If I had any Satyr left to write,
Cou'd I with suited Spleen Indite,
My Verse should blast that Fatal Town,
And Drowned Saylors Widows pull it down;
No Footsteps of it should appear,140
And Ships no more Cast Anchor there.
The Barbarous Hated Name of Deal shou'd die,
Or be a Term of Infamy;
And till that's done, the Town will stand
A just Reproach to all the Land.
The Ships come next to be my Theme,
The Men's the Loss, I'm not concern'd for them;
For had they perish'd e'er they went,
Where to no Purpose they were sent,
The Ships might ha' been built again,150
And we had sav'd the Money and the Men.
There the Mighty Wrecks appear,
Hic Jacent, Useless Things of War.
Graves of Men, and Tools of State,
There you lye too soon, there you lye too late.
But O ye Mighty Ships of War!
What in Winter did you there?
Wild November should our Ships restore
To Chatham, Portsmouth, and the Nore,
So it was always heretofore,160
For Heaven it self is not unkind,
If Winter Storms he'll sometimes send,
Since 'tis suppos'd the Men of War
Are all laid up, and left secure.
Nor did our Navy feell alone,
The dreadful Desolation;
It shook the Walls of Flesh as well as Stone,
And ruffl'd all the Nation.
The Universal Fright
Made Guilty H—— expect his Fatal Night;170
His harden'd Soul began to doubt,
And Storms grew high within, as they grew high without.
Flaming Meteors fill'd the Air,
But Asgil miss'd his Fiery Chariot there;
Recall'd his black blaspheming Breath,
And trembling paid his Homage unto Death.
Terror appear'd in every Face,
Even Vile Blackbourn felt some shocks of Grace;
Began to feel the Hated Truth appear,
Began to fear,180
After he had Burlesqu'd a God so long,
He should at last be in the wrong.
Some Power he plainly saw,
(And seeing, felt a strange unusual Awe;)
Some secret Hand he plainly found,
Was bringing some strange thing to pass,
And he that neither God nor Devil own'd,
Must needs be at a loss to guess.
Fain he would not ha' guest the worst,
But Guilt will always be with Terror Curst.190
Hell shook, for Devils Dread Almighty Power,
At every Shock they fear'd the Fatal Hour,
The Adamantine Pillars mov'd,
And Satan's Pandemonium trembl'd too;
The tottering Seraphs wildly rov'd,
Doubtful what the Almighty meant to do;
For in the darkest of the black Abode,
There's not a Devil but believes a God.
Old Lucifer has sometimes try'd
To have himself be Deify'd;200
But Devils nor Men the Being of God deny'd,
Till Men of late found out New Ways to sin,
And turn'd the Devil out to let the Atheist in.
But when the mighty Element began,
And Storms the weighty Truth explain,
Almighty Power upon the Whirlwind Rode,
And every Blast proclaim'd aloud
There is, there is, there is, a God.
Plague, Famine, Pestilence, and War,
Are in their Causes seen,210
The true Originals appear
Before the Effects begin:
But Storms and Tempests are above our Rules,
Here our Philosophers are Fools.
The Stagyrite himself could never show,
From whence, nor how they blow.
Tis all Sublime, 'tis all a Mystery,
They see no Manner how, nor Reason why;
All Sovereign Being is the amazing Theme,
'Tis all resolv'd to Power Supreme;220
From this First Cause our Tempest came,
And let the Atheists spight of Sense Blaspheme,
They can no room for Banter find,
Till they produce another Father for the Wind.
Satyr, thy Sense of Sovereign Being Declare,
He made the Mighty Prince o'th' Air,
And Devils recognize him by their Fear.
Ancient as Time, and Elder than the Light,
Ere the First Day, or Antecedent Night,
Ere Matter into settl'd Form became,230
And long before Existence had a Name;
Before th' Expance of indigested Space,
While the vast No-where fill'd the Room of Place.
Liv'd the First Cause The First Great Where and Why,
Existing to and from Eternity,
Of His Great Self, and of Necessity.
This I call God, that One great Word of Fear,
At whose great sound,
When from his Mighty Breath 'tis eccho'd round,
Nature pays Homage with a trembling bow,240
And Conscious Men would faintly disallow;