The building was a spacious theatre,

Half-round, on two main pillars vaulted high,
With seats, where all the lords, and each degree
Of sort, might sit in order to behold;

The other side was open, where the throng,

On banks and scaffolds, under sky might stand;

I among these aloof obscurely stood.

The feast and noon grew high, and sacrifice

Had fill'd their hearts with mirth, high cheer, and wine,
When to their sports they turn'd. Immediately

Was Samson as a public servant brought,
In their state livery clad; before him pipes
And timbrels, on each side went armed guards,
Both horse and foot, before him and behind,
Archers, and slingers, cataphracts, and spears.
At sight of him the people with a shout

Rifted the air, clamouring their god with praise,
Who had made their dreadful enemy their thrall.
He, patient, but undaunted, where they led him,
Came to the place, and what was set before him,
Which without help of eye might be essay'd,
To heave, pull, draw, or break, he still perform'd
All with incredible stupendous force,

None daring to appear antagonist.

At length, for intermission's sake, they led him
Between the pillars; he his guide requested,
For so from such as nearer stood we heard,
As over-tired, to let him lean awhile
With both his arms on those two massy pillars,
That to the arched roof gave main support.
He unsuspicious led him; which, when Samson
Felt in his arms, with head awhile inclined,
And eyes fast fix'd, he stood, as one who pray'd,
Or some great matter in his mind revolved:
At last, with head erect, thus cried aloud :
Hitherto, lords, what your commands imposed
I have perform'd, as reason was, obeying,
Not without wonder or delight beheld:
Now, of my own accord, such other trial
I mean to show you of my strength, yet greater;
As with amaze shall strike all who behold.
This utter'd, straining all his nerves, he bow'd,
As with the force of winds and waters pent,
When mountains tremble, those two massy pillars
With horrible convulsion to and fro

He tugg'd, he shook, till down they came, and drew
The whole roof after them, with burst of thunder

Upon the heads of all who sat beneath,

Lords, ladies, captains, counsellors, or priests,
Their choice nobility and flower, not only
Of this, but each Philistian city round,

Met from all parts to solemnise this feast.

Samson, with these immix'd, inevitably
Pull'd down the same destruction on himself;
The vulgar only 'scaped who stood without.

Chor. O dearly-bought revenge, yet glorious!
Living or dying thou hast fulfill'd

The work for which thou wast foretold
To Israel, and now liest victorious
Among thy slain, self-kill'd

Not willingly, but tangled in the fold

Of dire necessity, whose law in death conjoin'd
Thee with thy slaughter'd foes in number more

Than all thy life had slain before.

I Semichor. While their hearts were jocund and sublime, Drunk with idolatry, drunk with wine,

And fat regorged of bulls and goats,
Chanting their idol, and preferring
Before our Living Dread, who dwells
In Silo, his bright sanctuary;

Among them he a spirit of frenzy sent,
Who hurt their minds,

And urged them on with mad desire
To call in haste for their destroyer;
They, only set on sport and play,
Unweetingly importuned

Their own destruction to come speedy upon them.
So fond are mortal men,

Fallen into wrath divine,

As their own ruin on themselves to invite,
Insensate left, or to sense reprobate,

And with blindness internal struck.

2 Semichor. But he, though blind of sight, Despised, and thought extinguish'd quite, With inward eyes illuminated,

His fiery virtue roused

From under ashes into sudden flame,

And as an evening dragon came,

Assailant on the perched roosts

And nests in order ranged

Of tame villatic fowl; but as an eagle

His cloudless thunder bolted on their heads.

So virtue, given for lost,

Depress'd, and overthrown, as seem'd,

Like that self-begotten bird

In the Arabian woods embost,

That no second knows, nor third,

And lay erewhile a holocaust,

From out her ashy womb now teem'd,

Revives, reflourishes, then vigorous most

When most unactive deem'd;

And, though her body die, her fame survives,

A secular bird, ages of lives.

Man. Come, come, no time for lamentation now,

Nor much more cause; Samson hath quit himself
Like Samson, and heroically hath finish'd
A life heroic, on his enemies

Fully revenged, hath left them years of mourning,
And lamentation to the sons of Caphtor
Through all Philistian bounds. To Israel
Honour hath left, and freedom, let but them
Find courage to lay hold on this occasion;
To himself and father's house eternal fame;
And, which is best and happiest yet, all this
With God not parted from him, as was fear'd,
But favouring and assisting to the end.
Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail
Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,
Dispraise, or blame, nothing but well and fair,
And what may quiet us in a death so noble.
Let us go find the body where it lies

Soak'd in his enemies' blood, and from the stream,
With lavers pure, and cleansing herbs, wash off
The clotted gore. I, with what speed the while,
Gaza is not in plight to say us nay,

Will send for all my kindred, all my friends,
To fetch him hence, and solemnly attend,
With silent obsequy, and funeral train,
Home to his father's house: there will I build him
A monument, and plant it round with shade
Of laurel ever green, and branching palm,
With all his trophies hung, and acts enroll'd
In copious legend, or sweet lyric song.
Thither shall all the valiant youth resort,
And from his memory inflame their breasts
To matchless valour, and adventures high:
The virgins also shall on feastful days
Visit his tomb with flowers, only bewailing
His lot unfortunate in nuptial choice,
From whence captivity and loss of eyes.

Chor. All is best, though we oft doubt,
What the unsearchable dispose
Of Highest Wisdom brings about,
And ever best found in the close.
Oft he seems to hide his face,

But unexpectedly returns,

And to his faithful champion hath in place
Bore witness gloriously; whence Gaza mourns,
And all that band them to resist

His uncontrollable intent;

His servants he, with new acquist
Of true experience from this great event,
With peace and consolation hath dismiss'd,
And calm of mind, all passion spent.

his

In this Monody, the author bewails a learned friend, unfortunately drowned in passage from Chester on the Irish seas, 1637; and by occasion foretells the ruin of our corrupted clergy, then in their height.

YET once more, O ye laurels, and once more,
Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude;
And, with forced fingers rude,

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.
Bitter constraint, and sad occasion dear,
Compels me to disturb your season due :
For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,
Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer:
Who would not sing for Lycidas? He knew,
Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.
He must not float upon his watery bier
Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,
Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Begin then, sisters of the sacred well,

That from beneath the seat of Jove doth spring;
Begin, and somewhat loudly sweep the string.
Hence with denial vain, and coy excuse,

So may some gentle Muse

With lucky words favour my destined urn,

And as he passes turn,

And bid fair peace be to my sable shroud.
For we were nursed upon the self-same hill,
Fed the same flock, by fountain, shade, and rill.
Together both, ere the high lawns appear'd
Under the opening eye-lids of the morn,
We drove a field, and both together heard
What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,

Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,

Oft till the star, that rose at evening bright,

Toward heaven's descent had sloped his westering wheel.
Meanwhile the rural ditties were not mute,

Temper'd to the oaten flute;

Rough satyrs danced, and fauns with cloven heel
From the glad sound would not be absent long,
And old Damotas loved to hear our song.

But, O the heavy change, now thou art gone,
Now thou art gone, and never must return!
Thee, shepherd, thee the woods, and desert caves
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergrown,
And all their echoes mourn.

The willows, and the hazel copses green,
Shall now no more be seen

Fanning their joyous leaves to thy soft lays.
As killing as the canker to the rose,

Or taint-worm to the weanling herds that graze,
Or frost to flowers, that their gay wardrobe wear,
When first the white-thorn blows;

Such, Lycidas, thy loss to shepherd's ear.

Where were ye, nymphs, when the remorseless deep Closed o'er the head of your loved Lycidas?

For neither were ye playing on the steep,

Where your old bards, the famous Druids, lie,
Nor on the shaggy top of Mona high,

Nor yet where Deva spreads her wizard stream:
Ah me! I fondly dream,

Had ye been there, for what could that have done?
What could the Muse herself that Orpheus bore,
The Muse herself, for her enchanting son,
Whom universal nature did lament,

When, by the rout that made the hideous roar,
His gory visage down the stream was sent,
Down the swift Hebrus to the Lesbian shore?
Alas! what boots it with incessant care
To tend the homely, slighted, shepherd's trade,
And strictly meditate the thankless Muse?
Were it not better done, as others use,
To sport with Amaryllis, in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Neæra's hair?

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)

To scorn delights and live laborious days;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find,
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears,
And slits the thin-spun life. But not the praise,
Phoebus replied, and touch'd my trembling ears;
Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil,
Nor in the glistering foil

Set off to the world, nor in broad rumour lies,
But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes,
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove;
As he pronounces lastly on each deed,
Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.