Lucasta [66]
CUPID FAR GONE.
I. What, so beyond all madnesse is the elf, Now he hath got out of himself! His fatal enemy the Bee, Nor his deceiv'd artillerie, His shackles, nor the roses bough Ne'r half so netled him, as he is now.
II.<75.1> See! at's own mother he is offering; His finger now fits any ring; Old Cybele he would enjoy, And now the girl, and now the boy. He proffers Jove a back caresse, And all his love in the antipodes.
III. Jealous of his chast Psyche, raging he Quarrels with<75.2> student Mercurie, And with a proud submissive breath Offers to change his darts with Death. He strikes at the bright eye of day, And Juno tumbles in her milky way.
IV. The dear sweet secrets of the gods he tells, And with loath'd hate lov'd heaven he swells; Now, like a fury, he belies Myriads of pure virginities, And swears, with this false frenzy hurl'd, There's not a vertuous she in all the world.
V. Olympus he renownces, then descends, And makes a friendship with the fiends; Bids Charon be no more a slave, He Argos rigg'd with stars shall have, And triple Cerberus from below Must leash'd t' himself with him a hunting go.
<75.1> This stanza was suppressed by Mr. Singer.
<75.2> Original reads THE.
A MOCK SONG.
I. Now Whitehall's in the grave, And our head is our slave, The bright pearl in his close shell of oyster; Now the miter is lost, The proud Praelates, too, crost, And all Rome's confin'd to a cloister. He, that Tarquin was styl'd, Our white land's exil'd, Yea, undefil'd; Not a court ape's left to confute us; Then let your voyces rise high, As your colours did flye, And flour'shing cry: Long live the brave Oliver-Brutus.<76.1>
II. Now the sun is unarm'd, And the moon by us charm'd, All the stars dissolv'd to a jelly; Now the thighs of the Crown And the arms are lopp'd down, And the body is all but a belly. Let the Commons go on, The town is our own, We'l rule alone: For the Knights have yielded their spent-gorge; And an order is tane With HONY SOIT profane, Shout forth amain: For our Dragon hath vanquish'd the St. George.
<76.1> Cromwell.
A FLY CAUGHT IN A COBWEB.
Small type of great ones, that do hum Within this whole world's narrow room, That with a busie hollow noise Catch at the people's vainer voice, And with spread sails play with their breath, Whose very hails new christen death. Poor Fly, caught in an airy net, Thy wings have fetter'd now thy feet; Where, like a Lyon in a toyl, Howere thou keep'st a noble coyl, And beat'st thy gen'rous breast, that o're The plains thy fatal buzzes rore, Till thy all-bellyd foe (round elf<77.1>) Hath quarter'd thee within himself.
Was it not better once to play I' th' light of a majestick ray, Where, though too neer and bold, the fire Might sindge thy upper down attire, And thou i' th' storm to loose an eye. A wing, or a self-trapping thigh: Yet hadst thou fal'n like him, whose coil Made fishes in the sea to broyl, When now th'ast scap'd the noble flame; Trapp'd basely in a slimy frame, And free of air, thou art become Slave to the spawn of mud and lome?
Nor is't enough thy self do's dresse To thy swoln lord a num'rous messe, And by degrees thy thin veins bleed, And piecemeal dost his poyson feed; But now devour'd, art like to be A net spun for thy familie, And, straight expanded in the air, Hang'st for thy issue too a snare. Strange witty death and cruel ill That, killing thee, thou thine dost kill! Like pies, in whose entombed ark All fowl crowd downward to a lark, Thou art thine en'mies' sepulcher, And in thee buriest, too, thine heir.
Yet Fates a glory have reserv'd For one so highly hath deserv'd. As the rhinoceros doth dy Under his castle-enemy, As through the cranes trunk throat doth speed, The aspe doth on his feeder feed;