40

Or for some Idol of thy Fancy draw,

35 Some loose-gown'd dame ; O courage made of straw! Thus, desp’rate Coward! would'st thou bold appear, Yet when thy God has plac'd thee Centry here, To thy own foes, to bis, ignobly yield, And leave, for wars forbid, th' appointed field ?

Know thy own foes; th' Apoftate Angel, he You strive to please, the foremost of the Three; He makes the pleasures of his realm the bait, But can be give for Love, that acts in Hate ? The World's thy second Love, thy second Foe, 45 The World, whose beauties perish as they blow, They fly, she fades herself, and at the best You grasp a wither'd strumper to your breast. The Flesh is next, which in fruition wastes, High Aush'd with all the sensual joys it tastes, 50 While men the fair, the goodly Soul destroy, From whence the flesh has pow'r to taste a joy.

Seekst thou Religion, primitively sound Well, gentle friend, but where may she be found? By Faith Implicite blind Ignaro led,

55 Thinks the bright Seraph from his Country filed, And seeks her seat at Rome, because we know She there was seen a thousand years ago; And loves her Relick rags, as men obey The foot-cloth where the Prince fat yesterday. 60

These pageant Forms are whining Obed's scorn, Who seeks Religion at Geneva born,

a

A sullen thing, whose coarseness fuits the crowd,
Tho' young, unhandsome; tho' unhandsome, proud :
Thus, with the wanton, some perversely judge 65
All girls unhealthy but the Country drudge.

No foreign fchemes make easy Cæpio roam,
The man contented takes his Church at home;
Nay should come Preachers, servile bawds of gain,
Should some new Laws, which like new-fashions reign,
Command his faith to count Salvation ty'd

71 To visit his, and visit none beside, He grants Salvation centers in his own, And grants it centers but in his alone : From youth to age he grasps the proffer'd dame, 75 And they confer his Faith, who give his Name : So from the Guardian's hands, the Wards who live Enthrallid to Guardians, take the wives they give.

From all professions careless Airy flies, For, all professions can't be good, he cries,

80
And here a fault, and there another views,
And lives unfix'd for want of heart to chuse:
So men, who know what some loose girls have done,
For fear of marrying such, will marry none.

The Charms of all obsequious Courtly strike;
On each he doats, on each åttends alike;
And thinks, as diff'rent countries deck the dame,
The dresses altering, and the sex the same;
So fares Religion, chang'd in outward show,
But 'tis Religion still, where'er we go :

a

85

100

This blindness springs from an excess of light,
And men embrace the wrong to chuse the right,

But thou of force must one Religion own,
And only one, and that the Right alone.
To find that. Right one, ask thy Rev'rend Sire ; 95
Let him of his, and him of his enquire;
Tho' Truth and Falsood seem as twins ally’d,
There's Eldership on Truth's delightful side,
Her seek with heed who seeks the foundeft First

--
Is not of No Religion, nor the worst.
T'adore, or scorn an Image, or protest,
May all be bad: doubt wisely for the best;
'Twere wrong to sleep, or headlong run aftray ;
It is not wand'ring, to inquire the way.

.
On a large mountain, at the Basis wide,

105
Steep to the top, and craggy at the fide,
Sits sacred Truth enthron'd; and he who means
To reach the summit, mounts with weary pains,
Winds round and round, and ev'ry turn essays
Where sudden breaks resist the shorter

ways.
Yet labour so, that, ere faint
Thy searching foul poffefs her Rest alive;
To work by twilight were to work too late,
And Age is twilight to the night of fate.
To will alone, is but to mean delay;
To work at present is the use of day,
For man's employ much thought and deed remain,
High Thoughts the Soul, hard deeds the body strain :

I10

age arrive,

115

And Myst'ries ask believing, which to View
Like the fair Sun, are plain, but dazzling too.

120
Be Truth, so found, with sacred heed pofseft,
Not Kings have pow'r to tear it from thy breast;
By no blank Charters harm they where they hate,
Nor are they Vicars, but the Hands of Fate.
Ah! fool and wretch, who let'st thy soul be ty'd 125
To human Laws! Or must it so be try'd ?
Or will it boot thee, at the latest day,
When Judgment fits, and Justice asks thy plea,
That Philip that, or Gregʻry taught thee this,
Or John or Martin ? All may teach amiss:
?

130 For, ev'ry contrary in each extream This holds alike, and each may plead the fame.

Would't thou to Pow'r a proper duty shew? 'Tis thy first task the bounds of pow't to know; The bounds once past, it holds the name no more, 135 Its nature alters, which it own'd before, Nor were submission Humbleness expreft, But all a low Idolatry at best.

Pow'r, from above subordinately spread, Streams like a fountain from th' eternal head;

140 There, calm and pure the living waters flow, But roar a Torrent or a Flood below; Each flow'r, ordain'd the Margins to adorn, Each native Beauty from its roots is torn, And left on Deserts, Rocks, and Sands, or toft 145 All the long travel, and in Ocean loft:

So fares the soul, which more that Pow'r reveres
Man claims from God, than what in God inheres.

This noble Similitude, with which the Satire concludes, Dr. Parnell did not seem to understand, and so was not able to express, in its original force.. Dr. Donne says,

“ As streams are, Pow'r is ; those blest flow'rs that dwell “ At the rough Streams calm head, thrive, and do well “ But having left their roots, and themselves given " To the Streams tyrannous rage, alas, are driven “ Through mills, rocks, and woods, and at last, almost

? Consum'd in going, in the Sea are lost.

56 So perish Souls, etc. Dr. Donne compares Power or Authority to Streams; and Souls to Flowers; but not being so explicite in the latter, Dr. Parnell overlooked that part, and so has hurt the whole thought, by making the Flowers pasive; whereas the Original fays they leave their roots, and give themselves to the stream : that is, wilfully prefer human Authority to divine; and this makes them the object of his Satire ; which they would not have been, were they irresistibly carried away, as the Imitation supposes.