IF euer aduerse Influence enui'd
The glory of our Lands, or tooke a pride
To trample on our height; or in the Eye
Strooke all the pomp of Principalitie,
Now it hath done so; Oh, if euer Heauen
Made with the earth his angry reckening euen,
Now it hath done so. Euer, euer be
Admir'd, and fear'd, that Triple Maiestie
VVhose finger could so easily sticke a Fate,
Twixt least Felicity, and greatest state;
[Page]Such, as should melt our shore into a Sea,
And dry our Ocean with Calamitie.
Heauen open'd, and but show'd him to our eies,
Then shut againe, and show'd our Miseries.
Expostulatio à perturbatione.
O God, to what end are thy Graces giuen?
Onely to show the world, Men fit for Heauen,
Then rauish them, as if too good for Earth?
VVe know, the most exempt in wealth, power, Birth,
Or any other blessing; should employ
(As to their chiefe end) all things they enioy,
To make them fit for Heauen; and not pursue
VVith hearty appetite, the damned crue
Of meerely sensuall and earthye pleasures?
But whē one hath done so; shal strait the tresures
Digg'd to, in those deeps, be consum'd by death?
Shall not the rest, that error swalloweth,
Be, by the Patterne of that Master-peece,
Help't to instruct their erring faculties?
VVhen, without cleare example; euen the best
(That cannot put by knowledge to the Test
what they are taught) serue like the worst in field?
Is power to force, who will not freely yield,
(Being great assistant, to diuine example)
As vaine a Pillar to thy Manly Temple?
[Page]when (without perfect knowledge, which scarce one
Of many kingdoms reach) no other stone
Man hath to build one corner of thy Phane,
Saue one of these? But when the desperate wane
Of power,
Potentia expers sapientiae quo maior est, eo perniciosior: sapientia procul à potentia manca videtur. Plat.
and of example to all good,
So spent is, that one cannot turne the flood,
Of goodnes, gainst her ebbe; but both must plie,
And be at full to; or her streame will drie;
VVhere shall they meete againe, now he is gone
Where both went foot by foot; & both were one?
One that in hope, tooke vp to toplesse height
All his great Ancestors; his one saile, freight
VVith all, all Princes treasures; he like one
Of no importance; no way built vpon,
Vanisht vvithout the end, for vvhich he had
Such matchlesse vertues, & was God-l [...]ke made?
Haue thy best vvorkes no better cause t'expresse
Themselues like men, and thy true Images?
To toile in vertues study, to sustaine
(vvith comfort for her) want, & shame, & paine;
No nobler end in this life, then a death
Timeles, and wretched, wrought with lesse then breath?
And nothing solide, worthy of our soules?
Nothing that Reason, more then Sense extols!
[Page]Nothing that may in perfect iudgement be
A fit foote for our Crowne eternitie?
All which, thou seem'st to tell vs, in this one
Killing discomfort; apt to make our mone
Conclude gainst all things, serious and good;
Chymaera, a monster, hauing his head and brest like a Lyon; his belly like a Gote; and taile like a Dragon.
our selues, not thy forms, but Chymaeras brood.
Now Princes, dare ye boast your vig'rous states
That Fortunes breath thus builds and ruinates?
Exalt your spirits? trust in flowry youth?
Giue reynes to pleasure? all your humors sooth?
Licence in rapine? Powers exempt from lawes?
Contempt of all things, but your own applause?
And think your swindge to any tyranny giuen,
VVill stretch as broad, & last as long as heauen;
whē he that curb'd with vertues hand his powre
his youth with continence; his sweet with sowre
Boldnes with pious feare; his pallats height
Applied to health, and not to appetite;
Felt timeles sicknes charge; state, power to flie,
And glutted Death with all his crueltie.
To Death.
Partiall deuourer euer of the best,
VVith headlong rapture, sparing long the rest
Could not the precious teares his Father shed,
(That are with Kingdomes to be ransomed?)
[Page]His Bleeding prayer,
The Prayer of the King in the Princes sicknes.
vpon his knees t'implore,
That if for any sinne of his, Heauen tore
From his most Royall body that chiefe Limme,
It might be ransom'd, for the rest of Him?
Could not the sacred eies thou didst prophane
In his great Mothers teares? The spightful bane
Thou pour'dst vpon the cheeks of al the Graces
In his more gracious Sisters? The defaces
(with all the Furies ouer-flowing Galles)
Cursedly fronting her neere Nuptials?
Could not, O could not, the Almighty ruth
Of all these force thee to forbeare the youth
Of our Incomparable Prince of Men?
whose Age had made thy Iron Forcke his Pen,
T'eternise what it now doth murder meerely;
And shal haue from my soule, my curses yerely.
Tyrant, what knew'st thou, but the barbarous wound
Thou gau'st the son, the Father might cōfound?
Both liu'd so mixtly, and were ioyntly One,
Spirit to spirit cleft. The Humor bred
In one heart, straight was with the other fed;
The bloud of one, the others heart did fire;
The heart and humour, were the Sonne & Sire;
[Page]The heart yet, void of humors slender'st part,
May easier liue, then humour without heart;
The Riuer needes the helpfull fountaine euer,
More then the Fountaine, the supplyed Riuer.
Simil.
As th'Iron then, when it hath once put on
The Magnets qualitie, to the vertuous Stone
Is euer drawne, and not the stone to it:
Apodesis.
So may the heauens, the sonnes Fate, not admit
To draw the Fathers, till a hundred yeeres
Haue drown'd that Issue to him in our teares.
Reditio ad Principem.
Blest yet, and sacred shall thy memory be,
O-nothing-lesse-then-mortall Deitie.
Thy Graces, like the Sunne, to all men giuing;
Fatall to thee in death, but kill me liuing.
Now, as inuerted, like th'Antipodes,
The world (in all things of desert to please)
Is falne on vs, with thee: thy ruines lye
On our burst bosomes, as if from the skye
The Day-star, greater then the world were driuen
Suncke to the Earth, and left a hole in Heauen;
throgh which, a secōd deluge now poures down
On our poore Earth; in which are ouer-flowne
The seeds of all the sacred Vertues, set
In his Spring-Court; where all the prime spirits met
[Page]Of all our Kingdomes;
Those that came to the Princes seruice seem'd (compared with the places they liu'd in before) to rise from death to the fields of life, intending the best part of yong and noble Gentlemen.
as if from the death,
That in men liuing; basenes and rapine sheath,
VVhere they before liu'd, they vnwares were come
Into a free, and fresh Elisium;
Casting regenerate, and refined eyes
On him that rais'd them from their graues of vice,
Digg'd in their old grounds, to spring fresh on those
That his diuine Ideas did propose,
First to himselfe; & then would forme in them.
VVho did not thirst to plant his sonne neer him
as neer the Thames their houses? what one worth
VVas there in all our world, that set not forth
All his deserts, to Pilgrime to his fauors,
VVith all deuotion, offering all his labors?
And how the wilde Bore, Barbarisme, now
will roote these Quick-sets vp? what hearb shall grow,
that is not sown in his inhumane tracts?
No thought of good shall spring, but many acts
Will crop, or blast, or blow it vp: and see
How left to this,
The parting of the Princes Seruants.
the mournfull Familie,
Muffled in black clouds, full of teares are driuen
With stormes about the relickes of this Heauen;
Retiring from the world, like Corses, herst
Home to their graues, a hundred waies disperst.
[Page] The Princes house an Olimpus, where all contention of vertues were practised.
O that this court-schoole; this
Olimpus meerly,
VVhere two-fold Man was practisde; should so early
Dissolue the celebration purpos'd there,
Of all Heroique parts, when farre and neere,
All were resolu'd t'admire, None to contend,
VVhen, in the place of all, one wretched end
VVill take vp all endeauours; Harpye Gaine,
Non Homeri Aurea Restis
Pandare to Gote, Ambition; goulden Chaine
To true mans freedome; not from heau'n let fal
To draw men vp; But shot from Hell to hale
All men, as bondslaues, to his Turckish den,
For Toades, and Adders, far more fit then men.
Saint Iames his house.
His house had well his surname from a
Saint,All things so sacred, did so liuely paint
Their pious figures in it: And as well
Richmond.
His other house, did in his Name fore-tell
what it should harbour; a rich world of parts
Bonfire-like kindling, the still-feasted Arts,
which now on bridles bite, and puft Contempt
Spurres to Despaire, from all fit foode exempt.
O what a frame of Good, in all hopes rais'd
Came tumbling downe with him! as when was seisde
By Grecian furie, famous Ilion,
VVhose fall, still rings out his Confusion.
[Page]VVhat
Triumphs, scatterd at his feete, lye smoking!
Banquets that will not downe; their cherers choking,
Fields fought, and hidden now, with future slaughter,
Furies sit frowning, where late sat sweet laughter,
The actiue lying maim'd, the healthfull crasde?
All round about his Herse? And how amaz'd
The change of things stands! how astonisht ioy
VVonders he euer was? yet euery Toy
Quits this graue losse: Rainbowes no sooner taint
Thinne dewye vapors, which oppos'd beames paint
Round in an instant, (at which children stare
And slight the Sunne, that makes them circular
And so disparent) then mere gawds peirce men,
Slighting the graue, like fooles, and children.
So courtly nere plagues, sooth and stupefie
And vvith such paine, men leaue selfe flatterie.
Of vvhich,
The Prince not to be wrought on by flattery.
to see him free (who stood no lesse
Then a full siege of such) who can expresse
His most direct infusion from aboue,
Farre from the humorous seede of mortal loue?
He knew,
His knowledge and wisdome.
that Iustice simply vsd, vvas best,
Made princes most secure, most lou'd, most blest
No Artezan; No Scholler; could pretend,
No Statesman; No Diuine; for his owne end
[Page]Any thing to him, but he vvould descend
The depth of any right belong'd to it,
Where they could merit, or himselfe should quit.
He would not trust, with what himselfe concern'd,
Any in any kinde; but euer learn'd
Any man is capable of his own fit course and office in any thing.
The grounds of what he built on: Nothing lies
In mans fit course, that his own knowledge flies
Eyther direct, or circumstantiall.
O what are Princes then, that neuer call
Their actions to account, but flatterers trust
To make their triall, if vniust or iust?
Apostrophe. Men grow so vgly by trusting flattery with their informations, that when they see themselues truely, by casting their eyes inward, they cast themselues away with their owne lothing.
Flatterers are houshold theeues, traitors by law,
that rob kings honors, & their soules-bloud draw;
Diseases, that keep nourishment from their food.
And as to know himselfe, is mans chiefe good,
So that vvhich intercepts that supreame skill,
(which Flattery is) is the supreamest ill:
VVhose lookes will breede the Basilisk in kings eyes,
That by reflexion of his sight, dyes.
Simil.
And as a Nurse lab'ring a vvayward Childe,
Day, and night watching it, like an offspring wilde;
Talkes infinitely idly to it still;
Sings with a standing throate, to worse from ill;
[Page]Lord-blesses it; beares with his pewks and cryes;
And to giue it a long lifes miseries,
Sweetens his food, rocks, kisses, sings againe;
Plyes it with rattles, and all obiects vaine:
So Flatterers, with as seruile childish things,
Obserue, & sooth the waiward moods of kings;
So kings, that flatterers loue, had neede to haue
as nurse-like councellors, & contemn the graue;
Themselues as wayward, and as noisome too;
Full as vntuneable in all they doe,
As poore sicke Infants; euer breeding Teeth
In all their humours, that be worse then Death.
How wise then was our Prince that hated these,
and wold with nought but truth his humor plese
Nor would hee giue a place, but where hee saw
One that could vse it; and become a Law
Both to his fortunes, and his Princes Honor.
Who wold giue fortune noght she took vpon her,
Not giue but to desert; nor take a chance,
That might not iustly, his vvisht ends aduance.
His Good he ioyn'd with Equitie and Truth;
VVisedome in yeeres, crown'd his ripe head in youth;
His heart wore all the folds of Policie,
Yet went as naked as Simplicitie.
[Page]Knew good and ill; but onely good did loue;
In him the Serpent did embrace the Doue.
Hee was not curious to sound all the streame
Of others acts, yet kept his owne from them:
" He whose most darke deeds dare not stand the light,
" Begot was of imposture and the night.
" VVho surer then a Man, doth ends secure;
" Eyther a God is, or a Diuell sure.
The President of men; whom (as men can)
All men should imitate, was God and Man.
In these cleere deepes our Prince fish't troubl'd streams
of bloud & vantage challenge diadems.
In summe, (knot-like) hee was together put,
That no man could dissolue, and so was cut.
But we shal see our foule-mouth'd factions spite
(Markt, witch-like, with one blacke eie, th'other white)
Ope, & oppose against this spotlesse sun;
Such heauen strike blinder thē th'eclipsed moon
Twixt whom and noblesse, or humanities truth,
As much dull earth lies, and as little ruth,
(Should all things sacred perish) as there lyes
Twixt Phaebe, and the Light-fount of the skies,
In her most darke delinquence: vermine right,
That prey in darknesse, and abhorre the light;
[Page]Liue by the spoile of vertue; are not well
But when they heare newes, frō their father hell
Of some blacke mischiefe; neuer do good deed,
But where it does much harme, or hath no need.
What shall become of vertues far-short traine,
when thou their head art reacht, high Prince of men?
O that thy life could haue disperst deaths stormes,
To giue faire act to those Heroique formes,
with which al good rules had enricht thy mind,
Preparing for affayres of euery kinde;
Peace being but a pause to breathe fierce warre;
No warrant dormant, to neglect his Starre;
The licence sense hath, is t'informe the soule;
Not to suppresse her, and our lusts extoll;
This life in all things, to enioy the next;
Of which lawes, thy youth, both contain'd the text
And the contents; ah, that thy grey-ripe yeeres
Had made of all, Caesarean Commentares,
(More then can now be thoght) in fact t'enroule;
And make blacke Faction blush away her soule.
That,
Simil.
as a Temple, built when Pietie
Did to diuine ends offer specially,
What men enioy'd; that wondrous state exprest,
Strange Art, strange cost; yet who had interest
[Page]In all the frame of it; and saw those dayes,
Admir'd but little; and as little praise
Gaue to the goodly Fabricke: but when men,
That liue whole Ages after, view it, then,
They gaze, and wonder; and the longer time
It stands, the more it glorifies his prime;
Growes fresh in honor, and the age doth shame
That in such Monuments neglect such fame;
So had thy sacred Frame beene rais'd to height,
Forme, fulnesse, ornament: the more the light
Had giuen it view, the more had Men admir'd;
And tho men now are scarce to warmnesse fir'd
VVith loue of thee; but rather colde and dead
To all sense of the grace they forfeited
In thy neglect, and losse; yet after-ages
VVould be inflam'd, and put on holy rages
with thy inspiring vertues; cursing those
VVhose breaths dare blast thus, in the bud, the Rose.
But thou (woe's me) art blown vp before blowne,
And as the ruines of some famous Towne,
Show here a Temple stood; a Pallace, here;
A Cytadell, an Amphitheater;
Of which (ahlas) some broken Arches, still
(Pillars, or Columns rac't; which Art did fill
[Page]VVith all her riches and Diuinitie)
Retaine their great, and vvorthy memory:
So of our Princes state, I nought rehearse
But show his ruines, bleeding in my verse.
What poison'd Ast'risme, may his death accuse?
Tell thy astonisht Prophet (deathles Muse)
And make my starres therein, the more aduerse,
The more aduance, vvith sacred rage my Verse,
And so adorne my dearest Fautors Herse.
That all the wits prophane, of these bold times
May feare to spend the spawne of their rancke rymes
On any touch of him, that shold be sung
To eares diuine, and aske an Angels tongue.
VVith this it thundred; and a lightning show'd
VVhere she sate writing in a sable cloud;
A Penne so hard and sharpe exprest her plight,
It bit through Flint; and did in Diamant write;
Her vvords, she sung, and laid out such a brest,
As melted Heauen, and vext the very blest.
In which she cal'd all worlds to her complaints,
And how our losse grew,
Musae lachrimae.
thus vvith teares shee paints:
Hear earth & heauen (& you that haue no eares)
The cause and manner of the Princes death.
Hell, and the hearts of tyrants, heare my teares:
[Page]Thus Brittaine
Henry tooke his timelesse end;
VVhen his great Father did so far transcend
All other Kings; and that he had a Sonne
In all his Fathers gifts, so farre begunne,
As added to Fames Pynions, double wings;
And (as braue riuers, broken from their springs,
The further off, grow greater, and disdame
To spread a narrower current then the Maine)
Had drawne in all deserts such ample Spheares,
As Hope yet neuer turn'd about his yeeres.
All other Princes with his parts comparing;
Like all Heauens pettie Luminaries faring,
To radiant Lucifer, the dayes first borne)
Rhamnusia (Goddesse of reuenge, and taken for Fortune) in enuy of our Prince, excited Feuer against him.
It hurld a fire red as a threatning Morne
On fiery Rhamnusias sere, and sulphurous spight,
who turn'd the sterne orbs of her ghastly sight,
About each corner of her vaste Command,
And (in the turning of her bloudy hand)
Sought how to ruine endlesly our Hope,
The Feuer the Prince died on (by Prosopopeia) described by her effects & circumstances.
And set to all mishap all entries ope.
And see how ready meanes to mischiefe are;
She saw, fast by, the bloud-affecting Feuer,
(Euen when th'Autumnal-starre began t'expire)
Gathering in vapours thinne, Ethereall fire:
[Page]Of which, her venomde finger did jmpart
To our braue Princes fount of heat, the heart;
A praeternaturall heat; which through the vaines
And Arteries, by'th blood and spirits meanes
Diffus'd about the body, and jnflam'd,
Begat a Feuor to be neuer nam'd.
And now this loather of the louely Light,
(Begot of Erebus, and vglie Night)
Mounted in hast, her new, and noysefull Carre,
Whose wheeles had beam-spokes frō th'Hungarian star;
And all the other frame,
The Fever the Prince dyed off, is observ'd by our Moderne Phisitions to bee begun in Hungarie.
and freight; from thence
Deriu'd their rude and ruthlesse jnfluence.
Vp to her left side, lept jnfernall Death
His head hid in a cloud of sensuall breath;
By her sat furious Anguish, Pale Despight;
Murmure, and Sorrow, and possest Affright;
Yellow Corruption, Marow-eating Care;
Languor, chill Trembling, fits Irregulare;
Inconstant Collor, feeble voyc't Complaint;
Relentles Rigor, and Confusion faint;
Frantick Distemper;
Out of the property of the Hare that never shuts her eyes sleeping.
&
Hare-eyd vnrest;
And short-breath'd Thirst, with th'euer-burning breast
A wreath of Adders bound her trenched Browes;
Where Tormēt Ambusht lay with all her throws
[Page] Marmaricae Leunes, of Marmarica a Region in Affrica where the fiercest Lyons are bred; with which Feuer is supposd to bee drawn, for their excesse of heat & violence, part of the effects of this Feuer. The properties of the Feuer in these effects.
Marmarian Lyons, frindg'd with slaming
Manes, Drew this grym furie, and her brood of Banes,
Their hearts of glowing Coles, murmurd, & ror'd,
To beare her crook't yokes, and her Banes abhord,
To their deare Prince, that bore them in his Armes,
And should not suffer, for his Good, their Harmes;
Then from Hels burning whirlepit vp she hallde,
The horrid Monster fierce Echidna calde;
That from her Stigian Iawes, doth vomit ever,
Quitture, and Venome, yet is empty neuer:
Then burnt her bloudshot eyes, her Temples yet
Were cold as Ice, her Necke all drownd in swet:
Palenes spred all her breast, her lifes heat stung:
The Minds Interpreter, her scorched tongue,
Flow'd with blew poison: frō her yawning Mouth
Rhumes fell like spouts fild frō the stormy South:
Which being corrupt, the hewe of Saffron tooke,
A feruent Vapor, all her body shooke:
From whence, her Vexed Spirits, a noysome smell,
Expyr'd in fumes that lookt as blacke as Hell.
A ceaseles Torrent did her Nosthrils steepe,
Her witherd Entrailes tooke no rest, No sleepe:
Her swoln throte ratl'd, warmd with lifes last spark
And in her salt jawes, painfull Coughs did barke:
[Page]Her teeth were staind with Rust, her sluttish hand
Shee held out reeking like a New-quencht Brand:
Arm'd with crook'd Tallons like the horned Moone,
All Cheere, all Ease, all Hope with her was gone:
In her left hand a quenchles fire did glow,
And in her Right Palme freez'd Sithonian Snow:
The ancient Romanes did a Temple build
To her, as whome a Deitie they held:
So hyd, and farre from cure of Man shee flyes,
In whose Lifes Power she mates the Deities.
When fell Rhamnusia saw this Monster nere,
(Here steele
Heart sharpning) thus she spake to her:
Rhamnusi [...] excitatiō of feuer
Seest thou this Prince (great Maid & seed of Night)
Whose brows cast beams about thē, like the Light:
Who joyes securely in all present State,
Nor dreams what Fortune is, or future Fate:
At whome, with fingers, and with fixed eyes
All Kingdomes Point, and Looke, and Sacrifice:
Could be content to giue him: Temples rayse
To his Expectance, and Vnbounded Praise:
His Now-ripe Spirits, and Valor doth despise,
Sicknesse, and Sword, that giue our Godheads Prise:
His worth contracts the worlds, in his sole Hope,
Religion, Vertue, Conquest haue no scope:
[Page]But his Indowments; At him, at him, flie;
More swift, and timelesse, more the Deitie;
His Sommer, Winter with the jellid flakes;
His pure Life, poyson, sting out with thy Snakes;
This is a worke will Fame thy Maidenhead:
Rham: durst no lō ger indure her, beeing stirred into furie.
With this, her speach and she together fledde;
Nor durst she more endure her dreadfull eyes;
Who stung with goads her roaring Lyons thyes;
And brandisht, round about, her Snak-curld head
The starry Euening describ'd by Vulcans setting to worke at that time. The Night being ever chiefesly consecrate to the Works of the Gods, and out of this Deities fires, the Starres are supposd to flye; as sparkles of them.
With her left hand, the Torch it managed.
And now Heavens Smith, kindl'd his Forge & blew;
And throgh the round Pole, thick the sparkls flew
When great Prince Henrie, the delight of fame;
Darkn'd the Pallace, of his Fathers Name;
And hid his white lyms, in his downie Bed;
Then Heaven wept falling Stars that summoned
(With soft, and silent Motion) sleepe to breath
On his bright Temples, th'Ominous forme of death;
Which now the cruel Goddes did permit,
That she might enter so, her Mayden fit;
When the good Angell, his kind Guardian,
Her withet'd foot, saw neare this spring of Man;
The good Angell of the Prince to the Fever, as shee approache.
He shrik't and said: what, what are thy rude ends;
Cannot, in him alone, all vertues friends,
[Page](Melted into his all-vpholding Neru's;
For whose Assistance, euery Deity serues)
Mooue thee to proue thy Godhead, blessing him
With long long life, whose light extinckt, wil dim,
All heavenly graces? all this, moou'd her nought;
But on, & in his, all our rujnes wrought:
She toucht the Thresholds, and the thresholds shooke;
The dore-posts, Palenes pierst with her faint look:
The dores brake open, and the fatall Bed
Rudely sh'aproacht, & thus her fell mouth said;
Henrie, Feuer to the prince; who is thougght by a friend of mine to speake too mildly; not being satis compos mē tis Portice, in this. Her counsell or perswasiō, shewing onlie how the Prince was perswaded & resolu'd in his deadlyest sufferāce of her which shee is made to speake in spight of her selfe, since he at her worst was so sacredly resolute.
why tak'st thou thus thy rest secure?
Nought doubting what Fortune & fates assure;
Thou neuer yet felt'st my red right hands maims,
That I co thee, and fate to me proclaimes;
Thy fate stands jdle; spinns no more thy thread;
Die thou must (great Prince) sigh not; beare thy head
In all things free, even with necessity
If sweet it be to liue; tis sweet to dye:
This said shee shooke at him her Torch, and cast
A fire in him, that all his breast embrac't,
Then darting through his heart a deadly cold,
And as much venome as his vaines could holdj
Death, Death, O Death, jnserting, thrusting in,
Shut his faire eyes, and op't our vglie sinne:
[Page]This seene resolu'd on, by her selfe and fate;
Was there a sight so pale, and desperate,
Euer before seene, in a thrust-through State?
Descriptiō of the tempest that cast Sir Th. Ga [...]es on the Bermudas, & the state of his Ship and Men, to this Kingdomes Plight applyed in the Princes death.
The poore
Verginian, miserable sayle,
A long-long-Night-turnd-Day, that liu'd in Hell
Neuer so portrayd, where the Billowes stroue
(Blackt like so many Devils) which should proue
The damned Victor; all their furies heighting;
Their Drum, the thunder; & their Colours lightning,
Both souldiers in the battel; one contēding
To drown the waues in Noyse; the other spēding
His Hel-hot sulphurous flames to drink thē dry:
When heaven was lost, when not a teare-wrackt eye,
Could tell in all that dead time, if they were,
Sincking or sayling; till a quickning cleere
Gaue light to saue them by the ruth of Rocks
At the Bermudas; where the tearing shocks
And all the Miseries before, more felt
Then here halfe told; All, All this did not melt
Those desperate few, still dying more in teares,
Then this Death, all men, to the Marrow weares:
All that are Men; the rest, those drudging Beasts,
That onely beare of Men, the Coates, and Crests;
And for their Slaue, sick, that can earne thē pence,
[Page]More mourne (O Monsters) thē for such a Prince;
Whose soules do ebbe & flow still with their gain,
Whō nothing moues but pelf, & their own pain;
Let such (great Heauen) be onely borne to beare,
All that can follow this meere Massacre.
Lost is our poore Prince; all his sad jndurers;
The busie Art of those that should be Curers;
The sacred vowes made by the zealous King,
His God-like Syre; his often visiting;
Nor thy graue prayers and presence (holy Man)
The Archbishop of Cantebury passing pyous in care of the Prince. S. Ed: Phillips Master of the Rols and the Princes Chancelor, a chiefe sorrower for hlm.
This Realme thrice Reverend Metropolitan,
That was the worthy Father to his soule▪
Th'jnsulting Feuer could one fit controule.
Nor let me here forget on farre, and neare;
And in his lifes loue, Passing deepe and deare;
That doth his sacred Memorie adore,
Virtues true favtor his graue Chancellor,
Whose worth in all workes should a Place enioie,
Where his fit Fame her Trumpet shall jmploie,
Whose Cares, and Prayers, were euer vsde to ease
His feu'rous Warre, & send him healthfull peace,
Yet sicke our Prince is still; who though the steps
Of bitter Death, he saw bring in by heaps
Clouds to his Luster, and poore rest of light;
[...] [...][Page]And felt his last Day suffering lasting Night;
His true-bred-braue soule, shrunck yet at no part,
The prince heroical his bearing his sicknes at the Kings comming to see him, careful not to discomfort him.
Downe kept he all sighs, with his powers al-Hart;
Cler'd euen his dying browes: and (in an Eye
Manly dissembling) hid his Misery.
And all to spare the Royall heat so spent
In his sad Father, fearefull of th'event.
And now did Phoebus with his Twelfth Lampe show
The Twelfth day after his beginning to bee sicke, his sicknes was hold incurable.
The world his haples light: and in his Brow
A Torch of Pitch stuck, lighting halfe t'half skies,
When lifes last error prest the broken eyes
Of this heart-breaking Prince; his forc't look fled;
Fled was all Colour from his cheekes; yet fed
His spirit, his sight: with dying now, he cast
On his kind King, and Father: on whome, fast
He fixt his fading beames: and with his view
A little did their empty Orbs renew:
The prince dying to the King.
His Mind saw him, come frō the deeps of Death,
To whome he said, O Author of my Breath:
Soule to my life, and essence to my Soule,
Why grieue you so, that should al griefe cōtroule?
Death's sweet to me, that you are stil lifes creature,
I now haue finisht the great worke of Nature.
I see you pay a perfect Fathers debt
[Page]And in a feastfull Peace your Empire kept;
If your true Sonnes last words haue any right
In your most righteous Bosome, doe not fright
your hearkning kingdoms to your cariage now;
All yours, in mee, I here resigne to you,
My youth (I pray to God with my last powres)
Substract from me may adde to you and yours.
Thus vanisht he, thus swift, thus instantly;
Ah now I see,
The sorrowes and bemones of the King Queene, Prince and his most Princely Sister, for the Princes death.
euen heauenly powres must dye.
Now shift the King and Queene from court to court
but no way can shift off their cares resort,
That which we hate the more vve flie, pursues,
that which we loue, the more we seek, eschewes:
Now weepes his Princely Brother; Novv alas
His Cynthian Sister, (our sole earthly Grace)
Like Hebes fount still ouerflowes her bounds,
And in her colde lips, stick astonisht sounds,
Sh'oppresseth her sweet kinde; In her soft brest
Care can no vent finde, it is so comprest:
And see hovv the Promethean Liuer growes
The funerall described.
As vulture Griefe deuoures it: see fresh showes
Reuiue woes sence, and multiply her soule;
And worthely; for vvho would teares controle
On such a springing ground? Tis dearely fit,
To pay all tribute, Thought can poure on it:
[Page]For vvhy vvere Funerals first vs'd but for these,
Presag'd and cast in their Natiuities?
The streames were checkt a while: so Torrents staid
Enrage the more; but are (left free) allaid.
Now our grim waues march altogether; Now
Our blacke seas runne so high, they ouerflow
the clouds they nourish; now the gloomy herse
Puts out the Sunne: Reuiue, reuiue (dead vierse)
death hath slain death; there ther the person lies
VVhose death should buy out all mortalities.
But let the world be now a heape of death,
Lifes ioy lyes dead in him, and challengeth
No lesse a reason: If all motion stoode
Benumb'd and stupified, with his frozen blood;
And like a Tombe-stone, fixt, lay all the seas
There were fit pillers for our Hercules
To bound the world with: Men had better dye
Then out-liue free times; slaues to Policie.
On on sad Traine, as from a crannid rocke
Bee-swarmes rob'd of their honey, ceasles flock.
Mourne, mourne, dissected now his cold lims lie
Ah, knit so late vvith flame, and Maiestie.
where's now his gracious smile, his sparkling eie
His Iudgement, Valour, Magnanimitie?
O God, what doth not one short hour snatch vp
[Page]Of all mans glosse? still ouer-flowes the cup
Of his burst cares; put with no nerues together,
And lighter, then the shadow of a feather.
On: make earth pomp as frequent as ye can,
'Twill still leaue black, the fairest flower of man;
Yee vvell may lay all cost on miserie,
Tis all can boast, the proud'st humanitie.
If yong Marcellus had to grace his fall,
Sixe hundred Herses at his Funerall;
Sylla sixe thousand; let Prince Henry haue
Sixe Millions bring him to his greedy graue.
And now the States of earth, thus mourn below
Behold in Heauen, Loue with his broken Bow;
his quiuer downwards turn'd, his brands put out
Hanging his wings; with sighes all black about.
Nor lesse, our losse, his Mothers heart infests,
Her melting palmes, beating her snowy brests;
As much confus'd, as when the Calidon Bore
The thigh of her diuine Adonis tore:
Her vowes all vaine, resolu'd to blesse his yeeres
VVith Issue Royall, and exempt from freres;
Who now dyed fruitlesse; and preuented then
The blest of women, of the best of men.
Mourne all ye Arts, ye are not of the earth;
Fall, fall with him; rise with his second birth.
[Page]Lastly, with gifts enrich the sable Phane,
And odorous lights eternally maintaine;
Sing Priests, O sing now, his eternall rest,
His light eternall; and his soules free brest
As ioyes eternall; so of those the best;
And this short verse be on his Tomb imprest.
FINIS.