Classic Poem

M ADAM ,
With so much wonder we are struck
When we begin to read your matchless book,
A while your own excess of merit stays
Our forward pens, and does suspend your praise
Till time our minds does gently recompose,
Allays this wonder, and our duty shows;
Instructs us how your virtues to proclaim
And what we ought to pay to your great fame—
Your fame which in your country has no bounds,
But wheresoever learning's known it sounds.
Those graces nature did till now divide
(Your sex's glory, and our sex's pride)
Are joined in you, and all to you submit,
The brightest beauty and the sharpest wit.
No faction here or fiercer envy sways,
They give you myrtle, while we offer bays.
What mortal dares dispute those wreaths with you,
Armed thus with lightning and with thunder too.
This made the great Newcastle's heart your prize;
Your charming soul and your victorious eyes
Had only power his martial mind to tame,
And raise in his heroic breast a flame:
A flame which with his courage still aspires,
As if immortal fuel fed those fires.
This mighty chief and your great self made one,
Together the same race of glory run;
Together on the wings of fame you move,
Like yours his virtue, and like his your love.
While we, your praise endeavoring to rehearse.
Pay that great duty in our humble verse,
Such as may justly move your anger; you
Like heaven forgive them, and accept them too.
But what we cannot your brave Hero pays,
He builds those monuments we strive to raise;
Such as to after-ages shall make known,
While he records your deathless fame, his own;
So when an artist some rare beauty draws,
Both in our wonder share and our applause;
His skill, from time, secures the glorious dame,
And makes himself immortal in her fame.