HENRY,

THIRD LORD ARUNDEL OF

WARDOUR,

ONE of the lords imprisoned for the Popish plot, had behaved with distinguished bravery in the quarrel of Charles the first; but the merit of his religion and sufferings were stronger recommendations to James the second, in whose short reign lord Arundel was lord privy-seal, and much trusted. In a paltry collection, called "A Collection of eighty-six loyal Poems," printed in 1685, by one of the lowest tools of the Roman Catholic faction, I find five little Meditations in verse, ascribed to this lord, and said to be written whilst he was prisoner in the Tower.

2

In another poem in this collection, p. 227, it is said that Arundel was to have been chancelfor 3. Another, on the death of Charles the

[Nat. Thompson, the publisher, seems also to have been the compiler of this collection, which contains many pieces afterwards inserted in the State Poems.]

3 [LORD ARUNDEL, of old so warlike and bold,
Made choice of a chancellor's gown we are told.
All these did conspire with the lord Castlemain,
Who now his good dutchess will ne'er catch again."]

second, is so ridiculously bad, that I cannot help quoting the two first lines of it:

"Hang all the streets with sable sad; and call
The royal palace Black, and not White-hall."

The most remarkable piece in this miscellany, in which there are a few of a better style, is the elegy of Charles the first, which I have before mentioned, and which being printed, and ascribed to him in the life of his son, is a strong presumption of its authenticity.

[This lord was the son of Thomas, lord Arundel, and lady Blanch Somerset, the heroine who bravely defended Wardour with a few men, for nine days, against the parliamentary forces under the command of Hungerford and Ludlow. In 1678 Henry lord Arundel was committed to the Tower upon the information of that miscreant Titus Oates, and impeached by the commons of high crimes, &c. without being brought to trial. He continued in confinement till 1683, when he was admitted to bail. He was constituted lord keeper of the privy-seal, and knight of the Bath, in 1686, and retiring to his seat at Breamore, on the abdication of James the second, he lived in great hospitality till his death in December 16944.

• Collins's Peerage, vol. vii. p. 50.

The following is one of the five poems attributed to "Lord Arundel of Warder, and Count of the sacred Roman Empire," and confers some credit on his lordship's moral sentiments and manly style.

"A VALEDICTION TO THE WORLD.

"Hence, all ye visions of the world's delight,
You treach'rous dreams of our deluded sense,
Passion too long hath seiz'd on reason's right,
And play'd the tyrant in her own defence:
Her flatt'ring fancies hurri'd me about

To seek content which I could ne'er find out.
If any pleasure did slide o'er my sence,
It left a mark of shame when it went thence;
And when possest, it relished no more,

And I remain'd as thirsty as before:

Those pleasant charms that did my heart seduce,
Seem'd great, pursu'd, but less'ned in the use,
And that false flame that kindled my desire,
Ere I could taste, the pleasure did expire.
But reason now shall re-possess her throne,
And grace restore what nature had o'erthrown.
My better genius prompts me to declare
Against those follies, and to side with her:
She tells me, 'tis high time to stemm that tide
Whose torrent doth us from ourselves divide.

Those brutal passions do un-man our mind,
And rule, where virtue had them slaves design'd.
Such usurpation shall prevail no more,

I will to reason her just rights restore;

And make my rebel heart that duty pay
To her, which to my sence was cast away.

But this, dear Lord! must be thy work, not mine,
Thy grace must finish what I but design:
It is thy pow'r alone that first doth move,
Then give us strength to execute and love.
For nature hath by custom so prevail'd,
And such dominion o'er our sence entail'd,
That we can never hope but by thy hand
To free our captive souls from her command.
That fatal liberty which for our good

Thou gav'st us, was ill us'd, worse understood.
Men made by reason not like beasts t'obey;
Losing that reason, prove more beasts than they:
And sure they lose it, when they do dispence
With their known duty, to delight the sence.
Since then thy bounty doth my heart inspire,
Make me to do, as well as to desire:

Set so my warring heart from passions free,
That it may ne'er love any thing but Thee!
By thy sweet force my stubborn heart incline
To quit my conduct, and to follow thine:
So shall my soul a double conquest prove,

Bought by thy blood, and conquer'd by thy love."]