ON THE DEATH OF OUR LATE SOVEREIGN LORD King CHARLES' II. OF BLESSED MEMORY.  
A PINDARIC ODE.  
BY THOMAS FLATMAN.  
O mibi tam longae maneat pars ultima vitae,  
Spiritus & quantum sat erit Tua dicere facta!  Virgil. 
LONDON: Printed for Benj. took, at the Sign of the Ship in St. Paul's Churchyard. 1685.   

On the much Lamented DEATH OF OUR LATE SOVEREIGN LORD King CHARLES' II. OF BLESSED MEMORY. A PINDARIC ODE.  

STANZA I.  
ALas! Why are we tempted to complain,  
That Heaven is deaf to all our cries!  
Regardless of poor Mortals miseries!  
And all our fervent Prayers devoutly vain!  
'Tis hard to think th' immortal Powers attend  
Human affairs, who ravish from our sight  
The Man, on whom such Blessings did depend,  
heavens, and Mankind's Delight!  
The Man! O that opprobrious word The Man!  
Whose measure of duration's but a Span,  
Some other Name at Babel should have been contrived  
(By all the vulgar World t' have been received)  
A Word as near as could be to Divinity,  
Appropriate to Crowned Heads, who never ought to Die;  
Some signal Word that should imply  
All but the scandal of Mortality.  
'Tis fit, we little lumps of crawling Earth,  
Derived from a Plebeian birth,  
Such as our frail Forefathers were,  
Should to our primitive Dust repair;  
But Princes (like the wondrous Enoch) should be free  
From Death's unbounded Tyranny,  
And when their Godlike Race is run,  
And nothing glorious left undone,  
Never submit to Fate, but only Disappear.   

II.  
But, since th' eternal Law will have it so  
That Monarches prove at last but finer Clay,  
What can their humble Vassals do?  
What Reverence; what Devotion can we pay,  
When these, our earthly Gods, are snatched away?  
Yes, we can mourn, Yes, we can beat our breast,  
Yes, we can call to mind those happy days  
Of Pleasure, and of Rest,  
When CHARLES the Merciful did reign,  
That Golden Age, when void of cares,  
All the long Summer's day,  
We Atoms in His beams might sport, and play:  
Yes, we can teach our Children to bewail  
His fatal Loss, when we shall fail,  
And make Babes learn in after days  
The pretty way of stammering out His Praise,  
His merited praise, which shall in every Age  
With all advantage flame,  
In spite of Furies, or infernal Rage,  
And imp the Wings, and stretch the Lungs of Fame.   

III.  
Excellent Prince, whom every Mouth did bless,  
And every bended knee adore,  
On whom we gazed with ecstasies of Joy  
(A Vision which did satisfy, (but never cloy)  
From whom we dated all our happiness,  
And from above could ask no more,  
Our gladsome Cup was filled till it ran o'er.  
Our Land (like Eden) flourished in His time,  
Defended by an Angel's Sword,  
A terror 'twas to those abroad,  
But all was Paradise to those within:  
Nor could th' Old Serpent's Stratagem  
Ever supplant His well-watched Diadem.  
Excellent Prince, of whom we once did say  
With a triumphant noise,  
In one united voice,  
On that Stupendious Day,  
Long live, Long live the King!  
And Songs of IO PAEAN Sing,  
How shall we bear this Tragical Surprise,  
Now we must change Long Live, for Here He Lies?   

IV.  
Have you forgot? (but who can Him forget?)  
You watchful Spirits that preside  
O'er sublunary things,  
Who, when you look beneath, do oft deride,  
Not without cause, some other petty Kings;  
Have you forgot the greatness of His mind,  
The bravery of His elevated Soul,  
(But He had still a Goshen there)  
When darkest Cares around His Royal heart did wind,  
As Waves about a steady Rock do roll:  
With what disdain He viewed  
The fury of the giddy multitude,  
And bore the Cross, with more than manly fortitude,  
As He had learned in Sacred Lore,  
His mighty Master had done long before.  
And you must ever own  
(Or else you very little know  
Of what we think below)  
That when the Hurricanes of th' State were o'er,  
When in His noon-tide blaze He did appear,  
His gently awful brow  
Added fresh lustre to th' Imperial Crown,  
By Birthright, and by Virtue, more than once His own.   

V.  
He was!— but what He was, how great, how good,  
How just, how He delighted not in blood,  
How full of pity, and how strangely kind,  
How hazardously constant to His Friend,  
In Peace how glorious, and in War how brave,  
Above the charms of Life, and terrors of the Grave;  
When late Posterity shall tell:  
What He has done shall to a Volume swell,  
And every Line abound with Miracle  
In that prodigious Chronicle.  
Forgive (unbodyed Sovereign) forgive,  
And from your shining Mansion cast an Eye  
To pity our officious Blasphemy,  
When we have said the Best we can conceive.  
Here stop (presumptuous Muse!) thy daring flight,  
Here hide thy baffled head in shades of night,  
Thou too obscure, thy dazzling Theme too bright,  
For what thou shouldst have said, (with grief struck dumb)  
Will more emphatically be supplied  
By the joint Groans of melancholy Christendom.    

TO HIS SACRED MAJESTY King JAMES II.  
DRead Prince! Whom all the world admires, and fears,  
By Heaven designed to wipe away our tears,  
To heal our wounds, and drooping spirits raise,  
And to revive our former Halcyon days,  
Permit us to assure ourselves, that You,  
Your happy Brother's fortune will pursue,  
For what great thing is that You dare not do?  
Whose long known, unexampled Gallantry  
So oft has shaken th' Earth, and curbed the haughty Sea.  
And may those Stars, that ever o'er You shone,  
Double their influence on Your peaceful Throne.  
May You in honourable Deeds outshine  
The brightest Heroes of Your Royal Line,  
That when Your Enemies shall the Sceptre see  
Grasped in a hand enured to Victory,  
The Rebels may like Lucifer fall down,  
Or fly, like Phantoms from the rising Sun.  
FINIS.