Science to raise, and knowledge to enlarge,
Be our great master’s future charge;
To write his own memoirs, and leave his heirs
High schemes of government, and plans of wars;
By fair rewards our noble youth to raise
To emulous merit, and to thirst of praise;
To lead them out from ease ere opening dawn, 430
Through the thick forest and the distant lawn,
Where the fleet stag employs their ardent care,
And chases give them images of war.
To teach them vigilance by false alarms;
Inure them in feign’d camps to real arms;
Practise them now to curb the turning steed,
Mocking the foe; now to his rapid speed
To give the rein, and in the full career,
To draw the certain sword, or send the pointed spear.
Let him unite his subjects’ hearts, 340
Planting societies for peaceful arts;
Some that in nature shall true knowledge found;
And by experiment make precept sound;
Some that to morals shall recall the age,
And purge from vicious dross the sinking stage;
Some that with care true eloquence shall teach,
And to just Idioms fix our doubtful speech:
That from our writers distant realms may know,
The thanks we to our monarch owe;
And schools profess our tongue through every land,
That has invok’d his aid, or blest his hand. 351
Let his high power the drooping Muses rear,
The Muses only can reward his care:
’Tis they that guard the great Atrides’ spoils;
Tis they that still renew Ulysses’ toils:
To them by smiling Jove ’twas given, to save
Distinguish’d patriots from the common grave;
To them, great William’s glory to recall,
When statues moulder, and when arches fall.
Nor let the Muses, with ungrateful pride, 360
The sources of their treasure hide:
The Hero’s virtue does the string inspire,
When with big joy they strike the living lyre:
On William’s fame their fate depends:
With him the song begins: with him it ends.
From the bright effluence of his deed
They borrow that reflected light,
With which the lasting lamp they feed,
Whose beams dispel the damps of envious night.
Through various dimes, and to each distant pole, 370
In happy tides, let active commerce roll:
Let Britain’s ships export an annual fleece,
Richer than Argos brought to ancient Greece:
Returning loaden with the shining stores,
Which lie profuse on either India’s shores.
As our high vessels pass their watery way,
Let all the naval world due homage pay;
With hasty reverence their top-honours lower,
Confessing the asserted power,
To whom by fate ’twas given, with happy sway 380
Jo calm the earth, and vindicate the sea.
Our prayers are heard, our master’s fleets shall go
As far as Grinds can bear, or waters flow,
New lands to make, new Indies to explore,
In worlds unknown to plant Britannia’s power;.
Nations yet wild by precept to reclaim,
And teach them arms, and arts, in William’s name.
With humble joy, and with respectful fear
The listening people shall his story hear,
The wounds he bore, the dangers he sustain’d, 390
How far he conquer’d, and how well he reign’d;
Shall own his mercy equal to his fame,
And form their children’s accents to his name,
Enquiring how, and when from Heaven he came.
Their regal tyrants shall with blushes hide
Their little lusts of arbitrary pride,
Nor bear to see their vassals tied;
When William’s virtues raise their opening thought,
His forty years for public freedom fought,
Europe by his hand sustain’d, 400
His conquest by his piety restrain’d,
And o’er himself the last great triumph gain’d.
No longer shall their wretched zeal adore
Ideas of destructive power,
Spirits that hurt, and godheads that devour:
New incense they shall bring, new altars raise,
And fill their temples with a stranger’s praise;
When the great father’s character they find
Visibly stamp’d upon the hero’s mind;
And own a present Deity confest, 410
In valour that preserv’d, and power that blest.
Through the large convex of the azure sky
(For thither nature casts our common eye)
Fierce meteors shoot their arbitrary light:
And comets march with lawless horror bright:
These hear no rule, no righteous order own;
Their influence dreaded as their ways unknown:
Through threaten’d lands they wild destruction throw,
Till ardent prayer averts the public woe:
But the bright orb that blesses all above, 420
The sacred fire, the real son of Jove,
Rules not his actions by capricious will;
Nor by ungovern’d power declines to ill:
Fix’d by just laws he goes for ever right:
Man knows his course, and thence adores his light.
O Janus! would intreated Fate conspire
To grant what Britain’s wishes could require;
Above, that sun should cease his way to go,
Ere William cease to rule, and bless below:
But a relentless destiny 430
Urges all that e’er was born:
Snatch’d from her arms, Britannia once must mourn
The demi-god: the earthly half must die.
Yet if our incense can your wrath remove;
If human prayers avail on minds above;
Exert, great god, thy interest in the sky;
Gain each kind Power, each guardian Deity;
That conquer’d by the public vow,
They bear the dismal mischief far away:
O! long as utmost nature may allow, 440
Let them retard the threaten’d day!
Still be our master’s life thy happy care:
Still let his blessings with his years increase:
To his laborious youth consum’d in war,
Add lasting age, adorn’d and crown’d with peace:
Let twisted olive bind those laurels fast,
Whose verdure must for ever last!
Long let this growing era bless his sway:
And let our sons his present rule obey:
On his sure virtue long let earth rely: 450
And late let the imperial eagle fly,
To bear the hero through his father’s sky,
To Leda’s twins, or he whose glorious speed,
On foot prevail’d, or he who tamed the steed;
To Hercules, at length absolv’d by Fate
From earthly toil, and above envy great:
To Virgil’s theme, bright Cytherea’s son,
Sire of the Latian, and the British throne:
To all the radiant names above.
Rever’d by men, and dear to Jove. 460
Late, Janus, let the Nassau-star,
New-born, in rising majesty appear,
To triumph over vanquish’d night,
And guide the prosperous mariner
With everlasting beams of friendly light.
AN ODE INSCRIBED TO THE MEMORY OF THE HONOURABLE COLONEL GEORGE VILLIERS.
DROWNED IN TUE RIVER FIA VA, IN THE COUNT
RY
OF FRIULI, MDCCIII. IN IMITATION OF HORACE, ODE 38, LIB. I.
Te maris at terra numeroqae carentia arena
Menaorem cohibent, Archyta, &c.
SAY, dearest Villiers, poor departed friend,
(Since fleeting life thus suddenly must end)
Say, what did all thy busy hopes avail,
That anxious thou from pole to pole didst sail;
Ere on thy chin the springing beard began
To spread a doubtful down, and promise man?
What profited thy thoughts, and toils, and cares,
In vigour more confirm’d, and riper years?
To wake ere morning dawn to loud alarms,
And march till close of night in heavy arms; 10
To scorn the summer suns and winter snows,
And search through every clime thy country’s foes!
That thou mightst Fortune to thy side engage;
That gentle Peace might quell Bellona’s rage;
And Anna’s bounty crown her soldier’s hoary age?
In vain we think that free-will’d man has power
To hasten or protract th’ appointed hour.
Our term of life depends not on our deed:
Before our birth our funeral was decreed.
Nor aw’d by foresight, nor misled by chance, 20
Imperious Death directs his ebon lance;
Peoples great Henry’s tombs, and leads up Holbein’s dance.
Alike must every state, and every age
Sustain the universal tyrant’s rage:
For neither William’s power, nor Mary’s charms,
Could, or repel, or pacify his arms:
Young Churchill fell, as life began to bloom:
And Bradford’s trembling age expects the tomb.
Wisdom and eloquence in vain would plead
One moment’s respite for the learned head: 30
Judges of writings and of men have died;
Maecenas, Sackville, Socrates, and Hyde:
And in their various turns the sons must tread
Those gloomy journeys which their sires have led.
The ancient sage, who did so long maintain,
That bodies die, but souls return again,
With all the births and deaths he had in store,
Went out Pythagoras, and came no more.
And modern Argyll, whose capricious thought
Is yet with stores of wilder notions fraught, 40
Too soon convinc’d, shall yield that fleeting breath,
Which play’d so idly with the darts of death.
Some from the stranded vessel force their way;
Fearful of Fate, they meet it in the sea:
Some who escape the fury of the wave,
Sicken on earth, and sink into a grave:
In journeys or at home, in war or peace,
By hardships many, many fall by ease.
Each changing season does its poison bring,
Rheums chill the winter, agues blast the spring: 50
Wet, dry, cold, hot, at the appointed hour,
All act subservient to the tyrant’s power:
And when obedient nature knows his will,
A fly, a grapestone, or a hair can kill.
For restless Proserpine for ever treads
In paths unseen, o’er our devoted heads;
And on the spacious land, and liquid main,
Spreads slow disease, or darts afflictive pain:
Variety of deaths confirms her endless reign.
On curst Piava’s banks the goddess stood, 60
Stow’d her dire warrant to the rising flood;
When what I long must love, and long must mourn,
With fatal speed was urging his return;
In his dear country to disperse his care,
And arm himself by rest for future war;
To chide his anxious friends’ officious fears,
And promise to their joys his elder years.
Oh! destin’d head; and oh! severe decree;
Nor native country thou, nor friend shalt see:
Nor war hast thou to wage, nor year to come: 70
Impending death is thine, and instant doom.
Hark! the imperious goddess is obey’d:
Winds murmur; snows descend; and waters spread:
Oh! kinsman, friend — Oh! vain are all the cries
Of human voice; strong destiny replies:
Weep you on earth: for he shall sleep below:
Thence none return; and thither all must go.
Whoe’er thou art, whom choice or business leads
To this sad river, or the neighbouring meads;
If thou mayst happen on the dreary shores 80
To find the object which this verse deplores;
Cleanse the pale corpse with a religious hand
From the polluting weed and common sand;
Lay the dead hero graceful in a grave;
(The only honour he can now receive)
And fragrant mould upon his body throw:
And plant the warrior laurel o’er his brow:
Light lie the earth; and flourish green the bough.
So may just Heaven secure thy future life
From foreign dangers, and domestic strife! 90
And when the infernal judge’s dismal power
From the dark urn shall throw thy destin’d hour;
When yielding to the sentence, breathless thou
And pale shalt lie, as what thou buriest now;
May some kind friend the piteous object see,
And equal rites perform to that which once was thee.
PROLOGUE SPOKEN AT COURT BEFORE THE QUEEN, ON HER MAJESTY’S BIRTH-DAY, MDCCIV.
SHINE forth, ye planets, with distinguish’d light,
As when ye hallow’d first this happy night:
Again transmit your friendly beams to earth:
As when Britannia joy’d for Anna’s birth:
And thou, propitious star, whose sacred power
Presided o’er the monarch’s natal hour,
Thy radiant voyages for ever run,
Yielding to none but Cynthia, and the Sun:
With thy fair aspect still illustrate Heaven:
Kindly preserve what thou hast greatly given: 10
Thy influence for thy Anna we implore;
Prolong one life; and Britain asks no more:
For Virtue can no ampler power express,
Than to be great in war, and good in peace:
For thought no higher wish of bliss can frame,
Than to enjoy that virtue still the same.
Entire and sure the monarch’s rule must prove,
Who founds her greatness on her subjects’ love;
Who does our homage for our good require;
And orders that which we should first desire: 20
Our vanquish’d wills that pleasing force obey,
Her goodness takes our liberty away,
And haughty Britain yields to arbitrary sway.
Let the young Austrian then her terrors bear,
Great as he is, her delegate in war:
Let him in thunder speak to both his Spains,
That in these dreadful isles a woman reigns.
While the bright queen does on her subjects shower
The gentle blessings of her softer power;
Gives sacred morals to a vicious age, 30
To temples seal, and manners to the stage;
Bids the chaste Muse without a blush appear;
And wit be that which Heaven and she may hear.
Minerva thus to Perseus lent her shield;
Secure of conquest, sent him to the field:
The hero acted what the queen ordain’d:
So was his fame complete, and Andromede unchain’d.
Meantime amidst her native temples sate
The goddess, studious of her Grecian’s fate,
Taught them in laws and letters to excel,
&nbs
p; In acting justly, and in writing well.
Thus whilst she did her various power dispose;
The world was freed from tyrants, wars, and woes:
Virtue was taught in verse, and Athens’ glory rose.
A LETTER TO MONSIEUR BOILEAU DESPREAUX, OCCASIONED BY THE VICTORY AT BLENHEIM, MDCCIV.
Cupidum, pater optime, vires
Deficiuut : neque enim quivis horrentia pilis
Agmina, nee fractâ pereuntes cuspide Gallos.
Hor. Sat. i, L. 2.
Since hir’d for Life, thy Servile Muse must sing
Successive Conquests, and a glorious King;
Must of a Man Immortal vainly boast;
And bring him Lawrels, whatsoe’er they cost:
What Turn wilt thou employ, what Colours lay
On the Event of that Superior Day,
In which one English Subject’s prosp’rous Hand,
(So Jove did will; so Anna did command;)
Broke the proud Column of thy Master’s Praise,
Which sixty Winters had conspir’d to raise?
From the lost Field a hundred Standards brought
Must be the Work of Chance, and Fortune’s Fault.
Bavaria’s Stars must be accus’d, which shone,
That fatal Day the mighty Work was done,
With Rays oblique upon the Gallic Sun.
Some Daemon envying France mis-led the Fight;
And Mars mistook, tho’ Louis order’d right.
When thy young Muse invok’d the tuneful Nine
To say how Louis did not pass the Rhine,
What Work had we with Wageninghen, Arnheim,
Places that could not be reduc’d to Rhime?
And tho’ the Poet made his last Efforts,
Wurts — who could mention in Heroic — Wurts?
But, tell me, hast thou reason to complain
Of the rough Triumphs of the last Campaign?
The Danube rescu’d, and the Empire sav’d;
Say, is the Majesty of Verse retriev’d?
And would it prejudice thy softer Vein,
To sing the Princes, Louis and Eugene?
Is it too hard in happy Verse to place
The Vans and Vanders of the Rhine and Maes?
Her Warriors Anna sends from Tweed and Thames,
That France may fall by more harmonious Names.
Can’st thou not Hamilton or Lumly bear?
Would Ingoldsby or Palmes offend thy Ear?
And is there not a Sound in Marlbro’s Name,
Which thou and all thy Brethren ought to claim,
Sacred to Verse, and sure of endless Fame?
Complete Works of Matthew Prior Page 12
