Devout RHAPSODIES: IN which, Is Treated, of the excellency of Divine scriptures. ALSO, 

Of  
GOD, His 

Attributes.  
Plurality of Persons.  
Absolute monarchy.    
ANGELS, 

Good,  
Bad,  
Their Power.    
How the Bad 

Fell.  
Tempt Man.    
MAN, His 

Fall.  
Beatitude.      
By i: A: RIVERS.  Haec omnia Liber Vitae (Contine= t) & Testamentum Altissimi, & agnitio Veritatis. ECCLES. 44. 
LONDON▪ Printed by Thomas Harper, for Daniel Frere, and are to be sold at his Shop, at the Red Bull in Little Britain.   

To the Reader.  
WHy according to the custom of the present, and former ages, I have not dedicated this poem to some particular person, my motive was, because I am engaged to many, and therefore would pay ●bligations to many: To others though not much known yet to their worth, and virtue, I would give a testimony, and express affection, and perform all these more than with a ceremonious letter which, though in the choicest words, are like, at lest no more than Trajan's Wall-flowers, as our Constantine in derision of that Emperors too frequent inscriptions on City walls, gates and bridges, adagised: For whereas the former are but inns of memory, fame, and affection; written volumes, especially in Greek and Latin (if good) are Mausoleums, Pyramids, constant h●bitations and dwelling Palaces for fame love, and gratitude. In adressing the Sermons to particular personages, I did not think much election was necessary, distribution of Poems being like sitting at a round table, where the placing of the salt makes not the upper end of the Board; and great Augustus by his own Minions Vngil and Horace, was often saluted after mean Gentlemen of Rome.  
Being for many years detained in a miserable and chargeable Prison, to divert my mind from too serious thoughts of public and private calamities, made me undertake this employment. The public griefs were the condition of these lament●ble times wherein our Nation hath imitated that man of whom Gerson the Chancellor of Paris makes mention, that seeing a f●ie on his friends forehead, with an axe (intending to k●ll the poor fl●e) dashed out his unfortunate friends bra●nes; such have been the cures in civil and ecclesiastical affairs; both the Church and commonwealth being more rent, and distracted by these irreligious, and uncivil combustions, both made more diseased and Epidemically sick, by these unnatural, and desperate remedies.  
Private griefs were, that being with diverse noble Gentlemen for six years' prisoner in a comfortless, and chargeable goal, our means of livelihood taken away, our friends impoverished, or altogether undone, by plunderings, sequestrations, compositions, and imprisonments: Notwithstanding, contrary to the laws of God, which forbid, Exod. 23. to boil the Kid in the milk of the dam; contrary to the laws of this realm, which though severe enough, yet provide, that any may freely relieve, and support any person of our profession being in prison: Contrary to the honour of this Nation, to the dignity of this City, the authority of the Sheriffs, to whose care and charge, this prison is by his Majesty concredited: Contrary to all our hopes, and expectations of the subjects rights, and liberties, the vindication and assertion whereof have by so many vows, Covenants, and Declarations, been promised, sworn, and avowed: Finally contrary to all these laws and Titles, which have, and should make Bidentals reverend, and bestow immunity on them; the efficacy and equity of which laws Mr. Pym (reputed a great patriot) with such Eulogiums extols, that the sacred majesty of great Britain, (who 
Though now in clouds, yet he shall shine more bright,  
Then petty Comets, that eclipse his light)  with approbation hath vouchsafed twice to mention them: I say notwithstanding all these Laws, titles, hopes, and expectations, we even in prison have been diverse times plundered, our books, though bought publicly, and allowed to be sold by authority, as English Bibles, English Chronicles, grammars, Virgil's, and the like, most injuriously (may not I say feloniously?) taken from us, and for moneys redeemed, again with the same violence and injustice retaken by those Harpies of the Common wealth, and for more moneys redelivered, though some to this day most injustly detained Our slender householdstuff pilfered, our chambers rifled, considerable sums of money (which should have protracted the miserable life of above forty captivated persons) seized on; for want of which, many Gentlemen of birth, & heretofore of quality, have been thrust into the Common goal, where they, and diverse others in the other several wards, have died in much want and misery. We have made our addresses, if not for justice, yet for compassion, but our mediators & presenters of our petitions (though recti in Curia) were examined, if they were not of our profession; and being threatened as Malignants, have been deterred from further prosecution in our behalf, and so all supplications, and expectations have been rendered fruitless.  
'Tis one of Senecas gnomical, and commended distributions, that Magna pars vitae elabitur malè agentibus, maxima nihil agentibus, tota aliud agentibus: By which division (if right) my writing this Poem may be censured: Howsoever, I may profess some part of my study and care, in the prosecution of it, hath been as to offend no Religion, so no Person: and therefore my hopes are that no particular will proclaim himself so much faulty, as being not accused, he will take exceptions.   

Some faults escaped in the printing, may be so amended.  
Page 1. for sealed, read sealed. p. ●. for history, r. histories. p. 7. for silly profane, r. since profaner. p. 10. for living. r. lining. p. 12. for weapon. r. weapons▪ p. 24. for know, r. knew. p. 28. for alterations, r. altercations. p. 36. for God, r. good p. 57 for before, r. ●ore. p. 6. for precious stones, r. pebble stones.   

To his honoured Friend, Mr. Rivers, Upon his Holy Rhapsodies.  
who's this? who like the rosy-fingered morn,  
Is thus from mountain unto mountain borne:  
Whose mystic locks charged with the drops of nights,  
On us below hurl beams enriched with lights?  
Is it that soul, which having Jordan past,  
Pure Jordan, made such an ambitious haste  
To pass like Israel through the bloody maine,  
In hope another baptism to obtain?  
It is the same, whose Rhapsodies unfold,  
Sweet Raptures, Raptures which in cups of gold,  
To us celestial Constellations hold.  
Would all thus Poetize, who would refuse,  
To celebrate the strains of such a Muse?  
George Fortescue.   

To his honoured Friend, Mr. River's, upon his excellent poems, the Devout Rhapsodies.  
MYsterious Rivers, whose each sacred ●yne,  
Shows that thy ●use is absolute Divine;  
And cannot with impurity be stained,  
Or with obsc●a●e conceptions be prophained.  
But in Meanders, holy turns, and winds,  
Delightful to thine own, and Readers minds.  
He that will give thee a deserved praise,  
Must crown thy head with groves, not boughs of bays.  
James Yate.   

To my much honoured and Candid Friend, Mr. Abbot. alias Rivers, upon his Devout Rhapsodies.  
Was thy Quill made o'th' towering Eagles wing,  
Who soaring in the bosom of his King,  
Saw what was done in Heaven? straight thence descends,  
And sings our church's lot, and state of Fiends.  
Thy poem speaks all these, which I read o'er,  
With wonder and delight, but which was more,  
I know not of these two, and dare proclaim,  
Who understand it, will commend the same.  
Nor do I envy it, because 'tis thine,  
Yet were vows potent; I could wish it mine.   

Ad eundem Decasticon.  
QUale tuum pectus, quae Musa humana superna,  
Dum pariter lustrans, Tartareasque domus?  
Caelicolas cantat cives, ipsumque sedentem,  
In solio Dominum; Terrigenasque Deos.  
(Hinc amor invitat justos ad pnemia terret,  
(Dum legitur) sceleri debita, paena malos.)  
Sed benè cum cantas haec omnia; sperne quid ausint,  
In Librum Rabies invida, tempus redax.  
Scilicet haec Thamesis, resonabunt carmina Ripae,  
Dum placido Thamesis, mur●ure Lympha fluit.  
George Cox.   

To my worthy, and learned Friend, Mr. River's, after the reading of his Religious Rhapsodies.  
THat thou in noblest strains of poesy,  
Dost teach the mysteries of theology:  
And raisest human souls from sordid earth,  
Up to that blessed place, whence they take their breath.  
I leave to them whose learned spirits know,  
How best their knowledge, and thy praise to show.  
And only saying, I the Work admire,  
Wish that all those who Christian bays desire,  
With just attention, and clear sight would look,  
Each hour, or day, on thy sweet, mystic book:  
So they, reformed by virtue of thy Muse,  
No more shall Wit, and poesy abuse.  
John Chapperline.   

To my dear Friend, Mr. River's, upon his Rhapsodies.  
HOw often write I Verses? often tear  
My Verses? still imagining they were,  
Unworthy thy brave Muse? begin again:  
And search in every corner of my brain?  
Barren; I bite my P●●; my servant's rate,  
When the fault lies 〈◊〉 in them, but my Pate.  
Shall I who have so many Verses writ,  
In every Theme impl●yd my active wit;  
And having promised Verses, not perform  
What I have promised? here again I storm,  
Yet reassume my Quill: write: All men know;  
That to my noble Friend I Verses owe:  
Protest against myself, so great's the sum,  
Of thy due praise, my Muse is banquer out, Dumb.  
H. W.   

Devout RHAPSODIES.  
To the Right Honourable, Philip Herbert, Earl of Pembroke and Montgomerie; And to the Lord Philip Herbert his Son.  

Liber Primus.  
Sermo Primus.  
The Argument.  
As branches do the root, Rivers obey  
The Ocean, smaller lines their tribute pay,  
And homage to the Centre, as the Sreames  
Shot from the Sun confess themselves his beams;  
So must all Authors, all prescriptions fall  
Unto the scripture as original.  
Wrangling Philosophers may boast,  
The Scriptures only speak the Holy Ghost.  
Their schools decay, what's grounded on our Texts  
Shall flourish, maugre gentilism, and Sects.  
OUr sacred Volumes are the sealed springs, 
Cant. 4.   
Where choicest Nymphs, as they of heavenly things  
Sing ditties, both themselves: from the white Mount  
Of Liban issues this perennall Fount,  
Which proves an Ocean where the silly sheep  
May wade securely, 
St. Aug.  yet the same's so deep,  
The Elephant may swim, and if he range  
Too for be swallowed in the gulf: so strange  
And perilous are these streams. Was not a Wave,  
Nestorius ventured on Nestorius' grave?  
And did not Arrius perish in these seas,  
Whilst he durst sail midst the profundities.  
And wanted a sure Pilot: What Saint Paul  
Hath preached and writ to instruct and save us all,  
Turns to the ruin of illiterate men, 
2 Pet. 3.   
As they pervert the meaning of his pen.  
Who pry too nearly into Majesty,  
Struck purblind by the rays of glory die. 
Prov. 25.   
'Tis true: Pharphar and Abana are streams  
Of Syria; 
4 Reg. 5.  but if leprous Naaman dreams,  
they'll cleanse his spots he errs, and must obey  
The Prophet, and to Jordan take his way:  
There glide the waters which he washing in,  
Shall cure his leprosy, and cleanse his skin.  
Poems must from this crystal Torrent spring,  
Else they'll, as did those bitter waters bring  
Diseases to the Drinker. 
Exod. 15.  Wanton books,  
Hurt souls, as did the body Maras brooks,  
Like dangerous basilisks a passage find  
To dart their poison at the inveigled mind.  
What? Are our Rils drunk up? Our fountains dry?  
That we must to such dirty puddles fly,  
First shall no Tapers grace the spangled heaven,  
The rough Alps lie as the smooth valleys even:  
Ere who are conversant in sacred writ,  
Shall fail of Themes to exercise their wit.  
Are not the Fire, the air, the Earth, the Seas,  
The Spheres, the Saints, th' Angels above all these.  
A still supplying Subject? then to wade  
In the Divine ideas whence God made  
Of nothing every thing, and with one word,  
Could existence to all he made afford. 
Gen. 1.   
The Birth, 
Psal. 14●.  the Infancy of this Vast Frame,  
Increase, decrease, restoring of the same.  
All Sciences of things above, below,  
(More than Philosophy did ever know)  
Are objects of God's book, and easily yield  
To all invention a most spacious field.  
We grant profaner authors have given Rules  
Of living well, kept open natures schools:  
But this book gentilism exceeds as far  
As the bright Sun at noon some lesser Star.  
Why do we study? Wherefore are we joined  
So fiercely in dispute? To adorn the mind  
With truths, and as the flint and steel conspire  
In issuing forth the Element of fire:  
By joint collision, so from much bickerings  
In disputation Aletheia springs.  
Volve and revolve your Sages Volumes, you  
Shall not be certain one opinion's true  
Amongst one hundred. What their history?  
Patched up with idle fables and with lies. 
St. Austin. lib. de Doct. Christiana.   
What's noxious there our Scripture reprehends,  
What's crooked rectifies, what's faulty mends:  
What's good makes better, and you need not fear  
Any report or false position there.  
Millions of Lines about this Circle are,  
And though they mutually may seem to square,  
And contrary as East to West, the South  
To North; yet all meet in the Centre Truth.  
What can be thought or writ by any quill,  
Is in our Bible specified, and still  
New matter draws the curious Reader on,  
And makes the Learned to reflect upon  
The sense of deeper Mysteries, as he sees  
Here wondrous actions done: and out of these  
Draws moral applications, and can fly  
To allegory, and Anagog●e.  
From the same words and deeds quadripartite,  
Senses are fetched, and every one is right.  
Who but the Mother of us all God's mind  
Could in few words such strong allusions find?  
And than what he hath in aenigmas put,  
Make curious wits enueleat the Nut?  
GOD is a copious magazine; men are  
The dispensators of his precious ware,  
And here's such plenty that from every clause,  
New mysteries the ingenious Reader draws.  
Go juggling Mountebanks, cry up your toys  
Amongst the rustics, Idiots, girls, and boys.  
Ye winding Sophisters expose your tra●h,  
Wrangling Philosophers together clash.  
Frame-sophism, syllogisms, describe, divide,  
Bring in essentials to define, decide  
By Demonstrations problems. What's all this  
To what we are made for, everlasting bliss?  
Study four years the ten Predicaments,  
Mean while forget the ten commandments;  
What profits Stoicism? What Plato's wit  
To your salvation? What the Stagyrit?  
That Cynik Sage expresses, though he'll hide  
In's Tub, and currish manners far more pride  
Than Plato in his pomp. He who gave rules  
To Courtiers, had a Caesar in his schools  
For a Disciple, 
Seneca.  found another way  
How Princes Gnomically should write and say,  
With some Atheistik Documents spoils all,  
Commending such who on their own swords fall,  
And with a violent Fate themselves deliver, 
St. August. Laudantur ubi non sunt cruciantur ubi sunt.   
From pain or shame, for such shall live for ever  
In pain, and shame. These wisemen are commended  
Where they are not: but their pains shall ne'er be ended  
Where they are. Let's ask where are their followers now?  
Who to defend their marcid Axioms vow?  
Who now adore strict Zeno's apathy?  
Who for smooth Epicure will Champions be?  
Where are Diogenes scholars that can scrub,  
Sleep, wake, eat, drink, live, die; All in one Tub?  
Contented with a scrip, a dish, a staff,  
More mad themselves at others' madness laugh?  
Surely such men have been; and made a show  
Of Learning, had Disciples, and did know  
Something indeed, although not much; but what?  
Is it Times fault? All almost are forgot.  
No: 
Sap. 4.  time is blameless, for a Bastard sprout,  
Though watered much seld fixes a deep root.  
Our Scripture is a more celestial seed,  
Not Philosophik Darnell, or that weed  
That grows in one day, in the following fades;  
But planted by God's hand, 
Mat. 13.  shoots forth, the blades  
Increases so, that in the branches rest  
Your towering Eagles, and make them their Nest.  
(Our glorious doctors o'er whose head a Dove  
Hovers, and dictates Lines of Wit and love)  
Wit in expounding Mysteries of our Faith,  
Love, urging to perform what Scripture saith.)  
From bough to bough these soaring Eagles spring,  
Chanting the trophies of their slaughtered King  
Who (by his passion worthy made) revealed  
This sacramental Volume seven times sealed. 
Apoc. 5.   
For our lamb butchered, straight the Vale was rent,  
Which twixt the Temple, and the HOLIEST went.  
The Tables, 
Mat. 27.  Aaron's Rod, 
Luc. 23.  and Manna there  
Reserved, by immolated Jesus were  
To be brought forth, 
Heb. 9  the Law more plainly taught,  
Grace freelier given, 
Num. 17.  deeds more prodigious wrought.  
These Tables, and what appertains to them  
Were preached, were taught, received in every realm.  
These are the silly grains of mustardseed,  
That tasted once such operations breed. 
Mat. 23.   
Converted Nations, builded Churches, and  
Planted soul-saving faith in every Land.  
How is it possible poor Fishermen  
Should convert Nations, erect Temples, then  
Leave their Disciples, who when they were dead,  
This saving Doctrine everywhere should spread?  
Be Trumpets and the Pipes of heavenly grace,  
And in all Regions Jesus Banners place:  
Be daily Actors of stupendious things,  
Maugre all Sects, and persecuting KINGS?  
First does the Synagogue recalcitrate  
Against this progress with intestine hate.  
But Truth prevailing, the Apostles shall  
Inter her in a glorious funeral,  
And jointly every Ceremonious Rite  
Takes sweetrepose in darkness, but delight.  
Then Pagan Kesars' dreading th' overthrow  
Of their false Gods, against the true GOD show  
Their indignation, and with fire and sword  
Pursue, destroy professors of his Word  
Revealed, 
Exod. 7.  and writ: But as did Aaron's Rod  
Turned to a Serpent by the hand of God,  
Devour the Sorcerers Wands by magic spells,  
Also made Serpents, yet not tumid swells,  
So this divinely-vigorous mustardseed  
Shall eat up, and hath swallowed every weed,  
That through the world by gentilism was sown,  
(Their Doctrines, Phanes, and Idols overthrown.)  
No honours now to Moloch, Camos given,  
None to Astarthe, 
2 C●●on 3●.  and the hosts of Heaven.  
Their maimed Dagon falls before the ark,  
Does Hamon bleat now? 
Jer 19  does Anubis bark?  
Paphus and Cyprus no more Venus follow, 
S●pn.   
No doubtful answers uttered by Apollo.  
These have, all Sects successively must perish,  
Our heavenly seed eternally shall flourish.   

To the Right honourable, William, Lord Powis, and Sir Percy Herbert his Son.  
Sermo Secundus.  
The Argument.  
We mean to treat of GOD, what shall we take  
For Essence, and a Definition make?  
Can he who no ways will be circumscrib'de,  
By any terms of Learning be describ'de?  
Can he be specified by words of Art?  
When thought cannot imagine the least part  
Of his perfections. Yet we'll something write  
From God's own Lucid Lanthorne borrowing light, 
Ps. 119.   
For silly profane Authors Buzzards were,  
By this directed, we our course must steer.  
SO sacred are our Records, no profane  
Hand must attempt to touch èm under pain  
Of severe chastisement. 
Exod. 18.  So Sinais Mount,  
Nor man nor beast approach when Moses on't  
Receives the Law; and the same Prophet must  
Pull off his shoes in reverence of that Dust,  
Where God shall show himself. 
Ib. 3.  He answers well,  
Who being commanded by his King to tell  
What God was, and desiring still more days  
The Question to resolve, y●t still delays:  
Truly confessing that the Thesis grew  
Harder, and harder, and the less he knew.  
The more he studied. 
Theodectes a tragic Poet.  Who writ Tragedies,  
For his presumption forfeited his eyes.  
And Theopompus lost his health, because  
One in his Stories, 
Aristaeas' one of the ●2 Translators.  the other Moses laws  
Durst bring upon the Stage, both are restored  
To sight, and health; their fault by both deplored.  
Yet who are humble with a prosperous gaile  
In Cephas ship shall through the Ocean sail,  
And in the depths behold God's Attributes,  
How this perfection, that negation suits,  
To express some thing of a deity,  
(More than created understandings high)  
And character as follows. GOD'S a Being,  
That ever was, and shall be; a mind seeing,  
All in the mirror of himself, 
A description of God.  where all  
Future things, and possible (though these shall  
Ne'er have existence) boast eternity,  
And in the Godhead all whole sharers be,  
GOD everywhere is present, nowhere seen,  
He filleth the whole world, and had there been  
Myriads of worlds, 
God's Immensity.  he would them all have rounded,  
Himself not compassed, bounded all not bounded.  
Fancy some vast imaginary space,  
The Centre, and circumference of that place  
Is GOD. Imagine thousand vaster, there  
GOD must by'r involved the surrounding Sphere▪  
All intimate to all things, yet all without  
All things; though nothing can be, if God be out.  
GOD is an entity most simple, yet  
Millions of discrepant perfections meet,  
As Lines Concentrike in this SIMPLE ONE,  
And without all these we'll acknowledge none:  
For GOD: where all are with a bended knee  
Offer our vows to that sole majesty.  
Admire his immutability, 
Immutability.  the same  
Still in himself, yet changing still the frame  
O'th' world with various Motions: Can love, hate,  
Be pleased, displeased, yet still keeps the same state.  
(Exteriors only altered.) Stanil amazed  
When man's and Angels thoughts to'th height are raised  
Byth' light of Glory, yet inferior far  
To penetrate what Mines of Treasures are  
Hid in that supreme Nature, 
Omnipotency.  Power, and Skill  
To make ten thousand worlds, when e'er he will,  
More beautiful than this, increase the store  
Of Angels numberless, and make 'em more  
Glorious beyond esteem. Can any Law  
Limit his arm? When this world's but a straw  
Compared to what he can: turn when he please  
To their first Chaos, the air, the Land, the Seas.  
Dissolve the Heavens, reduce to'th old abyss,  
Of nothing, whence they came, those Bands of his  
Own Court, the Angels, and when this is done,  
Be full as happy in himself alone.  
For GOD did not those glorious spirits create  
With purpose to increase hi● blessed State:  
Who was so copious, as he was before,  
Nor do their Legions multiply his store.  
Repute Earth, Angels, Heavens, but a mere story  
To speak a Deities more extensive glory:  
And when he made this ample fabric, He  
For our good would declared majesty  
Ineffable; in all express a will  
Of doing good, a power to do't, a skill  
To do't in the best manner, as much Art  
In the production of each several part,  
As of the whole, (an Artists skill being weighed,  
Not after what, but how the work is made.)  
A child may be begot, brought forth, and cry,  
But without more solicitude must die.  
God's Providence his Creatures must attend  
Else were they made to little, 
Divine Providence.  or no end.  
Soon would this world to the first nothing fall,  
If wisdom should not nurse, and govern all.  
The Machine a disordered ataxy,  
General confusions, and combustions be.  
What's Provideence? A fair exterior Robe  
Encompassing, and covering the whole Globe,  
And all things comprehended in't: Beside  
It is the living of the world's inside;  
Ordains, rules, acts, for ends peculiar; yet  
This Queen does not her Maj●sty forget;  
But makes the secondary causes know  
They are her Agents, and obedience owe  
To what she lists. Could the intensive heat  
O'th' flaming Furnace make the children sweat, 
Dan. 5.   
This Providence a while suspending fire  
From action maugre the fierce tyrant's ire? 
Jo●.   
Did not she make at Gomorrah's vows the team  
O'th' posting Sun a while shoot every beam  
From the same Zenith, and in lieu of night,  
Mortals stand gazing at a noonedayes' light?  
This prescribes Rules, ordaineth Ends, gives laws  
Constant to th' universe, makes every cause.  
Help its associate: Nothing does in vain,  
But first disposing sweetly without pain  
Brings forth what nature would: Yet most appears  
Where liberty of action domineers.  
And with so deep a wisdom enterweaves  
Human affairs, that though she freedom leaves  
To several purposes and different ends,  
Yet happily effects what she pretends, 
S●p. 8.   
Attends to all, yet so to every one,  
As if save that, she notice took of none.  
To dictate, write, read, hear, all in one hour,  
Made Caesar wondered at, Origen much more.  
This world of creatures God's eye looks upon,  
Governs, provides for; yet for all as one.  
Observes as well what's in the Cottage acted.  
As what votes are i'th' Senate House transacted.  
Searches intentions, searcheth hear●s and reins,  
What's done for public, 
Ps. l. 7.  what for private gains,  
Has admirable fetches. 
Jer. 11.  Did not God's  
Providence make B●nadad and John Rods  
Of Achab, though that an Idolater  
Jehu a Jew, 
Reg. 19 10.  yet a false worshipper:  
These scourges were of God's revenging ire,  
And vengeance acted, cast, into the fire.  
This lets bad men bear sway some months, or years,  
And then excited by the cries and tears  
Of the oppressed, with a potent hand  
Frees a distressed and captivated Land.  
So Tribes return to Palestine again,  
And Portugal shakes off the yoke of Spain. 
Nehem.   
How this was done the following lines shall speak, 
Esdras.   
And how man's Arts to Providence are weak.  
No end of Taxes, of Excises none,  
How to get money still is thought upon;  
Water excised, and Spanish Lordans are  
So greedy, they would tax even the free air.  
True Patriots are suppressed, and only they  
Advanced for Officers, who have the way  
To grind the Land, and out the poor man's throat  
Get for Corbona an extorted g●oat,  
Harpies o'th' the Commonwealth, who procure hate  
To an easy King, and x King, and State.  
All tattered th' other day, Banc●●apts, poor John's,  
Now prance it on their foot-cloths, are great Dons:  
These are dispersed through the whole kingdom, and  
Their Arbitrary power for Law must stand,  
They are seconded at Court, if any take  
Exceptions, are so potent, they can make  
Him a dangerous Malignant, have him sent  
For up, plagued in purse or imprisonment.  
Thus groans poor Portugal, knows not to whom  
She should address herself, no help from home.  
St. Julian's Fort is in the Spaniards hands,  
All Castles kept by Military Bands.  
No Lovers of their country weapon bear,  
But sent to Italy, or Flanders, there  
A God's name let 'em fight the ●●ore are slain,  
The more firm is the Monarchy of Spain.  
Now steps in Providence, no more quoth she  
Of bondage; I will set this Nation free,  
And make D' Almeida with the Mello's plot,  
And never cease till they have freedom got.  
And take that crown from the third Philip's Son, 
Philip 2.   
Which D' Alva's arms for Prudent Philip won.  
Could human wit or strength? But sole God's hand,  
And PROVIDENCE (that can events command)  
So soon, 
Eccles. 10.  so easily with no loss of blood  
Redeem a kingdom from long servitude?  
But we must know the Kings, and people's sin  
Translates the Natives, 
Reg. 4.  and brings strangers in.  
So Roderigo'es fault brought moors to Spain, 
Edward. 3.   
Our Britain by the Saxon, 
Henry. 5.  Norman, Dane,  
Subdued; 
Henry 6.  the Frenchman's sins for us have fought,  
And what but our own sins fetched in the Scot?  
So when the conquerors crimes weigh down the scale,  
They make their vassals over them prevail.  
When wise, and just men fall, fools, Tyrants rise  
On the heavenly disposition with squint eyes  
We look, 
Ecclesiastes. 10.  and cry an error of the Prince,  
When rightly 'tis a supreme Providence.  
Let's higher go. 
Jud. 8.  Abimelech combined  
With Sichem, and with melo, all are joined  
To ruin Gedeons' house. The Olive Tree,  
The Vine, the figtree put off Majesty:  
Tell the Trees plainly; we'll not lose our ease,  
And for your sakes so much ourselves displease.  
We shoot, we spring, we flourish, bring forth fruit  
Which with the Spring, the Summer, autumn suit  
Please God, and man: what are great monarchs shares?  
But as their realms, so multiply their cares.  
Only a Whin, a Bramble will be great,  
Takes complacence enthroned in royal seat;  
But what's the sequel? Sichemites shall rue  
That with their Tyrant Gedeons' Race they slew,  
And by such murders chose Abimelek Prince,  
Gloried in him: Now steps in Providence.  
Which Joathan foretold 'em. God shall send  
From the dark shades of hell some subtle Fiend,  
That shall the Subjects, and the King divide,  
Make them hate his Tyranny, him their pride:  
They upbraid him with his brethren's murder, though  
They were associates in the murder: (So  
Eager on mischief, we first rashly do,  
At leisure see how foul the fact's, then rue)  
He who was raised by them, races their Walls,  
Destroys their town, and by a woman falls.  
(Heavens not permitting such League should last long,  
Which for Foundation murder had and wrong.)  
Mark kingdoms, commonwealths, and private States,  
And you'll observe not Fortune nor the Fates,  
But God's transcendent Providence bear sway,  
And always sin with shame, or sorrow pay.  
As Providence and Power, so his science is  
His Bounty, Mercy, Justice, an abyss  
Of infinite Perfections. we'll conceive,  
Millions of worlds i'th' Divine Essence, leave  
Nothing which may add beauty, give delight  
To the understanding, hearing, and the sight,  
Angels surmounting sands o'th' Ocean shore,  
Of populous Nations a far ampler store,  
Then should of atoms be, 
The beatifical Vision.  had this vast Frame▪  
Nothing but distinct atoms in the same.  
Now, what a pleasant Vision wert? If you  
Saw all these objects in one simple view.  
Millions of Angels, Men, Beasts, Plants, rich Stones  
All Minerals, heard all Symphonies at once.  
Beheld all Colours, Fields, Woods, Trees, flowers, fountains,  
Oceans, Springs, Rivers, valleys, plains, Rocks, mountains,  
Numberless cities, Hamlets, Castles, Courts,  
All recreations, all delightful sports.  
Is there delight in War? the siege of Troy,  
And sacking oft? How barbarous Kings destroy  
Rome, and Jerusalem: The Punik slights  
Of Hannibal, Grecian, and Roman fights:  
The battles by our third stout Edward fought  
Against the French, and Flower-de Luce's got  
To adorn our Scutcheons, the renowned story  
O'th' Field of Agincourt fift Harry's glory,  
And what with blood not ink should be set down  
Our civil fights, since that at Keinton town,  
Which so much blood, and many lives have cost,  
That whosoever was gainer, England lost:  
Had they been well employed, those Legions might  
Have subdued France, regained the electoral Right.  
The Roman Triumphs, and Olympian Games,  
And whatsoever Magnificent in fame's  
Book stands registered, is, shall be, hath been,  
Are in God's Essence as a mirror seen:  
And all these known a thousand Myria●s more  
Of objects may be seen, and yet the store  
Never exhausted: GOD alone must be  
The Comprehender, of his infinity.  
Eternally there was duration, though  
Nor years, 
God's Eternity.  nor months, six thousand years ago,  
Nor days, nor hours, nor minutes did divide  
Ages, and Times, and all these specified  
By the perpetual motions of the sun,  
As he shall through his annual mansions run,  
And by the carrying his eternal Light  
Make Winter, Summer, autumn, spring, day, night.  
So when the world shall fade, and all these ●●ase,  
The tired Earth enjoy a constant peace.  
No Plough rip up her Bowels: The Gl●be-land  
Still unmannured, and untilled stand.  
No aurigations of the heavenly ca●res,  
No incertain motions of the wandering Stars.  
Shall not there be duration? Sure there shall,  
But such an one as comprehendeth all  
Ages, and Times, the present, future, past,  
And all these vanished evermore shall last,  
And is the same with God. This never had  
Beginning, never shall have end. This made  
When it pleased him the universe: we know  
How long 'tis since he made it: If we go  
further that further is Eternity,  
And will not measured, but admired be.  
For who conceives some thousand Centuries  
Of ages past, and again multiplies  
The same millions, and millions more of time,  
Yet cannot this grand Calculator climb,  
Although perpetually he multiply  
Unto the Top of God's eternity.  
Who only can his own duration tell,  
Above created thoughts ineffable.  
These glorious Attributes, and Idioms show  
A mighty GOD, come we to things below.  
As he converses with the sons of men,  
Bestows his gifts, bears with their manners, than  
Greater amazement will arise to see  
His Bounty, Mercy, Longanimity;  
But we'll defer to insist upon this Text.  
And with Devotion prosecute the next.   

To the honourable, my most honoured Friends, the Lady Francis Nevil: And Mistress Margaret Brooke her Daughter.  
Sermo Tertius.  
The Argument.  
We sing the Notions of the Father, Son,  
And Holy Ghost, issuing from both; yet ONE  
With BOTH: One individed Essence: Three  
Persons by relative plurality:  
Man is God's Image, and does represent  
This ternal One, 
Gen. 1.  and the unconfinde extent  
Of the whole macrocosm; yet never shall  
Be happy till he gain this ONE, this ALL.  
SHall he from whose redundant Plenitude  
We all receive, Being, Grace, Beatitude.  
Who fills the Ocean with innumerous spawns,  
Replenishes the deserts, and the lawns  
With stock of cattle, daily does repair  
With young ones the inhabitants of the air.  
Can such a God be barren? 
Esay. 66.  No, a sire  
Issuing a Son shall with that Son conspire  
To breathe the Holy Ghost, and all these three  
Equal in glory and in Majesty.  
Ethinks acknowledged, though with much ado  
One God, but knew not what belonged to  
ATRIAD what is Divine GENERATION,  
What is PROCESSION what active SPIRATION.  
The FATHER needs must ●et a SON, and then,  
That FATHER and that SON give Origen  
To the Holy Ghost; the first Two cannot be,  
Unless they make their Number Ternary:  
For Love which gives all Creatures birth and growth,  
Before all Creatures had his birth from Both:  
(Father on Son the Son on Him reflecting,  
And with a mutual Complacence affecting)  
The Synagogue of this had shadows; but  
Their lantern was under a bushel put: 
Matth. 5.   
And the Hebrew Rites, 
Luke 11.  and Books enigmas are,  
They' Explain not Truths, but point at from a far;  
The Law in measure, 
S. Ambrose.  above measure Grace,  
When that once past, this other comes in place.  
That lamb, that lamp of the celestial town,  
Shall leave his royal Throne, and coming down,  
Enucleat Mysteries, preach a Godhead, three  
In Notions, yet a pure identity.  
Who comprehends himself, could only tell,  
God's immanent Acts, that are ineffable.  
O thou eternal Son, and Word, who far,  
(i'th' rays of Saints) before the morning Star  
Wert got, 
Psal. 109.  and spoke; let's through all Ages break,  
And search, when GOD did thee beget, and speak;  
For both are One, GOD did no more afford,  
To give thee birth, then uttering of a Word.  
Let's search a hundreth thousand Ages moe,  
Yet shall we not thy Birth, and utterance know.  
If we thy Father question, he'll reply,  
My Son is both so old, and young as I.  
When he was got, as no time can design,  
So when he was not got, no time define.  
Yet of his Origen, you truly may,  
Affirm he is begetting every day:  
And through Eternity all Ages past,  
Shall this continued Generation last.  
A SON of's FATHER independent, Heat  
As th' ORIGEN, whence 'tis derived so great.  
True GENERATIONS yet devoid o● Motions,  
Real relations, yet no more than Notions.  
As the Vast Ocean that surrounds the Earth,  
Though it give RIVERS springs and brooks their Birth,  
Euphrates, Volga, Quahu, Nile, our Thame,  
Yet never wanteth but runs still the same.  
As th●nkfullie all these return again  
And ●isembog●e themselves into the Maine.  
The FATHER never wants, although the SON  
〈…〉 hath: nor are these TWO undone,  
Nor the least jot of all their Treasure lost  
Though als be f●owde upon the holy ghost.  
For though they mutually give all their store  
Yet give they so, that they can still give more.  
Imagine some eternal Spring, or Mine  
Whence Purest Gold is ●igd, flows richest wine,  
And you'll conceive some glimpses that come nigh  
●o shadow this still Bounteous trinity.  
Not Trimegistus or the Stagy●it,  
Not any Stoik, 
S. Th. 1. p q. 32.  or Platonik wit,  
Though Monas Monadem begat, can tell  
How this fecundity, yet no wombs swell,  
Arises, how one can give all his store  
Yet never be exhausted, never poor.  
Such science is a more peculiar grace,  
Granted to none o'th' Philosophike race,  
And who will have this TRIAD for his book  
Must with faith's candle on the volume look,  
Though none can understand each page aright  
Who has not for his Flame-bew Glories light.  
Merchants, who travel to the rising sun,  
And view his setting when the day is done  
In neither of the Worlds can fullness find,  
For though they fill their purses, yet their mind  
Is empty still, and still they covet more,  
And are amidst their heaps of Riches poor.  
The Macedonian youth contented not  
Himself with the whole World his sword had got.  
The Reason: all things here confined are  
Within their model, insufficient far  
To satisfy man's APPETITE ordained,  
Not to be satisfied till GOD begaind.  
The Spherik Figure no way can suffice,  
To equal what is made TRIANGLE wise.  
Lay one upon another, you shall see  
All ways some corners will unfurnished be.  
When the world's maker made man's soul, the same  
Triangular did the best workman frame  
To represent his matchless self and be  
The Image of one GOD in Persons three;  
Ordaining him to love, to honour, serve  
His GOD, who for such service does reserve  
A crown, and place in Heaven; where he shall see  
The TRIADS order, and how all things be  
Derived from thence. Nor can there ought be found  
In this low O●be, that's spherical, and round,  
May satisfy our souls; nor can we ●est  
In Creatures, who are ordered to be blessed  
By his fruition, who to Creatures gave  
That existence, and essence which they have.  
Sol'e God's proportioned to our souls, and till  
GOD be injoid, we ne'er shall have our fill,  
Unless we feed on this celestial meat,  
We still shall hunger, still desire to ear.  
Creatures observe that order, keep that state,  
Which GOD appoints: Sole MAN'S retrogradate.  
Behold the wandering Planets, and fixed stars  
Are Constant in the motion of their Cars,  
And as they approach, or go from several seats  
Cause winter's nipping frosts, and Summer heats.  
Make buds and blossoms sprout forth in the Spring,  
And in the Au●●mne to perfection bring.  
See how the Simple Elements Combine  
And in the making of mixed Bodies join.  
The Fire, the air, the Water, that surrounds  
The Earth▪ how all observe their proper bounds,  
And very bounteously themselves bestow,  
On all things that have sense, or move, or grow.  
Suppose (what will not be) some glorious light,  
(The Sun or moon) should fall from Heaven, or quite  
Extinguished be: suppose God's arm should take  
This World, and of't the Pristine Chaos make;  
Involving in the same calamity,  
The old, the middle aged, and the fry.  
Here death gives rest to Beasts, to Fish, to foul,  
All pain expiring with the fleeting soul:  
And though here's some inversion of that end,  
Which Nature in Creation did pretend:  
Yet 'tis no more than if some clown should grub,  
Or cut a plant up, but as yet a shrub;  
Or a young Partridge caught i'th' fowler's net,  
Or by the hawk devoured pin-fethered yet.  
But different far is man's accursed state,  
If by transgression he prevaricate:  
For if in prosecution he shall err,  
Sulphurean Flames that first prepared were  
For the infernal Fiends must be his hire,  
And with condemned Ghosts, eternal fire.  
Better he had ne'er been borne, 
Matth. 〈◊〉.  then be borne so,  
As dying, he must live in endless woe:  
For not as souls of Birds and Beasts, man's mind,  
Shall with the body dissolution find;  
But when chance, age, or sickness break the tye,  
Twixt Body and the soul, this last shall fly  
(Supported by the wings of heavenly love)  
To those magnifie●e palaces above,  
Where Saints and Angels with much blitheness sing, 
Apoc. 4.   
The trophies of the slaughtered lamb, and bring  
Their Anadems of Glory, (as 'tis meet)  
Offering them, and themselves at Jesus feet.  
Who with the treasure of his precious blood,  
Purchased his Courtiers such Beatitude.  
Or else the soul poysde with transacted faults,  
Shall straight descend to subterranean Vaults;  
Where horror with pale desperation dwell,  
And damned Ghosts eternally shall yell.  
'Twould be some ease if thousand myriads past,  
Of years, hell's torments should have end at last,  
But they'll endure so long as GOD shall be,  
And one way equalise eternity.  
O thou all-potent Trinity, whose hand,  
First made, than polished Fire, air, Water, Land:  
Prescribdst to all their duty, and their end,  
Which they without reluctancy attend,  
And gain; Illuminate our souls to know,  
Wherefore thou mad'st us, whether we should go;  
To heaven our journey is, direct our ways,  
To that blessed Land; there crown us with thy rays  
Of glory; who made by, and after thee,  
Without thyself shall ne'er contented be.   

To the honourable, William Savile, Baronet, my Godson. Edward Atsloe, John Church, Esquires.  
Sermo Quartus.  
The Argument.  
We sing what power bad Angels have, and how  
All causes, and their consequents they know,  
Are incorporeal, and with w●nged speed  
Act what they will, but not their bounds exceed.  
We sing unhappy man's corrupted state,  
How more than Beasts he does degenerate.  
THe World being finished God amazed stood, 
Gen. 1.   
And with much complacence pronounced als good:  
If all be good, how come ill Angels then  
(So noxious, yet so conversant with men?)  
If they are ill, why are they left to roam  
Abroad, why are they not confined to home  
In Hell? why did they not when they lost grace,  
Forfeit as well their Energye as place?  
In Heaven? they can do wonders, have a power  
As great as zions courtier's, some have more.  
What from the rising of the Radiant sune,  
Till in the Occident his race be run  
Is acted, 
2. Reg. 5. 14.  they see clearly, can without  
Passing through mediums scued the World about  
it'h twinkling of an eye; at distance can  
Mountains oreturne, destroy, or tempt a man.  
Local Dimensions limit not their Sphere  
Of action, where they operate they are there.  
And though these Devils can the Sun as soon  
Shut in a lantern, as deduce the moon  
Down from its Mansion; yet they are petty Kings  
In the airy Region, 
Ephes. 6.  and o'er earthly things  
Can domineer, although not reach so far  
As is the Mansion of the lowest star,  
All theory, and practic arts they know,  
Nature's abstruser secrets, no plants grow,  
But they their virtue's ken, and can apply  
Actives on Passives to bring misery  
And witchcrafts upon man, and as if we  
Framed of Ambition, envy, enmity,  
Were not sufficient devils to ourselves,  
We must have aid from these infernal Elves  
In our malicious plots, and for the hire  
Damn our own souls to their eternal fire,  
And as we share in their iniquity,  
So in their punishment associates be.  
And such must of necessity be ill,  
Who once depraved can never change their will,  
Never retract an Error, nor repent  
What once (apprehended good) they durst attempt.  
Speak more celestial Muses, what's the cause  
Of so much pervicacy against the laws  
Of human sense, how fell the Angels down  
Why did they forfeit that Perennall crown  
Due to integrity and (Virgins) know  
The knowledge of such chronicles you owe  
To Sacred histories? how Ba●thasar,  
And Nemroths Babylon surprised are,  
And the Assyrian monarchy cast down  
The Medes and Persians share the imperial crown,  
How Tomyris the warlike S●ythian Queen  
Amidst her thickest troops in Armour seen,  
Acts dire Revenge, and having first made drunk  
The Persian Brigades, drenches the cold trunk  
Of slaughtered Cyrus in a tub of gore,  
Bidding him quaff his fill, who evermore  
Had thirsted blood; how like the flashing fire,  
Of angry Heaven, when Heaven and Earth conspire  
To raise a tempest, Alexander flies,  
And shows the World his glorious Victories;  
How by death conquered, he who conquered all,  
Must in the midst of all his Trophies fall;  
Many great Homer's (Alexander's Vow)  
Enrich you with such Histories, and how,  
Caesar amidst and by perfidious friends,  
I'th' capital his life, not glory ends.  
The sad disasters of these Monarchies,  
With the addition of ten thousand lies,  
Of the Assyrian, Greek, Odrysian Lords,  
Innumerous Stories, numberless Records  
Speak amply: many Birds first reassume,  
Only their proper Feathers, then unplume,  
The Roman Eagle, till great Mahomet,  
As he did Constantine's Byzantium get,  
Wrung off one neck, and in that Empire placed  
The beauty of our towering Bird defaced.  
But of the real grounds, why these States fall,  
Why th' other rise, no mention's made at all;  
Nor once remembered what condition they  
Be of, who are chief Actors in this Play  
Of blood, and death, where a Muse buskined sings  
With tears the Fates of commonwealths, and Kings.  
The Gentile Sages by experience see,  
But know not whence proceeds our misery:  
They never know with what industrious Arts,  
The Devils in our Drames act chiefest parts.  
Why Man doth with the spider's Cobwebs spin,  
And one net wrought, unsatisfied begin  
A fresher web, why with the ant take pains,  
With such solicitude for sordid gains.  
Why thrust the Badger with the Foxes slight  
Out his own Hole, why with the lions might  
Invade the weaker; why made Lord of all  
The Universe, does he degenerate fall  
So low beneath himself, and far inferior  
In sense to many Beasts, to all superior  
In brutish qualities, exceeds the Hog  
In drunkenness, more fawning than the Dog,  
When profit shall accrue, in rage outgoes  
The Hyrcanian tigers, when assailed by foes,  
She saves her young ones, and with teeth and nails  
Against a world of combatants prevails;  
Prouder than the Horse, when in his bravery,  
He shall attract every beholde● eye▪  
To mark him only, as with stately grace,  
Through the streets richly hanged he shall pace.  
As here the Gentiles all are silent, we  
Should sit amazed, and with them silent be;  
Wholly transformed, knowing our God all good,  
Dispute, how with such bounty it hath stood,  
To suffer his chief creature, Man to fall,  
In such disorders, and permit in all  
So general a confusion, when behold,  
Only our writs the Origen unsold  
Of all these mischiefs, taught by them we'll speak  
The causes: and through many ages break  
Boldly our passage ope, beginning long  
Before the Universe began a Song.   

To the right honourable, John Paulet, marquess of Winchester, the Lady Honoria, The best Example of her Sex, His Marchiones; and the honourable, Walter Montague.  
Sermo Quintus.  
The Argument.  
What round Angels? a transcendent pride?  
Or envy? Because Man was deified.  
Proud Lucifer turned traitor animates  
His fellow Angels to be associates  
In the Rebellion: Michael with the bands,  
Of loyal Subjects for God's title stands:  
The traitors lose the day, Grace, glories crown,  
(They might have 〈◊〉) tothth' depth● of Hell cast down.  
THe devil ne'er was glutton; never soiled,  
With amorous embraces; never foiled  
with drink: 
Aug. de Civit. Dei, lib. 14. cap. 3.  no purser by the high way side,  
Never for Murder at the Sessions tried.  
(Nor could ●e fail so, such concupiscence  
Following corporeal faculties and sense.)  
Yet has he perpetrated all these crimes,  
By proxy, above a hundred thousand times)  
How fell the devil then? how lost his place,  
And share o'th' Deity, celestial grace.  
How did the searcher of all entrails find,  
Iniquity in so sublime a mind?  
What horrid act hath his eversion wrought? 
Psal. 3.   
Ruin on him? 
Job 4.  on Us destruction brought,  
(For he having limp● himself, made Adam halt,  
Whence issued our hereditary fault.) 
Gen. 3.   
Was Lucifer a Peacock? when he spied  
His specious plumes, with a self-pleasing pride,  
Took he fond complacence in gifts bestowed,  
And with those gifts rebelled against his God,  
Who gave 'em? did he glorying in his state,  
Aspire to be with God coequal Mate?  
With soaring wings why would he northward fly,  
And independent be as the most high? 
1 Sam. 14.   
Or did not envy reign? that God should slight,  
The angelic Essence, and himself unite  
To our weak substance, by a wondrous tye,  
Including in one Man the Deity,  
And human Nature: this makes traitors rise  
In arms 'gainst their Creator; envies eyes  
Are so malignant, that another's good,  
Like daggers strikes tothth' heart, and fetches blood.  
What quoth th' aspiring angel, shall this slime  
Oth' earth, this worm in plenitude of time,  
Graced with the union hypostatical,  
Be Deified? have Empire overall.  
Must Angels so accomplished with grace,  
In Entity so perfect give him place?  
Be slaves, and as obsequious Vassals stand,  
To know, then execute what he'll command?  
If God cannot his bounties better share,  
we'll learn him Order, teach him who we are:  
If needs he will his gifts, and self diffuse  
In Donatives, let him election use:  
Wherefore you (Legions) aid me, and we'll make,  
This partial God recall his purpose, take  
Ou● Nature, where you all shall sharers ●e,  
And fellows with me in the Deity.  
As in a Leguer, where distracted minds,  
Revolt against their general, Treason finds,  
New complices to act a d●irie plot;  
So now seditious Lucifer has got  
Whole multitudes to second what he saith,  
As Impious Angels violate their faith,  
Turn to a Creature their chief leader, and  
Amazed at his eminencies stand:  
For Lucifer had such similitude  
With God, that he, next him was the first good.  
No Cedar in Mount Libanus so tall,  
No Beech as he: 
Ezech. 31.  he far surmounted all;  
Great his endowments, 
Job 40.  specious were his rays,  
And he styled justly, First of all God's ways,  
Allured with such parts, the inferior stars  
Forsake their stations, denounce open Wars  
Against their Maker, 
Apoc. 12.  Now the signal's given,  
Of a great battle to be fought in Heaven.  
For Michael and his friends oppose themselves,  
In Squadrons ranged against the haughty Elves:  
The loyalty of Subjects now is tried,  
As they take part on Michael's and God's side; 
In what manner the good and bad Angels fought in heaven.   
Who stands impartial a spectator by,  
To see these Combatants for mastery try.  
No party brought to th' field, or swords or bills,  
But serious alterations of their wills:  
Neither did they with a Stenthrean voice,  
On any part plead rights; but without noise  
Joined the Batalia's: No loud ●lamots there,  
Let the left Wing advance, 
How the Angels express themselves one to another.  bring up the rear:  
But what they would have either friend or foe,  
Should understand, their wills did make) 'em know:  
Yet Drums and Trumpets were the harmonious Spheres,  
Still echoing terror in the Rebels ears:  
When they reflect how those, though senseless stand,  
In order, when these spurn at God's command.  
That fight was famous in Pharsalia field,  
Where the Patritians, and their Pompey yield  
To Caesar's conquering Legions, and one day,  
Makes Rome, and the whole world the Victors pray:  
So was that naumachy by the Actium shore,  
Where Anthony pursues his flying Whore;  
And great Octavian all the Empire gets,  
Where the Sun first appears, and where he sets.  
The whole world's sovereignty, being set at stake,  
Did these encounters so conspicuous make.  
But in this battle fought on zions plain,  
Where the false Angels lose, the loyal gain  
The day: what ever is above the skies,  
Even God's command must be the victor's prize.  
The Armies ordered, and in mutual view,  
The grand Commander of the Traytruos crew  
Himself advances, and at every strain,  
Presents Goliath, or fierce Ta●●erlaine.  
Blasphemes and curses God's selected band,  
But as (if such comparisons may stand)  
A thick necked Bull made captain of the Herd,  
And for his strength, of all the forest feared;  
Meeting some stately lion at a spring,  
Disdains to pay due homage to his King:  
But ventilating oft his horns i'th' air,  
He and his Flock themselves to fight prepare;  
When the stout lion backed by his friends,  
The conflict presently begins and ends:  
As furiously upon the Bull he goes:  
And, maugre his great strength, casts in the close.  
Then on the prostrate neck, setting his foot,  
With a disdainful paw pulls out his throat:  
The rest, as they behold their Leader die,  
With the disaster all appalled fly.  
In the same manner Michael putting on  
His trusty Armour: Vindication  
Of God's supremacy, a two edged Sword,  
Strongly composed of God's revealed Word: 
● Ephes. 6.   
Justice his breastplate, and of Faith the shield:  
A belt of Verity: his helmet steeled  
With safety. 
1 Reg. 17.  Armed thus against his foe,  
He marches, and as David with one blow  
Defeats the elf: then trampling on his head,  
This ovant speech in following manner said:  
Who like to God? who from the abyss of nought,  
First made thee, then to this perfection brought?  
Ingrateful wretch to thy creator's grace,  
Unworthy such endowments, and chief place.  
Was thy eye evil because God was good? 
Matth. 20.   
Or didst thou surfeit with much plenitude?  
What is, is his; and must he come so low  
Beneath himself, that when he will bestow  
His favours, he must ask his creatures what  
He shall bestow? whether on this or that  
Person, or nature? he can best dispense,  
Who knows what's given is but benevolence  
Great were thy eminencies: did we repine  
At dignities conferred on thee, and thine?  
We knew, and so shouldst thou, that he who gave  
Such gifts, knew well what every one should have,  
And in what measure, neither thou, nor I,  
Can limit or enlarge his liberality.  
False imp, who wouldst have Empire over all,  
To the lowest pit thou shalt dejected fall:  
Can nothing please thee but thy maker's crown?  
To Hell with thy associates tumble down.  
As when the heavens, the air, the winds conspire  
With horrid thunder, and with flashing fire,  
To terrify the world, and make us think,  
Our sins had filled God's cup even to the brink,  
And the Universe must cod▪ Midst all these tones  
Of angry Heaven, innumerable stones,  
Of hail fall down, and with their fragour make,  
The machine of the frighted World to shake.  
Such was the angel's precipice from Heaven,  
When glorious Michael had his sentence given.  
For Lucifer, who made the Angels fail,  
As he fell head●g, 
Apoc. 12.  dragged down with his tail,  
The stars third part (when men of high estate  
Decline, the ruin ends not in their Fate.)  
But as some potent Lording, who hath wrought  
Treason against his sovereign Prince, and sought  
To murder or depose him, for which ends,  
Conspiring with his Vassals, and his Friends;  
He traitorously takes arms, but in the field,  
Is vanquished by his King, compelled to yield.  
Brought to a trial, all receive their doom,  
But differently; some from their native home,  
Banished; some forfeit life, some goods and land,  
So did the case with the damned Angels stand,  
Some are confined i'th' spacious air to dwell,  
Others on the earth, and seas; yet all in Hell.  
For they still bear about the load of sin▪  
Fire in the apprehension, tortured minds within.  
And we might see, had we spiritual eyes,  
How innumerous Devils, 
Perei in D●n.  atom-like and Flies  
In a hot summer's day, 
Haec omnium Doctorum opinio est, quod Aeer iste, qui Cae●um, & terram medius dividens, inane Vocatur, plenus sit contrari●● fertitudinibus.  hop up and down,  
Ith'ayre o'er every City, Village, town.  
Soaring like hawks, with vulture's maws and eyes,  
And when 'tis sprung, source down upon their prize.  
Then let us know that as they tower so high,  
They easily, viewing, with advantage sly,  
And seize upon their prey. (What's poor man's state,  
Continually exposed to their hate?)  
But that grand traitor, 
S. Hierom in Cap. 6. Ep. ad Eph.  Lucifer, what's done  
With him? do not the conquerors sit upon  
The manner of his chastisement? who lead  
The dance in this Rebellion, was the head  
Plotter, and actor in the treason, shall  
Be more severely punished then all  
The minor Devils; and one clause they add  
Tothth' rest of's torments, that makes him stark mad:  
Namely, that he who would so high have flown,  
With wings of pride, even to ●ehova●s throne,  
In a deep dungeon, shut eternally,  
Shall a confined slave and prisoner lie.  
A hole his goal furthest from Heaven to show,  
That as transgressions so must penance go.  
The other Fiends have the vast air and Seas,  
And land to range in whensoe'er they please:  
But their great monarch must in fetters tied,  
In lowest Hell perpetully abide.  
And this was the first prison made for sin,  
A pattern to torment Delinquents in:  
Yet no confinements, Fetters, Bolts, and Gives,  
Can make the damned wretches mend their lives.  
Sure the strange qualities of Alpheus streams,  
Are idle Poets or Historians dreams.  
How he though difimboguing in the Maine,  
Yet midst the brine his sweetness can retain;  
Debt, and transgression are conducent gins,  
To Prisons, Prisons colleges of sins.  
The noble Sciences professed, and chief  
Arts taught, are of the Drunkard, Whore and thief,  
Who were in knavery Freshmen, coming here,  
Shall proceed learned graduates in one year.  
Behold the galleys, and a Prison view,  
And they shall fully represent to you  
What's done in Hell; blaspheming everywhere,  
Continual torments, yet they curse and swear  
Amidst those torments: boatswains, gaolers are,  
The Furies that torment 'em and their fare,  
Biscuit, Tobacco; trickling t●ares must serve  
To make their meat go down: else let 'em st●rve,  
What then? too many care no more when half  
Are starved then Butchers when they kill a calf.  
A Prison's like the cruel Martichore,  
Or Hell itself, still seeking to devour,  
It's always taking, the least favour must  
Be dearly bought, nor can you go on trust.  
Sweat, labour 〈◊〉 sour Go●lers, a good turn,  
Is never thought of in the following morn.  
Best courtesy's done to them are but their due,  
And what's their Office must be sold to you▪  
French imposts, Spanish taxes are not hard,  
If to th' exactions of a goal compared.  
Yet heavens forbid all Keepers should be such,  
I know some gently bred, who will not grudge  
To do a favour gratis, know the same  
Fortune that o'ertakes others, is not lame,  
But may o'ertake themselves, and they may be,  
Their fellow-prisoners in Captivity: 
Exod. 23.   
Know what a sin it is, to boil the lamb,  
Ith' milk and sight of the afflicted dam,  
And therefore scorn to add fresh woes to woe,  
(Only ignoble, bears and Wolves do so.)  
They understand all gains these Vultures take  
From undone men cannot them wealthy make,  
No more than did that silver Judas good,  
Which he had purchased with his Master's blood.  
The poor are Christ himself, and what is got,  
Over the devil's shoulders needs must rot  
Under the belly of his dam (as tears,  
And Prisoners clamours penetrate God's ears.)  
These keep not goals as Charon kept his Boat,  
To crave for every passenger a groat,  
Nor (gentle souls) will they, or curse, or rail,  
If any in their bounty sometimes fail. 
Exod. 23.   
May such (and prisoners votes are potent) be  
Fellows with Peter in Eternity. 
Exod. 2.   
(Turn-keys best pattern) who with little state, 
Jud. 2.   
But much humanity will ope heaven's gate  
Tothth' poorest soul, 
Psa. 79.  that cleansed from his sin,  
Or knocks, or rings, craving admission in.  
No mischief on such Keepers ever fall,  
But let 'em have his lot who kept Saint Paul:  
No prisoners scaping from 'em run away,  
Much courtesy with much injustice pay. 
Act. ●p. 16.   
Free from the bondman's heaven-ascending curse,  
May they die rich in credit, rich in purse.  
As the Egyptian midwives, let their race,  
And they thrive here, 
Exod. 1.  and have in Heaven a place.  
Yet thrice blessed Rome, who in the seven King's times,  
And Tribunes rule, wert so devoid of crimes,  
That one poor goal sufficed, to detain,  
All Malefactors, but as Scipio's gain,  
Asia, and Africa, Emilius Greece,  
And all return rich Jasons' with the fleece  
Of gold, then as thy sins and town increase  
New goals are made, and Justices of Peace.  
How art thou spotted, with what tincture died,  
Of sins proud London? which so loud have cried  
To Heaven for vengeance, that in every street,  
New prisons must be made; the Gatehouse, Fleet,  
Newgate, and Ludgate, and a hundreth more,  
Not large enough for murderer, thief, and whore;  
But so increases the Malignant trade,  
That Courts and palaces are prisons made.  
O inauspitious Stars to live and die  
In torments worse than those of Gregory.  
There miseries end with our exhaled breaths,  
Continued prisons are continued deaths:  
A prison's like Vesta's deflowered Nun,  
Ramed in the grave before his thread be spun.  
Yet heavens are gentle, and permit this curse,  
To fall on some, to keep 'em from a worse.   

To the right honourable, Henry Parker, Lord Morlie, and Mount-Eagle, William Habington Esquire, and Mistress Lucy Habington.  
Sermo Sextus.  
The Argument.  
What undiscovered paths the Serpent treads,  
With what sly Engines, and dark ways he leads  
Mankind to error? with what subtlety,  
Invites he us to our own misery.  
The Fowler and the fisherman may gain,  
Arts of deceit from his more subtle brain.  
Eve poisons Adam, and by his sad fall,  
Conveys pernicious venom to us all.  
The foolish Woman, and her female seed,  
Taxed worthily for this accursed deed.  
WHy does the Spouse in a Cygnean song,  
Descant so dolefully of the great wrong  
Her Brethren do her, 
Cant. 1. Pugnautrunt Contra me Filij ma●ris m●●.  and of battles fought,  
And stratagems wherein her life is sought;  
Who are these barbarous Brethren so unkind?  
Legions of evil Angels in God's mind,  
Our general Mother, who, Idea'de there,  
Were formed, than fell, and after suffered were  
To range abroad; these tempt, solicit Man,  
And do him all the injuries they can,  
(Thinking erroneously 'tis some relief,  
To have companions in their endless grief,)  
As meager envy made 'em first to fall,  
So the same fury domineers in all  
Their actions: 
Psal. 109.  knowing man must wear that crown,  
And fill those thrones from which they tumbled down: 
Apoc. 12. 〈◊〉. 21.   
Knowing how no coinquinated thing,  
Shall see the face of zions glorious King.  
At every step, and place they set their gins,  
To entrap the passengers in snares of sins.  
All creatures of the world are traps and nets,  
Which to catch fools the cunning devil sets  
And Satan having long conversed with man,  
Is in his Volume deeply read, and can  
Co●ply with all his appetites; invert  
The order of his intellect; divert  
Affections rightly placed; persuade him choose  
Evil clothed in the shape of God, refuse  
Virtue looked on, not in her proper guise,  
But formed by Fancy, or our carnal eyes:  
For the grand workman of this earthly mole,  
When in our body be infused the soul,  
He made the Inteilect, Will, memory,  
A true resemblance of the Trinity.  
As they have power to issue several,  
Most distinct operations; yet they all  
Are one, and the same soul; and though we name  
Them diversely, yet they are all the same.  
The soul as some great Queen of many lands,  
All the corporeal faculties commands;  
And though she seem to rule by Deputy,  
Yet in all acts 'tis she, and only she,  
Who records only understands, wils only, hoards  
Only in her vast magazine records,  
The species of things present, past, to come,  
And when she will remember, to that room,  
Makes her recourse. These species Satan can  
Stir up, when he intends to tempt a man,  
Objects of riches, 
Ioh. Ep.  pleasure, and the height  
Of honour; and propose with such delight,  
That the Intellect obscured by the Will,  
Shows in false glasses good, that which is ill:  
Then sense, will, understanding headlong run.  
Into transgression, and are all undone.  
The Serpent such a colour set on pride,  
With a rich gloss of being deified, 
Gen. 3.   
And knowing much, that Eve liked it so well,  
As having tasted Heaven, she'd venture Hell.  
To know what's ill. The Fiends not long a wooing,  
But tells her if she'll know, she must be doing.  
Behold that goodly Apple, take and eat,  
The choice of Paradise, delicious meat;  
This will bestow an immortality,  
And make you sharers in the Deity.  
God knows this well, ther'fore lest you should be,  
Partners with him, he has forbid this Tree.  
The liquorish Woman eyes, and eyes again  
The Apple; sees it lovely and would fain  
Pluck it, but fears: at last demurreth so;  
If not for use, why did this apple grow?  
What aromatic smell? how smooth the skin,  
And gay? Can any poison lurk within?  
No sure: God in forbidding has some end,  
That's envious, I'll believe my speckled friend;  
Who gives the world to roam in, and excludes  
But the least corner, all his gifts deludes,  
And pens you in a prison. All the trees  
Of Eden are but toys; forbidding these  
Choice fruits, what gave God when he gave command,  
O'er fishes, fowls of th' air, beasts of the land?  
And then forsooth to say, dare not once touch  
This Apple; bounty is not valued much,  
Hedged in with limits: I had rather have,  
What he exempts, than all the rest he gave,  
Had it not been forbid, it might have past,  
Not cared for, now I must needs, and will taste.  
Be it what it will, I'll by experience try,  
If it bring death, or immortality.  
With this, maugre Jehovah's frowns and threats,  
The bold Virago the Apple plucks and eats.  
She scarce had gorgd it when the subtle Snake,  
Tickling with laughter in such manner spoke.  
Are not your eyes now open? sure you know,  
What's Good and Bad: but be not envious, go  
Present your husband with an Apple, and  
Both good and ill alike shall understand.  
Let's to the devil give what is his due,  
Though he equivocate, yet he speaks true.  
But why did he assume the serpent's shape?  
Are not there other beasts, the Fox, the Ape,  
The Dog, the Elephant so wise as is  
The Serpent? but he takes this vermins hiss,  
To cheat our grandam: Satan will declare,  
How near allied he and the Serpent are.  
All other creatures only will defend  
Themselves, 
Gen. 49  not unprovoked man offend:  
This venom still in ambush lies like Dan, 
Psal. 69. 109.   
To bite our heels, and not touched poisons man.  
What harm did we the devil? that he should,  
Envy our happiness, prevent our good?  
Then in the turns and windings that he makes,  
How does he represent the circling snakes?  
Observe this plot, and by one wile guess all,  
As he made Eve, so he makes others fall.  
Knowing the woman of the two more frail,  
He will the weaker vessel first assail.  
Knowing the man of sounder judgement, he  
Sends his ambassadors to Adam, she  
Must play the Orator; command the meat,  
Turn Crocodile, 
3 Reg. 11.  peule, weep, unless he eat.  
(By such seducers Solomon all-wise, 
Iud. 16   
Forsook his God, Samson lost strength and eyes.)  
If we dare trust the Jews, their stories tell,  
How Nathan saw before King David fell  
His ardent love to Bershabe, and thought  
To stay the Prince from his adulterous fault. 
Epiph. in vitis Prop●●tar.   
He trudges to the Court, but in the way,  
The subtle Fiend as a dead carcase lay:  
The Prophet stops his course to inter the dead,  
Mean while the King defiles Uriah's bed.  
Shall we conceive Adam was so unwise,  
To think an apple could make clear his eyes?  
Endued with grace, and a strong Intellect,  
He could not but on God's command reflect,  
Wherefore we must believe his chiefest end,  
In the transgression was not to offend  
His cogging wife. (A precedent of those,  
Who to please others their own souls dare lose.)  
So Solomon his Queens so much affects,  
That for 'em to false Gods he Phanes erects: 
3 Reg. 11.   
But did the mischief end in Adam's sin?  
No sure I our misery must here begin.  
A business of such consequence, that all,  
Involved in him with him must jointly fall.  
Had he been single, there had stayed the doom,  
But he was Father of the World to come:  
And in his sentence we were censured, who  
Ne'er understood what appertained to  
Transgression. Is't' not strange one single crime,  
Should last, and blast all progresses of time?  
Let Epictetus, let the Stagirite,  
With Divine Plato, who have amply writ  
Of virtues, and of vices, speak the cause,  
Why man so easily transgresses laws.  
When all are dumb, our sacred Volumes can  
Tell wherefore all these mischiefs light on man.  
Adam had all our wills in his, and we  
Eat jointly with him the forbidden Tree.  
His only act, that one pestiferous bit,  
Had many thousand Aconites in it.  
It scarce is swallowed when infernal gates,  
With violence sly open, Iron grates  
Of Hell are burst; anxieties, cares, fears,,  
Sorrow with all her dropping children, tears,  
Suspicion, 
Jesus. praef. lib. 1.  jealousy, lawless desire,  
Unbridled lust, pretensions to aspire.  
Fond joys, sad discontent at present state,  
Aversion from good: anger, envy, hate,  
Avarice still greedy, griping penury,  
Dogging at the heels of Prodigality,  
Darkness of mind, perversity of will,  
And what in both can be suspected ill.  
Beguiling error, pervicatious schism,  
C●ab-creeping heresy, impious atheism:  
Idolatry always inventing where  
New Gods may be adored for love or fear.  
Egypt to Ibis, Rome will sacrifice  
To th' fire, and Cloaca a goddess is.  
These monsters with their pale commander death,  
(Kept hitherto close prisoners beneath,  
Nor should they ever have beheld the Sun)  
Hearing what man against his God had done,  
Scorn longer to obey prescribed laws,  
But they will forth and vindicate God's cause.  
By the effects judge Adam of thy fault,  
These mischiefs are the purchase thou hast bought,  
Corruption is the house; the land sad woes,  
In which though with tears watered no good grows.  
Making at hour of death thy latest will,  
Thou didst bequeathe this Legacy of ill,  
And for executors, the devil trust,  
Who though a Bankrupt, yet in this is just,  
And takes such care th●● jointly with our breath,  
We do rec●ive thy testament of death.  
Hence issu●, if we well ●●volve our Fate,  
Those woes which follow man's accu●sed state:  
Hence those afflictions which attend our ways,  
Those sad catastrophs of our wretched days:  
Hence that unequal share of joy and pain,  
A drop of pleasure, but of woe a main;  
O, hadst thou loved God more, Eve not so well,  
Thou wouldst have left us heirs of Heaven, not Hell.  
Who can describe what's sin? Nothing at all,  
And must the mass of man for nothing fall?  
All things i'th' world God made, 
Gen. 1.  and God was glad,  
That by his making hand they being had,  
Only thou misbegotten Monster, sin,  
As Bastards use stolest at the Window in,  
Ashamed of thy birth: God never put  
lest finger to thy Essence: Hell was shut.  
Thou wert' the Key to open it; day light  
Changed by thy birth into eternal night.  
Cursed be thy birth day; 
Job 3.  let it not appear,  
Nor once be named with th'other days o'th' year.  
Be long expected, and as thou shalt fail,  
Be cursed of those, who watch to chase the Whale:  
On that black day let the Universe be sad,  
And Furies only at thy birth be glad,  
For thou hast on us all these mischiefs ●urld,  
And made a Pristine Chaos of the World.  
And we'll be angry with thee, Grandam Eve,  
The Mother of this Child: thou didst conceive  
The odious Monster: Satan was his Sire,  
But you adulterous Paramou●● conspire,  
And with such slights juggle the business, that  
Adam must father the misgotten brat.  
God formed thee of the man's selected bone,  
To help him, 
Gen. 2.  that he should not be alone:  
This was your task: Have you not helped him well,  
And all his progeny to go to Hell?  
Eve must bring children forth in pangs and throes, 
Gen. 3.   
And make a joyful father by her woes,  
Which she performs, with a delight in pain,  
(One teeming past, another hasts again.)  
Eve must be subject to her Husband, and  
A vassal always be at his command.  
Grounded on this, some commonweals ordain,  
A Salic Law, the distaff shall not reign;  
Esteeming those God censured to obey,  
Unfit for Government, and regal sway.  
And this first fault all mankind so has vexed,  
That men take all the Nation for a text  
Of their invectives, dip in gall their quill,  
And with satiric lines whole Volumes fill  
Against Eve's sex, who in much ignorance bred,  
Unable are their proper cause to plead.  
But had they pens, as good as are their tongues,  
They amply would retaliate such great wrongs:  
And we should read, as well as loudly hear,  
With how much patience they these scandals bear.   

To my Honourable Friends, Master EDWARD, and Mistress Ruth PETRE.  
Sermo Septimus.  
The Argument.  
We sing those Courtiers, who attend the Throne,  
And act commands of that most absolute One,  
Who gives all, takes from none, but what before,  
Issued from his never exhausted store:  
We likewise treat, with what despotike sway,  
This monarch governs, Citizens obey.  
PLATO framed a republic, and it cost  
Tully much labour to write, what is lost,  
A commonwealth: so Aristotle writ,  
His book of politics, proving in it  
How the best form of Government is, where  
One absolute monarch shall the sceptre bear.  
Be it so, 
Herodo●.  or not, let slain Cambyses Peres  
Dispute the Question: jealousies and fears,  
Arise on every side: a monarch may  
Turn tyrant, Nero, or Dionysius play.  
Violently take your goods, 
A Tyrant.  command your Wives,  
And what more precious is then both your lives:  
Bring in an arbitrary Government,  
or fear, or scorn to call a Parliament?  
Forget himself, and how one single clause  
Of his life more commands then all his laws.  
He acts on a conspicuous stage, and is  
Subject to all his subjects clap or hiss.  
Thus monarchs may decline, and may not such,  
Who to a state turn kingdoms do as much?  
Suppose your Noblemen should bear the sway,  
Even these may err as well as tyrants may:  
Consult, 
aristocracy.  combine, to keep the people low,  
And from the public pressures potent grow.  
A crafty party circumvent the rest,  
Some few prevail, the bad o'ertop the best.  
From reason's rule, and square of Justice err,  
Before the general, private ends prefer.  
Athens a slave by thirty tyrants made;  
And Rome by the Decemviri betrayed.  
These promised cures o'th' body politic,  
But made the same a hundreth times more sick.  
Weary of Kings, Rome ordains Consuls, those  
Suppressed, she ten chief Magistrates will choose.  
Rods only scourged her in the days of Kings,  
And Consuls, these few men with Scorpions stings  
Slash the poor Commons, as none can be sure  
Of his own goods, nor in's own house secure;  
The people grumble: let 'em, this base yoke,  
They brought upon themselves, and till the have broke  
Their Asses back i'th' carriage must endure  
The burden; armed Cohorts shall secure  
The tyrant's lives, and military bands,  
Force speedy execution of commands.  
For the fond multitude, they never knew  
Their proper good, 
democracy.  nor what belonged to  
Or worth, or manners; Peers and monarchs know,  
When they do injuries, that they do so.  
But the base vulgars' unrestrained will,  
Is model of their actions good, or ill.  
A many headed monster, yet not one  
Sconce stuffed with Reason, or Religion;  
Fiery in prosecution of what's new,  
Which had, they presently their wishes rue:  
And you as easily may, and even as soon,  
Shape out and make a garment for the moon,  
Now crescent, now i'th' full, now in the wain,  
As satisfy the vulgars' fickle brain.  
The rabble doted on this Parliament,  
With clubs and staves for their protection went  
To Westminster: gloried to hear● themselves  
Called roundheads, others Cavaliers (new Guelphs  
And Gibelines) what blood shed they? what sights?  
Adventured for the parliamental rights?  
How bountifully did they give their store,  
Of gold at Guildhall? yea, contribute more  
Than was required. City and Country cry,  
T'have reverend Laud and active Strafford die,  
As enemies to'th realm, and Parliament;  
And till their heads are off ne'er be content.  
But now the case is altered, they rail on  
Both Houses, cry down for oppression  
Excises, are so impudent, they'd thrust  
Them from their Voting, whom themselves did trust,  
With all their rights; whisper, express their spite  
In prose and verse, most dangerous pamphlets write:  
Yea some ('tis strange) so rash they dare proclaim  
Themselves the authors, and subscribe a name:  
Boldness and mercy, these would spend their blood  
Most willingly, our Senators are good,  
And will not spiled, knowing a Magistrate.  
Should th' Emperor Nero (yet young) imitate.  
Who wept when he should sign to th' deaths of men,  
Condemned, and wished he could not use a pen.  
But howsoe'er they hold a wolf by th' ear,  
Who court the multitude, and still must fear,  
he'll bite 'em; 
Psal  all their bones are broke in twain,  
Who seek the fickle vulgars' love to gain.  
So weak our providence, so full of fear,  
No state that's perfect can be established here;  
None formed yet a body politic,  
That sundry noxious humours made not sick.  
Utopia fancied by our learned More,  
Had faults, and Plato's commonwealth had more.  
Let Genoa, Jena, Venice, Amsterdam,  
And my dear London a republic frame,  
As they have framed, some Constitutions are,  
That err from reason, and with justice square.  
Yet when Philolophers with all their wit,  
(Though some were statesmen) fail, our sacred Writ  
Shall speak a commonweal, so sound, so sure,  
That for eternity it shall endure.  
For lift your eyes up, and contemplate them,  
Who fill the Senate of Jerusalem;  
There you shall see an ordered policy  
Established, a sure grounded Monarchy:  
That on the burghers has more blessings brought,  
Than commonweals have dreamt of, or have sought.  
A glorious City, that surpasseth far,  
Ninus vast Ninive, or the grand Cairo:  
Though that could vaunt of threescore miles in length,  
Walls of unmeasured magnitude, and strength,  
Almost two thousand towers as Babel high,  
Threatening as Memphis Pyramids, the sky.  
Yet if with Zion you both these compare,  
Both silly cottages, both Sheep-coats are.  
The pavement, 
Apoc. 21.  walls, and roof of gold are made,  
With diamonds and precious stones inlaid. 
Tob. 13.   
That with their lustre give a constant light,  
Although such need not, for the sable night  
Is ever banished thence; (the fulgent rays,  
Oth' slaughtered Lamb, causing perpetual days.)  
No watch, no warding at the several ports,  
No military stations at the Forts.  
Only at every Gate an Angel stands,  
And brandishes a falchion in his hands,  
To keep Malignants ou●, 
Gen. 3.  as heretofore  
Th' Angel kept watch and ward at Eden's door.  
And when that shame of nature went about,  
To break Lot's house, 
Ibid. 19  the angels kept 'em out:  
Besides the Citizens all soldiers are,  
Knights of St. Vincent for their fea●s of War.  
They made their passage through a crimson flood,  
(As did the Israelites) of Jesus blood. 
Exod. 14.   
And Satan mindful he was vanqushed here,  
Scarce lifts his eyes to Heaven, much less comes there.  
The form of Government is such; one King,  
To whom all homage owe, and tribute bring;  
His Court most glorious: Myriads of those Peres,  
Whose charge it is to volve the circling Spheres,  
Assist his throne: Cherubs who pierce, and see,  
The secret Orders of the Deity.  
And those Seraphike Lords, with fiery love  
Inflamed, 
The hierarchy of Angels.  in and about the centre move  
Oth' divine Essence. Sedentary be,  
The thrones, and with a sweet tranquillity,  
Contemplate God. O'er sublunary things,  
The dominations sway, and act their King's  
Commands; who uses to employ the powers  
When he will curb those enemies of ours,  
Th' Acrian Potentates: as Satan would,  
Bring Moses body forth, 
Epist. Iud.  that th' Hebrews should  
It idolise, he was made hold his peace  
By Michael, and from th' enterprise surcease.  
Who take the charge of Kings and kingdoms, these  
Are sti●'d magnific Principalities.  
When God prodigious operations takes  
In hand, he then the active Virtues makes  
His instruments. Angels, archangels, are  
His nuntios, when he pleases to declare  
His mind to Mortals: the angel Gabriel went,  
In embassy to crave a maid's consent,  
And as some Paranymph prepare a room, 
Luc. 1.   
Where God himself should to our nature come,  
And wooing in's own person make a tye  
Betwixt our flesh, and his Divinity;  
The hypostatick Union was the Ring,  
Did make the match, and to perfection bring:  
And made our lump of despicable clay,  
O'er the Empyrian Dominations sway.  
What time the Spouse, 
Eph. 5.  both Jews and Gentiles takes,  
And with them both a mystique marriage makes.  
The fervent Seraphin, and Cherubs be  
Lords of God's privy council, although he  
Nor sits, nor needs much to deliberate,  
What's to be done in businesses of State.  
Yet some blessed Angels know more of his mind,  
And in the Book of Life (read deeply,) find,  
The fixed decrees of his eternal will,  
How he elects the good, rejects the ill.  
Some leaders of God's Army, whom he sends,  
Or to subdue his foes, or aid his friends;  
So Michael, Generalissimo, commands  
The sacred Brigades, and celestial Bands;  
Guess at their strength, by what but one has done,  
Killing in Egypt every fi●st borne for. 
Exod. ●1.   
All this one night performed: Did not almost  
Two hundreth thousand of the Syrian Host,  
Oth' ground lie gasping, by one angel killed,  
And all the rest with Panik terrourfilde,  
Trudge with their King away? 
4. Reg. Ch. 19  some Angel must  
I'th' latest day collect all human dust:  
When souls shall reassume their flesh, and give,  
Account of all their actions done alive.  
All these great Princes hourly wait upon  
Their glorious King, encompassing his throne,  
To do him service, and i'th' very name,  
Each one Enucleates his creator's fame.  
For every single appellation suits,  
To be the Banner of God's attributes.  
The Seraphim proclaim that ardent fire,  
Wherewith the Persons mutually conspire,  
To give existence, and communicate,  
To what's existent an accomplished state.  
The Cherubs witness an abyss of skill,  
In the production, and a provident will,  
In government o'th' world: both in the height  
Of wisdom, number, and of weight.  
How fitly do the quiet thrones express,  
Gods never to be altered quietness?  
Who in himself immoved, always the same,  
With various motions altars the world's frame.  
Mutations in the fire, air, water, land,  
And in all these God has a special hand.  
But as some Rock fixed firmly midst the waves,  
Stirs not a jot, although the ocean raves,  
And boisterous winds conspiring with the tide,  
'cause noise, and fear alike on every side:  
So in the world, though daily motions be,  
Changes of elements, and kingdoms; he  
Who changes all, sits quiet in his throne,  
Ever the same unalterable, One.  
Powers, virtues, principalities, display  
With dominations a despotic sway.  
The Angels fancied young with Cherubs wings,  
The cheerful expedition in their King's  
Commands: 
Matth. 18.  these ninety nine have never erred,  
But always loyal to their God adhered:  
When Lucifer that Ca●●lin lost his place,  
These purchased glory, keeping their first grace.  
A mighty Prince prepared Assuerus feasts,  
And sent his Vassals to invite the guests, 
Esther. 1.   
And bid 'em forthwith to the banquet come,  
They only wanted to adorn his room.  
They all excuse; one answers, he hath bought,  
A farm, 
Luc. 14.  and goes to see if't be worth aught;  
Another has bought Oxen, and must know  
By trial, whether they be good or no.  
The three's a married man, and for his life,  
He cannot obtain licence of his wife.  
What's to be done? must all the Kates be spoilt?  
This noble Prince, and all his curtsy foiled?  
No sure his servants go to every street,  
And take up all the passengers they meet.  
Yet there is place: he sends for the riff-raff,  
They come sit at his table, drink, eat, laugh.  
Such is God bounty, he prepared feasts,  
Adorned heavens Hall, and only wanted guests  
To fill the rooms of those rebellious Fiends,  
Wherefore to Jews and Gentiles out he sends.  
Many excuse themselves: 
Ioh.  some pride of life  
Retard, some hope of gain, others a Wife.  
But who can cross God's efficacious will?  
Guests are compelled, 
Rom. 9  whether they will or nil,  
By congruous grace to come, and fill the seats  
O'th' traitorous Elves, and feed on dainty meats.  
The lame, the feeble, and the poor in spirit,  
By grace of Christ advanced, not their own merit,  
To God's own table, eat celestial Kates,  
Where Angels minister, 
Luc. 11.  and Jesus waits.  
Of these in Heaven a countless multitude,  
Inhabit, 
Apoc. 7.  not as the base vulgar rude;  
But deeply learned, having for their book,  
Even God himself, on whom they daily look:  
And as they more or less relations see  
I th' sacred triad, so they learned be;  
And happy more or less, and what them all,  
Most firmly comforts, they shall never fall  
From this beatitude: some ages past,  
This state of things shall end; theirs ever last.  
No sickness, no diseases can come near  
That happy town, nor is there any fear,  
That all consuming time, or pensive cares,  
Shall issue furrowing wrinkles, 
Apoc. 21.  or grey hairs:  
Never sedition troubled this blessed town,  
Since Lucifer that Boutifew fell down.  
And care is had that none shall enter in  
The gates, 
Ibid.  de●il'd with leprosy of sin.  
'tis true, there's difference twixt the light of stars,  
Yet cannot inequality breed jars: 
● Cor. 15.   
No Saint repining at another's share,  
Though some more glorious than some others are.  
All rest contented with their proper store  
Of grace, and glory, and require no more.  
And 'twere a madness any should repine,  
The cheerful Sun should on his fellow shine;  
Or dropping Clouds with a fructiferous shower,  
Upon his neighbour's fields a blessing pour.  
The self same mirror bounteously reflects.  
Upon a thousand several men's aspects.  
The airy species, nor is less your view,  
Because a thousand sharers are with you.  
God is this glorious planet, this clear glass,  
That cheers all, shows all objects as they pass.  
Though he cheer all, though he be seen of many,  
All this is done sans detriment of any.  
And had there been millions of such worlds more,  
Of saints, and angels, an innumerous store,  
All had had heat, all had as clearly seen,  
Yet th'object never penetrated been.  
As easily God giving life and form,  
To all as he doth to the silliest worm:  
And though to some his bounties ampler be,  
Yet even in this we shall Deco●um see.  
As a●chitects, who rear a house or wall,  
When ponderous stones are fit, apply not small:  
When small proportion will not massy place,  
For so the work would want both art and grace.  
Such is God's City made of lively stones,  
Spiritual Chrysolithes', and Unions.  
The Sardonix, 
Apoc. 21,  and sparkling Chrysoprase,  
Beryllus, Jasper, crystalline like glass.  
All these rich gems proportionably cut,  
Are in that form, and decent manner put,  
And of such quantity, and valour be,  
As with the Universe shall best agree.  
For if the workman showed such curious art,  
In making this low orb, and every part  
Contained in it, how must his skill abound,  
When he a palace for himself will found?  
We have viewed God's City, know the subjects, now  
Let's contemplate the policy and how  
This mighty monarch governs, by what law  
So steers, his subjects love, yet stand in awe.  
King's are compelled to employ their subjects hands,  
As use●ull instruments of their commands:  
They cannot live without 'em, nor are Kings,  
Unless the subject necessary things;  
Supply for life, and state, whence come their treasures,  
But from the subject's purse? even to their pleasures  
The subject must contribute, nor the field,  
Nor River without▪ Subjects pleasure yield,  
Unless the Falconer trave●sing the mounds,  
Shall lu●e the hawk, the hun●s-men rate the Hounds.  
In masks, and shows, and plays, which Princes see,  
Subjects must revellers, and actors be.  
If he rule wisely the best monarch hears,  
More with his subjects, then with his own ears:  
He must have ledgers, and his spies maintain,  
To inform what's done in Rome, France, Flanders, Spain.  
Is't' the least misery of Kings to stand●▪  
In fear of their own subjects, lest they band  
Against them, or plot treason; monarchs are,  
Jealous when subjects grow too popular,  
Too potent, or too rich; on purpose send  
Them out ambassadors, to make 'em spend  
Their formidable treasures: Or in show  
Of honour, let 'em for their viceroys go  
To the remoter Indies. Who can tell,  
How many monarchs by their Vassals fell?  
We need not travail Greece, Rome, Beme, France, Spain;  
In our sole Britain fifty monarchs slain:  
That Auentinus boldly dares report, 
Auentinus de Bello Turcico. George Abbot Archbish Ca●. in his description of the World.   
The Roman-German Emperor kept a court,  
Where Kings were subject: none but Asses were  
Vassals to the French King, because they bear  
Such heavy burdens; the Hesperian Kings,  
Were Kings of men, because the Spaniard clings  
So closely to his Prince. A King of Devils,  
Our English King, by reason of the evils  
Against their Kings done by the subjects' hands,  
Rebellions, depositions, murders, bands.  
Yet we must understand there's mighty odds,  
Betwixt the Commons, and terrestrial Gods.  
Angels guard us, 
Matth. 18.  archangel's wait on them,  
Secure their persons, 
Dan. 10.  and protect the realm  
For monarch's sakes: 
Ps. 81.  let the world know that Kings,  
Are gods on earth, and consecrated things.  
Precious i'th' sight of God, in state most high,  
Who touch 'em, 
Zach. 2.  touch the apple of God's eye.  
Semei may bark, 
Reg. 2. cap. 16. ib. 17.  Achitophel counsel give,  
But how long after did these traitors live?  
The politician, farewell gently takes  
Of all his friends, and with decorum makes  
(If hanging have a decency) an end  
Of's loathed life. 
Ibid. 19  Semei is made a friend,  
To the restored King; but with this law  
(Which whilst he lives shall keep him still in awe)  
He must not leave his house: some few years pass,  
His servants run away; mounting his ass  
He brings 'em back again. 
Reg. 3. cap. 2.  'Tis told the Prince,  
And Semei dies for's first, and last offence.  
(God's scourge oretaking (though 'tis sometimes long)  
Still subjects, who dare do their monarch's wrong.)  
But though high powers guard Kings, yet we may see,  
How to their subjects spleens they subject be.  
No such dependent monarchy in Heaven,  
Where nothing by the subject can be given,  
That was not Gods before: their very being  
Glorious endowments, beatifique seeing.  
For pleasure, not for want of power or skill,  
He makes the angel's actors of their will.  
Nor fears he mutinies; love's the only law,  
Of their obedience, and a filyall awe.  
Should any rise (which cannot be) one frown,  
Would easily cast to Hell the Rebels down.  
Who acts all things, above, beneath the Sun,  
Needs no informers to know what is done.  
The greatest monarch governs, as well clounes,  
As Kings: in Heaven all are Kings, all wear crowns.  
Nor can we reckon the innumerous list,  
Of God's apparent heirs, 
Apoc. 7.  coheyrs with Christ.  
Commanders of his Military Bands, 
Galat. 4.   
Who for their brave exploits by God's own hands,  
Have Diadems set on every victor's front,  
Of precious stones, and every stone has on't  
The trophies they have reared by Victories got,  
As with the devil, World, and Flesh they fought.  
Thus is our zions government in all  
Points most complete, truly monarchical.   

To the right Honourable, Thomas Lord Brudenol, Master Robert Brudenol his Son, and my learned Friend, Master James Yate.  
Sermo Octavus.  
The Argument.  
All good here scanted, if a Man have wealth,  
He wants or wit to use it, or wants health.  
This witty as Achitophel, but his case,  
As poor as jobs, or worse: for he wants grace.  
Only in Heaven these Three are friendly joined,  
Health, Wealth, and choice endowments of the Mind:  
Then the fourth Good on these Three former waits,  
Angels, Archangels, patriarchs are your mates:  
With Prophets, Martyrs, Doctors to their King,  
Melodious Allelujas you shall sing.  
THe end of Common weals is to procure,  
A temporal happiness, and put in ure,  
All means conducent to that purpose, this  
Obtained they rest contented with such bliss.  
Was ever Rome, Spar●●, or Athens blessed,  
With such a happiness? Lot's view the rest,  
Of commonwealths; they often changed their forms  
Of government, to be secured from storms.  
Now Kings, now Peers, now Commons, now commixed,  
All three; no policy long standing fixed.  
Which shows that all your commonwealths are lame,  
Gain not their ends, but only at them aim.  
Are private men more happy? Let us see  
What's requisite to our felicity. 
Aristot. Ethic.   
A plenteous fortune, Dowries of the mind,  
To which the bodies health must be adjoined.  
(Does not such bliss stand on a ticklish point,  
The Gout, or headache can put out of joint?)  
Then choice associates must accumulate,  
The full fruition of a blessed state:  
And 'tis extension of a private good,  
When friends partake in our Beatitude.  
Such have blind Fortunes various changes been,  
That never yet a commonwealth was seen,  
Or single man, in whom these blessings joined,  
Friends, health, the goods of fortune, and the mind.  
In wrongs was Alexander fortunate,  
H●s friends unfaithful, mind intemperate.  
What was his fury? what his drunkenness?  
When he slew Clitus, and Callisthenes.  
Virtues in others can this Prince offend,  
Which were they his, heed● in himself commend.  
What can content this brainsick young man's mind?  
When what his foes cannot, himself will find  
A want in his own greatness: Philip's son,  
Though Asia he subdued has nothing done,  
Because Perdiccas hath a warlike breast,  
Lysimachus amongst his chieftains best,  
Can lead an Army. Attalus brave gate,  
A shadow casts on Alexander's state.  
Seleucus is magnanimous, and where,  
Dangers and death are most apparent, there  
He will be foremost, Ptolemy does rest  
In fortune's lap, all his attempts are blessed.  
Thus envy has, as Argus many eyes,  
Above, beneath, on every ●ide she spies.  
We hate superiors, because they are so,  
We fear lest our inferiors equal grow.  
We look a squint on such we fellows see,  
And have a jealousy they'll better be.  
The best of Romans, and most worthy man,  
Was Scipio Major, surnamed African.  
Was he accomplished? no, though wherein weak,  
His noble Wife can, 
Valerius Maximus.  but disdains to speak.  
Omitting these, we'll come to Solomon,  
A type of the Messiah, David's son:  
This monarch by his subjects even adored  
For wisdom, with all rich endowments stored:  
Well kenned all plants, and could describe the tall  
Cedar as well, 
1 Reg. 10. 11.  as th' hyssop of the wall:  
He knew all secrets, and could make his texts,  
The causes influences on their effects:  
He well was versed in what few mortals know,  
Whence it proceeds, why these, and those winds blow.  
And what learned Aristotle put beside,  
His wits, he knew the ebbing of the tide,  
And the reflux: whether the moon be cause  
Th' Ocean in both observes such constant laws.  
Taught by omniscious God, he knew the motions  
Of all the Orbs, and how their revolutions  
Sway sublunary things, and whether those  
Have a predominance in joys and woes.  
Whether our lily or his Booker●rre,  
Or we must Wharton before them both prefer:  
Had he writ almanacs, (and sure he had  
Such knowledge, half whereof would have made mad  
All our Astrologers) by this we had seen,  
What th' end of all our troubles would have been.  
Sith these by Prophets only are foretold,  
For we are masters of our arts and hold  
Our Fortunes in our hands: stars may incline,  
But not necessitate thy will or mine.  
Had he turned alchemist (as many say  
He did) he would have taken the right way,  
To make projection come, and not with brags  
Of Peru's mines, have gone himself inrags,  
As our impostures do, who rich men cheat,  
Only to sneak in matters and to eat.  
The Rabbins tell; so powerful was hit skill,  
That th' airy potentates obeyed his will;  
And that in pity knowing how much hurt,  
Is done to mankind by this glistering dirt,  
Called Gold, the sinews of unnatural war,  
Lust, and ambition; and how Lawyers are  
Frunished by this to feed eternal strife,  
twixt friend and dearest friend, man and his wife;  
And if men get the philosophic stone,  
All would be rich, proud, and luxurious, none  
Go the right way; he therefore th' Angels bound,  
By a strong oath, that whensoever they found,  
Projection, near to come, they should like thunder,  
Fall on th' Alembiks, and break all asunder,  
And ever since projection has been spun,  
Even to the latest day: then als undone.  
Though empirics whine and swear some grievous fault  
Has crush their stills, and made their science halt.  
Our Soloman had a full theory  
Of all the moral arts: economy,  
How we should rule our house, how rule a state,  
How our unruly passions subjugate. 
Prov.   
How we should children rule, 
Eccles.  and if we can,  
Make every wife obeisant to her man.  
What all surmounts by gift of prophecy,  
He could the mysteries of our Church foresee;  
And to one God a sumptuous Temple rear,  
Pre●igurating that which Jesus here  
Founded: 
3 Reg.  although to this inferior far,  
As to prototypons all shadows are.  
Then wrapped with heavenly fires chaste hymns enroll,  
Wherewith the Spouse shall cou●t the Church, the soul,  
(His compheres) and as this musician sings,  
The amorous emoraces of his Kings,  
In strong allusions, and harmonious airs,  
What are his own 〈…〉 he declares.  
His comely body was a curious house,  
For a composed soul. His Memphian spouse  
Ith' following song thus shall h●r consort greet.  
The fragrant roses and while lilies meet, 
Cant.   
In my love's face, his form surpasseth far,  
The sons of men! 
Psal. 44.  th' attractive graces are,  
Dancing about his lips, when he'll decide  
Some doubtful case, or else his wit is tried  
In parables, what Combs of honey flow,  
What heavenly elocution does he show? 
3 Reg.   
Kings and domestics, all astonished gaze  
Upon him, and the happy fortune's praise,  
Of the worst menial of his house, who stands,  
And hears as well his wisdom, as commands.  
If these enjoy such bliss, how great is hers,  
Whom to his bed, and bosom he prefers,  
His loyal consort, Empress, turtle Dove,  
His friend, completely fair, his only Love?;  
Will you behold the royal majesty,  
Of Spanish Kings? travel to Sicily,  
Or else a● Naples, view the viceroy's port,  
And all the glorious circumstance of Court.  
But if you'll see Magnificence indeed,  
To Salem's new adorned city speed.  
There you'll behold a mighty Prince command,  
From the Sea shore to swift Euphrates strand,  
Potent in horse and foot: innumerous sums,  
Of coin, of Sercan silks, Arabian Gums,  
Odours of Saba: every neighbour King,  
Courts him with presents, or does Tribute bring.  
His heat (in a firm league of friendship joined,  
With Tyrian Hyram) shall mount Ophir find,  
And marking when the lions go to pray,  
S●aze on the precious Ore, 
R. 3. c. 9  and bring' ● away  
(For Ophir lions dig, and watch those Mines,  
Of purer dust which covetous man refines, 
Lyra ib.   
And spreads about the world to maintain what,  
Ambition, lust, wrath, envy, level at.)  
Now view this glorious monarch sit alone,  
(Like some terrestrial God on's Ivory throne)  
Or the resplendent Sun at noon days pride,  
His Memphian Empress sitting by his side, 
Psal. 44.   
In a rich pearl-imbroidered Cyclad dight,  
(Resembling the fair Mistress of the night.)  
Two massy lions made of beaten gold,  
On either side the high-set-throne uphold: 
3 Reg. 10.   
Six steps th' ascent: a dozen lions are,  
Of the same metal guarding every stair.  
A world of Grandees wait upon their Prince,  
Admiring his full answers, and deep sense:  
Either as the ambassadors shall grace,  
Or else enucleate some ambiguous case:  
For pleasures now what were his house and court?  
A City this, that Eden full of sport.  
Ordered so well that every menial knows  
His proper duties, and discharges those  
Without disturbance to the rest, 
3 Reg.  all move  
In their own centrike lines as does behoove,  
Vassals of Solomon: 
Eccles. 3.  the plains, the woods,  
Yield profit and delight: the springs, the floods,  
To fishponds turned, and made inhabitants,  
About his house to water trees, flowers, plants.  
When he feeds every element combines  
To grace his board: the earth her richest wines.  
Sea, earth, and air, present fish, fowl, and beasts,  
And every day he makes Apician feasts.  
At all his banquets, massy plate behold,  
Cups, Tankards, Flagons, all of purest gold,  
Embossed with gems: For gold, pearls, diamonds,  
Abounded there, as rife as precious stones,  
What stately Masques, where wit with bravery strives,  
Presented are before him, and his wives,  
And concubines? (a thousand) every one,  
So gracious, might be a Prototypon,  
And single give ingenious Zeuxis laws,  
When for rich Croton he a goddess draws,  
At every strain such music charms their ears,  
May parallel with the Harmonious spheres.  
Such was the life of Solomon, and sure,  
If you will character an Epicure,  
Enveloped in all pleasures, 
Eccles. 2.  do but look,  
And seriously, upon this monarchs' book,  
And you must grant an happiness, if this  
Low orb, and all things in't can yield a bliss.  
But More's, and Plato's Common-weals have been  
Fancied ingeniously, though never seen.  
And Xenophon with a neat pen could draw  
A curious Cyrus, whom the world ne'er saw.  
So Aristotle formed a happy man,  
In his own brain, which no age could or can,  
Or shall behold: Riches, and outward things,  
Are temporary▪ Pleasure brings  
No constant bliss: are wives, and women ware,  
More precious? let our Ancestors declare  
The worth of these. What is for silver sold,  
Less valued is then Silver, 
Osea. 5.  less than gold:  
A Wife by God's command the Prophet buys,  
And with her having paid his Sicles lies:  
A King's first daughter chaffered for the skins,  
And slippits of preputiate Philistines. 
Reg. 1. 18.   
We go beyond their wisdom; now 'tis common,  
Without a Dowry few will take a woman.  
Five thousand, twenty, forty thousand crowns,  
Laid down upon the nail; wardrobes of gowns,  
And rich attire, jewels prepared before  
She enters her dread Lord, and husband's door.  
Yet notwithstanding all this stir and cost,  
The hapless husbands have by th' bargain lost.  
For some such shrews, or rather Furies are,  
Their husband's better be without 'em far.  
What are your Empires? what your large commands▪  
So many several cares, as several lands.  
What are your stately masks? ingenious plays?  
Wit uttered, shows performed by popinjays.  
Besides this transitory life's so short,  
That passing we can only look at sport,  
Not sit by it; that thread, the life of man  
Spins out, fitly resembled to a span.  
What's Solomon on his imperial Throne,  
His Grandees all attending, every one  
Praising his wisdom? Despicable clay,  
Accou●red well, set forth in rich array:  
Yet thus set forth a lily withering straight, 
Matth 6.   
Shall quite eclipse this gaudy monarchs' state.  
If wisdom, learning, erudition bring  
Felicity; we must confess this King  
A happy man: but he himself shall grant,  
Where's much affliction, likewise there's much want  
Of happiness: though sciences delight,  
Yet what a toil is studying day and night, 
Eccles. 1.   
To purchase arts; and when all's done none know,  
What animates a dog, a cat, a crow.  
We see when any such poor creature dies,  
The senseless carcase without motion lies.  
Death some thing must destroy, some thing divide,  
That soul and body hath together tied.  
The union's lost, where is, and what is that?  
Did constitute a crow, a dog, a cat.  
We cannot tell, more than in general,  
How we these actuating souls should call.  
We have surveighed the world and nothing find,  
Which can beatify m●ns restless mind:  
Created to be happy: must this end,  
Be frustrate? must we toil, and labour spend  
In vain? No! we will fly with wings of love  
To heaven; and find beatitude above.  
The state of joy and pleasure, is the will,  
The object either real good or ill  
Yet such as clothes itself in the antique tire  
Of good: the senses when what they desire,  
They have, transmit to th' soul (their Queen) delight,  
Which issues from the heating, cast, smell, sight.  
That pleasure is the scules, we are easily taught,  
Because the will, or else some pensive thought  
Can curb all pleasure in exteriours t●ne.  
Yea more, convert all pleasure into pain.  
Fair Aletkeia the search, and object is  
Oth' understanding, and its proper bliss  
Is formal verity: How are we glad,  
When certain demonstrations can be had,  
In any science? through what labours run,  
To find how, where, by whom, such deeds were done?  
Pleasures belong to th' will, and to know much  
Gives the understanding great contentment: such  
Knowledge have zions Citizens; they know  
All things; as torrents, so their pleasures flow.  
A torrent, 
Torrente vo●uptatis tuae potasti 〈◊〉.  blessing the overwhelmed meads,  
Derives his origin from several heads:  
Heaven-threatning mountains in abundance send, 
Psal. 35.   
Their fleecy snows; the neighbouring rivers lend  
Friendly their streams, heavens cataracts fly open,  
The earth to all her ●lood-gates gives full scope:  
So shall there be a confluence of all good,  
To make complete the Saints beatitude.  
Will understanding, memory, every sense,  
Shall freely give a large benevolence.  
A body so exact in every part,  
That skilful nature cannot mend, nor art  
Make better, 
Ephes. 4.  after the age of Christ; for he,  
As author, so th' exemplar cause must be  
Of the Saints bliss; full of agility,  
Can when it will through the 〈◊〉 kingdoms fly.  
Drakes Ship as a rare monument was kept, 
The dowries of a glorified body.   
At Debtfort, 'cause she had the Ocean swept,  
Encompassing the world, and 〈◊〉 the Sun  
Had thrice his course through th' oblique zodiac run,  
Circled the coasts of parched Africa,  
Of Asia, Europe, and America,  
What is this world compared to heaven? a span, 
Agility.   
To fifty leagues. Yet the Saints bodies can,  
As soon as the swift sun all regions see,  
And at the journeys end not wearied be.  
Then how pellucid bodies made divine  
By glory are? 
clarity.  how radiantly they shine.  
Here they were Tabernacles (though of clay,)  
In which souls dear to God, a while made stay,  
Organs o'th' divine glory; so Paul's tongue,  
Through th' Universe, God's praise, and gospel sung,  
O'erthrew Idolatry, 
Act.  o'erthrew false Gods,  
His body for the true God scourged with rods. 
2 Cor. 11.   
O'erwhelmed with stones; in perils on the Maine.  
His head by th' sword from off his shoulders ta'en.  
These several members for the several wounds,  
Shall be adorned with several Diamonds.  
Anadems of glory circle that blessed front,  
Garlands of richest Jewels set upon't.  
The protomartyrs body black and blue, 
Act. 7.   
With stones shall shine in a most fulgent hue.  
Such glorious dowries, 
subtlety.  the Saints bodies grace,  
That rocks and hardest marble must give place.  
To make them way, nor can they suffer harm,  
By any sword managed by th' strongest arm. 
Impassibility   
Subject to woes, to blows, to torments here,  
Senseless of woes, of blows, of torments there.  
Parched Afriks' glory (borne in's mother's eyes)  
(An happier issue of her holy cries,  
Then of her womb) would magnify three sights  
Above all other temporal delights. 
S. Aug.   
To see our Saviour in that flesh arrayed,  
In which he was to the false Jews betrayed,  
By Gentiles crucified, rose from the grave,  
And by his death did Jews and Gentiles save.  
To hear the Doctor of the Gentiles Paul,  
Either in the Athenian judgement Hall,  
From th' unknown statue fit occasion take, 
Act. 17.   
And to his auditors a Sermon make:  
Or in the Synagogues, instruct the Jews,  
How he whom they so barbarously did use,  
nailed to the cross should with much glory come, 
Act. 13 14. &c. 23.   
To give all Mortals an impartial doom.  
Or else before the Roman precedents, 
Act. 24.   
Thundering God's judgements, and what punishments  
Attend transgressors, with his rhetoric make  
Affrighted Faelix and Drusilla quake.  
Then what a glorious sight wilt be to see,  
Great Rome in all her former Majesty?  
Or in Augustus, or Vespasians time,  
Proud with the trophies of the Easter clime?  
The spoils of Nations Caesar's bringing forth  
In Ovant pomp, what in the South and North  
Was rich, and glorious: soldiers crowned with bays,  
Ecohoing in Paeans their Commanders praise.  
Rome at the greatest was but thirty miles  
About; had for its householdstuff the spoils  
Of the whole World: the riches of all realms,  
Arabian Gums, and gold, Egyptian Gems.  
What's thirty miles to zions amplitude?  
What's the world's treasure to Beatitude?  
We speak a city, where large kingdoms are  
The graceful streets: Rome, Babylon, Grand Cairo,  
But simple Cottages compared with ours,  
Their palaces, their high-Heaven-threatning Towers,  
But sties for swine: though we fond mortals cry  
'Em up, not knowing true Felicity.  
Heavenly Jerusalem with gems is built, 
Apoc. 21.   
The walls, 
Tob. 13.  the Battlements, the turret's guilt,  
The streets are paved with sapphire, Ophir stones,  
Berill, rich Carbuncles, and Uniones,  
In such a city, (when the blessed souls must,  
Be reunited to their wonted dust,  
Completed by that Union) the Saints shall  
Have lordly domination over all  
The World, 
Sap. 3.  and seated in majestic chairs,  
Judge Nations, 
Rom. 8.  heirs of God, with Christ coheirs.  
Be conversant with him, humbly adore,  
And kiss those wounds by which he trumphed o'er  
The grave, and Hell; acknowledge his sole blood.  
The only price of their Beatitude.  
Therefore with the Elders every Saint casts down  
Prostrate at Jesus feet his royal crown. 
Apoc.   
Not only in the mirror of God's mind,  
You shall the Apostles, Paul, John, Peter find,  
But all the patriarchs, Martyrs, Doctors see,  
Converse, and with 'em most familiar be.  
Hear every passage of their lives and deaths,  
How the stout Martyrs purchased their wreathes.  
Hear Paul relate through what Seas he did wade,  
What dangers scap't, where, what Orations made,  
And before whom; what good his Sermons wrought,  
And who by them into the Church were brought.  
And as he speaks, so act at every strain,  
That you would think you heard him preach again.  
Your understanding shall be lightened so,  
That you the several Hierarchies shall know,  
See perfectly what now, we but in trust,  
Take up; if every Individuum must  
Be' a several Species by itself, and God  
Must needs of the same form create an odd;  
Suppose, if two of the same form he'll make,  
He must our Mother, the first Hyle take.  
But these are niceties: Your principal  
Happiness is God, whose Vision includes all  
May satisfy. What's done in Heaven, the Son,  
By his Father got: active Spiration.  
How these embracing mutually conspire,  
From both their heats, to give eternal fire  
Its Origen: which sent by them shall move,  
In such a circle, that with ardent love  
The World shall burn, acknowledging a Law,  
That shall both Jews and Gentiles keep in awe.  
A Law not of stern threats and fetters made,  
To compel man; but gently shall persuade,  
Attracte with ties of love, 
Zach.  no more command,  
Then what may easily with practice stand.  
Let's well observe what things are requisite  
To draw from Scientifique arts delight,  
So shall we know what they, and how much pleasure  
Enjoy, who purchased have this hidden treasure.  
A power, a faculty, apt to conceive,  
And from proportioned objects forms receive;  
And knowledge, and delight, completer be,  
According to the objects dignity.  
This power cognoscitive must be combined,  
With th' object, and the closer it is joined,  
The more it knows, receives the more content,  
And both increase when th' object's excellent.  
Can any object be like God? of good,  
The fountain, in himself Beatitude.  
Of bounty, mercy, justice, a vast Ocean,  
Whose every virtue, every single notion  
Speaks an abyss of worth; where silly sheep  
May wade, Elephants may swim▪ not reach the deep.  
With this sea of perfections, sea of good,  
The soul's so joined, 'tis swallowed in the flood.  
Immerged so deeply in that vast abyss,  
That with it one, 
1 Cor. 6.  and the same spirit 'tis.  
Knows all his immanent acts, sees all respects,  
Which his All-potent hand has to eff●cts.  
Is entered to all God's joys, and enjoys  
Made one with God, all treasures, pleasures, joys.  
God's all in all things, 
1 Cor. 15.  and whom he unites  
So nearly to him, with him all delights  
Partakes; nor need the blessed journeys take,  
To seek Beatitude; God alone will make  
Them happy, having in himself all store  
Of bounty, mercy, justice, wisdom, power.  
And such an object how must it distil,  
Torrents of pleasures on the ravished will?  
How shall our memory, th●●●… M●g●zin,  
Of all ideas showing what has been,  
Is extant, shall exist before us lay  
All acts from the world's cradle to this day?  
Present all passages through our life run,  
The many favours God for us hath done:  
The many dangers we have scaped, the fights,  
We had against the world, the flesh, the slights  
Of Satan, how God aided with his grace,  
And brought us conquerors to this happy place,  
Where (our brows circled with triumphant bays)  
Eternally we shall his mercy's praise. 
Psal.   
Then we survey the world's chronology,  
And entering in God's Cabinet council see,  
Why he so oft hath suffered just men here  
To be oppressed, the wicked domineer.  
Plainly perceive these miserable times,  
To issue from the deluge of our crimes.  
Our bloody sins have made so loud a cry,  
Nothing can cure us but phlebotomy.  
We did abhor the very name of Peace,  
The clamour of the Drum shall never cease.  
We chase Religion out the Land, not any  
One can content us, now we have too many.  
Did too much plenty cause a surquedry?  
Famine shall cure it, and much penury.  
The stock of cattle spent, a barren year  
Shall Victuals make, and corn excessive dear.  
Excises shall, set up on every score,  
Add to the famine, and undo the poor.  
Necessity caused taxes, the same Law,  
Must keep 'em up to keep the rout in awe.  
Why did th' ambitious Horse endure the bit,  
To chase the hart, then would be free from it?  
But can't; who thrust themselves into a yoke,  
Deserve to bear until their backs be broke.  
The Saints shall see why God permits all this,  
And not a jot be troubled in their bliss.  
For those blessed Citizens of Zion be,  
As well from trouble, as from sickness free.  
Nor can their Kin, or dearest friends annoy,  
Though known, diminish their eternal joy.  
For mercies towards themselves, to God they owe,  
And praise his justice in Delinquents woe.   

To the right Honourable, Edward, Earl of Dorset, Richard, Lord Buckhurst his Son, and my truly honoured Friend, Doctor Samuel Turner.  
Sermo Nonus.  
The Argument.  
Man labouring like the Spider, when als done,  
'tis but a simple Cobweb he hath spun.  
The Epirot will with his Armies roam  
Abroad, to gain what he enjoys at home.  
Well may we learn of the industrious Ant,  
To gather treasures 'gainst the time of want.  
Such is that dreadful day when all souls shall  
In public audience, give account of all  
Their life▪ The good mounting in heaven shall dwell,  
The bad descend down to th' abyss of Hell.  
HOw does the Spider toil, and when als done  
'tis but a silly cobweb she hath spun:  
Worth nothing, of no durance, every blast  
Can break it, with a dish of water cast,  
It falls; or Joan when she makes clean the room  
Sweeps down the Cobweb, and with her long broom,  
The Spider kills: from heaven's embroidered hall,  
The Angels see (who with one act view all  
That done on earth, (so do the Devils too,  
And crave such acts as to their nature due.)  
Fond men with the laborious Spider toil  
By day and night are troubled, keep a coil,  
To purchase Lands, and Titles, and all done,  
'Tis but a silly Cobweb they have spun.  
Your goods, your lands, your glorious titles be,  
Exposed to fortune's mutability.  
The senate's anger, or a King's displeasure,  
Commands your liberty, life, honours, treasure.  
How many Princes, mounted even to th' top  
Of fortune's wheel, have fall'n? and without hope  
Ever to rise; who but the other day,  
O'er many Nations had Monarchicke sway?  
How many wealthy men, even in our times,  
Either for real or supposed Crimes,  
Have been despoiled of all? and know no more  
Of their vast treasures, but that heretofore,  
They had abundance: And 'tis no relief,  
To have been happy, but a greater grief.  
So rich men only dream of goods and lands, 
Psal. 76.   
And waking grasp just nothing in their hands.  
A sickness soils the choicest beauties grace,  
Time leaves his furrows in the smoothest face.  
Wast not a frenzy in the Epyrot  
To boast when his Victorious sword had got,  
Great Rome and Italy; 
Plutarch in vita Pyrrhi.  he would waft o'er,  
And land his forces on the Lybick shore.  
afric subdued, he'd conquer ●●ince and Spain,  
Then Asia, and the Eastern R●gions game.  
The sage Philosopher demanding leave,  
Thus does the haughty Pyrrhus undeceive.  
What title have you to invade these lands?  
'Tis not the number of acquired commands  
Makes monarchs potent? rather such are weak,  
Who in their Conquests laws of justice break.  
Pyrrhus. do not I lineally claim● my descent,  
From great Achilles, who to ●lium went?  
And Neoptolemus his warlike son,  
Who sacked the city of Laomedon.  
I tell thee Cineas thy friend Pyrrhus springs  
From Alexander, and Molossian Kings.  
Who like Jove's thunder through the world did fly.  
Imped with the plumes of nimble Victory.  
And of the East a speedy conquest made;  
And had there been more worlds, my kinsman's blade  
Had all subdued. From great Aeacides,  
My mother, from renowned Hercules  
My father draws his stem; from both my blood,  
And both excite me to be great and good.  
Fear argues baseness, demigods and Kings,  
Are borne t'attempt, and act heroic things.  
Have I degenerated? did not these hands  
Defeat Demetrius, and his bay-crowned bands?  
When I was young, whose valour but mine own  
Worth could restore me to my father's throne?  
Here Cyneas smiles, and pitying much his Prince,  
(Pardon first begged, thus speaks without offence.  
Is't not a folly (Sir) to vaunt of blood?  
When such are only Noble, who are good.  
And 'tis a sign of small inherent worth,  
When kin and clothes are urged to set us forth.  
True worth and virtue not by deed of gift  
Or birth descend, but we must make a shift  
To purchase 'em. Such are more noble, who  
(First) raise a house, than they who (last) undo.  
As valiant deeds, so kindred then are best,  
When others, not ourselves the same shall test.  
Gaurus cures any sickness, if not named,  
Speak Gaurus, and his energy is maimed.  
'Tis brave to do exploits worthy the Pen  
Of Homer, and Herodotus, but then  
Beware to be the trump of your own praise,  
Let Courts and Cottages your trophies blaze.  
For noble virtue like some stream that's deep,  
A constant, but a silent course will keep.  
When shallow rivulets, which on pebbles glide,  
Make louder noise than Seas at a full tide.  
Alive we build no Monuments of Fame,  
To our own memory, but leave the same  
To progeny: The father tells his son,  
The worthy acts his Ancestors have done:  
So we acquire addition to our glory,  
When we being silent others speak our story.  
But tell me (Prince) when what yo● intend is done,  
And we have conquered all, where th' humble Sun  
Declines, and where he gloriously appears:  
How shall we spend the remnant of our years?  
Pyrrhus' to this replies, Then coming back  
To our native Land, we'll free from cares drink Sack,  
Fare jovially, consume the days and nights,  
In banquets, revelings, and fresh delights.  
Wearied with sports, our choicest Captive Dames,  
Shall set our bloods on fire, then quench our flames.  
The air, the land, the Ocean shall conspire,  
To furnish us with what we two desire.  
Why all this stir? 
Cineas.  why must we go so far,  
Expose ourselves to th' hazard of a war?  
Suffer the heat of days, the cold of nights?  
Such Victories obtained enter new sights?  
Suppose we conquer Rome, afric, Spain, France,  
In Asia our victorious ●lags advance,  
What have we got? let's cast up our account,  
To how much-does the total sum amount?  
That Pyrrhus and his Cineas coming back,  
T●our native Land▪ may free from cares drink Sack,  
Fare jovially, consume the days and nights,  
In banquets, revelings, and fresh delights.  
But cannot Pyrrhus and his Cineas do  
All this in Epire? why should we run through  
So many dangers; wherefore fight and room?  
When we may have this happiness at home.  
O foolish mortals, senseless cares of men,  
To leave what we enjoyed at home, and then  
To seek't abroad, with loss of limbs, and lives,  
Our daughter's rapes, deflowering of our Wives.  
Had we not peace? what have we got by wars?  
But undone families, but death, but fears,  
(The tests of civil fights) with English gore  
We are forced to purchase what we had before,  
And might have still enjoyed, had we not been  
Self-author of our mischiefs, and brought in,  
All the destructive plagues that wait upon  
A commonweal rent by dissension.  
A state before indifferently good,  
Turned shambles, an Acheld●●● of blood.  
And slaughtered corpse; 'tis t●ue, before w''ve many  
Religion's with us, now we scarce have any.  
And what must be deplored with gushing tears,  
Weak hopes of better, but of worse strong fears.  
Yet now (with Pyrrhus) we have conquered all,  
Let's bury strife in a just funeral.  
As Christians ought, know the best and of blows  
Is clemency, and to forgive our foes.  
Such moderation Cajus C●●sar made  
More loved and famed then his victorius blade.  
That conquered Caesar foes; but mercy takes  
Caesar, and of himself a conqueror makes.  
They're Wolves and Bea●●●, who on dead ●●lies pray,  
The lion scorns a prostrate foe to s●●y.  
Is't not God's chiefest attribute to show  
Much mercy to transgressors? such who know  
To pardon injuries resemble God,  
Who more delights in favours then the Rod.  
And in the midst of's fury does a●●wage, 
Habac. 3.   
With clemency the 〈…〉.  
So when his doom strikes our first parents dead, 
Gen. 3.   
The woman's seed shall 〈…〉 serpent's head.  
And when the world is swallowed up in waves,  
Just Noah and his Family God ●alves,  
To be a future Nursery of men,  
And to make populous the world again.  
Shall sins against ourselves be thought almost,  
As great as sins against the Holy Ghost,  
Ne'er to be pardoned? shall our children rue,  
And children's children (what they never knew)  
Their grandsire's errors? If't eironeous be,  
To serve, t'obey, to fight for Majesty.  
Dare we presume we have a deity,  
In us to cast on faults infinity▪  
Are we not mortal men? and shall we bear  
Immortal enmities? Will we not fear,  
Like retributions at God's hands? Can we  
For sins against that supreme Majesty. 
Psal.   
Done by us vermin, who to God compared  
Are nothing, hope by th' same God to be heard,  
When we forgiveness ask for Talents ought,  
Ourselves forgiving not a petty fault? 
Matth. 18.   
Will nothing satisfy? but deaths, but bands,  
But sequestrations of men's goods and lands, 
The army's remonstrance concerning the impeachment, and suspending of the eleven Members.   
Will we not fear? will we not stand in awe,  
Of the like recompense? or Talions Law?  
How did we handle Strafford? how grave Laud?  
We made a rod for them; now the same rod,  
Scourges ourselves, as our own soldiers plead,  
They trace our steps, who first this dance dar'st lead.  
How do the Angels smile to see poor Ants,  
More wise than the world's chief inhabitants;  
They toil, they labour, gather here and there,  
To hoard up grain against the following year:  
When they are sure by winter's frosts and reins,  
To be besieged, therefore take all this pains,  
To fortify their hold; but man that knows,  
Not whether in the Sabbath, of the snows  
Of winter, 
Matth. 24.  he shall take his flight; (both times,  
Unfit to travel into distant climes)  
Provides not for his journey, scarce demands,  
What come goes currant in remoter Lands.  
Sound faith, firm hope love, hospitality,  
Patience in trouble, meekness, piety.  
These when our soul does the frail body leave,  
Shall in eternal mansions it receive.  
And when we all by th' Angels summoned must  
Be reunited to our wonted dust,  
And Christ appear in his majestic state  
Of glory, in the vale of Josaphat;  
Myriads of Angels waiting on their prince,  
(All of the judge's verdict in suspense.)  
These shall conduct you up to Christ's right hand,  
Where without dread securely you shall stand,  
And see the Book of Consciences laid open,  
And all our actions done under the Cope  
Of heaven made known, then hear the Judges votes,  
Remunerating sheep, condemning goats.  
Ingrateful wretches why have you misused,  
Those treasures I have given you, why abused?  
Your stewardship, not knowing, or not caring,  
How I to thousand others have been sparing,  
To you most bountiful? your labours blessed,  
Your sheep, your oxen, and your stock● increased;  
Your ears of corn yielding a hundreth fold,  
Your Ships returned loaded with spice and gold.  
And why all this? that your superfluous store,  
Should find out, pity, and relieve the poor.  
Amongst the needy distribute your pelf,  
Whom I esteemed my Brethren: more, myself.  
But your boards furnished with choice Kates and Wines,  
Distressed Lazarus at your threshold pines.  
You strut in silks and purple, Lazarus begs  
Your crumbs to satisfy his hunger, rags▪  
To clothe his nakedness, bind up his wounds,  
But finds more merciful than you, your Hounds.  
You cruel men, what pleasure did you take?  
When you could several goals and Prisons ma●●;  
To torture poor offenders; as if God,  
Had not for you as well a scourging rod,  
As them: did ever your superfluous sto●e,  
Comfort a prisoner, or relieve the poor?  
How many starved in prisons thither sent,  
Even for no crimes, at your commandment?  
And being petitioned for poor men in clogs,  
You cried out, let 'em famish, hang 'em dogs.  
Thus you your Christian brethren did abuse,  
As if or they, or rather you were Jews;  
Put in authority, you so did bear,  
With cruelty your state, as if you were,  
Not as are other men, but Wolves or Fiends,  
Still sacking blood for private spleens, eand ends.  
Deaf to laments of others, with false lies,  
Detractions, slanders, fears, and jealousies,  
Cozoning the world; making the multitude,  
Your instruments in shedding guiltless blood.  
So at the priest's command, the rabble cried  
When I was judged, Let him be crucified.  
When helped you widows, and the fatherless?  
When gave you lodging to the harbourless?  
Wretches pack hence to ●ubtenanean vaults,  
Prepared for the Devils and their faults.  
This sentence given; with flashes, and with thunder.  
The yawning earth shall forthwith rive asunder,  
And swallowing in her jaws, convey to Hell  
The damned, who there eternally shall yell.  
And wail in flames their most accursed state,  
With Devils whom they here did imitate.  
Christ gently turning towards the elect his face,  
Speaks mildly, but with a majestic grace.  
You blessed of my Father, come, partake  
That kingdom, and those joys which for your sake.  
When the foundation of the world was laid,  
By God predestinated were and made;  
For when my members begged from door to door,  
You gently did support them with your store:  
When hungry, fed 'em, thirsty, gave 'em drink,  
Nor were you frighted with the loath●ome stink  
Of cutthroat goals, but when they lay in gives  
Your supreme charity, preserved their lives;  
When they were sick you ministered unto 'em,  
When they were wounded, and the Priest not knew 'em,  
Nor Levite, you like the true Samarite,  
Taking compassion from your Horse did light,  
Bound up their wounds, and brought 'em to an inn,  
Which you had made an ample magazine  
Of chirurgery for the sick, and with much pity,  
Erected Hospitals in every City.  
And you who for profession of my word,  
And Church, and faith, dreaded nor fire, nor sword;  
Courageously shedding your noble blood,  
Have swum with Israel through a crimson flood.  
You sowed my gospel's seed the whole world o'er,  
And rained on it your own fructiferous gore,  
To make it grow; 
Acts 5.  and deemed it your chief fame,  
To suffer ignominy for my Name.  
You wept when you went forth to sow this seed, 
Psal. 125.   
But now with joy you shall receive your meed:  
Bringing along with you those souls to Heaven,  
To whom you faith have and salvation given.  
You learned Doctors decked with verdant bays,  
Shall issue forth as the fresh more your rays. 
Dan. ●2.   
You guided others in the way of right,  
And now shall shine as stars th' gloomy night.  
This speech being ended with triumphant cries,  
The judge, th' Angels, the Saints ascend the skies.  
All Roman triumphs were but silly toys,  
Or rather gaudy feastings of schoolboys,  
Compared to this, where Christ the King of Kings,  
With him his captives, yet all conquerors brings,  
Into the eternal city. (All had been,  
Made slaves to death, and Hell, and both by sin;)  
(They were enfranchised by his precious blood,  
On Golgoth shed, from this base servitude.  
And fighting battles of the God of hosts,  
Subdued the world, the flesh, infernal Ghosts.)  
For though the blessed Saints shall always play,  
(Their life being one continued holy-day.)  
Yet shall their first ascent more glorious be,  
And solemnised with more festivity.  
The Hierarchies of Angels will attend,  
And entertain obsequiously their friend,  
And fellow-sharer Man, leading the way,  
And as they mount, sing hymns, and sweetly play.  
What a magnific spectacle shalt be?  
To behold every distinct hierarchy,  
March in array, as if they went to win  
A battle, or some Citadel take in.  
These Squadrons marching: of hiacinthine clouds,  
A stately Chariot made great Jesus shrouds,  
And such his grandeure is, his beauty such,  
Angels of viewing him have ne'er too much.  
For now the glory of his soul, (which he  
Enjoyed even in this veil of misery)  
Reflecting on his comely face a light, 
1 Pet. 1.   
Shall make it then the Sun (at noon) more bright.  
The Angels gone before, the Saints shall follow,  
And Epinician acclamations hollow.  
Apostles, Martyrs, (their fronts crowned with bays,  
Shall blithely chant their grand Commanders praise.  
The patriarchs, Prophets, Doctors, maids conspire,  
With choicest voices to make up the choir.  
Roses at every passage, as they go,  
And Violets on Jesus head they throw:  
As if the welkin now turned April Spring,  
Would pay the latest tribute to its King.  
The airy Regions echo in the cares,  
Of our Musicians, what th' harmonious Spheres  
Sweetly deliver; melody of Lutes,  
Viols, 
The condition of this World after the day of judgement.  Theorbos, Clarions, Triumpets, Flutes.  
This glorious sight so wondrously shall scare,  
The Sun, the moon, and every lesser Star,  
That all the glittering Tapers, which cause day  
And night, amazed perpetually shall stay  
In the same Zenith; no more shoot their beams,  
By winding motions of their Orbed Temes. 
Ap●r. 1●.   
Hoping (although such hopes will be in vain,)  
They shall be●ld the ●elfe same show again.  
FINIS.    

To the truly Noble, and Virtuous Lady, Honoria, marchioness of Winchester.  
In Sermonem Quintum.  
WHy did God labour when he made the Court  
Of Heaven so glorious? wherefore in such sort  
Did he adorn it? wherefore take a mould,  
Better than this terrestrial we behold,  
For the material? furnish it with light,  
Of all the scattered Tapers of the night,  
And that eternal Torch the Sun? let's break  
Into God's Cabinet council, and then speak  
Freely our sense. He meant a house to make,  
For th' Angels and blessed Saints, and for their sake,  
Mansions prepare with all magnificence,  
To please the eye, and pleasure every sense.  
And may we not imagine that God aimed  
At the same end? when with such Art he framed,  
Your beauteous self, proportioned limbs, a face  
Most amiable, and a peculiar grace,  
In all your actions. Did God idly take  
Such pains in the composure? No; he'd make  
A curious Palace for a spirit divine,  
Which seriously should emulate the Nine  
Orders of Angels, and as they do move,  
In the same orb of a seraphic Love.  
A sumptuous Court to entertain a soul,  
That mounting to its Centre, should control,  
Terrene affections: As you firmly stand,  
When Apostatick Scenes through the whole Land,  
Are daily acted; and i'th' gloomy night,  
Of more than D●cian Tempests shine more bright.  
(Though Noah's streams to th' multitude proved graves,  
Yet like his ark, You're raised to Heaven by waves.)  
And we dare say, not idolising You,  
Nor flattering, but with confidence what's true,  
GOD framed your specious Outside, and ordained,  
A fa●●er soul should in't be entertained.  
Which guiding for a while, that ordered Sphere,  
Should afterwards ascendto Heaven, and there,  
Fixed a bright Constellation with your ●ayes,  
Direct our Ladies in their nobler ways.  
I: A: R.