ODE

UPON HIS MAJESTY'S RESTORATION AND

RETURN.

"-Quod optanti divûm promittere nemo
"Auderet, volvenda dies, en, attulit ultro.”

NOW blessings on you all, ye peaceful stars,
Which meet at last so kindly, and dispense
Your universal gentle influence

VIRG.

To calm the stormy world, and still the rage of wars! Nor, whilst around the continent

Plenipotentiary beams ye sent,

Did your pacifick lights disdain In their large treaty to contain The world apart, o'er which do reign Your seven fair brethren of great Charles's-wain ; No star amongst ye all did, I believe, Such vigorous assistance give,

As that which, thirty years ago,

*

At Charles's birth, did, in despite

Of the proud sun's meridian light, His future glories and this year foreshow.

The star that appeared at noon, the day of the king's birth, just as the king his father was riding to St. Paul's to give thanks to God for that blessing.

No less effects than these we may

Be assur'd of from that powerful ray,

Which could outface the sun, and overcome the

day.

Auspicious star! again arise,

And take thy noon-tide station in the skies,
Again all heaven prodigiously adorn;
For, lo! thy Charles again is born.
He then was born with and to pain;
With and to joy he's born again.
And, wisely for this second birth,
By which thou certain wert to bless
The land with full and flourishing happiness,

}

Thou mad'st of that fair month thy choice, In which heaven, air, and sea, and earth, And all that's in them, all, does smile and does rejoice.

'T was a right season; and the very ground Ought with a face of paradise to be found,

Then, when we were to entertain

Felicity and innocence again.

Shall we again (good Heaven!) that blessed pair

behold,

Which the abused people fondly sold

For the bright fruit of the forbidden tree,
By seeking all like Gods to be?

Will Peace her halcyon nest venture to build
Upon a shore with shipwrecks fill'd,

And trust that sea, where she can hardly say
She 'as known these twenty years one calmy day?
Ah! mild and gall-less dove,

Which dost the pure and candid dwellings love,
Canst thou in Albion still delight?

Still canst thou think it white?

Will ever fair Religion appear

In these deformed ruins? will she clear
Th' Augean stables of her churches here?
Will Justice hazard to be seen

Where a High Court of Justice e'er has been?
Will not the tragick scene,

And Bradshaw's bloody ghost, affright her there,
Her, who shall never fear?

Then may Whitehall for Charles's seat be fit,
If Justice shall endure at Westminster to sit.

Of all, methinks, we least should see

The cheerful looks again of Liberty.

That name of Cromwell, which does freshly still
The curses of so many sufferers fill,

Is still enough to make her stay,
And jealous for a while remain,
Lest, as a tempest carried him away,
Some hurricane should bring him back again.
Or, she might justlier be afraid

Lest that great serpent, which was all a tail
(And in his poisonous folds whole nations prisoners
made),

Should a third time perhaps prevail

To join again, and with worse sting arise,
As it had done when cut in pieces twice.
Return, return, ye sacred Four!

And dread your perish'd enemies no more.
Your fears are causeless all, and vain,

Whilst you return in Charles's train;
For God does him, that he might you, restore,
Nor shall the world him only call

Defender of the faith, but of you all.

Along with you plenty and riches go,
With a full tide to every port they flow,

With a warm fruitful wind o'er all the country
blow.

Honour does as ye march her trumpet sound,

The Arts encompass you around,
And, against all alarms of Fear,
Safety itself brings up the rear;

And, in the head of this angelick band,
Lo! how the goodly Prince at last does stand
(O righteous God !) on his own happy land:
'Tis happy now, which could with so much ease
Recover from so desperate a disease;

A various complicated ill,

Whose every symptom was enough to kill;
In which one part of three phrensy possest,
And lethargy the rest:

'Tis happy, which no bleeding does endure,
A surfeit of such blood to cure;
"Tis happy, which beholds the flame
In which by hostile hands it ought to burn,

}

Or that which, if from Heaven it came,

It did but well deserve, all into bonfire turn.

We fear'd (and almost touch'd the black degree
Of instant expectation)

That the three dreadful angels we,

Of famine, sword, and plague, should here establish'd

see

(God's great triumvirate of desolation !)
To scourge and to destroy the sinful nation.
Justly might Heaven Protectors such as those,
And such Committees for their Safety, impose
Upon a land which scarcely better chose.

We fear'd that the Fanatick war,

Which men against God's houses did declare,
Would from th' Almighty enemy bring down
A sure destruction on our own,

We read th' instructive histories which tell
Of all those endless mischiefs that befel
The sacred town which God had lov'd so well,
After that fatal curse had once been said,

}

"His blood be upon ours and on our children's head!" We know, though there a greater blood was spilt, 'T was scarcely done with greater guilt.

We know those miseries did befal

Whilst they rebell'd against that Prince, whom all The rest of mankind did the love and joy of mankind call.

Already was the shaken nation
Into a wild and deform'd chaos brought,