_Cleaveland_ again his sacred head doth raise, Even in the dust crown'd with immortal Bayes, Again with verses arm'd that once did fright _Lycambe's_ Daughters from the hated Light, Sets his bold foot on Reformations neck, And triumphs o'er the vanquisht Monster _Smec_; That _Hydra_ whose proud heads did so encrease, That it deserv'd no less an _Hercules_. This, this is he who in Poetick Rage, With Scorpions lash'd the Madness of the age; Who durst the fashions of the times despise, And be a Wit when all Mankind grew wise. When formal Beards at Twenty one were seen, And men grew Old almost as soon as Men: Who in those daies when reason, wit, and sence Were by the Zealots grave Impertinence _Ycliped_ Folly, and in Ve-ri-ty Did savour rankly of Carnality. When each notch'd Prentice might a Poet prove. For warbling through the Nose a Hymn of Love, When sage _George Withers_ and grave _William Prin_, Himself might for a Poets share put in: Yet then could write with so much art and skill, That _Rome_ might envy his Satyrick Quill; And crabbed _Persins_ his hard lines give ore, And in disdain beat his brown Desk no more. How I admire the _Cleaveland_! when I weigh Thy close-wrought Sense, and every line survey! They are not like those things which some compose, Who in a maze of Words the Sense do lose. Who spin one thought into so long a thread, And beat their Wit we thin to make it spread; Till 'tis too fine for our weak eyes to find, And dwindles into Nothing in the end. No; they'r above the Genius of this Age, Each word of thine swells pregnant with a Page. Then why do some Mens nicer ears complain, Of the uneven Harshness of thy strain? Preferring to the vigour of thy Muse Some smooth weak Rhymer, that so gently flowes, That Ladies may his easy strains admire, And melt like Wax before the softning fire. Let such to Women write, you write to Men; We study thee, when we but play with them. * * * * * Sir _JOHN BERKENHEAD_. Sir _John Berkenhead_ was a Gentleman, whose Worth and deserts were too high for me to delineate. He was a constant Assertor of his Majesties Cause in its lowest Condition, painting the Rebels forth to the life in his _Mercurius Aulicus_ and other Writings; his _Zany Brittanicus_ who wrote against him, being no more his Equal, than a Dwarf to a Gyant, or the goodness of his cause to that of the Kings; for this his Loyalty he suffered several Imprisonments, yet always constant to his first Principles. His skill in Poetry was such, that one thus writes of him. Whil'st Lawrel sprigs anothers head shall Crown, Thou the whole Grove mayst challenge as thy Own. He survived to see his Majesties happy Restoration, and some of them hanged who used their best endeavor to do the same by him. As for his learned Writings, those who are ignorant of them, must plead ignorance both to Wit and Learning.