To a Lady who sent me a copy of verses at my going to bed

Lady your art or wit could nere devise
To shame me more then in this nights surprise.
Why I am quite unready, and my eye
Now winking like my candle, doth deny
To guide my hand, if it had ought to write;
Nor can I make my drowsie sense indite
Which by your verses musick (as a spell
Sent from the Sybellean Oracle)
Is charm'd and bound in wonder and delight,
Faster then all the leaden chains of night.
What pity is it then you should so ill
Employ the bounty of your flowing quill,
As to expend on him your bedward thought,
Who can acknowledge that large love in nought
But this lean wish; that fate soon send you those
Who may requite your rhimes with midnight prose?
Mean time, may all delights and pleasing Theams
Like Masquers revell in your Maiden dreams,
Whil'st dull to write, and to do more unmeet,
I, as the night invites me, fall asleep.

poem by Henry King
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Another of the same, paraphrased for an Antheme

Out of the horrour of the lowest Deep,
Where cares & endlesse fears their station keep,
To thee (O Lord) I send my woful cry:
O heare the accents of my misery.
If Thy enquiry (Lord) should be severe,
To mark all sins which have been acted here,
Who may abide? or, when they fisted are,
Stand un-condemned at Thy Judgments bar?
But there is mercy (O my God) with Thee,
That Thou by it may'st lou'd, and feared be.
My Soule waites for the Lord, in Him I trust,
Whose word is faithful, & whose promise just.
On him my longing thoughts are fixt, as they,
Who wait the cōforts of the rising day:
Yea more then those that watch the morning light
Tir'd with the sorrowes of a rest-less night.
O Israel, trust in that Gratious Lord,
Who plentifull remission doth afford;
And will His people, who past pardon seeme,
By mercyes greater then their sins redeeme.

poem by Henry King
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To my Sister Anne King, who chid me in verse for being angry

Dear Nan, I would not have thy counsel lost,
Though I last night had twice so much been crost;
Well is a Passion to the Market brought,
When such a treasure of advice is bought
With so much dross. And could'st thou me assure,
Each vice of mine should meet with such a cure,
I would sin oft, and on my guilty brow
Wear every misperfection that I ow,
Open and visible; I should not hide
But bring my faults abroad: to hear thee chide
In such a Note, and with a Quill so sage,
It Passion tunes, and calmes a Tempests rage.
Well I am charm'd, and promise to redress
What, without shrift, my follies doe confess
Against my self: wherefore let me intreat,
When I fly out in that distemper'd heat
Which frets me into fasts, thou wilt reprove
That froward spleen in Poetry and Love:
So though I lose my reason in such fits,
Thoul't rime me back again into my wits.

poem by Henry King
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On two Children dying of one Disease, and buried in one Grave

Brought forth in sorrow, and bred up in care,
Two tender Children here entombed are:
One Place, one Sire, one Womb their being gave,
They had one mortal sickness, and one grave.
And though they cannot number many years
In their Account, yet with their Parents tears
This comfort mingles; Though their dayes were few
They scarcely sinne, but never sorrow knew:
So that they well might boast, they carry'd hence
What riper ages lose, their innocence.
You pretty losses, that revive the fate
Which in your mother death did antedate,
O let my high-swol'n grief distill on you
The saddest drops of a Parentall dew:
You ask no other dower then what my eyes
Lay out on your untimely exequies:
When once I have discharg'd that mournfull skore,
Heav'n hath decreed you ne're shall cost me more,
Since you release and quit my borrow'd trust,
By taking this inheritance of dust.

poem by Henry King
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The Vow-Breaker

VVhen first the Magick of thine ey,
Usurpt upon my liberty,
Triumphing in my hearts spoyl, thou
Didst lock up thine in such a vow;
When I prove false, may the bright day
Be govern'd by the Moons pale ray!
(As I too well remember) This
Thou said'st, and seald'st it with a kiss.
O Heavens! and could so soon that Ty
Relent in slack Apostacy?
Could all thy Oaths, and morgag'd trust,
Vanish? like letters form'd in dust
Which the next wind scatters. Take heed,
Take heed Revolter; know this deed
Hath wrong'd the world, which will fare worse
By thy Example then thy Curse.
Hide that false Brow in mists. Thy shame
Ne're see light more, but the dimme flame
Of funeral Lamps. Thus sit and moane,
And learn to keep thy guilt at home.

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poem by Henry King
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AN EPITAPH On his most honoured Friend Richard Earl of Dorset

Let no profane ignoble foot tread neer
This hallow'd peece of earth, Dorset lies here.
A small sad relique of a noble spirit,
Free as the air, and ample as his merit;
Whose least perfection was large, and great
Enough to make a common man compleat.
A soul refin'd and cull'd from many men,
That reconcil'd the sword unto the pen,
Using both well. No proud forgetting Lord,
But mindful of mean names and of his word.
One that did love for honour, not for ends,
And had the noblest way of making friends
By loving first. One that did know the Court,
Yet understood it better by report
Then practice, for he nothing took from thence
But the kings favour for his recompence.
One for religion, or his countreys good
That valu'd not his Fortune nor his blood.
One high in fair opinion, rich in praise;
And full of all we could have wisht, but dayes.

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poem by Henry King
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The Defence

Piensan los Enamorados
Que tienen los otros, los oios quebranta dos.

Why slightest thou what I approve?
Thou art no Peer to try my love,
Nor canst discern where her form lyes,
Unless thou saw'st her with my eyes.
Say she were foul and blacker than
The Night, or Sun-burnt African,
If lik't by me, tis I alone
Can make a beauty where was none;
For rated in my fancie, she
Is so as she appears to me.
But tis not feature, or a face,
That does my free election grace,
Nor is my liking onely led
By a well temperd white and red;
Could I enamour'd grow on those,
The Lilly and the blushing Rose
United in one stalk might be

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poem by Henry King
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The Farewell

Splendidis longum valedico nugis.

Farewell fond Love, under whose childish whip,
I have serv'd out a weary Prentiship;
Thou that hast made me thy scorn'd property,
To dote on Rocks, but yielding Loves to fly:
Go bane of my dear quiet and content,
Now practise on some other Patient.
Farewell false Hope that fann'd my warm desire
Till it had rais'd a wild unruly fire,
Which nor sighs cool, nor tears extinguish can,
Although my eyes out-flow'd the Ocean:
Forth of my thoughts for ever, Thing of Air,
Begun in errour, finish't in despair.
Farewell vain World, upon whose restless stage
Twixt Love and Hope I have foold out my age;
Henceforth ere sue to thee for my redress,
Ile wooe the wind, or court the wilderness;
And buried from the dayes discovery,
Study a slow yet certain way to dy.

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poem by Henry King
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To his Friends of Christ-Church upon the mislike of the Marriage of the Arts acted at Woodstock

But is it true, the Court mislik't the Play,
That Christ-Church and the Arts have lost the day;
That Ignoramus should so far excell,
Their Hobby-horse from ours hath born the Bell?
Troth you are justly serv'd, that would present
Ought unto them, but shallow merriment;
Or to your Marriage-table did admit
Guests that are stronger far in smell then wit.
Had some quaint Bawdry larded ev'ry Scene,
Some fawning Sycophant, or courted queane;
Had there appear'd some sharp cross-garter'd man
Whom their loud laugh might nick-name Puritan,
Cas'd up in factious breeches and small ruffe,
That hates the surplis, and defies the cuffe: Then sure they would have given applause to crown
That which their ignorance did now cry down.
Let me advise, when next you do bestow
Your pains on men that do but little know,
You do no Chorus nor a Comment lack,
Which may expound and construe ev'ry Act:
That it be short and slight; for if 't be good

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poem by Henry King
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AN ELEGY Upon the L. Bishop of London John King

Sad Relick of a blessed Soul! whose trust
We sealed up in this religious dust.
O do not thy low Exequies suspect
As the cheap arguments of our neglect.
'Twas a commanded duty that thy grave
As little pride as thou thy self should have.
Therefore thy covering is an humble stone,
And but a word for thy inscription.
When those that in the same earth neighbour thee,
Have each his Chronicle and Pedigree:
They have their waving pennons and their flagges,
(Of Matches and Alliance formal bragges.)
VVhen thou (although from Ancestors thou came
Old as the Heptarchy, great as thy Name)
Sleep'st there inshrin'd in thy admired parts,
And hast no Heraldry but thy deserts.
Yet let not Them their prouder Marbles boast,
For They rest with less honour, though more cost.
Go, search the world, and with your Mattocks wound
The groaning bosom of the patient ground:

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poem by Henry King
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