[...].
LONDON'S Bitter-Sweet-CUP OF TEARS, For Her late VISITATION: AND JOY, FOR The KING's Return.
With a Complement (in the close) to FRANCE.
Non nos ampullas, —
By Iohn Crouch.
LONDON, Printed for THOMAS PALMER, at the Crown in Westminster-Hall. 1666.
The POEM
AFter a wanton Century of Peace,
Which all things but Obedience did increase;
Feuds and Rebellions midst three Kingdomes spread,
Whose Hellish zeal took off both Crown and Head;
Foul dregs contracted by Intestine Wars,
Ill-Aspects, and worse frights of bearded Stars;
Rank Exhalations from the Blood was spilt,
And rankor from Impiety and Guilt:
After all these, with thousand Causes more,
(Foreseen, though not prevented, long before;)
The Air grown sick, and the Contagion high,
Poor Londoners (not all prepar'd to die)
Herd after Herd into the Countrey throngs,
While many force their way thorow Forks and Prongs;
Some in wide Fields their Tabernacle pitch,
And some both Bed and Grave make in a Ditch;
Provisions set at so unkind a space,
The sick man dies, ere he can reach the place:
One that had seen the placing of those Cates,
Would not have judg'd them to be food, but Baits
Cunningly planted to deceive, not cherish:
'Tis sad by ill plac'd Charity to perish!
Nay Londons Money must not passe, but there
All the free Bounty not of Love, but Fear;
The Plow men are as jealous of their Lives,
As ever Citizens were of their Wives!
But leave we Rural hearts to Rocks and Stones,
And Survey London's Sorrows, Sighs and Moans.
As when our Thames with monstrous Ebbe doth fly,
To wider Straits, and leaves his Channel dry;
The great Fish with his rapid Streams retire,
Leaving the less and weaker to expire
Upon the thirsty Sands, and desolate Shelves,
Lost, and unable to Protect themselves:
The like destructive and unequal Fate,
Left London Streets too Wide and Desolate;
Threw out the Wealthy int' th' open Air,
And leaves the Needy to Heavens angry care!
Trade interrupted, and the Royal Burse,
Quitted and Empty as the Cities Purse;
While Steeples howling Day and Night, do call
Thousands together to one Funeral:
Our Bells, neither the Old, and Consecrate;
Nor the unhallowed New, could help our Fate:
Not with perpetual Motion purge the Sky,
Still mid-night and meridian Arrows fly.
Graves wide and deep Gape like the mouth of Hell,
In which whole Lanes (now nearer Neighbours) fell;
Pits round the Church, cast like a fatal Line,
Threatned the Sacred Pile to undermine.
Pale Famine feeds upon the Plague; The Poor
All Searchers grown, to find a Rich-man's Door;
If One in a whole Street live here and there,
Their Gates are shut, either by Pest or fear;
Perhaps some brawny Usurer stayes behind,
Not to the City, but his Avarice, kind;
Who dying 'midst his Gold and Silver, sends
His City-gods to bless his Countrey Friends;
Now happily by Rusticks us'd so well,
As if they had Remov'd from Heaven to Hell.
Sometimes when Charity her self did meet,
A poor afflicted Creature in the Street;
Though warm'd Passion and Preservatives,
Her trembling Palme contracts, and nothing gives;
But fearing some infected Hand or Breath,
Leaves the starv'd Soul to pity and to Death:
Which now grew so familiar to the Eye,
The present wonder was to Live, not Dye.
The Vault at Westminster so large and wide;
Which every Term fill'd with a busie Tide
Of lawfull Adversaries, (who, though mov'd
With Wrath and Spleen, walk close as if they lov'd)
How sad it looks! How like that paved Hall,
Which did a Christ, and King, to Iudgement call.
Nothing sold here, but Oxford and L'Estrange,
Two Sheets, the Cities Market and Exchange:
Perhaps some idle Squire walks to and fro,
Not knowing what to do, nor where to go;
Till his Dogs Appetite barks, though in vain,
And wishes Arthurs Table here again.
The Sacred Fabricks of St. Pauls, and Abby,
Now (Synagogue like) serv'd with one Scribe and Rabby:
No Breath the Seats nor Organs to Inspire,
Poor Robbin Redbrest Sings for all the Quire;
When this sad Reformation first was seen,
I thought Sir Robert Harlow had been Dean;
Who Broak and Melted all was in his power,
But dearly lov'd the Images o'th' Tower.
Mr. of the Mint.
Yet of the Two, this of St. Peters Chair,
Is, if not Beautiful, in good Repair;
When good St. Paul hath more of Faith then Works,
Th'East Christian, but the West not fit for Turks;
Only the King, to shew 'tis not his Guilt,
Has beautified all his blest Father Built;
Pauls Reformation do's most sadly stick,
Rent in the Middle and turn'd Schismatick;
And now may well renew his just Complaint,
He came too late to be our Almanack-Saint:
St. Pauls Day, till this last Convocation, not marked with red Letters.
Many I fear could wish both Temples down;
T'enjoy (that Ador'd Trinity) in town;
King, Term, and Parliament; Great Cryes are made,
Not for St. Pauls, but (our Diana) Trade.
Ah! but when Westminster or London meet,
Upon those Peebles of the Royal Street;
(Anenst that White tower, Rais'd by Scotlands Iames,
Banquetting-house.
To gain two Prospects, of the Park and Thames)
They weep o're the discoloured Stones, and Cry,
Here sprung that High Blood first inflam'd the Sky:
Here was committed Englands Capital Crime,
The Monster Plague hatcht here, but born in time.
O then bright Sun o'th' British World appear,
To Influence Your Native Hemisphere:
Whose Presence (Light and Heat) all Good creates;
Whose Absence (an Eclipse) Depopulates.
Till You with Oriental beames Arise,
Poor London faints, peopl'd with Winter flyes;
Which with Consumptive Legs and Spirits crawle,
To seek their Sun from Cheapside to White-hall;
The Place bereav'd of your Presential Care,
Must sink: Where you breath not, breaths no good Air:
Of those vast Heaps the Sword of Pest'lence slew,
Most died o'th' Pest, many for want of You.
But You are Come in Charitable hast,
The first Return'd, who went away the last;
When noble Constellations drag by th' way,
With many lesser Planets gon a stray;
Nothing but your warm Influence could ope,
London, that long clos'd dying
Marigold.
Heliotrope:The City not with grief, but triumph pants,
Each Street as busie as a Field of Ants;
Your Presence, Barracado'd Shops and Doors,
Opens as kindly as the Spring our Pores:
Bon-fires Salute You, and the New-tun'd Bells
Chyme Psalms of Ioy, instead of doleful Knells;
To purge the Air, no Coal-fires now need burn,
Magnificats do that for Your Return:
Thus Loyal LONDON hath a Ransome paid,
For that Defection the Disloyal made.
Heaven bless Your Majesty, may You Advance,
Victorious Ensigns, through the Heart of France:
And since your Vice-Roy has committed Treason,
Be pleas'd sans Complement, to do him Reason:
S. George shall go, and play a Game at Tennis,
In
VV [...]ere the French was b [...]a [...]by the English.
Agincourt, or elsewhere, with S. Dennis.Then over MONCK, and make your Dukedome good,
Seal Albemarle once more with Gallick Blood;
And let the Proclamation of proud Lewis,
Proclaim Great CHARLES, who King of France the true is.
FINIS.