THE YEAR OF WONDERS, M.DC.LXVI.

.I.

In thriving arts long time had Holland grown, ney
Crouching at home, and cruel when abroad:
Scarce leaving us the means to claim our own;
Our King they courted, and our merchants aw'd.
HIA

Trade, which, like blood, should circularly flow,
Stopp'd in their channels, found its freedom lost:
Thither the wealth of all the world did go,

And seem'd but shipwreck'd on so base a coast.
III.

For them alone the heav'n's had kindly heat,

In eastern quarries ripening precious dew: For them the Idumæan balm did sweat, And in hot Ceylon spicy forests grew.

IV.

The sun but seem'd the lab'rer of the year;

Each waxing moon supply'd her watʼry store,
To swell those tides, which from the line did bear
Their brim-full vessels to the Belgian shore.
V.'.

Thus, mighty in her ships, stood Carthage long,
And swept the riches of the world from far;

Yet stoop'd to Rome, less wealthy, but more strong;
And this may prove our second Punic war,

VI.

What peace can be where both to one pretend ? (But they more diligent, and we more strong) Or if a peace, it soon must have an end;

For they would grow too powerful were it long. ( VII, M

Behold two nations then, engag'd so far,

That each seven years the fit must shake each land; Where France will side to weaken us by war, erg Who only can his vast designs withstand.

See how he feeds th' Iberian with delay's,
To render us his timely friendship vain;
And, while his secret soul on Flanders preys,
He rocks the cradle of the babe of Spain.
IX..

Such deep designs of empire does he lay

2

O'er them whose cause he seems to take in hand; And, prudently, would make them lords at sea, To whom with ease he can give laws by land.

X..

This saw our King; and long within his breast
His pensive counsels balanc'd to and fro:
He griev'd the land he freed should be opprest,
And he less for it than usurpers do.'

Of fame and honour, which in dangers lay;

Where wealth, like fruit on precipices, grew,
Not to be gather'd but by birds of prey.
XII.

The loss and gain each fatally were great;
And still his subjects call'd aloud for war
But peaceful kings, o'er martial people set,
Each other's poize and counterbalance are.

XIII.

He first survey'd the charge with careful eyes,
Which none but mighty monarchs could maintain;
Yet judg'd, like vapours that from limbecs rise,
It would in richer show'rs descend again.
XIV.

At length resolv'd' assert the wat'rý ball,
He in himself did whole armadoes bring:
Him aged seamen might their master call,
And chuse for general, were he not their King.
XV.

*

It seems as ev'ry ship their Sovereign knows,
His awful summons they so soon obey;
So hear the scaly herd when Proteus blows,
And so to pasture follow through the sea.
XVI.

To see this fleet upon the ocean move,

Angels drew wide the curtains of the skies;

*When Proteus blows.]

-Cœruleus Proteus immania ponti

"Armenta et magnas pascit sub gurgite Phocas.

which, you know, change the nature of a known word; by applying it to some other signification: and this is it which Horace means in his Epistle to the Pisos :

"Dixeris egregie, notum si callida verbum

"Reddiderit junctura novum"

But I am sensible I have presumed too far to entertain you with a rude discourse of that art which you both know so well, and put into practice with so much happiness. Yet before I leave Virgil, I must own the vanity to tell you, and by you the world, that he has been my master in this Poem; I have followed him every where; I know not with what success, but I am sure with diligence enough: my images are many of them copied from him, and the rest are imitations of him. My expressions also are as near as the idioms of the two languages would admit of in translation. And this, Sir, I have done with that boldness for which I will stand accountable to any of our little critics, who, perhaps, are no better acquainted with him than I am. Upon your first peru. sal of this Poem, you have taken notice of some words which I have innovated (if it be too bold for me to say refined) upon his Latin; which, as I offer not to introduce into English prose, so I hope they are neither improper, nor altogether unelegant, in verse; and, in this, Horace will again defend me.

"Et nova, fictaque nuper, habebunt verba fidem, si
"Græco fonte cadunt, parce detorta”-

The inference is exceeding plain: for if a Roman poet might have liberty to coin a word, supposing only that it was derived from the Greek, was put in to a Latin termination, and that be used this liberty but seldom, and with modesty; how much more justly may I challenge that privilege to do it, with the same prerequisites, from the best and most judicious of Latin writers? In some places, where either the fancy or the words were his, or any other's, I have noted it in the margin, that I might not seem a plagiary; in others I have neglected it, to avoid as well tedious. ness as the affectation of doing it too often. Such descriptions or images, well wrought, which I promise not for mine, are, as I have said, the adequate delight of heroic peesy for they beget admiration, which is its proper object; as the images of the bur lesque, which is contrary to this, by the same reason, beget laughter for the one shews Nature beautified, as in the picture of a fair woman, which we all admire; the other shews her deformed, as in that of a lazar, or of a fool, with distorted face and antique gestures, at which we cannot forbear to laugh, because it is a deviation from Nature. But though the same images serve equally for the epic poesy, and for the historic and panegyric, which are branches of it, yet a several sort of sculpture is to be used in them. If some of them are to be like those of Juvenal, "Stantes in cur ribus Æmiliani," heroes drawn in their triumphal