Poems by J.C. ; with additions.

The Kings Disguise.

ANd why a Tenant to this vile disguise, Which who but sees, blasphemes thee with his eyes? My twins of light within their pent-house shrink, And hold it their Allegiance now to wink. Oh for a State-distinction, to arraign Charles of high Treason 'gainst my Soveraign.

What an usurper to his Prince is wont, Cloyster and shave him, he himself hath don't. His muffled feature speaks him a recluse, His ruines prove him a religious house. The Sun hath mew'd his beams from off his lamp, And Majesty defac'd the Royall stamp. Is't not enough thy Dignity's in thrall, But thou'lt transmute it in thy shape and all? As if thy Blacks were of too faint a die, Without the tincture of Tautology. Flay an Egyptian for his Cassock skin Spun of his Countrey's darknesse, line't within, With Presbyterian budge, that drowsie trance, The Synod sable, foggy ignorance. Nor bodily nor ghostly Negro could Rough-cast thy figure in a sadder mould▪ This Privie-chamber of thy shape would be But the Close mourner of thy Royalty. 'Twill break the circle of thy Jailors spell, A Pearl within a rugged Oysters shell. Heaven, which the Minister of thy Person owns, VVill fine thee for Dilapidations. Like to a martyr'd Abbeys courser doom, Devoutly alter'd to a Pigeon room: Or like the Colledge, by the changeling rabble, Manchesters Elves; transform'd into a stable. Or if there be a prophanation higher, Such is the Sacriledge of thine attire.

By which th'art half depos'd, thou look'st like one Whose looks are under Sequestration. Whose Renegado form, at the first glance, Shews like the self-denying Ordinance. Angell of light, and darknesse too, I doubt, Inspir'd within, and yet possess'd without. Majestick twilight in the state of grace, Yet with an excommunicated face. Charles and his Mask are of a different mint, A Psalm of mercy in a miscreant print. The Sun wears Midnight, day is beetle-brow'd, And lightning is in Keldar of a cloud. Oh the accurst Stenography of fate! The Princely Eagleshrunk into a Bat. What charm, what Magick vapour can it be That shrinks his raies to this Apostasie? It is no subtile film of tiffany ayr, No Cob-web vizard, such as Ladies wear, When they are veyl'd, on purpose to be seen, Doubling their lustre by their vanquisht skreen: Nor the false scabberd of a Princes tough Metall, and three pil'd darknesse like the slough Of an imprisoned flame, 'tis Faux in grain, Dark Lanthorn to our high Meridian. Hell belcht the damp, the Warwick-Castle-Vote Rang Britains Curfeu, so our light went out. Thy visage is not legible, the letters, Like a Lords name writ in phantastick fetters:

Cloaths where a Switzer might be buried quick, Sure they would fit the Body Politique. False beard enough, to fit a stages plot, For that's the ambush of their wit, God wot: Nay all his properties so strange appear, Y'are not i'th' presence, though the King be there. A Libell is his dresse, a garb uncouth, Such as the * Hue and Cry once purg'd at mouth. Scribling Assassinate, thy lines attest An ear-mark due, Cub of the Blatant Beast, Whose wrath before 'tis syllabled for worse, Is blasphemy unfledg'd, a callow curse. The Laplanders when they would sell a wind Wafting to hell, bag up thy phrase, and bind It to the Barque, which at the voyage end Shifts Poop, and brings the Collick in the fiend. But I'le not dub thee with a glorious scar, Nor sink thy skuller with a Man of War. The black-mouth'd Si quis, and this slandering suit, Both do alike in picture execute. But since w'are all call'd Papists, why not date, Devotion to the rags thus consecrate. As Temples use to have their Porches wrought With Sphynxes, creatures of an antick draught, And puzling Pourtraitures, to shew that there Riddles inhabited, the like is here. But pardon Sir, since I presume to be Clark of this Closet to your Majesty;

Me thinks in this your dark mysterious dresse I see the Gospell coucht in Parables. At my next view, my pur-blind fancy ripes And shews Religion in its dusky types. Such a Text Royall, so obscure a shade VVas Solomon in Proverbs all array'd. Come all ye brats of this expounding age, To whom the spirit is in pupillage; You that damn more, then ever Sampson slew, And with his engine, the same jaw-bone too: How is't he 'scapes your Inquisition free, Since bound up in the Bibles Livery? Hence Cabinet-intruders, Pick-locks hence, You that dim Jewells with your Bristoll-sense: And Characters, like VVitches, so torment, Till they confesse a guilt, though innocent. Keyes for this Coffer you can never get, None but S. Peter's ope's this Cabinet. This Cabinet, whose aspect would benight Critick spectators with redundant light. A Prince most seen, is least: VVhat Scriptures call The Revelation, is most mysticall. Mount then thou shadow royall, and with hast Advance thy morning star, Charles's overcast. May thy strange journey, contradictions twist, And force fair weather from a Scottish mist. Heavens Confessors are pos'd, those star-ey'd sages To interpret Eclipse, thus riding stages.

Thus Israel-like, he travells with a cloud, Both as a conduct to him, and a shroud. But oh! he goes to Gibeon, and renews A league with mouldy bread, and clouted shoos.