How lackeys and subsizers press
And scramble for degrees.
But leave it, scholler, leave it,
'Twas much against our mind,
But when the prison doors are ope
Noe thief will stay behind.
Behold, more anger yet:
He threatens us ere long, When as the king comes back againe, To make another song. But leave it, scholler, leave it, Your weakness you disclose; For "Bonny Nell" doth plainly tell Your wit lies all in prose.
Nor can you make the world
Of Cambridge praise to ringe,
A mouth so foul no market eare
Will stand to hear it sing.
Then leave it, scholler, leave it,
For yet you cannot say,
The king did go from you in March,
And come again in May.
Quos nostra Academia
Honoribus erexit.
Sed parce, precor, parcito, Nam ipse es expertus, Effugiunt omnes protinus Cum carcer est apertus.
At nobis minitatur,
Si rex sit rediturus, Tunc iste (Phœbo duce) est
Tela resumpturus.
Sed parce, precor, parcito, Piscator ictus sapit, Fugatus namque miles iners Arma nunquam capit.
Et Cantabrigiam non
Lædi hinc speramus,
Ex ore tam spurcidico
Nil damni expectamus.
Ó parce, ergo, parcito,
Oxonia nunquam dicit,
Cum Martio princeps abiens
In Maio nos revisit.
THE LADY ARABELLA.
(THE UNFORTUNATE LADY ARABELLA STUART, WHO DIED IN THE TOWER, SEPT. 27, 1615.)
How do I thanke thee, Death, and blesse thy power,
That I have past the guard, and scaped the Tower!
And now my pardon is my epitaph,
And a small coffin my poore carkasse hath.
For at thy charge both soule and body were
Enlarged at last, secured from hope and feare;
That among saints, this amongst kings is laid,
And what my birth did claim, my death hath paid.
Sent from Dr. Corbet to Sir Thomas Ailesbury, Secretary to the Duke of Buckingham, December the 9th, 1618.
ON THE OCCASION OF A BLAZING STAR.
My brother and much more, hadst thou been mine, Hadst thou in one rich present of a line
Inclos'd sir Francis, for in all this store
No gift can cost thee less, or binde me more;
Hadst thou (dear churle) imparted his return,
I should not with a tardy welcome burn;
But had let loose my joy at him long since,
Which now will seem but studied negligence :
But I forgive thee, two things kept thee from it,
First such a friend to gaze on, next a comet;
Which comet we discern, though not so true
As you at Sion, as long tayl'd as you;
We know already how will stand the case,
With Barnavelt* of universal grace,
Though Spain deserve the whole star, if the fall
Be true of Lerma duke and cardinal:
Marry, in France we fear no blood, but wine;
Less danger's in her sword, than in her vine.
And thus we leave the blazers coming over,
For our portends are wise, and end at Dover:
And though we use no forward censuring,
Nor send our learned proctors to the king,
Yet every morning when the star doth rise,
There is no black for three hours in our eyes;
But like a Puritan dreamer, towards this light
All eyes turn upward, all are zeale and white:
More it is doubtful that this prodigy
Will turne ten schools to one astronomy:
And the analysis we justly fear,
Since every art doth seek for rescue there;
Physicians, lawyers, glovers on the stall,
The shopkeepers speak mathematics all;
And though men read no gospels in these signes,
Yet all professions are become divines;
All weapons from the bodkin to the pike,
The mason's rule and taylor's yard alike
Take altitudes, and th' early fidling knaves
On fluits and hoboyes made them Jacobs-staves;
• The great negociator and general, who fell by the jealousy of the prince of Orange the 13th March 1619.
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