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A jolly god, that paffes hours too well

To promise heaven, or threaten us with hell.
That unconcern'd can at rebellion fit,

And wink at crimes he did himself commit.

A tyrant theirs; the heaven their priesthood paints
A conventicle of gloomy fullen faints;

A heaven like Bedlam, flovenly and fad;
Fore-doom'd for fouls, with false religion, mad.
Without a vifion poets can foreshow

What all but fools by common fenfe may know:
If true fucceffion from our ifle should fail,
And crowds profane with impious arms prevail,
Not thou, nor thofe thy factious arts engage
Shall reap that harvest of rebellious rage,
With which thou flattereft thy decrepid age.
The fwelling poifon of the feveral fects,
Which wanting vent, the nation's health infects,
Shall burst its bag; and fighting out their way
The various venoms on each other prey.
The prefbyter puff'd up with fpiritual pride,
Shall on the necks of the lewd nobles ride:
His brethren damn, the civil power defy;
And parcel out republic prelacy.

But short shall be his reign: his rigid yoke
And tyrant power will puny fects provoke ;

And frogs and toads, and all the tadpole train

Will croak to heaven for help, from this devouring

crane.

The cut-throat fword and clamorous gown fhall jar, In fharing their ill-gotten fpoils of war:

Chiefs fhall be grudg'd the part which they pretend;

Lords envy lords, and friends with every friend
About their impious merit fhall contend.
The furly commons fhall refpect deny,
And juftle peerage out with property.
Their general either fhall his truft betray,
And force the crowd to arbitrary fway;
Or they fufpecting his ambitious aim,
In hate of kings fhall caft anew the frame;
And thruft out Collatine that bore their name.

engage,

Thus inborn broils the factions would Or wars of exil'd heirs, or foreign rage, Till halting vengeance overtook our age: And our wild labors wearied into rest, Reclin'd us on a rightful monarch's breast.

Pudet hæc opprobria, vobis

Et dici potuiffe, & non potuiffe refelli.

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THE

PREFACE.

A

Poem with fo bold a title, and a name prefixed from which the handling of so serious a subject would not be expected, may reasonably oblige the author to fay fomewhat in defence, both of himself and of his undertaking. In the first place, if it be objected to me that being a layman, I ought not to have concerned myfelf with fpeculations, which belong to the profeffion of divinity; I could anfwer, that perhaps laymen, with equal advantages of parts and knowlege, are not the most incompetent judges of facred things; but in the due fenfe of my own weaknefs and want of learning I plead not this: I pretend not to make myfelf a judge of faith in others, but only to make a confeffion of my own. I lay no unhallowed hand upon the ark, but wait on it with the reverence that becomes me at a diftance. In the next place I will ingenuoufly confefs, that the helps I have used in this small treatife, were many of them taken from the works of our own reverend divines of the church of England; fo that the weapons with which I combat irreli

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