Mess. Inevitable cause, At once both to destroy, and be destroy'd; The edifice, where all were met to see him, Upon their heads and on his own he pull'd. Man. O lastly over-strong against thyself! A dreadful way thou took'st to thy revenge. Met from all parts to solemnize this feast. More than enough we know; but while things yet The work for which thou wast foretold Are in confusion, give us, if thou canst, Mess. Occasions drew me early to this city; Half-round, on two main pillars vaulted high, The other side was open, where the throng The feast and noon grew high, and sacrifice [wine, At length for intermission's sake they led him - Hitherto, lords, what your commands impos'd I mean to show you of my strength, yet greater, He tugg'd, he shook, till down they came, and drew, To Israel, and now liest victorious Not willingly, but tangled in the fold Of dire necessity, whose law in death conjoin'd And urg'd them on with mad desire Their own destruction to come speedy upon them. Fall'n into wrath divine, As their own ruin on themselves to invite, And with blindness internal struck. 2. Semichor. But he, though blind of sight, From under ashes into sudden flame, Of tame villatic fowl; but as an eagle Depress'd, and overthrown, as seem'd, In the Arabian woods embost, From out her ashy womb now teem'd, And, though her body die, her fame survives Man. Come, come; no time for lamentation now, Nor much more cause; Samson hath quit himself Like Samson, and heroicly hath finish'd A life heroic, on his enemies Fully reveng'd, hath left them years of mourning, Soak'd in his enemies' blood; and from the stream Will send for all my kindred, all my friends, To fetch him hence, and solemnly attend With silent obsequy, and funeral train, The idle spear and shield were high up hung; The hooked chariot stood Unstain'd with hostile blood; The trumpet spake not to the armed throng; And kings sat still with awful eye, As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by. Home to his father's house: there will I build him But peaceful was the night, A monument, and plant it round with shade But unexpectedly returns, And to his faithful champion hath in place Bore witness gloriously; whence Gaza mourns, His uncontrollable intent; His servants he, with new acquist Of true experience, from this great event With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing; And, waving wide her myrtle wand, Wherein the Prince of light His reign of peace upon the Earth began: Whispering new joys to the mild ocean, The stars, with deep amaze, Bending one way their precious influence; Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence; Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go. And, though the shady gloom Had given day her room, The Sun himself withheld his wonted speed, And hid his head for shame, As his inferior flame The new-enlighten'd world no more should need: He saw a greater Sun appear (bear. Than his bright throne, or burning axletree, could She strikes an universal peace through sea and land. And sworded Seraphim, No war, or battle's sound, Was heard the world around: Are seen in glittering ranks with wings display'd, Harping in loud and solemn quire, With unexpressive notes, to Heaven's new-born Heir. And the well-balanc'd world on hinges hung; And cast the dark foundations deep, The lonely mountains o'er, And the resounding shore, A voice of weeping heard and loud lament; From haunted spring and dale, Edg'd with poplar pale, The parting genius is with sighing sent; [keep. With flower-inwoven tresses torn, [mourn. And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets And speckled Vanity Will sicken soon and die, And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould; And Hell itself will pass away, Peor and Baälim Forsake their temples dim, With that twice-batter'd god of Palestine; Heaven's queen and mother both, Now sits not girt with taper's holy shine; [mourn. And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day. In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz Yea, Truth and Justice then Will down return to men, Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing, Mercy will sit between, Thron'd in celestial sheen, With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering; And Heaven, as at some festival, And sullen Moloch, fled, Hath left in shadows dread His burning idol all of blackest hue; In vain with cymbals' ring They call the grisly king, In dismal dance about the furnace blue: Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall. Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste. So both himself and us to glorify: Yet first, to those ychain'd in sleep, [the deep; Nought but profoundest Hell can be his shroud; In vain with timbrell'd anthems dark The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through The sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipt ark. EDMUND WALLER. EDMUND WALLER, born at Coleshill, Hertford-| Waller had a brother-in-law, named Tomkyns shire, in March, 1605, was the son of Robert Wal- who was clerk of the queen's council, and possess. ler, Esq., a gentleman of an ancient family and good ed great influence in the city among the warm fortune, who married a sister of the celebrated John loyalists. On consulting together, they thought it Hampden. The death of his father during his infancy would be possible to raise a powerful party, which left him heir to an estate of 3500l. a year, at that might oblige the parliament to adopt pacific measperiod an ample fortune. He was educated first at ures, by resisting the payment of the taxes levied Eton, whence he was removed to King's College for the support of the war. About this time Sir in Cambridge. His election to parliament was as Nicholas Crispe formed a design of more dangerous early as between his sixteenth or seventeenth year; import, which was that of exciting the king's and it was not much later that he made his appear- friends in the city to an open resistance of the auance as a poet and it is remarkable that a copy of thority of parliament; and for that purpose he obverses which he addressed to Prince Charles, in his tained a commission of array from his majesty. eighteenth year, exhibits a style and character of This plan appears to have been originally unconversification as perfectly formed as those of his nected with the other; yet the commission was maturest productions. He again served in parlia-made known to Waller and Tomkyns, and the whole ment before he was of age; and he continued his was compounded into a horrid and dreadful plot services to a later period. Not insensible of the Waller and Tomkyns were apprehended, when the value of wealth, he augmented his paternal fortune pusillanimity of the former disclosed the whole by marriage with a rich city heiress. In the long secret. "He was so confounded with fear," (says intermissions of parliament which occurred after Lord Clarendon,) "that he confessed whatever he 1628, he retired to his mansion of Beaconsfield, had heard, said, thought, or seen, all that he knew where he continued his classical studies, under the of himself, and all that he suspected of others, withdirection of his kinsman Morley, afterwards bishop out concealing any person, of what degree or qualiof Winchester; and he obtained admission to a ty soever, or any discourse which he had ever upon society of able men and polite scholars, of whom any occasion entertained with them." The concluLord Falkland was the connecting medium. sion of this business was, that Tomkyns, and Cha Waller became a widower at the age of twenty-loner, another conspirator, were hanged, and that five: he did not, however, spend much time in Waller was expelled the House, tried, and conmourning, but declared himself the suitor of Lady demned; but after a year's imprisonment, and a fine Dorothea Sydney, eldest daughter of the Earl of of ten thousand pounds, was suffered to go into Leicester, whom he has immortalized under the exile. He chose Rouen for his first place of foreign poetical name of Saccharissa. She is described by exile, where he lived with his wife till his removal him as a majestic and scornful beauty; and he to Paris. In that capital he maintained the appearseems to delight more in her contrast, the gentler ance of a man of fortune, and entertained hospitaAmoret, who is supposed to have been a Lady So- bly, supporting this style of living chiefly by the phia Murray. Neither of these ladies, however, sale of his wife's jewels. At length, after the lapse was won by his poetic strains; and, like another of ten years, being reduced to what he called his man, he consoled himself in a second marriage. rump jewel, he thought it time to apply for per When the king's necessities compelled him, in mission to return to his own country. He obtained 1640, once more to apply to the representatives this license, and was also restored to his estate, of the people, Waller, who was returned for Ag- though now diminished to half its former rental. mondesham, decidedly took part with the members Here he fixed his abode, at a house built by himwho thought that the redress of grievances should self, at Beaconsfield; and he renewed his courtly precede a vote for supplies; and he made an ener- strains by adulation to Cromwell, now Protector, getic speech on the occasion. He continued during to whom his mother was related. To this usurper three years to vote in general with the Opposition the noblest tribute of his muse was paid. in the Long Parliament, but did not enter into all When Charles II. was restored to the crown, their measures. In particular, he employed much and past character was lightly regarded, the stains cool argument against the proposal for the abolition of that of Waller were forgotten, and his wit and of Episcopacy; and he spoke with freedom and poetry procured him notice at court, and admission severity against some other plans of the House. to the highest circles. He had also sufficient inIn fact, he was at length become a zealous loyalist terest to obtain a seat in the House of Commons, in his inclinations; and his conduct under the dif- in all the parliaments of that reign. The king's ficulties into which this attachment involved him gracious manners emboldened him to ask for the became a source of his indelible disgrace. A short vacant place of provost of Eton college, which was narrative will suffice for the elucidation of this granted him; but Lord Clarendon, then Lord Chancellor, refused to set the seal to the grant, alleging matter. that by the statutes laymen were excluded from died at Beaconsfield in October, 1687, the 83d year that provostship. This was thought the reason why Waller joined the Duke of Buckingham, in his hostility against Clarendon. of his age. He left several children by his second wife, of whom, the inheritor of his estate, Edmund, after representing Agmondesham in parliament, became a convert to Quakerism. On the accession of James II., Waller, then in his 80th year, was chosen representative for Saltash. Waller was one of the earliest poets, who obHaving now considerably passed the usual limit of tained reputation by the sweetness and sonorousness human life, he turned his thoughts to devotion, and of his strains; and there are perhaps few masters composed some divine poems, the usual task in at the present day who surpass him in this parwhich men of gaiety terminate their career. He ticular. TO AMORET. FAIR! that you may truly know, Joy salutes me, when I set If sweet Amoret complains, And, those scorching beams to shun, If the soul had free election I would not thus long have borne Tis amazement more than love, Heaven (as eas'ly scal'd) does know! As the most delicious food, Unto that adored dame: For 'tis not unlike the same, Which, though not so fierce a flame, Then smile on me, and I will prove TO AMORET. AMORET, the Milky Way, Fram'd of many nameless stars! The smooth stream, where none can say, Amoret, my lovely foe! Tell me where thy strength does lie? In thy soul, or in thy eye? By that snowy neck alone, Or thy grace in motion seen, Yet thy waist is straight, and clean, OF LOVE. ANGER, in hasty words, or blows, |