Christ Exalted and Wisdom Justified, Poem
A Poem intituled the Churches Ordinary.
WElcome my Friends, be merry, drink and eate,
Bring you but sauce, little's to pay for meat:
Here are two Lordly dishes ready drest,
Like double gaudies at a Princes feast.
This little Isle wi h Milk and Honey flowes,
And who its fatness, or its sweetness knows?
Here's little labour twin'd with greatest treasure,
Maschil and Michtam, profit joyn'd with pleasure
Come buy, and try, and if you like't not then,
Return my Gold, and take your drosse agen.
Come stand not off, a little charge will do't,
Buy but the Prose, and take the verse to boot.
What won't you buy? If any do but doubt it,
Read it and try who can be well without it?
You that our Poanerges Canons fear,
And care not roaring Guns nor Drums to bear;
This silent voice will not your wits confound;
Arme, arme, this Trumpet gives a certain sound.
You that God Esculapius idolize,
Come search this ship of Drugs, and find a prize:
Catholicon's, Panchymagogon? all,
It's like the Pills we sine quibus call:
Physick that's proper both for fall and spring,
From lowest Subject to the highest King.
Come Polititians buy, you'l not be lurch't;
The Church is stated here, the State is church't;
It's from such times our peace will bear its date,
When Christ's Church stands, and Wisdom sits in State.
In such a Ship who would not Pilot he,
Where each can guide the Ship as well as he?
Many a fool large promises will make,
Yet nothing is perform'd they undertake;
Of such deceivers it is rightly said,
Mountains are promised, but Molehills paid:
Who builds a porch, and promises a house,
Doth make the Mountains labour of a mouse.
He is the man whose promises though large,
Is slow at making, quickest at discharge.
Who would not hazard all in Church and State,
Where Christ is Master, and where Wisdom's Mate?
Come yeomen buy, your choice you'l not repent,
When Christ is King, and Wisdom Parliament.
What sad Benonies, will you sorrowing sit?
And sop your bread in tears at every bit;
That may have Wine and Oyle new from the Presse,
And here be fed with a Benjamins messe.
Born out of time for Wisdom's Advocate,
I yet make bold to be its Candidate;
In this Twin-birth there's no unequal yoke,
No Cain that kill'd good Abell with a stroke;
No Esau, both are Jacob's, all is free,
No bond in Christ's, or Wisdom's pettigree:
Reader, thine eyes, and ears, and heart addresse,
To meet thy Friends from Pulpit and from Presse.
Here's one that would be spent, and preach and pray
For God and thee, and watch both night and day;
That would most gladly compass Sea and Land,
That thou mayst see, and hear, and understand:
And would put out his very utmost might,
To make indeed a Gospel Proselite.
Here's Precept joyn'd to Precept, Line to Line,
No night can come where two such Suns do shine.
From Pulpit and from Presse, loe here are sent,
The two great Lights o'th Gospel Firmament:
Hear me two words, the first for Christ the prize,
T'others a word of Wisdom to the Wise.
If we will not be hir'd with such a summe,
Be you for ever deaf, let me be dumb:
But I must speak, and speak, and never cease,
For Zyons sake I cannot hold my peace:
What Christ and Wisdom offer'd and refus'd,
Gods bounty and his patience thus abus'd!
Oh learn in Christs and Wisdom's freest Schools,
Or bear the name and blame of Christless fools.
Turn you aside to see this double light,
The Sun that rules the day, the Moon the night.
Royal King Jesus sitting on his Throne,
And Wisdom waiting on him, as his own:
A fairer sight than this hath not been seen,
The fairest Handmaid with a fairer Queen.
Yea Christ that glorious Sun is such a sight,
Out-shines the Sun when shining in its might;
And Wisdom is so pure, I should not erre,
To say the Moon's a Mole compar'd to her.
Come buy you worldly Mammonists, pay fines,
East and West Indian Gold and Silver Mines;
And better treasure far lies here, 'twere losse,
To lose these Pearls for Gold and Silver drosse:
Here Christ and Wisdom are well met in this,
They greet each other with an holy kisse.
How we may make (alas that we could tell,)
Dissenting Brethren to agree as well,
To hold them out with one heart, mind and lip,
Then should we have seducers on the hip.
Schisme and Heresie would then look dark,
And Dagon fall down flat before the Ark.
This were the way, (and you would find it true,)
To Truth and Peace to make old England new.
Then Gentiles in their fullnesse would come in,
The hood-wink't Jews would then break off their sin,
Men then would set up Christ, give God his due,
Things the Fift Monarchy will never do.
The Scene would alter, and 'twould change our fate;
This Island be sirnamed fortunate:
That would fair Albion be, which now like pitch,
Looks black, brittish, or bruitish, chose you which,
Then Angli would be Angeli indeed,
Secur'd in Angulo in time of need:
And were our Grandee's on Gods errand sent,
With after-Ages we would all indent.
These names in Golden Characters should shine,
Blest Parliament and Shanedrin divine.
England spawns Preachers now as Nilus frogs,
Such creep in Pulpits, as should croke in Bogs;
Each Dottrel now commences Preacher strait,
First flying Pulpit, and then steeple height;
Then above Duties Ordinances all,
As if it were a credit for to fall
From highest pinacles, and break their necks,
Like Phaeton i'th Fable playing Rex.
Such crawling vermine from the Draggons mouth,
Disperse like Locusts, East, West, North and South.
Like Egypts lice and frogs, or Satans darts,
Shot into Princes Courts, and next their hearts;
Where flattery and heresie's their Theame,
To fly-blow th'ears of such as are supream;
From Julian they fetcht, and Machiavel
The smoothest Politicks of Rome and Hell,
To paint and palliate is their greatest task,
The Devils face under an Angels mask:
A wonder 'tis to see that earth can bear
Such Bruits and Monsters, and not quake for fear,
With more than Antick quakings, and such Fits,
As once did scare Belshazzar from his wits.
The Earth may gape, and greedily devour
Those Mutes whose mouths are shut at such an hour!
Oh that such fools, as made the Land to groane,
Were sent to Schools until their beards are grown:
Their little hair concludes them much unfit,
And yet with most, their hair is more than wit.
I know the beard makes not Philosophers,
But beardless boyes have made our greatest stirs.
To study first were best, and then to preach,
Lilmodd le lammed, learn before they teach;
Except this pollicy they act and hold,
Blind Bayards blindness makes blind Bayard bold.
Let State and Churches Powers once combine,
Moses and Aaron hand in hand to joyn,
Let peaceable Divines debate a way,
How Church may stand unto the State a stay:
Let it be found how civil Pow'rs and we,
Like soul and body sweetly may agree:
Let Lay and Clergy yet yee'r all's undon,
Like upright Bowls without a Bias run:
But this is granted, Bees can never thrive,
If still they be distasted by their Hive.
Let Gods Remembrancers give Heaven no rest,
Till we agree like birds of the same neast;
Let's pray and pray, and wait until we prove,
One house of Faith, and Family of love:
All hearts are in the hand of God, and he
Makes many men of the same mind to be;
It's he that can Mens Languages divide,
To make a Babel to confound our peide;
Or if he do but speak to build and plant,
A Bethel 'twill be done, there'l be no want
Of many hands to work when Godly men
Make hearty prayers, and God doth say AMEN.
Morning they say is most the Muses friend,
I found it true when these few lines were penn'd;
For like to Mushroms in a Fairy Ring,
They ripened soon, when they began to spring;
A mornings work they were, and little more,
Then blame them not if they be lean and poor:
Had the Cook skill, then had been better drest
This dish of Mushroms which concludes the Feast.
Adieu my Friends, and take all in good part,
The gift is small, but given with the heart.
FINIS.
End of the text · Richard Eedes, Christ Exalted and Wisdom Justified (1659)