HIS MAJEST
AJESTY'.
PRESENTED TO THE LORD KEEPER.
THE RIGHT HON. SIR JOHN SOMERS. LORD KEEPER OF THE GREAT SEAL,
F yet your thoughts are loose from state affairs,
Nor feel the burden of a kingdom's cares;
If yet your time and actions are your own;
Receive the prefent of a Muse unknown:
A Mufe that, in adventurous numbers, fings
The rout of armies, and the fall of Kings,
Britain advanc'd, and Europe's peace reftor'd,
By Somers' counfels, and by Naffau's sword.
To you, my Lord, these daring thoughts belong
Who help'd to raise the subject of my song;
To you the hero of my verfe reveals
His great designs, to you in council tells
His inmoft thoughts, determining the doom
Of towns unstorm'd, and battles yet to come.
And well could you, in your immortal strains,
Defcribe his conduct, and reward his pains :
But, fince the ftate has all your cares ingrofs'd,
And poetry in higher thoughts is loft,
Attend to what a leffer Muse indites,
Pardon her faults, and countenance her flights.
On you, my Lord, with anxious fear I wait,
And from your judgement must expect my fate,
Who, free from vulgar paffions, are above
Degrading envy, or misguided love;
If you, well pleas'd, shall smile upon my lays,
Secure of fame, my voice I'll boldly raise,
For next to what you write, is what you praife.
HEN now the bufinefs of the field is o'er,
The trumpets fleep, and cannons cease to roar,
every difinal echo is decay'd,
And all the thunder of the battle laid;
Attend, aufpicious prince; and let the Mufe
In humble accents milder thoughts infufe.
Others, in bold prophetic numbers skill'd,
Set thee in arms, and led thee to the field;
My Muse expecting on the British strand
Waits thy return, and welcomes thee to land:
She oft has feen thee preffing on the foe,
When Europe was concern'd in every blow;
But durft not in heroic ftrains rejoice;
The trumpets, drums, and cannons drown'd, her voice :
She faw the Boyne run thick with human gore,
And floating corps lie beating on the shore ;
She faw thee climb the banks, but try'd in vain
To trace her Hero through the dusty plain,
When through the thick embattled lines he broke,
Now plung'd amidst the foes, now loft in clouds of fmoke,
O that fome Muse, renown'd for lofty verse,
In daring numbers would thy toils rehearse !
Draw thee belov'd in peace, and fear'd in wars,
Inur'd to noon-day fweats, and mid-night cares!
But ftill the God-like man, by fome hard fate,
Receives the glory of his toils too late ;
Too late the verse the mighty act fucceeds,
One age the hero, one the poet breeds.
A thousand years in full fucceffion ran,
Ere Virgil rais'd his voice, and fung the man
Who, driven by stress of fate, such dangers bore
On ftormy feas, and a difaftrous fhore,
Before he fettled in the promis'd earth,
And gave the empire of the world its birth.
Troy long had found the Grecians bold and fierce,
Ere Homer mufter'd up their troops in verse;
Long had Achilles quell'd the Trojans' luft,
And laid the labour of the gods in duft,
Before the towering Mufe began her flight,
And drew the hero raging in the fight,
Engag'd in tented fields and rolling floods,
Or flaughtering mortals, or a match for gods.
And here, perhaps, by fate's unerring doom,
Some mighty bard lies hid in years to come,
That shall in William's god-like acts engage,
And with his battles warm a future age,
Hibernian fields fhall here thy conquests fhow,
And Boyne be fung, when it has ceas'd to flow;
Here Gallic labours fhall advance thy fame,
And here Seneffe fhall wear another name.
Our late pofterity, with fecret dread,
Shall view thy battles, and with pleasure read
How, in the bloody field too near advanc'd,
The guiltless bullet on thy shoulder glanc'd.
The race of Naflau was by Heaven defign'd
To curb the proud oppreffors of mankind.
To bind the tyrants of the earth with laws,
And fight in every injur'd nation's cause,
The world's great patriots; they for justice call;
And, as they favour, kingdoms rife or fall,
Our British youth, unus'd to rough alarms,
Careless of fame, and negligent of arms,
Had long forgot to meditate the foe,
And heard unwarm'd the martial trumpet blow;
But now infpir'd by thee, with fresh delight,
Their fwords they brandish, and require the fight,
Renew their ancient conquefts on the main,
And act their fathers' triumphs o'er again;
Fir'd, when they hear how Agincourt was ftrow'd
With Gallic corps, and Creffi swam in blood,
With eager warmth they fight, ambitious all
Who firft fhall ftorm the breach, or mount the wall.
In vain the thronging enemy by force
Would clear the ramparts, and repel their course;
They break through all, for William leads the way,
Where fires rage most, and loudest engines play.
Namur's late terrors and destruction fhow,
What William, warm'd with just revenge, can do:
Where once a thousand turrets rais'd on high
Their gilded spires, and glitter'd in the sky,
An undiftinguifh'd heap of duft is found,
And all the pile lies fmoking on the ground.
His toils, for no ignoble ends design'd,
Promote the common welfare of mankind;
No wild ambition moves, but Europe's fears,
The cries of orphans, and the widow's tears :
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