Selected quad for the lemma: power_n
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A11360
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The history of Ioseph a poem. VVritten by Sir Thomas Salusbury, Barronet, late of the Inner Temple.; Life of Joseph
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Salusbury, Thomas, Sir, d. 1643.
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1636
(1636)
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STC 21620; ESTC S116522
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52,210
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126
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world by light the best And first of creatures made to rule the rest Angels are in their kinde lesse blest then we That images of our Creator be But that curb break and passions ruling then No storme no Chaos so deform'd as men And thus with Joseph's brethren 't was that stood Now like so many Cains in wait for 's blood See where yond dreamer comes say they let 's kill Let 's make an end of hm and see what will Become of all his projects and his visions His idle fancies and fond aparitions And for a good excuse we can not misse Wee 'l say Some beast devour'd him true it is Most savage beasts they were that thus did plot To ruine him their rage considered not His fathers care who sent whose love him brought To hearken of their healths this they nere thought All seek his death but Ruben who more milde Then were the rest labours to save the childe The boy is yong and childish he in vain Urg'd and for dreams deserv's not to be slain Then with his fathers weaknesse intercedes His years and his great love to Joseph pleads Joseph's the staffe and prop of Israels age Thus he persists but they still deafe with rage Give him no eare his words can do no good Which when he sees oh yet let 's shed no blood He cries my brethren I 'le direct a way To your revenge and yet we will not slay Nor lay our hands on him not farre from hence Ith'desert is a hollow hole and thence Down to the bottome the discent so steep That t is impossible he ere should creep Again above ground there 's no water there And t is so steep withall that none can heare His cryes and if by chance he there be found It may be said he fell into the ground Then can it nere be told we took his breath Although indeed we left him to his death None of his bloud can on our heads be laid For none of it we shed all this he said To rid him from their hands and if he might To bring him to their father home at night At last more pacified they take for sence His words and give him freer audience Reuben say they speaks truth then let 's not strive We will not kill but bury him alive Their plot concluded on and Joseph come They fall upon him altogether some Rip off his many colour'd coat the signe Of Jacobs love others make fast a line About his tender waste and ripping thence All but his shirt white like his innocence They hale him forwards whilst his grief and fears Can vent it self in nothing but in tears They will not heare him speak nor are they mov'd Nor once consider'd how their father lov'd Those blubber'd eyes nor what hold grief would take On his gray hairs for his lost Josephs sake Mindlesse of this with other thoughts then whet Their fury on and more on edge did set Their vengeance being by this come to the pit They rudely take and cast him into it And in the ground they bury O vild deed Gods promise and the hopes of Isacque's seed But see his power that from the loose stones can Or looser dust raise Abraham sonnes made man Of nought can cause new quickned bodies come From the graves barren and unfruitfull wombe He that shall make all deeps and seas at last Their dead from forth their silent mansions cast That power can Israels seed so deeply sowne Cause sprouting thence to flourish in a throne Ev'n he that puls the mighty from their seat Shall make the lowest highest Joseph great Who left thus deep now to his deeper thoughts More then his own fate wails his brethrens faults Thinks on their impious rage and what a curse Must follow their offence this griev'd him worse Then his own suffrings they mean while the feat Long plotted on perform'd sate down to eat On th' earths green carpet but what ere their food I dare presume their cheer was not so good It cannot be the guilt of their offence Could sit so light upon their conscience Some anxious thoughts of their great God displeas'd Poore Joseph left to cold and hunger seised Sometimes upon them all as there they led It seems they muâ—'d for lo they lift their head And looking round behold upon the sight Of certain Merchants that were Ishmaelites Whose camels loden towards Aegypt bent With balme and mirrh and spice from Gilead went Judah cries out what will it do us good To kill our brother and conceal his bloud He is our brother and our flesh 't were well We layd no hands upon him let us sell Him rather to you Merchants and being sold We are reveng'd and our reward is gold The saying pleas'd them all and up they rose Whilst absent Reuben nothing of it knows And coming to the pit cast in a rope To hale up weeping Joseph now in hope Some pity came upon them when he found Worse mischiefs gaping for him then the ground He in the narrow confines of the cave Was King there being none else but now 's a slave For th' Ishmaelites being come to them they brought him Who having lookt upon and lik't him bought him For twenty silver peeces a good rate Judas but thirty for his Master gaâ— Joseph thou highly valued art to rise Within ten peeces of thy Saviours price Thy brethren I 'm assur'd thought 't was good gain To have revenge and silver for their pain Two pieces ev'ry man but now th' art gone A cloak to hide their fault they think upon And here the worst of all their malice noat Their infamy they cover with thy coat Gods finger's in 't a ramme's for Isaac slain A kid for Joseph with whose blood they stain His colour'd rayment mean while to the pit Reuben makes haste and being come to it Bows him there down and whispers brother rise I come to free thee from the cruelties Of them that hate thee as from being slain I sav'd so now I le bring thee home again Unto thy father but when none replyes He doubts and louder and yet louder cryes At last with out-stretcht throat he lifts his voyce So have I often heard the climbing noyse Of some exact Musitian that begins So low ' youl l scarce beleeve he toucht the strings Then by degrees mounts to a tone so high That each eare tingles as in sympathy Or like the tune oth'winde that calmly blows At first then swels and by degrees it grows Higher and higher yet and is at last Able to deafe the hearers ev'ry blast Such and so fruitlesse is th' exalted voyce Of Reuben now he hears no answring noyse But his own eccho willingly beguil'd He takes that as an answer from the childe And cals again till reason makes him know It is not though God wot he wish it so He finds his error and with tears laments His brothers losse then passionatly rents His cloaths and with redoubled haste he makes After his