POEMS

Compiled with great variety of Wit and Learning, full of Delight.

Wherein especially is contained a compleat Difcourfe, and Description of

The Four

ELEMENTS

CONSTITUTIONS,
AGES of Man,

SEASONS of the Year.

Together with an exact Epitome of the three first Monarchyes

Viz. The

ASSYRIAN,

PERSIAN,

GRECIAN.

And beginning of the Romane Common-wealth to the end of their last King:

With diverfe other pleasant & serious Porms;

By a Gentlewoman in New-England.

The fecond Edition, Corrected by the Author, and enlarged by an Addition of feveral other Poems found amongst her Papers after her Death.

Bofton, Printed by fohn Foster, 1678.

FACSIMILE OF THE TITLE-PAGE OF THE
SECOND EDITION.

KIND READER:

Had I opportunity but to borrow some of the Author's wit, 't is possible I might so trim this curious work with such quaint expressions as that the preface might bespeak thy further perusal; but I fear 't will be a shame for a man that can speak so little to be seen in the title-page of this woman's book, lest by comparing the one with the other the reader should pass his sentence that it is the gift of women not only to speak most but to speak best. I shall leave therefore to commend that which with any ingenuous reader will too much commend the Author, unless men turn more peevish than women, to envy the excellency of the inferior sex. I doubt not but the reader will quickly find more than I can say, and the worst effect of his reading will be unbelief, which will make him question whether it be a woman's work, and ask, Is it possible? If any do, take this as an answer from him that dares avow it: It is the work of a woman, honored and esteemed where she lives for her gracious demeanor, her eminent parts, her pious conversation, her courteous disposition, her exact diligence in her place, and discreet managing of her

family occasions; and more than so, these poems are the fruit of but some few hours curtailed from her sleep and other refreshments. I dare add little lest I keep thee too long. If thou wilt not believe the worth of these things in their kind when a man says it, yet believe it from a woman when thou seest it. This only I shall annex: I fear the displeasure of no person in the publishing of these poems but the Author, without whose knowledge, and contrary to her expectation, I have presumed to bring to public view what she resolved in such a manner should never see the sun; but I found that divers had gotten some scattered papers, affected them well, were likely to have sent forth broken pieces to the Author's prejudice, which I thought to prevent, as well as to pleasure those that earnestly desired the view of the whole.

Mercury showed Apollo Bartas' book,

Minerva this, and wished him well to look
And tell uprightly which did which excel.

He viewed and viewed, and vowed he could not tell.
They bid him hemisphere his moldy nose
With his cracked leering glasses, for it would pose
The best brains he had in his old pudding-pan,
Sex weighed, which best-the woman, or the man?
He peered, and pored, and glared, and said, forwore,
"I'm e'en as wise now as I was before."

They both 'gan laugh, and said it was no mar'l,
The Authoress was a right Du Bartas girl.

"Good sooth!" quoth the old Don, "tell ye me so?
I muse whither at length these girls will go.
It half revives my chill frost-bitten blood.
To see a woman once do aught that's good;
And chode by Chaucer's boots and Homer's furs,
Let men look to it lest women wear the spurs.

N. WARD.