On the Death of Mr. Crashaw

1 Poet and Saint! to thee alone are given

2The two most sacred names of earth and heaven,

3 The hard and rarest union which can be

4Next that of godhead with humanity.

5Long did the Muses banish'd slaves abide,

6And built vain pyramids to mortal pride;

7Like Moses thou (though spells and charms withstand)

8Hast brought them nobly home back to their Holy Land.

9 Ah wretched we, poets of earth! but thou

10Wert living the same poet which thou'rt now.

11Whilst angels sing to thee their airs divine,

12And joy in an applause so great as thine,

13Equal society with them to hold,

14Thou need'st not make new songs, but say the old.

15And they (kind spirits!) shall all rejoice to see

16How little less than they exalted man may be.

17Still the old heathen gods in numbers dwell,

18The heavenliest thing on earth still keeps up Hell.

19Nor have we yet quite purg'd the Christian land;

20 Still idols here like calves at Bethel stand.

21 And though Pan's death long since all oracles broke,

22 Yet still in rhyme the fiend Apollo spoke:

23Nay with the worst of heathen dotage we

24(Vain men!) the monster Woman deify;

25Find stars, and tie our fates there in a face,

26And Paradise in them by whom we lost it, place.

27What different faults corrupt our Muses thus

28 Wanton as girls, as old wives fabulous!

29 Thy spotless Muse, like Mary, did contain

30The boundless Godhead; she did well disdain

31That her eternal verse employ'd should be

32On a less subject than eternity;

33And for a sacred mistress scorn'd to take

34But her whom God himself scorn'd not his spouse to make.

35 It (in a kind) her miracle did do;

36A fruitful mother was, and virgin too.

37 How well, blest swan, did fate contrive thy death;

38And make thee render up thy tuneful breath

39In thy great mistress' arms! thou most divine

40And richest offering of Loretto's shrine!

41Where like some holy sacrifice t' expire

42A fever burns thee, and Love lights the fire.

43 Angels (they say) brought the fam'd chapel there,

44And bore the sacred load in triumph through the air.

45'Tis surer much they brought thee there, and they,

46And thou, their charge, went singing all the way.

47 Pardon, my Mother Church, if I consent

48That angels led him when from thee he went,

49For even in error sure no danger is

50When join'd with so much piety as his.

51Ah, mighty God, with shame I speak't, and grief,

52Ah that our greatest faults were in belief!

53And our weak reason were even weaker yet,

54Rather than thus our wills too strong for it.

55 His faith perhaps in some nice tenents might

56Be wrong; his life, I'm sure, was in the right.

57And I myself a Catholic will be,

58So far at least, great saint, to pray to thee.

59 Hail, bard triumphant! and some care bestow

60On us, the poets militant below!

61Oppos'd by our old enemy, adverse chance,

62Attack'd by envy, and by ignorance,

63Enchain'd by beauty, tortured by desires,

64Expos'd by tyrant Love to savage beasts and fires.

65Thou from low earth in nobler flames didst rise,

66 And like Elijah, mount alive the skies.

67Elisha-like (but with a wish much less,

68More fit thy greatness, and my littleness)

69Lo here I beg (I whom thou once didst prove

70So humble to esteem, so good to love)

71Not that thy spirit might on me doubled be,

72I ask but half thy mighty spirit for me;

73And when my Muse soars with so strong a wing,

74'Twill learn of things divine, and first of thee to sing.

Notes

1 ] Richard Crashaw was born about 1613, the son of a violently anti-Catholic clergyman. He became a scholar of Pembroke College, Cambridge in 1631, and a fellow of Peterhouse in 1636. In 1644 he was ejected from his fellowship for refusing to take the Covenant. Like his friend, Cowley, he seems to have then taken refuge at Oxford, and after the defeat of the King he went to Paris. By this time he had become a Roman Catholic. In Paris, Cowley, now secretary to the exiled queen and court, procured him letters of introduction by means of which he obtained the post of secretary to Cardinal Palotta, in Rome. Later he was instituted a canon of the Church of Our Lady of Loretto (April 24, 1649). He died of a fever shortly afterwards.

3 ] hard and rarest. The termination "-est" does duty for both adjectives.

20 ] See I Kings, xii, 26-33.

21 ] Eusebius in his De Preparatione Evangelica, V, xvii, relates that about the time of Christ's passion the crew and passengers of a ship on the way from Italy to Cyprus heard a voice calling out that Pan was dead. "By which Pan, though of some be understood the great Satanas, whose kingdom at that time was by Christ conquered.... (for at that time, as he (Eusebius) saith, all oracles surceased, and enchanted spirits that were wont to delude the people, thenceforth held their peace).... yet I think it more properly meant of the death of Christ, the only and very Pan, then suffering for his flock." (Glosse to Spenser's Shepheardes Calender, May).

22 ] The pagan gods were regarded by the Christian fathers as evil spirits; cf. Paradise Lost, I, 364 ff. Apollo who inspired the Delphian oracle, was the god of song and poetry. Cf. also note to Carew, An Elegy on the Death of Doctor Donne, 22.

28 ] fabulous. Cf. I Timothy, iv, 7. 30.
well. Perhaps.

35 ] kind. Manner.

43-44 ] The shrine at Loretto was believed to be the house of the Virgin Mary, transported by angels from Nazareth at the close of the 13th century.

55 ] nice tenents. Subtle doctrines. With 55-56 cf. Pope, Essay on Man, III, 303:

For modes of faith let graceless
zealots fight; His can't be
wrong whose life is in the right.

59-60 ] triumphant... militant. An adaptation of the phrases "the church militant" and "the church triumphant" for the church on earth and in heaven.

66 ] See II Kings, ii, 1-15.

Online text copyright © 2003, Ian Lancashire for the Department of English, University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.

Original text: Abraham Cowley, Poems (London: H. Moseley, 1656). E-10 2928 Fisher Rare Book Library (Toronto) pt. 1-4. Facs. edn. (Menston: Scolar, 1971). PR 3370 A1 1656A Robarts Library
First publication date: 1656
RPO poem editor: N. J. Endicott
RP edition: 2RP 1.452.
Recent editing: 4:2002/2/10

Composition date: 1651
Form: Pindaric Ode

The Wish

1Well then; I now do plainly see

2This busy world and I shall ne'er agree.

3The very honey of all earthly joy

4Does of all meats the soonest cloy;

5 And they (methinks) deserve my pity

6Who for it can endure the stings,

7The crowd, and buzz, and murmurings

8 Of this great hive, the city.

9 Ah, yet, ere I descend to th' grave

10May I a small house and large garden have!

11And a few friends, and many books, both true,

12Both wise, and both delightful too!

13 And since love ne'er will from me flee,

14A mistress moderately fair,

15And good as guardian angels are,

16 Only belov'd, and loving me.

17 O fountains! when in you shall I

18Myself eas'd of unpeaceful thoughts espy?

19O fields! O woods! when shall I be made

20The happy tenant of your shade?

21 Here's the spring-head of Pleasure's flood:

22Here's wealthy Nature's treasury,

23Where all the riches lie that she

24 Has coin'd and stamp'd for good.

25 Pride and ambition here

26Only in far-fetch'd metaphors appear;

27Here nought but winds can hurtful murmurs scatter,

28And nought but Echo flatter.

29 The gods, when they descended, hither

30From heaven did always choose their way:

31And therefore we may boldly say

32 That 'tis the way too thither.

33 How happy here should I

34And one dear she live, and embracing die!

35She who is all the world, and can exclude

36In deserts solitude.

37 I should have then this only fear:

38Lest men, when they my pleasures see,

39Should hither throng to live like me,

40 And so make a city here.

Online text copyright © 2003, Ian Lancashire for the Department of English, University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.

Original text: Abraham Cowley, The Mistresse (London: for Humphrey Mosely, 1647). Wing 6674.
First publication date: 1647
RPO poem editor: N. J. Endicott
RP edition: 2RP 1.450.
Recent editing: 4:2002/2/10

Form: Horatian Ode
Rhyme: aabbcddc

Anacreontiques:
OR,
Some Copies of Verses Translated
Paraphrastically out of
Anacreon

I.
Love

I'll sing of Heroes, and of Kings;
In mighty Numbers, mighty things,
Begin, my Muse; but lo, the strings
To my great Song rebellious prove;
The strings will sound of nought but Love.
I broke them all, and put on new;
'Tis this or nothing sure will do.
These sure (said I) will me obey;
These sure Heroick Notes will play.
Straight I began with thundring Jove,
And all the'immortal Pow'ers but Love.
Love smil'ed, and from my'enfeebled Lyre
Came gentle airs, such as inspire
Melting love, and soft desire.
Farewel then Heroes, farewel Kings,
And mighty Numbers, mighty Things;
Love tunes my Heart just to my strings.

ODE. Sitting and Drinking in the Chair, made out of the Reliques of Sir Francis Drake's Ship.

[1.] Chear up my Mates, the wind does fairly blow, Clap on more sail and never spare; Farewell all Lands, for now we are In the wide Sea of Drink, and merrily we go. Bless me, 'tis hot! another bowl of wine, And we shall cut the Burning Line: Hey Boyes! she scuds away, and by my head I know, We round the World are sailing now. What dull men are those who tarry at home, When abroad they might wantonly rome, 10 And gain such experience, and spy too Such Countries, and Wonders as I do? But prythee good Pilot take heed what you do, And fail not to touch at Peru; With Gold; there the Vessel we'll store, And never, and never be poor, No never be poor any more. 2. What do I mean? What thoughts do me misguide? As well upon a staff may Witches ride Their fancy'd Journies in the Ayr, 20 As I sail round the Ocean in this Chair: 'Tis true; but yet this Chair which here you see, For all its quiet now, and gravitie, Has wandred, and has travailed more, Than ever Beast, or Fish, or Bird, or ever Tree before. In every Ayr, and every Sea't has been, 'T has compas'd all the Earth, and all the Heavens 't has seen. Let not the Pope's it self with this compare, This is the only Universal Chair. 3. The pious Wandrers Fleet, sav'd from the flame, 30 (Which still the Reliques did of Troy persue, And took them for its due) A squadron of immortal Nymphs became: Still with their Arms they row about the Seas, And still make new and greater voyages; Nor has the first Poetick Ship of Greece, (Though now a star she so Triumphant show, And guide her sailing Successors below, Bright as her ancient freight the shining fleece;) Yet to this day a quiet harbour found, 40 The tide of Heaven still carries her around. Only Drake 's Sacred vessel which before Had done, and had seen more, Than those have done or seen, Ev'n since they Goddesses, and this a Star has been; As a reward for all her labour past, Is made the seat of rest at last. Let the case now quite alter'd be, And as thou went'st abroad the World to see; Let the World now come to see thee. 50 4. The World will do't; for Curiosity Does no less than devotion, Pilgrims make; And I my self who now love quiet too, As much almost as any Chair can do, Would yet a journey take, An old wheel of that Chariot to see, Which Phaeton so rashly brake: Yet what could that say more than these remains of Drake? Great Relique! thou too, in this Port of ease, Hast still one way of Making Voyages; 60 The breath of fame, like an auspicious Gale, (The great Trade-wind which ne're does fail,) Shall drive thee round the World, and thou shalt run, As long around it as the Sun. The straights of time too narrow are for thee, Lanch forth into an indiscovered Sea, And steer the endless course of vast Eternitie, Take for thy Sail this Verse, and for thy Pilot Mee.