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LENOX LIBRARY

NEW YORK

THE

ENGLISH POET S.

ТНЕ

POEMS OF JOHN DRYDEN.

ON DRYDEN'S RELIGIO LAICI.

BY THE EARL OF ROSCOMMON.

gone, you flaves, you idle vermin go,

If then a blind, well-meaning, Indian stray,
Shall the great gulph be fhew'd him for the way?
For better ends our kind Redeemer dy'd
Or the faln angels room will be but ill fupply'd.
That Chrift, who at the great deciding day,
(For he what he refolves to fay)

B Fly from the fcourses, and your mafter know; Will dentares whs for their ill-natur'd faults,

Let free, impartial men, from Dryden learn
Mysterious fecrets, of a high concern,
And weighty truths, folid convincing fense,
Explain'd by unaffected eloquence.

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What can you (Reverend Leri) here take ill?
Mer ftill had faults, and men will have them fill;
He that hath rone, and lives as angels do,
Must be an angel, but what's that to you?
While mighty Lewis finds the pope too great,
And dreads the yoke of his impofing feat,
Our fects a more tyrannic power affume,

And would for fcorpions change the rods of Rome;
That church detain'd the legacy divine;
Fanatics caft the pearls of heaven to swine:
What then have thinking honest men to do,
But chufe a mean between th' ufurping two?
Nor can th' syptian patriarch Flame thy muse,
Which for his firinnefs does his heat excufe;
Whare er councils have approv'd his creed,
The preface fure was his own act and deed.
Our church will have that preface read, yo:>ll say:"
'Tis true: but fo fhe will th' Apocrypha;
And fuch as can believe them, freely may.
But did that God (fo little underflood)
Whofe darling attribute is being good,
From the dark wont of the rude chaos bring
Such various creatures and make man their king,
Yet leave his favourite man, his chiefest care,
More wretched than the vileft infects are?
O! how much happier and more fafe are they?
If helpless millions must be doom'd a prey
To yelling furies, and for ever burn
In that fad place from whence is no return,
For unbelief in ore they never knew,
Or for not doing what they could not do!
The very fiends krow for what crime they fell
And fo do all their followers that rebel :

VOL. III.

And fave the theep for actions, not for thoughts,
Hath too much mercy to fend men to hell,
For humble charity, and hoping well.

To what stupidity are zealots grown,
In damning crowds of fouls, may damn their own.
Whofe inhumanity profusely fhown
I'll err at leaft on the fecurer fide,

A convert free from malice and from pride.

TO MY FRIEND, MR. JOHN DRYDEN,

ON HIS SEVERAL EXCELLENT TRANSLATIONS OF THE ANCIENT POETS.

A

BY G. GRANVILLE, LORD LANSDOWNE.

S flowers tranfplanted from a fouthern sky, Eut hardly bear, or in the raifing die; Miffing their native fun, at left retain But a faint odour, and furvive with pain: Thus anc ent wit, in modern numbers taught, Wanting the warmth with which its author wrote, Is a dead image, and a fenfclefs draught. While we transfufe, the nimble fpirit flies, Efcapes ur feen, evaporates, and dies. Who then to copy Roman wit defire, Muft imitate with Roman force and fire, In elegance of ftyle and phrafe the fame, And in the fparkling genius, and the flame. Whence we conclude from thy tranflated fong, So just, fo fmooth, fo foft, and yet so strong, Coeleftial poet! foul of harmony!

That every genius was reviv'd in thee.

Thy trumpet founds, the dead are rais'd to light, Never to die, and take to heaven their flight;

B

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