THE MOTTO. "Tentanda via est, &c." WHAT shall I do to be for ever known, Whilst others great, by being born, are grown; In this scale gold, in th' other fame does lie, If I, her vulgar stone, for either look, Out of myself it must be strook. Yet I must on; What sound is't strikes mine ear? It sounds like the last trumpet; for it can Unpast Alps stop me; but I'll cut them all, Hence, the desire of honours or estate, Hence, Love himself, that tyrant of my days! Come, my best friends, my books! and lead me on; "T is time that I were gone. Welcome, great Stagyrite! and teach me now Thy scholar's victories thou dost far out-do; He conquer'd th' earth, the whole world you. Welcome, learn'd Cicero! whose blest tongue and wit Preserves Rome's greatness yet: Thou art the first of Orators; only he Who best can praise thee, next must be. But you have climb'd the mountain's top, there sit And, whilst with wearied steps we upward go, ODE. O F WIT. TELL me, O tell, what kind of thing is Wit, For the first matter loves variety less; A thousand different shapes it bears, Comely in thousand shapes appears. Yonder we saw it plain; and here 't is now, Like spirits, in a place we know not how. London, that vents of false ware so much store, For men, led by the colour and the shape, Some things do through our judgment pass And sometimes, if the object be too far, Hence 't is a Wit, that greatest word of fame, And Wits by our creation they become, Admir'd with laughter at a feast, Nor florid talk, which can that title gain; The proofs of Wit for ever must remain. "T is not to force some lifeless verses meet All, every-where, like man's, must be the soul, Such were the numbers which could call The stones into the Theban wall. Such miracles are ceas'd; and now we see Yet 't is not to adorn and gild each part; Jewels at nose and lips but ill appear; Rather than all things Wit, let none be there. If there be nothing else between. Men doubt, because they stand so thick i'th'sky, If those be stars which paint the Galaxy. 'Tis not when two like words make up one noise (Jests for Dutch men and English boys); In which who finds out Wit, the same may see In an'grams and acrostick poetry: Much less can that have any place At which a virgin hides her face; Such dross the fire must purge away: 't is just The author blush there, where the reader must. 'Tis not such lines as almost crack the stage And force some odd similitude.. What is it then, which, like the Power Divine, In a true piece of Wit all things must be, As in the ark, join'd without force or strife, Or, as the primitive forms of all (If we compare great things with small) Which, without discord or confusion, lie In that strange mirror of the Deity. But Love, that moulds one man up out of two, Makes me forget, and injure you: you for myself, sure, when I thought you in any thing were to be taught. I took That Correct my error with thy pen; And, if any ask me then What thing right Wit and height of Genius is, TO THE LORD FALKLAND, FOR HIS SAFE RETURN FROM THE NORTHERN EXPEDITION AGAINST THE SCOTS. GREAT is thy charge, O North! be wise and just, All things that are but writ or printed there, There all the sciences together meet, And every art does all her kindred greet, |