To The Lord Chancellor Hyde.[1] Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCCDEFGHHDEIIJJKKLMN OPPQRKKSTPP UUIIVWXXYYZA2B2B2WWC 2C2 D2E2F2F2G2G2H2H2WVI2 I2IIRQG2G2J2J2K2K2PI G2G2L2L2IIM2M2B2B2AA C2C2 J2J2III2I2LMXUN2N2JJ O2O2P2P2 Q2Q2R2R2WWCCS2S2UXT2 T2XXU2U2KKV2V2PP PPPPKKW2W2KKPPAAPPX2 Y2Z2Z2KKQ2Q2A3A3DE| Presented On New Year's Day | A |
| - | |
| My Lord | B |
| While flattering crowds officiously appear | C |
| To give themselves not you a happy year | C |
| And by the greatness of their presents prove | D |
| How much they hope but not how well they love | E |
| The Muses who your early courtship boast | F |
| Though now your flames are with their beauty lost | G |
| Yet watch their time that if you have forgot | H |
| They were your mistresses the world may not | H |
| Decay'd by time and wars they only prove | D |
| Their former beauty by your former love | E |
| And now present as ancient ladies do | I |
| That courted long at length are forced to woo | I |
| For still they look on you with such kind eyes | J |
| As those that see the church's sovereign rise | J |
| From their own order chose in whose high state | K |
| They think themselves the second choice of fate | K |
| When our great monarch into exile went | L |
| Wit and religion suffer'd banishment | M |
| Thus once when Troy was wrapp'd in fire and smoke | N |
| The helpless gods their burning shrines forsook | O |
| They with the vanquish'd prince and party go | P |
| And leave their temples empty to the foe | P |
| At length the Muses stand restored again | Q |
| To that great charge which Nature did ordain | R |
| And their loved Druids seem revived by fate | K |
| While you dispense the laws and guide the state | K |
| The nation's soul our monarch does dispense | S |
| Through you to us his vital influence | T |
| You are the channel where those spirits flow | P |
| And work them higher as to us they go | P |
| - | |
| In open prospect nothing bounds our eye | U |
| Until the earth seems join'd unto the sky | U |
| So in this hemisphere our utmost view | I |
| Is only bounded by our king and you | I |
| Our sight is limited where you are join'd | V |
| And beyond that no farther heaven can find | W |
| So well your virtues do with his agree | X |
| That though your orbs of different greatness be | X |
| Yet both are for each other's use disposed | Y |
| His to enclose and yours to be enclosed | Y |
| Nor could another in your room have been | Z |
| Except an emptiness had come between | A2 |
| Well may he then to you his cares impart | B2 |
| And share his burden where he shares his heart | B2 |
| In you his sleep still wakes his pleasures find | W |
| Their share of business in your labouring mind | W |
| So when the weary sun his place resigns | C2 |
| He leaves his light and by reflection shines | C2 |
| - | |
| Justice that sits and frowns where public laws | D2 |
| Exclude soft mercy from a private cause | E2 |
| In your tribunal most herself does please | F2 |
| There only smiles because she lives at ease | F2 |
| And like young David finds her strength the more | G2 |
| When disencumber'd from those arms she wore | G2 |
| Heaven would our royal master should exceed | H2 |
| Most in that virtue which we most did need | H2 |
| And his mild father who too late did find | W |
| All mercy vain but what with power was join'd | V |
| His fatal goodness left to fitter times | I2 |
| Not to increase but to absolve our crimes | I2 |
| But when the heir of this vast treasure knew | I |
| How large a legacy was left to you | I |
| Too great for any subject to retain | R |
| He wisely tied it to the crown again | Q |
| Yet passing through your hands it gathers more | G2 |
| As streams through mines bear tincture of their ore | G2 |
| While empiric politicians use deceit | J2 |
| Hide what they give and cure but by a cheat | J2 |
| You boldly show that skill which they pretend | K2 |
| And work by means as noble as your end | K2 |
| Which should you veil we might unwind the clew | P |
| As men do nature till we came to you | I |
| And as the Indies were not found before | G2 |
| Those rich perfumes which from the happy shore | G2 |
| The winds upon their balmy wings convey'd | L2 |
| Whose guilty sweetness first their world betray'd | L2 |
| So by your counsels we are brought to view | I |
| A rich and undiscover'd world in you | I |
| By you our monarch does that fame assure | M2 |
| Which kings must have or cannot live secure | M2 |
| For prosperous princes gain their subjects' heart | B2 |
| Who love that praise in which themselves have part | B2 |
| By you he fits those subjects to obey | A |
| As heaven's eternal Monarch does convey | A |
| His power unseen and man to his designs | C2 |
| By his bright ministers the stars inclines | C2 |
| - | |
| Our setting sun from his declining seat | J2 |
| Shot beams of kindness on you not of heat | J2 |
| And when his love was bounded in a few | I |
| That were unhappy that they might be true | I |
| Made you the favourite of his last sad times | I2 |
| That is a sufferer in his subjects' crimes | I2 |
| Thus those first favours you received were sent | L |
| Like heaven's rewards in earthly punishment | M |
| Yet fortune conscious of your destiny | X |
| Even then took care to lay you softly by | U |
| And wrapp'd your fate among her precious things | N2 |
| Kept fresh to be unfolded with your king's | N2 |
| Shown all at once you dazzled so our eyes | J |
| As new born Pallas did the gods surprise | J |
| When springing forth from Jove's new closing wound | O2 |
| She struck the warlike spear into the ground | O2 |
| Which sprouting leaves did suddenly enclose | P2 |
| And peaceful olives shaded as they rose | P2 |
| - | |
| How strangely active are the arts of peace | Q2 |
| Whose restless motions less than war's do cease | Q2 |
| Peace is not freed from labour but from noise | R2 |
| And war more force but not more pains employs | R2 |
| Such is the mighty swiftness of your mind | W |
| That like the earth it leaves our sense behind | W |
| While you so smoothly turn and roll our sphere | C |
| That rapid motion does but rest appear | C |
| For as in nature's swiftness with the throng | S2 |
| Of flying orbs while ours is borne along | S2 |
| All seems at rest to the deluded eye | U |
| Moved by the soul of the same harmony | X |
| So carried on by your unwearied care | T2 |
| We rest in peace and yet in motion share | T2 |
| Let envy then those crimes within you see | X |
| From which the happy never must be free | X |
| Envy that does with misery reside | U2 |
| The joy and the revenge of ruin'd pride | U2 |
| Think it not hard if at so cheap a rate | K |
| You can secure the constancy of fate | K |
| Whose kindness sent what does their malice seem | V2 |
| By lesser ills the greater to redeem | V2 |
| Nor can we this weak shower a tempest call | P |
| But drops of heat that in the sunshine fall | P |
| - | |
| You have already wearied fortune so | P |
| She cannot further be your friend or foe | P |
| But sits all breathless and admires to feel | P |
| A fate so weighty that it stops her wheel | P |
| In all things else above our humble fate | K |
| Your equal mind yet swells not into state | K |
| But like some mountain in those happy isles | W2 |
| Where in perpetual spring young nature smiles | W2 |
| Your greatness shows no horror to affright | K |
| But trees for shade and flowers to court the sight | K |
| Sometimes the hill submits itself a while | P |
| In small descents which do its height beguile | P |
| And sometimes mounts but so as billows play | A |
| Whose rise not hinders but makes short our way | A |
| Your brow which does no fear of thunder know | P |
| Sees rolling tempests vainly beat below | P |
| And like Olympus' top the impression wears | X2 |
| Of love and friendship writ in former years | Y2 |
| Yet unimpair'd with labours or with time | Z2 |
| Your age but seems to a new youth to climb | Z2 |
| Thus heavenly bodies do our time beget | K |
| And measure change but share no part of it | K |
| And still it shall without a weight increase | Q2 |
| Like this new year whose motions never cease | Q2 |
| For since the glorious course you have begun | A3 |
| Is led by Charles as that is by the sun | A3 |
| It must both weightless and immortal prove | D |
| Because the centre of it is above | E |
John Dryden
(1)
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About To The Lord Chancellor Hyde.[1]
To The Lord Chancellor Hyde.[1] is a poem by John Dryden. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
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