Th' heroick exaltations of Good Are so far from understood, We count them Vice: alas! our sight's so ill, That things which swiftest move seem to stand still: But as her beams reflected pass Through our own Nature or Ill-custom's glass : As 't is no wonder, so, If with dejected eye In standing pools we seek the sky, That stars, so high above, should seem to us below. Can we stand by and see Our mother robb'd, and bound, and ravish'd be, Pleas'd with the strength and beauty of the ravisher ? The cancel'd name of friend he bore? Ingrateful Cæsar, who could Rome enthrall! There's none but Brutus could deserve That all men else should wish to serve, And Cæsar's usurp'd place to him should proffer; None can deserve 't but he who would refuse the offer. Ill Fate assum'd a body thee t' affright, And wrapp'd itself i' th' terrors of the night: With such a voice, and such a brow, Goes out when spirits appear in sight. One would have thought 't heard the morning crow, Had it presum'd in any shape thee to oppose, A conqueror and a monarch mightier far than he. What joy can human things to us afford, Ill men, and wretched accidents, The best cause and best man that ever drew a sword? When we see The false Octavius and wild Antony, God-like Brutus! conquer thee? What can we say, but thine own tragick word- An idol only, and a name ? Hold, noble Brutus! and restrain Too deep for all thy judgment and thy wit. Which these great secrets shall unseal, A few years more, so soon hadst thou not dy'd, TO DR. SCARBOROUGH. HOW long, alas! has our mad nation been Seem'd like its sea, embracing round the isle, Would now untill'd, desert, and naked stand, At the same time let loose Diseases' rage But thou by Heaven wert sent This desolation to prevent, A medicine, and a counter-poison, to the age. By wondrous art, and by successful care, The inundations of all liquid Pain, And deluge Dropsy, thou dost drain. The subtle Ague, that for sureness' sake And at each battery the whole fort does shake, The cruel Stone, that restless pain, That's sometimes roll'd away in vain, But still, like Sysiphus's stone, returns again, Thou break'st and meltest by learn'd juices' force (A greater work, though short the way appear, Than Hannibal's by vinegar!) [flow. Oppressed Nature's necessary course It stops in vain; like Moses, thou Strik'st but the rock, and straight the waters freely The Indian son of Lust (that foul disease Which did on this his new-found world but lately seize, Yet since a tyranny has planted here, Than Aaron's incense, or than Phineas' dart. Of man's infirmity? At thy strong charms it must be gone Though a disease, as well as devil, were called Legion. From creeping moss to soaring cedar thou Who, whilst thy wondrous skill in plants they see, |