Parents shame let it forgotten be And may the sad example die with thee It is not now thy grieved friends intent To render thee dull Pities argument Thou hast a bolder title unto fame And at Edge-Hill thou didst make good the claime When in thy Royal Masters Cause and Warre Thy ventur'd life brought off a noble skarre Nor did thy faithful services desist Till death untimely strook thee from the List Though in that prouder vault then which doth tomb Thy ancestors thy body find not room Thine own deserts have purchas'd thee a place Which more renowned is then all thy race For in this earth thou dost ennobled ly With marks of Valour and of Loyalty To my dead friend Ben Johnson I See that wreath which doth the wearer arm ' Gainst the quick strokes of thunder is no charm To keep off deaths pale dart For Johnson then Thou hadst been number'd still with living men Times sithe had fear'd thy Lawrel to invade Nor thee this subject of our sorrow made Amongst those many votaries who come To offer up their Garlands at thy Tombe Whil'st some more lofty pens in their bright verse Like glorious Tapers flaming on thy herse Shall light the dull and thankless world to see How great a maim it suffers wanting thee Let not thy learned shadow scorn that I Pay meaner Rites unto thy memory And since I nought can adde but in desire Restore some sparks which leapt from thine own fire What ends soever others quills invite I can protest it was no â—tch to write Nor any vain ambition to be read But meerly Love and Justice to the dead Which rais'd my fameless Muse and caus'd her bring These drops as tribute thrown into that spring To whose most rich and fruitful head we ow The purest streams of language which can flow For 't is but truth thou taught'st the ruder age To speake by Grammar and reform'dst the Stage Thy Comick Sock induc'd such purged sence A Lucrece might have heard without offence Amongst those soaring wits that did dilate Our English and advance it to the rate And value it now holds thy self was one Helpt lift it up to such proportion That thus refin'd and roab'd it shall not spare With the full Greck or Latine to compare For what tongue ever durst but ours translate Great Tully's Eloquence or Homers State Both which in their unblemisht lustre shine From Chapmans pen and from thy Catiline All I would ask for thee in recompence Of thy successful toyl and times expence Is onely this poor Boon that those who can Perhaps read French or talk Italian Or do the lofty Spaniard affect To shew their skill in Forrein Dialect Prove not themselves so unnaturally wife They therefore should their Mother-tongue despise As if her Poets both for style and wit Not equall'd or not pass'd their best that writ Untill by studying Johnson they have known The height and strength and plenty of their own Thus in what low earth or neglected room Soere thou sleep'st thy book shall be thy tomb Thou wilt go down a happy Coarse bestrew'd With thine own Flowres and feel thy self renew'd Whil'st thy immortal neve-with'ring Bayes Shall yearly flourish in thy Readers praise And when more spreading Titles are forgot Or spight of all their Lead and Sear-cloth rot Thou wrapt and Shrin'd in thine own sheets wilt ly A Relick fam'd by all Posterity AN ELEGY Vpon Prince Henry's death KEep station Nature and rest Heaven sure On thy supporters shoulders lest past cure Thou dasht in ruine fall by a griefs weight Will make thy basis shrink and lay thy height Low as the Center Heark and feel it read Through the astonisht Kingdom Henry's dead It is enough who seeks to aggravate One strain beyond this prove more sharp his fate Then sad our doom The world dares not survive To parallel this woes superlative O killing Rhetorick of Death two words Breathe stronger terrours then Plague Fire or Swords Ere conquer'd This were Epitaph and Verse Worthy to be prefixt in Natures herse Or Earths sad dissolution whose fall Will be less grievous though more generall For all the woe ruine ere buried Sounds in these fatal accents Henry's dead Cease then unable Poetry thy phrase Is weak and dull to strike us with amaze Worthy thy vaster subject Let none dare To coppy this sad hap but with despair Hanging at his quills point For not a stream Of Ink can write much less improve this Theam Invention highest wrought by grief or wit Must sink with him and on his Tomb-stone split Who like the dying Sun tells us the light And glory of our Day set in his Night AN ELEGY Vpon S. W. R. I Will not weep for 't were as great a sin To shed a tear for thee as to have bin An Actor in thy death Thy life and age Was but a various Scene on fortunes Stage With whom thou tugg'st strov'st ev'n out of breath In thy long toil nere master'd till thy death And then despight of trains and cruell wit Thou did'st at once subdue malice and it I dare not then so blast thy memory As say I do lament or pity thee Were I to choose a subject to bestow My pity on he should be one as low In spirit as desert That durst not dy But rather were content by slavery To purchase life or I would pity those Thy most industrious and friendly foes Who when they thought to makethee scandals story Lent thee a swifter flight to Heav'n and glory That thought by cutting off some wither'd dayes Which thou could'st spare them to eclipse thy praise Yet gave it brighter foil made thy ag'd fame Appear more white and fair then foul their shame And did promote an Execution Which but for them Nature and Age had done Such worthless things as these were onely born To live on Pities almes too mean for scorn Thou dy'dst an envious wonder whose high fate The world must still admire scarce imitate AN ELEGY Vpon the L. Bishop of London John King SAd Relick of a blessed Soul whose trust We sealed up in this religious dust O do not thy low Exequies suspect As the cheap arguments of our neglect 'T was a commanded duty that thy grave As little pride as thou thy self should have Therefore thy covering is an humble stone And but a word * Resurgam for thy inscription When those that in the same earth neighbour thee Have each his Chronicle and Pedigree They have their waving pennons and their flagges Of Matches and Alliance formal bragges VVhen thou although from Ancestors thou came Old as the Heptarchy great as thy Name â—leep'st there inshrin'd in thy admired parts â—nd hast no Heraldry but thy deserts Yet let not Them their prouder Marbles boast For They rest with less honour though more cost Go search the world and with your Mattox wounâ— The groaning bosom of the patient ground Digge from the hidden veins of her dark womb All that is rare and precious
worst acts of my life incinerate He shall in story fill a glorious room Whose ashes and whose sins sleep in one Tomb. If now to my cold hearse thou deign to bring Some melting sighs as thy last offering My peacefull exequies are crown'd Nor shall I ask more honour at my Funerall Thou wilt more richly balm me with thy tears Then all the Nard fragrant Arabia bears And as the Paphian Queen by her griefs show'r Brought up her dead Loves Spirit in a flow'r So by those precious drops rain'd from thine eies Out of my dust O may some vertue rise And like thy better Genius thee attend Till thou in my dark Period shalt end Lastly my constant truth let me commend To him thou choosest next to be thy friend For witness all things good I would not have Thy Youth and Beauty married to my grave 'T would shew thou didst repent the style of wife Should'st thou relapse into a single life They with preposterous grief the world delude Who mourn for their lost Mates in solitude Since Widdowhood more strongly doth enforce The much lamented lot of their divorce Themselves then of their losses guilty are Who may yet will not suffer a repaire Those were Barbarian wives that did invent Weeping to death at th'Husbands Monument But in more civil Rites She doth approve Her first who ventures on a second Love For else it may be thought if She refrain She sped so ill Shee durst not trie again Up them my Love and choose some worthler one Who may supply my room when I am gone So will the stock of our affection thrive No less in death then were I still alive And in my urne I shall rejoyce that I Am both Testatour thus and Legacie The short Wooing LIke an Oblation set before a Shrine Fair One I offer up this heart of mine Whether the Saint accept my Gift or no He neither fear nor doubt before I know For he whose faint distrust prevents reply Doth his own suits denial prophecy Your will the sentence is Who free as Fate Can bid my love proceed or else retreat And from short views that verdict is decreed Which seldom doth one audience exceed Love asks no dull probation but like light Conveyes his nimble influence at first sight I need not therefore importune or press This were t'extort unwilling happiness And much against affection might I sin To tire and weary what I seek to win Towns which by lingring siege enforced be Oft make both sides repent the victorie Be Mistriss of yourself and let me thrive Or suffer by your own prerogative Yet stay since you are Judge who in one breath Bear uncontrolled power of Life and Death Remember Sweet pity doth best become Those lips which must pronounce a Suitors doome If I find that my spark of chast desire Shall kindle into Hymens holy fire Else like sad flowers will these verses prove To stick the Coffin of rejected Love St. Valentines day NOw that each feather'd Chorister doth sing The glad approches of the welcome Spring Now Phoebus darts forth his more early beam And dips it later in the curled stream I should to custome prove a retrograde Did I still dote upon my sullen shade Oft have the seasons finisht and begun Dayes into Months those into years have run Since my cross Starres and inauspicious fate Doom'd me to linger here without my Mate Whose loss ere since befrosting my desire Left me an Altar without Gift or Fire I therefore could have wisht for your own sake That Fortune had design'd a nobler stake For you to draw then one whose fading day Like to a dedicated Taper lay Within a Tomb and long burnt ouâ— in 〈◊〉 Since nothing there saw better by the flame Yet since you like your Chance I must not try To marre it through my incapacity I here make title to it and proclaime How much you honour me to wear my name Who can no form of gratitude devise But offer up my self your sacrifice Hall then my worthy Lot and may each Morn Successive springs of joy to you be born May your content ne're wane untill my heart Grown Bankrupt wants good wishes to impart Henceforth I need not make the dust my Shrine Nor search the Grave for my lost Valentine To his unconstant Friend BUt say thou very woman why to me This fit of weakness and inconstancie What forfeit have I made of word or vow That I am rack't on thy displeasure now If I have done a fault I do not shame To cite it from thy lips give it a name I ask the banes stand forth and tell me why We should not in our wonted loves comply Did thy cloy'd appetite urge thee to trie If any other man could love as I I see friends are like clothes lad up whil'st new But after wearing cast though nere so true Or did thy fierce ambition long to make Some Lover turn a martyr for thy sake Thinking thy beauty had deserv'd no name Unless some one do perish in that flame Upon whose loving dust this sentence lies Here 's one was murther'd by his Mistriss eyes Or was 't because my love to thee was such I could not choose but blab it swear how much I was thy slave and doting let thee know I better could my self then thee forgo Hearken ye men that ere shall love like me He give you counsel gratis if you be Possest of what you like let your fair friend Lodge in your bosom but no secrets send To seek their lodging in a female brest For so much is abated of your rest The Steed that comes to understand his strength Growes wild and casts his manager at length And that tame Lover who unlocks his heart Into his Mistriss teaches her an art To plague himself shews her the secret way How She may tyrannize another day And now my fair unkindness thus to thee Mark how wise Passion and I agree Hear and be sorry for 't I will not die To expiate thy crime of levitie 〈◊〉 walk not cross-arm'd neither ear and live â—ea live to pity thy neglect not grieve That thou art from thy faith and promise gone Nor envy him who by my loss hath won Thou shalt perceive thy changing Moon-like fits Have not infected me or turn'd my wits To Lunacie I do not mean to weep When I should eat or sigh when I should sleep I will not fall upon my pointed quill Bleed ink and Poems or invention spill To contrive Ballads or weave Elegies For Nurses wearing when the infant cries Nor like th'enamour'd Tristrams of the time Despair in prose and hang my self in rhime Nor thither run upon my verses feet Where I shall none but fools or mad-men meet Who mid'st the silent shades and Myrtle walks Pule and do penance for their Mistress faults I 'm none of those poetick male-contents Born to make paper dear with my laments Or wild Orlando that will rail and vex And for thy sake fall out with
which nought avail me to gainsay For whil'st in sorrowes Maze I wander on I do but follow lifes vocation Sure we were made to grieve at our first birth With cries we took possession of the earth And though the lucky man reputed be Fortunes adopted son yet onely he Is Natures true born child who summes his years Like me with no Arithmetick but tears On two Children dying of one Disease and buried in one Grave BRought forth in sorrow and bred up in care Two tender Children here entombed are One Place one Sire one Womb their being gave They had one mortal sickness and one grave And though they cannot number many years In their Account yet with their Parents tears This comfort mingles Though their dayes were few They scarcely sinne but never sorrow knew So that they well might boast they carry'd hence What riper ages lose their innocence You pretty losses that revive the fate Which in your mother death did antedate O let my high-swol'n grief distill on you The saddest drops of a Parentall dew You ask no other dower then what my eyes Lay out on your untimely exequies When once I have discharg'd that mournfull skore Heav'n hath decreed you ne're shall cost me more Since you release and quit my borrow'd trust By taking this inheritance of dust A Letter I Ne'r was drest in Forms nor can I bend My pen to flatter any nor commend Unless desert or honour do present Unto my verse a worthy argument You are my friend and in that word to me Stand blazon'd in your noblest Heraldry That style presents you full and does relate The bounty of your love and my own fate Both which conspir'd to make me yours A choice Which needs must in the giddy peoples voice That onely judge the outside and like apes Play with our names and comment on our shapes Appear too light but it lies you upon To justifie the disproportion Truth be my record I durst not presume To seek to you 't was you that did assume Me to your bosom Wherein you subdu'd One that can serve you though ne're could intrude Upon great titles nor knows how t' invade Acquaintance Like such as are onely paid With great mens smiles if that the passant Lord Let fall a forc't salute or but afford The Nod Regardant It was test enough For me you ne're did find such servile stuff Couch't in my temper I can freely say I do not love you in that common way For which Great Ones are lov'd in this false time I have no wish to gain nor will to climbe I cannot pawn my freedom nor out-live My liberty for all that you can give And sure you may retain good cheap such friends Who not your fortune make but you their ends I speak not this to vaunt in my own story All these additions are unto your glory Who counter to the world use to elect Not to take up on trust what you affect Indeed 't is seldom seen that such as you Adopt a friend or for acquaintance sue Yet you did this vouchsafe you did descend Below your self to raise an humble friend And fix him in your love where I will stand The constant subject of your free command Had I no ayerie thoughts sure you would teach Me higher then my own dull sphere to reach And by reflex instruct me to appear Something though course and plain fit for your wear Know best of friends however wild report May justly say I am unapt to sort With your opinion or society Which truth would shame me did I it deny There 's something in me sayes I dare make good When honour calls me all I want in blood Put off your Giant titles then I can Stand in your judgements blank an equal man Though Hills advanced are above the Plain They are but higher earth nor must disdain Alliance with the Vale we see a spade Can level them and make a Mount a Glade Howere we differ in the Heralds book He that mankindes extraction shall look In Natures Rolles must grant we all agree In our best parts immortal pedigree You must by that perspective onely view My service else 't will nere shew worthy you You see I court you bluntly like a friend Not like a Mistress my Muse is not penn'd For smooth and oylie flights And I indent To use more honesty then complement But I have done in lieu of all you give Receive his thankful tribute who must live Your vow'd observer and devotes a heart Which will in death seal the bold counterpart An Acknowledgment MY best of friends what needs a chain to tie One by your merit bound a Votarie Think you I have some plot upon my peace I would this bondage change for a release Since 't was my fate your prisoner to be Heav'n knows I nothing fear but libertie Yet you do well that study to prevent After so rich a stock of favour spent On one so worthless lest my memory Should let so dear an obligation dy Without Record This made my precious Friend Her Token as an Antidote to send Against forgetful poysons That as they Who Vespers late and early Mattins say Upon their Beads so on this linked skore In golden numbers I might reckon ore Your vertues and my debt which does surmount The trivial laws of Popular account For that within this emblematick knot Your beauteous mind and my own fate is wrote The sparkling constellation which combines The Lock is your dear self whose worth out shines Most of your sex so solid and so clear You like a perfect Diamond appear Casting from your example fuller light Then those dimme sparks which glaze the brow of night And gladding all your friends as doth the ray Of that East-starre which wakes the cheerful day But the black Map of death and discontent Behind that Adamantine firmament That luckless figure which like Calvary Stands strew'd and coppy'd out in skuls is I Whose life your absence clouds and makes my time Move blindfold in the dark ecliptick line Then wonder not if my removed Sun So low within the Western Tropick run My eyes no day in this Horizon see Since where You are not all is night to me Lastly the anchor which enfastned lies Upon a pair of deaths sadly applies That Monument of Rest which harbour must Our Ship-wrackt fortunes in a road of dust So then how late soere my joyless life Be tired out in this affections strife Though my tempestuous fancie like the skie Travail with stormes and through my watry eie Sorrows high-going waves spring many a leak Though sighs blow loud til my hearts cordagebreaâ— Though Bath and all my wishes prove untrue Yet Death shall fix and anchor Me with You. 'T is some poor comfort that this mortal scope Will Period though never Crown my Hope The Acquittance NOt knowing who should my Acquittance take I know as little what discharge to make The favour is so great that it out-goes All forms of thankfulness
And could'st thou me assure â—ach vice of mine should meet with such a cure 〈◊〉 would sin oft and on my guilty brow â—ear every misperfection that I ow â—pen and visible I should not hide â—ut bring my faults abroad to hear thee chide 〈◊〉 such a Note and with a Quill so sage 〈◊〉 Passion tunes and calmes a Tempests rage 〈◊〉 Well I am charm'd and promise to redress â—hat without shrift my follies doe confess â—gainst my self wherefore let me intreat â—hen I fly out in that distemper'd heat â—hich frets me into fasts thou wilt reprove â—hat froward spleen in Poetry and Love 〈◊〉 though I lose my reason in such fits â—â—oul't time me back again into my wits AN ELEGY Vpon the immature loss of the most vertuous Lady Anne Rich. I Envy not thy mortal triumphs Death Thou enemy to Vertue as to Breath Nor do I wonder much nor yet complain The weekly numbers by thy arrow slain The whole world is thy Factory and we Like traffick driven and retail'd by Thee And where the springs of life fill up so fast Some of the waters needs must run to waste It is confest yet must our griefs dispute That which thine own conclusion doth refute Ere we begin Hearken for if thy ear Be to thy throat proportion'd thou canst hear Is there no order in the work of Fate Nor rule but blindly to anticipate Our growing seasons or think'st thou 't is just To sprinkle our fresh blossomes with thy dust Till by abortive funerals thou bring That to an Autumn Nature meant a Spring Is' t not enough for thee that wither'd age Lies the unpiti'd subject of thy rage But like an ugly Amorist thy crest Must be with spoyles of Youth and Beauty drest In other Camps those which sate down to day March first to morrow and they longest stay Who last came to the service But in thine Onely confusion stands for discipline We fall in such promiscuous heaps none can Put any diffâ—rence 'twixt thy Rear or Van Since oft the youngest lead thy Files For this The grieved world here thy accuser is And I a Plaintiff ' mongst those many ones Who wet this Ladies Urn with zealous moanes As if her ashes quick'ning into years Might be again embody'd by our tears But all in vain the moisture we bestow Shall make assoon her curled Marble grow As render heat or motion to that blood Which through her veins branch't like an azurè flood Whos 's now still Current in the grave is lost Lock't up and feeter'd by eternal frost Desist from hence doting Astrology To search for hidden wonders in the sky Or from the concourse of malignant starres Foretel diseases gen'ral as our warres What barren droughts forerunners of lean dearth Threaten to starve the plenty of the earth What horrid forms of darkness must affright The sickly world hast'ning to that long night Where it must end If there no Portents are No black eclipses for the Kalendar Our times sad Annals will remembred be Ith'loss of bright Northumberland and Thee Two Starres of Court who in one fatal year By most untimely set dropt from their Sphear Shee in the winter took her flight and soon As her perfections reach't the point of Noon Wrapt in a cloud contracted her wisht stay Unto the measure of a short-liv'd day But Thou in Summer like an early Rose By Deaths cold hand nipp'd as Thou didst disclose Took'st a long day to run that narrow stage Which in two gasping minutes summ'd thy age And as the fading Rose when the leaves shed Lies in its native sweetness buried Thou in thy vertues bedded and inherst Sleep'st with those odours thy pure fame disperst Where till that Rising Morn thou must remain In which thy wither'd flowres shall spring again And greater beauties thy wak't body vest Then were at thy departure here possâ—st So with full eyes we close thy vault Content With what thy loss bequeaths us to lament And make that use of thy griev'd funerall As of a Chrystall broken in the fall Whose pitti'd fractures gather'd up and set May smaller Mirrours for Thy Sex beget There let them view themselves untill they see The end of all their glories shew'n in Thee Whil'st in the truth of this sad tribute I Thus strive to Canonize thy Memory AN ELEGY Vpon Mrs. Kirk unfortunately drowned in Thames FOr all the Ship-wracks and the liquid graves Lost men have gain'd within the furrow'd waves The Sea hath fin'd and for our wrongs paid use When its wrought foam a Venus did produce But what repair wilt thou unhappy Thames Afford our losse thy dull unactive streames Can no new beauty raise nor yet restore Her who by thee was ravisht from our shore Whose death hath stain'd the glory of thy flood And mixt the guilty Channel with her blood O Neptune was thy favour onely writ In that loose Element where thou dost sit That after all this time thou should'st repent Thy fairest blessing to the Continent Say what could urge this Fate is Thetis dead Or Amphitrite from thy wet armes fled Was 't thou so poor in Nymphs that thy moist love Must be maintain'd with pensions from above If none of these but that whil'st thou did'st sleep Upon thy sandy pillow in the deep This mischief stole upon us may our grief Waken thy just revenge on that lie thief Who in thy fluid Empire without leave And unsuspected durst her life bereave Henceforth invert thy order and provide In gentlest floods a Pilot for our guide Let rugged Seas be lov'd but the Brooks smile Shunn'd like the courtship of a Crocodile And where the Current doth most smoothly pass Think for her sake that stream deaths Looking-glass To shew us our destruction is most neer When pleasure hath begot least sense of fear Else break thy forked Scepter ' gainst some Rock If thou endure a flatt'ring calm to mock Thy far-fam'd pow'r and violate that law Which keeps the angry Ocean in aw Thy Trident will grow useless which doth still Wild tempests if thou let tame rivers kill Mean time we ow thee nothing Our first debt Lies cancell'd in thy waâ—ry Cabinet We have for Her thou sent'st us from the Main Return'd a Venus back to thee again AN ELEGY Vpon the death of Mr. Edward Holt. VVHether thy Fathers or diseases rage More mortal prov'd to thy unhappy age Our sorrow needs not question since the first Is known for length and sharpness much the worst Thy Feaver yet was kind which the ninth day For thy misfortunes made an easie way When th' other barbarous and Hectick fit In nineteen winters did not intermit I therefore vainly now not ask thee why Thou didst so soon in thy Youths mid way dy But in my sence the greater wonder make Thy long oppressed heart no sooner brake Of force mâ—st the neglected blossom all When the tough root becomes unnaturall And to his branches doth that sap deny Which them with life and verdure should supply For
for a tomb Yet when much treasure and more time is spent You must grant His the nobler Monument Whose Faith stands ore Him for a Hearse and haâ— The Resurrection for His Epitaph Vpon the death of my ever desired friend Doctor Donne Dean of Pauls TO have liv'd eminent in a degreee Beyond our lofty'st flights 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 with the Hatchments to the Herse But at thine Poem or inscription Rich Soul of wit and language we have none Indeed a silence does that Tomb befit Where is no Herald left to blazon it Widdow'd invention justly doth forbear To come abroad knowing thou art not here 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 dowre estate Or else that awful fire which once did burn In thy clear brain now fall'n into thy Urn. Lives there to 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-pitcht fancie can devise Will prove at best but hallow'd injuries Thou like the dying Swan didst lately sing Thy mournful Dirge in audience of the King When pale looks and faint accents of thy breath Presented so to life that piece of death That it was fear'd and prophesi'd by all Thou thither cam'st to preach thy Funerall O! hadst thou in an Elegiack knell Rung out unto the world thine own farewell And in thy high victorious numbers beat The solemn measure of thy griev'd retreat Thou might'st 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 is' t fit Thou who didst lend our age such summes of wit Should'st now reborrow from her Bankrupt Mine That Ore to bury thee which once was thine Rather still leave us in thy debt and know Exalted Soul More glory 't is to ow Unto thy Herse what we can never pay Then with embased coin those Rites defray Commit we then Thee to Thy Self nor blame Our drooping loves which thus to thine own fame Leave Thee Executour since but thy own No pen could do Thee Justice nor Bayes crown Thy vast desert save that we nothing can Depute to be thy ashes Guardian So Jewellers no Art or Metal trust To form the Diamond but the Diamonds dust AN ELEGY Vpon the most victorious King of Sweden Gustavus Adolphus LIke a cold fatal sweat which ushers death My thoughts hang on me my lab'ring breath Stopt up with sighs my fancie big with woes Feels two twinn'd mountains struggle in her throws Of boundless sorrow one t'other of sin For less let no one rate it to begin Where honour ends In Great Gustavus flame That style burnt out and wasted to a name Does barely live with us As when the snuff That fed it failes the Taper turns to snuff With this poor snuff this ayerie shadow we Of Fame and Honour must contented be Since from the vain grasp of our wishes fled Their glorious substance is now He is dead Speak it again and louder louder yet Else whil'st we hear the sound we shall forget What it delivers Let hoarse rumor cry Till she so many ecchoes multiply Those may like num'rous witnesses confute Our unbelieving soules that would dispute And doubt this truth for ever This one way Is left our incredulity to sway To waken our deaf sense and make our ears As open and dilated as our fears That we may feel the blow and feeling grieve At what we would not feign but must believe And in that horrid faith behold the world From her proud height of expectation hurl'd Stooping with him as if she strove to have No lower Center now then Swedens grave O could not all thy purchas'd victories Like to thy Fame thy Flesh immortalize Were not thy vertue nor thy valour charmes To guard thy body from those outward harmes Which could not reach thy soul could not thy spirit Lend somewhat which thy frailty might inherit From thy diviner part that Death nor Hate Nor envy's bullets ere could penetrate Could not thy early Trophies in stern fight Torn from the Dane the Pole the Moscovite Which were thy triumphs seeds as pledges sown That when thy honours harvest was ripe grown With full-summ'd wing thou Falcon-like wouldst fly And cuff the Eagle in the German sky Forcing his iron beak and feathers feel They were not proof ' gainst thy victorious steel Could not all these protect thee or prevaile To fright that Coward Death who oft grew pale To look thee and thy battails in the face Alas they could not Destiny gives place To none nor is it seen that Princes lives Can saved be by their prerogatives No more was thine who clos'd in thy cold lead Dost from thy self a mournful lecture read Of Mans short-dated glory learn you Kings You are like him but penetrable things Though you from Demi-Gods derive your birth You are at best bâ—t honourable earth And howere sisted from that courser bran Which does compound and knead the common man Nothing 's immortal or from earth refin'd About you but your Office and your Mind â—ere then break your false Glasses which present â—ou greater then your Maker ever meant Make truth your Mirrour now since you find all That flatter you confuted by his fall Yet since it was decreed thy lifes bright Sun â—ust be eclips'd ere thy full course was run â—e proud thou didst in thy black Obsequies â—ith greater glory set then others rise â—or in thy death as life thou heldest one â—ost just and regular proportion â—ook how the Circles drawn by Compass meet â—ndivisibly joyned head to feet â—nd by continued points which them unite â—row at once Circular and Infinite 〈◊〉 did thy Fate and honour now contend â—o match thy brave beginning with thy end â—herefore thou hadst instead of Passing bells â—he Drums and Cannons thunder for thy knells â—nd in the Field thou did'st triumphing dy â—osing thy eye-lids with a victory â—hat so by thousands who there lost their breath â—ing-like thou might'st be waited on in death Liv'd Plutarch now and would of Caesar tell He could make none but Thee his parallel Whose tide of glory swelling to the brim Needs borrow no addition from Him When did great Julius in any Clime Atchieve so much and in so small a time Or if he did yet shalt Thou in that land Single for him and unexampled stand When ore the Germans first his Eagle towr'd What saw the
piece of earth Which they will not ingross making a dearth Of all inhabitants untill they stand Unneighbour'd as unblest within their land This sin cryes in Gods ear who hath decreed The ground they sow shall not return the seed They that unpeopled countreys to create Themselves sole Lords made many desolate To build up their own house shall find at last Ruine and fearful desolation cast Upon themselves Their Mansion shall become A Desart and their Palace prove a tombe Their vines shall barren be their land yield tares Their house shall have no dwellers they no heires Woe unto those that with the morning Sun Rise to drink wine and sit till he have run His weary course not ceasing untill night Have quencht their understanding with the light Whose raging thirst like fire will not be tam'd The more they poure the more they are inflam'd Woe unto them that onely mighty are To wage with wine in which unhappy war They who the glory of the day have won Must yield them foil'd and vanquisht by the tun Men that live thus as if they liv'd in jest Fooling their time with Musick and a feast That did exile all sounds from their soft ear But of the harp must this sad discord hear Compos'd in threats The feet which measures tread Shall in captivity be fettered Famine shall scourge them for their vast excess And Hell revenge their monstrous drunkenness Which hath enlarg'd it self to swallow such Whose throats nere knew enough though still too much Woe unto those that countenance a sin Siding with vice that it may credit win By their unhallow'd vote that do benight The truth with errour putting dark for light And light for dark that call an evil good And would by vice have vertue understood That with their frown can sowre an honest cause Or sweeten any bad by their applause That justify the wicked for reward And void of morall goodness or regard Plot with detraction to traduce the fame Of him whose merit hath enroll'd his name Among the just Therefore Gods vengeful ire Glows on his people and becomes a fire Whose greedy and exalted flame shall burn Till they like straw or chaffe to nothing turn Because they have rebell'd against the right To God and Law perversly opposite As Plants which Sun nor showres did ever bless So shall their root convert to rottenness And their successions bud in which they trust Shall like Gomorrahs fruit moulder to dust Woe unto those that drunk with self-conceit Value their own desiggs at such a rate Which humane wisdome cannot reach that sit Enthron'd as sole Monopolists of wit That out-look reason and suppose the eye Of Nature blind to their discovery Whil'st they a title make to understand What ever secret's bosom'd in the land But God shall imp their pride and let them see They are but fools in a sublime degree He shall bring down and humble those proud eyes In which false glasses onely they lookt wise That all the world may laugh and learn by it There is no folly to pretended wit Woe unto those that draw iniquity With cords and by a vain security Lengthen the sinful trace till their own chain Of many links form'd by laborious pain Do pull them into Hell that as with lines And Cart-ropes drag on their unwilling crimes Who rather then they will commit no sin Tempt all occasions to let it in As if there were no God who must exact The strict account for e'ry vicious fact An Essay on Death and a Prison A Prison is in all things like a grave Where we no better priviledges have Then dead men nor so good The soul once fled Lives freer now then when she was cloystered In walls of flesh and though she organs want To act her swift designs yet all will grant Her faculties more clear now separate Then if the same conjunction which of late Did marry her to earth had stood in force Uncapable of death or of divorce But an imprison'd mind though living dies And at one time feels two captivities A narrow dungeon which her body holds But narrower body which her self enfolds Whil'st I in prisonâ—ly nothing is free Nothing enlarg'd but thought and miserie Though e'ry chink be stopt the doors close barr'd Despight of walls and locks through e'ry ward These have their issues forth may take the aire Though not for health but onely to compare How wretched those men are who freedom want By such as never suffer'd a restraint In which unquiet travel could I find Ought that might settle my distemper'd mind Or of some comfort make discovery It were a voyage well imploy'd but I Like our raw travellers that cross the seas To fetch home fashions or some worse disease Instead of quiet a new torture bring Home t' afflict me malice and murmuring What is' t I envy not no dog nor fly But my desires prefer and wish were I For they are free or if they were like me They had no sense to know calamitie But in the grave no sparks of envy live No hot comparisons that causes give Of quarrel or that our affections move Any condition save their own to love There are no objects there but shades and night And yet that darkness better then the light There lives a silent harmony no jar Or discord can that sweet soft consort mar The graves deaf ear is clos'd against all noise Save that which rocks must hear the angels voice Whose trump shall wake the world and raise up men Who in earths bosom slept bed-rid till then What man then would who on deaths pillow slumbers Be re-inspir'd with life though golden numbers Of bliss were pour'd into his breast though he Were sure in change to gain a Monarchies A Monarchs glorious state compar'd with his Less safe less free less firm less quiet is For nere was any Prince advanc't so high That he was out of reach of misery Never did story yet a law report To banish fate or sorrow from his Court Where ere he moves by land or through the Main These go along sworn members of his train But he whom the kind earth hath entertain'd Hath in her womb a sanctuary gain'd Whose charter and protection arm him so That he is priviledg'd from future woe The Coffin's a safe harbour where he rides Land-bound below cross windes or churlish tides For grief sprung up with life was mans half-brother Fed by the taste brought forth by sin the mother And since the first seduction of the wife God did decree to grief a lease for life Which Patent in full force continue must Till man that disobey'd revert to dust So that lifes sorrows ratifi'd by God Cannot expire or find their period Untill the soul and body disunite And by two diff'rent wayes from each take flight But they dissolved once our woes disband Th' assurance cancell'd by one fatall hand Soon as the passing bell proclaims me dead My sorrows sink with me lye buried In the
bath'd in tear Beat but a bitter fruit in elder years Just such is this and his maturer age Teems with event more sad then the presage For view him higher when his childhoods span Is raised up to Youths Meridian When he goes proudly laden with the fruit Which health or strength or beauty contribute Yet as the mounted Canon batters down The Towres and goodly structures of a town So one short sickness will his force defeat And his frail Cittadell to rubbish beat How does a dropsie melt him to a floud Making each vein run water more then bloud A Chollick wracks him like a Northern gust And raging feavers crumble him to dust In which unhappy state he is made worse By his diseases then his makers curse God said in toyl and sweat he should earn bread And without labour not be nourished Here though like ropes of falling dew his sweat Hangs on his lab'ring brow he cannot eat Thus are his sins scourg'd in opposed themes And luxuries reveng'd by their extremes He who in health could never be content With Rarities fetcht from each Element Is now much more afflicted to delight His tasteless Palate and lost appetite Besides though God ordain'd that with the light Man should begin his work yet he made night For his repose in which the weary sense Repaires it self by rests soft recompence But now his watchful nights and troubled dayes Confused heaps of fear and fancy raise His chamber seems a loose and trembling mine His Pillow quilted with a Porcupine Pain makes his downy Couch sharp thornes appear And ev'ry feather prick him like a spear Thus when all forms of death about him keep He copies death in any form but sleep Poor walking-clay hast thou a mind to know To what unblest beginnings thou dost ow Thy wretched self fall sick a while and than Thou wilt conceive the pedigree of Man Learn shalt thou from thine own Anatomie That earth his mother wormes his sisters be That he 's a short-liv'd vapour upward wrought And by corruption unto nothing brought A stagg'ring Meteor by cross Planets bear Which often reeles and falles before his set A tree which withers faster then it growes A torch puff't out by ev'ry wind that blowes A web of fourty weekes spun forth in pain And in a moment ravell'd out again This is the Model of frail man Then say â—hat his duration's onely for a day â—nd in that day more fies of changes pass â—hen Atomes run in the turn'd Hower-glass So that th' incessant cares which life invade â—ight for strong truth their heresie perswade Who did maintain that humane soules are sent â—to the body for their punishment 〈◊〉 least with that Greek Sage still make us cry Not to be born or being born to dy * Non nasci aut quà m citissinè mori But Faith steers up to a more glorious scope â—hich sweetens our sharp passage and firm hope â—â—hors our torne Barks on a blessed shore â—yond the Dead sea we here ferry o're 〈◊〉 this Death is our Pilot and disease â—e Agent which solicites our release Though crosses then poure on my restless head 〈◊〉 lingring sickness nail me to my bed â—t this my Thoughts eternall comfort bee â—at my clos'd eyes a better light shall see And when by fortunes or by natures stroke My bodies earthen Pitcher must be broke My Soul like Gideons lamp from her crackt urn Shall Deaths black night to endlesse lustre turn The Dirge VVHat is th'Existence of Mans life But open war or slumber'd strife Where sickness to his sense presents The combat of the Elements And never feels a perfect Peace Till deaths cold hand signs his release It is a storm where the hot blood Out-vies in rage the boyling flood And each loud Passion of the mind Is like a furious gust of wind Which beats his Bark with many a Wave Till he casts Anchor in the Grave It is a flower which buds and growes And withers as the leaves disclose Whose spring and fall faint seasons keep Like fits of waking before sleep Then shrinks into that fatal mold Where its first being was enroll'd It is a dream whose seeming truth Is moraliz'd in age and youth Where all the comforts he can share As wandring as his fancies are Till in a mist of dark decay The dreamer vanish quire away It is a Diall which points out The Sun-set as it moves about And shadowes out in lines of night The subtile stages of times slight Till all obscuring earth hath laid The body in perpetual shade It is a weary enterlude Which doth short joyes long woes include The World the Stage the Prologue tears The Acts vain hope and vary'd fears The Scene shuts up with loss of breath And leaves no Epilogue but Death AN ELEGY Occasioned by the lesse of the most incomparable Lady Stanhope daught or to the Earl of Northumberland LIghtned by that dimme Torch our sorrow bear We sadly trace thy Coffin with our rears And though the Ceremonious Rites are past Since thy fair body into earth was cast Though all thy Hatchments into ragges are come Thy Funerall Robes and Ornaments outwom We still thy mourners without Shew or Art With solemn Blacks hung round about our heart Thus constantly the Obsequies renew Which to thy precious memory are due Yet think not that we tudely would invade The dark recess of thine untroubled shade Or give disturbance to that happy peace Which thou enjoy'st at full since thy release Much less in sullen murmurs do complain Of His decree who took thee back again And did e're Fame had spread thy vertues light Eclipse and fold thee up in endless night This like an act of envy not of grief Might doubt thy bliss and shake our own belief Whose studi'd wishes no proportion bear With joyes which crown thee now in glories sphere Know then blest Soul we for our selves not thee Seal our woes dictate by this Elegie Wherein our tears united in one streame Shall to succeeding times convey this theme Worth all mens pity who discern how rare Such early growths of fame and goodness are Of these part must thy sexes loss bewail Maim'd in her noblest Patterns through thy fail For 't would require a double term of life To match thee as a daughter or a wife Both which Northumberlands dear loss improve And make his sorrow equal to his love The rest fall for our selves who cast behind Cannot yet reach the Peace which thou dost find But slowly follow thee in that dull stage Which most untimely poasted hence thy age Thus like religious Pilgrims who designe A short salute to their beloved Shrine Most sad and humble Votaries we come To offer up our sighs upon thy Tomb And wet thy Marble with our dropping eyes Which till the spring which feeds their current dries Resolve each falling night and rising day This mournfull homage at thy Grave to pay FINIS ERRATA PAge 2. The Pink never wrote by the Author of these Poems Pag. 22. lin 8. for she read air Pag. 100. lin 3. for Mattox read Mattocks