To the Queen, Occasioned upon Sight of Her Majesty's Picture

Well fare the hand, which to our humble sightPresents that beauty, which the dazzling lightOf royal splendour hides from weaker eyes,And all access, save by this art, denies.Here only we have courage to beholdThis beam of glory; here we dare unfoldIn numbers thus the wonders we conceive;The gracious image, seeming to give leave,Propitious stands, vouchsafing to be seen;And by our Muse saluted Mighty Queen,In whom th'extremes of power and beauty move,The Queen of Britain and the Queen of Love!

As the bright sun (to which we owe no sightOf equal glory to your beauty's light)Is wisely placed in so sublime a seat,T' extend his light, and moderate his heat;So, happy 'tis you move in such a sphere,As your high Majesty with awful fearIn human breasts might qualify that fire,Which, kindled by those eyes, had flamèd higherThan when the scorched world like hazard run,By the approach of the ill-guided sun.

No other nymphs have title to men's hearts,But as their meanness larger hope imparts;Your beauty more the fondest lover movesWith admiration than his private loves;With admiration! for a pitch so high(Save sacred Charles his) never love durst fly.Heaven, that preferr'd a sceptre to your hand,Favour'd our freedom more than your command;Beauty had crown'd you, and you must have beenThe whole world's mistress, other than a Queen.All had been rivals, and you might have spared,Or kill'd, and tyrannised, without a guard;No power achieved, either by arms or birth,Equals love's empire both in heaven and earth.Such eyes as yours on Jove himself have thrownAs bright and fierce a lightning as his own;Witness our Jove, prevented by their flameIn his swift passage to th'Hesperian dame;

When, like a lion, finding, in his wayTo some intended spoil, a fairer prey,The royal youth pursuing the reportOf beauty, found it in the Gallic court;There public care with private passion foughtA doubtful combat in his noble thought:Should he confess his greatness, and his love,And the free faith of your great brother prove;With his Achates breaking through the cloudOf that disguise which did their graces shroud;And mixing with those gallants at the ball,Dance with the ladies, and outshine them all;Or on his journey o'er the mountains ride?--So when the fair Leucothoë he espied,To check his steeds impatient Phoebus yearn'd,Though all the world was in his course concern'd.What may hereafter her meridian do,Whose dawning beauty warm'd his bosom so?Not so divine a flame, since deathless godsForbore to visit the defiled abodesOf men, in any mortal breast did burn;Nor shall, till piety and they return.

'Sea-born niece': Venus.'Majesty's picture': Henrietta, daughter of Henry IV., married byproxy to Charles I. in Paris, 1st May 1625. Marriages made in Mayare said to be unlucky--this certainly was.'Great brother': Louis XIII., King of France.'Graces shroud': 'Achates,' the Duke of Buckingham.