XIV.

ON THE RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF MRS. CATHERINE

THOMSON,
MY CHRISTIAN FRIEND, DECEASED 16TII DEC. 1646.
WHEN faith and love, which parted from thee never,

Had ripen’d thy just soul to dwell with God,
Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load

Of death, call'd life; which us from life doth sever.
Thy works, and alms, and all thy good endeavour,

Stay'd not behind, nor in the grave were trod;
But, as Faith pointed with her golden rod,

Follow'd thee up to joy and bliss for ever.
Love led them on, and Faith, who knew them best

Thy handmaids, clad them o'er with purple beams

And azure wings, that up they flew so drest,
And spake the truth of thee on glorious themes

Before the Judge, who thenceforth bid thee rest
And drink thy fill of pure immortal streams.

XV.

TO THE LORD GENERAL FAIRFAX.?

1648.
FAIRFAX, whose name in arms through Europe rings,

Filling each mouth with envy or with praise,
And all her jealous monarchs with amaze

And rumours loud, that daunt remotest kings,
Thy firm unshaken virtue ever brings

Victory home, though new rebellions raise
Their Hydra heads, and the false North displays
Her broken league 3 to imp their serpent wings.

3

Vhen Milton was first made Latin etary to Cromwell, he lodged at a Mr. omson's, next to the “Bull Head" rern, Charing Cross. Mrs. Thomson upposed to have been the wife of his dlord.-NEWTON. Addressed to Fairfax at the siege of chester. It was first printed, to

gether with the two following sonnets, and the two to Cyriack Skinner, at the end of Phillips's “ Life of Milton,” 1694.

O yet a nobler task awaits thy hand,

(For what can war, but endless war still breed ?)

Till truth and right from violence be freed,
And public faith clear'd from the shameful brand

Of public fraud. In vain doth valour bleed,
While avarice and rapitie share the land.

TO THE LORD ĠENERAL CROMWELL.

1652.
CROMWELL, our chief of men, who through a cloud

Not of war only, but detractions rude,
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude,

To peace and truth thy glorious way hast plough'd,
And on the neck of crowned fortune proud

Hast rear'd God's trophies, and his work pursued,
While Darwen stream with blood of Scots imbrued,

And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud,
And Worcester's ? laureat wreath. Yet much remains

To conquer still; peace hath her victories

No less renown'd than war: new foes arise
Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains : 3

Help us to save free conscience from the páw
Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.

XVII.

TO SIR HENRY VANE THE YOUNGER.'

1652.
VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old,

Than whom a better senator ne'er held
The helm of Rome, when gowns not arms repell’d

The fierce Epirot and the African bold,
Whether to settle peace, or to unfold

The drift of hollow states a hard to be spell’d,
Then to advise how war may, best upheld,

Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold
In all her equipage: besides to know

Both spiritual pow'r and civil, what each means,

What severs each, thou hast learn'd, which few have The bounds of either sword to

done : Therefore on thy firm hand Religion leans In peace, and reckons thee her eldest son.

we owe:

AVENGE, O Lord, thy slaughter'd saints, whose bones
Lie scatter'd on the Alpine

mountains cold ;
Ev'n them who kept thy truth so pure of old,
When all our fathers worshipp'd stocks and stones,

Forget not: in thy book record their

groans Who were thy sheep, and in their ancient fold Slain by the bloody Piedmontese that rollid

Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans The vales redoubled to the hills, and they

To Heav'n. Their martvr'd blood and ashes sow

O'er all th' Italian fields, where still doth sway
The triple tyrant;' that from these may, grow

A hundred fold, who having learn'd thy way
Early may fly the Babylonian woe.:

1

XIX.

ON HIS BLINDNESS.

WHEN I consider how my light is spent

Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide,

Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present

My true account, lest he returning chide ;
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied P"

I fondly ask: But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, “God doth not need

Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best

Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best: his state Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed,

And post o'er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait."

XX

TO MR. LAWRENCE.

LAWRENCE, of virtuous father virtuous son,

Now that the fields are dank, and ways are mire,
Where shall we sometimes meet, and by the fire
Help waste a sullen day, what may

be won
From the hard season gaining ? Time will run

On smoother, till Favonius ? re-inspire
The frozen earth, and clothe in fresh attire

The lily and rose, that neither sow'd nor spun.
What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice,

Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise

To hear the lute well touch'd, or artful voice
Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air ?

He who of those delights can judge, and spare
To interpose them oft, is not unwise.

XXI.

TO CYRIAC SKINNER.

3

CYRIAC, whose grandsire : on the royal bench

Of British Themis, with no mean applause
Pronounced and in his volumes taught our laws,

Which others at their bar so often wrench;
To-day deep thoughts resolve with me to drench

In mirth, that after po repenting draws;
Let Euclid rest and Archimedes pause,
And what the Swede 4 intends, and what the French.