Quemadmodum nec officiis hujus mundi Nec loci in quo me posuit dignitati nec Servis nec egenis in toto hujus anni Curriculo mihi conscius sum me defuissi Ita liberi quibus quae supersunt Supersunt grato animo eâ— accipiant Et beneficum authorem recognoscant Amen But I return from my long Digression We left the Author sick in Essex where he was forced to spend much of that winter by reason of his disability to remove from thence And having never for almost twenty yeares omitted his personall Attendance on his Majesty in that moneth in which he was to attend and preach to him nor having ever been left out of the Roll and number of Lent-Preachers and there being then in Ianuary 1630. a report brought to London or raised there that Dr. Donne was dead That report gave him occasion to write this following letter to a friend Sir This advantage you and my other friends have by my frequent fevers that I am so much the oftner at the Gates of Heaven and this advantage by the solitude close imprisonment that they reduce me to after that I am so much the oftner at my prayers in which I shall never leave out your happinesse and I doubt not but among his other blessings God will adde some one to you for my prayers A man would almost be content to dye if there were no other benefit in death to hear of so much sorrow and so much good Testimony from good men as I God be blessed for it did upon the report of my death yet I perceive it went not through all for one writ to me that some and he said of my friends conceived I was not so ill as I pretended but withdrew my self to live at ease discharged of preaching It is an unfriendly and God knowes an ill-grounded interpretation for I have alwaies been sorrier when I could not preach then any could be they could not hear me It hath been my desire and God may be pleased to grant it that I might dye in the Pulpit if not that yet that I might take my death in the Pulpit that is dye the sooner by occasion of those labours Sir I hope to see you presently after Candlemas about which time will fall my Lent-Sermon at Court except my Lord Chamberlain believe me to be dead and so leave me out of the roll but as long as I live and am not speechlesse I would not willingly decline that service I have better leisure to write then you to read yet I would not willingly oppresse you with too much Letter God blesse you and your Son as I wish Your poor friend and servant in Christ Iesus J. Donne Before that moneth ended he was designed to preach upon his old constant day the first Friday in Lent he had notice of it and had in his sicknesse so prepared for that imployment that as he had long thirsted for it so he resolved his weaknesse should not hinder his journey he came therefore to London some few dayes before his day appointed At his being there many of his friends who with sorrow saw his sicknesse had left him onely so much flesh as did cover his bones doubted his strength to performe that task and therefore disswaded him from undertaking it assuring him however it was like to shorten his daies but he passionately denyed their requests saying he would not doubt that God who in many weaknesses had assisted him with an unexpected strength would not now withdraw it in his last employment professing an holy ambition to performe that sacred work And when to the amazement of some beholders he appeared in the Pulpit many thought he presented himself not to preach mortification by a living voice but mortality by a decayed body and dying face And doubtlesse many did secretly ask that question in Ezekiel Do these bones live or can that soul Organize that tongue to speak so long time as the sand in that glasse will move towards its Centre and measure out an hour of this dying mans unspent life Doubtlesse it cannot yet after some faint pauses in his zealous prayer his strong desires enabled his weake body to discharge his memory of his preconceived meditations which were of dying the Text being To God the Lord belong the issues from Death Many that then saw his teares and heard his hollow voice professing they thought the Text prophetically chosen and that Dr. Donne had preach't his own funerall Sermon Being full of joy that God had enabled him to performe this desired duty he hastened to his house out of which he never moved till like St. Stephen he was carryed by devout men to his Grave The next day after his Sermon his strength being much wasted and his spirits so spent as indisposed him to businesse or to talk A friend that had often been a witnesse of his free and facetious discourse asked him Why are you sad To whom he replyed with a countenance so full of cheerfull gravity as gave testimony of an inward tranquillity of mind and of a soul willing to take a farewell of this world And said I am not sad but most of the night past I have entertained my self with many thoughts of severall friends that have left me here and are gone to that place from which they shall not returne And that within a few dayes I also shall go hence and be no more seen And my preparation for this change is become my nightly meditation upon my bed which my infirmities have now made restlesse to me But at this present time I was in a serious Contemplation of the goodnesse of God to me who am lesse then the least of his mercies and looking back upon my life past I now plainly see it was his hand that prevented me from all temporall imployment and it was his will that I should never settle nor thrive till I entred into the Ministry in which I have now liv'd almost twenty yeares I hope to his glory and by which I most humbly thank him I have been inabled to requite most of those friends which shewed me kindnesse when my fortune was very low and as it hath occasioned the expression of my gratitude I thank God most of them have stood in need of my requitall I have liv'd to be usefull and comfortable to my good father in Law Sir George Moore whose patience God hath been pleased to exercise with many temporall crosses I have maintained my own mother whom it hath pleased God after a plentifull fortune in her younger dayes to bring to a great decay in her very old Age I have quieted the Consciences of many that have groaned under the burthen of a wounded Spirit whose prayers I hope are available for me I cannot plead innocency of life especially of my youth But I am to be judged by a mercifull God who is not willing to see what I have done amisse And though of my self I
have nothing to present to him but sins and misery yet I know he looks not upon me now as I am of my self but as I am in my Saviour and hath given me even at this time some testimonies by his holy Spirit that I am of the number of his Elect I am full of joy and shall die in peace I must here look so far back as to tell the Reader that at his first return out of Essex his old Friend and Physician Dr. Fox a man of great worth came to him to consult his health who after a sight of him and some queries concerning his distempers told him That by Cordials and drinking milk twenty dayes together there was a probability of his restauration to health but he passionately denied to drink it Neverthelesse Dr. Fox who loved him most intirely wearied him with solicitations till he yielded to take it for ten dayes at the end of which time he told Dr. Fox he had drunk it more to satisfie him than to recover his health and that he would not drink it ten dayes longer upon the best morall assurance of having twenty years added to his life for he loved it not and he was so far from fearing death which is the King of terrours that he longed for the day of his dissolution It is observed that a desire of glory or commendation is rooted in the very nature of man and that those of the severest and most mortified lives though they may become so humble as to banish self-flattery and such weeds as naturally grow there yet they have not been able to kill this desire of glory but that like our radicall heat it will both live and die with us and many think it should do so and we want not sacred examples to justifie the desire of having our memory to out-live our lives which I mention because Dr. Donne by the perswasion of Dr. Fox yielded at this very time to have a Monument made for him but Dr. Fox undertook not to perswade how or what it should be that was left to Dr. Donne himself This being resolved upon Dr. Donne sent for a Carver to make for him in wood the figure of an Urn giving him directions for the compasse and height of it and to bring with it a board of the height of his body These being got and without delay a choice Painter was in a readiness to draw his picture which was taken as followeth Severall Charcole-fires being first made in his large study he brought with him into that place his winding-sheet in his hand and having put off all his clothes had his sheet put on him and so tied with knots at his head and feet and his hands so placed as dead bodies are usually fitted for the grave Upon this Urn he thus stood with his eyes shut and so much of the sheet turned aside as might shew his lean pale and death-like face which was purposely turned toward the East from whence he expected the second coming of our Saviour Thus he was drawn at his just height and when the picture was fully finished he caused it to be set by his bed-side where it continued and became his hourly object till his death and was then given to his dearest friend and Executor Dr. King who caused him to be thus carved in one entire piece of white Marble as it now stands in the Cathedrall Church of S. Pauls and by Dr. Donn's own appointment these words were to be affixed to it as his Epitaph JOHANNES DONNE Sac. Theol. Professor Post varia Studia quibus ab annis tenerrimis fideliter nec infeliciter incubuit Instinctu impulsu Sp. Sancti Monitu Hortatu REGIS JACOBI Ordines Sacros amplexus Anno sui Iesu 1614. suae aetatis 42. Decanatu hujus Ecclesiae indutus 27. Novembris 1621. Exutus morte ultimo Die Martii 1631. Hiclicet in Occiduo Cinere Aspicit Eum Cujus nomen est Oriens Upon Monday following he took his last leave of his beloved Study and being sensible of his hourly decay retired himself to his bed-chamber and that week sent at severall times for many of his most considerable friends with whom he took a solemn and deliberate farewell commending to their considerations some sentences usefull for the regulation of their lives and dismist them as good Iacob did his sons with a spirituall Benediction The Sunday following he appointed his servants that if there were any businesse undone that concerned him or themselves it should be prepared against Saturdy next for after that day he would not mix his thoughts with any thing that concerned this world nor ever did But as Iob so he waited for the appointed time of his dissolution And now he had nothing to do but die to do which he stood in need of no longer time for he had studied long and to so happy a perfection that in a former sickness he called God to witness * he was that minute ready to deliver his soul into his hands if that minute God would determine his dissolution In that sickness he begg'd of God the constancy to be preserved in that estate forever and his patient expectation to have his immortall soul disrob'd from her garment of mortality makes me confident he now had a modest assurance that his Prayers were then heard and his Petition granted He lay fifteen dayes earnestly expecting his hourly change and in the last hour of his last day as his body melted away and vapoured into spirit his soul having I verily believe some revelation of the Beatificall Vision he said I were miserable if I might not die and after those words closed many periods of his faint breath by saying often Thy kingdome come thy will be done His speech which had long been his ready and faithfull servant left him not till the last minute and then forsook him not to serve another Master but died before him for that it was become uselesse to him that now conversed with God on earth as Angels are said to do in heaven onely by thoughts and looks Being speechless he did as S. Stephen look stedfastly towards heaven till he saw the Son of God standing at the right hand of his Father and being satisfied with this blessed sight as his soul ascended and his last breath departed from him he closed his own eyes and then disposed his hands and body into such a posture as required no alteration by those that came to shroud him Thus variable thus vertuous was the Life thus excellent thus exemplary was the Death of this memorable man He was buried in that place of S. Pauls Church which he had appointed for that use some yeares before his death and by which he passed daily to pay his publick Devotions to Almighty God who was then served twice a day by a publick form of Prayer and Praises in that place but he was not buried privately though he desired it for beside an unnumbred number
THE LIFE OF IOHN DONNE Dr. in DIVINTY AND Late DEAN of Saint PAULS Church LONDON The second impression corrected and enlarged Ecclus. 48.14 He did wonders in his life and at his death his works were marvelous LONDON Printed by I. G. for R. Marriot and are to be sold at his shop under S. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street 1658. TO MY Noble honoured Friend Sir ROBET HOLT of Aston in the County of Warwick Baronet SIR WHen this relation of the life of Doctor Donne was first made publick it had besides the approbation of our late learned eloquent King a conjunction with the Authors most excellent Sermons to support it and thus it lay some time fortified against prejudice and those passions that are by busie and malicious men too freely vented against the dead And yet now after almost twenty yeares when though the memory of Dr. Donne himself must not cannot die so long as men speak English yet when I thought Time had made this relation of him so like my self as to become useless to the world and content to be forgotten I find that a retreat into a desired privacy will not be afforded for the Printers will again expose it and me to publick exceptions and without those supports which we first had and needed and in an Age too in which Truth Innocence have not beene able to defend themselves from worse then severe censures This I foresaw and Nature teaching me selfe-preservation and my long experience of your abilities assuring me that in you it may be found to you Sir do I make mine addresses for an umbrage and protection and I make it with so much humble boldnesse as to say 't were degenerous in you not to afford it For Sir Dr. Donne was so much a part of your self as to be incorporated into your Family by so noble a friendship that I may say there was a marriage of souls betwixt him and your * reverend Grandfather who in his life was an Angel of our once glorious Church and now no common Star in heaven And Dr. Donne's love died not with him but was doubled upon his Heire your beloved Uncle the Bishop of * Chichester that lives in this froward generation to be an ornament to his Calling And this affection to him was by Dr. D. so testified in his life that he then trusted him with the very secrets of his soul at his death with what was dearest to him even his fame estate children And you have yet a further title to what was Dr. Donne's by that dear affection friendship that was betwixt him and your parents by which he entailed a love upon your self even in your infancy which was encreased by the early testimonies of your growing merits and by them continued till D. Donne put on immortality and so this mortall was turned into a love that cannot die And Sir 't was pity he was lost to you in your minority before you had attained a judgement to put a true value upon the living beauties and elegancies of his conversation and pitty too that so much of them as were capable of such an expression were not drawn by the pensil of a Tytian or a Tentoret by a pen equall and more lasting then their art for his life ought to be the example of more then that age in which he died And yet this copy though very much indeed too much short of the Originall will present you with some features not unlike your dead friend and with fewer blemishes and more ornaments than when 't was first made publique which creates a contentment to my selfe because it is the more worthy of him and because I may with more civility intitle you to it And in this designe of doing so I have not a thought of what is pretended in most Dedications a Commutation for Courtesies no indeed Sir I put no such value upon this trifle for your owning it will rather increase my Obligations But my desire is that into whose hands soever this shall fall it may to them be a testimony of my gratitude to your self and Family who descended to such a degree of humility as to admit me into their friendship in the dayes of my youth and notwithstanding my many infirmities have continued me in it till I am become gray-headed and as Time has added to my yeares have still increased and multiplied their favours This Sir is the intent of this Dedication and having made the declaration of it thus publick I shall conclude it with commending them and you to Gods deare love I remain Sir what your many merits have made me to be The humblest of your Servants Isaac VValton TO THE READER MY desire is to inform and assure you that shall become my Reader that in that part of this following discourse which is onely narration I either speak my own knowledge or from the testimony of such as dare do any thing rather that speak an untruth And for that part of it which is my own observation or opinion if I had a power I would not use it to force any mans assent but leave him a liberty to dis-believe what his own reason inclines him to Next I am to inform you that whereas Dr. Donne's life was formerly printed with his Sermons and then had the same Preface or Introduction to it I have not omitted it now because I have no such confidence in what I have done as to appear without an apology for my undertaking it I have said all when I have wished happinesse to my Reader I. VV. THE Life of Dr. DONNE Late DEANE of Saint PAULS Church Lond. IF the late deceased Provost of Eaton Colledge Sir Henry Wotton that great Master of Language and Art had lived to see the publication of these Sermons he had presented the world with the Authors life exactly written which was a work worthy his undertaking and he fit to undertake it Betwixt whom and the Author there was such a friendship contracted in their youth as nothing but death should force a separation And though their bodies were divided yet their affections were not for that Learned Knights love followed his friends fame beyond death and the forgetfull grave And this he testifyed by intreating me whom he acquainted with his intentions to inquire of some particulars that concerned it not doubting but my knowledge of the Author and love to his memory might make my diligence usefull I did prepare them in a readiness to be augmented and rectifyed by his powerfull pen but then death prevented his intentions When I heard that sad news heard also that these Sermons were to be printed want the Authors Life wch I thought worthy to be recorded indignation or grief truly I know not wch transported me so far that I reviewed my forsaken collections resolved the world should see the best narration of it that my artlesse pen guided by the hand of truth could present to it I shall
viewing Ierusalem and the Sepulchre of our Saviour But at his being in the furthest parts of Italy the disappointment of company or of a safe Convoy or the uncertainty of returns for money into those remote parts denied him that happiness which he did often occasionally mention with a deploration Not long after his returne into England that exemplary pattern of gravity and wisdom the Lord Elsemore Keeper of the great Seal and Lord cellour of England taking notice of his Learning Languages and other abilities and much affecting his person and condition took him to be his chief Secretary supposing and intending it to be an Introduction to some more weighty employment in the State for which his Lordship did often protest he thought him very fit Nor did his Lordship in this time of Mr. Donne's attendance upon him account him to be so much his servant as to forget he was his friend and to testifie it did alwayes use him with much courtesie appointing him a place at his own table to which he esteemed his company and discourse a great ornament He continued that employment for the space of five years being daily usefull and not mercenary to his friends During which time he I dare not say unhappily fell into such a liking as with her approbation increased into a love with a young Gentlewoman that lived in that Family who was Niece to the Lady Elsemore and Daughter to Sir George Moor then Chancellour of the Garter and Lieutenant of the Tower Sir George had some intimation of it and knowing prevention to be a great part of wisdom did therefore remove her with much haste from that to his own house at Lothesley but too late by reason of some faithfull promises which were so interchangably passed as never to be violated These promises were onely known to themselves and the friends of both parties used much diligence and many arguments to kill or coole their affections to each other but in vain for love is a flattering mischief that hath denied aged and wise men a foresight of those evils that too often prove to be the children of that blind father a passion that carries us to commit errors with as much ease as whirlwinds remove feathers and beget in us an unwearied industry to the attainment of what we desire And such an industry did notwithstanding much watchfulness against it bring them together I forbear to tell how and to a marriage too without the allowance of those friends whose approbation always was ever will be necessary to make even a vertuous love become lawful And that the knowledge of their marriage might not fall like an unexpected tempest on those that were unwilling to have it so but that preapprehensions might make it the less enormous it was purposely whispered into the ears of many that it was so yet by none that could attest it But to put a period to the jealousies of Sir George Doubt often begetting more restless thoughts then the certain knowledge of what we fear the news was in favour to Mr. Donne and with his allowance made known to Sir George by his honourable friend and neighbour Henry Earl of Northumberland but it was to Sir George so immeasurably unwelcome and so transported him that as though his passion of anger and inconsideration might exceed theirs of love and errour he presently engaged his sister the Lady Elsemore to joyn with him to procure her Lord to discharge Mr. Donne of the place he held under his Lordship This request was followed with violence and though Sir George were remembred that errors might be over-punished and desired therefore to forbear till second considerations might clear some scruples yet he became restlesse untill his suit was granted and the punishment executed The Lord Chancellour then at Mr. Donnes dismission saying he parted with a Friend and protested he thought him a Secretary fitter for a King then a Subject But this Physick of M. Donne's dismission was not strong enough to purge out all Sir George his choler who was not satisfied till Mr. Donne and his Compupill in Cambridge that married him namely Samuel Brook who was after Doctor in Divinity and Master of Trinity Colledge and his brother Mr. Christopher Brook Mr. Donne's Chamber-fellow in Lincolns Inne who gave Mr. Donne his Wife and witnessed the marriage were all committed and to three severall prisons Mr. Donne was first enlarged who neither gave rest to his body or brain nor any friend in whom he might hope to have an interest untill he had procured an enlargement for his two imprisoned friends He was now at Liberty but his dayes were still cloudy and being past these troubles others did still multiply upon him for his wife was to her extreme sorrow detained fom him and though with Iacob he endured not an hard service for her yet he lost a good one and was forced to make good his title to her and to get possession of her by a long and a restlesse suit in Law which proved troublesome and chargeable to him whose youth and travell and bounty had brought his estate into a narrow compass It is observed and most truly that silence and submission are charming qualities and work most upon passionate men and it proved so with Sir George for these and a generall report of Mr. Donne's merits together with his winning behaviour which when it would intice had a strange kind of elegant irresistible art these and time had so dispassionated Sir George that as the world had approved his daughters choice so he also could not but see a more then ordinary merit in his new son and this melted him into so much remorse for Love and Anger are so like Agues as to have hot and cold fits And love in parents though it may be quenched yet is easily re-kindled and expires not till death denies mankind a naturall heat that he laboured his sons restoration to his place using to that end both his own and his sisters power to her Lord but with no successe for his answer was That though he was unfeignedly sorry for what he had done yet it was inconsistent with his place and credit to discharge and re-admit admit servants at the request of passionate petitioners Sir George's endeavour for Mr. Donne's re-admission was by all meanes to be kept secret for men do more naturally reluct for errours than submit to put on those blemishes that attend their visible acknowledgement However it was not long before Sir George appeared to be so far reconciled as to wish their happinesse and not to deny them his paternall blessing but refused to contribute any meanes that might conduce to their livelihood Mr. Donne's estate was the greatest part spent in many and chargable Travels Books and dear-bought Experience he out of all employment that might yield a support for himself and wife who had been curiously and plentifully educated both their natures generous and accustomed to confer but not to receive
pity me if you saw me write and therefore will pardon me if I write no more my pain hath drawn my head so awry and holds it so that mine eye cannot follow mine hand I receive you therefore into my prayers with mine own weary soul and commend my self to yours I doubt not but next week I shall be good news to you for I have mending or dying on my side which is two to one If I continue thus I shall have comfort in this that my Blessed Saviour exercising his Justice upon my two worldly parts my fortune and body reserves all his mercy for that which best tasts it and most needs it my soul I professe to you truly that my lothnesse to give over now seems to my self an ill sign that I shall write no more Your poor friend and Gods poor patient J. Donne To the Humble Lady the Lady Kingsmel upon the death of her Husband MADAME THose things which God dissolves at once as he shall doe the Sun and Moon and those bodies at the last conflagration he never intends to re-unite again but in those things which he takes in pieces as he doth man and wife in these divorces by death and in single persons by the divorce of body and soul God hath another purpose to make them up again That peice which he takes to himself is presently cast in a mould and in an instant made fit for his use for heaven is not a place of a proficiency but of present perfection That piece which he leaves behind in this world by the death of a part thereof grows fitter and fitter for him by the good use of his corrections and the intire conformity to his will Nothing disproportions us nor makes us so uncapable of being reunited to those whom we loved here as murmuring or not advancing the goodness of him who hath removed them from hence We would wonder to see a man who in a wood were left to his liberty to fel what trees he would take onely the crooked and leave the straightest trees but that man hath perchance a ship to build and not a house and so hath use of that kind of timber let not us who know that in Gods house there are many mansions but yet have no modell no designe of the form of that building wonder at his taking in of his materialls why he takes the young and leaves the old or why the sickly over-live those that had better health We are not bound to think that soules departed have devested all affections towards them whom they left here but we are bound to thinke that for all their loves they would not be here again then is the will of God done in earth as it is in heaven when we neither pretermit his actions nor resist them neither pass them over in an inconsideration as though God had no hand in them nor go about to take them out of his hands as though we could direct him to do them better As Gods Scriptures are his will so his actions are his will both are testaments because they testifie his mind to us It is not lawful to adde a Schedule to either of his wills as they do ill who adde to his written will the Scriptures a schedule of Apocryphall books so do they also who to his other will his manifested actions adde Apocryphall conditions and a schedule of such limitations as these If God would have staid thus long or if God would have proceeded in this or this manner I could have borne it To say that our afflictions are greater then we can bear is so neer to despairing as that the same words express both for when we consider Cains words in that originall Tongue in which God spake we cannot tell whether the words be My punishment is greater then can be borne or My sin is greater then can be forgiven But Madam you who willingly sacrificed your self to God in your obedience to him in your own sickness cannot be doubted to dispute with him about any part of you which he shall be pleased to require at your hands The difference is great in the losse of an arme or a head of a child or a husband but to them who are incorporated into Christ their head there can be no beheading upon you who are a member of the Spouse of Christ the Church there can fal no widow-head nor orphanage upon those childeren to whom God is father I have not another office by your husbands death for I was your Chaplain before in my dayly prayers but I shall inlarge that office with other Collects than before that God will continue to you that peace which you have ever had in him and send you quiet and peaceable dispositions in all them with whom you shall have any thing to do in your temporall estate and matters of this world Amen At my poor house at S. Pauls 26. Octob. 1624. Your Ladyships very humble and thankfull Servant in Chr. Iesus J. Donne An Epitaph written by Dr. Corbet Bishop of Oxford on his friend Dr. Donne HE that wood write an Epitaph for thee And write it well must first begin to be Such as thou wert for none can truly know Thy life and worth but he that hath liv'd so He must have wit to spare and to hurle down Enough to keep the gallants of the Town He must have learning plenty both the Lawes Civil and Common to Judge any Cause Divinity great store above the rest Not of the last Edition but the best He must have language travell all the Arts Judgement to use or else he wants thy parts He must have friends the highest able to do Such as Mecaenas and Augustus too He must have such a sicknesse such a death Or else his vain descriptions come beneath He that would write an Epitaph for thee Should first be dead let it alone for me To the Memory of my ever desired Dr. Donne An Elegy by H. King B. C. TO have liv'd eminent in a degree Beyond our loftiest thoughts that is like thee Or t' have had too much merit is not safe For such excesses find no Epitaph At common graves we have poetick eyes Can melt themselves in easie Elegies Each quill can drop his tributary verse And pin it like the hatchments to the hearse But at thine poem or inscription Rich soul of wit and language we have none Indeed a silence does that tomb be fit Where is no Herald left to blazon it Widow'd invention justly doth forbear To come abroad knowing thou art not there Late her great patron whose prerogative Maintain'd and cloth'd her so as none alive Must now presume to keep her at thy rate Though he the Indies for her dower estate Or else that awfull fire which once did burn In thy clear brain now fallen into thy urn Lives thereto fright rude Empericks from thence Which might profane thee by their Ignorance Who ever writes of thee and in a style Unworthy such a theme does but revile Thy precious dust and wake a learned spirit Which may revenge his rapes upon thy merit For all a low-pitch't fancy can devise Will prove at best but hallowed injuries Thou like the dying Swan did'st lately sing Thy mournfull dirge in audience of the King When pale lookes and faint accents of thy breath Presented so to life that piece of death That it was fear'd and propheci'd by all Thou thither cam'st to preach thy Funerall Oh hadst thou in an Elegiack knell Rung out unto the world thine own farewell And in thy high victorious numbers beat The solemn measures of thy griev'd retreat Thou mightst the Poets service now have mist As well as then thou didst prevent the Priest And never to the world beholden be So much as for an Epitaph for thee I do not like the office nor i' st fit Thou who didst lend our age such summs of wit Should'st now re-borrow from her bankrupt mine That ore to bury thee which first was thine Rather still leave us in thy debt and know Exalted Soul more glory 't is to owe Thy memory what we can never pay Then with embased Coine those rites defray Commit we then thee to thy self nor blame Our drooping loves that thus to thine own fame Leave thee executors since but thine own No pen could do thee Justice nor bayes Crown Thy vast deserts save that we nothing can Depute to be thy ashes guardian So Jewellers no art or metall trust To form the Diamond but the Diamonds dust FINIS * Iohn King B. of Lond. * Hen King now B.C. * In his Preface to Pseudo-Mar * In his book of Devotions Ezek. 37.3 * In his book of Devotions * Dr. King and Dr. Monfort