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But, with affected yawnings at the close,
Seem'd to require her natural repose:
For now the streaky light began to peep;
And setting stars admonish'd both to fleep.
The dame withdrew, and, wifhing to her guest
The peace of heaven, betook herself to reft.
Ten thousand angels on her flumbers wait,
With glorious vifions of her future gate.

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A

POEM on the PRINCE,

Born on the Tenth of JUNE, 1688.

Ο

UR vows are heard betimes, and heav'n takes care To grant, before we can conclude the pray'r: Preventing angels met it half the way,

And fent us back to praife, who came to pray.

Juft on the day, when the high-mounted fun
Did fartheft in its northern progress run,
He bended forward, and even ftretch'd the sphere
Beyond the limits of the lengthen'd year,
To view a brighter fun in Britain born;
That was the bufinefs of his longest morn;
The glorious object feen, 'twas time to turn.
Departing Spring could only ftay to shed
Her gloomy beauties on the genial bed,
But left the manly fummer in her stead,
With timely fruit the longing land to chear,
And to fulfil the promise of the year.
Betwixt two feafons comes th' aufpicious heir,
This age to bloffom, and the next to bear.

Laft folemn 1 fabbath faw the Church attend,
The Paraclete in fiery pomp defcend;
But when his wond'rous 2 octave roll'd again,
He brought a royal infant in his train.
So great a bleffing to fo good a king,
None but th' Eternal Comforter could bring.

I Whit-Sunday.

2 Trinity Sunday.

Or

Or did the mighty Trinity confpire,
As once in council to create our fire?
It feems as if they fent the new-born guest
To wait on the proceffion of their feast;
And on their facred anniverfe decreed
To ftamp their image on the promis'd feed.
Three realms united, and on one bestow'd,
An emblem of their myftic union show'd:
The mighty trine the triple empire fhar'd,
As every person would have one to guard.
Hail fon of prayers! by holy violence

Drawn down from heaven; but long be banish'd thence,
And late to thy paternal fkies retire:

To mend our crimes whole ages would require;
To change th' inveterate habit of our fins,
And finish what thy godlike fire begins.

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Kind heaven, to make us nglishmen again,
No lefs can give us than a patriarch's reign.

The facred cradle to your charge receive,
Ye feraphs, and by turns the guard relieve ;
Thy father's angel, and thy father join,
To keep poffefion, and fecure the line;
But long defer the honours of thy fate :
Great may they be like his, like his be late;
That James his running century may view,
And give this fon an aufpice to the new.

Our wants exact at least that moderate stay:
For fee the 3 dragon winged on his way,
To watch the 4 travail, and devour the prey.
Or, if allufions may not rife fo high

Thus, when 5 Alcides rais'd his infant cry,
The fnakes befieg'd his young divinity:

3 Alluding only to the common-wealth party, here and in other places of the poem.

4. See Revelations, chap. 12. verfe 4.

5 Alcides was the fon of Jupiter by Alcmena, Juno fent two ferpents to kill him in his cradle; but he ftrangled them both, crying eat vehemently at the fame time.

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But vainly with their forked tongues they threat;
For oppofition makes a hero great.

To needful fuccour all the good will run,
And Jove affert the godhead of his fon.

O ftill repining at your prefent flate,
Grudging yourselves the benefits of fate,
Look up, and read in characters of light.
A bleffing fent you in your own defpight.
The manna falls, yet that celeftial bread
Like Jews you munch, and murmur while you feed.
May not your fortune be like theirs, exil'd,
Yet forty years to wander in the wild:
Or if it be, may Mofes live at least,

To lead you to the verge of promis'd reft.
Tho' poets are not prophets, to foreknow
What plants will take the blight, and what will grow,
By tracing heaven his footfteps may be found:
Behold! how awfully he walks the round!
God is abroad, and, wond'rous in his ways,
The rife of empires, and their fall furveys;
More, might I fay, than with an usual eye,
He fees his bleeding church in ruin lie,

And hears the fouls of faints beneath his altar cry.
Already has he lifted high the 6 fign,

Which crown'd the conquering arms of Conftantine:
The 7 moon grows pale at that prefaging fight,
And half her train of ftars have loft their light.
Behold another & Sylvefter, to bless

The facred ftandard, and fecure fuccefs;

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6 The fign of the crofs, which was the military standard of Con ftantine, is here used to fignify the Roman catholick religion, which - king James wanted to establish.

7 The Turks ufe a crefcent for their arms; and are here introduced as grieving at the progrefs of popery, which as the true religion, muft foon overcome their false fyftem.

8 The pope in James the Ild's time is here compared to him that governed the Romish church in the time of Conftantine.

Large

Large of his treafures, of a foul fo great,
As fills and crowds his univerfal feat.
Now view at home a fecond 9 Conftantine;
(The former too was of the British line)
Has not his healing balm your breaches clos'd,
Whofe exile many fought, and few oppos'd?
O, did not heaven by its eternal doom
Permit those evils, that this good might come?
So manifeft, that e'en the moon-ey'd fects
See whom and what this Providence protects.
Methinks, had we within our minds no more
Than that one fhipwreck on the fatal 2 ore,
That only thought may make us think again,
What wonders God referves for fuch a reign.
To dream that chance his prefervation wrought,
Were to think Noah was preferv'd for nought;
Or the furviving eight were not defign'd
To people earth, and to restore their kind.
When humbly on the royal babe we gaze,
The manly lines of a majeflic face
Give awful joy: 'tis paradife to look
On the fair frontispiece of Nature's book:
If the first opening page fo charms the fight,
Think how th' unfolded volume will delight!
See how the venerable infant lies

In early pomp; how thro' the mother's eyes
The father's foul, with an undaunted view,
Looks out, and takes our homage as his due.
See on his future fubjects how he fmiles,
Nor meanly flatters, nor with craft beguiles;

9 King James the IId.

St. Helen, mother of Conftantine the great, was an Engli woman; and archbishop Ufher affirms, that the emperor himself was born in this kingdom.

2 The fandbank, on which the duke of York had like to have been loft in 1682, on his voyage to Scotland, is known by the name of Lemman ore.

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