Then with heart and with voice
Prepare to rejoice,
All you that are loyal and true:
They nobly contend
Who maintain to the end
Those honours to Majesty due.

Rivers from their channels turn’d
Other plains and meadows bless,
And those tow’rs from whence they cease
Ruin’d lie and unadorn’d;
’Tis the Prince’s presence graces,
And his absence that defaces;
Seats of monarch naked look
By the monarch once forsook.

For Majesty moves like the seasons’ bright King
Appears and withdraws, restores and gives life both the places and men,
If then we have found the want of his rays,
Thank wicked Contrivance, and Ambition as vain,
That sought to have shorten’d our Sovereign’s days.

But kings, like the sun, sometimes have their clouds
To make them shine more bright;
Their greatness exhales the vapour that shrouds
And seeks to eclipse their light.
But Heaven has now dispell’d those fears,
And here once again our Monarch appears,
The delight of our eyes,
To try if his subjects at length will grow wise.

Come then, change your notes, disloyal crowd,
You that already have been too loud
With importunate follies and clamours;
’Tis no business of yours
To dispute high pow’rs
As if you were the government framers;
But with heart and with voice
Join all to rejoice,
With welcomes redoubled to see him appear
Who brings mercy and peace,
And all things to please
A people that know but how happy they are.

Be welcome then, great Sir, to constant vows
Of loyalty never to vary more,
Welcome to all that obedience owes
To a Prince so mild and gentle in pow’r.

Welcome to all those wishes fulfill’d
That thrones of monarchs firmly build;
Welcome to all the blessings of a long reign:
Thus let united duty pray, and never pray in vain.