Twice the
reformed
must fight a bloody prize.
Marvell - Poems
From whence our vices and our ruin flow.
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272 THE POEII8
Here parents their own offspring prostitute.
By such vile arts to obtain some viler suit.
Here blooming youth adore Priapus' shrine,
And priests pronounce him sacred and divine.
The goatish god behold in his alcove,
(The secret scene of damned incestuous love)
Melting in lust, and drunk like Lot, he lies
Betwixt two bright daughter-divinities.
Oh ! that like Saturn he had eat his brood.
And had been thus stained with their impious
blood;
He had in that less ill, more manhood showed.
Cease, cease, (O Charles) thus to pollute our
isle.
Return, return, to thy long-wished exile ;
There with thy court defile thy neighbour-
states.
And with their crimes precipitate their fates.
See where the Duke in damned divan does sit,
To *8 vast designs wracking his pigmy wit ;
Whilst a clioice senate of the Ignatian crew.
The ways to murder, treason, conquest show.
Dissenters they oppress with law severe,
That whilst to wound those innocents we fear.
Their cursed sect we may be forced to spare.
Twice the reformed must fight a bloody prize.
That Rome and France may on their ruin rise,
Old Bonner single heretics did burn.
These reformed cities into ashes turn.
And every year new fires do make us mourn.
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OP MARVELL. 273
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Ireland stands ready for his cruel reign ;
Well-fattened once, she gapes for blood again,
For blood of English martyrs basely slain.
Our valiant youth abroad must learn the trade
Of unjust war, their country to invade,
Whilst others here do guard us, to^ prepare
Our galled necks his iron yoke to bear.
Lo ! how the Wight already is betrayed,
And Bashaw Holmes does the poor isle invade.
To ensure the plot, Prance must her legions
lend,
Rome to restore, and to enthrone Rome's friend. .
*Tis in return, James does our fleet betray,
(That fleet whose thunder made the world obey. )
Ships once our safety, and our glorious might,
Are doomed with worms and rottenness to fight,
Whilst France rides sovereign o'er the British
main,
Our merchants robbed, and our brave seamen>
ta'en.
Thus the rash Phaeton with fury hurled,
And rapid rage, consumes our British world-
Blast him, O heavens ! in his mad career,
And let this isle no more his frenzy fear.
Cursed James, 'tis he that all good men abhor.
