'Tis custom, Lord, this day to send
A gift to every vulgar friend;
And shall I find no gift for thee,
That art the best of friends to me?
There's nothing which my thoughts survey-
My life, my soul, the light, the day-
But they are all thy gifts to me;
And shall I find no gift for thee?
Yea, Lord; behold I here confer
My life, my soul, and whatsoe'er
Thy liberal hand hath given to me,
Back as a new-year's gift, on thee.
Said I, a gift? Ah! 'tis not so:
Alas both men and angels know,
That all these things thy Christ hath bought,
And therefore I can give thee nought.
He's dead! Insult, infernal powers, the dread
Messias, Jesus, whom you fear'd, is dead!
But stay! rejoice not neither—it is from
His death that your great empire's fall doth come.
Twas 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 your great champion overthrown;
But through his sides yourselves accurs'd you slew,
And he being ruined by you ruin'd you.
COME down, blest Saviour! 'tis 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'er before could'st gain—
Even my proud heart, which rebel lusts have ta'en,
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-rais'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 lie low, and be
Subject, henceforth, unto no king but thee.
Do this, dear Lord, and my glad soul shall say,
To me thou ne'er ascendedst till to-day.
SEE here, in George's portraiture, a true
Description of what Christians ought to do:
No civil wars, no brothers' blood imbrues
His righteous hands, he no such foes pursues;
The cross his ensign is, his faith his shield,
His sword the Scripture, his own heart the field,
His enemy the dragon-him alone
He thinks it worth his while to set upon :-
O God, that we, who George our champion call,
Save such as these would fight no fights at all!
SUCH due respect the Romans to their grave
And hoary elders, though but heathens, gave,
That next their guardian deities they set
Their names upon this month's fair frontelet;
Which it keeps still unraz'd, and, to this day,
From those grand Majors is surnamed May.
Age crown'd with wisdom high regards doth claim;
"Ancient of days," is God's own glorious name;
Whose more especial stamp doth seem to be
Engrav'd upon their snowy sovereignty:
Yet such is our foul sin-Oh, woe the while !—
We slight the duty, though we own the style.
THE judicious reader will infer from the subjoined poems by FLATMAN, that this writer, if unworthy of all the praise lavished on him by his contemporaries, as little deserves the severe and contemptuous censures which more recent critics have passed upon his pretensions to the character of a poet.
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