Embrace thy radiant brows. O may the best
Of everlasting joys bathe thy white breast.
Live, our chaste love, the holy mirth
Of Heaven; the humble pride of Earth.
Live, crown of women, queen of men,
Live, mistress of our song; and when
Our weak desires have done their best,
Sweet angels come, and sing the rest.
ON A TREATISE OF CHARITY 1
RISE, then, immortal maid, Religion, rise!
Put on thyself in thine own looks: t' our eyes Be what thy beauties, not our blots, have made thee, Such as (ere our dark sins to dust betray'd thee) Heaven set thee down new dress'd; when thy bright birth
Shot thee like lightning to th' astonished Earth.
From th' dawn of thy fair eyelids wipe away
Dull mists and melancholy clouds: take Day
And thine own beams about thee: bring the best
Of whatsoe'er perfumed thy Eastern nest,
Girt all thy glories to thee; then sit down,
Open this book, fair Queen, and take thy crown.
These learned leaves shall vindicate to thee
Thy holiest, humblest handmaid, Charity.
She'll dress thee like thyself, set thee on high
Where thou shalt reach all hearts, command each
eye.
Lo! where I see thy offerings wake, and rise
From the pale dust of that strange sacrifice
Which they themselves were; each one putting on
A majesty that may beseem thy throne.
1 The treatise On Charity, on which Crashaw has written this poem, was by Robert Shelford, parson of Ringsfield, in Suffolk,
The holy youth of Heaven, whose golden rings
Girt round thy awful altars, with bright wings
Fanning thy fair locks (which the World believes
As much as sees) shall with these sacred leaves
Trick their tall plumes, and in that garb shall go
If not more glorious, more conspicuous though.
-Be it enacted then
By the fair laws of thy firm-pointed pen,
God's services no longer shall put on
Pure sluttishness for pure religion:
No longer shall our Churches' frighted stones
Lie scatter'd like the burnt and martyr'd bones
Of dead Devotion, nor faint marbles weep
In their sad ruins, nor Religion keep
A melancholy mansion in those cold
Urns. Like God's sanctuaries they look'd of old:
Now seem they Temples consecrate to none,
Or to a new god, Desolation.1
No more the hypocrite shall th' upright be
Because he's stiff, and will confess no knee:
While others bend their knee, no more shalt thou,
(Disdainful dust and ashes) bend thy brow;
Nor on God's altar cast two scorching eyes
Baked in hot scorn, for a burnt sacrifice :
But (for a lamb) thy tame and tender heart
New struck by Love, still trembling on his dart;
Or (for two turtle-doves) it shall suffice
To bring a pair of meek and humble eyes.
This shall from henceforth be the masculine theme
Pulpits and pens shall sweat in; to redeem
1 Peterhouse Chapel was terribly handled by the Rebels. Crashaw used to be fond of praying there when he was a Fellow.
Virtue to action, that life-feeding flame
That keeps Religion warm: not swell a name
Of Faith; a mountain-word, made up of air,
With those dear spoils that wont to dress the fair
And fruitful Charity's full breasts (of old),
Turning her out to tremble in the cold.
What can the poor hope from us, when we be
Uncharitable even to Charity?
Nor shall our zealous ones 1 still have a fling
At that most horrible and hornèd thing,
Forsooth the Pope: by which black name they call
The Turk, the devil, Furies, Hell and all,
Doubt this and doubt (say they) that Christ is Christ:
Why, 'tis a point of Faith. Whate'er it be,
I'm sure it is no point of Charity.
In sum, no longer shall our people hope,
To be a true Protestant's but to hate the Pope.
DIES IRÆ, DIES ILLA
THE HYMN OF THE CHURCH, IN MEDITATION OF THE DAY OF JUDGMENT
HEAR'ST thou, my soul, what serious things
Both the Psalm and Sibyl 3 sings
1 Evidently the Puritan party.
2 Crashaw's friend Shelford, author of this Treatise on which he is writing, was an Anglican priest, and had repudiated the idea of the Pope being Anti-Christ dear to the Puritan mind.
3 Dies ira, dies illa
Solvet sæclum in favilla
Teste David cum Sibylla, etc.
Of a sure Judge, from Whose sharp ray The World in flames shall fly away.
O that fire, before whose face
Heaven and Earth shall find no place.
O those eyes, Whose angry light
Must be the day of that dread night.
O that trump, whose blast shall run
An even round with the circling sun,
And urge the murmuring graves to bring
Pale mankind forth to meet his King.
Horror of Nature, Hell, and Death,
When a deep groan from beneath
Shall cry, "We come, we come," and all
The caves of Night answer one call.
O that Book, whose leaves so bright
Will set the World in severe light.
O that Judge, Whose hand, Whose eye
None can endure; yet none can fly.
Ah then, poor soul, what wilt thou say?
And to what patron 2 choose to pray?
1 Liber scriptus proferetur
In quo totum continetur
Unde mundus judicetur.
2 Quem patronum rogaturus.
When stars themselves shall stagger, and
The most firm foot no more then stand.
But Thou givest leave (dread Lord!) that we
Take shelter from Thyself in Thee;
And with the wings of Thine Own Dove
Fly to Thy sceptre of soft love.
Dear, remember in that Day
Who was the cause Thou cam'st this way. Thy sheep was stray'd; and Thou wouldst be Even lost Thyself in seeking me.
Shall all that labour, all that cost
Of love, and even that loss, be lost?
And this loved soul, judged worth no less
Than all that way and weariness?
Just mercy, then, Thy reck'ning be
With my Price, and not with me;
'Twas paid at first with too much pain,
To be paid twice, or once, in vain.
Mercy (my Judge), mercy I cry
With blushing cheek and bleeding eye:
The conscious colours of my sin
Are red without and pale within.
1 Recordare Jesu pie,
Quod sum causa tuæ viæ,
Ne me perdas illa die.
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