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And the full wrath befide

Of vengeful juftice bore for our excess,

And feals obedience firft with wounding smart
This day, but Q ere long

Huge pangs and strong

Will pierce more near his heart.

BLE

Wed

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LEST pair of Sirens, pledges of Heav'n's joy,11 Sphere-born harmonious fifters, Voice and Verse, divine founds, and mix'd pow'r employ Dead things with inbreath'd sense able to pierce, 14 And to our high-rais'd phantafy prefent

your

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of pure concent,] So we

Mix your choice words, and happieft read in the Manufcript, and in the

found's employ

edition of 1673, and we prefer the
authority

That undisturbed fong of pure concent,
Ay fung before the faphir-color'd throne
To him that fits thereon

With faintly fhout, and folemn jubilee,
Where the bright Seraphim in burning row
Their loud up-lifted angel-trumpets blow,
And the cherubic hoft in thousand quires
Touch their immortal harps of golden wires,
With thofe juft Spirits that wear victorious palms,
Hymns devout and holy pfalms

Singing everlastingly;

That we on earth with undifcording voice
May rightly answer that melodious noise;
As once we did, till difproportion'd fin

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Jarr'd against nature's chime, and with harsh din 20
Broke the fair mufic that all creatures made
To their great Lord, whose love their motion sway'd
In perfect diapafon, whilst they stood

In first obedience, and their state of good.

0 may we foon again renew that fong,

And keep in tune with Heav'n, till God ere long
To his celeftial confort us unite,

To live with him, and fing in endless morn of light.

VIII.

* An Epitaph on the MARCHIONESS of Winchester,

HIS rich marble doth enter

ΤΗ

The honor'd wife of Winchester, A Vicount's daughter, an Earl's heir, Befides what her virtues fair

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Added to her noble birth,

5

More than fhe could own from earth.

Summers three times eight fave one

She had told; alas too foon,

After fo fhort time of breath,

To house with darkness, and with death.

Yet had the number of her days

Been as complete as was her praise,

Nature and fate had had no ftrife

In giving limit to her life.

Her high birth, and her

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graces

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15

Quickly found a lover meet;

The virgin quire for her request

The God that fits at marriage feast
He at their invoking came

But with a scarce well-lighted flame;

ter of Thomas Lord Vicount Savage of Rock-Savage in the countty of Chefter, who by marriage became the heir of Lord Darcy Earl of Rivers; and was the wife of John Marquifs of Winchester, and the mother of Charles firft Duke of Bolton. She died in childbed of a fecond fon in the 23d year of her age, and Milton made these verses at Cambridge as appears by the fequel.

20 And

19. He at their invoking came But with a fearce well-lighted flame;] From Ovid. Met. X. 4.

Adfuit ille quidem; fed nec folemnia verba,

Nec lætos vultus, nec felix attu-
lit omen.

Fax quoque, quam tenuit, la-
crimofo ftridula fumo
Ufque fuit, nullofque invenit
motibus ignes. Fortin.

And in his garland as he stood,

Ye might difcern a cypress bud.

Once had the early matrons run
To greet her of a lovely fon,
And now with second hope fhe goes,
And calls Lucina to her throws;
But whether by mischance or blame
Atropos for Lucina came;

25

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The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck'd up by fome unheedy fwain,
Who only thought to crop the flow'r
New fhot
up from vernal show'r;

22.a cypress bud] An emblem of a funeral and it is called in Virgil feralis, En. VI. 216. and in

40 But

Horace funebris Epod. V. 18. and
in Spenfer the cyprefs funeral. Faery
Queen. B. 1. Cant. 1. St. 8.
28. Atropos.

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