Who to the life an exact piece would make,
Must not from others' work a copy take;

No, not from Rubens or Vandyke;

Much less content himself to make it like
Th' ideas and the images which lie
In his own fancy or his memory.

No, he before his sight must place
The natural and living face;

The real object must command

Each judgment of his eye and motion of his hand.

From these and all long errors of the way,
In which our wandering predecessors went,
And, like th' old Hebrews, many years did stray,
In deserts but of small extent,

Bacon, like Moses, led us forth at last :

The barren wilderness he past;

Did on the very border stand

Of the blest promis'd land;

And from the mountain's top of his exalted wit, Saw it himself, and shew'd us it.

But life did never to one man allow

Time to discover worlds and conquer too;

Nor can so short a line sufficient be

To fathom the vast depths of Nature's sea.
The work he did we ought t' admire;
And were unjust if we should more require
From his few years, divided 'twixt th' excess
Of low affliction and high happiness:
For who on things remote can fix his sight,
That's always in a triumph or a fight?

From you, great champions! we expect to get
These spacious countries, but discover'd yet;
Countries, where yet, instead of Nature, we
Her images and idols worshipp'd see:
These large and wealthy regions to subdue,
Though Learning has whole armies at command,
Quarter'd about in every land,

A better troop she ne'er together drew:
Methinks, like Gideon's little band,
God with design has pick'd out you,

To do those noble wonders by a few: When the whole host he saw, "They are" (said he) "Too many to o'ercome for me;"

And now he chooses out his men,

Much in the way that he did then ;
Not those many whom he found
Idly' extended on the ground,

To drink with their dejected head

The stream, just so as by their mouths it fled:
No; but those few who took the waters up,
And made of their laborious hands the cup.

Thus you prepar'd, and in the glorious fight

Their wondrous pattern too you take;
Their old and empty pitchers first they brake,
And with their hands then lifted up the light.
Io! sound too the trumpets here!
Already your victorious lights appear;
New scenes of heaven already we espy,
And crowds of golden worlds on high,

Which from the spacious plains of earth and sea
Could never yet discover'd be,

By sailors' or Chaldeans' watchful eye.

Nature's great works no distance can obscure,
No smallness her near objects can secure;
Y' have taught the curious sight to press
Into the privatest recess

Of her imperceptible littleness!

Y' have learn'd to read her smallest hand,

And well begun her deepest sense to understand!

Mischief and true dishonour fall on those
Who would to laughter or to scorn expose
So virtuous and so noble a design,

}

}

So human for its use, for knowledge so divine.
The things which these proud men despise, and

call

Impertinent, and vain, and small,

Those smallest things of nature let me know,
Rather than all their greatest actions do!
Whoever would deposed Truth advance
Into the throne usurp'd from it,
Must feel at first the blows of Ignorance,
And the shap points of envious Wit.

So, when, by various turns of the celestial dance,
In many thousand years

A star, so long unknown, appears,
Though heaven itself more beauteous by it grow,
It troubles and alarms the world below;

Does to the wise a star, to fools a meteor, show.

With courage and success you the bold work begin;

Your cradle has not idle been :

None e'er, but Hercules and you, would be

At five years age worthy a history.

And ne'er did Fortune better yet

Th' historian to the story fit:

As

you from all old errors free
And purge the body of Philosophy;
So from all modern follies he
Has vindicated Eloquence and Wit.

His candid style like a clean stream does slide,
And his bright fancy, all the way,
Does like the sun-shine in it play;

It does, like Thames, the best of rivers! glide,
Where the God does not rudely overturn,

But gently pour, the crystal urn,

And with judicious hand does the whole current guide:

'T has all the beauties Nature can impart,

And all the comely dress, without the paint, of Art.

SIR FRANCIS DRAKE'S SHIP,

Presented to the University Library of Oxford by
John Davis, of Deptford, Esquire.

To this great ship, which round the globe has run,
And match'd in race the chariot of the sun,
This Pythagorean ship (for it may claim
Without presumption so deserv'd a name,
By knowledge once, and transformation now)
In her new shape, this sacred port allow.
Drake and his ship could not have wish'd from Fate
A more blest station, or more blest estate;

For, lo! a seat of endless rest is given
To her in Oxford, and to him in heaven.

PROLOGUE

TO THE

CUTTER OF COLMAN STREET.

AS, when the midland sea is no-where clear
From dreadful fleets of Tunis and Argier-
Which coast about, to all they meet with foes,
And upon which nought can be got but blows—