Page:Three Poems upon the death of the late Usurper Oliver Cromwell (1682).djvu/21



SIR,

''Eeing you are pleas'd to think fit that these Papers should come into the publick, which were at first design'd to live only in a Desk, or some private friends hands; I humbly take the boldness to commit them to the Security which your name and protection will give them with the most knowing part of the world. There are two things especially in which they stand in need of your defence. One is, that they fall so infinitely below the full and lofty Genius of that excellent Poet, who made this way of writing free of our Nation: The other, that they are so little proportion'd and equal to the renown of that Prince on whom they were written. Such great Actions and Lives deserving rather to be the Subjects of the Noblest Pens and'' Rh