Classic Poem

T H at which their zeale, whose onely zeale was bent
To shew the best they could that might delight
Your royall minde, did lately represent
Renowned Empresse to your Princely sight:
Is now the offring of their humblenesse,
Here consecrated to your glorious name;
Whose happy presence did vouchsafe to blesse
So poore presentments, and to grace the same:
And though it be in th'humblest ranke of words,
And in the lowest region of our speach,
Yet is it in that kinde, as best accords
With rurall passions; which vse not to reach
Beyond the groues and woods, where they were bred:
And best become a claustrall exercise,
Where men shut out retyr'd, and sequestred
From publike fashion, seeme to sympathize
With innocent, and plaine simplicity:
And liuing here vnder the awfull hand
Of discipline, and strict obseruancy,
Learne but our weakenesses to vnderstand,
And therefore dare not enterprize to show
In lowder stile the hidden mysteries,
And arts of Thrones; which none that are below
The Sphere of action, and the exercise
Of power can truely shew: though men may straine
Conceipt aboue the pitch where it should stand,
And forme more monstrous figures then containe
A possibility, and goe beyond
The / nature of those managements so farre,
As oft their common decency they marre:
Whereby the populasse (in whom such skill
Is needlesse) may be brought to apprehend
Notions, that may turne all to a tast of ill
What euer power shall do, or might intend:
And thinke all cunning, all proceeding one,
And nothing simple, and sincerely done:
Yet the eye of practise, looking downe from hie
Vpon such ouer-reaching vanity,
Sees how from error t'error it doth flote,
As from an vnknowne Ocean into a Gulfe:
And how though th'Woolfe, would counterfeit the Goate,
Yet euery chinke bewrayes him for a Woolfe.
And therefore in the view of state t'haue show'd
A counterfeit of state, had beene to light
A candle to the Sunne, and so bestow'd
Our paines to bring our dimnesse vnto light.
For maiesty, and power, can nothing see
Without it selfe, that can sight-worthy be.
And therefore durst not we but on the ground,
From whence our humble Argument hath birth,
Erect our Scene, and thereon are we found,
And if we fall, we fall but on the earth,
From whence we pluckt the flowers that here we bring;
Which if at their first opening they did please,
It was enough, they serue but for a spring:
The first sent is the best in things as these.
A musicke of this nature on the ground,
Is euer wont to vanish with the sound.
But yet your royall goodnesse may raise new,
Grace but the Muses they will honour you.