s, though they raised no storm,
Foreflow'd her passage, to behold her form:
Some cried, A Venus; some, A Thetis, pass'd;
But this was not so fair, nor that so chaste.
Far from her sight flew Faction, Strife, and Pride;
And Envy did but look on her, and died.
Whate'er we suffer'd from our sullen fate, 20
Her sight is purchased at an easy rate.
Three gloomy years against this day were set,
But this one mighty sum has clear'd the debt:
Like Joseph's dream, but with a better doom,
The famine past, the plenty still to come.
For her the weeping heavens become serene;
For her the ground is clad in cheerful green:
For her the nightingales are taught to sing,
And Nature has for her delay'd the spring.
The Muse resumes her long-forgotten lays; 30
And Love, restored his ancient realm surveys,
Recalls our beauties, and revives our plays;
His waste dominions peoples once again,
And from her presence dates his second reign.
But awful charms on her fair forehead sit,
Dispensing what she never will admit:
Pleasing, yet cold, like Cynthia's silver beam,
The people's wonder, and the poet's theme.
Distemper'd Zeal, Sedition, canker'd Hate,
No more shall vex the Church, and tear the State: 40
No more shall Faction civil discords move,
Or only discords of too tender love:
Discord, like that of music's various parts;
Discord, that makes the harmony of hearts;
Discord, that only this dispute shall bring,
Who best should love the Duke, and serve the King.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 15: 'Queen of beauty:' Mary D'Este, the beautiful second wife
of the Duke of York; she had been banished to Scotland.]

* * * * *

EPISTLE VII.

A LETTER TO SIR GEORGE ETHEREGE.[16]

To you who live in chill degree,
As map informs, of fifty-three,
And do not much for cold atone,
By bringing thither fifty-one,
Methinks all climes should be alike,
From tropic e'en to pole arctique;
Since you have such a constitution
As nowhere suffers diminution.
You can be old in grave debate,
And young in love-affairs of state; 10
And both to wives and husbands show
The vigour of a plenipo.
Like mighty missioner you come
"Ad Partes Infidelium."
A work of wondrous merit sure,
So far to go, so