Valentine a Valendo Epig. 1. THy name imports a Power and justly too For no Power else can work what thine can do Kings rule the earth fire sword and torturing racks The body with a thousand death's distracts But can proceed no further only thine Thy power commands the soul great Valentine Epigr. 2. THere 's no resisting I must serve thee too Great Saint as well as all the Creatures do Feirce untam'd Beasts and winged Foules betray A sense of Love and feel thy power to day And so do I but in a lawful fire Whose heat oh may it never more expire Epigr. 3. NO more vayne men to Cupids Altars sue We have a better Saint to go unto A Saint that breaths chast flames whose hand doth hold Arrowes compacted all of purest gold No leaden mixtures no blew wounds that show The venom'd point from whence their rancors flow If then to blesse your amorous hopes you need Some favoring Powers let Valentine succeed The Cyprian fondling Pious souls may seek The sweets of Love without a blushing cheek Matthias de seipso Epigr. 1. ACcurst Iscariots vacant roome I fill See's make their Bishops neither good nor ill All are not rocks that sit in Peters chaire Nor Divels that Judas his successors are Judas ad Romanos Epigr. 2. FOnd Romans Peters dubious chaire resigne 'T is for your honor more to sit in mine None of the twelve themselves will not deny Left an Apostle in his seat but I. Their meaner followers meaner titles bare Mine with th' eleven assum'd an equal chaire If you would needs aspire my name had bin Apter t' have mask'd your vast ambition in Then Peter's claime of whom 't is hard to know Whe'r ere indeed he were at Rome or no. But my opprobrious death is that alone Which your else shameless cheeks do blush to own As for the rest the conscious world doth see That you recede from Cephas more then me In outward show I seem'd for Jesus's sake To quit the world and his sharp cross to take But play'd the thief the while and made no spare So I might fill the cursed bagge I bare To rob the poor and as if that were small To set to sale even Christ himself and all Yet mask'd my treasons still with sacred guile And cry'd hail Lord and kiss'd him too the while And is not this your guise I pray you tell Can any actions be more parallel Did ever any to one chaire succeed Whose lives exactly view'd so well agreed But go to since you think it yet a shame Though you approve my works to own my name Know this your Seat's not so asham'd of me As my Successor of your seat would be Vpon Joseph sirnamed Justus that was passed by and Matthias that was chosen by lot into the roome of Judas Act. 1. 24 26. Epigr. 3. JOseph the Just refus'd Heavens righteous doom Lots out Matthias unto Judas's room God looks not with mans eyes the thing and name His wisdome oft finds not to be the same The Just one could not but the Just approve Conformity's the surest ground of love But his discerning eyes no doubt did see One not so stil'd to be more Just then he March 1. CHange but the names the Heathen Fables are Our Christian Gospels what 's their God of war But our dread Lord of Hoasts their vestal Nun And great Quirinus her immortal Son Romes God-like Founder by his Patriots slayn But from the eating grave reviv'd again And in his Fathers Chariot mounted high Above Heavens star-enamel'd canopy If you will note it what doth this proclaime But Jesus and his Virgin-Mothers name Give things this sense and you shall nothing erre Though you this Month to Mars his name referr Though Rhea Syluia have her Festal day And Romulus his Quirinalia All if you thus interpret things will be Who ere gain-saies it good Divinitie The Feasts of March 2. WAles for her David March his first doth claime The sixteenth bears the Irish Patricks name Bright Gabriel on the twenty fifth doth bear Glad tidings to the Virgin-Mothers eare Saint David Epigr. 1. BRutes Sons shall never say great Saint that I Have thrust thy name out of our Liturgy Let others doubt thy History to me It is enough that Cambrians honor thee Epigr. 2. BIshop or Champion whether name be due Or whether both great Saint and thou like to That other David in one person bear Prophet and Souldiers equal character I cannot tell but this I am assur'd Under thy auspice Wales hath long endur'd Epigr. 3. WHen my observing thoughts revolv how long Brutes warlike Sons have kept their name and tongue With what stout hands they their own fields have held Maugre the rage of those feirce stormes which swell'd From the rough Saxons Danes and Nonmans hate Which like the none-excepting doom of fate Fell upon all this Isle and rouled with An irresisted stream from Thames to Frith Yet Brutes stern children kept their own and stood Colossi like athwart those Seas of blood Unshaken with the tempest When I weigh These things great David I am forc'd to say That either thou their Champion dost excell Or they no Champion need they fight so well S. Patrick Epig. 1. VEnice sometimes chose Theodore to be Her guardian Saint but when she found that he Gave no success to her designs she laid Him by and call'd in Mark unto her aid Which course unless the ruin'd Ireland run And change her Saint too she is quite undone For either her Patrick cannot ease her needs Or which is worse he cares not how she speeds Epig. 2. PAtrick his prayers they say to pass did bring That in the Irish soil no venom'd thing May breed no Toads no Serpents Spiders there Nor other poisonous creatures do appear A blessed gift if what in them is lost The men have not within their brests ingrost Epig. 3. VVIse Romans when they first commenced wars Against a Town call'd out her Tutelars And gave them worship least perhaps they might In favour of the place against them fight Which course whether England took when long ago Sh' assail'd the Irish Kings I do not know But this I 'me sure their Patricks hand since then Was ne're lift up against the English-men Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Epig. 1. HAd Adam known his wife before the fall The blessing doubtless had been virtual To propagation and her first-born Son Had been conceiv'd without corruption But 't was not so the guilt which she convei'd To all her Issue proves she sinn'd a Maid Before coition the Impostor knew Too well accursed what he had to do When he the fountain did infect that all The lower streams might suck from thence their gall Which yet least it might bring a blot upon That glorious state the Angels portion The lot of Spirits the life of heaven and we For her crimes sake might loath virginity His Grace our all-wise Saviour did dispense In such an
answering method that th' offence And cure at one same gate might enter in And the salvation parallel the sin Thus what a Maiden lost a Maid restores A Virgin caus'd a Virgin heal'd our sores Evah transgres'd but you revers'd may read In Maries Ave both her name and deed Vpon Luke 1. 45. Blessed is she that beleeved c. Epig. 2. SUch news blest maid as this bright Angel brings Of such unheard of inconsistent things 'T is as much wonder that thou couldst beleeve As 't is that God could those strange works atchieve What hand could interweave but his alone A Moment and Eternity in one Th' incomprehended essence and a span The creature and Creator God and Man Or which is lesse yet hard enough to do Comprise in one a Maid and Mother too 'T was only God this work to pass could bring And onely thou that couldst beleeve the thing Epig. 3. VVHen in our flesh thou deign'st to lodge no room My God would serve thee but a Virgins womb But in our hearts being pleas'd by faith to dwell It is not now thy lot to speed so well For such oh horrid is our sinful state Thou canst find none that 's not adulterate To find Easter for ever THe change in Februs if there any be Or that which first ensues note carefully And the next Tuesday doubt it not all That doth succeed Shrove Tuesday you may call Shrove-Tuesday past you may be bold to say That Sunday six weeks after ' s Easter Day The other Moveable Feasts 2. TWo days Good Friday Easter doth precede Fourty from thence to Holy Thursday lead Ten more unto Whitsunday numbred be And one week after that to Trinity Good-Friday Passio Domini Epig. 1. HEe 's dead Insult the Infernal Powers the dread Messias Jesus whom you fear'd is dead But stay rejoyce not neither it is from His death that your great Empires fall doth come 'T was a strange combat this wherein to slay The foe you fought with was to lose the day Yet thus it was the Field had been your own Had you not our great Champion overthrown But through his sides your selves accurst you slew And he being ruin'd by you ruin'd you Vpon Luke 22. 44. And his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground SEe here my soul what weight in sin remains When he whose shoulder all things else sustains Bow'd underneath the load if he that stood In equall poize with God sweat clods of blood And the Almighty groan'd to undergo The burthen what must finite creatures do Vpon Matth. 27. 52 53. And the graves were opened and many bodies of Saints which slept arose Epig. 3. THe Prince of life was slain and nothing now Remain'd on earth whose greatnes did not bow To Death's all conquering power you would have thought The world it self would quickly have bin brought To its last gaspe and all the creatures have Been buried with their maker in the grave When lo midst all these spoils appal'd with fear From his own holds the enfeebled Conquerour Flies with distracted steps and leaves his prey Free and unguarded to escape away From their close dungeons the enfranchis'd dead Are sent again the sacred streets to tread But wonder not it was but time to flie When he beheld his Kingdome seized by So strange a wile Death found alas too late That he had brought a prey within his gate That would destroy his rights and that 't was vayne To think to stay where Jesus was though slayne So sure it was that he a wondrous thing Who came in Captaine would go out a King Easter-Day Resurrectio Domini Epig. 1. I Know not where the greater wonder lies That God should dy or man from death should rise But this I know th' are both enough to make The Angels faith if not upheld to shake God is immortal and for him to dy Were to be stripped of his Deity And for fraile man being dead to rise again Is in effect to cease to be humane Neither if you consider them alone Can be without a contradiction And when all tongues have argu'd what they can God must be God and man can be but man But start not at it 't is not thus that we Must measure this transcendent Mysterie If you would view these Natures rightly 't is As they concurre in our Hypostasis And thus considered they no more oppose Man-God did die God-Man from death arose 'T was one same Person both these mazes trod Yet rose he not as Man nor dy'd as God Epigr. 2. CHrist all the Sabbath bound in Grave did ly The Sabbath types out vast Eternity And 't was Eternal death indeed our sin Infinite that it was had wrapp'd us in But he by carrying brake those bonds and quit Us from Eternal death by suffering it Happy exchange now though we die yet shall Our death not stretch to that great Festival Death may our Corps indeed a while surprize But we on that great Sabbaths Eve shall rise Epigr. 3. THe Phoenix birth no more admire nor what Old Bardes of her renewed age have wrote The Fables which of that strange Bird you read Are in our Jesus verified indeed He 's the true Phoenix uncompell'd that flies Into the Mountains forked tops and dies His Tombe like hers with sweet perfumes is fill'd The gums whereof such fragrant smells do yeeld As Heaven it self delights to sent and those Blest Spirits above rejoyce therewith to close Dead from his Grave as from a second Wombe New-borne like her he back again doth come Into th' astonished world more faire to see And bright then ere before he us'd to be Only in this our Phoenix comes before The other that once rays'd he dies no more Ascension Epigr. 1. COme down blest Saviour 't is no sin to pray Thee down I hope upon Ascension day So to descend as I would have thee do Is not indeed to fall but mount unto A Zenith which thou ne're before couldst gain Even my proud heart which rebel lusts have ta'ne And mann'd against thee this my God is it That I would have thee come and see and get Get this strong hold into thy hands and make Her high-rays'd bulwarks at thy storming shake And droop their heads make my stout thoughts to fall Prostrate before thy glorious feet and all The powers within me to ly low and be Subject henceforth unto no King but thee Do this dear Lord and my glad soul shall say To me thou ne're ascendedst till to day Epigr. 2. Look in what sense the Son of man was said To be in Heaven whil'st yet on Earth he stayd In the same sense we grant his body though In Heaven may still be say'd to be below He is ascended all agree that same Material flesh and blood of his that came From the pure Virgins Womb Heavens now retain And until all things be restor'd again Must still retain it yet it is confest That when
sin Prince Peeres and People all at once might flie Like Manaoh's Angel to those joyes on high who 'le now hereafter charge the Popish rabble Of shaveling Priests to be uncharitable Who would at their own charge kind soules convey Their Enemies to Heaven so near a way Andrew Apostle Epig. 1. ANdrew having found the Christ brings Peter in True Converts still strive others souls to win Nor lose they by 't for grace is such a thing The more men spend the more their waters spring Like Christ his loaves whereof the more do share The fuller still the emptied baskets are Or like the widdows oyle which never stayed Till she an end of pouring out had made A sparing hand here makes the Owner poor They that do dole most out have most in store Vpon John 1. 38 39. Epig. 2. ANdrew enquires where Jesus dwelleth he Answers him truly he must come and see 'T is not the hearing of the eare O man That is enough to make a Christian Unlesse thou come to Christ and with thine eye Of faith survey the place where he doth lie Thousands have heard his own sweet mouth to tell Where his abode and yet are gone to Hell But none e're came to him that went away And perisht in his sins another day Epigr. 3. Vpon the Scots Arrogating Saint Andrew for their Patron SCotland we grant feels Andrews powerful hand But 't is to punish not to guard their land Their King their God their Souls and all they 'll sell For a few pence and run themselves to Hell But this sad curse their Saint on them hath laid That they shall still be poor for all their Trade December 1. MEthinks this Moneth to Sinai sadly leades And in our ears the ten Commandments reads Those ten sad words which none e're kept and none E're broke but 't was to his own destruction Sad words indeed but that this Month before It doth expire brings in a Saviour One that doth keep them from us and doth bear That death himself which our sad souls did fear O happy Advent that hath power to make This yoak so easie now to undertake That takes all dread from these ten words away And turns our Serpent to a helping stay Which way so e're we look this Number now Hath no more threatning wrinkles in its brow Look upon Christ and this tenth Month will bring Him clad in flesh to be our offering Look on the Law and all the thunder 's gone And it hath nothing in 't but light alone Thus thou my God can'st make December snow With more sweet joyes then verdant May to flow December his Feasts 2 DEcember's twenty first is Thomas Fee The twenty fift is Christ's Nativity Stephen upon the twenty sixt they stone The twenty seventh's assign'd to aged John The twenty eight by Herods cruelty At Bethlehem the poor Innocents did dy Thomas Apostle Epig. 1. THy faith was weak it cannot be deny'd Such doubtings are not to be justifi'd When such a cloud of Witnesses do meet To clear a truth then Thomas not to see 't Is willful blindness which doth not admit Of any just excuse to cover it But yet blest Saint when by thy Lords consent Thy hands had felt those holes the nails had rent And that the spear had made within his side Then never man with greater fervour cry'd My Lord my God O happy happy tongue That feelingly so sweet an Anthem sung Thomas thy failings they were great indeed But thy great faith I 'm sure did more exceed Epig. 2. THomas had not thy failings been so sad Our Faith had not so firm a footing had Thy weakness is our strength and by thy fall W' are now so setled as no tempest shall Unfix our holds or make us doubt again O God what cannot thy great power attain Who mak'st thy Saints miscarriages to be An Antidote to all Posteritie Well may we by their graces look to win That do become such gainers by their sin Epig. 3. Vpon John 20. 21. THomas 't is true thy late dead Master stands Before thy eyes thou feel'st his side and hands Such is his grace and now beleev'st indeed But 't is weak faith that such strong proofs doth need Blessed are they whom lesser means will draw To rest upon that Christ they never saw Thou dost not want thy wages but their Faith No doubt my God a double portion hath Christmas Day Epig. 1. Vpon Luke 2. 7. STruck with a new Instinct me thinks I spy The Beasts before thy manger prostrate lie And strait cry out Lord now 't is true indeed That which we in thy Holy Book do read The Oxe and th' Asse their Masters crib do know But Israel thine own people do not so Epig. 2. Vers eod There was no room for them in the Inne VVHo'd think that Davids heir in Davids town With child should find no lodging to lay down Her precious burthen but poor creature must Into the stable with the Beasts be thrust But thus in common Inns t' hath always bin They thrust out Christ whilst Ruffians vaunt within Epigr. 3. Vpon Luke 2. 8 9 10 11. VVHy didst thou send thine Angel Lord to tell Poor Shepherds first of this great Miracle The birth of thy Messias which had bin News for the stateliest Courts to have gloried in Was it to show that in these heavenly things Poor Swains oft get the start of mighty Kings Or was 't because that he whose birth was told Himself was the great Shepherd of the fold And 't was but meet that such as Shepherds were The birth of the great Shepherd first should hear Or wouldst thou have these Shepherds know that Lambe Of God was now brought forth whom it became Them to look after more then all their own A Lamb that whosome're doth wait upon They are kept safe by that same Lamb they keep The Shepherds are preserved by the Sheep Whether this or that induc'd thee Lord to show This grace to these poor men I do not know But this I know they 've seen such things to day As never men beheld before but they Go happy Shepherds leave your flocks and hie To Beth'lem where your Infant Lord doth lie And when you have view'd his sacred person well Spare not aloud what you have seen to tell Write volums of these things and let them bear The title of the Shepherds Calender This I assure you never shepherds knew With all their studies half so much as you Saint Stephen Epig. 1. THy name great Stephen doth a Crown denote And thou indeed a goodly Crown has got The first rich Crown that ever Martyr ware That witness to his glorious Master bare Christ by his sufferings past into his Throne And thou the self same-way to thine art gone Where thou now reignest with him O happy man That by one Combat such a Kingdome wan Had I great Saint that learned Graecian's skill And could drop golden raptures from my quill I 'de
write whole books like his and they should be Î ÎÏι στεφάνου of thy Crown and thee Vpon Act. 7. 56. Epig. 2. THat Christ on Gods right hand enthron'd doth sit Our Creed and all the Scriptures witness it Yet thou great Martyr seest him stand a thing Well worthy of our strict examining But I have found it Thou being now to fight This first pitch'd Combat in thy Masters right Christ leaves his seat and upon tiptoe stands To see how thou thereof wouldst quit thy hands And having seen thee with much joy to win The prize he opes the Heavens to take thee in And will sit down no more thou happy one Till he have plac'd thee first upon thy throne And ta'ne those stones which when thou now didst dy About thy head like stormes of hayl did fly And chang'd to Rubies have enameld them About thy well-wrought glorious Diadem Stephen thy way indeed was hard and rough But thy reward at last was sweet enough Vpon Act. 7. 6. He fell asleep Epig. 3. THen when the furious stones in stormes did fall About thy head when blood and brains and all Spatt'red from thy dissevered skull and those That gave them have bemoan'd their dreadful blowes 'T is sayd thou fell'st asleep O wondrous thing Was this a time for sleep to spred her wing About thy peaceful temples cou'd'st thou ly So gently down when such rough storms did fly But I admire not thou hadst seen a sight That ravish'd thy glad Soul with more delight Then all those wounds could fright thee with which were Indeed an Exit not a cause of fear Let me my God but such a vision see And I shall sleep in death as well as he John the Evangelist Epig. 1. 'T was not for naught great John that thou didst rest Thy head upon thy Masters sacred Brest Thence thou deriv'st those heavenly gifts that none Of all the twelve e're had but thou alone They mov'd in narrower Spheres one's hand did pen Epistles to the scattered brethren Another fill'd with a celestial light The storie of his Saviours life did write But thou alone in one sweet knot didst twist Prophet Apostle and Evangelist Epig. 2. Vpon John 19. 26 27. THis povver to all beleevers is convey'd That they are Gods adopted children made And 't is a grace indeed to be alli'd To Christ the Lord upon the better side But John to thee this further honour 's done That thou' rt adopted also Maries son On both sides novv unto thy Lord a kin His German-brother doubly grafted in O vvho can boast great Saint as thou canst do The Son of God and Son of Mary too No mortal man had e're that favour shovvn To be thus truly stil'd but thou alone Epig. 3. Vpon the Effigies of an Eagle ascrib'd to S. John T' Was not unmeet blest Saint that thou didst bear The quick-y'd Eagles specious Character Who couldst with fixed looks so freely gaze Upon those beams which other eyes amaze Who hast thy Lords dread person so exprest As if thou dst lain not on but in his brest As though the other Writers all had seen But his back-parts and thou alone hadst been Familiar with his face which shone so bright That no mans eies but thine could brook the sight The Type was apt but short the Eagles eye And towring wing indeed that soars so high Something present thy Genius but not well For she wants tongue the things she sees to tell Thou with Seraphick skill at once didst see And warble out thy Saviours dignitie Well did the Church in one sweet Book of thine Ascribe to thee the Title of Divine Thou showd'st thy self so there and to say true In all the rest great Saint thou didst so too Innocents day Epig. 1. VVEigh but the sins and sorrows age doth bring And you 'l conclude it is a happy thing To die betimes and so prevent those woes Which he that long surviveth undergoes This was your case sweet Babes you early dy'd And so blest souls the fewer evils try'd But that 's not all you dy'd for Jesus sake And that 's a cause indeed enough to make The saddest suffrings glorious never man For his behoof the smalest hazzard ran And loâ—â—â—y the adventure so to dy Is to live happy everlastingly Then weep not Rachell that thy Sons are slayne Nor reckon that thy loss that was their gaine 'T was mercy that thy children dy'd so soon But that they thus did dy 's a double Boon Epig. 2. THe sting of death is sin remove but that And death hath nothing to be trembled at What need then these sweet Infants fear th' events Of death ne're hurt such harmless Innocents Lord wash my Soul as clean as theirs and I When e're thou call'st will be content to dy Epigr. 3. YOu dy'd for Christ sweet Babes but grudge not though You gain'd a glorious Crown by doing so And 't was no sorry bargain that to lose A moments breath for such rich joys as those And yet that breath was none of yours beside 'T was bought before by him for whom you dy'd FINIS