ON LUCY, COUNTESS OF BEDFORD. THIS morning, timely rapt with holy fire, I thought to form unto my zealous Muse What kind of creature I could most desire To honor, serve, and love, as poets use. I meant to make her fair, and free, and wise, Of greatest blood, and yet more good than great; I meant the Day-Star should not brighter rise, Nor lend like influence from his lucent seat. I meant she should be courteous, facile, sweet, Hating that solemn vice of greatness, pride; I meant each softest virtue there should meet Fit in that softer bosom to reside. The rock, the spindle, and the shears control Of Destiny, and spin her own free hours. Such when I meant to feign, and wished to see, My Muse bade Bedford write, and that was she. EPITAPH ON SHAKSPEARE. WHAT needs my Shakspeare for his honored bones, The labor of an age in piled stones? Or that his hallowed relics should be hid Under a star-y-pointing pyramid? Dear son of Memory, great heir of fame, What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name? Thou in our wonder and astonishment Hast built thyself a live long monument. For whilst, to the shame of slowendeavoring art Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book Those Delphic lines with deep impression took, Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving, Dost make us marble with too much conceiving; And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie. That kings for such a tomb would wish to die. EPITAPH. MILTON. UNDERNEATH this stone doth lye TRANSLATION OF COWLEY'S EPIGRAM ON FRANCIS DRAKE. THE stars above will make thee known, If man were silent here; BEN JONSON. TO WILLIAM SIDNEY, ON HIS GIVE me my cup, but from the Thes- That I may tell to Sidney, what And he may think on that And he with his best genius left alone, son, Whose nephew, whose grandchild you are; And men will then Say you have followed far, Which must be now: they teach you And he that stays To live until to-morrow, hath lost two days. Then The birthday shines, when logs not burn, but men. BEN JONSON. The golden pomp is come; Rich beads of amber here. Now reigns the Rose, and now Homer! this health to thee, In sack of such a kind, That it would make thee see, Though thou wert ne'er so blind. Next, Virgil I'll call forth, To pledge this second health In wine, whose each cup's worth An Indian commonwealth. A goblet next I'll drink To Ovid; and suppose Then this immensive cup Of aromatic wine, Catullus, I quaff up To that terse muse of thine.. Wild I am now with heat, O Bacchus! cool thy rays; Or frantic I shall eat Thy Thyrse, and bite the Bays. Round, round, the roof does run; And being ravisht thus, Come, I will drink a tun To my Propertius. Now, to Tibullus next, This flood I drink to thee; But stay, I see a text, That this presents to me. Behold! Tibullus lies Here burnt, whose small return Of ashes scarce suffice To fill a little urn. Trust to good verses then; And when all bodies meet In Lethe, to be drowned; Then only numbers sweet, With endless life are crowned. HERRICK. TO SIR HENRY VANE. VANE, young in years, but in sage counsel old, Than whom a better senator ne'er held The helm of Rome, when gowns, not arms, repelled The fierce Epirot, and the African bold, Whether to settle peace, or to unfold The drift of hollow states, hard to be spelled; Then to advise how War may, best upheld, Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold, In all her equipage: besides to know Both spiritual power and civil, what each means, What severs each, thou hast learned, which few have done: The bounds of either sword to thee we owe: Therefore on thy firm hand In peace, and reckons thee her MILTON. ON HIS BLINDNESS. WHEN I consider how my light is spent, Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide, Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide; "Doth God exact day-labor, light denied ?" I fondly ask: But Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies, "God doth not need Either man's work, or his own gifts; who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best: his state Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest; They also serve who only stand and wait." MILTON. SONNET. O, FOR my sake do you with Fortune chide, The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds That did not better for my life provide, Than public means, which public manners breeds. Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued To what it works in, like the dyer's hand: Pity me then, and wish I were renewed; Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drink Potions of eyesell, 'gainst my strong infection: No bitterness that I will bitter think, Nor double penance, to correct correction. Pity me then, dear friend, and I assure ye, Even that your pity is enough to Pleased Vaga echoes through her winding bounds, And rapid Severn hoarse applause resounds. Who hung with woods yon mountain's sultry brow? From the dry rock who bade the waters flow? Not to the skies in useless columns tost, Or in proud falls magnificently lost, But clear and artless, pouring through the plain Health to the sick, and solace to the swain. Whose causeway parts the vale with shady rows? Whose seats the weary traveller repose? Who taught that heaven-directed spire to rise? "The Man of Ross," each lisping babe replies. Behold the market-place with poor o'erspread! The Man of Ross divides the weekly bread: He feeds yon almshouse, neat, but void of state, Where age and wart sit smiling at the gate: Him portioned maids, apprenticed orphans blest, The young who labor, and the old who rest. Is any sick? The Man of Ross relieves, Prescribes, attends, the medicine makes and gives. Is there a variance? enter but his door, Balked are the courts, and contest is no more: Despairing quacks with curses fled the place, And vile attorneys, now a useless race. Thrice happy man! enabled to pur sue What all so wish but want the power to do! Oh say, what sums that generous hand supply? What mines to swell that boundless charity? Of debts and taxes, wife and children clear, This man possessed-five hundred pounds a year. |