Edward Farr, ed. Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth. 1845.
Stanzas from the LepantoI. King James I.
I
I sing his mercies great,
I sing his justice heere withall,
Powr’d from his holy seat.
A bloodie battell bolde,
Long doubtsome fight, with slaughter huge,
And wounded manifold:
Betwixt the baptized race
And circumcised turband Turkes,
Rencountring in that place.
Thrise one in persons three,
Alike eternall, like of might,
Although distinct yee be:
Thy Word immortall still,
The great archangell of records,
And worker, of thy will,
And eik my pen inflame
Aboue my skill to write this worke,
To magnifie thy name.
I erre no time can be,
Whoe was, and is, and times to come,
Confounded are all three:
(For sunne and moone deuides
The times in earth by houres and dayes,
And seesons still that slides;)
Must speake into this cace;
As man our flesh will not permit
Wee heauenlie things imbrace.
One day it did fall out,
As glorious God in glistering throne,
With angells round about,
That craftie Satan came,
Deceauer, lyar, hating man,
And God’s most sacred name;
The presence of the Lord;
Then in this manner Christ accus’de
The sower of discord.
Constantinople great,
Where thou hast by thy malice made
The faithles Turkes to freat;
With raging fire of wraith
Against them all that doe professe
My name with feruent fayth.
Quite vnder foote be tred
By faithles folkes, who executes
What in this snake is bred?
Their fayth is too, too small;
They striue, methinke, on either part
Who farthest backe can fall.
Euen boath the sides, I say,
That I, as best doth seeme to me,
May use them euery way?
The heauens and mountains quake,
Whose smallest wrath the centres makes
Of all the earth to shake;
And whose approoving syne
Did stablish all, even as wee see,
By force of voice deuine;
Graue wordes of waight to bring:
All Christians serue my Sonne, though not
Aright in everie thing.
With infidels opprest;
So of my holie hallowed name
The force is great and blest.
O thou archangel true,
Whome I haue oft in message sent
To realmes and townes anew.
And put into their mindes
To take reuenge of wrongs the Turks
Haue done in sundrie kinds.
From hilles can hirle ore heugh,
As he whose thought doth furnish speed—
His thought was speed aneugh.