To His Grace The Archbishop Of Dublin; A Poem

Serus in coelum redeas, diuque         Laetus intersis populo. - HOR., Carm. I, ii, 45.     Great, good, and just, was once applied     To one who for his country died;[l]     To one who lives in its defence,     We speak it in a happier sense.     O may the fates thy life prolong!     Our country then can dread no wrong:     In thy great care we place our trust,     Because thou'rt great, and good, and just:     Thy breast unshaken can oppose     Our private and our public foes:     The latent wiles, and tricks of state,     Your wisdom can with ease defeat.     When power in all its pomp appears,     It falls before thy rev'rend years,     And willingly resigns its place     To something nobler in thy face.     When once the fierce pursuing Gaul     Had drawn his sword for Marius' fall,     The godlike hero with a frown     Struck all his rage and malice down;     Then how can we dread William Wood,     If by thy presence he's withstood?     Where wisdom stands to keep the field,     In vain he brings his brazen shield;     Though like the sibyl's priest he comes,     With furious din of brazen drums     The force of thy superior voice     Shall strike him dumb, and quell their noise.     [Footnote 1: The epitaph on Charles I by the Marquis of Montrose:     "Great, good, and just! could I but rate     My griefs to thy too rigid fate,     I'd weep the world in such a strain     As it should deluge once again;     But since thy loud-tongued blood demands supplies     More from Briareus' hands than Argus' eyes,     I'll sing thine obsequies with trumpet sounds,     And write thine epitaph in blood and wounds."     See Napier's "Montrose and the Covenanters," i, 520.]