence,  
And make them feel the weight of their offence.  
To ' examine and arraign them at his bar,  
And show them what vile criminals they were:  
But ah! our utterance here is choked with woe,  
With tardy steps from Paradise we go.  
Then let us pause on our lost joys a while  
Before we enter on our sad exile.    

Canto V.  

SAd Nature's sighs gave the Alarms,  
And all her frighted hosts stood to their arms,  
Waiting whom the great Sovereign would employ  
His all deserted rebels to destroy:  
When God descended out of heaven above  
His disobedient Viceroy to remove. 
Gen. 3. 8.   
Yet though himself had seen the forfeiture,  
Which distance could not from his eyes obscure,  
To teach his future Substitutes how they  
Should judgements execute in a right way,  
He would not unexamined facts condemn, 
2 Sam. 23. 3.   
Nor punish sinners without hearing them.  
Therefore citys to his bar the Criminals,  
And Adam first out of his covert calls,  
Where art thou Adam? the Almighty said, 
Gen. 3. 9, 10, 11, 12.   
Here Lord, the trembling sinner answer made,  
Amongst the trees I in the garden heard  
Thy voice, and being naked was afeard,  
Nor durst I so thy purer sight abide,  
Therefore myself did in this shelter hide.  
Hast thou (said God) eat the forbidden tree,  
Or who declared thy nakedness to thee?  
She, answered Adam, whom thou didst create  
To be my helper and associate,  
Gave me the fatal fruit, and I did eat;  
Then Eve was also called from her retreat,  
Woman what hast thou done? th' Almighty said; 
ver. 13.   
Lord, answered she, the serpent me betrayed,  
And I did eat. Thus did they both confess  
Their guilt, and vainly sought to make it less,  
By such extenuations, as well weighed,  
The sin, so circumstanced, more sinful made:  
A course which still half softened sinners use,  
Transferring blame their own faults to excuse,  
They care not how, nor where, and oftentimes  
On God himself obliquely charge their crimes,  
Expostulating in their discontent, 
Rom. 9 19   
As if he caused what he did not prevent; 
Ez. 18. 2.   
Which Adam wickedly implies, when he 
Jam. 1. 13, 14, 15.   
Cries, 'Twas the woman That thou gavest me;  
Oft-times make that the devil's guilt alone,  
Which was as well and equally their own.  
His lies could never have prevailed on Eve  
But that she wished them truth, and did believe  
A forgery that suited her desire,  
Whose haughty heart was prone enough to ' aspire.  
The tempting and the urging was his ill,  
But the compliance was in her own will.  
And herein truly lies the difference  
Of natural and gracious penitence,  
The first transferreth and extenuates  
The guilt, which the other owns and aggravates. 
Psal. 51. 3, 4, 5. & 32. 5.   
While sin is but regarded slight and small,  
It makes the value of rich mercy fall,  
But as our crimes seem greater in our eyes, 
1 Joh. 1. 8, 9, 10.   
So doth our grateful sense of pardon rise.   

Poor mankind at God's righteous bar was cast  
And set for judgement by, when at the last  
Satan within the serpent had his doom,  
Whose execrable malice left no room  
For plea or pardon, but was sentenced first;  
Thou (said the Lord) above all beasts accursed,  
Shalt on thy belly creep, on dust shalt feed,  
Between thee and the woman, and her seed  
And thine, I will put lasting enmity; 
1 Pet. 5. 8.   
Thou in this war his heel shalt bruise, but He  
Thy head shall break. More various Mystery 
Mat. 13. 25.   
ne'er did within so short a sentence lie.  
Here is irrevocable vengeance, here 
Judas 6.   
Love as immutable. Here doth appear 
Mal. 3. 6.   
Infinite Wisdom plotting with free grace, 
Zac. 6. 13.   
Even by Man's Fall, th' advance of humane race. 
1 Cor. 2. 9   
Severity here utterly confounds, 
Rom. 11. 22.   
Here Mercy cures by kind and gentle wounds,  
The Father here, the Gospel first reveals,  
Here fleshly veils th' eternal son conceals. 
Esa. 7. 14.   
The law of life and spirit here takes place, 
Rom. 8. 2, 3, 4.   
Given with the promise of assisting grace:  
Here is an Oracle foretelling all, 
Act. 13. 10.   
Which shall the two opposed seeds befall. 
Mat. 3. 7.  
Psal. 22. 30.   
The great war hath its first beginning here, 
Jer. 31. 22.   
Carried along more than five thousand year, 
Eph. 6. 12.  
Joh. 8. 44.   
With various success on either side, 
Judas 9   
And each age with new combatants supplied: 
Gen. 6. 2, 4, 5.   
Two Sovereign Champions here we find, 
Heb. 2. 10.   
Satan and Christ contending for mankind. 
Act. 5. 31.   
Two Empires here, two opposite Cities rise, 
Eph. 2. 2.   
Dividing all in two Societies. 
Joh. 15. 18, 19   
The little Church and the world's larger State 
Lu. 12. 32.   
Pursuing it with ceaseless spite and hate. 
Ps. 105. 12, 13, 14, 15.   
Each party here erecting their own walls,  
As one advances, so the other falls.  
Hope in the Promise the weak Church confirms, 
Esa. 9 6, 7.   
Hell and the world fight upon desperate terms,  
By this most certain Oracle they know, 
Rev. 12. 12.   
Their war must end in final overthrow. 
Joh. 16. 30.   
Some little present mischief they may do,  
And this with eager malice they pursue. 
Joh. 16. 20.   
The Angels whom God's justice did divide, 
Mat. 10. 34.   
Engage their mighty powers on either side,  
Hell's gloomy Princes the world's rulers made, 
Psal. 2. 1.  
Rev. 12. 7, 9   
Heaven's unseen host the Church's guard and aid.  
Till the frail woman's conquering son shall tread 
Dan. 10. 13, 21.   
Beneath his feet the serpent's broken head; 
Psa. 104. 4.   
Though God the speech to man's false foe address, 
Rom. 16. 20.   
The words rich grace to fallen man express,  
Which God will not to him himself declare,  
Till he implore it by submissive prayer; 
Psa. 50. 15.   
Sufficient 'tis to know a latitude 
Es. 41. 9   
For hope, which doth no penitent exclude. 
Psa. 130. 4.  
Luk. 1. 74.   
Had deaths sad sentence passed on man, before  
The promise of that seed which should restore 
Gal. 3. 8, 16.   
His fallen state, destroying death and sin, 
1 Cor. 15. 54, 57   
Cureless as Satan's had his misery been.  
But though free grace did future help provide,  
Yet must he present loss and woe abide; 
1 Cor. 3. 15.   
And feel the bitter curse, that he may so  
The sweet release of saving mercy know.  
Prepared with late indulged hope, on Eve 
Gal. 3. 13.  
Gen. 3. 16, etc.   
Th' almighty next did gentler sentence give.  
I will, said he, greatly augment thy woes,  
And thy conceptions, which with painful throes  
Thou shalt bring forth, yet shall they be to thee  
But a successive crop of misery.  
Thy husband shall thy ruler be, whose sway  
Thou shalt with passionate desires obey.  
Alas! how sadly to this day we find  
Th' effect of this dire curse on womankind;  
Eve sinned in fruit forbid, and God requires  
Her penance in the fruit of her desires.  
When first to men their inclinations move,  
How are they tortured with distracting love! 
Gen. 39 7.   
What disappointments find they in the end;  
Constant uneasinesses which attend  
The best condition of the wedded state, 
1 Cor. 7. 34, 39, 40.   
Giving all wife's sense of the curses weight,  
Which makes them ease and liberty refuse, 
1 Pet. 3. 5.   
And with strong passion their own shackles choose:  
Now though they easier under wise rule prove,  
And every burden is made light by love, 
Gen. 29. 20.   
Yet golden fetters, soft lined yokes still be,  
Though gentler ourbs, but curbs of liberty,  
As well as the harsh tyrant's iron yoke,  
More sorely galling them whom they provoke,  
To loathe their bondage, and despise the rule  
Of an unmanly, fickle, froward fool. 
1 Sam. 25, 25.   
whate'er the husbands be, they covet fruit,  
And their own wishes to their sorrows contribute. 
Gen. 30. 1. & 35. 18.   
How painfully the fruit within them grows, 
Mat. 24. 19   
What tortures do their ripened births disclose,  
How great, how various, how uneasy are  
The breeding sicknesses, pangs that prepare  
The violent openings of life's narrow door, 
Joh. 16. 21.   
Whose fatal issues we as oft deplore!  
What weaknesses, what languishments ensue,  
Scattering dead Lilies where fresh Roses grew.  
What broken rest afflicts the careful nurse,  
Extending to the breasts the mother's curse;  
Which ceases not when there her milk she dries,  
The froward child draws new streams from her eyes.  
How much more bitter anguish do we find  
Labouring to raise up virtue in the mind,  
Then when the members in our bowels grew,  
What sad abortions, what cross births ensue? 
Prov. 10. 1.   
What monsters, what unnatural vipers come  
Eating their passage through their parent's womb; 
Pro. 15. 20.   
How are the tortures of their births renewed,  
Unrecompensed with love and gratitude:  
Even the good, who would our cares requite,  
Would be our crowns, joys, pillars, and delight,  
Affect us yet with other griefs and fears,  
Opening the sluices of our ne'er dried tears.  
Death, danger, sickness, losses, all the ill 
Luk. 2. 48, 35.   
That on the children falls, the mothers feel,  
Repeating with worse pangs, the pangs that bore 
Mat. 2. 18.   
Them into life, and though some may have more  
Of sweet and gentle mixture, some of worse,  
Yet every mother's cup tastes of the curse.  
And when the heavy load her faint heart tires,  
Makes her too oft repent her fond desires, 
Gen. 27. 46.    

Now last of all, as Adam last had been  
Drawn into the prevaricating sin,  
His sentence came: Because that thou didst yield, 
Gen. 3. 17.   
(Said God) to thy enticing wife, The field  
Producing briers and fruitless thorns to thee,  
Accursed for thy sake and sins shall be.  
Thy careful brows in constant toils shall sweat,  
Thus thou thy bread shalt all thy whole life eat,  
Till thou return into the earth's vast womb;  
Whence, taken first, thou didst a man become;  
For dust thou art, and dust again shalt be  
When lives declining spark goes out in thee. 
Ps. 103. 14. & 104. 29.    

In all these Sentences we strangely find  
Gods admirable love to lost mankind;  
Who though he never will his word recall,  
Or let his threats like shafts at random fall,  
Yet can his Wisdom order curses so  
That blessings may out of their bowels flow.  
Thus death the door of lasting life became, 
2 Cor. 4. 6.   
Dissolving nature, to rebuild her frame,  
On such a sure foundation, as shall break 
2 Tim. 1. 10.   
All the attempts Hells cursed Empire make.  
Thus God revenged man's quarrel on his foe,  
To whom th' Almighty would no mercy show,  
Making his reign, his respite, and success, 
Lu. 18. 7, 8.   
All augmentations of his cursedness.  
Thus gave he us a powerful Chief and Head,  
By whom we shall be out of bondage led. 
Zac. 9 10, 11, 12.   
And made the penalties of our offence,  
Precepts and rules of new obedience,  
Fitted in all things to our fallen State, 
Mat. 11. 29, 30.   
Under sweet promises, that ease their weight.  
Our first injunction is to hate and fly 
1 Joh. 5. 3.   
The flatteries of our first grand enemy; 
Prov. 1. 10, etc.   
To have no friendship with his cursed race,  
The interest of the opposite seed t' embrace, 
Eph. 5. 11.   
Where though we toil in fights, tho' bruised we be, 
1 Tim. 6. 12.   
Yet shall our combat end in victory: 
Judas 3.   
Eternal glory, healing our slight wound, 
Rev. 2. 10.  
Mic. 7. 16, 17.   
When all our labours are with triumph crowned.  
The next command is, mothers should maintain  
Posterity, not frighted with the pain,  
Which tho' it make us mourn under the sense  
Of the first mother's disobedience,  
Yet hath a promise that thereby she shall 
1 Tim. 2. 15.   
Recover all the hurt of her first fall,  
When, in mysterious manner, from her womb 
Es. 9 6.   
Her father, brother, husband, son shall come. 
Heb. 2. 12, 13.   
Subjection to the husband's rule enjoined,  
In the next place, that yoke with love is lined, 
Eph. 5. 25, etc.   
Love too a precept made, where God requires 
Luk. 1. 35.   
We should perform our duties with desires; 
1 Pet. 3. 1, 2.   
And promises t' incline our averse will,  
Whose satisfaction takes away the ill  
Of every toil, and every suffering  
That can from unenforced submission spring;  
The last command, God with man's curse did give,  
Was that men should in honest callings live,  
Eating their own bread, fruit of their own sweat;  
Nor feed like drones on that which others get: 
1 Thes. 4. 11, 12.   
And this command a promise doth imply,  
That bread should recompense our industry. 
2 Thes. 3. 12.   
One mercy more his sentence did include,  
That mortal toils, faintings and lassitude, 
Rev. 14. 13.   
Should not beyond deaths fixed bound extend,  
But there in everlasting quiet end; 
Mat. 10. 28.   
When men out of the troubled air depart,  
And to their first material dust revert, 
Job 3. 17, 18, 19   
The utmost power that death or woe can have 
Eccl. 3. 20.   
Is but to shut us prisoners in the grave,  
Bruising the flesh, that heel whereon we tread,  
But we shall trample on the serpent's head. 
1 Thes. 4. 14.   
Our scattered atoms shall again condense,  
And be again inspired with living sense; 
Es. 26. 19   
Captivity shall then a captive be,  
Death shall be swallowed up in victory, 
Job 19 26, 27.   
And God shall man to Paradise restore,  
Where the foul tempter shall seduce no more 
1 Cor. 15. 20, 21, 22, 26, 54, 55, 57    

How far our parents, whose sad eyes were fixed  
On woe and terror, saw the mercy mixed, 
Act. 2. 24.  
Psa. 68 18.   
We can but make a wild uncertain guess,  
As we are now affected in distress,  
Who less regard the mitigation still 
Esa. 43. 2, etc.   
Than the slight smart of our afflicting ill;  
And while we groan under the hated yoke, 
1 Pet. 4. 12, 13.   
Our gratitude for its soft lining choke. 
Jer. 30. 11, etc.    

But God having th' amazed sinners doomed,  
Put off the Judge's frown and reassumed 
Mic. 7. 18, 19   
A tender father's kind and melting face  
Opening his gracious arms for new embrace, 
Es. 49. 15.   
Taught them to expiate their heinous guilt 
Jer. 31. 20.   
By spotless sacrifice and pure blood spilt, 
Psal. 50. 5.  
1 Pet. 1. 19   
Which done in faith did their faint hearts sustain,  
Till the intended lamb of God was slain, 
Heb. 11. 4.  
Dan. 9 26, 27.   
Whose death, whose merit, and whose innocence,  
The forfeit paid and blotted out th' offence. 
Joh. 1. 29.  
Ps. 40. 6, 7.   
The skins of the slain beasts, God vestures made, 
1 Joh. 2. 2.   
Wherein the naked sinners were arrayed, 
Rev. 1. 5. & 5. 9, 10.   
Not without mystery, which typified 
Rom. 5. 10, 19   
That righteousness that doth our foul shame hide. 
Col. 2. 14.   
As when a rotting patient must endure 
Ps. 32. 1, 2.   
Painful excisions to effect his cure, 
Rev. 19 8.   
His spirits we with cordials fortify, 
Rom. 3. 22. & 13. 14.   
Lest, unsupported, he should faint and die:  
So with our parents the Almighty dealt, 
Gal. 3. 27.   
Before their necessary woes they felt, 
Zac. 3. 4, 5.   
Their feeble souls rich promises upheld, 
Deut. 33. 27.   
And their deliverance was in types revealed,  
Even their bodies God himself did arm  
With clothes that kept them from the weather's harm, 
Mat. 6. 30.   
But after all, they must be driven away, 
Psa. 89. 32, 33, 34.   
Nor in their forfeit Paradise must stay.   

Then, said the Lord, with holy irony,  
Whence man the folly of his pride might see, 
Gen. 3. 22.   
The earthy man like one of us is grown,  
To whom, as God, both good and ill is known,  
Now lest he also eat of th' other tree  
Whose fruit gives life, and an Immortal be,  
Let us by just and timely banishment  
His further sinful arrogance prevent.  
Then did he them out of the garden chase,  
And set a Cherubin to guard the place;  
Who waved a flaming Sword before the door,  
Through which the wretches must return no more:  
May we not liken to this Sword of flame 
Heb. 1. 7, 12, 18, 19, 20, 21.   
The threatening law which from Mount Sinai came,  
With such thick flashes of prodigious fire  
As made the mountains shake and men retire:  
Forbidding them all forward hope, that they  
Could enter into life that dreadful way.  
whate'er it was, whate'er it signifies,  
It kept our parents out of Paradise,  
Who now returning to their place of birth  
Found themselves strangers in their native earth. 
1 Pet. 2. 11.   
Their fatal breach of Gods most strict command 
Heb. 11. 13.   
Had there dissolved all concord, the sweet band 
Psa. 39 12.   
Of universal loveliness and peace.  
And now the calm in every part did cease;  
Love, tho' immutable, its smiles did shroud  
Under the dark veil of an angry cloud. 
Rev. 3. 19   
And while he seemed withdrawn, whose grace upheld  
The order of all things, confusion filled 
Psal. 75. 3.   
The Universe. The air became impure,  
And frequent dreadful conflicts did endure  
With every other angry element;  
The whirling fires its tender body rend.  
From earth and seas gross vapours did arise,  
Turned to prodigious Meteors in the skies;  
The blustering winds let lose their furious rage, 
Psal. 107. 25, 26, 27.   
And in their battles did the floods engage.  
The Sun confounded was with nature's shame,  
And the pale Moon shrunk in her sickly flame;  
The rude congressions of the angry Stars 
Jud. 5. 20.   
In Heaven, begun the universal wars,  
While their malicious influence from above,  
On earth did various perturbations move,  
Droughts, inundations, blast, killed the plants;  
Worse influence wrought on th' inhabitants,  
Inspiring lust, rage, ravenous appetite,  
Which made the creatures in all regions fight. 
Psa. 78. 45, 46, 47, 48.   
The little infects in great clouds did rise,  
And in Battalia's spread, obscured the skies;  
Armies of birds encountered in the air,  
With hideous cries deciding battles there;  
The birds of prey to gorge their appetite,  
Seized harmless fowl in their unwary flight.  
When the dim evening had shut in the day,  
Troops of wild beasts, all marching out for prey,  
To the restless flocks would go, and there 
Psal. 104. 20, 21, 22.   
Oft-times by other troops assailed were,  
Who snatched out of their jaws the new slain food,  
And made them purchase it again with blood.  
Thus sin the whole creation did divide  
Into th' oppressing and the suffering side;  
Those still employing craft and violence  
To ' ensnare and murder simple innocence,  
True emblems were of Satan's craft and power  
In daily ambuscado to devour. 
1 Pet. 5. 8.   
Nor only emblems were, but organs too, 
Rev. 12. 8, 12.   
In and by whom he did his mischiefs do,  
While persecuting cruelty and rage  
Them in his cursed party did engage.  
Love, meekness, patience, gentleness, combined  
The tamer brood with those of their own kind.  
Wherefore God chose them for his sacrifice,  
When he the proud and mighty did despise,  
And his most certain Oracles declare, 
Rom. 8. 20, 21.   
They man's restored peace at last shall share:  
But to our parents, then, sad was the change 
Es. 11. 7. & 65. 25.   
Which them from peace and safety did estrange,  
Brought universal woe and discord in,  
The never failing consequents of sin; 
Es. 57 20, 21.   
Nor only made all things without them jar,  
But in their breasts raised up a civil war, 
Eph. 2. 12, 13, 14.   
Reason and sense maintained continual fight,  
Urging th' aversion and the appetite,  
Which led two different troops of passions out,  
Confounding all, in their tumultuous rout.  
The less world with the great proportion held:  
As winds the caverns, sighs the bosoms filled;  
So flowing tears did beauties fair fields drown,  
As inndations kept within no bound.  
Fear earthquakes made, lust in the fancy whirled,  
Turned into flame, and bursting fired the world:  
Spite, hate, revenge, ambition, avarice  
Made innocence a prey to monstrous vice.  
The cold and hot diseases represent  
The perturbations of the element.  
Thus woe and danger had beset them round,  
Distressed without, within no comfort found.  
Even as a Monarch's Favourite in disgrace  
Suffers contempt both from the high and base,  
And the most abject most insult o'er them,  
Whom the offended Sovereigns condemn;  
So after man th' Almighty disobeyed,  
Each little fly durst his late King invade,  
Aswell as the woods monsters, wolves and bears,  
And all things else that exercise his fears.  
Methinks I hear sad Eve in some dark Vale  
Her woeful state, with such sad plaints, bewail:   

Ah! why doth death its latest stroke delay,  
If we must leave the light, why do we stay  
By slow degrees more painfully to die,  
And languish in a long calamity?  
Have we not lost by one false cheating sin  
All peace without, all sweet repose within?  
Is there a pleasure vet that life can show,  
Doth not each moment multiply our woe:  
And while we live thus in perpetual dread,  
Our hope and comfort long before us dead?  
Why should we not our angry maker pray 
Job 3.   
At once to take our wretched lives away?  
Hath not our sin all nature's pure leagues rend 
Jonah 4. 3.   
And armed against us every element?  
Have not our subjects their allegiance broke,  
Doth not each worm scorn our unworthy yoke?  
Are we not half with griping hunger pined,  
Before we bread amongst the brambles find?  
All pale diseases in our members reign,  
Anguish and grief no less our sick souls pain,  
Wherever I my eyes, or thoughts convert,  
Each object adds new tortures to my heart.  
If I look up, I dread heavens threatening frown,  
Thorns prick my eyes, when shame hath cast them down,  
Dangers I see, looking on either hand,  
Before me all in fight posture stand.  
If I cast back my sorrow-drowned eyes,  
I see our ne'er to be recovered Paradise,  
The flaming Sword which doth us thence exclude,  
By sad remorse and ugly guilt pursued.  
If I on thee a private glance reflect,  
Confusion doth my shameful eyes deject,  
Seeing the man I love by me betrayed,  
By me, who for his mutual help was made,  
Who to preserve thy life ought to have died,  
And I have killed thee by my foolish pride;  
Defiled thy glory, and pulled down thy throne.  
O that I had but sinned, and died alone!  
Then had my torture and my woe been less,  
I yet had flourished in thy happiness.   

If these words adam's melting soul did move,  
He might reply with kind rebuking love.   

Cease, cease, O foolish woman, to dispute,  
God's sovereign will and Power are absolute. 
Psa. 115. 3.   
If he will have us soon, or slow to die,  
Frail worms must yield, but must not question why. 
Rom. 9 20, 21, 22, 23.   
When his great hand appears, we must conclude  
All that he doth is wife, and just, and good; 
Ps. 119. 68   
Though our poor, sin-benighted fouls, are blind, 
Rom. 3. 4.   
Nor can the mysteries of his wisdom find, 
Psal. 51. 4.   
Yet in our present case we must confess 
Gen. 18. 25.   
His justice and our own unrighteousness.  
He warned us of this fatal consequence,  
That death must wait on disobedience;  
Yet we despised his threat, and broke his law, 
Rom. 6. ult.   
So did destruction on our own heads draw;  
Now under his afflicting hand we lie,  
Reaping the fruit of our iniquity.  
Which, had not he prevented, when we fell,  
At once had plunged us in the lowest hell;  
But by his mercy yet we have reprieve, 
Gen. 6. 3.  
1 Pet. 3. 20.   
And yet are showed how we in death may live,  
If we improve our short indulged space 
Joh. 11. 25.   
To understand, prize, and accept his grace.  
Did all of us at once like brutes expire,  
And cease to be, we might quick death desire:  
But since our chief and immaterial part,  
Not framed of dust, doth not to dust revert:  
Its death not an annihilation is,  
But to be cut off from its supreme bliss: 
Mat. 25. 41, 46.   
Whatever here to mortals can befall,  
Compared to future miseries is small, 
Luk. 16. 21, 22.   
The saddest, sharpest, and the longest have  
Their final consummations in the grave, 
Mat. 10. 28.   
These have their intermissions and allays,  
Though black and gloomy ones, these nights have days,  
The worst calamities we here endure  
Admit a possibility of cure; 
Psa. 130. 1.   
Our miseries here are varied in their kind, 
Psal. 107.   
And in that change the wretched some ease find.  
Sleep here our pained senses stupifies, 
Esa. 29. 8.   
And cheating dreams in our sick fancies rise,  
But in our future sufferings 'tis not so,  
There is no end, no intermitted woe,  
No more return from the accursed place, 
Lu. 16. 26.   
No hope, no possibility of grace,  
No sleepy intervals, no pleasant dreams,  
No mitigations of those sad extremes,  
No gentle mixtures, no soft changes there, 
Rom. 2. 8, 9   
Perpetual tortures, heightened with despair,  
Eternal horror, and eternal night, 
Judas 13.   
Eternal burnings, with no glance of light, 
Mat. 13. 50.   
Eternal pain. O 'tis a thought too great, 
Lu. 16. 24.   
Too terrible, for any to repeat, 
Mat. 8. 12. & 22. 13.   
Who have not scaped the dread. Let's not to shun 
Rev. 19 20.   
Heaven's scorching rays, into hell's furnace run:  
But having slain ourselves, let's fly to him 
Host 13. 9   
Who only can our souls from death redeem, 
Rom. 3. 16.  
Psa. 103. 4.   
To undo what's done is not within our power,  
No more than to call back the last fled hour.  
To think we can our fallen state restore,  
Or without hope, our ruin to deplore,  
Are equal aggravating crimes; the first  
Repeats that sin for which we were accursed, 
Eph. 2. 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.   
while we with foolish arrogating pride,  
More in ourselves than in our God confide; 
Rom. 3. 27.   
The last is both ungrateful and unjust,  
That doth his goodness, or his power distrust.  
Which wheresoever we look, without, within,  
Above, beneath, in every place is seen,  
Doth Heaven frown? Above the sullen shrouds 
Psal. 36. 5, 6.   
God sits, and sees through all the blackest clouds  
Sin casts about us, like the misty night,  
Which hide his pleasing glances from our sight, 
Esa. 44. 22.   
Nor only sees, but darts on us his beams 
Lam. 3. 44, 31, 32, 25.   
Ministering comfort in our worst extremes.  
When lightnings fly, dire storm and thunder roars,  
He guides the shafts, the serene calm restores. 
Job 37. 11, 12, 13.   
When shadows occupy days vacant room,  
He makes new glory spring from night dark womb. 
Esa. 40. 1, 2. & 57 18, 19   
When the black Prince of air le's lose the winds,  
The furious warriors he in prison binds. 
Joh. 14. 18.   
If burning stars do conflagrations threat,  
He gives cool breezes to allay the heat. 
Esa. 25. 4.   
When cold doth in its rigid season reign, 
Psal. 78. 16, 17.   
He melts the snows, and thaws the air again;  
Restoring the vicissitude of things, 
Psal. 30. 5.   
He still new good from every evil brings. 
Luk. 8. 24, 25. Esa. 27. 8. Esa. 4. 6. Cant. 2. 11, 12. Gen. 8. 22. Psal. 147. 17, 18. Esa. 45. 6, 7, 8.   
He holds together the world's shaken frame, 
Psal. 75. 3.   
Ordaining every change, is still the same. 
Jam. 1. 17.   
If he permit the elements to fight,  
The rage of storms, the blackness of the night; 
Psal. 102. 26, 27.   
'Tis that his power, love and wisdom may 
Mal. 3. 6.   
More glory have, restoring calm and day; 
Esa. 54. 11.   
That we may more the pleasant blessings prise, 
Jer. 31. 35, 36.   
Laid in the balance with their contraries.  
Though dangers then, like gaping monsters stand 
2 Cor. 4. 17.   
Ready to swallow us on either hand; 
Esa. 54. 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.   
Let us despise them, firm in this faith still,  
If God will save, they can nor hurt nor kill; 
Psal. 46. 1, 2.   
If by his just permission we are slain,  
His power can heal and quicken us again. 
Esa. 8. 9, 10, 12, 13, 14.   
If briers and thorns, which from our sins arise  
Looking on earth, pierce through our guilty eyes, 
Esa. 51. 11, etc.   
Let's yet give thanks they have not choked the seed  
Which should with better fruit our sad lives feed. 
Gen. 50. 20.   
If discord set the inward world on fire, 
2 Sam. 17. 14.   
With haste let's to the living spring retire,  
There quench, and quiet the disturbed soul, 
Esther 5. 14. & 6. 13. & 7. 10.   
There on Love's sweet refreshing green banks roll,  
Where ecstasied with joy, we shall not feel 
Ezek. 37. 1, etc.   
The Serpent's little nibbling at our heel.  
If we look back on Paradise, late lost, 
Esa. 19 22.   
Joys vanished like swift dreams, thawed like a frost, 
Jer. 30. 17.   
Converting pleasant walks to dirt and mire,  
Would we such frail delights again desire, 
Act. 14. 17.   
Which at their best, however excellent, 
Joh. 7. 37, 38.   
Had this defect, they were not permanent? 
Psal. 23. 1, 2. 6. 7. Col. 3. 1, 2. Psal. 107. 35, 36, 34, 33. 1. Cor. 7. 31. Eccles. 1. 2. 2 Cor. 4. 18.   
If sin, remorse, and guilt give us the chase,  
Let us lie close in mercies sweet embrace, 
Psal. 49. 4, 15.   
Which when it us ashamed, and naked found  
In the soft arms of melting pity bound; 
Rev. 3. 18, 20.   
Eternal glorious triumphs did prepare, 
Psa. 32. 1, 2.   
Armed us with clothes against the wounding air,  
By expiating sacrifices taught, 
1 Joh. 2 2. 25.   
How new life shall by death to light be brought.  
If we before us look, although we see  
All things in present fight posture be:  
Yet in the promise we a prospect have  
Of victory swallowing up the empty grave; 
1 Cor. 15. 54, 55, 26.   
Our foes all vanquished, death itself lies dead,  
And we shall trample on the monster's head. 
Host 13. 14.   
Entering into a new and perfect joy, 
Rom. 16. 20.   
Which neither sin nor sorrow can destroy: 
Mat. 25. 21.   
A lasting and refined felicity, 
Rev. 20. 4.   
For which even we ourselves refined must be. 
Mal. 3. 2, 3.   
Then shall we laugh at our now childish woes, 
Col. 1. 12.   
And hug the birth that issues from these throes. 
Joh. 16. 21. 22.   
Let not my share of grief afflict thy mind,  
But let me comfort in thy courage find;  
'Twas not thy malice, but thy ignorance  
That lately my destruction did advance;  
Nor can I my own self excuse; 'twas I  
Undid myself by my facility.  
Let's not in vain each other now upbraid,  
But rather strive to afford each other aid:  
And our most gracious Lord with due thanks bless,  
Who hath not left us single in distress.  
When fear chills thee, my hope shall make thee warm,  
When I grow faint, thou shalt my courage arm;  
When both our spirits at a low ebb are,  
We both will join in mutual fervent prayer  
To him whose gracious succour never fails,  
When sin and death poor feeble man assails,  
He that our final triumph hath decreed,  
And promised thee salvation in thy seed.   

Ah! can I this in Adam's person say,  
While fruitless tears melt my poor life away?  
Of all the ills to mortals incident,  
None more pernicious is than discontent,  
That brat of unbellef, and stubborn pride,  
And sensual lust, with no joy satisfied,  
That doth ing ratitude and murmur nurse,  
And is a sin which carries its own curse;  
This is the only smart of every ill;  
But can we without it sad tortures feel?  
Yes; if our souls above our sense remain,  
And take not in th' afflicted bodies pain,  
When they descend and mix with the disease,  
Then doth the anguish live, reign, and increase  
Which when the soul is not in it, grows saint,  
And wastes its strength, not nourished with complaint,  
Submissive, humble, happy, sweet content  
A thousand deaths by one death doth prevent;  
When our rebellious wills subdued thereby  
Into th' eternal will and wisdom, die; 
Gal. 2. 20.   
Nor is that will harsh or irrational,  
But sweet in that which we most bitter call,  
Who err in judging what is ill or good, 
Mat. 11.   
Only by studying that will, understood.  
What we admire in a low Paradise,  
If they our souls from heavenly thoughts entice,  
Here terminating our most strong desire,  
Which should to perfect permanence aspire,  
From being good to us they are so far,  
That they our fetters, yokes and poisons are,  
The obstacles of our felicity,  
The ruin of our souls most firm healths be,  
Quenching that life-maintaining appetite,  
Which makes substantial fruit our sound delight.  
The evils, so miscalled, that we endure  
Are wholesome medicines tending to our cure,  
Only disease to these aversion breeds,  
The healthy soul on them with due thanks feeds.  
If for a Prince, a Mistress, or a Friend,  
Many do joy their bloods and lives to spend,  
Wealth, honour, ease, dangers and wounds despise, 
Luk. 9 23, 24.   
Should we not more to Gods will sacrifice?  
And by free gift prevent that else-sure loss?  
whate'er our will is, we must bear the cross,  
Which freely taken up, the weight is less,  
And hurts not, carried on with cheerfulness;  
Besides, what we can lose, are gliding streams,  
Light airy shadows, unsubstantial dreams, 
Psal. 90. 5, 6, 9 & 49. 10, 11, 12, 13.   
Wherein we no propriety could have  
But that which our own cheating fancy gave;  
The right of them was due to God alone, 
Lu. 12. 20.   
And when with thanks we render him his own,  
Either he gives us back our offerings,  
Or our submission pays with better things:  
Were ills as real as our fancies make, 
Job 1. 21 & 42. 10, 11, 12.   
They soon must us, or we must them forsake;  
We cannot miss ease and vicissitude,  
Till our last rest our labours shall conclude.  
Natural tears there are, which in due bound  
Do not the soul with sinful sorrow drown,  
Repentant tears too are no fretting brine, 
2 Cor. 7. 10.   
But loves soft melt, which the soul refine,  
Like gentle showers, that usher in the spring,  
These make the soul more fair and flourishing.  
No murmuring winds of passions here prevail,  
But the life-breathing Spirits sweet fresh gale,  
Which by those fruitful drops all graces feeds,  
And draws rich extracts from the soaked seeds,  
But worldly sorrow, like rough winter's storms,  
All graces kills, all loveliness deforms,  
Augments the evils of our present state,  
And doth eternal woes anticipate.  
Vain is that grief which can no ill redress,  
But adds affliction to uneasiness;  
Unnerving the souls powers, then, when they should  
Most exercise their constant fortitude.   

With these most certain truths let's wind up all,  
Whatever doth to mortal men befall  
Not casual is, like shafts at random shot,  
But Providence distributes every lot,  
In which th' obedient and the meek rejoice,  
Above their own preferring Gods wise choice:  
Nor is his providence less good than wise,  
Tho' our gross sense pierce not its mysteries.  
As there's but one most true substantial good,  
And God himself is that Beatitude:  
So can we suffer but one real ill,  
Divorce from him by our repugnant will,  
Which when to just submission it returns,  
The reunited soul no longer mourns,  
His serene rays dry up its former tears,  
Dispel the tempest of its carnal fears,  
Which dread what either never may arrive,  
Or not as seen in their false perspective;  
For in the crystal mirror of God's grace  
All things appear with a new lovely face.  
When that doth Heavens more glorious palace show  
We cease to ' admire a Paradise below,  
Rejoice in that which lately was our loss,  
And see a Crown made up of every Cross.  
Return, return, my soul to thy true rest,  
As young benighted birds unto their nest, 
Psa. 116. 7.   
There hide thyself under the wings of love  
Till the bright morning all thy clouds remove.    
FINIS.