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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=419805" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Britannia Rediviva: A Poem on the Birth of the Prince</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Our vows are heard betimes, and heaven takes care <br>To grant, before we can conclude the prayer; <br>Preventing angels met it half the way, <br>And sent us back to praise, who came to pray. <br>Just on the day, when the high-mounted sun <br>Did farthest in his northern progress run,<br>He bended forward, and even stretched the sphere <br>Beyond the limits of the lengthened year, <br>To view a brighter sun in Britain born; <br>That was the business of his longest morn; <br>The glorious object seen, 'twas time to turn. <br>Departing spring could only stay to shed <br>Her bloomy beauties on the genial bed, <br>But left the manly summer in her stead, <br>With timely fruit the longing land to cheer, <br>And to fulfil the promise of the year. <br>Betwixt two seasons comes the auspicious heir, <br>This age to blossom, and the next to bear. <br>Last solemn Sabbath saw the Church attend, <br>The Paraclete in fiery pomp descend; <br>But when his wondrous octave rolled again, <br>He brought a royal infant in his train: <br>So great a blessing to so good a king, <br>None but the Eternal Comforter could bring. <br>Or did the mighty Trinity conspire, <br>As once in council to create our sire? <br>It seems as if they sent the new-born guest, <br>To wait on the procession of their feast; <br>And on their sacred anniverse decreed <br>To stamp their image on the promised seed. <br>Three realms united, and on one bestowed, <br>An emblem of their mystic union showed; <br>The Mighty Trine the triple empire shared, <br>As every person would have one to guard. <br>Hail, son of prayers! by holy violence <br>Drawn down from heaven; but long be banished thence, <br>And late to thy paternal skies retire! <br>To mend our crimes, whole ages would require; <br>To change the inveterate habit of our sins, <br>And finish what thy godlike sire begins. <br>Kind heaven, to make us Englishmen again, <br>No less can give us than a patriarch's reign. <br>The sacred cradle to your charge receive, <br>Ye seraphs, and by turns the guard relieve; <br>Thy father's angel, and thy father join, <br>To keep possession, and secure the line; <br>But long defer the honours of thy fate; <br>Great may they be like his, like his be late, <br>That James this running century may view, <br>And give this son an auspice to the new. <br>Our wants exact at least that moderate stay; <br>For, see the dragon winged on his way, <br>To watch the travail, and devour the prey: <br>Or, if allusions may not rise so high, <br>Thus, when Alcides raised his infant cry, <br>The snakes besieged his young divinity; <br>But vainly with their forked tongues they threat, <br>For opposition makes a hero great. <br>To needful succour all the good will run, <br>And Jove assert the godhead of his son. <br>O still repining at your present state, <br>Grudging yourselves the benefits of fate; <br>Look up, and read in characters of light <br>A blessing sent you in your own despite! <br>The manna falls, yet that celestial bread, <br>Like Jews, you munch, and murmur while you feed. <br>May not your fortune be, like theirs, exiled, <br>Yet forty years to wander in the wild! <br>Or, if it be, may Moses live at least, <br>To lead you to the verge of promised rest! <br>Though poets are not prophets, to foreknow <br>What plants will take the blight, and what will grow, <br>By tracing heaven, his footsteps may be found; <br>Behold, how awfully he walks the round! <br>God is abroad, and, wondrous in his ways, <br>The rise of empires, and their fall, surveys; <br>More, might I say, than with an usual eye, <br>He sees his bleeding Church in ruins lie, <br>And hears the souls of saints beneath his altar cry. <br>Already has he lifted high the sign, <br>Which crowned the conquering arms of Constantine,<br>The moon grows pale at that presaging sight, <br>And half her train of stars have lost their light. <br>Behold another Sylvester, to bless <br>The sacred standard, and secure success; <br>Large of his treasures, of a soul so great, <br>As fills and crowds his universal seat. <br>Now view at home a second Constantine;<br>(The former too was of the British line,) <br>Has not his healing balm your breaches closed, <br>Whose exile many sought, and few opposed? <br>O, did not Heaven, by its eternal doom, <br>Permit those evils, that this good might come? <br>So manifest, that even the moon-eyed sects <br>See whom and what this Providence protects. <br>Methinks, had we within our minds no more <br>Than that one shipwrack on the fatal Ore, <br>That only thought may make us think again, <br>What wonders God reserves for such a reign. <br>To dream, that chance his preservation wrought, <br>Were to think Noah was preserved for nought; <br>Or the surviving eight were not designed <br>To people earth, and to restore their kind. <br>When humbly on the royal babe we gaze, <br>The manly lines of a majestic face <br>Give awful joy; 'tis paradise to look <br>On the fair frontispiece of nature's book: <br>If the first opening page so charms the sight, <br>Think how the unfolded volume will delight! <br>See how the venerable infant lies <br>In early pomp; how through the mother's eyes <br>The father's soul, with an undaunted view, <br>Looks out, and takes our homage as his due! <br>See on his future subjects how he smiles, <br>Nor meanly flatters, nor with craft beguiles; <br>But with an open face, as on his throne, <br>Assures our birthrights, and assumes his own.<br>Born in broad day-light, that the ungrateful rout <br>May find no room for a remaining doubt; <br>Truth, which itself is light, does darkness shun, <br>And the true eaglet safely dares the sun. <br>Fain would the fiends have made a dubious birth, <br>Loath to confess the godhead clothed in earth; <br>But, sickened, after all their baffled lies, <br>To find an heir apparent of the skies, <br>Abandoned to despair, still may they grudge, <br>And, owning not the Saviour, prove the judge. <br>Not great Æneas stood in plainer day,<br>When the dark mantling mist dissolved away; <br>He to the Tyrians showed his sudden face, <br>Shining with all his goddess mother's grace; <br>For she herself had made his countenance bright, <br>Breathed honour on his eyes, and her own purple light. <br>If our victorious Edward, as they say, <br>Gave Wales a prince on that propitious day, <br>Why may not years revolving with his fate <br>Produce his like, but with a longer date; <br>One, who may carry to a distant shore <br>The terror that his famed forefather bore? <br>But why should James, or his young hero, stay <br>For slight presages of a name or day? <br>We need no Edward's fortune to adorn <br>That happy moment when our prince was born; <br>Our prince adorns this day, and ages hence <br>Shall wish his birthday for some future prince. <br>Great Michael, prince of all the ethereal hosts, <br>And whate'er inborn saints our Britain boasts; <br>And thou, the adopted patron of our isle, <br>With cheerful aspects on this infant smile! <br>The pledge of heaven, which, dropping from above, <br>Secures our bliss, and reconciles his love. <br>Enough of ills our dire rebellion wrought, <br>When to the dregs we drank the bitter draught; <br>Then airy atoms did in plagues conspire, <br>Nor did the avenging angel yet retire, <br>But purged our still-increasing crimes with fire. <br>Then perjured plots, the still impending test, <br>And worse—but charity conceals the rest. <br>Here stop the current of the sanguine flood; <br>Require not, gracious God! thy martyrs' blood; <br>But let their dying pangs, their living toil, <br>Spread a rich harvest through their native soil; <br>A harvest ripening for another reign, <br>Of which this royal babe may reap the grain. <br>Enough of early saints one womb has given, <br>Enough increased the family of heaven; <br>Let them for his and our atonement go, <br>And, reigning blest above, leave him to rule below. <br>Enough already has the year foreslowed <br>His wonted course, the sea has overflowed, <br>The meads were floated with a weeping spring, <br>And frightened birds in woods forgot to sing; <br>The strong-limbed steed beneath his harness faints, <br>And the same shivering sweat his lord attaints. <br>When will the minister of wrath give o'er? <br>Behold him at Araunah's threshing-floor!<br>He stops, and seems to sheathe his flaming brand, <br>Pleased with burnt incense from our David's hand; <br>David has bought the Jebusite's abode, <br>And raised an altar to the living God. <br>Heaven, to reward him, makes his joys sincere; <br>No future ills nor accidents appear, <br>To sully and pollute the sacred infant's year. <br>Five months to discord and debate were given; <br>He sanctifies the yet remaining seven. <br>Sabbath of months! henceforth in him be blest, <br>And prelude to the realms perpetual rest! <br>Let his baptismal drops for us atone;<br>Lustrations for offences not his own: <br>Let conscience, which is interest ill disguised, <br>In the same font be cleansed, and all the land baptized. <br>Unnamed as yet; at least unknown to fame; <br>Is there a strife in heaven about his name, <br>Where every famous predecessor vies, <br>And makes a faction for it in the skies? <br>Or must it be reserved to thought alone? <br>Such was the sacred Tetragrammaton.<br>Things worthy silence must not be revealed; <br>Thus the true name of Rome was kept concealed, <br>To shun the spells and sorceries of those <br>Who durst her infant majesty oppose. <br>But when his tender strength in time shall rise <br>To dare ill tongues, and fascinating eyes, <br>This isle, which hides the little Thunderer's fame, <br>Shall be too narrow to contain his name: <br>The artillery of heaven shall make him known; <br>Crete could not hold the god, when Jove was grown. <br>As Jove's increase, who from his brain was born, <br>Whom arms and arts did equally adorn, <br>Free of the breast was bred, whose milky taste <br>Minerva's name to Venus had debased; <br>So this imperial babe rejects the food, <br>That mixes monarch's with plebeian blood: <br>Food that his inborn courage might control, <br>Extinguish all the father in his soul, <br>And for his Estian race, and Saxon strain, <br>Might reproduce some second Richard's reign. <br>Mildness he shares from both his parents' blood; <br>But kings too tame are despicably good: <br>Be this the mixture of this regal child, <br>By nature manly, but by virtue mild. <br>Thus far the furious transport of the news <br>Had to prophetic madness fired the muse; <br>Madness ungovernable, uninspired, <br>Swift to foretell whatever she desired. <br>Was it for me the dark abyss to tread, <br>And read the book which angels cannot read? <br>How was I punished, when the sudden blast <br>The face of heaven, and our young sun, o'ercast! <br>Fame, the swift ill increasing as she rolled, <br>Disease, despair, and death, at three reprises told: <br>At three insulting strides she stalked the town, <br>And, like contagion, struck the loyal down. <br>Down fell the winnowed wheat; but, mounted high, <br>The whirlwind bore the chaff, and hid the sky. <br>Here black rebellion shooting from below, <br>(As earth's gigantic brood by moments grow,)<br>And here the sons of God are petrified with woe: <br>An apoplex of grief! so low were driven <br>The saints, as hardly to defend their heaven. <br>As, when pent vapours run their hollow round, <br>Earthquakes, which are convulsions of the ground, <br>Break bellowing forth, and no confinement brook, <br>Till the third settles what the former shook; <br>Such heavings had our souls, till, slow and late, <br>Our life with his returned, and faith prevailed on fate. <br>By prayers the mighty blessing was implored, <br>To prayers was granted, and by prayers restored. <br>So, ere the Shunamite a son conceived, <br>The prophet promised, and the wife believed; <br>A son was sent, the son so much desired, <br>But soon upon the mother's knees expired. <br>The troubled seer approached the mournful door, <br>Ran, prayed, and sent his pastoral staff before, <br>Then stretched his limbs upon the child, and mourned, <br>Till warmth, and breath, and a new soul returned.<br>Thus Mercy stretches out her hand, and saves <br>Desponding Peter, sinking in the waves. <br>As when a sudden storm of hail and rain <br>Beats to the ground the yet unbearded grain, <br>Think not the hopes of harvest are destroyed <br>On the flat field, and on the naked void; <br>The light, unloaded stem, from tempest freed, <br>Will raise the youthful honours of his head; <br>And, soon restored by native vigour, bear <br>The timely product of the bounteous year. <br>Nor yet conclude all fiery trials past, <br>For heaven will exercise us to the last; <br>Sometimes will check us in our full career, <br>With doubtful blessings, and with mingled fear, <br>That, still depending on his daily grace, <br>His every mercy for an alms may pass; <br>With sparing hands will diet us to good, <br>Preventing surfeits of our pampered blood. <br>So feeds the mother bird her craving young <br>With little morsels, and delays them long. <br>True, this last blessing was a royal feast; <br>But where's the wedding-garment on the guest? <br>Our manners, as religion were a dream, <br>Are such as teach the nations to blaspheme. <br>In lusts we wallow, and with pride we swell, <br>And injuries with injuries repel; <br>Prompt to revenge, not daring to forgive, <br>Our lives unteach the doctrine we believe. <br>Thus Israel sinned, impenitently hard, <br>And vainly thought the present ark their guard;<br>But when the haughty Philistines appear, <br>They fled, abandoned to their foes and fear; <br>Their God was absent, though his ark was there. <br>Ah! lest our crimes should snatch this pledge away, <br>And make our joys the blessings of a day! <br>For we have sinned him hence, and that he lives, <br>God to his promise, not our practice, gives. <br>Our crimes would soon weigh down the guilty scale, <br>But James and Mary, and the Church prevail. <br>Nor Amalek can rout the chosen bands, <br>While Hur and Aaron hold up Moses' hands. <br>By living well, let us secure his days, <br>Moderate in hopes, and humble in our ways. <br>No force the free-born spirit can constrain, <br>But charity, and great examples gain. <br>Forgiveness is our thanks for such a day; <br>'Tis godlike God in his own coin to pay. <br>But you, propitious queen, translated here, <br>From your mild heaven, to rule our rugged sphere, <br>Beyond the sunny walks, and circling year; <br>You, who your native climate have bereft <br>Of all the virtues, and the vices left; <br>Whom piety and beauty make their boast, <br>Though beautiful is well in pious lost; <br>So lost as star-light is dissolved away, <br>And melts into the brightness of the day; <br>Or gold about the royal diadem, <br>Lost, to improve the lustre of the gem,— <br>What can we add to your triumphant day? <br>Let the great gift the beauteous giver pay; <br>For should our thanks awake the risingsun, <br>And lengthen, as his latest shadows run, <br>That, though the longest day, would soon, too soon be done. <br>Let angels' voices with their harps conspire, <br>But keep the auspicious infant from the choir; <br>Late let him sing above, and let us know <br>No sweeter music than his cries below. <br>Nor can I wish to you, great monarch, more <br>Than such an annual income to your store; <br>The day, which gave this unit, did not shine <br>For a less omen, than to fill the trine. <br>After a prince, an admiral beget; <br>The Royal Sovereign wants an anchor yet. <br>Our isle has younger titles still in store, <br>And when the exhausted land can yield no more, <br>Your line can force them from a foreign shore. <br>The name of Great your martial mind will suit; <br>But justice is your darling attribute: <br>Of all the Greeks, 'twas but one hero's due, <br>And, in him, Plutarch prophesied of you. <br>A prince's favours but on few can fall, <br>But justice is a virtue shared by all. <br>Some kings the name of conquerors have assumed, <br>Some to be great, some to be gods presumed; <br>But boundless power, and arbitrary lust, <br>Made tyrants still abhor the name of Just; <br>They shunned the praise this godlike virtue gives <br>And feared a title that reproached their lives. <br>The power, from which all kings derive their state, <br>Whom they pretend, at least, to imitate, <br>Is equal both to punish and reward; <br>For few would love their God, unless they feared. <br>Resistless force and immortality <br>Make but a lame, imperfect deity; <br>Tempests have force unbounded to destroy, <br>And deathless being even the damned enjoy; <br>And yet heaven's attributes, both last and first; <br>One without life, and one with life accurst; <br>But justice is heaven's self, so strictly he, <br>That could it fail, the godhead could not be. <br>This virtue is your own; but life and state <br>Are, one to fortune subject, one to fate: <br>Equal to all, you justly frown or smile; <br>Nor hopes nor fears your steady hand beguile; <br>Yourself our balance hold, the world's our isle.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=John+Dryden">John Dryden</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=419805" data-title="Britannia Rediviva: A Poem on the Birth of the Prince de John Dryden" data-description="Our vows are heard betimes, and heaven takes care 
To grant, before we can conclude the prayer; 
Preventing angels met it half the way, 
And sent us back to praise, who came to pray. 
Just on the day, when the high-mounted sun 
Did farthest in his..."></div>
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