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Chor. That hope would much rejoice us to partake This evil on the Philistines is fall'n: With thee; say, reverend sire, we thirst to hear.

Man I have attempted one by one the lords,
Either at home, or through the high street passing,
With supplication prone and father's tears,

To accept of ransom for my son their prisoner.
Some much averse I found, and wondrous harsh,
Contemptuous, proud, set on revenge and spite;
That part most reverenc'd Dagon and his priests:
Others more moderate seeming, but their aim
Private reward, for which both God and state
They easily would set to sale: a third
More generous far and civil, who confess'd
They had enough reveng'd; having reduc'd
Their foe to misery beneath their fears,
The rest was magnanimity to remit,
If some convenient ransom were propos'd.
What noise or shout was that? it tore the sky.

Chor. Doubtless the people shouting to behold Their once great dread, captive, and blind before them,

Or at some proof of strength before them shown.
Man. His ransom, if my whole inheritance
May compass it, shall willingly be paid
And number'd down: much rather I shall choose
To live the poorest in my tribe, than richest,
And he in that calamitous prison left.
No, I am fix'd not to part hence without him.
For his redemption all my patrimony,
If need be, I am ready to forego
And quit: not wanting him, I shall want nothing.
Chor. Fathers are wont to lay up for their sons,
Thou for thy son art bent to lay out all;
Sons wont to nurse their parents in old age,
Thou in old age car'st how to nurse thy son,
Made older than thy age through eye-sight lost.
Man. It shall be my delight to tend his eyes,
And view him sitting in the house, ennobled
With all those high exploits by him achiev'd,
And on his shoulders waving down those locks
That of a nation arm'd the strength contain'd:
And I persuade me, God had not permitted
His strength again to grow up with his hair,
Garrison'd round about him like a camp
Of faithful soldiery, were not his purpose
To use him further yet in some great service;
Not to sit idle with so great a gift
Useless, and thence ridiculous about him.
And since his strength with eye-sight was not lost,
God will restore him eye-sight to his strength.
Chor. Thy hopes are not ill-founded, nor seem vain
Of his delivery, and the joy thereon
Conceiv'd, agreeable to a father's love,
In both which we, as next, participate.

[noise!

Man. I know your friendly minds and-O what
Mercy of Heaven, what hideous noise was that,
Horribly loud, unlike the former shout.

Chor. Noise call you it, or universal groan,
As if the whole inhabitation perish'd!
Blood, death, and deathful deeds, are in that noise,
Ruin, destruction at the utmost point.

From whom could else a general cry be heard?
The sufferers then will scarce molest us here;
From other hands we need not much to fear.
What if, his eye-sight (for to Israel's God
Nothing is hard) by miracle restor'd,
He now be dealing dole among his foes,
And over heaps of slaughter'd walk his way?
Man. That were a joy presumptuous to be thought
Chor. Yet God hath wrought things as incredible
For his people of old; what hinders now?

Man. He can, I know, but doubt to think he will,
Yet hope would fain subscribe, and tempts belief.
A little stay will bring some notice hither.

Chor. Of good or bad so great, of bad the sooner;
For evil news rides post, while good news bates.
And to our wish I see one hither speeding,
An Hebrew, as I guess, and of our tribe.

[Enter MESSENGER.]

Mess. O whither shall I run, or which way fly
The sight of this so horrid spectacle,
Which erst my eyes beheld, and yet behold,
For dire imagination still pursues me.
But providence or instinct of nature seems,
Or reason though disturb'd, and scarce consulted,
To have guided me aright, I know not how,
To thee first, reverend Manoah, and to these
My countrymen, whom here I knew remaining,
As at some distance from the place of horror,
So in the sad event too much concern'd.

Man. The accident was loud, and here before thee
With rueful cry, yet what it was we hear not;
No preface needs, thou seest we long to know.

Mess. It would burst forth, but I recover breath
And sense distract, to know well what I utter.

Man. Tell us the sum, the circumstance defer.
Mess. Gaza yet stands, but all her sons are fall'n,
All in a moment overwhelm'd and fall'n.

Man. Sad, but thou know'st to Israelites not saddest
The desolation of a hostile city.
[surfeit.
Mess. Feed on that first: there may in grief be
Man. Relate by whom.

Mess.
Man.

By Samson.

That still lessens

The sorrow, and converts it nigh to joy.
Mess. Ah! Manoah, I refrain too suddenly
To utter what will come at last too soon;
Lest evil tidings with too rude irruption
Hitting thy aged ear should pierce too deep.
Man. Suspense in news is torture, speak them out.
Mess. Take then the worst in brief, Samson is dead.
Man. The worst indeed, O all my hopes de-
feated

To free him hence! but death, who sets all free,
Hath paid his ransom now and full discharge.
What windy joy this day had I conceiv'd
Hopeful of his delivery, which now proves
Abortive as the first-born bloom of spring
Nipt with the lagging rear of winter's frost!
Yet ere I give the reins to grief, say first,

Man. Of ruin indeed methought I heard the noise: How died he; death to life is crown or shame. Oh! it continues, they have slain my son.

Chor. Thy son is rather slaying them: that outcry From slaughter of one foe could not ascend.

Man. Some dismal accident it needs must be; What shall we do, stay here or run and see?

Chor. Best keep together here, lest, running thither,

We unawares run into danger's mouth.

All by him fell, thou say'st: by whom fell he?
What glorious hand gave Samson his death's wound?
Mess. Unwounded of his enemies he fell. [plain.
Man. Wearied with slaughter then, or how? ex-
Mess. By his own hands.
Man.
Self-violence? what cause
Brought him so soon at variance with himself
Among his foes?

Mess.

Inevitable cause, At once both to destroy, and be destroy'd ; The edifice, where all were met to see him, Upon their heads and on his own he pull'd. Man. O lastly over-strong against thyself! A dreadful way thou took'st to thy revenge.

Met from all parts to solemnize this feast.
Samson, with these inmix'd, inevitably
Pull'd down the same destruction on himself;
The vulgar only 'scap'd who stood without.

Chor. O dearly-bought revenge, yet glorious!
Living or dying thou hast fulfill'd

More than enough we know; but while things yet The work for which thou wast foretold

Are in confusion, give us, if thou canst,
Eye-witness of what first or last was done,
Relation more particular and distinct.

Mess. Occasions drew me early to this city;
And, as the gates I enter'd with sun-rise,
The morning trumpets festival proclaim'd
Through each high street: little I had dispatch'd,
When all abroad was rumor'd that this day
Samson should be brought forth, to show the people
Proof of his mighty strength in feats and games;
I sorrow'd at his captive state, but minded
Not to be absent at that spectacle.
The building was a spacious theatre
Half-round, on two main pillars vaulted high,
With seats where all the lords, and each degree
Of sort, might sit in order to behold!
The other side was open, where the throng
On banks and scaffolds under sky might stand;
I among these aloof obscurely stood.

The feast and noon grew high, and sacrifice [wine,
Had fill'd their hearts with mirth, high cheer, and
When to their sports they turn'd. Immediately
Was Samson as a public servant brought,
In their state livery clad; before him pipes,
And timbrels, on each side went armed guards,
Both horse and foot, before him and behind
Archers, and slingers, cataphracts and spears.
At sight of him the people with a shout
Rifted the air, clamoring their god with praise,
Who had made their dreadful enemy their thrall.
He patient, but undaunted, where they led him,
Came to the place; and what was set before him,
Which without help of eye might be assay'd,
To heave, pull, draw, or break, he still perform'd
All with incredible, stupendous force;
None daring to appear antagonist.

At length for intermission's sake they led him
Between the pillars; he his guide requested
(For so from such as nearer stood we heard)
As over-tir'd to let him lean awhile
With both his arms on those two massy pillars,
That to the arched roof gave main support.
He, unsuspicious, led him; which when Samson
Felt in his arms, with head awhile inclin'd,
And eyes fast fix'd he stood, as one who pray'd,
Or some great matter in his mind revolv'd:
At last with head erect thus cried aloud,
"Hitherto, lords, what your commands impos'd
I have perform'd, as reason was, obeying,
Not without wonder or delight beheld:
Now of my own accord such other trial

I mean to show you of my strength, yet greater,
As with amaze shall strike all who behold."
This utter'd, straining all his nerves he bow'd,
As with the force of winds and waters pent,
When mountains tremble, those two massy pillars
With horrible convulsion to and fro

He tugg'd, he shook, till down they came, and drew,
The whole roof after them, with burst of thunder
Upon the heads of all who sat beneath,
Lords, ladies, captains, counsellors, or priests,
Their choice nobility and flower, not only
Of this but each Philistian city round,

To Israel, and now liest victorious
Among thy slain self-kill'd,

Not willingly, but tangled in the fold

Of dire necessity, whose law in death conjoin'd
Thee with thy slaughter'd foes, in number more
Than all thy life hath slain before. [sublime,
1. Semichor. While their hearts were jocund and
Drunk with idolatry, drunk with wine,
And fat regorg'd of bulls and goats,
Chanting their idol, and preferring
Before our living Dread who dwells
In Silo, his bright sanctuary:
Among them he a spirit of frenzy sent,
Who hurt their minds,

And urg'd them on with mad desire
To call in haste for their destroyer;
They, only set on sport and play,
Unweetingly importun'd

Their own destruction to come speedy upon them.
So fond are mortal men,

Fall'n into wrath divine,

As their own ruin on themselves to invite,
Insensate left, or to sense reprobate,

And with blindness internal struck.

2. Semichor. But he, though blind of sight, Despis'd and thought extinguish'd quite, With inward eyes illuminated,

His fiery virtue rous'd

From under ashes into sudden flame,
And as an evening dragon came,
Assailant on the perched roosts
And nests in order rang'd

Of tame villatic fowl; but as an eagle
His cloudless thunder bolted on their heads.
So virtue, given for lost,

Depress'd, and overthrown, as seem'd,
Like that self-begotten bird

In the Arabian woods embost,
That no second knows nor third,
And lay erewhile a holocaust,

From out her ashy womb now teem'd,
Revives, reflourishes, then vigorous most
When most unactive deem'd;

And, though her body die, her fame survives
A secular bird ages of lives.

Man. Come, come; no time for lamentation now, Nor much more cause; Samson hath quit himself Like Samson, and heroicly hath finish'd

A life heroic, on his enemies

Fully reveng'd, hath left them years of mourning,
And lamentation to the sons of Caphtor
Through all Philistian bounds, to Israel
Honor hath left, and freedom, let but them
Find courage to lay hold on this occasion;
To himself and father's house eternal fame;
And, which is best and happiest yet, all this
With God not parted from him, as was fear'd,
But favoring and assisting to the end.
Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail
Or knock the breast; no weakness, no contempt,
Dispraise, or blame; nothing but well and fair,
And what may quiet us in a death so noble.
Let us go find the body where it lies

Soak'd in his enemies' blood; and from the stream
With lavers pure, and cleansing herbs, wash off
The clotted gore. I, with what speed the while,
(Gaza is not in plight to say us nay,)

Will send for all my kindred, all my friends,

To fetch him hence, and solemnly attend

With silent obsequy, and funeral train,

The idle spear and shield were high up hung; The hooked chariot stood

Unstain'd with hostile blood;

The trumpet spake not to the armed throng; And kings sat still with awful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

Home to his father's house: there will I build him But peaceful was the night,

A monument, and plant it round with shade
Of laurel ever-green, and branching palm,
With all his trophies hung, and acts enroll'd
In copious legend, or sweet lyric song.
Thither shall all the valiant youth resort,
And from his memory inflame their breasts
To matchless valor, and adventures high:
The virgins also shall, on feastful days,
Visit his tomb with flowers; only bewailing
His lot unfortunate in nuptial choice,
From whence captivity and loss of eyes.
Chor. All is best, though we oft doubt
What the unsearchable dispose
Of highest Wisdom brings about,
And ever best found in the close,
Oft he seems to hide his face,

But unexpectedly returns,

And to his faithful champion hath in place

Bore witness gloriously; whence Gaza mourns,
And all that band them to resist

His uncontrollable intent;

His servants he, with new acquist

Of true experience, from this great event
With peace and consolation hath dismist.
And calm of mind, all passion spent.

CHRISTMAS HYMN.

IT was the winter wild,
While the Heaven-born child

All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature in awe to him,

Had doff'd her gaudy trim,

With her great Master so to sympathize: It was no season then for her

To wanton with the Sun, her lusty paramour.

Only with speeches fair

She wooes the gentle air

To hide her guilty front with innocent snow;
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinful blame,

The saintly veil of maiden white to throw;
Confounded, that her Maker's eyes
Should look so near upon her foul deformities.

But he, her fears to cease,
Sent down the meek-ey'd Peace;

She, crown'd with olive-green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphere,

His ready harbinger,

With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing; And, waving wide her myrtle wand,

She strikes an universal peace through sea and land.

No war, or battle's sound,

Was heard the world around:

Wherein the Prince of light

His reign of peace upon the Earth began:
The winds, with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kist,

Whispering new joys to the mild ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
[wave.
While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed

The stars, with deep amaze,
Stand fix'd in stedfast gaze,

Bending one way their precious influence;
And will not take their flight,
For all the morning light,

Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence;
But in their glimmering orbs did glow,

Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go.

And, though the shady gloom

Had given day her room,

The Sun himself withheld his wonted speed, And hid his head for shame,

As his inferior flame

The new-enlighten'd world no more should need: He saw a greater Sun appear

[bear.

Than his bright throne, or burning axletree, could

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Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold; And speckled Vanity

Will sicken soon and die,

And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould;

And Hell itself will pass away,

[mourn.
The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets
In consecrated earth,
And on the holy hearth,

[plaint;

The Lars, and Lemures, moan with midnight In urns, and altars round,

A drear and dying sound

Affrights the Flamens at their service quaint; And the chill marble seems to sweat,

While each peculiar Power foregoes his wonted seat.

Peor and Baälim

Forsake their temples dim,

With that twice-batter'd god of Palestine;
And mooned Ashtaroth,

Heaven's queen and mother both,

Now sits not girt with taper's holy shine;
The Libyc Hammon shrinks his horn,

[mourn.

And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day. In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz

Yea, Truth and Justice then

Will down return to men,

Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing, Mercy will sit between,

Thron'd in celestial sheen,

With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering;

And Heaven, as at some festival,

And sullen Moloch, fled,

Hath left in shadows dread

His burning idol all of blackest hue;

In vain with cymbals' ring

They call the grisly king,

In dismal dance about the furnace blue:
The brutish gods of Nile as fast,

Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall. Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.

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So both himself and us to glorify:

Yet first, to those ychain'd in sleep,

[the deep;

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Nought but profoundest Hell can be his shroud; In vain with timbrell'd anthems dark

The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through The sable-stoled sorcerers bear his worshipt ark.

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With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving. No nightly trance, or breathed spell,

Inspires the pale-ey'd priests from the prophetic cell.

So, when the Sun in bed,

Curtain'd with cloudy red,

The flocking shadows pale

Troop to the infernal jail,

Each fetter'd ghost slips to his several grave; And the yellow-skirted Fayes

[maze.

Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-lov'd

But see, the Virgin blest

Hath laid her babe to rest;

Time is, our tedious song should here have ending:
Heaven's youngest-teemed star
Hath fix'd her polish'd car,

Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending
And all about the courtly stable
Bright-harness'd angels sit in order serviceable.

EDMUND WALLER.

EDMUND WALLER, born at Coleshill, Hertford-1

Waller had a brother-in-law, named Tomkyns shire, in March, 1605, was the son of Robert Wal- who was clerk of the queen's council, and possessler, Esq., a gentleman of an ancient family and good ed great influence in the city among the warm fortune, who married a sister of the celebrated John loyalists. On consulting together, they thought it Hampden. The death of his father during his infancy would be possible to raise a powerful party, which left him heir to an estate of 3500l. a year, at that might oblige the parliament to adopt pacific measperiod an ample fortune. He was educated first at ures, by resisting the payment of the taxes levied Eton, whence he was removed to King's College for the support of the war. About this time Sir in Cambridge. His election to parliament was as Nicholas Crispe formed a design of more dangerous early as between his sixteenth or seventeenth year; import, which was that of exciting the king's and it was not much later that he made his appear- friends in the city to an open resistance of the auance as a poet and it is remarkable that a copy of thority of parliament; and for that purpose he obverses which he addressed to Prince Charles, in his tained a commission of array from his majesty. eighteenth year, exhibits a style and character of This plan appears to have been originally unconversification as perfectly formed as those of his nected with the other; yet the commission was maturest productions. He again served in parlia-made known to Waller and Tomkyns, and the whole ment before he was of age; and he continued his was compounded into a horrid and dreadful plot. services to a later period. Not insensible of the Waller and Tomkyns were apprehended, when the value of wealth, he augmented his paternal fortune pusillanimity of the former disclosed the whole by marriage with a rich city heiress. In the long secret. "He was so confounded with fear," (says intermissions of parliament which occurred after Lord Clarendon,) "that he confessed whatever he 1628, he retired to his mansion of Beaconsfield, had heard, said, thought, or seen, all that he knew where he continued his classical studies, under the of himself, and all that he suspected of others, withdirection of his kinsman Morley, afterwards bishop out concealing any person, of what degree or qualiof Winchester; and he obtained admission to a ty soever, or any discourse which he had ever upon society of able men and polite scholars, of whom any occasion entertained with them." The concluLord Falkland was the connecting medium. sion of this business was, that Tomkyns, and ChaWaller became a widower at the age of twenty- loner, another conspirator, were hanged, and that five: he did not, however, spend much time in Waller was expelled the House, tried, and conmourning, but declared himself the suitor of Lady demned; but after a year's imprisonment, and a fine Dorothea Sydney, eldest daughter of the Earl of of ten thousand pounds, was suffered to go into Leicester, whom he has immortalized under the exile. He chose Rouen for his first place of foreign poetical name of Saccharissa. She is described by exile, where he lived with his wife till his removal him as a majestic and scornful beauty; and he to Paris. In that capital he maintained the appearseems to delight more in her contrast, the gentler ance of a man of fortune, and entertained hospitaAmoret, who is supposed to have been a Lady So- bly, supporting this style of living chiefly by the phia Murray. Neither of these ladies, however, sale of his wife's jewels. At length, after the lapse was won by his poetic strains; and, like another of ten years, being reduced to what he called his man, he consoled himself in a second marriage. rump jewel, he thought it time to apply for perWhen the king's necessities compelled him, in mission to return to his own country. He obtained 1640, once more to apply to the representatives this license, and was also restored to his estate, of the people, Waller, who was returned for Ag- though now diminished to half its former rental. mondesham, decidedly took part with the members Here he fixed his abode, at a house built by himwho thought that the redress of grievances should self, at Beaconsfield; and he renewed his courtly precede a vote for supplies; and he made an ener- strains by adulation to Cromwell, now Protector, getic speech on the occasion. He continued during to whom his mother was related. To this usurper three years to vote in general with the Opposition the noblest tribute of his muse was paid. in the Long Parliament, but did not enter into all When Charles II. was restored to the crown, their measures. In particular, he employed much and past character was lightly regarded, the stains cool argument against the proposal for the abolition of that of Waller were forgotten, and his wit and of Episcopacy; and he spoke with freedom and poetry procured him notice at court, and admission severity against some other plans of the House. to the highest circles. He had also sufficient inIn fact, he was at length become a zealous loyalist terest to obtain a seat in the House of Commons, in his inclinations; and his conduct under the dif- in all the parliaments of that reign. The king's ficulties into which this attachment involved him gracious manners emboldened him to ask for the became a source of his indelible disgrace. A short vacant place of provost of Eton college, which was narrative will suffice for the elucidation of this granted him; but Lord Clarendon, then Lord Chancellor, refused to set the seal to the grant, alleging

matter.

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