Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
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A44171
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On the death of my much honoured friend, Colonel Richard Lovelace an elegie.
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Holland, Samuel, gent.
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1660
(1660)
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Wing H2439; ESTC R13340
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841
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2
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ON THE DEATH OF MY Much Honoured Friend Colonel Richard Lovelace AN ELEGIE MEthinks when Kings Prophets and Poets dye We should not bid men weep nor ask them why But the great loss should by instinct impaire The Nations like a pestilentiall ayre And in a moment Men should feele the Cramp Of griefe like persons poyson'd with a damp All things in nature should their death deplore And the Sun look less lovely then before The fixed Starrs should change their constant spaces And Comets cast abroad their flagrant faces Yet still we see Princes and Poets fall Without their proper pomp of Funerall Men look about as if they nere had known The Poets Lawrell or the Princes Crown LOVELACE hath long been dead and we can be Oblig'd to no man for an Eligie Are you all turn'd to silence or did he Retain the only sap of Poetrie That kept all branches living must his fall Set an eternall Period upon all So when a Spring-tide doth begin to fly From the green shoar each neighbouring Creek growes dry But why do I so pettishly detract An age that is so perfect so exact In all things excellent it is no Fame Or glory to deceased Lovelace Name For he is weak in wit who doth deprave Anothers worth to make his own seem brave And this was not his aime nor is it mine I now conceive the scope of their design Which is with one consent to bring and burn Contributary Incense on his Vrne Where each Mans Love and Fancy shall be try'd As when great Johnson or brave Shakespeare dy'd Wits must unite for Ignorance we see Hath got a great train of Artillerie Yet neither shall nor can it blast the Fame And honour of deceased LOVELACE Name Whose own LUCASTA can support his credât Amongst all such who knowingly have read it But who that Praise can by desert discusse Due to those Poems that are Posthumous And if the last conceptions are the best Those by degrees do much transcend the rest So full so fluent that they richly suite With Orpheus Lyre or with Anacreons Lute And he shall melt his wings that shall aspire To reach a Fancy or one accent higher Holland and France have known his nobler parts And found him excellent in Arms and Arts To sum up all few Men of Fame but know He was Tam Marti quam Mercurio Samuel Holland