XI. TO THE LORD GENERAL CROMWELL. CROMWELL Our chief of men, who through a cloud Not of war only, but detractions rude, Guided by faith and matchless fortitude, To peace and truth thy glorious way hast plough'd And on the neck of crowned Fortune proud Hast rear'd God's trophies, and his work pursued, While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued, And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud, And Worcester's laureat wreath. Yet much remains To conquer still; Peace hath her victories No less renown'd than War: New foes arise Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains: Help us to save free conscience from the paw Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw. XII. TO SIR HENRY VANE, the Younger. VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old, Than whom a better senator ne'er held The helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms, repell'd The fierce Epirot and the African bold; Whether to settle peace, or to unfold The drift of hollow States hard to be spell'd; Then to advise how War may, best upheld, Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold, In all her equipage: besides to know Both spiritual power and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learn'd, which few have done : The bounds of either sword to thee we owe : XIII. On the late massacre in PIEMONT. AVENGE, O Lord, thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones Lie scatter'd on the Alpine mountains cold; Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipt stocks and stones, Forget not: in thy book record their groans Who were thy sheep, and in their ancient fold Slain by the bloody Piemontese that roll'd Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans The vales redoubled to the hills, and they To Heaven. Their martyr'd blood and ashes sow O'er all the Italian fields, where still doth sway The triple Tyrant; that from these may grow A hundred fold, who, having learn'd thy way, Early may fly the Babylonian woe. XIV. ON HIS BLINDNESS. WHEN I consider how my light is spent Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present That murmur, soon replies, "God doth not need Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, "And post o'er land and ocean without rest; They also serve who only stand and wait." XV. ΤΟ MR. LAWRENCE. LAWRENCE, of virtuous father virtuous son, The frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attire The li ly and rose, that neither sow'd nor spun.. What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice, Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise To hear the lute well touch'd, or artful voice Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air? He who of those delights can judge and spare To interpose them oft, is not unwise. |