AN EPIGRAM, ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER, JUST AFTER MR. DRYDEN. DRYDEN is dead: Dryden alone could sing 1700. AN EPIGRAM OF MARTIAL TO CIRINIUS "Sic tua, Cirini, promas epigrammata vulgo INSCRIBED TO MR. JOSIAH HORT, NOW (1694) LORD BISHOP OF KILMORE, IN IRELAND. So smooth your numbers, friend, your verse so sweet, So sharp the jest, and yet the turn so neat, 1 Afterwards Archbishop of Tuam. Rome would prefer your sense and thought to mine: Yet modest, you decline the public stage, To fix your friend alone amidst the applauding age. So Maro did; the mighty Maro sings In vast heroic notes, of vast heroic things, And leaves the ode to dance upon his Flaccus' strings. He scorn'd to daunt the dear Horatian lyre, Who lays his laurels at inferior feet, And yields the tenderest point of honour,— wit. EPISTOLA. FRATRI SUO DILECTO R. W. I. W. S. P. D. RURSUM tuas, amande frater, accepi literas, eodem fortasse momento quo meæ ad te pervenerunt; idemque qui te scribentem vidit dies, meum ad epistolare munus excitavit cala mum. Non inane est inter nos fraternum nomen, unicus enim spiritus nos intus animat agitque, et concordes in ambobus efficit motus. O utinam crescat in dies, et vigescat mutua charitas! Faxit Deus ut amor sui nostra incendat et defæcet pectora: tunc etenim et alternis puræ amicitiæ flammis erga nos invicem divinum in modum ardebimus. Contemplemur Jesum nostrum, cœleste illud et adorandum exemplar charitatis. Ille est QUI quondam, æterno delapsus ab æthere, vultus Ecce, jacet desertus humi, diffusus in herbam, Integer, innocuas versus sua sidera palmas Et placidum attollens vultum, nec ad oscula Patris Amplexus solitos ve; artus nudatus amictu Sidereos, et sponte sinum patefactus ad iras Numinis armati. "Pater, hic infige1 sagittas; "Hæc,” ait, "iratum sorbebunt pectora ferrum ; Abluat æthereus mortalia crimina sanguis." Dixit, et horrendum fremuere tonitrua cœli Infensusque Deus, quem jam posuisse paternum Musa queri vellet nomen, sed et ipsa fragores Ad tantos pavefacta silet. Jam dissilit æther, Pandunturque fores ubi duro carcere regnat 1.Job iv. 6. [?] Ira, et pœnarum thesauros mille coercet. 66 sus Restat, compressos dumque ardens explicat artus Sic fata, immiti contorquet vulnera dextra Dilaniatque sinus: sancti penetralia cordis Panduntur; sævis avidus dolor involat alis, Atque audax mentem scrutatur, et ilia mordet. Interea Servator ovat, victorque doloris Eminet, illustri perfusus membra cruore, Exultatque miser fieri; nam fortius illum 1 Luke xxii. 44. 2 Zech. xiii. 7. 3 Col. ii. 15. Urget patris honos, et non vincenda voluptas Poenarum! O quid non mortalia pectora cogis, Durus Amor? Quid non cœlestia? At subsidat phantasia, vanescant imagines; nescio quo me proripuit amens Musa. Volui quatuor lineas pedibus astringere, et ecce, numeri crescunt in immensum; dumque concitato genio laxavi fræna, vereor ne juvenilis impetus theologiam læserit, et audax nimis imaginatio. Heri adlata est ad me epistola indicans matrem meliuscule se habere, licet ignis febrilis non prorsus deseruit mortale ejus domicilium. Plura volui, sed turgidi et crescentes versus noluere plura, et coarctarunt scriptionis limites. Vale, amice frater, et in studio pietatis et artis medicæ strenuus decurre. Datum a musœo meo, Londini, xvto Calend. Febr., FRATRI E. W. OLIM NAVIGATURO. I, FELIX, pede prospero, I, frater, trabe pinea |