UPON THE BLESSED RETVRN OF OUR Gracious Sovereign KING CHARLES The Second.
Presented to his sacred Majesty by a Person of Honour the next day.
The Proeme.
WHat Pen is fitting to salute a King?
Lend me a Quill pluck'd from an Angels wing.
My Muse doth tremble, and my hand doth shake,
Whil'st that my
King I do my
Subject make.
So tender am I to my Sovereign's Name,
I fear the Press, whil'st that it stamps the same:
Hold, Printers, hold, pray stop your hands again,
Let
Jove impress it in his
Charles his Wain.
Heav'n's milky path suits best for papyr here,
And golden Letters from the starry Sphear.
Yet since my knee, nor yet Poetick feet
Bow'd e're to
Baal, or Times-Idol greet:
Since mouth ne're swore, nor yet subscrib'd my hand,
A Poets feet in loyal verse may stand:
On
Pegasus now mounted will I style
My Poem a Troop to lead in rank and file.
The Wish.
LET Canons speak it with their Brazen lungs,
Let Muskets shout it with their iron tongues;
Let Towr's and Steeples now instead of Knells,
Chime with their Canons, Volleys sound with Bells.
Let Squibs and Crackers ring their Peals of joyes,
Let old decrepid men turn skipping boyes.
Let frozen Stoicks melt; our
vowed Dads
Drop off their snowy beards, turn smooth-cheek Lads.
Let Poets toss their Laurels up, and try
To lodge them on the Blew slate-Eves of th' Sky.
Let th' Muses fill each head, their Conduits may
Through their Quil-pipe run Hippocrene to day.
Let th' British Island frisk a Water Daunce,
Like the Nymph
Isles of
Lydia let them prance.
Let now the Irish waves like th'
Attick Sea,
Sound like an Harp, and quaver Harmonye.
Let both the
York and the
Lancastrian Rose,
Which in War's
Limbeck was distill'd by foes:
Let it so spring, that all the world may say,
Alt'ring the Proverb,
like a Rose in May.
Let the
Scotch Thistle yield up all her down,
To ease the Travels of the tossed Crown.
Let the
French Lily with its silver Bell,
And jealous Clapper ring our joy, their Knell.
Let Souldiers now no more from
Cromwel's Nose
Be Blazon'd
Red Coats, but from
Charles his Rose.
O let, that blazing Comet be accurst,
For its predicting death to
Charles the First:
That
Nebuchadnezzar's furnace and the Urn
Where
Charl's three Children were condemn'd to burn.
Hadn'to our
Moses God himself been seen:
For
Elohim both God and Oak doth mean.
'Twould be no Legend sure, if I should say
The withered Oaks grow fresh and plump to day.
Let trees who have their mossie rugs for age
Skip at this News upon the grassie stage.
In fine, the Church of
England let us see,
To day not Militant, but Triumphant be.
Let old decrepid
Pauls, whose palsie head,
Bare to the scull was ev'n trapanned dead;
Let it revive with joy, to think it shall
Have a new Birth-day, not a Funeral.
Let not Religion come to this, we must
Pull down the Altar to set up a
Just.
Let
Moses, Jesus, Gospel and the Law,
Ne're more be hid in Reeds, or laid in Straw;
Let never such contempt in Churches reign,
As in the Manger lay our Christ again.
CHARLES STƲART
Ana—gramme
A Rachel's Trust.
ENgland thy
Rachel is, thy
Leah we
May
Scotland call, first marry'd unto thee.
Had
Monk thy
Laban been, we surely know,
Th' hadst marry'd been to
Rachel long ago.
England his love can ne're mistrust 'tis true,
Which twelve years waited for what first was due.
The Embleme of our English Times.
Vivat CAROLVS. II. Augustissimus Magnae Britanniae REX.
HAs not the world been round? our Times can say
This giddy age was turned every day.
Spare, spare such pains, of which no need at all;
The World is round enough for Fortunes ball.
Some that did see these precious shavings lye
Under the Lathe, strait covet with their eye.
The parings of this golden Apple they
With wide-mouth'd bags gape after every day.
One on his Pike a golden Pippin sets;
Another hedg-hog a Queen Apple gets.
See how the Royal Rose was stole by such,
Who left their Sovereign but the Thorny bush.
It seems that fruit, which they a Crab did call,
So sweet it was, they would devour'd it all.
But what's the Tool hath turn'd our British sphear?
Not the smooth Chizel, but the Pike and Speare.
Hence drops the Scepter; there a royal Jem,
Here falls a
George, and there a Diadem.
Sweet Angel leave thy turning, and but see,
What kind of men these shavings steal from thee.
Well then! if that my Muse this sacred time,
'Stead of
Parnassus may
Olympus climbe,
A wheel within a wheel I shall descry,
Not
Cupid turning, but the watchful eye.
For th' hand of th' Dyall stands now where't begun,
Twelve years are past, and we are come to
One.
Kingdomes are Watches, and their Native King,
His Scepter is the Hand, himself the Spring.
The Crown-wheel keeps the other wheels in awe,
Justice the Ballance, and its string the Law.
God grant now of our Watch it may be sain,
Once more wound up shall ne're go down again.
The concluding Embleme.
JOHANNES LAWSON
HEav'n bad the Angels cry aloud to
Fame
To blow the Trumpet in our Sovereigns Name.
Just
Fame obeys and sounds it in the Eares
Of
Englands Commons and the Noble Peeres.
Both Houses meet, and Vote the Droven Bees
With their Great King, are welcom when they please.
White-Hall and all the Palaces do strive
To be unto this honey-dew a Hive.
When
Neptune heard the News, he swell'd with pride,
To think our Sovereign on his back should ride:
Forthwith he Courtier turn'd, to make him fine,
Besnow'd his curled Locks against the Time;
But when he saw our
Charles, no more he raves,
But's Trident Kembeth smooth his tangled Waves.
Now th' wildernesse is pass'd, now
Canaan found,
Our Crown is landed, and our Land is Crown'd.
With milk and honey doth white
Albion flow;
The silver and the golden Mint will goe;
This day for
Englands Vintage wee'll allow,
Since very Conduits turn wine-presses now.
Sure
Charles his presence can't but be Divine,
That turnes our Water thus to purest Wine.
Charles the best Christian does
Assurance gain;
The World will witness that he's born again.
Johan. Lawson. M. D. de Coll.
Lond.
In the first Year of Englands restored Liberty and Happinesse.
LONDON, Printed by Thomas Ratcliffe, 1660.