Vulcan from heav’n fell, yet on ’s feet did light,
And stood no less a God than at his height.
[From “Bussy D’Ambois,” a Tragedy, by G. Chapman, 1613.]
Invocation for Secrecy at a Love-meeting.
Tamyra. Now all the peaceful Regents of the Night,
Silently-gliding Exhalations,
Languishing Winds, and murmuring Falls of Waters,
Sadness of Heart, and Ominous Secureness,
Enchantment’s dead Sleeps; all the Friends of Rest,
That ever wrought upon the life of man;
Extend your utmost strengths, and this charm’d hour
Fix like the center; make the violent wheels
Of Time and Fortune stand; and great Existence.
The Maker’s Treasury, now not seem to be
To all but my approaching friend[245] and me.
At the Meeting.
Here’s nought but whispering with us: like a calm
Before a tempest, when the silent air
Lays her soft ear close to the earth, to hearken
For that, she fears is coming to afflict her.
Invocation for a Spirit of Intelligence.
D’Ambois. I long to know
How my dear Mistress fares, and be inform’d
What hand she now holds on the troubled blood
Of her incensed Lord. Methought the Spirit
When he had utter’d his perplext presage,
Threw his chang’d countenance headlong into clouds;
His forehead bent, as he would hide his face:
He knock’d his chin against his darken’d breast,
And struck a churlish silence thro’ his powers.—
Terror of Darkness: O thou King of Flames,
That with thy music-footed horse dost strike
The clear light out, of chrystal, on dark earth;
And hurl’st instructive fire about the world:
Wake, wake the drowsy and enchanted night,
That sleeps with dead eyes in this heavy riddle.[246]
Or thou, Great Prince of Shades, where never sun
Sticks his far-darted beams; whose eyes are made
To see in darkness, and see ever best
Where sense is blindest: open now the heart
Of thy abashed oracle, that, for fear
Of some ill it includes, would fain lie hid;
And rise Thou with it in thy greater light.[247]