Holland, that scarce deserves the name of land,
As but the off-scouring of the British sand;
And so much earth as was contributed
By English pilots when they heaved the lead;
Or what by th' ocean's slow alluvion fell
Of shipwrecked cockle and the mussel shell;
This indigested vomit of the sea
Fell to the Dutch by just propriety.

Glad, then, as miners that have found the ore,
They with mad labour fished the land to shore,
And dived as desperately for each piece
Of earth, as if't had been of ambergris,
Collecting anxiously small loads of clay,
Less than what building swallows bear away,
Or than those pills which sordid beetles roll,
Transfusing into them their dunghill soul.

How did they rivet, with gigantic piles,
Thorough the centre of their new-catchèd miles,
And to the stake a struggling country bound,
Where barking waves still bait the forcèd ground,
Building their watery Babel far more high
To reach the sea, than those to scale the sky.

Yet still his claim the injured ocean laid,
And oft at leap-frog o'er their steeples played:
As if on purpose it on land had come
To show them what's their Mare Liberum.
A daily deluge over them does boil;
The earth and water play at level-coil;
The fish ofttimes the burger dispossessed,
And sat not as a meat but as a guest.
And oft the tritons and the sea nymphs saw
Whole shoals of Dutch served up for cabillau;
Or as they over the new level ranged
For pickled herring, pickled Heeren changed.
Nature, it seemed, ashamed of her mistake,
Would throw their land away at duck and drake.

Therefore necessity, that first made kings,
Something like government among them brings.
For as with pygmies, who best kills the crane,
Among the hungry, he that treasures grain,
Among the blind, the one-eyed blinkard reigns,
So rules among the drownèd, he that drains.
Not who first sees the rising sun commands,
But who could first discern the rising lands.
Who best could know to pump an earth so leak
Him they their Lord and country's Father speak.
To make a bank was a great plot of state;
Invent a shovel, and be magistrate.
Hence some small dyke-grave unperceived invades
The power, and grows, as 'twere, a King of Spades.
But for less envy some joint states endures,
Who look like a Commission of the Sewers.
For these Half-anders, half wet, half dry,
Nor bear strict service, nor pure liberty.

'Tis probable religion after this
Came next in order, which they could not miss.
How could the Dutch but be converted, when
The Apostles were so many fishermen?
Besides, the waters of themselves did rise,
And, as their land, so them did re-baptize,
Though herring for their god few voices missed,
And Poor-John to have been the Evangelist.
Faith, that could never twins conveive before,
Never so fertile, spawned upon this shore,
More pregnant than their Margaret, that laid down
For Hans-in-Kelder of a whole Hans-town.

Sure when religion did itself embark,
And from the East would Westward steer its ark,
It struck, and splitting on this unknown ground,
Each one thence pillaged the first piece he found:
Hence Amsterdam, Turk-Christian-Pagan-Jew,
Staple of sects and mint of schism grew,
That bank of conscience, where not one so strange
Opinion but finds credit, and exchange.
In vain for Catholics ourselves we bear;
The Universal Church is only there.

Nor can civility there want for tillage,
Where wisely for their court they chose a village.
How fit a title clothes their governors,
Themselves the Hogs, as all their subject Bores!

Let it suffice to give their country fame
That it had one Civilis called by name,
Some fifteen hundred and more years ago;
But surely never any that was so.

See but their mermaids with their tails of fish,
Reeking at church over the chafing -dish:
A vestal turf enshrined in earthen ware
Fumes through the loopholes of a wooden square.
Each to the temple with these altars tend
(But still does place it at her western end),
While the fat stream of female sacrifice
Fills the priest's nostrils and puts out his eyes.

Or what a spectacle the skipper gross,
A water-Hercules butter-coloss,
Tunned up with all their several towns of Beer;
When staggering upon some land, snick and sneer,
They try, like statuaries, if they can
Cut out each other's Athos to a man:
And carve in their large bodies, where they please,
The arms of the United Provinces.

But when such amity at home is showed,
What then are their confederacies abroad?
Let this one court'sy witness all the rest:
When their whole navy they together pressed -
Not Christian captives to redeem from bands,
Or intercept the Western golden sands -
No, but all ancient rights and leagues must vail,
Rather than to the English strike their sail;
To whom their weather-beaten province owes
Itself-when as some greater vessel tows
A cockboat tossed with the same wind and fate -
We buoyed so often up their sinking state.

Was this Jus Belli et Pacis? Could this be
Cause why their burgomaster of the sea
Rammed with gun powder, flaming with brand wine,
Should raging hold his linstock to the mine,
While, with feigned treaties, they invade by stealth
Our sore new circumcisèd Commonwealth?

Yet of his vain attempt no more he sees
Than of case-butter shot and bullet-cheese.
And the torn navy staggered with him home,
While the sea laughed itself into a foam.
'Tis true since that (as fortune kindly sports),
A wholesome danger drove us to our ports,
While half their banished keels the tempest tossed,
Half, bound at home in prison to the frost:
That ours meantime at leisure might careen,
In a calm winter, under skies serene,
As the obsequious air and waters rest,
Till the dear halcyon hatch out all its nest.
The Commonwealth doth by its losses grow;
And, like its own seas, only ebbs to flow.
Besides, that very agitation laves,
And purges out the corruptible waves.

And now again our armèd Bucentore
Doth yearly their sea nuptials restore.
And now their hydra of seven provinces
Is strangled by our infant Hercules.
Their tortoise wants its vainly stretchèd neck;
Their navy all our conquest or our wreck;
Or, what is left, their Carthage overcome
Would render fain unto our better Rome,
Unless our Senate, lest their youth disuse
The war, (but who would?) peace, if begged, refuse.

For now of nothing may our state despair,
Darling of heaven, and of men the care;
Provided that they be what they have been,
Watchful abroad, and honest still within.
For while our Neptune doth a trident shake,
Steeled with those piercing heads-Deane, Monck, and Blake -
And while Jove governs in the highest sphere,
Vainly in Hell let Pluto domineer.