The Spanish Descent
Long had this nation been amused in vain
With posts from Portugal, and news from Spain,
With Ormond's conquests, and the fleet's success,
And favors from the Moors at Maccaness.
The learned mob bought compasses and scales,
And every barber knew the Bay of Cales,
Showed us the army here, and there the fleet,
Here the troops land, and there the foes retreat,
There at St. Maries how the Spaniard runs,
And listen close as if they heard the guns,
And some pretend they see them swive the nuns.
Others describe the Castle and Puntalls,
And tell how easy 'tis to conquer Cales;
Wisely propose to let the silver come,
And help to pay the nation's debts at home.
But still they count the spoils without the cost,
And still the news comes faster than the post.
The graver heads, like mountebanks of state,
Of abdication and revolts debate,
Except a revolution should appear
As cheap and easy as it had done here;
Bring the revolting grandees to the coast,
And give the duke de Anjou up for lost;
Doom him to France to seek relief in vain,
And send the duke of Austria to Spain; —
Canvas the council at Madrid, and find
How all the Spanish courtiers stand inclined;
Describe the strange convulsions of the state,
And old Carreroe sacrificed to Fate.
Then all the stage of action they survey,
And wish our generals knew as much as they.
Some have their fancies so exceeding bold,
They saw the queens fall out, and heard 'em scold:
Nor is the thing so strange, for if they did,
It was but from Toledo to Madrid.
And now the farce is acting o'er again,
The meaning of our mischiefs to explain.
The learned mob o'er-read in arms and law,
The cause of their miscarriages foresaw;
Tell us the loitering minutes were misspent,
Too long a going, and too few that went;
Exalt the Catalonian garrison,
The new-made works, the platform, and the town;
Tell us it was impossible to land,
And all their batteries sunk into the sand.
Some are all banter, and the voyage despise —
For fruitless actions seldom pass for wise —
Tell us 'twas our English politics,
To think to wheedle Spain with heretics.
The disproportioned force they banter too;
The ships too many, and the men too few.
Then they find fault with conduct, and condemn
Sometimes the officers, sometimes the men:
Nor scapes his grace the satire of the town;
Whoever fails success, shall fail renown.
Sir George comes in among the indiscreet;
Sometimes the army's censured, then the fleet;
How the abandoned country they destroyed,
And made their early declarations void;
Too hasty proofs of their protection gave,
Plundering the people they came there to save;
As if the Spaniards were so plagued with France,
To fly to thieves for their deliverance.
But amongst all the wisdom of the town,
The vast designs of Fate remain unknown,
Unguessed at, unexpected, hid from thoughts,
For no man looked for blessings in our faults.
Mischances sometimes are a nation's good,
Rightly improved, and nicely understood.
Ten years we felt the dying pangs of war,
And fetched our grief and miseries from far.
Our English millions foreign war maintains,
And English blood has drenched the neighboring plains.
Nor shall we blush to boast what all men own,
Uncommon English valor has been shown;
The forward courage of our ill-paid men
Deserves more praise than nature spares my pen.
What could they not perform, or what endure,
Witness the mighty bastions of Namur!
We fasted much, and we attempted more,
But ne'er could come to giving thanks before,
Unless 'twas when the fatal strife was o'er.
Some secret Achan cursed our enterprise,
And Israel fled before her enemies.
Whether the poisonous particles were hid
In us that followed, or in them that led:
What fatal charm benumbed the nation's sense,
To struggle with Eternal Providence:
Whether some curse, or else some perjured vow,
Or some strange guilt that's expiated now:
Was it the pilots who ill steered the state:
Or was it the decisive will of Fate;
'Tis hard to tell; but this too well we know,
All things went backward, or went on too slow;
Small was the glory of our high success,
A tedious war, and an imperfect peace;
Peace dearly purchased, and which cost us more
Great kingdoms than we conquered downs before.
Actions may miss of their deserved applause,
When Heaven approves the men, and not the cause;
And well-contrived designs miscarry when
Heaven may approve the cause, but not the men;
Here then's the ground of our expense of blood,
The sword of Gideon's, not the sword of God.
The mighty and the wise are laid aside,
And victory the sex has dignified;
We have been used to female conquests here,
And queens have been the glory of the war,
The scene revives with smiles of Providence,
All things declined before, and prosper since;
And as if ill success had been entailed,
The posthume projects are the last that failed;
As Heaven, whose works are hid from human view,
Would blast our old designs, and bless our new.
And now the baffled enterprise grows stale,
Their hopes decrease, and juster doubts prevail:
The unattempted town sings victory,
And scared with walls, and not with men, we fly;
Great conduct in our safe retreat we show,
And bravely re-embark when none pursue;
The guns, the ammunition, put on board,
And what we could not plunder, we restored.
And thus we quit the Andalusian shores,
Drenched with the Spanish wine, and Spanish whores.
With songs of scorn the Arragonians sing,
And loud Te Deums make the valleys ring.
Uncommon joys now raise the hopes of Spain,
And Vigo does their Plate fleet entertain;
The vast galleons deep ballasted with ore,
Safely reach home to the Galitian shore.
The double joy spreads from Madrid to Rome,
The English fled, the Silver Fleet come home:
From thence it reaches to the banks of Po,
And the loud cannons let the Germans know.
The rattling volleys tell their short-lived joys,
And roar Te Deum out in smoke and noise.
To Milan next it flies on wings of fame,
There the young monarch and his heroes came,
From sad Luzara, and the Mantuan walls,
To seek new dangers, and to rescue Cales.
His joy for welcome treasure he expressed,
But grieves at his good fortune in the rest:
The flying English he had wished to stay,
To crown with conquest one victorious day.
The priests, in high procession, show their joy,
And all the arts of eloquence employ,
To feed his pride of fancied victories,
And raise his untried valor to the skies.
The flattering courtiers his vain mind possess
With airy hopes of conquest and success,
Prompt his young thoughts to run on new extremes,
And sycophantic pride his heart inflames.
His native crime springs up, his pulse beats high,
With thoughts of universal monarchy;
Fancies his foreign enemies suppressed,
And boasts too soon how he'll subdue the rest.
Princes, like other men, are blind to fate;
He only sees the event who does the cause create.
From hence through France the welcome tidings fly,
To mock his ancient sire with mushroom joy.
Raptures possess the ambitious heads of France,
And golden hopes their new designs advance.
Now they consult to crush the world again,
And talk of rifling Christendom for men.
New fleets, new armies, and new leagues contrive,
And swallow men and nations up alive;
Prescribe no bounds to their ambitious pride,
But first the wealth, and then the world, divide.
Excess of pride to airy madness grows,
And makes men strange romantic things propose:
The head turns round, and all the fancy's vain,
And makes the world as giddy as the brain.
Men that consult such weighty things as those
All possible disasters should suppose:
In vain great princes mighty things invent,
While Heaven retains the power to prevent:
He that to general mischief makes pretense
Should first know how to conquer Providence.
Such strive in vain, and only show mankind,
How tyrants clothed with power are all inclined.
Meanwhile our melancholy fleet steers home,
Some grieved for past, for future mischiefs some:
Disaster swells the blood, and spleen the face,
And ripens them for glorious things apace.
With deep regret they turn their eyes to Spain,
And wish they once might visit her again.
Little they dreamed that good which Heaven prepared;
No merit from below, no signs from Heaven appeared;
No hints, unless from their high-ripened spleen,
And strange ungrounded sympathy within.
The silent duke, from all misconduct free,
Alone enjoys the calm of honesty:
Fears not his journal should be fairly shown,
And sighs for England's errors, not his own.
His constant temper's all serene and clear;
First free from guilt, and therefore free from fear.
Not so the rest, for conscious thoughts become
More restless now the nearer they come home.
The party-making feuds on board begin:
For people always quarrel when they sin.
Reflect with shame upon the things misdone,
And shift their faults about from one to one,
Prepare excuses, and compute their friends,
And dread the fate which their desert attends.
Some wish for storms, and curse the wind and sails,
And dream, no doubt, of gibbets, and of jails;
Imaginary punishments appear,
And suited to their secret guilts, their fear,
Their hast'ning fate in their own fancies read,
And few, 'tis feared, their innocence can plead.
Then their sweet spoils to trusty hands convey,
And throw the rifled gods of Spain away;
Disgorge that wealth they dare not entertain,
And wish the nuns their maidenheads again;
Dismiss their wealth for fear of witnesses,
And purge their coffers and their consciences,
Cursing their ill-got trifles, but in vain,
For still the guilt, and still the fears, remain.
Tell us, ye rabbis of abstruser sense,
Who jumble fate and fools with Providence;
Is this the chosen army, this the fleet,
For which Heaven's praises sound in every street?
Could Heaven provide them one occasion more,
Who had so ill discharged themselves before?
That fleet so many former millions lost,
So little had performed, so much had cost:
That fleet, so often manned with knaves before,
That served us all the war to make us poor;
That twice had made their fruitless voyage to Spain,
And saw the straits, and so came home again:
Our wooden walls that should defend our trade,
And many a witless wooden voyage have made;
How oft have they been fitted out in vain,
Wasted our money, and destroyed our men,
Betrayed our merchants, and exposed their fleets,
And caused eternal murmurs in our streets?
The nation's Genius sure prevails above,
And Heaven conceals his anger, shows his love:
The nation's guardian angel has prevailed,
And on her guardian queen new favors has entailed.
Now let glad Europe in her turn rejoice,
And sing new triumphs with exalted voice.
See the glad post of tidings winged with news,
With suited speed the wond'ring fleet pursues:
His haste discerned, increases their surprise,
The more they wonder, and the more he flies.
Nor wind, nor seas, proportioned speed can bear;
For Joy and Hope have swifter wings than Fear.
With what surprise of joy they meet the news!
Joys, that to every vein new spirits infuse.
The wild excess in shouts and cries appear;
For joys and griefs are all irregular.
Councils of war for sake of forms they call,
But shame admits of no disputes at all:
How should they differ where no doubt can be
But if they should accept of victory?
Whether they should the great occasion take,
Or baffle Heaven, and double their mistake?
Whether the naked and defenseless prize
They should accept, or Heaven and that despise?
Whether they should revive their reputation,
Or sink it twice, and twice betray the nation?
Who dare the horrid negative design?
Who dare the last suggest, the first decline?
Envy herself; for Satan's always there,
And keeps his councils with the god of war.
Though with her swelling spleen she seemed to burst,
Willed the design while the event she cursed.
The word's gone out, and now they spread the main
With swelling sails, and swelling hopes, for Spain:
To double vengeance pressed where'er they come,
Resolved to pay the haughty Spaniard home:
Resolved by future conduct to atone
For all our past mistakes, and all their own.
New life springs up in every English face,
And fits them all for glorious things apace:
The booty some excites, and some the cause;
But more the hope to gain their lost applause.
Eager their sullied honor to restore,
Some anger whets, some pride and vengeance more.
The lazy minutes now pass on too slow,
Fancy flies faster than the winds can blow:
Impatient wishes lengthen out the day;
They chide the loitering winds for their delay.
But time is nature's faithful messenger,
And brings up all we wish, as well as all we fear.
The mists clear up, and now the scout decries
The subject of their hopes and victories:
The wished for fleets embayed, in harbor lie,
Unfit to fight, and more unfit to fly.
Triumphant joy throughout the navy flies,
Echoed from shore with terror and surprise.
Strange power of noise! which at one simple sound
At once shall some encourage, some confound.
In vain the lion tangled in the snare
With anguish roars, and rends the trembling air:
'Tis vain to struggle with Almighty Fate;
Vain and impossible the weak debate.
The mighty boom, the forts, resist in vain,
The guns with fruitless force in noise complain.
See how the troops intrepidly fall on!
Wish for more foes, and think they fly too soon.
With eager fury to their forts pursue,
And think the odds of four to one too few.
The land's first conquered, and the prize attends;
Fate beckons in the fleet to back their friends:
Despair succeeds, they struggle now too late,
And soon submit to their prevailing fate:
Courage is madness when occasion's past,
Death's the securest refuge, and the last.
And now the rolling flames come threat'ning on,
And mighty streams of melted gold run down.
The flaming ore down to its center makes,
To form new mines beneath the oozy lakes.
Here a galleon with spicy drugs inflamed,
In odoriferous folds of sulphur streamed.
The gods of old no such oblations knew,
Their spices weak, and their perfumes but few.
The frighted Spaniards from their treasure fly,
Loath to forsake their wealth, but loath to die.
Here a vast carrack flies while none pursue,
Bulged on the shore by her distracted crew:
There like a mighty mountain she appears,
And groans beneath the golden weight she bears.
Conquest perverts the property of friend,
And makes men ruin what they can't defend:
Some blow their treasure up into the air
With all the wild excesses of despair.
Strange fate! that war such odd events should have;
Friends would destroy, and enemies would save:
Others their safety to their wealth prefer,
And mix some small discretion with their fear.
Life's the best gift that nature can bestow;
The first that we receive, the last which we forego:
And he that's vainly prodigal of blood,
Forfeits his sense to do his cause no good.
All desperation's the effect of fear;
Courage is temper, valor can't despair.
And now the victory's completely gained;
No ships to conquer now, no foes remained.
The mighty spoils exceed whate'er was known
That vanquished ever lost, or victor won:
So great, if Fame shall future times remind,
They'll think she lies, and libels all mankind.
Well may the pious queen new anthems raise,
Sing her own fortunes, and her maker's praise;
Invite the nation willing thanks to pay;
And well may all the mighty ones obey.
So may they sing, be always so preserved,
By grace unwished, and conquest undeserved.
Now let us welcome home the conquering fleet,
And all their well-atoned mistakes forget:
Such high success should all resentments drowned,
Nothing but joy and welcome should be found.
No more their past miscarriages reprove,
But bury all in gratitude and love;
Let their high conduct have a just regard,
And meaner merit meet a kind reward.
But now what fruits of victory remain?
To Heaven what praise? What gratitude to man?
Let France sing praise for shams of victories,
And mock their maker with religious lies:
But England blessed with thankful hearts shall raise,
For mighty conquests, mighty songs of praise.
She needs no false pretenses to deceive:
What all men see, all men must needs believe.
Our joy can hardly run into excess,
The well-known subject all our foes confess:
We can't desire more, they can't pretend to less.
Anne, like her great progenitor, sings praise:
Like her she conquers, and like her she prays;
Like her she graces and protects the throne,
And counts the land's prosperity her own:
Like her, and long like her, be blessed her reign,
Crowned with new conquests, and more fleets from Spain.
See now the royal chariot comes amain,
With all the willing nation in her train,
With humble glory, and with solemn grace,
Queen in her eyes, and Christian in her face.
With her, her represented subjects join;
And when she prays, th' whole nation says " amen. "
With her, in stalls the illustrious nobles sat,
The cherubims and seraphims of state:
Anne like a comet in the center shone,
And they like stars that circumfere the sun.
She great in them, and they as great in her;
Sure Heaven will such illustrious praises hear.
The crowding millions hearty blessings pour:
Saint Paul ne'er saw but one such day before.
With posts from Portugal, and news from Spain,
With Ormond's conquests, and the fleet's success,
And favors from the Moors at Maccaness.
The learned mob bought compasses and scales,
And every barber knew the Bay of Cales,
Showed us the army here, and there the fleet,
Here the troops land, and there the foes retreat,
There at St. Maries how the Spaniard runs,
And listen close as if they heard the guns,
And some pretend they see them swive the nuns.
Others describe the Castle and Puntalls,
And tell how easy 'tis to conquer Cales;
Wisely propose to let the silver come,
And help to pay the nation's debts at home.
But still they count the spoils without the cost,
And still the news comes faster than the post.
The graver heads, like mountebanks of state,
Of abdication and revolts debate,
Except a revolution should appear
As cheap and easy as it had done here;
Bring the revolting grandees to the coast,
And give the duke de Anjou up for lost;
Doom him to France to seek relief in vain,
And send the duke of Austria to Spain; —
Canvas the council at Madrid, and find
How all the Spanish courtiers stand inclined;
Describe the strange convulsions of the state,
And old Carreroe sacrificed to Fate.
Then all the stage of action they survey,
And wish our generals knew as much as they.
Some have their fancies so exceeding bold,
They saw the queens fall out, and heard 'em scold:
Nor is the thing so strange, for if they did,
It was but from Toledo to Madrid.
And now the farce is acting o'er again,
The meaning of our mischiefs to explain.
The learned mob o'er-read in arms and law,
The cause of their miscarriages foresaw;
Tell us the loitering minutes were misspent,
Too long a going, and too few that went;
Exalt the Catalonian garrison,
The new-made works, the platform, and the town;
Tell us it was impossible to land,
And all their batteries sunk into the sand.
Some are all banter, and the voyage despise —
For fruitless actions seldom pass for wise —
Tell us 'twas our English politics,
To think to wheedle Spain with heretics.
The disproportioned force they banter too;
The ships too many, and the men too few.
Then they find fault with conduct, and condemn
Sometimes the officers, sometimes the men:
Nor scapes his grace the satire of the town;
Whoever fails success, shall fail renown.
Sir George comes in among the indiscreet;
Sometimes the army's censured, then the fleet;
How the abandoned country they destroyed,
And made their early declarations void;
Too hasty proofs of their protection gave,
Plundering the people they came there to save;
As if the Spaniards were so plagued with France,
To fly to thieves for their deliverance.
But amongst all the wisdom of the town,
The vast designs of Fate remain unknown,
Unguessed at, unexpected, hid from thoughts,
For no man looked for blessings in our faults.
Mischances sometimes are a nation's good,
Rightly improved, and nicely understood.
Ten years we felt the dying pangs of war,
And fetched our grief and miseries from far.
Our English millions foreign war maintains,
And English blood has drenched the neighboring plains.
Nor shall we blush to boast what all men own,
Uncommon English valor has been shown;
The forward courage of our ill-paid men
Deserves more praise than nature spares my pen.
What could they not perform, or what endure,
Witness the mighty bastions of Namur!
We fasted much, and we attempted more,
But ne'er could come to giving thanks before,
Unless 'twas when the fatal strife was o'er.
Some secret Achan cursed our enterprise,
And Israel fled before her enemies.
Whether the poisonous particles were hid
In us that followed, or in them that led:
What fatal charm benumbed the nation's sense,
To struggle with Eternal Providence:
Whether some curse, or else some perjured vow,
Or some strange guilt that's expiated now:
Was it the pilots who ill steered the state:
Or was it the decisive will of Fate;
'Tis hard to tell; but this too well we know,
All things went backward, or went on too slow;
Small was the glory of our high success,
A tedious war, and an imperfect peace;
Peace dearly purchased, and which cost us more
Great kingdoms than we conquered downs before.
Actions may miss of their deserved applause,
When Heaven approves the men, and not the cause;
And well-contrived designs miscarry when
Heaven may approve the cause, but not the men;
Here then's the ground of our expense of blood,
The sword of Gideon's, not the sword of God.
The mighty and the wise are laid aside,
And victory the sex has dignified;
We have been used to female conquests here,
And queens have been the glory of the war,
The scene revives with smiles of Providence,
All things declined before, and prosper since;
And as if ill success had been entailed,
The posthume projects are the last that failed;
As Heaven, whose works are hid from human view,
Would blast our old designs, and bless our new.
And now the baffled enterprise grows stale,
Their hopes decrease, and juster doubts prevail:
The unattempted town sings victory,
And scared with walls, and not with men, we fly;
Great conduct in our safe retreat we show,
And bravely re-embark when none pursue;
The guns, the ammunition, put on board,
And what we could not plunder, we restored.
And thus we quit the Andalusian shores,
Drenched with the Spanish wine, and Spanish whores.
With songs of scorn the Arragonians sing,
And loud Te Deums make the valleys ring.
Uncommon joys now raise the hopes of Spain,
And Vigo does their Plate fleet entertain;
The vast galleons deep ballasted with ore,
Safely reach home to the Galitian shore.
The double joy spreads from Madrid to Rome,
The English fled, the Silver Fleet come home:
From thence it reaches to the banks of Po,
And the loud cannons let the Germans know.
The rattling volleys tell their short-lived joys,
And roar Te Deum out in smoke and noise.
To Milan next it flies on wings of fame,
There the young monarch and his heroes came,
From sad Luzara, and the Mantuan walls,
To seek new dangers, and to rescue Cales.
His joy for welcome treasure he expressed,
But grieves at his good fortune in the rest:
The flying English he had wished to stay,
To crown with conquest one victorious day.
The priests, in high procession, show their joy,
And all the arts of eloquence employ,
To feed his pride of fancied victories,
And raise his untried valor to the skies.
The flattering courtiers his vain mind possess
With airy hopes of conquest and success,
Prompt his young thoughts to run on new extremes,
And sycophantic pride his heart inflames.
His native crime springs up, his pulse beats high,
With thoughts of universal monarchy;
Fancies his foreign enemies suppressed,
And boasts too soon how he'll subdue the rest.
Princes, like other men, are blind to fate;
He only sees the event who does the cause create.
From hence through France the welcome tidings fly,
To mock his ancient sire with mushroom joy.
Raptures possess the ambitious heads of France,
And golden hopes their new designs advance.
Now they consult to crush the world again,
And talk of rifling Christendom for men.
New fleets, new armies, and new leagues contrive,
And swallow men and nations up alive;
Prescribe no bounds to their ambitious pride,
But first the wealth, and then the world, divide.
Excess of pride to airy madness grows,
And makes men strange romantic things propose:
The head turns round, and all the fancy's vain,
And makes the world as giddy as the brain.
Men that consult such weighty things as those
All possible disasters should suppose:
In vain great princes mighty things invent,
While Heaven retains the power to prevent:
He that to general mischief makes pretense
Should first know how to conquer Providence.
Such strive in vain, and only show mankind,
How tyrants clothed with power are all inclined.
Meanwhile our melancholy fleet steers home,
Some grieved for past, for future mischiefs some:
Disaster swells the blood, and spleen the face,
And ripens them for glorious things apace.
With deep regret they turn their eyes to Spain,
And wish they once might visit her again.
Little they dreamed that good which Heaven prepared;
No merit from below, no signs from Heaven appeared;
No hints, unless from their high-ripened spleen,
And strange ungrounded sympathy within.
The silent duke, from all misconduct free,
Alone enjoys the calm of honesty:
Fears not his journal should be fairly shown,
And sighs for England's errors, not his own.
His constant temper's all serene and clear;
First free from guilt, and therefore free from fear.
Not so the rest, for conscious thoughts become
More restless now the nearer they come home.
The party-making feuds on board begin:
For people always quarrel when they sin.
Reflect with shame upon the things misdone,
And shift their faults about from one to one,
Prepare excuses, and compute their friends,
And dread the fate which their desert attends.
Some wish for storms, and curse the wind and sails,
And dream, no doubt, of gibbets, and of jails;
Imaginary punishments appear,
And suited to their secret guilts, their fear,
Their hast'ning fate in their own fancies read,
And few, 'tis feared, their innocence can plead.
Then their sweet spoils to trusty hands convey,
And throw the rifled gods of Spain away;
Disgorge that wealth they dare not entertain,
And wish the nuns their maidenheads again;
Dismiss their wealth for fear of witnesses,
And purge their coffers and their consciences,
Cursing their ill-got trifles, but in vain,
For still the guilt, and still the fears, remain.
Tell us, ye rabbis of abstruser sense,
Who jumble fate and fools with Providence;
Is this the chosen army, this the fleet,
For which Heaven's praises sound in every street?
Could Heaven provide them one occasion more,
Who had so ill discharged themselves before?
That fleet so many former millions lost,
So little had performed, so much had cost:
That fleet, so often manned with knaves before,
That served us all the war to make us poor;
That twice had made their fruitless voyage to Spain,
And saw the straits, and so came home again:
Our wooden walls that should defend our trade,
And many a witless wooden voyage have made;
How oft have they been fitted out in vain,
Wasted our money, and destroyed our men,
Betrayed our merchants, and exposed their fleets,
And caused eternal murmurs in our streets?
The nation's Genius sure prevails above,
And Heaven conceals his anger, shows his love:
The nation's guardian angel has prevailed,
And on her guardian queen new favors has entailed.
Now let glad Europe in her turn rejoice,
And sing new triumphs with exalted voice.
See the glad post of tidings winged with news,
With suited speed the wond'ring fleet pursues:
His haste discerned, increases their surprise,
The more they wonder, and the more he flies.
Nor wind, nor seas, proportioned speed can bear;
For Joy and Hope have swifter wings than Fear.
With what surprise of joy they meet the news!
Joys, that to every vein new spirits infuse.
The wild excess in shouts and cries appear;
For joys and griefs are all irregular.
Councils of war for sake of forms they call,
But shame admits of no disputes at all:
How should they differ where no doubt can be
But if they should accept of victory?
Whether they should the great occasion take,
Or baffle Heaven, and double their mistake?
Whether the naked and defenseless prize
They should accept, or Heaven and that despise?
Whether they should revive their reputation,
Or sink it twice, and twice betray the nation?
Who dare the horrid negative design?
Who dare the last suggest, the first decline?
Envy herself; for Satan's always there,
And keeps his councils with the god of war.
Though with her swelling spleen she seemed to burst,
Willed the design while the event she cursed.
The word's gone out, and now they spread the main
With swelling sails, and swelling hopes, for Spain:
To double vengeance pressed where'er they come,
Resolved to pay the haughty Spaniard home:
Resolved by future conduct to atone
For all our past mistakes, and all their own.
New life springs up in every English face,
And fits them all for glorious things apace:
The booty some excites, and some the cause;
But more the hope to gain their lost applause.
Eager their sullied honor to restore,
Some anger whets, some pride and vengeance more.
The lazy minutes now pass on too slow,
Fancy flies faster than the winds can blow:
Impatient wishes lengthen out the day;
They chide the loitering winds for their delay.
But time is nature's faithful messenger,
And brings up all we wish, as well as all we fear.
The mists clear up, and now the scout decries
The subject of their hopes and victories:
The wished for fleets embayed, in harbor lie,
Unfit to fight, and more unfit to fly.
Triumphant joy throughout the navy flies,
Echoed from shore with terror and surprise.
Strange power of noise! which at one simple sound
At once shall some encourage, some confound.
In vain the lion tangled in the snare
With anguish roars, and rends the trembling air:
'Tis vain to struggle with Almighty Fate;
Vain and impossible the weak debate.
The mighty boom, the forts, resist in vain,
The guns with fruitless force in noise complain.
See how the troops intrepidly fall on!
Wish for more foes, and think they fly too soon.
With eager fury to their forts pursue,
And think the odds of four to one too few.
The land's first conquered, and the prize attends;
Fate beckons in the fleet to back their friends:
Despair succeeds, they struggle now too late,
And soon submit to their prevailing fate:
Courage is madness when occasion's past,
Death's the securest refuge, and the last.
And now the rolling flames come threat'ning on,
And mighty streams of melted gold run down.
The flaming ore down to its center makes,
To form new mines beneath the oozy lakes.
Here a galleon with spicy drugs inflamed,
In odoriferous folds of sulphur streamed.
The gods of old no such oblations knew,
Their spices weak, and their perfumes but few.
The frighted Spaniards from their treasure fly,
Loath to forsake their wealth, but loath to die.
Here a vast carrack flies while none pursue,
Bulged on the shore by her distracted crew:
There like a mighty mountain she appears,
And groans beneath the golden weight she bears.
Conquest perverts the property of friend,
And makes men ruin what they can't defend:
Some blow their treasure up into the air
With all the wild excesses of despair.
Strange fate! that war such odd events should have;
Friends would destroy, and enemies would save:
Others their safety to their wealth prefer,
And mix some small discretion with their fear.
Life's the best gift that nature can bestow;
The first that we receive, the last which we forego:
And he that's vainly prodigal of blood,
Forfeits his sense to do his cause no good.
All desperation's the effect of fear;
Courage is temper, valor can't despair.
And now the victory's completely gained;
No ships to conquer now, no foes remained.
The mighty spoils exceed whate'er was known
That vanquished ever lost, or victor won:
So great, if Fame shall future times remind,
They'll think she lies, and libels all mankind.
Well may the pious queen new anthems raise,
Sing her own fortunes, and her maker's praise;
Invite the nation willing thanks to pay;
And well may all the mighty ones obey.
So may they sing, be always so preserved,
By grace unwished, and conquest undeserved.
Now let us welcome home the conquering fleet,
And all their well-atoned mistakes forget:
Such high success should all resentments drowned,
Nothing but joy and welcome should be found.
No more their past miscarriages reprove,
But bury all in gratitude and love;
Let their high conduct have a just regard,
And meaner merit meet a kind reward.
But now what fruits of victory remain?
To Heaven what praise? What gratitude to man?
Let France sing praise for shams of victories,
And mock their maker with religious lies:
But England blessed with thankful hearts shall raise,
For mighty conquests, mighty songs of praise.
She needs no false pretenses to deceive:
What all men see, all men must needs believe.
Our joy can hardly run into excess,
The well-known subject all our foes confess:
We can't desire more, they can't pretend to less.
Anne, like her great progenitor, sings praise:
Like her she conquers, and like her she prays;
Like her she graces and protects the throne,
And counts the land's prosperity her own:
Like her, and long like her, be blessed her reign,
Crowned with new conquests, and more fleets from Spain.
See now the royal chariot comes amain,
With all the willing nation in her train,
With humble glory, and with solemn grace,
Queen in her eyes, and Christian in her face.
With her, her represented subjects join;
And when she prays, th' whole nation says " amen. "
With her, in stalls the illustrious nobles sat,
The cherubims and seraphims of state:
Anne like a comet in the center shone,
And they like stars that circumfere the sun.
She great in them, and they as great in her;
Sure Heaven will such illustrious praises hear.
The crowding millions hearty blessings pour:
Saint Paul ne'er saw but one such day before.
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