With such a chief the meanest nation blest,
Might hope to lift her head above the rest:
What may be thought impossible to do
By us, embraced by the seas, and you?
Lords of the world's great waste, the ocean, we
Whole forests send to reign upon the sea,
And ev'ry coast may trouble or relieve;
But none can visit us without your leave.
Angels and we have this prerogative,
That none can at our happy seats arrive;
While we descend at pleasure to invade
The bad with vengeance, and the good to aid.
[260] Our little world, the image of the great,
Like that, amidst the boundless ocean set,
Of her own growth hath all that nature craves,
And all that's rare, as tribute from the waves.
As Ægypt does not on the clouds rely,
But to the Nile owes more than to the sky;
So what our Earth and what our heav'n denies,
Our ever-constant friend the sea, supplies.
The taste of hot Arabia's spice we know,
Free from the scorching sun that makes it grow;
Without the worm in Persian silks we shine,
And without planting drink of ev'ry vine.
To dig for wealth we weary not our limbs.
Gold (tho' the heaviest Metal) hither swims:
Our's is the harvest where the Indians mow,
We plough the deep, and reap what others sow.
Things of the noblest kind our own soil breeds;
Stout are our men, and warlike are our steeds;
Rome (tho' her eagle thro' the world had flown)
Cou'd never make this island all her own.
Here the third Edward, and the Black Prince too,
France conq'ring Henry flourish'd, and now you;
For whom we staid, as did the Grecian state,
Till Alexander came to urge their fate.
When for more world's the Macedonian cry'd,
He wist not Thetys in her lap did hide
Another yet, a word reserv'd for you,
To make more great than that he did subdue.