Hated not learning worse than toad or asp, When thou taught'st Cambridge, and king Ed ward, Greek.

ON THE SAME.

I DID but prompt the age to quit their clogs
By the known rules of ancient liberty,

When straight a barbarous noise environs me
Of owls and cuckoos, asses, apes and dogs:
As when those hinds that were transform'd to frogs,
Rail'd at Latona's twin-born progeny,

Which after held the sun and moon in fee. But this is got by casting pearl to hogs; That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood, And still revolt when truth would set them free License they mean when they cry Liberty; For who loves that, must first be wise and good: But from that mark how far they rove we see, For all this waste of wealth, and loss of blood.

гO MR. H. LAWES, ON HIS AIRS, 1645.*

HARRY, whose tuneful and well-measur'd song
First taught our English music how to span
Words with just note and accent not to scan
With Midas' ears, committing short and long;
Thy worth and skill exempts thee from the throng.
With praise enough for Envy to look wan;
To after age thou shalt be writ the man,

That with smooth air could humour best our tongue. Thou honour'st verse, and verse must lend her wing

* This Mr. Henry Lawes was a gentleman of the king's chapel, and one of his band of music, and an intimate friend of Milton.

To honour thee, the priest of Phoebus' choir, That tun'st their happiest lines in hymn, or story Dante shall give fame leave to set thee higher Than his Casella, whom he woo'd to sing, Met in the milder shades of Purgatory.

On the religious memory of Mrs. Catharine Thomson, my Christian Friend, deceased 16th of December 1646.*

WHEN faith and love, which parted from thee never. Had ripen'd thy just soul to dwell with God, Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load

Of death, call'd life; which us from life doth sever. Thy works, and alms, and all thy good endeavour, Stay'd not behind, nor in the grave were trod : But, as Faith pointed with her golden rod, Follow'd thee up to joy and bliss for ever. Love led them on, and faith who knew them best Thy hand-maids, clad them o'er with purple beams

And azure wings, that up they flew so dress'd And spake the truth of thee on glorious themes Before the Judge: who thenceforth bid thee rest. And drink thy fill of pure immortal streams.

TO THE LORD GENERAL FAIRFAX.t

FAIRFAX, whose name in arms through Europe rings Filling each mouth with envy or with praise,

"Who this Mrs. Thomson was, (says Dr. Newton,) we can not be certain; but I find in the accounts of Milton's life, that when he was first made Latin Secretary, he lodged at one Thomson's, next door to the Bull-head tavern at Charing-cross. This Mrs. Thomson, therefore, was, in all probability, one of that family."

✦ This sonnet appears, from the manuscript, to have been ad

And all her jealous monarchs with amaze
And rumours loud, that daunt remotest kings
Thy firm, unshaken virtue, ever brings

Victory homie, though new rebellions raise
Th ir Hydra heads, and the false North displays
Her broken league, to imp their Serpent wings.
nobler task awaits thy hand,

› yet

(For what can war but endless war still breed ?)
Till truth and right from violence be freed,
And ublic faith clear'd from the shameful brand
Of public fraud. In vain doth valour bleed,
While Avarice and Rapine share the land.

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 crown'd fortune proud

Hast rear'd God's trophies, and his works pursued, While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots imbrued,

And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud,
And Worcester's laureate wreath. Yet much remains
To conquer still; Peace hath her victories

No less renown'd than War: new foes arise
Threat'ning to bind our souls with secular chains:
Help us to save free conscience from the paw
Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

fressed to Gen. Fairfax at the seige of Colchester, which was car ced on in the summer of 1648.

In the Author's manuscript is this inscription: To the Lord General Cromwell, May, 1652. On the proposals of certain Ministers at the committee for propagation of the Gospel.

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 th' 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;
Therefore on thy firm hand religion leans
In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son.

ON THE LATE MASSACRE IN

PIEDMONT.*

AVENGE, O Lord thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones

This persecution of the Protestants in Peidmont broke out in 1655. In May, that year, Cromwell wrote several letters to the Duke of Savoy, and other potentates and states complaining of that persecution. Echard tells us, that he proclaimed a fast, and caused large contributions to be gathered for them in England; that he sent his agents to the Duke of Savoy, a prince with whom he had no correspondence or commerce, and the next year, so engaged Cardinal Mazarine, and even terrified the Pope himself, without so much as doing any favour to the English Roman Catholics, that the Duke thought it necessary to restore all that he had taken from them, and renewed all those privileges they had formerly enjoyed. "So great (adds Echard) was the terror of his name; nothing being more usual than his saying, that his ships in the Medditerranean should visit Civita Vecchia, and the Sound of his cannon should be heard in Rome."

Lie scatter'd on the Alpine mountains cold Ev'n them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipp'd stocks and stones, Forget not in thy book: record their groans

Who were thy sheep, and in their ancient folds Slain by the bloody Piedmontese, that roll'd Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moan The vales redoubled to the hills, and they

To Heaven. Their martyr'd blood and ashes sow O'er all th' 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 wo.

WHEN I consider how my light is spent

Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide, Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he, returning, chide; Doth God exact day-labour, light denied? I fondly ask but Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best; his state Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest; They also serve who cnly stand and wait.