Some Carolina, to heaven's dictates true,
Who, while the sceptred rivals vainly sue,
Thy inborn worth with conscious eyes shall see,
And slight the imperial diadem for thee.
Pleased with the prospect of successive reigns,
The tuneful tribe no more in daring strains
Shall vindicate, with pious fears oppressed,
Endangered rights, and liberty distressed:
To milder sounds each Muse shall tune the lyre,
And gratitude, and faith to kings inspire,
And filial love; bid impious discord cease,
And soothe the madding factions into peace;
Or rise ambitious in more lofty lays,
And teach the nation their new monarch's praise, 40 Describe his awful look and godlike mind,
And Cæsar's power with Cato's virtue joined.
Meanwhile, bright Princess, who, with graceful ease And native majesty, are formed to please, Behold those arts with a propitious eye, That suppliant to their great protectress fly! Then shall they triumph, and the British stage Improve her manners and refine her rage, More noble characters expose to view, And draw her finished heroines from you. Nor you the kind indulgence will refuse, Skilled in the labours of the deathless Muse: The deathless Muse with undiminished rays Through distant times the lovely dame conveys: To Gloriana1 Waller's harp was strung; The queen still shines, because the poet sung. Even all those graces, in your frame combined, The common fate of mortal charms may find,
1 'Gloriana:' Henrietta Maria, Queen of Charles I. See our edition of Waller.
(Content our short-lived praises to engage,
The joy and wonder of a single age,)
Unless some poet in a lasting song
To late posterity their fame prolong,
Instruct our sons the radiant form to prize.
And see your beauty with their fathers' eyes.
TO SIR GODFREY KNELLER ON HIS
PICTURE OF THE KING.2
KNELLER, with silence and surprise
We see Britannia's monarch rise,
A godlike form, by thee displayed
In all the force of light and shade;
And, awed by thy delusive hand,
As in the presence-chamber stand.
The magic of thy art calls forth
His secret soul and hidden worth,
His probity and mildness shows,
His care of friends and scorn of foes:
In every stroke, in every line,
Does some exalted virtue shine,
And Albion's happiness we trace
Through all the features of his face.
Oh may I live to hail the day,
When the glad nation shall survey
Their sovereign, through his wide command,
Passing in progress o'er the land!
Each heart shall bend, and every voice
In loud applauding shouts rejoice,
1 Sir Godfrey Kneller:' born at Lubeck in 1648; became a painter of portraits; visited England; was knighted by William III.; died in 1723; lies in Westminster Abbey. This refers to a portrait of George I.
Whilst all his gracious aspect praise,
And crowds grow loyal as they gaze.
This image on the medal placed,
With its bright round of titles graced,
And stamped on British coins, shall live,
To richest ores the value give,
Or, wrought within the curious mould,
Shape and adorn the running gold.
To bear this form, the genial sun
Has daily, since his course begun,
Rejoiced the metal to refine,
And ripened the Peruvian mine.
Thou, Kneller, long with noble pride,
The foremost of thy art, hast vied
With nature in a generous strife,
And touched the canvas into life.
Thy pencil has, by monarchs sought,
From reign to reign in ermine wrought,
And, in their robes of state arrayed,
The kings of half an age displayed.
Here swarthy Charles appears, and there
His brother with dejected air:
Triumphant Nassau here we find,
And with him bright Maria joined;
There Anna, great as when she sent
Her armies through the continent,
Ere yet her hero was disgraced:
Oh may famed Brunswick be the last,
(Though heaven should with my wish
And long preserve thy art in thee,)
The last, the happiest British king,
Whom thou shalt paint, or I shall sing!
Wise Phidias, thus his skill to prove,
Through many a god advanced to Jove,
And taught the polished rocks to shine
With airs and lineaments divine;
Till Greece, amazed, and half afraid,
The assembled deities surveyed.
Great Pan, who wont to chase the fair,
And loved the spreading oak, was there;
Old Saturn too, with up-cast eyes,
Beheld his abdicated skies;
And mighty Mars, for war renowned,
In adamantine armour frowned;
By him the childless goddess rose,
Minerva, studious to compose
Her twisted threads; the web she strung,
And o'er a loom of marble hung:
Thetis, the troubled ocean's queen,
Matched with a mortal, next was seen,
Reclining on a funeral urn,
Her short-lived darling son to mourn.
The last was he, whose thunder slew
The Titan race, a rebel crew,
That, from a hundred hills allied
In impious leagues, their king defied.
This wonder of the sculptor's hand
Produced, his art was at a stand:
For who would hope new fame to raise,
Or risk his well-established praise,
That, his high genius to approve,
Had drawn a GEORGE, or carved a Jove!
WHERE gentle Thames through stately channels glides, And England's proud metropolis divides;
A lofty fabric does the sight invade,
And stretches o'er the waves a pompous shade; Whence sudden shouts the neighbourhood surprise, And thundering claps and dreadful hissings rise. Here thrifty R 1 hires monarchs by the day,
And keeps his mercenary kings in pay;
With deep-mouth'd actors fills the vacant scenes,
And rakes the stews for goddesses and queens:
Here the lewd punk, with crowns and sceptres graced,
Teaches her eyes a more majestic cast;
And hungry monarchs with a numerous train
Of suppliant slaves, like Sancho, starve and reign.
But enter in, my Muse; the stage survey,
And all its pomp and pageantry display;
Trap-doors and pit-falls, form the unfaithful ground,
And magic walls encompass it around:.
On either side maim'd temples fill our eyes,
And intermixed with brothel-houses rise;
Disjointed palaces in order stand,
And groves obedient to the mover's hand
O'ershade the stage, and flourish at command.
A stamp makes broken towns and trees entire:
So when Amphion struck the vocal lyre,
He saw the spacious circuit all around,
With crowding woods and rising cities crown'd.
But next the tiring-room survey, and see
False titles, and promiscuous quality,
|