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Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying:
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, O think it worth enjoying;
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,

Take the good the gods provide thee-
The many rend the skies with loud applause;
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair,

Who caused his care,

And sighed and looked, sighed and looked, Sighed and looked, and sighed again; At length, with love and wine at once oppressed, The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.

CHORUS

The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair

Who caused his care,

And sighed and looked, sighed and looked,
Sighed and looked, and sighed again;

At length, with love and wine at once oppressed,
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.

VI.

Now strike the golden lyre again;
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleep asunder,

And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark! the horrid sound

Has raised up his head;

As awaked from the dead,

And amazed, he stares around. Revenge, revenge! Timotheus cries, See the furies arise;

See the snakes, that they rear,

How they hiss in their hair,

And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a glastly band,

Each a torch in his hand!

Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain,
And, unburied, remain
Inglorious on the plain:
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.

Behold how they toss their torches on high,

How they point to the Persian abodes,
And glittering temples of their hostile gods.-
The princes applaud, with a furious joy,

And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,

To light him to his prey,

And, like another Helen, fired another Troy.

CHORUS

And the King seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy; Thais led the way,

To light him to his prey,

And, like another Helen, fired another Troy.

Thus, long ago,

VII.

Ere heaving bellows learned to blow,
While organs yet were mute,
Timotheus, to his breathing flute,

And sounding lyre,

Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,

Inventress of the vocal frame;

The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,

With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before. Let old Timotheus yield the prize,

Or both divide the crown;

He raised a mortal to the skies,

She drew an angel down.

GRAND CHORUS

At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame:
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,

Or both divide the crown;
He raised a mortal to the skies,
She drew an angel down.

UNDER MR. MILTON'S PICTURE

Three poets, in three distant ages born,
Greece, Italy, and England, did adorn.
The first, in loftiness of thought surpassed;
The next, in majesty; in both the last.
The force of Nature could no further go;
To make a third, she joined the former two.

Matthew Prior

1664-1721

TO A CHILD OF QUALITY FIVE YEARS OLD. MDCCIV

THE AUTHOR THEN FORTY

(From Poems on Several Occasions, 1709)

Lords, knights, and 'squires the numerous band,
That wear the fair Miss Mary's fetters,
Were summoned by her high command,
To show their passions by their letters.

My pen among the rest I tɔok,

Lest those bright eyes that cannot read
Should dart their kindling fires, and look
The power they have to be obeyed.

Nor quality, nor reputation,

Forbid me yet my flame to tell,

Dear five years old befriends my passion,
And I may write till she can spell.

For, while she makes her silk-worm's beds,
With all the tender things I swear;
Whilst all the house my passion reads,
In papers round her baby's hair;

She may receive and own my flame,

For though the strictest prudes should know it,
She'll pass for a most virtuous dame,
And I for an unhappy poet.

Then, too, alas! when she shall tear
The lines some younger rival sends;
She'll give me leave to write, I fear,

And we shall still continue friends.

For, as our different ages move,

'Tis so ordained, (would Fate but mend it!) That I shall be past making love, When she begins to comprehend it.

A BETTER ANSWER

Dear Chloe, how blubbered is that pretty face! Thy cheek all on fire, and thy hair all uncurled: Pr'ythee quit this caprice; and (as old Falstaff says),

Let us e'en talk a little like folks of this world.

How cans't thou presume, thou hast leave to destroy

The beauties, which Venus but lent to thy keeping?

Those looks were designed to inspire love and joy: More ordinary eyes may serve people for weeping.

To be vexed at a trifle or two that I writ,

Your judgment at once, and my passion you

wrong:

You take that for fact, which will scarce be found wit:

Od's life! must one swear to the truth of a

song?

What I speak, my fair Chloe, and what I write, shows

The difference there is betwixt nature and art: I court others in verse; but I love thee in prose: And they have my whimsies; but thou hast my

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