Selected quad for the lemma: book_n
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A46280
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Wit in a wildernesse of promiscuous poesie by the author Tho. Jordan.
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Jordan, Thomas, 1612?-1685?
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1665
(1665)
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Wing J1072; ESTC R19732
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17,369
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50
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WIT IN A WILDERNESSE Of Promiscuous POESIE By the Author Tho. Jordan Hunc novere modum nostri servare Libelli Parcere personis dicere de vitiis LONDON Printed by R. A. TO THE LIBERALL LOVER CHARITABLE CHERISHER AND PIOUS PRESERVER OF INDUSTRY HONESTY CHAST INGENUITY SCIENCE and CIVILITY THE much HONORED GEORGE Lord Bishop of St Ashaph WITH Due Addresses I present and Dedicate the dull devotion of these imperfect and unpolished POEMS WIT IN A WILDERNESSE Of Promiscuous POESIE THE CHARACTERS OF A Compleat POET WITH An Apology for POETRY HE is a man from Prophanation free Unreverend railings or obscoenity His Muse commits no treason against trust Doth not invite to vengeance pride or lust He is Truth's Favourite and nere exalts His Mean Degree by guilding great mens faults Who sitting in his own sublimed height Survays and weighs the billow-beaten fate Of towring Statists who do vainly raise Their Arms on bladders blown with vulgar praise Popular throats who in one hour will cry Both Halelujah and Crucifie Whose lungs like Whirlwinds in tempestuous weathers Do bear down Churches whilft they blow up Feathers This and much more then this we safely fee Through the clear Opticks of pure Pectry There we see one whose head within few years Did bear a Mytre now wears Band ô Liers Would it not move a Poets spleen with jest To see a Crosier made a Musket Rest Yonder 's another by swift alteration Struck dumb that was the Tongue of a wholeNation The Scene is chang'd and He whose high command Held up his head must now hold up his hand He that in Law did hold such learned strife Must shew by what tenure he holds his Life What Act so firm that strength cannot devoure For Laws are but the Favorites of Power What 's he that will submit his Sword and Tent To the tame vigor of an Argument Or will resign his ravish'd power upon The flegmatick results of Pro and Con These are the vile vicisitudes which we Are not obnoxious to in ' Poetry Such storms fly over us when have ye known Pernassus under Sequestration Or Pegasus his winged shoulders stoop To the Conductor of a County Troop What Sequestrator yet could ever call The Muses unto Habâ—rdashers Hall Go search the books where Prize accompts are writ You 'l scarce find Item took ten tun of wit For what they have so tenderly theyhandle It may be vented by one inch of candle A Poets poverty is a defence 'Gainst the most honorable insolence We have no Ships at Sea doubt no distress Our hopes are little and our fears are less Whilst the poor Merchant rob'd by Dutch or French Sinks in th' Exchange to rise in the Kings Bench Shew me that Age a Poet can produce Who ever lost a thousand pound at Use Or who can say a Poet hath undone An hundred families to raise one Son Whilst the grave Mizer and his powder'd Sir Study to be damn'd in Diameter Pray tell me you that lye upon the lurch What brack in State or Schism in the Church Hath Poetry begot what Kingdom lies Drown'd in its tears for Poets villanics Wealth and ambition tempt not us we pity The careful Country and the subtil City Where one mans bounds a hundred fields imbrace To pick out three yards for his burying place Whilst we under the shadow of one tree Extract more absolute content then he Finds in the firtil substance vve have more Wealth at command then rolls along the shore Of golden Ganges He is onely poore That hath too much if he do vvish for more And he is truly rich that in his dish And on his back hath all that he can vvish Somtimes vvee'r woundâ—d vvith Loves dart but then Our Contemplation licks us vvhole agen Content is our Elixar vvhat a stir The Patient Reason-rackt Philosopher Keeps for the Stone attending all events That fall from fast and loose Experiments He sayes he vvill make Gold of Lead and Brass But in the end turns his ovvn Gold to Glass His Furnace then as bad as hell doth grovv And he poore man is damn'd in Balneo Whil'st he that sits upon the Muses hill Crovvn'd vvith content turns all to vvhat he vvill Paine into pleasure Misery to Myrth By sacred skill extâ—acts Heaven out of earth All out of nothing and at length can dye With a difiance to all Tyranny Like Lucan in his Bathing Tub that stood Speaking of verses vvhi'lst his eyes ran blood Nor are they Poets that can onely chyme In numbers and put giâ—gles into Rhyme But he vvhose Catholique Conceptions can Demonstrate to the Intellect of man By active Metaphor and Alegory Remote designe Antique and modern story Descriptions of Battalia's Sea-fights The Characters of sorrows and delights Annual seasons rivers weeping fountains The firtil Valleys and the mineral Mountains All forreign Countries Cities and Kings Courts Their trade war Law Religion food and sports All contrarieties and what doth border Upon the Banks of Beauty and disorder All passions and affections that do lye Reveal'd or hid in mans capacity Great Kings you are our Subjects though more true You are to us then yours have been to you We can imbalm your Vertues with pure Spices And make a Pickle shall preserve State-vices Five hundred years the rage a Pâ—â—â— vents Can rase a thousand Marble Monuments The Factious people do but vainly strive To kill that Fame vvhich we will keep alive What are the deeds of the most valiant men If Poets do not write them o're agen 'T was not Achilles Lance nor Hectors Shield But Homers Poetry that won the Field Caesar and Pompey Worthies more then men Were made not by their Acts but Lucan's pen What are your best Orations if they be Not guilded by the Beams of Poetry It is a sweet Compendium of all Arts Divide the Bible in four equal parts And by your disquisition 't will be known Without offence that Poetry is one Though not the first in order th' other three Treat of Law History and Propheey Then blush for shame you that do bid defiance To the bright Beams of so serene a Science For he that dares give it an ill report His understanding is a foot too short A Poem composed and spoken by the Author to the late King at the Dedication of Mr. Tho. Bushel's Rock at Enston in Oxon 1638. in the porson of Caliope LOe I Caliope chief of the Nine And first in order of that triple Trine The Muses Sisterhood for who is he That knows not of our sacred Hierarchy Am now at length through many a weary mile Safely arriv'd upon the British Isle The causes of my coming what they were That drew me to this Western Hemisphere Are these the Muses heard for nothing's done Which they discern not in a Vision Of a strange Rock discover'd under ground That with fresh streams and wonders doth abound Which Nature unto such perfection brought It looks like day from the old Chaos wrought