Departing Spring could only stay to shed
Her bloomy beauties on the genial bed,
But left the manly Summer in her stead,
With timely fruit the longing land to cheer,
And to fulfil the promise of the year.
Betwixt two seasons comes the auspicious heir,
This age to blossom, and the next to bear.
Last solemn Sabbath[161] saw the Church attend,
The Paraclete in fiery pomp descend; 20
But when his wondrous octave[162] roll'd again,
He brought a royal infant in his train.
So great a blessing to so good a king,
None but the Eternal Comforter could bring.
Or did the mighty Trinity conspire,
As once in council, to create our sire?
It seems as if they sent the new-born guest
To wait on the procession of their feast;
And on their sacred anniverse decreed
To stamp their image on the promised seed. 30
Three realms united, and on one bestow'd,
An emblem of their mystic union show'd:
The Mighty Trine the triple empire shared,
As every person would have one to guard.
Hail, son of prayers! by holy violence
Drawn down from heaven; but long be banish'd thence,
And late to thy paternal skies retire:
To mend our crimes, whole ages would require;
To change the inveterate habit of our sins,
And finish what thy godlike sire begins. 40
Kind Heaven, to make us Englishmen again,
No less can give us than a patriarch's reign.
The sacred cradle to your charge receive,
Ye seraphs, and by turns the guard relieve;
Thy father's angel, and thy father join,
To keep possession, and secure the line;
But long defer the honours of thy fate:
Great may they be like his, like his be late;
That James this running century may view,
And give his son an auspice to the new. 50
Our wants exact at least that moderate stay:
For see the Dragon[163] winged on his way,
To watch the travail,[164] and devour the prey.
Or, if allusions may not rise so high,
Thus, when Alcides[165] raised his infant cry,
The snakes besieged his young divinity:
But vainly with their forked tongues they threat;
For opposition makes a hero great.
To needful succour all the good will run, 60
And Jove assert the godhead of his son.
O still repining at your present state,
Grudging yourselves the benefits of fate,
Look up, and read in characters of light
A blessing sent you in your own despite.
The manna falls, yet that celestial bread
Like Jews you munch, and murmur while you feed.
May not your fortune be, like theirs, exiled,
Yet forty years to wander in the wild!
Or if it be, may Moses live at least, 70
To lead you to the verge of promised rest!
Though poets are not prophets, to foreknow
What plants will take the blight, and what will grow,
By tracing Heaven, his footsteps may be found:
Behold! how awfully he walks the round!
God is abroad, and, wondrous in his ways,
The rise of empires, and their fall surveys;
More, might I say, than with an usual eye,
He sees his bleeding church in ruin lie,
And hears the souls of saints beneath his altar cry. 80
Already has he lifted high the Sign,[166]
Which crown'd the conquering arms of Constantine;
The Moon[167] grows pale at that presaging sight,
And half her train of stars have lost their light.
Behold another Sylvester,[168] to bless
The sacred standard, and secure success;
Large of his treasures, of a soul so great,
As fills and crowds his universal seat.
Now view at home a second Constantine;
(The former too was of the British line;)[169] 90
Has not his healing balm your breaches closed,
Whose exile many sought, and few opposed?
Or, did not Heaven by its eternal doom
Permit those evils, that this good might come?
So manifest, that even the moon-eyed sects
See whom and what this Providence protects.
Methinks, had we within our minds no more
Than that one shipwreck on the fatal Ore,[170]
That only thought may make us think again,
What wonders God reserves for such a reign. 100
To dream that Chance his preservation wrought,
Were to think Noah was preserved for nought;
Or the surviving eight were not design'd
To people Earth, and to restore their kind.
When humbly on the royal babe we gaze,
The manly lines of a majestic face
Give awful joy: 'tis Paradise to look
On the fair frontispiece of Nature's book:
If the first opening page so charms the sight,
Think how the unfolded volume will delight! 110