Fear not, for I am with thee, and will stand My tongue shall call unto the north, and say They shall be called and honoured by my name. I'll cure the deaf, and make their hearts rejoice As not to credit Him that will assure Thy shame-faced soul, that so thou mayst descry Descant upon his promises; advise With thine own thoughts; let wisdom make thee wise. Thy thoughts together, and discreetly fall Into a serious study. Let thy mind Be absolute and really inclined To meditation. Contradict the rage Of thine own passions. Labour to assuage Remember how his sacred temples wore His sublime front; remember how they broached Thy thoughts as thy deserts, that Heaven should send And suffer death for thee: thou wert as dead As sin could make thee; 'twas for thy offence Wilt thou contemn the hand that gave thee bread? Respect unto thee when the ebbing tide Of fortune runs so low, that thou mayst ride Upon the sands of poverty? Fond man, He proved Himself a most obedient Son. And wilt thou not, coy wretch! drink one poor sup Of bitter drink for Him that drank a cup To sweeten thine? ABRAHAM COWLEY. ABRAHAM COWLEY, the most miscellaneous of all our poets, was born in London in 1618. He was early sent to Cambridge, but being a zealous loyalist, he was ejected thence, and retired first to Oxford, and afterwards to France. He was made secretary to Lord Jermyn, and after the Restoration, through his interest, obtained an advantageous lease, which set him at ease in fortune. He died at Chertsey in 1667, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, near Chaucer and Spenser. The writings of Cowley possess great intrinsic merit. They display a vivid imagination, clear intellect, and a rich command of language; but his style is too artificial. "In Cowley," says Mr. Montgomery, "it has been the fate of one of the most brilliant intellects that ever arose in this country never to be estimated by its real excellence.' THE GARDEN. WHEN God did man to his own likeness make, Could the Divine impression take; A kind of heaven, too, did appear, As far as earth could such a likeness bear: That man no happiness might want, Which earth to her first brother could afford, He did a garden for him plant By the quick hand of his omnipotent word; As the chief help and joy of human life, He gave him the first gift, first e'en before a wife. O blessed shades! O gentle cool retreat From all the immoderate heat In which the frantic world does burn and sweat! This does the lion-star ambition's rage, This avarice, the dog-star's, thirst assuage: Everywhere else their fatal power to see, They make and rule man's wretched destiny: They neither set nor disappear, But tyrannize o'er all the year, Whilst we ne'er feel their flame or influence here. The birds that dance from bough to bough, And sing above in every tree, Are not from fears and cares more free Without reward or thanks for their obliging pains; The whistling winds add their less artful strains, When Epicurus to the world had taught That pleasure was the chiefest good, (And was perhaps i' th' right, if rightly understood,) His life he to his doctrine brought, And in a garden's shade that sovereign pleasure sought. May there find cheap and virtuous luxury. Vitellius's table, which did hold As many creatures as the ark of old; That fiscal table, to which every day All countries did a constant tribute pay; Helped with a little art and industry, The wanton taste no fish or fowl can choose, Yet still the fruits of earth we see Placed the third story high in all her luxury. But with each sense the garden does comply; With bright Assyrian carpets on them spread, Though she looked up to roofs of gold, And Babylonian tapestry, And wealthy Hiram's princely dye Through Ophir's starry stones met everywhere her eye; With all the shining glories of the East; When lavish art her costly work had done, The honour and the prize of bravery Was by the garden from the palace won; And every rose and lily there did stand Better attired by nature's hand: The case thus judged against the king we see, By one that would not be so rich, though wiser far than he. Nor does this happy place only dispense Such various pleasures to the sense; Here health itself does live, That salt of life, which does to all a relish give; Its standing pleasure and intrinsic wealth, The body's virtue, and the soul's good fortune-health. The tree of life, when it in Eden stood, Did its immortal head to heaven rear; It lasted a tall cedar till the Flood: Now a small thorny shrub it does appear, |