In this new paradiſe the goddeſs reigns
In ſovereign ſtate, and mocks the lover’s pains:
Beneath thoſe beams that ſcorch us from her eyes15
Her ſnowy boſom ſtill unmelted lies:
Love from her lips ſpreads all his odours round,
But bears on ice, and ſprings from frozen ground.
So cold the clime that can ſuch wonders bear,
The garden ſeems an emblem of the fair.20
TO FLAVIA,
Her gardens having eſcaped a flood that had laid all the country round under water.
What hands divine have planted and protect
The torrent ſpares, and deluges reſpect;
So when the waters o’er the world were ſpread,
Covering each oak, and ev’ry mountain’s head,
The choſen Patriarch ſail’d within his ark,5
Nor might the waves o’erwhelm the ſacred bark.
The charming Flavia is no leſs, we find,
The favourite of Heav’n than of mankind:
The gods, like rivals, imitate our care,
And vie with mortals to oblige the fair.10
These favours, thus beſtow’d on her alone,
Are but the homage which they ſend her down.
O Flavia! may thy virtue from above
Be crown’d with bleſſings endleſs as my love!14
