A POEM On that Execrable TREASON Plotted by the Papists on the 5th of November, Anno 1605.  
Flectere si nequeunt Superos Acheronta movebunt.  
CAMBRIDGE, Printed by John Hayes, Printer to the University, for Robert Nicholson Bookseller in Cambridge, 1670.   

A Poem on that Execrable Treason Plotted by the Papists on the 5th of November, Anno 1605.  

1  
'TWas in a day, whose smiling face  
Might tempt with ravishing delight  
Heaven's dwellers down to take a sight;  
Not that they it, but that it them might grace.  
Flowers, Phoenix like, from others ashes rise,  
So fresh and fair,  
As ready to prepare  
A second Paradise,  
Or marry lusty earth to th' azure skies.  
The sweet breathed Zephyrus woos  
Coy Flora, and still showers,  
Into her lap whole heaps of flowers,  
Who flying pou'rs  
Them on earth's face, while he poor Lover murmuring goes  
Whispering out in warm sighs his woes.  
The river that e'er while  
Curled up his face in frowns, fanned with a gentle gale,  
Let's them shrink all  
To th' dimples of a smile.  
The loving flowers did bow their heads to meet,  
And with officious kindness kiss your feet.  
'Twas in those chequered fields, where th' crystal streams  
Of reverend Cham do sweetly glide,  
Calm as heaven's face, when candid beams,  
Not clouds, his face do hid:  
Illustrious Cham (upon  
Whose silver streams the grace's train,  
And all the Muse's reign:  
That one might truly call it Helicon.)  
'Twas here in such a charming May,  
(Not sympathising with the day)  
The melancholy HEYRICKE lay;  
Lay down (I cannot say did rest)  
For midst of such a joy his breast,  
With strangest Hurricanes oppressed,  
Those charms that ne'er before  
Wanted a conquering power,  
Were then opposed: their subtlest motions ne'er could move  
Or  dispose his duller soul to love.  
At last grief that had played his part,  
And triumphed o'er his senses, and his heart,  
To perfect his half gotten prize,  
Locked up his eyes;  
And as cold sleep employed his senses, so  
A fluttering dream possessed his fancy too.   

2  
He thought 'twas night, and not one breath  
Of whispering air durst stir abroad,  
But fearful kept within their close abode,  
Sleep then was th' only God;  
Sleep younger brother unto death,  
To whom grand conquerors all  
Humble themselves, and prostrate fall;  
Sleep then had universal conquest made,  
And those that just before durst vie  
With death itself for victory,  
Were in his fetters captive laid,  
When a strange noise broke through the air,  
A noise that froze the stoutest hearts with fear,  
A noise that none would doubt to come  
From hel's own womb.  
The listening trees that just before  
Pricked up their leaves to hear  
Some news, struck with a fear  
Turn Aspines' all: heaven shrouds  
Her but now shining eyes in clouds,  
ne'er willing to restore  
Her lamps for such a sight; nor strange  
That peace to horror thus should change:  
Hells Pursuivants cut through the air,  
And bid foul spirits all repair  
To Pluto's cell.  
Straight none denied,  
Only those that in Papists breasts reside;  
For there they find a worse (which they term better) hell.   

3  
The Council met; Lucifer takes his Throne,  
Ith' midst; yet lowest (for in hell  
The highest is the lowest still)  
And belching out an horrid groan,  
So great that hell's self shook,  
With pride he much, but more by far with wrath did swell.  
And viewing heaven with lightning in his eyes,  
At once from out his mouth words and a thundering broke;  
Must heaven, quoth he (nay worse) must men despise  
Our power? are we degenerate?  
And though fallen from our heaven, and hopes, by fate,  
Must our courages fall too? sure hel's fire  
Might Chemically have refined,  
The dross from each polluted mind:  
And make those now-made-purer parts aspire.  
Those calcined parts that dare to fly  
And brush with their proud wings the sky.  
Degenerate souls, go, basely go  
Beg mercy from your foe.  
Oh! how I'd tear and rend my heart,  
Should there lie hid in any part  
Such poisonous thoughts, should heaven now offer's grace,  
I'd dart it back into his face.  
Recall once more into your thought,  
How I your Captain fought  
Against heaven's arms; and though I could not get  
The victory, heaven never awed me yet.  
In my own hell I'd fry the eternity,  
Once but to try  
With heaven again for victory.  
Though I knew I could nothing gain,  
But to sink down to hell again,  
The enterprise would doubly pay my pain.  
I'll do't: I'll Giantlike his Palace scale,  
And make his prison turn his Jail:  
Let him to ' said his stars go hire,  
They'll serve for torches, and for's funeral fire.  
Heaven's great I must confess; and were't not so  
I'd scorn to own it for my foe.  
The greater is the foe 'twill be  
(Once got) the greater victory.  
But see (I break with spleen) that Isle in peace  
That countermines our plots, and still at ease  
Laughs at, and calms our tempests; and so well  
As if not Rome but she, had th' keys of hell.  
Sure I'm a Prince, but still some higher power,  
Gently doth hover o'er  
Their blessed abode; that let me play my part  
Never so well it still diverts my dart.  
That great Armada, rigged scarce at the cost  
Of all the Indian mines; though blest  
By my good brother, and the rest  
Of my own kindred there at Rome; nay more  
Prayed for by me (that never prayed before)  
In one day it, and with it all our hopes were lost.  
And shall we here (poor harmless spirits) sit,  
And never once be sensible of it?  
Shall we in sleepish sottishness still lie,  
As in a stupid Lethargy?  
Shall all our conquests that e'er while  
Awed heaven, stay at one petty Isle?  
No, let us break their peace,  
And make them swim in blood, as now in seas.  
Their now-Pacifick sea let's change  
To the dead sea: let horror range,  
And fill the wondering world with monsters strange.  
Let drums out-roar the Lyre  
And justice once again to heaven retire.  
But why thus say I (let it) it shall come,  
I in your faces read their doom.   

4  
This said an humming noise succeeds,  
The speech had raised their spirits higher:  
They now their former sottishness admire:  
Their breasts glow not with hells but anger's fire  
That roused the seeds  
Of wont wrath; so fire doth harmless lie,  
Cloistered in ashes till some wind  
Blows up the sparks, and makes it raging show its  
By the effects of's wont Tyranny.  
At last from out the rest Rome's fury came,  
Unlike her sisters or the brood  
Of swarming sins, that round her stood.  
Her skin heavens milky way, her eyes  
Seem those two tapers, that adorn the skies.  
Such symmetry in every part  
That loadstone-like they can attract the heart:  
That Owls and such base birds of night  
Are ravished at the sight.  
Her smile sets up a Monarchy, her frown  
As quickly pulls it down;  
Nay Kings must owe to her proud feet their Crown.  
Thus she deludes the ravished eye,  
That could it spy,  
What under that but-skin-deep beauty lie:  
(Nay painted too) he'd loathe what he before,  
With such blind worship did adore,  
Yet to this whore;  
Nations drink off Cyrcaean cups, and feast,  
Turning from heaven to her, and so from man to beast.  
Thus she came forth, but all the way,  
Trampled on Emperor's necks that groaning lay,  
Hating her now as they before did day.  
On still she came, but with a pride,  
That yielded nor to Lucifer's, or any one beside.  
For this a man may tell,  
She that would rival heaven, would never yield to hell.  
Then bowing with disdain thus spoke;  
Great Monarch, to whom earth doth homage do,  
Air, sea, men and men's souls too,  
'Tis true we vex in vain, and this believe,  
Both you, and I, have equal cause to grieve.  
That Isle before drunk with my poisoned wine,  
At once shakes off your yoke and mine.  
A new born light dispels the clouds;  
And with them our Religion, that shrouds  
Herself in ignorance: they see,  
And seeing hate, and hating sly  
Our plots, and damned treachery.  
Our Masques took off, we can no more  
Deceive their senses as before.  
Hypocrisy no longer takes,  
Our Machiavilian Plots we draw  
So subtly out, their fineness makes them break.  
In vain we strive to keep the world in awe,  
In vain we like Chameleons change  
To th' colour of all objects where we range:  
For spite of envy we, I fear,  
Must like Chameleons too go live on air.  
Come, than our forces let's unite:  
And though our projects fail, let not our spite.  
My wrangling Jesuit shall sow  
Sedition, strife, and whatsoever  
May a full harvest bear,  
Of murder, rapine, theft, and woe.  
— Well, well!  
I've a new project, and as high,  
As would not ill become a Deity.  
And since heaven will not, help me hell.  
I scorn to kill a King: 'tis base, and low,  
Nor fits it my brave soul; I'll at one blow,  
King and his Nobles mow,  
But not the manner how, the quickest sighted know.  
I'll (Godlike) make the Sun stand still amazed,  
As once when at it Israel gazed.  
Old fearful Grandam earth shall quake, and flit,  
As troubled with an ague fit.  
Oh how I'll laugh to see their members fly  
(As though they fought against the Deity)  
In heavens own face: those that did scorn to move  
In lower, then in higher orbs shall rove:  
I'll blow them up to heaven, but this I'll tell,  
(My comfort) they with you, and me, shall backward fall to hell.  
Heaven's self shall think we opeed his door,  
And stole from thence his chiefest power,  
His wide-mouthed thunder; that even he shall fear,  
Lest I should him with his own weapons tear.  
That Hydra, that we never yet could mow,  
But for one head cut off there sprang up two;  
I'll cut the snake in parts so small,  
That he shall ne'er again together crawl.  
Help, help, ye fiends; from you, and from the fire  
I must require  
A means on this damned crew to wreak mine ire.  
'Tis thus: under that stately frame  

* West minster  Adorned with Trophies of still living fame,  
In caverns deep (that one might swear  
They with your Kingdom correspondence bear)  
In these, instead of wine, I'll thrust  
Hells sooty dust,  
That must  
Not only hell's colour, but forces wear.  
And when the King, and Nobles all shall meet,  
And he shall them with honeyed phrases greet,  
And when he shall  
Perhaps invectively against us fall,  
I'll snatch a brand from hell, made of the bones  
Of some old Papist; and at once  
Blow up three Kingdoms into nought; and send  
Their King to hell, his half-spoke speech to end.  
This breach once made, my Fury's all  
Cloistered before, I'll soon disband,  
And turn them on th' already conquered land;  
And with unheard of tortures on them fall.  
Unto three Furies Poets give a birth,  
I'll be the fourth on earth.  
Hark, hark, methinks I hear  
Some pleasant Music strike mine ear,  
Better than whatsoever  
Harmonious sounds, the deafened world counts dear.  
Oh? 'tis the far-fetched groans of those,  
Whose haughty spirits scorned our yoke,  
And must be broke  
By tortures and by blows.   

5  
This said the spirits all by a dumb Rhetoric show  
By silence, they do of the Plot allow.  
Yet they though nursed in blood,  
And i'th' profession long had stood,  
‛ Shamed to be beat in their own art, they would  
Have blushed (if through their black they could)  
Yet struck they were with horror at the first;  
But straight the thirst  
Of sweet revenge these new bred fears did burst.  
Oh! how their breasts do glow  
With thoughts of this revenge; a Century of years  
In hell, but the Epitome appears  
Of one small minute now.  
And sure some juster Nemesis had sent,  
Only there thoughts for punishment:  
For hell's great pain  
Is nothing to what they in expectation do sustain.  
Impatient, out they fly, and fill the earth  
With stranger Monsters, than e'er took a birth  
In slimy Egypt; and for fear some eye  
Should them, and their Plot too espy,  
They turn not Asses in  
Lions, but Lions in an Ass' skin.  
For well they know Asses go free  
When Foxes oft suspected be.  
Turned to a Jesuit here's one  
That vaunts with strength of words  
And not of swords  
He can plant Rome's Religion.  
And 'tis not strange Rome can so subtly plead;  
When that old Sophisters their head.  
No wonder that Imposter triumphs thus  
We are the sons of Eve,  
And he that could deceive  
Our mother, quickly conquers us.  
An apple tempted her, but we  
Are catched with shades, and empty Pageantry.  
Mean while hell's fiends work in their cell  
(A man might safely call it hell)  
Hating, as did their Plot, the light;  
Keeping from men's, and so they thought, from Gods own sight.  
And 'tis a wonder he that once durst vie  
With God himself for principality,  
Should force his pride to stoop so low  
As in man's shape to go:  
But hence, you see what envy's self can do.  
England mean while, was lulled asleep  
While her grand enemy did sentry keep.  
But watchful heaven still in their actions pries;  
And never shuts her Galaxy of eyes.  
England i'th' midst of day was in a night,  
Wand'ring without a light.  
England was turned a floating Isle,  
And in a sea of misery did toil,  
Wand'ring from's knowledge far  
Without or sight of compass, or of Star:  
When straight (me thought) a ray  
Descends from heaven, and reduces day,  
And at one blessed sight,  
Brings them, and that damned Plot to light.  
England was even  
Sinking in woe; when straight an hand from heaven  
It did (and still does it) from sinking keep:  
And me thought, at once it risen from woe, and I from sleep.  
Awaked I found my breast,  
(Grief gone) with an unknown joy oppressed:  
When my too swelling joy t' assuage;  
Raptur'd with a Poetic rage,  
I burst out in these words, Oh! happy Isle,  
That can like kingdoms rule stern fate,  
That can outbrave whate'er  
Palsy strikes others, with a Panic fear,  
That one may style,  
Without a wild Hyperbole, thee th' only Fortunate.  
See smiling peace, wars horror gone,  
Doth crown our (rightly named) Albion.  
No Tragedies appall the eye with fear,  
No thunder-imitating noise the ear:  
The happy natives know not war,  
Only from far,  
They hear it named perhaps: pure Haltion days  
Attends their blessed lives: that canker care  
Corrodes not their blessed peace: but free as air,  
They chant their lays.  
Each field is pure Elysian; earth doth seem  
To rival heaven, and show  
At once what all past ages e'er did know: That one would deem  
England her beauty's Magazine: where lie  
Opposed to th' ravished eye  
Her sweets contracted in one point: that Jove  
Seems with the earth in love,  
And as to Danae poured,  
Not gold, but flowers, yet whatsoever  
This Lecher seems by this t' infer,  
She is a virgin pure not yet deflowered.  
O land thrice happy in thy blessed guide,  
That at full tide  
Of blood, and woe, did steer thy wand'ring course  
And break thy greatest tempests force.  
Thou sittest above while winds do storm thy fort,  
And they that once thy terror were, do now become thy sport.  
Peace doth not hover o'er,  
Our no longer tempestuous shore,  
But take her seat: scattering her joys amain  
That one might swear, she had brought the golden days again.  
And may'st thou still (blessed Land) embalmed in peace,  
Securely sit, Queen Regent of the Seas:  
And may thy wooden castles all about,  
Keep sweet peace in; and enemies out,  
And may'st thou be  
In a true sense called Great Britanny.  
And may thy glorious King loaden with praise,  
More than with years, when Fate shall end his days,  
(But  be long first) lay his down,  
As in exchange for a celestial Crown.   
FINIS.