We sigh'd to hear the fair Iberian Bride
Must grow a Lilie to the Lilies side,
While Our cross Stars deny'd us Charles his bed
Whom Our first Flames and Virgin Love did wed.
For his long absence Church and State did groan;
Madness the Pulpit, Faction seiz'd the Throne:
Experienc'd Age in deep despair was lost
To see the Rebel thrive, the Loyal crost:
Youth that with Joys had unacquainted been
Envy'd gray hairs that once good Days had seen:
We thought our Sires, not with their own content,
Had ere we came to age our Portion spent. (Lines 17-28)

Basic set up:

John Dryden wrote this poem to celebrate Charles II's restoration to the English throne in 1660. Dryden was a huge Charlie Two fanboy.

Here we have one of many political poems by John Dryden; this one's celebrating the restoration of Charles II to the throne. As we've mentioned, politics is a huge theme in Restoration literature. Authors wrote about the king (usually praising him, because they could get into a whole lot of trouble if they criticized him), and about other political issues of the day.

Dryden's poem, then, is a great example of the way in which politics worked its way into the poetry and the prose of the period. Writers such as Dryden were directly impacted by the political happenings of their day, and they responded to these political happenings in their literary work.

Dryden is the man who perfected the Heroic Couplet. He's the hero, in fact, of the Heroic Couplet. And the lines in this poem are great examples of the way in which he used this form. The lines are ten syllables each and they're rhyming, as you can see in this couplet: "For his long absence Church and State did groan:/ Madness the pulpit, Faction seiz'd the Throne."

Dryden was so good at coming up with Heroic Couplets, and he used them to such good effect (as in the above excerpt), that he played a big role in popularizing their use in English poetry.