TEARES OF IOY SHED At the happy departure from Great Britaine, of the two Paragons of the Christian world.
FREDERICKE and ELIZABETH, Prince, and Princesse Palatines of Rhine, Duke and Dutches of Bauaria, &c.
By R. A.
Iam redit & virgo, redeunt Saturnia regna.
LONDON, Printed for Thomas Archer, and are to be sold at his shop in the Popes-head-pallace, neere the Royall Exchange. 1613.
TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE, SIR THOMAS ERSKENE, LORD VICOVNT FENTON, Baron of Dirrilton, Captaine of his Maiesties Guards, Gentleman of his Highnesse Bedchamber, and one of his Maiesties most Honorable Priuie Councell, &c.
MY heart abhorres vngratefulnesse, as hell,
Yet how to cleere my selfe, I cannot tell.
I do not plow the fertile plaines of Inde,
Whose fruitfull gifts may match the giuers mind;
I reape no haruest, from rich Arabian fields;
Nor drinke the golden streames, that Ganges yeelds.
My greatest gift hath nothing to commend it,
Except the giuers gratefull mind that send it,
The least in meanes, but not the last in loue,
If equall power could poore goodwill approue.
Which, if your honor, do but rightly weigh,
A gratefull mind is more, then gold can buy;
In signe whereof my simple Muse affoords,
A worthy subiect, drawne in worthlesse words;
A base-borne sister to the sacred Nine,
Which neuer yet did taste Castalian wine,
Nor sund her selfe vpon Parnassus side;
But liu'd obscurely on the banke of Clide,
A flood, beyond Permessis streames in pleasures,
But vnacquainted with the Muses measures.
The field from whence these fruitles gifts do flow,
But new broke vp, in time may riper grow.
Which if it do, if by excesse of toile,
This barren field may turne a fertile soile;
Vnto your Honor (though their vse be small)
Ile consecrate the field, the fruit, and all.
Which once, I wish, may yeeld some greater worth,
Or still be barren, and bring nothing forth.
Meane time, take this, not as the totall sum,
But as the interest of the rest to come.
Your Honours, Most obsequious seruant, Robert Allyne.
Teares of loy.
SHall Brittaine then forgo her other eye,
And lend her rarest gemme, t'enrich the Rhine?
This spatious Ile, though all too straight for three,
Yet large enough, wherein two lampes may shine.
Why then? thogh heauens haue rob'd vs of the best,
Shall distant roomes, diuide the two, that rest?
If nearnesse of the one, make both obscurer?
Can distance adde more brightnesse, then before?
Is vertue, by it selfe sequestred, purer?
Then, when obumbrate by anothers glore.
O sure it is! Nor can this Northerne clime,
Sustaine two Sunnes together, at one time.
This little world, within it selfe, confin'd,
(Which Neptune from the greater world diuides)
Whose lampes gaue light, beyond remotest Inde;
Must now diuide them, with the world besides;
And that, which late enioyd three lampes, alone,
Now rob'd of two, must be content of one.
Go then (great Phebe) one halfe of our hope,
And lend a new light, to an antient land;
A light; that neither raging seas can stop,
Nor Tagus quench, nor Tibers streames withstand.
A light, a starre, a fire, that shall consume,
And dim th'adulterate light of Spanish Rome.
Feare not worse fortune, in a forren part,
Or losse of parents sight, or lacke of friends,
With one that caries more, then halfe thy heart,
Whose breath, or death, vpon thy loue depends.
And one, that glories more in being thine,
Then being great commander of the Rhine.
Behold a mighty land, a martiall soile,
(Whom Caesar had so much ado to dant,
And to contain in duty; of whose spoile
Victorious Rome had little cause to vant)
To thee (great Dame) do greater homage yeeld,
Then Caesar could enforce, in armed field.
The soile it selfe, a fertile glebe of ground,
Where golden Zephire pleasant aire inspires;
Where grasse, and graine, and Bacchus gifts abound,
And all that nature needs, or vse requires.
Where christal brooks, & mettall-sheering strands,
Infect their siluer streames, with golden sands.
The fields, no lesse delightfull there, then here;
The plaines, irriguat with another Thames,
A riuer, no lesse delicate, and cleere,
Deriuing, from the steepie Alpes, his streames.
Adorn'd with spatious parkes, in pleasant rankes;
And many Londons built vpon his bankes.
A thousand tributary torrents falles,
And in his bossome buries all their state;
Who like a masse, made vp of many smalles,
Obscures their memories, that made him great.
By whose augmenting helpe, growne monstrous huge
He braues the Ocean, with a fresh deluge.
Right ouer, and against, where stately Thames,
Disburdens in the maine, his borrowed grouth,
There changing both their natures, and their names,
Each hath a prospect, to the others mouth.
That, if a way lay through the boundlesse brine,
The English Thames shold touch the Germain Rhine.
And sure it seemes, the gentle, fauouring waues,
Haue yeelded passage, to these friendly floods,
While winds, retiring in their trembling caues.
Did leaue calme seas, to welcome Neptunes broods,
And father Ocean himselfe consented
To haue his mighty sonnes made more acquainted.
Where, after some short parly past betweene,
They both did sweare a solemne league of loue;
A league, that shall not end, till Thames and Rhine
Leaue off to run, or heauenly orbes to moue:
And as they sware, that so they meant to do,
The Water-nymphes were witnesses vnto.
But least succeeding ages might aledge
Some friuole reasons, to infringe their oath,
Each did confirme the friendship with a pledge,
Two rarest Iewels, that adorn'd them both.
And for more surety, 'twas agreed vpon,
That both the Iewels were conioin'd in one.
In whom, and in their sacred seed, for euer,
That louing league shall vndissolued stand,
Which times, nor fates, nor death, cannot disseuer,
Nor all the force of hels confederate band.
Whose date (but new begun) shall ne're expire,
Till first, this three-fold frame dissolue in fire.
Let Tiber, Iber, Rodanus, and Seine;
Let Tygris, Tanais, Euphrates, and Nile,
Despise the heauen-bread-peace of Thames and Reine,
In whose proud eyes these precious gems seeme vile.
From these vnited flouds shall spring a flower,
To ruine Tibers pride, and Ibers power.
Let Ganges glory in his golden sands,
Pactolus spread his streames in stately rankes:
Let Indus lend his name to neigbouring lands,
And throe despised pearles vpon his bankes.
In your vnequal'd worths (O peerelesse paire!)
The Thames and Rhine are rich aboue compare.
Nor thou (O Forthe) must be exempt, in this,
Whose merite equals either of the two,
From thee proceeds the ground of both their blisse,
Thou bred these Gemmes, that Thames enioyeth now.
These lights, these stars, that now adorne the earth,
To thee, do owe their bloud, their breath, their birth.
Ioyne with the two, and make the number three,
(Three famous flouds, as earth cannot yeeld such)
That so in number, yee may equall be,
To those three Lampes, that grac'd you once so much.
To whom (since one hath changed earth for heauen)
One more succeeds, to make the number euen.
Our Henry-Fredricke, lies in timelesse toome,
Whose double name exprest not halfe his worth;
A Fredricke in his losse, supplies his roome,
And bearing halfe his name, one halfe sets forth
Of him, whose all, is hardly match'd by two,
And therefore is too much, for one, to do.
Yet thou (braue youth) of all the sonnes of men,
Was onely worthy, to be one of three,
Ranck'd in that roome, by him, who brook'd it then,
And dying, did resigne the same to thee,
Who by a high instinct of heauenly grace,
Left not the world, till thou assum'd his place.
Go then, great Prince, and thou his other halfe,
Grace of his youth, and glory of his age,
Key of his secret thoughts, his second selfe;
Ioy in his care, and comfort in his rage;
And each, in others debt, so deepe inuolued,
That Gordius knot can sooner be dissolued.
Go (royall pare) and let the Rhine augment,
What Thames hath now so gloriously begun,
And while, that lampe of life is yet vnspent,
As Phaenix burnes herselfe against the sunne,
That from her dust may spring another one,
To grace th' Arabian bounds when she is gone:
So now, raise vp a world of royall seed,
That may adorne the earth when ye are dead.
R. A.
To FREDERICKE, Prince Palatine of RHINE, Duke of BAVARIA, &c.
GReat off-spring of a high Imperiall Race,
And now allyed with a Royall kinde,
whose worth exceeds thy years, whose glorious place
Is more then matched, by a generous minde.
Whose outward grace, and inward gifts are such,
As highest veines cannot expresse too much.
Yet neither doth thy race, nor place, nor worth,
Nor these rare parts of body, and of minde,
Nor all thy merits, halfe so much set forth
Thy happinesse, as being now combin'd
In loue, and life, with one, whose vertues shall
Adde new renowne, to race, and place, and all.
Great Caesar-maker, thou whose powerfull vote,
Can raise a subiect to the Imperiall hight;
Thou canst make Emperours, and hast thou not
In creating an Empresse equall might?
Expresse it then vpon thy better halfe,
And in aduancing her, raise vp thy selfe.
That both together gracing Caesars chaire,
Thy sonne may bee Arch-sewer to his sire.
TO EIZABETH Princesse PALATINE of RHINE, Dutches of BAVARIA.
MIrrour of vertue, Beauties blazing starre,
VVhose worth amazes earths remotest ends,
A peece, which nature to adorne so farre,
In skorne of Art, her vtmost skill extends.
VVhere Pallas, Venus, Iuno's giftes are such,
That skarse they haue reseru'd themselues so much.
And must thou th̄e (great dame) withdraw these beams,
And darke this Ile, fr̄o whence thou draws thy stampe,
Is all the circuite, betwixt Tay and Thames,
Too straite a limite, for so great a Lampe?
That so to giue thy glory greater vent,
Thou must possesse the spacious continent.
Yet though thy bodie be remou'd to Rhine,
Thy name shall still thy natiue Ile adorne,
Thy glory in the furthest North shall shine;
And (as the Sunne, through vapors seene, at Morne,
Appeares a larger body, to the eye,
Then when he mountes the high Meridian skie)
Thy beames shall from beyond the Belgicke shore,
Shine still as bright, and brighter then before.
Collatio.
VVhat wonder was't, that Mortalleies did weepe,
VVhen heauens th̄eselues could not abstain fr̄o tears?
What course in mourning, could the loosers keepe,
When those, that gain'd so much, so sad appeares
But when times alter'd, with a milder turne,
Then heauens, & earth did both leaue off to mourn.
What wonder was't, that mortal breasts did grone,
When winds, & waues, could not containe their griefe?
Or what could stil the cheifest mourners mone,
When sympathyzing things found no reliefe?
Till wedding ioyes, did weeping woes exile,
Then sea, and aire, did both beginne to smile.
What wonder is't that mortals leaue their mones,
When heauen themselues haue chang'd their mourning cheere?
What wonder is't, that earth forgets her grones,
VVhen sea, and aire, are growne so calme and cleere?
O happy change! that heauens and earth doth turne,
And seas, and aire, to mirth, that late did mourne.
Heauens, at our sorrowes, seem'd not halfe so sad,
As now they ioy, to see such ioy on earth,
Nor windes, were at our mourning halfe so mad,
As now th'are pleas'd, and partners in our mirth;
Nor at our griefe, the seas grieu'd halfe so much,
As now made calme, they ioy, that our ioye's such.
This lower element, is but the center,
To which, the other's dregs, do downe-ward moue,
That in the same, nor griefe, nor ioy can enter,
But what the other three effect aboue,
And mortall things that on the base earth breed,
Moue by superiour powers, as by their head.
But thou that swayes this lands Imperiall Mace,
Whose spirit doth inspire, and moue this Ile;
And yee, his royall Queene, and Princely race,
Though earth confine your persons for a while,
Yet more then earthly is your sacred power,
Which beares a kinde of rule or'e all the foure,
For as yee seeme too grieue or ioy on earth,
Fire, aire, and seas, incline to griefe, or mirth.
FINIS.