Classic Poem

Great Goddesse to whose throne in Cynthian fires,
This earthlie Alter endlesse fumes exspires,
Therefore, in fumes of sighes and fires of griefe,
To fearefull chances thou sendst bold reliefe,
Happie, thrise happie, Type, and nurse of death,
Who breathlesse, feeds on nothing but our breath,
In whom must vertue and her issue live,
Or dye for ever; now let humor give
Seas to mine eyes, that I may quicklie weepe
The shipwracke of the world: or let soft sleepe
(Binding my sences) lose my working soule,
That in her highest pitch, she may controule
The court of skill, compact of misterie,
Wanting but franchisement and memorie
To reach all secrets: then in blissfull trance,
Raise her (deare Night) to that perseverance,
That in my torture, she all earths may sing,
And force to tremble in her trumpeting
Heavens christall temples: in her powrs implant
Skill of my griefs, and she can nothing want.
Then like fierce bolts, well rammd with heate and cold
In Joves Artillerie; my words unfold,
To breake the labyrinth of everie eare,
And make ech frighted soule come forth and heare,
Let them breake harts, as well as yeelding ayre,
That all mens bosoms (pierst with no affaires,
But gaine of riches) may be lanced wide,
And with the threates of vertue terrified.
Sorrowes deare soveraigne, and the queene of rest,
That when unlightsome, vast, and indigest
The formelesse matter of this world did lye,
Fildst every place with thy Divinitie,
Why did thy absolute and endlesse sway,
Licence heavens torch, the scepter of the Day,
Distinguisht intercession to thy throne,
That long before, all matchlesse rulde alone?
Why letst thou order, orderlesse disperse,
The fighting parents of this universe?
When earth, the ayre, and sea, in fire remaind,
When fire, the sea, and earth, the ayre containd,
When ayre, the earth, and fire, the sea enclosde
When sea, fire, ayre, in earth were indisposde,
Nothing, as now, remainde so out of kinde,
All things in grosse, were finer than refinde,
Substance was sound within, and had no being,
Nor forme gives being; all our essence seeming,
Chaos had soule without a bodie then,
Now bodies live without the soules of men,
Lumps being digested; monsters, in our pride.
And as a wealthie fount, that hils did hide,
Let forth by labor of industrious hands,
Powres out her treasure through the fruitefull strands,
Seemely divided to a hundred streames,
Whose bewties shed such profitable beames,
And make such Orphean Musicke in their courses,
That Citties follow their enchanting forces,
Who running farre, at length ech powres her hart
Into the bosome of the gulfie desart,
As much confounded there, and indigest,
As in the chaos of the hills comprest:
So all things now (extract out of the prime)
Are turned to chaos, and confound the time.
A stepdame Night of minde about us clings,
Who broodes beneath her hell obscuring wings,
Worlds of confusion, where the soule defamde,
The bodie had bene better never framde,
Beneath thy soft, and peace-full covert then,
(Most sacred mother both of Gods and men)
Treasures unknowne, and more unprisde did dwell;
But in the blind borne shadow of this hell,
This horrid stepdame, blindnesse of the minde,
Nought worth the sight, no sight, but worse then blind,
A Gorgon that with brasse, and snakie brows,
(Most harlot-like) her naked secrets shows:
For in th' expansure, and distinct attire,
Of light, and darcknesse, of the sea, and fire,
Of ayre, and earth, and all, all these create,
First set and rulde, in most harmonious state,
Disjunction showes, in all things now amisse,
By that first order, what confusion is:
Religious curb, that manadgd men in bounds,
Of publique wellfare; lothing private grounds,
(Now cast away, by selfe-lov's paramores)
All are transformd to Calydonian bores,
That kill our bleeding vines, displow our fields,
Rend groves in peeces; all things nature yeelds
Supplanting: tumbling up in hills of dearth,
The fruitefull disposition of the earth,
Ruine creates men: all to slaughter bent,
Like envie, fed with others famishment.
And what makes men without the parts of men,
Or in their manhoods, lesse then childeren,
But manlesse natures? all this world was namde
A world of him, for whom it first was framde,
(Who (like a tender Chevrill,) shruncke with fire
Of base ambition, and of selfe-desire,
His armes into his shoulders crept for feare
Bountie should use them; and fierce rape forbeare,
His legges into his greedie belly runne,
The charge of hospitalitie to shunne)
In him the world is to a lump reverst,
That shruncke from forme, that was by forme disperst,
And in nought more then thanklesse avarice,
Not rendring vertue her deserved price.
Kinde Amalthaea was trasferd by Jove,
Into his sparckling pavement, for her love,
Though but a Goate, and giving him her milke,
Basenesse is flintie; gentrie softe as silke,
In heavens she lives, and rules a living signe
In humane bodies: yet not so divine,
That she can worke her kindnesse in our harts.
The sencelesse Argive ship, for her deserts,
Bearing to Colchos, and for bringing backe,
The hardie Argonauts, secure of wracke,
The fautor and the God of gratitude,
Would not from number of the starres exclude.
A thousand such examples could I cite,
To damne stone-pesants, that like Typhons fight
Against their Maker, and contend to be
Of kings, the abject slaves of drudgerie:
Proud of that thraldome: love the kindest lest,
And hate, not to be hated of the best.
If then we frame mans figure by his mind,
And that at first, his fashion was assignd,
Erection in such God-like excellence
For his soules sake, and her intelligence:
She so degenerate, and growne deprest,
Content to share affections with a beast,
The shape wherewith he should be now indude,
Must beare no signe of mans similitude.
Therefore Promethean Poets with the coles
Of their most geniale, more-then-humane soules
In living verse, created men like these,
With shapes of Centaurs, Harpies, Lapithes,
That they in prime of erudition,
When almost savage vulgar men were growne,
Seeing them selves in those Pierean founts,
Might mend their mindes, ashm'd of such accounts.
So when ye heare, the sweetest Muses sonne,
With heavenly rapture of his Musicke, wonne
Rockes, forrests, floods, and winds to leave their course
In his attendance: it bewrayes the force
His wisedome had, to draw men growne so rude
To civill love of Art, and Fortitude.
And not for teaching others insolence,
Had he his date-exceeding excellence
With soveraigne Poets, but for use applyed,
And in his proper actes exemplified;
And that in calming the infernall kinde,
To wit, the perturbations of his minde,
And bringing his Eurydice from hell,
(Which Justice signifies) is proved well.
But if in rights observance any man
Looke backe, with boldnesse lesse then Orphean,
Soone falls he to the hell from whence he rose:
The fiction then would temprature dispose,
In all the tender motives of the minde,
To make man worthie his hel-danting kinde.
The golden chaine of Homers high device
Ambition is, or cursed avarice,
Which all Gods haling being tyed to Jove,
Him from his setled height could never move:
Intending this, that though that powrefull chaine
Of most Herculean vigor to constraine
Men from true vertue, or their pristine states
Attempt a man that manlesse changes hates,
And is enobled with a deathlesse love
Of things eternall, dignified above:
Nothing shall stirre him from adorning still
This shape with vertue, and his powre with will.
But as rude painters that contend to show
Beasts, foules or fish, all artlesse to bestow
On every side his native counterfet,
Above his head, his name had neede to set:
So men that will be men, in more then face,
(As in their foreheads) should in actions place
More perfect characters, to prove they be
No mockers of their first nobilitie:
Else may they easly passe for beasts for foules:
Soules praise our shapes, and not our shapes our soules.
And as when Chloris paints th'ennamild meads,
A flocke of shepherds to the bagpipe treads
Rude rurall dances with their countrey loves:
Some a farre off observing their removes,
Turnes, and returnes, quicke footing, sodaine stands,
Reelings aside, od actions with their hands;
Now backe, now forwards, now lockt arme in arme,
Noe hearing musicke, thinke it is a charme,
That like loose froes at Bacchanalean feasts,
Makes them seeme franticke in their barraine jestes;
And being clustered in a shapelesse croude,
With much lesse admiration are allowd.
So our first excellence, so much abusd,
And we (without the harmonie was usd,
When Saturnes golden scepter stoke the strings
Of Civill governement) make all our doings
Savour of rudenesse, and obscuritie,
And in our formes shew more deformitie,
Then if we still were wrapt, and smoothered
In that confusion, out of which we fled.
And as when hosts of starres attend thy flight,
(Day of deepe students, most contentfull night)
The morning (mounted on the Muses stead)
Ushers the sonne from Vulcans golden bed,
And then from forth their sundrie roofes of rest,
All sorts of men, to sorted taskes addrest,
Spreade this inferiour element: and yeeld
Labour his due: the souldier to the field,
States-men to counsell, Judges to their pleas,
Merchants to commerce, mariners to seas:
All beasts, and birds, the groves and forrests range,
To fill all corners of this round Exchange,
Till thou (deare Night, ô goddesse of most worth)
Letst thy sweet seas of golden humor forth
And Eagle-like dost with thy starrie wings,
Beate in the foules, and beasts to Somnus lodgings,
And haughtie Day to the infernall deepe,
Proclaiming scilence, studie, ease, and sleepe.
All things before thy forces put in rout,
Retiring where the morning fir'd them out.
So to the chaos of our first descent,
(All dayes of honor, and of vertue spent)
We basely make retrait, and are no lesse
Then huge impolisht heapes of filthinesse.
Mens faces glitter, and their hearts are blacke,
But thou (great Mistresse of heavens gloomie racke)
Art blacke in face, and glitterst in thy heart.
There is thy glorie, riches, force, and Art;
Opposed earth, beates blacke and blewe thy face,
And often doth thy heart it selfe deface,
For spite that to thy vertue-famed traine,
All the choise worthies that did ever raigne
In eldest age, were still preferd by Jove,
Esteeming that due honor to his love.
There shine they: not to sea-men guides alone,
But sacred presidents to everie one.
There fixt for ever, where the Day is driven,
Almost foure hundred times a yeare from heaven.
In hell then let her sit, and never rise,
Till Morns leave blushing at her cruelties.
Meane while, accept, as followers of thy traine,
(Our better parts aspiring to thy raigne)
Vertues obscur'd, and banished the day,
With all the glories of this spongie sway,
Prisond in flesh, and that poore flesh in bands
Of stone, and steele, chiefe flowrs of vertues Garlands.
O then most tender fortresse of our woes,
That bleeding lye in vertues overthroes,
Hating the whoredome of this painted light:
Raise thy chast daughters, ministers of right,
The dreadfull and the just Eumenides,
And let them wreake the wrongs of our disease,
Drowning the world in bloud, and staine the skies
With their split soules, made drunke with tyrannies.
Fall Hercules from heaven in tempestes hurld,
And cleanse this beastly stable of the world:
Or bend thy brasen bow against the Sunne,
As in Tartessus, when thou hadst begunne
Thy taske of oxen: heat in more extreames
Then thou wouldst suffer, with his envious beames:
Now make him leave the world to Night and dreames.
Never were vertues labours so envy'd
As in this light: shoote, shoote, and stoope his pride:
Suffer no more his lustfull rayes to get
The Earth with issue: let him still be set
In Somnus thickets: bound about the browes
With pitchie vapours, and with Ebone bowes.
Rich-tapird sanctuarie of the blest,
Pallace of Ruth, made all of teares, and rest,
To thy blacke shades and desolation,
I consecrate my life; and living mone,
Where furies shall for ever fighting be,
And adders hisse the world for hating me,
Foxes shall barke, and Night-ravens belch in grones,
And owles shall hollow my confusions:
There will I furnish up my funerall bed,
Strewd with the bones and relickes of the dead.
Atlas shall let th'Olimpick burthen fall,
To cover my untombed face withall.
And when as well, the matter of our kind,
As the materiall substance of the mind,
Shall cease their revolutions, in abode,
Of such impure and ugly period,
As the old essence, and insensive prime:
Then shall the ruines of the fourefold time,
Turnd to the lumpe (as rapting Torrents rise)
For ever murmure forth my miseries.
Ye living spirits then, if any live,
Whom like extreames, do like affections give,
Shun, shun this cruell light, and end your thrall,
In these soft shades of sable funerall:
From whence with ghosts, whom vengeance holds from rest,
Dog-fiends and monsters hanting the distrest,
As men whose parents tyrannie hath slaine,
Whose sisters rape, and bondage do sustaine.
But you that ne'er had birth, nor ever prov'd,
How deare a blessing tis to be belov'd,
Whose friends idolatrous desire of gold,
To scorne, and ruine have your freedome sold:
Whose vertues feele all this, and shew your eyes,
Men made of Tartar, and of villanies:
Aspire th'extraction, and the quintessence
Of all the joyes in earths circumference:
With ghosts, fiends, monsters: as men robd and rackt,
Murtherd in life: from shades with shadowes blackt:
Thunder your wrongs, your miseries and hells,
And with the dismall accents of your knells,
Revive the dead, and make the living dye
In ruth, and terror of your torturie:
Still all the powre of Art into your grones,
Scorning your triviall and remissive mones,
Compact of fiction, and hyperboles,
(Like wanton mourners, cloyd with too much ease)
Should leave the glasses of the hearers eyes
Unbroken, counting all but vanities.
But paint, or else create in serious truth,
A bodie figur'd to your vertues ruth,
That to the sence may shew what damned sinne,
For your extreames this Chaos tumbles in.
But wo is wretched me, without a name:
Vertue feeds scorne, and noblest honor, shame:
Pride bathes in teares of poore submission,
And makes his soule, the purple he puts on.
Kneele then with me, fall worm-like on the ground,
And from th'infectious dunghill of this Round,
From mens brasse wits, and golden foolerie,
Weepe, weepe your soules, into felicitie:
Come to this house of mourning, serve the night,
To whom pale day (with whoredome soked quite)
Is but a drudge, selling her beauties use
To rapes, adultries, and to all abuse.
Her labors feast imperiall Night with sports,
Where Loves are Christmast, with all pleasures sorts:
And whom her fugitive, and far-shot rayes
Disjoyne, and drive into ten thousand wayes,
Nights glorious mantle wraps in safe abodes,
And frees their neckes from servile labors lodes:
Her trustic shadowes, succour men dismayd,
Whom Dayes deceiptfull malice hath betrayd:
From the silke vapors of her Iveryport,
Sweet Protean dreames she sends of every sort:
Some taking formes of Princes, to perswade
Of men deject, we are their equals made,
Some clad in habit of deceased friends,
For whom we mournd, and now have wisht amends,
And some (deare favour) Lady-like attyrd,
With pride of Beauties full Meridian fir'd:
Who pitie our contempts, revive our harts:
For wisest Ladies love the inward parts.
If these be dreames, even so are all things else,
That walke this round by heavenly sentinels:
But from Nights port of horne she greets our eyes
With graver dreames inspir'd with prophesies,
Which oft presage to us succeeding chances,
We prooving that awake, they shew in trances.
If these seeme likewise vaine, or nothing are
Vaine things, or nothing come to vertues share:
For nothing more then dreames, with us shee findes:
Then since all pleasures vanish like the windes,
And that most serious actions not respecting
The second light, are worth but the neglecting,
Since day, or light, in anie qualitie,
For earthly uses do but serve the eye.
And since