My God! If 'tis thy great decree
That this must the last moment be
Wherein I breathe this ayre—
My heart obeyes, joy'd to retreate
From the false favours of the great
And treachery of the faire.
····
For in the fire when Ore is tryed,
And by that torment purified;
Doe we deplore the losse?
And when thou shalt my smile refine,
That it thereby may purer shine,
Shall I grieve for the drosse?
Of Habington's last years, which were passed amid much turmoil, few details have survived. In 1641 appeared the last of his published works, Observations upon Historie; the next year saw England dark with the smoke of her Civil War. His love of freedom must have rendered him a Royalist with reservations, yet with the fanaticism of the reformers he could have had no part. If there was one word which fired every spark of Puritan wrath and Puritan fanaticism, that word was Popery. Very serviceable at all times has a scapegoat been found; and the Parliamentary proclamation which declared Catholicism responsible for the sins and afflictions of Protestant England are not without their own grim humour. "Under such circumstances," says Dr. Lingard, "the Catholics found themselves exposed to insult and persecution wherever the influence of the Parliament extended: for protection they were compelled to flee to the quarters of the Royalists, and to fight under their banners; and this again confirmed the prejudice against them, and exposed them to additional obloquy and punishment,"
