In me is no delay; with thee to go,

Is to stay here; without thee here to stay,
Is to go hence unwilling; thou to me

Art all things under Heaven, all places thou, Who for my wilful crime art banish'd hence.

This further consolation yet secure

I carry hence; though all by me is lost,
Such favor I unworthy am vouchsaf'd,

By me the promis'd Seed shall all restore."

So spake our mother Eve; and Adam heard Well pleas'd, but answer'd not: for now, too nigh

The archangel stood; and from the other hill
To their fix'd station, all in bright array
The cherubim descended; on the ground
Gliding meteorous, as evening mist
Ris'n from a river o'er the marish glides,
And gathers ground fast at the laborer's heel,
Homeward returning. High in front advanc'd
The brandish'd sword of God before them blaz'd,
Fierce as a comet; which with tor id heat,
And vapor as the Libyan air adust,
Began to parch that temperate clime; whereat
In either hand the hastening angel caught
Our lingering parents, and to the eastern gate
Led them direct, and down the cliff as fast
To the subjected plain; then disappear'd.
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of paradise, so late their happy seat,
Wav'd over by that flaming brand; the gate
With dreadful faces throng'd, and fiery arms:
Some natural tears they dropt, but wip'd them

soon;

The world was all before them, where to choose Their place of rest, and Providence their guide: They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and

slow,

Through Eden took their solitary way.

TO THE NIGHTINGALE.

O NIGHTINGALE, that on yon bloomy spray Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still,

Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill,

While the jolly hours lead on propitious May.

Thy liquid notes that close the eye of day, First heard before the shallow cuckoo's bill,

Portend success in love; oh, if Jove's will Have linked that amorous power to thy soft lay,

Now timely sing, ere the rude bird of hate Foretell my hopeless doom in some grove nigh;

As thou from year to year hast sung too late

For my relief, yet hadst no reason why. Whether the Muse, or Love, call thee his mate,

Both them I serve, and of their train ain I.

ON HIS BLINDNESS.

WHEN I consider how my light is spent

Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide;
And that one talent which is death to hide,
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more
bent

To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide;
Doth God exact day-labor, light denied,
I fondly ask? But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts; who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best: his
state

Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed,
And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.

ON HIS WIFE.

METHOUGHT I Saw my late espoused saint Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave, Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband

gave,

Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint.

Mine, as whom washed from spot of child-bed taint,

Purification in the old law did save;

And such, as yet once more I trust to have Full sight of her in Heaven without restraint, Came vested all in white, pure as her mind:

Her face was veiled, yet to my fancied sight Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shined

So clear, as in no face with more delight.
But oh! as to embrace me she inclined,

To conquer still; peace hath her victories No less renowned than war: new foes arise Threatening to bind our souls with secular. chains:

Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,

What need'st thou of such weak witness of thy name?

Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a livelong monument.
For while to the shame of flow-endeavoring art
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took;
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving,
And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie,
That kings, for such a tomb, would wish to die.

ON THE MASSACRE IN PIEMONT.

AVENGE, O Lord! thy slaughtered saints, whose bones

Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold; Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipped stocks and

stones,

OF TWENTY-THREE.

How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth, Stolen on his wing my three-and-twentieth year!

My hasting days fly on with full career,

But my late spring no bud or blossom sheweth.

To Heaven. Their martyred blood and ashes

SOW

O'er all the Italian fields, where still doth sway

The triple tyrant; that from these may grow A hundredfold, who having learned thy way, Early may fly the Babylonian woe.

ABRAHAM COWLEY was born at London, in 1618. His father, who was a grocer by trade, died before his birth; but his mother procured his admission into Westminster School, as a king's scholar. He has represented himself as 80 deficient in memory as to have been unable to retain the common rules of grammar: it is, however, certain that, by some process, he became an elegant and correct classical scholar. He early displayed a taste for poetry; and while yet at school, in his fifteenth or sixteenth year, he published a collection of verses, under the appropriate title of "Poetical Blossoms."

In 1636 he was elected a scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge. In this favorable situation he obtained much praise for his academical exercises; and he again appeared as an author, in a pastoral comedy, called "Love's Riddle," and a Latin comedy, entitled "Naufragium Joculare;" the last of which was acted before the university, by the members of Trinity College. He continued to reside at Cambridge till 1643, and was a Master of Arts when he was ejected from the university by the puritanical visitors. He thence removed to Oxford, and fixed himself in St. John's College. Here he engaged actively in the royal cause, and was present in several of the king's journeys and expeditions, but in what quality does not appear. He ingratiated himself, however, with the principal persons about the court, and particularly with Lord Falk

land.

When the events of the civil war obliged the queen-mother to quit the kingdom, Cowley accompanied her to France, and obtained a settlement at Paris, in the family of the Earl of St. Alban's. During an absence of nearly ten years from his native country, he took various journeys into Jersey, Scotland, Holland, and Flanders; and it was principally through his instrumentality that a correspondence was maintained between the king and his consort. The business of ciphering and deciphering their letters was intrusted to his care, and often occupied his nights as well as his days. It is no wonder that, after the Restoration, he long complained of the neglect with which he was treated. 1656, having In no longer any affairs to transact abroad, he returned to England; still, it is supposed, engaged in the service of his party, as a medium of secret intelligence. Soon after his arrival, he published an edition of his poems, containing most of those which now appear in his

in the royal cause, the hopes of which now began to revive. The Restoration reinstated him, with other royalists, in his own country; and he naturally expected a reward for his long services. He had been promised, both by Charles I. and Charles II., the mastership of the Savoy, but was unsuccessful in both his applications. He had also the misfortune of displeasing his party by his revived comedy of "The Cutter of Coleman Street," which was construed as a satire on the Cavaliers. At length, through the interest of the Duke of Buckingham and the Earl of St. Alban's, he obtained a lease of a farm at Chertsey, held under the queen, by which his income was raised to about three hundred pounds sterling per annum.

Cowley took up his abode first at Barn-elms, on the banks of the Thames; but this place not agreeing with his health, he removed to Chertsey. Here his life was soon brought to a close. According to his biographer, Dr. Sprat, the fatal disease was an affection of the lungs, the consequence of staying too late in the fields among his laborers. Dr. Warton, however, from the authority of Mr. Spence, gives a different account of the matter. He says that Cowley, with his friend Sprat, paid a visit on foot to a gentleman in the neighborhood of Chertsey, which they prolonged, in free conviviality, till midnight; and that missing their way on their return, they were obliged to pass the night under a hedge, which gave to the poet a severe cold and fever, which terminated in his death. He died on July 28, 1667, and was interred, with a most honorable attendence of persons of distinction, in Westminster Abbey, near the remains of Chaucer and Spenser. King Charles II. pronounced his eulogy, by declaring that "Mr. Cowley had not left a better man behind him in England."

At the time of his death, Cowley certainly ranked as the first poet in England; for Milton lay under a cloud, nor was the age qualified to appreciate him. And, although a large portion of Cowley's celebrity has since vanished, there still remains enough to raise him to a considerable rank among the British poets. M. Taine says: "He was a well-governed, reasonable, instructed, polished, well-trained man, fertile in general reflections and ideas"-in short, a literary man, rather than a poet, the first who, in England, was really deserving to be called an author by profession. He possessed the ability to say what he pleased, but had really nothing to say. His poetry is contorted and artificial,

After the death of Cromwell, Cowley returned to France, and resumed his station as an agent

er here to add that, as a prose-writer, particularly in the department of essays, there are few who can compare with him in elegant simplicity.

Sure I Fame's trumpet hear:

It sounds like the last trumpet; for it can
Raise up the buried man.

Unpast Alps stop me; but I'll cut them all,
And march, the Muses' Hannibal.
Hence, all the flattering vanities that lay
Nets of roses in the way!
Hence, the desire of honors or estate,

And all that is not above Fate!
Hence, Love himself, that tyrant of my days!
Which intercepts my coming praise!
Come, my best friends, my books! and lead me on;
'Tis time that I were gone.
Welcome, great Stagyrite! and teach me now
All I was born to know:

Thy scholar's victories thou dost far outdo;

He conquered the earth, the whole world you.

Noisy nothing! stalking shade!
By what witchcraft wert thou made,
Empty cause of solid harms!
But I shall find out counter-charms
Thy airy devilship to remove
From this circle here of love.

Sure I shall rid myself of thee
By the night's obscurity,
And obscurer secrecy!
Unlike to every other sprite,
Thou attempt'st not men to fright,
Nor appear'st but in the light.

OF MYSELF.

THIS only grant me, that my means may lie
Too low for envy, for contempt too high.
Some honor I would have,
Not from great deeds, but good alone.
Th' unknown are better than ill known:
Rumor can ope the grave.

Acquaintance I would have, but when 't depends
Not on the number, but the choice, of friends.

Books should, not business, entertain the light,
And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night.
My house a cottage more
Than palace; and should fitting be
For all my use, no luxury.

My garden painted o'er

With Nature's hand, not Art's; and pleasures yield

Horace might envy in his Sabine field.

and wit

Preserves Rome's greatness yet: Thou art the first of orators; only he

Who best can praise thee, next must be. Welcome the Mantuan swan, Virgil the wise!

Whose verse walks highest, but not flies; Who brought green Poesy to her perfect age, And made that art which was a rage. Tell me, ye mighty Three! what shall I do To be like one of you!

But you have climbed the mountain's top, there sit On the calm flourishing head of it,

And, while with wearied steps we upward go, See us, and clouds, below.

HONOR.

SHE loves, and she confesses too;
There's then, at last, no more to do;
The happy work 's entirely done;
Enter the town which thou hast won;
The fruits of conquest now begin;
Iö, triumphe! enter in.

What's this, ye gods! what can it be?
Remains there still an enemy?
Bold Honor stands up in the gate,
And would yet capitulate;

Have I o'ercome all real foes,

And shall this phantom me oppose?

For he, that runs it well, twice runs his race.

And in this true delight,

These unbought sports, this happy state,
I would not fear, nor wish, my fate;
But boldly say each night,
To-morrow let my sun his beams display,
Or in clouds hide them; I have lived to-day.

THE CHRONICLE.

A BALLAD.

MARGARITA first possessed,

If I remember well, my breast,
Margarita first of all;

But when awhile the wanton maid
With my restless heart had played,
Martha took the flying ball.

Martha soon did it resign

To the beauteous Catharine.
Beauteous Catharine gave place
(Though loath and angry she to part
With the possession of my heart)
To Eliza's conquering face.
Eliza till this hour might reign,

Had she not evil counsels ta'en.
Fundamental laws she broke

I'LL sing of heroes and of kings,
In mighty numbers, mighty things.
Begin, my Muse! but lo! the strings
To my great song rebellious prove;
The strings will sound of nought but love.
I broke them all, and put on new;
"Tis this or nothing sure will do.
These, sure, (said I) will me obey;
These, sure, heroic notes will play.
Straight I began with thundering Jove,
And all th' immortal powers; but Love,
Love smil'd, and from m' enfeebled lyre
Came gentle airs, such as inspire
Melting love and soft desire.
Farewell, then, heroes! farewell, kings
And mighty numbers, mighty things!
Love tunes my heart just to my strings

II. DRINKING.

THE thirsty earth soaks up the rain,
And drinks, and gapes for drink again,
The plants suck-in the earth, and are
With constant drinking fresh and fair;
The sea itself (which one would think
Should have but little need of drink)
Drinks twice ten thousand rivers up,
So fill'd that they o'erflow the cup.
The busy Sun (and one would guess
By's drunken fiery face no less)
Drinks up the sea, and, when he 'as done
The Moon and Stars drink up the Sun:
They drink and dance by their own light,
They drink and revel all the night.
Nothing in nature's sober found,
But an eternal health goes round.
Fill up the bowl, then, fill it high,
Fill all the glasses there; for why
Should every creature drink but I?
Why, man of morals, tell me why?

III. BEAUTY.

LIBERAL Nature did dispense
To all things arms for their defence;
And some she arms with sinewy force,
And some with swiftness in the course
Some with hard hoofs or forked claw3,
And some with horns or tusked jaws :