Here fin for want of food must starve,

Where tempting objects are not feen; And these strong walls do only ferve

To keep vice out, and keep me in: Malice of late's grown charitable fure, I'm not committed, but am kept fecure.

So he that ftruck at Jafon's life *,

By a malicious friendly knife

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Thinking t' have made his purpose fure,

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Did only wound him to a cure:

Malice, I fee, wants wit; for what is meant
Mischief, oft-times proves favour by th' event..

When once my prince affliction hath,

Profperity doth treason feem;
And to make smooth so rough a path,

I can learn patience from him:

Now not to suffer fhews no loyal heart,
When kings want ease subjects must bear a part.

What though I cannot fee my king

Neither in perfon or in coin;

Yet contemplation is a thing

That renders what I have not, mine:

૬૦

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*See this remarkable ftory in Cicero de Nat. Deorum, Lib. 3, c. 28. Cic, de Offic. Lib. 1, 6, 30; fee alfo Val. Max. 1. 8.

My

My king from me what adamant can part,
Whom I do wear engraven on my heart?

Have you not feen the nightingale,

A prifoner like, coopt in a cage, How doth fhe chaunt her wonted tale

In that her narrow hermitage?

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Even then her charming melody doth prove,

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That all her bars are trees, her cage a grove.

I am that bird, whom they combine

Thus to deprive of liberty;

But though they do my corps confine,

Yet maugre hate, my foul is free:

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And though immur'd, yet can I chirp, and sing

Difgrace to rebels, glory to my king.

My foul is free, as ambient air,

Although my baser part's immew'd, Whilst loyal thoughts do still repair

T'accompany my folitude:

Although rebellion do my body binde,
My king alone can captivate my minde.

VOL. II.

2

XIII. VERSES

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XIII.

VERSES BY K. CHARLES I.

"This prince, like his father, did not confine himself to "profe: Billop Burnet has given us a pathetic elegy, Jaid "to be ritten by Charles in Cariftrcok caftle [in 1648.] "The foury is most uncouth and unbarmonious, but there are firong thoughts in it, fome good fenfe, and a strain of ma"jefic piety." Mr. Walpole's Royal and Noble Authors,

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vol. I.

It is in his "Memoirs of the Duke of Hamilton," p. 379, that Burnet hath preferved this elegy, which he tells us he had from a gentleman, who waited on the king at the time when it was written, and copied it out from the original. It is there intitled, “ MAJESTY IN MISERY: OR "AN IMPLORATION TO THE KING OF KINGS.”

Hune bath remarked of thefe fianzas, "that the truth of "the fentiment, rather than the elegance of the expreffion, "renders them very pathetic." See his hift. 1763, 4to. Vol. V. pp. 437. 442. which is no bad comment upon them. -Thefe are almost the only verfes known of Charles's com‐ pofition. Indeed a little Poem ON A QUIET CONSCIENCE printed in the Foetical Calendar, 1763, vol VIII. is attributed to K. CHARLES I; being reprinted from a thin evo. published by Nahum Tate, called Miscellanea Sacra, or "Poems on Divine and Moral Subjects.”

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Reat monarch of the world, from whofe power fprings

GThe potency and power of kings,

Record the royal woe my fuffering fings;

And teach my tongue, that ever did confine
Its faculties in truth's feraphick line,
To track the treasons of thy foes and mine.

Nature and law, by thy divine decree, (The only root of righteous royaltie) With this dim diadem invested me:

With it, the facred fcepter, purple robe,
The holy unction, and the royal globe:
Yet am i levell❜d with the life of Job.

5

10

The fierceft furies, that do daily tread
Upon my grief, my grey difcrowned head,

Are those that owe my bounty for their bread.

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They raise a war, and christen it THE CAUSE,
While facrilegious hands have beft applause,
Plunder and murder are the kingdom's laws;

Tyranny bears the title of taxation,
Revenge and robbery are reformation,
Oppreffion gains the name of fequeftration.

My loyal fubjects, who in this bad feafon
Attend me (by the law of God and reafon),
They dare impeach, and punish for high treason.

Next at the clergy do their furies frown,

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Pious epifcopacy must go down,

They will destroy the crosier and the crown.

Churchmen are chain'd, and fchifmaticks are freed,
Mechanicks preach, and holy fathers bleed,

The crown is crucified with the creed.

The church of England doth all factions fofter,
The pulpit is ufurpt by each impoftor,

Extempore excludes the Paternofter.

The Prefbyter, and Independent feed

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Springs with broad blades. To make religion bleed 35 Herod and Pontius Pilate are agreed.

The corner stone's misplac'd by every pavier:
With fuch a bloody method and behaviour

Their ancestors did crucifie our Saviour.

My royal confort, from whose fruitful womb
So many princes legally have come,
Is forc'd in pilgrimage to feek a tomb.

Great Britain's heir is forced into France,
Whilft on his father's head his foes advance:

Poor child! he weeps out his inheritance

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