|
|
[ p.iii ]
|
MY AFFECTIONATE AND TRUE FRIEND Mr. Henry Jones.
THE most unvaluable and dismayful hope of my most dear and heroical patron, Prince H
GEORGE CHAPMAN.
|
/ p.1 / (image of first page.)
OR
FUNERAL SONG:
On the most disastrous Death of the High=born Prince of Men,
HENRY PRINCE OF WALES, &c.
F ever adverse influence enviedThe glory of our lands, or took a pride To trample on our height ; or in the eye Struck all the pomp of principality, Now it hath done so ! Oh, if ever Heaven |
|
Made with the earth his angry reckoning even, Now it hath done so. Ever, ever be Admired, and fear'd, that Triple Majesty, Whose finger could so easily stick a fate 'Twixt least felicity, and greatest state ; Such, as should melt our shore into a sea, And dry our ocean with calamity. Heaven open'd, and but shew'd him to our eyes ; Then shut again, and shew'd our miseries. |
|
O God, to what end are our Graces given ? Only to shew the world men fit for heaven ; Then ravish them, as if too good for earth ? We know the most exempt in wealth, power, birth, Or any other blessing, should employ, As to their chief end, all things they enjoy, To make them fit for heaven ; and not pursue With hearty appetite the damned crew Of merely sensual and earthy pleasures. But when one hath done so, shall strait the treasures Digg'd to, in those deeps, be consumed by death ? Shall not the rest, that error swalloweth, Be, by the pattern of that masterpiece, Help'd to instruct their erring faculties ? When, without clear example, even the best, That cannot put by knowledge to the test What they are taught, serve like the worst in field ? Is power to force who will not freely yield, (Being great assistant to divine example,) As vain a pillar to thy manly temple ? When without perfect knowledge, which scarce one Of many kingdoms reach, no other stone Man hath to build one corner of thy Fane, Save one of these ? But when the desperate wane |
|
Of power, and of example to all good, So spent is, that one cannot turn the flood Of goodness 'gainst her ebb ; but both must ply, And be at full too ; or her stream will dry ; Where shall they meet again, now he is gone, Where both went foot by foot ; and both were one ? One that in hope took up to topless height All his great ancestors ; his one sail, freight With all, all Princes' treasures ; he, like one Of no importance, no way built upon, Vanish'd without the end, for which he had Such matchless virtues, and was Godlike made ? Have thy best works no better cause t' express Themselves like men, and thy true images ? To toil in Virtue's study ; to sustain With comfort for her want and shame and pain ; No nobler end in this life, than a death Timeless, wretched, wrought with less than breath ? And nothing solid, worthy of our souls ? Nothing that Reason more than sense extolls ! Nothing that may in perfect judgment be A fit foot for our crown eternity ? All which thou seem'st to tell us in this one Killing discomfort ; apt to make our moan |
|
Conclude 'gainst all things serious and good ; Ourselves not thy forms, but Chimera's brood. Now, Princes, dare ye boast your vig'rous states That Fortune's breath thus builds and ruinates ? Exalt your spirits ? trust in flow'ry youth ? Give reins to pleasure ? all your humours soothe ? Licence in rapine ? powers exempt from laws ? Contempt of all things but your own applause ? And think your swindge to any tyranny given, Will stretch as broad, and last as long as heaven ; When He, that curb'd with Virtue's hand his power, His youth with continence ; his sweet with sour ; Boldness with pious fear ; his palate's height Applied to health ; and not to appetite ; Felt timeless sickness' charge ; state, power to fly ; And glutted Death with all his cruelty ? Partial Devourer a ever of the best, With head long rapture, sparing long the rest, Could not the precious tears his Father shed, (That are with kingdoms to be ransomed ?) His bleeding prayer, b upon his knees t' implore, That if for any sin of his Heaven tore |
|
|
/ p.5 /
|
From his most royal body that chief limb, It might be ransom'd for the rest of Him ? Could not the sacred eyes thou didst profane In his great mother's tears ? The spiteful bane Thou pour'dst upon the cheeks of all the Graces In his more gracious sisters ? The defaces (With all the Furies' overflowing galls,) Cursedly fronting her near nuptials ? Could not, O could not the Almighty ruth Of all these force thee to forbear the youth Of our incomparable Prince of Men ? Whose age had made thy iron fork his pen, To eternize what it doth murder merely ; And shall have from my soul my curses yearly. Tyrant, what knew'st thou, but the barbarous wound Thou gav'st the Son, the Father might confound ? Both lived so mixtly, and were jointly One, Spirit to spirit cleft. The Humour bred In one heart strait was with the other fed ; The blood of one the other's heart did fire ; The heart and humour were the Son and Sire ; The heart yet void of humour's slender'st part, May easier live than humour without heart ; |
|
The river needs the helpful fountain ever, More than the fountain the supplied river. As th' iron then, c when it hath once put on The magnet's quality, to the virtuous stone Is ever drawn, and not the stone to it ; So may the heavens d the Son's fate not admit To draw the Father's, till a hundred years Have drown'd that issue to him in our tears. Blest e yet, and sacred shall thy memory be, O nothing-less-than-mortal Deity ! Thy Graces, like the Sun, to all men giving, Fatal to thee in Death, but kill me living. Now as inverted, like th' Antipodes, The world, (in all things of desert to please) Is fall'n on us with thee: thy ruins lie On our burst bosoms, as if from the sky The Day-star, greater than the world, were driven Sunk to the earth, and left a hole in heaven ; Through which a second deluge now pours down On our poor earth ; in which are overflown The seeds of all the sacred Virtues, set In his Spring-Court, where all the prime spirits met |
|
|
/ p.7 /
|
Of all our kingdoms, as if from the death That in man living, baseness and rapine sheath, Where they before lived, they unwares were come Into a free, and fresh Elysium.f Casting regenerate and refined eyes On him that raised them from their graves of vice, Digg'd in their old grounds, to spring fresh on those That his divine ideas did propose, First to himself ; and then would form in them Who did not thirst to plant his son near him, As near the Thames their houses ? What one worth Was there in all our world, that set not forth All his deserts, to pilgrim to his favours, With all devotion, offering all his labours ? And how the wild Boar, Barbarism, now Will root their quick-sets up ? What herb should grow, That is not sown in his inhuman tracts ? No thought of good shall spring, but many acts Will crop, or blast, or blow it up : and see How left to this, the mournful family, |
|
f Those that came to the Prince's service seemed (compared with the places they lived in before) to rise from death to the fields of life, intending the best part of young and noble gentlemen. |
/ p.8 /
|
Muffled in black clouds, full of tears are driven With storms about the relics of this heaven ; Retiring from the world, like corses, hearst Home to their graves, a hundred ways disperst. O that this Court-School,g this Olimpus merely, Where two-fold man was practised, should so early Dissolve the celebration, purposed there Of all Heroic parts, when far and near, All were resolved to admire, none to contend ; When in the place of all, one wretched end Will take up all endeavours, Harpy Gain, Pandar to goat-ambition ; golden chain h To true man's freedom ; not from Heaven let fall To draw men up ; but shot from Hell to haul All men, as bond-slaves, to his Turkish den, For toads and adders far more fit than men. His House had well his surname from a Saint, i All things so sacred did so lively paint Their pious figures in it ; and as well His other House k did in his name foretell |
| a The Prince's House, an Olimpus, where all contention of virtues were practised. | ||
| h Nou Homeri Aurea Restis. | i St. James his house. | k Richmond. |
/ p.9 /
|
What it should harbour ; a rich world of parts Bonfire-like kindling, the still-feasted arts, Which now on bridle's bite, and pufft contempt Spurs to despair, from all fit food exempt. O what a frame of good, in all hopes raised Came tumbling down with Him ! as when was seized By Grecian fury famous Ilion, Whose fall still rings out his confusion. What Triumphs scatter'd at his feet, lie smoking ! Banquets that will not down ; their cheerers choking ; Fields fought, and hidden now with future slaughter, Furies sit frowning, where late sat sweet Laughter ; The active lying maim'd, the healthful crazed, All round about his hearse ! And how amazed The change of things stands ! How astonish'd Joy Wonders he ever was ! Yet every toy Quits this grave loss : Rainbows no sooner taint Thin dewy vapours, which opposed beams paint Round in an instant, (at which children stare And slight the Sun, that makes them circular And so disparent) than mere gauds pierce men, Slighting the graves, like fools, and childëren. So courtly near plagues soothe and stupify ; And with such pain men leave self-flattery. |
|
Of which l to see him free (who stood no less Than a full siege of such) who can express His most direct infusion from above, Far from the humorous seed of mortal love? He knew that justice simply used was best ; m Made princes most secure, most loved, most blest ; No artisan, no scholar could pretend ; No statesman, no divine for his own end Any thing to him, but he would descend The depth of any right belong'd to it, Where they could merit, or himself should quit. He would not trust with what himself concern'd n Any in any kind ; but ever learn'd The grounds of what he built on : Nothing lies In man's fit course, that his own knowledge flies Either direct, or circumstantial. O what are Princes then, that never call Their actions to account ; but flatterers trust To make their trial, if unjust or just ? Flatterers o are household thieves ; traitors by law, That rob kings' honours, and their soul's blood draw ; |
|
l The Prince not to be wrought on by flattery. m His knowledge and wisdom. n Any man is capable of his own fit course and office in any thing. o Apostrophe. Men grow so ugly by trusting flattery with their informations, that when / p.11 / they see themselves truly, by casting their eyes inward, they cast themselves away with their own loathing. |
/ p.11 /
|
Diseases, that keep nourishment from their food. And as to know himself is man's chief good, So that, which intercepts that supreme skill, (Which Flattery is), is the supremest ill : Whose looks will breed the Basilisk in Kings' eyes, That by reflection of his sight dies. And p as a nurse lab'ring in wayward child, Day and night watching it, like an offspring wild, Talks infinitely idly to it still ; Sings with a standing throat to worse from ill ; Lord blesses it ; bears with his pukes and cries ; And to give it a long life's miseries, Sweetens his food ; rocks ; kisses ; sings again ; Plies it with rattles, and all objects vain : So flatterers, with as servile childish things, Observe and soothe the wayward moods of Kings ; So Kings, that flatterers love, had need to have As nurse-like counsellors and contemn the grove, Themselves as wayward and as noisome too ; Full as unblameable in all they do, |
|
|
/ p.12 /
|
As poor sick infants ever breeding teeth, In all their humours, that be worse than death. How wise then was our Prince, that hated these, And would with nought but truth his humour please : Nor would he give a place, but when he saw One that could use it, and become a law Both to his fortunes, and his Prince's honour, Who would give fortune nought she took upon her ; Nor give but to descent ; nor take a chance That might not justly his wish'd ends advance. His good he join'd with equity and truth ; Wisdom in years crown'd his ripe head in youth. His heart wore all the folds of policy : Yet went as naked as simplicity. Knew good and ill ; but only good did love ; In him the Serpent did embrace the Dove. He was not curious to sound all the stream Of others' acts ; yet kept his own from them : " He, whose most dark deeds dare not stand the light, Begot was of imposture and the night. Who surer than a man doth ends secure, Either a God is, or a Devil sure." The President of Men, whom (as Men can) All men should imitate, was God and Man. |
|
In these clear deeps our Prince fish'd troubled streams Of blood, and vantage challenge diadems. In sum, (knot-like) he was together put, That no man could dissolve ; and so was cut, But we shall see our foul-mouth'd Faction's spite (Mark'd, witch-like, with one black eye, th' other white) Ope and oppose against this spotless Sun ; Such heaven strike blinder than th' eclipsed moon, 'Twixt whom and nobless, or humanity's truth, As much dull earth lies, and as little ruth, (Should all things sacred perish) as there lies 'Twixt Phœbe, and the light-fount of the skies, In her most dark delinquence : vermin right, That prey in darkness, and abhor the light ; Live by the spoil of virtue ; are not well But when they hear news, from their father Hell, Of some black mischief ; never do good deed, But where it does much harm, or hath no need. What shall become of Virtue's far-short train, When thou their head art reach'd, high Prince of Men ? O that thy life could have dispersed Death's storms, To give fair act to those heroic forms, With which all good rules had enrich'd thy mind, Preparing for affairs of every kind ; |
|
Peace being but a pause to breathe fierce war ; No warrant dormant, to neglect his star ; The licence sense hath, is t' inform the soul ; Not to suppress her, and our lusts extoll ; This life in all things, to enjoy the next ; Of which laws thy youth both contain'd the text And the contents ; ah, that thy grey-ripe years Had made of all Cæsarian Commentares, (More than can now be thought) in fact t' enrol, And make black Faction blush away her soul. That as a Temple,q built when piety Did to divine ends offer specially, What men enjoy'd ; that wondrous state exprest, Strange act, strange cost ; yet who had interest In all the frame of it ; and saw those days, Admired but little ; and as little praise Gave to the goodly Fabric : but when men, That live whole ages after, view it, then They gaze and wonder ; and the longer time It stands, the more it glorifies his prime ; Grows fresh in honour ; and the age doth shame That in such monuments neglect such fame ; |
|
|
/ p.15 /
|
So had thy sacred frame been raised to height, Form, fulness, ornament ; the more the light Had given it view, the more had men admired ; And tho' men now are scarce to warmness fired With love of thee ; but rather cold and dead To all sense of the grace they forfeited In thy neglect and loss ; yet after ages Would be inflamed, and put on holy rages With thy inspiring Virtues ; cursing those Whose breaths dare blast thus, in the bud, the Rose. But thou, (woe's me!) art blown up before blown ; And as the ruins of some famous town Shew here a temple stood ; a palace here ; A citadel ; an amphitheatre ; Of which, alas, some broken arches still, (Pillars or columns rased ; which art did fill With all her riches and divinity,) Return their great and worthy memory : So of our Prince's state I nought rehearse, But shew his ruins bleeding in my verse. What poison'd Ast'rism may his death accuse ? Tell thy astonish'd prophet, deathless Muse ; And make my stars therein, the more adverse, The more advance with sacred rage my verse ; |
|
And so adorn my dearest fautor's hearse. That all the wits profane of these bold times May fear to spend their spawn of their rank rhymes On any touch of Him, that should be sung To ears divine, and ask an angel's tongue. With this it thunder'd ; and a lightning shew'd Where she sat writing in a sable cloud : A pen so hard and sharp express'd her plight, It bit through flint ; and did in diamond write : Her words she sung and laid out such a breast, As melted Heaven, and vex'd the very blest. In which she called all worlds to her complaints ; And how her loss grew, thus with tears she paints: r " Hear earth and heaven, (and you that have no ears) s Hell, and the hearts of tyrants, hear my tears ! Thus Britain Henry took his timeless end ; When his great Father did so far transcend All other kings ; and that he had a Son In all his Father's gifts so far begun, As added to Fame's pinions double wings ; And, as brave rivers broken from their springs, The further off grow greater, and disdain To spread a narrower current than the main, |
|
|
/ p.17 /
|
Had drawn in all deserts such ample spheres, As hope yet never turn'd about his years. All other Princes, with his parts comparing, Like all Heaven's petty luminaries faring, To radiant Lucifer, the Day's first-born, It hurl'd a fire red as a threatning morn. On fiery Rhamnusia's t sere and sulphurous spite, Who turn'd the stern orbs of her ghastly sight About each corner of her vast command, And in the turning of her bloody hand Sought how to ruin endlessly our hope, And set to all Mishap all entries ope. And see, how ready means to mischief are ! She saw, fast by, the blood-affecting FEVER, u (E'en when th' autumnal star began t' expire) Gathering in vapours thin etherial fire : Of which her venom'd finger did impart To our brave Prince's fount of heat, the heart, A preternatural heat ; which thro' the veins And arteries, by the blood and spirits' means |
|
t Rhamnusia, Goddess of Revenge, and taken for Fortune, in envy of our Prince excited Fever against him. u The Fever the Prince died of, by Prosopopeia, described by her effects and circumstances. |
/ p.18 /
|
Diffused about the body and enflamed, Begat a Fever to be never named : And now this loather of the lovely light, Begot of Erebus, and ugly Night ; Mounted in haste her new and noiseful car, Whose wheels had beam-spokes from th' Hungarian v star ; And all the other frame and freight from thence Derived their rude and ruthless influence. Up to her left side leap'd infernal Death, His head hid in a cloud of sensual breath ; By her sat furious Anguish ; pale Despite ; Murmur, and Sorrow, and possest Affright ; Yellow Corruption ; marrow-eating Care ; Languor ; chill Trembling ; Fits irregular ; Inconstant Colour ; feeble-voiced Complaint ; Relentless Rigour ; and Confusion faint ; Frantic Distemper ; and hair-eyed Unrest ;w And short-breathed Thirst, with th' ever-burning breast. A wreath of adders bound her trenched brows ; Where Torment ambush'd lay with all her throes. |
|
v The Fever the Prince died of is observed by our modern Physicians to be begun in Hungary. |
/ p.19 /
|
Marmarian Lions,x fringed with flaming manes, Drew this grim Fury, and her brood of Banes ; Their hearts of glowing coals murmur'd and roar'd, To bear her crook'd yokes, and her Banes abhorr'd, To their dear Prince, that bore them in his arms, And should not suffer, for his good, their harms. Then from Hell's burning whirl-pit up she haul'd The horrid Monster, fierce Echidna call'd ; That from her Stygian jaws doth vomit ever Quitture, and venom ; yet is empty never. Then burn'd her blood-shot eyes ; her temples yet Were cold as ice ; her neck all drown'd in sweat ; Paleness spread all her breast ; her life's heat stung ; The Mind's Interpreter ; her scorched tongue, Flow'd with blue poison : from her yawning mouth Rheums fell like spouts fill'd from the stormy south : Which being corrupt the hue of saffron took ; A fervent vapour all her body shook : From whence her vexed spirits, a noisome smell Expired in fumes that look'd as black as Hell. |
|
x Marmaricæ Leones, of Marmarica, a region of Africa, where the fiercest lions are bred ; with which Fever is supposed to be drawn, for their excess of heat and violence, part of the effects of this fever. The properties of the Fever in these effects. |
/ p.20 /
|
A ceaseless torrent did her nostrils steep ; Her wither'd entrails took no rest ; no sleep : Her swoln throat rattled, warm'd with life's last spark ; And in her salt jaws painful Coughs did bark : Her teeth were stain'd with rust ; her sluttish hand She held out reeking, like a new-quench'd brand : Arm'd with crook'd talons, like the horned Moon, All Cheer, all Ease, all Hope with her was gone : In her left hand a quenchless fire did glow ; And in her right palm freezed Sithonian snow. The ancient Romans did a Temple build To her, as whom a Deity they held : So hid, and far from cure of man she flies, In whose life's power she mates the Deities. When fell Rhamnusiay saw this Monster near, Her steel-heart sharpening, thus she spake to her : " See'st thou this Prince, great Maid and seed of Night, Whose brows cast beams about them, like the light ; Who joys securely in all present state, Nor dreams what Fortune is, or future Fate : At whom with fingers and with fixed eyes All kingdoms point, and look and sacrifice. |
|
|
/ p.21 /
|
Could be content to give him : Temples raise To his expectance, and unbounded praise : His now ripe spirits and valour doth despise Sickness and sword, that give our Godheads price : His worth contracts the worlds in his sole hope ; Religion, Virtue, Conquest have no scope, But his endowments ! At him, at him fly ! More swift and timeless, more the Deity ! His summer, winter with the jellied flakes ; His pure life poison ; sting out with thy snakes : This is a work will fame thy maidenhead !" With this her speech and she together fled ; Nor durst z she more endure her dreadful eyes ; Who stung with goads her roaring lions' thighs. And brandish'd round about her snake-curl'd head, With her left hand the torch it managed. And now Heaven's Smitha kindled his forge ; and blew ; And through the round pole thick the sparkles flew ; When great Prince Henry, the delight of Fame, Darken'd the palace of his Father's name ; |
|
|
/ p.22 /
|
And hid his white limbs in his downy bed ; Then Heaven wept falling stars, that summoned With soft and silent motion Sleep to breathe On his bright temples th' ominous form of death ; Which now the cruel Goddess did permit, That she might enter so her maiden fit. When the good Angel,b his kind Guardian, Her wither'd foot saw near this spring of man ; He shriek'd, and said ; " What are thy rude ends ? Cannot in him alone all Virtue's friends, (Melted into his all-upholding nerves ; For whose assistance every Deity serves ;) Move thee to prove thy Godhead, blessing him With long long life, whose light extinct will dim All heavenly graces ?" All this moved her nought ; But on ; and in his, all our ruins wrought. She touch'd the thresholds ; and the thresholds shook ; The door-posts Paleness pierced with her faint look : The doors brake open ; and the fatal bed Rudely she approach'd ; and thus her fell mouth said : " Henry,c why takest thou thus thy rest secure ; Nought doubting what Fortunes and Fates assure ? |
|
|
/ p.23 /
|
Thou never yet felt'st my red right hand's maims ; That I to thee, and Fate to me proclaims : Thy fate stands idle ; spins no more thy thread ; Die thou must, great Prince ! sigh not : bear thy head In all things free, even with necessity : If sweet it be to live ; 'tis sweet to die !" This said, she shook at him her torch, and cast A fire in him, that all his breast embraced ; Then darting through his heart a deadly cold ; And as much venom, as his veins could hold ; Death, Death, O Death, inserting, thrusting in, Shut his fair eyes ; and ope'd our ugly sin. This seen, resolved on by herself and Fate, Was there a sight so pale and desperate Ever before seen in a thrust-through State ? The poor Virginian,d miserable sail, A long-long-night-turn'd-day, that lived in Hell, Never so pourtray'd, where the billows strove (Black'd like so many devils) which should prove |
|
d Description of the tempest that cast Sir Thomas Gates on the Bermudas ; and the state of his ships and men to this kingdom's plight applied in the Prince's death. |
/ p.24 /
|
The damned Victor ; all their furies heightening ; Their drum the thunder ; and their colours lightning ; Both soldiers in the battle ; one contending To drown the waves in noise ; the other spending His hell-hot sulphurous flames to drink them dry : When heaven was lost ; when not a tear-wreck'd eye Could tell in all that dead time if they were Sinking or sailing ; till a quickening clear Gave light to save them by the ruth of rocks At the Bermudas ; when the tearing shocks And all the miseries before, more felt Than here half told ; all, all this did not melt Those desperate few, still dying, more in tears, Than this death all men to the marrow wears. All that are men ; the rest, those drudging beasts, That only bear of men the coats and crests ; And for their slave, sick, that can earn them pence, More mourn, O monsters, than for such a Prince ; Whose souls do ebb and flow still with their gain ; Whom nothing moves but pelf, and their own pain ! Let such, great Heaven, be only born to bear All that can follow this meer massacre. Lost is our poor Prince ; all his sad endurers ; The busy art of those that should be curers ; |
|
The sacred vows made by the zealous King, His godlike Sire ; his often visiting ; Nor thy grave prayers and presence, Holy Man,e This realm' thrice-reverend Metropolitan, That was the worthy Father to his soul ; The' insulting Fever could one fit controul. Nor let me here forget one far and near ; And in his life's love passing deep and dear, That doth his sacred memory adore, Virtue's true fautor, his grave Chancellor,f Whose worth in all works should a place enjoy, Where his fit fame her trumpet shall employ ; Whose cares and prayers were ever used to ease His fev'rous war, and send him healthful peace ; Yet sick our Prince is still ; who though the steps Of bitter Death he saw bring in by heaps Clouds to his lustre, and poor rest of light ; And felt his last day suffering lasting night ; His true-bred brave soul shrunk yet at no part ; Down kept he all sighs with his powers all-heart ; |
|
|
/ p.26 /
|
Clear'd even his dying brows : and in an eye Manly dissembling, hid his misery. And all to spare the Royal heart so spent In his sad Father, fearful of th' event.g And now did Phœbush with his twelfth lamp shew The world his hapless light ; and in his brow A torch of pitch stuck, lighting half t' half skies, When Life's last error press'd the broken eyes Of this heart-breaking Prince ; his forced look fled ; Fled was all colour from his cheeks ; yet fed His spirit his sight : with dying now, he cast On his kind King, and Father : on whom fast He fix'd his fading beams : and with his view A little did their empty orbs renew : His Mind i saw him come from the deeps of Death, To whom he said, O Author of my Breath ; Soul to my life, and essence to my soul, Why grieve you so, that should all grief controul ? Death's sweet to me, that you are still life's creature : I now have finish'd the great work of Nature. |
|
g The Prince heroical his bearing his sickness at the King's coming to see him, careful not to discomfort him. h The twelfth day after his beginning to be sick, his sickness was held incurable. |
/ p.27 /
|
I see you pay a perfect Father's debt ; And in a feastful peace your empire kept : If your true son's last words have any right In your most righteous bosom, do not fright Your hearkening Kingdoms to your carriage new ; All yours in me I here resign to you, My youth, I pray to God with my last powers, Substract from me may add to you and yours ! Thus vanish'd He, thus swift, thus instantly ; Ah now, I see, e'en heavenly Powers must die. Now shift the King and Queen k from Court to Court ; But no way can shift off their Cares' resort ; That which we hate, the more we fly pursues ; That which we love, the more we seek, eschues. Now weeps his princely Brother ; now, alas, His Cynthian Sister, our sole earthly Grace, Like Hebes fount still overflows her bounds ; And in her cold lips stick astonish'd sounds : Sh' oppresseth her sweet kind ; in her soft breast Care can no vent find, it is so comprest. |
|
k The sorrows and bemoans of the King, Queen, Prince, and his most Princely Sister, for the Prince's death. |
/ p.28 /
|
And see l how the Promethean liver grows, As Vulture Grief devours it : see fresh shows Revive woe's sense, and multiply her soul ; And worthily ; for who would tears controul On such a springing ground ? 'Tis dearly fit To pay all tribute thought can pour on it. For why were Funerals first used but for these, Presaged and cast in their nativities ? The streams were check'd awhile : so torrents staid Enrage the more ; but are, left free, allay'd. Now our grim waves march altogether ; now Our black seas run so high, they overflow The clouds they nourish ; now the gloomy hearse Puts out the sun. Revive, revive, dead Verse ; Death hath slain Death ; there there the person lies, Whose death should buy out all mortalities. But let the world be now a heap of Death ; Life's joy lies dead in him ; and challengeth No less a reason : if all motion stood Benumb'd and stupified with his frozen blood ; And like a tombstone, fix'd, lay all the seas ; There were fit pillars for our Hercules. |
|
|
/ p.29 /
|
To brand the world with : Men had better die Than outlive free times, slaves to policy. On, on, sad Train, as from a crannied rock Bee-swarms, robb'd of their honey ceaseless flock. Mourn, mourn : dissected now his cold limbs lie ; Ah, knit so late with flame, and majesty ! Where's now his gracious smile ? his sparkling eye ? His judgment, valour, magnanimity ? O God, what doth not one short hour snap up Of all men's gloss ? Still overflows the cup Of his burst cares ; put with no nerves together ; And lighter than the shadow of a feather. On : make earth pomp as frequent as ye can ; 'Twill still leave black the fairest flower of Man. Ye well may lay all cost on misery ; 'Tis all can boast the proud'st Humanity ! If young Marcellus had to grace his fall Six hundred hearses at his funeral, Sylla six thousand ; let Prince Henry have Six millions bring him to his greedy grave. And now the States of Earth thus mourn below ; Behold in Heaven Love with his broken bow ; His quiver downwards turn'd ; his brands put out, Hanging his wings ; with sighs all black about. |
|
Nor less our loss his Mother's heart infests ; Her melting palms beating her snowy breasts ; As much confused, as when the Calidon Boar The thigh of her divine Adonis tore : Her vowes all vain ; resolved to bless his years With issue royal, and exempt from fears ; Who now died fruitless ; and prevented then The blest of women, of the best of men. Mourn, all ye Arts ; ye are not of the earth ; Fall, fall with him ; rise with his second birth : Lastly with gifts enrich the sable Fane ; And odorous lights eternally maintain ! Sing, Priests, O sing now his eternal rest ; His light eternal ; and his soul's free breast, As joys eternal ; so of those the best ; And this short Verse be on his tomb imprest. |
/ p.31 / (image of page 31.)
|
So flits, alas, an everlasting river, As our loss in him, past, will last for ever. The golden age, star-like, shot through our sky, Arm'd at his pomp renew'd ; and stuck in's eye. And (like the sacred knot, together put) Since no man could dissolve him, he was cut. |
|
Whom all the vast frame of the fixed earth Shrunk under ; now a weak hearse stands beneath ; His fate he past in fact ; in hope his birth; His youth in good life ; and in spirit his death. |
|
Blest be his great begetter ; blest the womb That gave him birth, though much too near his tomb. |
|
In them was he, and they in him were blest : What their most great powers gave him, was his least. His person graced the earth ; and of the skies His blessed spirit the praise is, and the prize. |
[ p.33 ]
|
I
|
FINIS.
Printed by John Warwick, At the private Press of LEE PRIORY, Kent. |
|
