A PINDARIQVE ELEGY On the most Famous and Learned PHYSITIAN DR. VVILLIS
1.
POor mortal dust! how we admire
The sparkling, vital fire,
That like a silent Taper under ground,
Goes out as soon as found;
No sooner has the Teeming womb,
Prepar'd her burthen for another room,
But now the Infant's born, and cries,
Complains a little while, and dies.
The weari'd Patriarchs at last,
After so many hundred years were past,
Lay'd down their aged heads,
Tyr'd with their numerous daies, in their original beds.
2.
Swadled with cares, we come
From the dark prison of the womb,
Where we half smother'd lay
Till rescu'd by a beam of day;
And here the world presents
Infectious Elements,
To converse with the stranger, till
They bring him to his fatal Ill.
With much ado, much pains, and strife,
We run the Gauntlet in this wretched life,
On each side stands the merci'lesse throng,
To scourge us as we run along,
And after we have almost spent our breath,
Are rackt at last, by some slow lingring pain to death.
3.
And now great death has got the start
Of thee, and thy so powerfull art;
Yet thou like the great Champion of the age,
Once quel'st the Tyrants rage,
And whil'st he triumph't did'st controul,
Redeem'st the trembling, captive soul;
[Page 2] Nature, and torment, both obey,
And to the saving medicine give way;
Thou'dst dispossess, and Cure
The shivering Ague, and the burning Galenture,
Consumptions, Feavers, Gripings, Stone
That makes the tortur'd Patient grone;
With all the num'rous host
Of torments, that the body still accost;
Thou'dst stretch lifes little span,
Cast out the mighty Legion, and restore the man.
4.
Could either Art, or Nature save
Thee, from the gulph, the grave,
Or change the constant course of fate,
Make it revoke th' unalterable date;
Could all the treasures of Philosophy,
Defeat the mighty Destiny,
Or with its pleasant, golden fruit,
Stop Fates swift chariot in the fierce pursuit;
Could ought that's mortal e're revoke,
This Fatal, Universal stroke;
Obstruct Heaven to dispence,
Or dart again from hence,
To the infectious Stars their poy'snous influence.
5.
The [...] thy art thou wouldst renew,
And still extend the fatal Clue;
We then had seen engrost in thee
Learnings Monopoly.
The Microcosm thou sail'st round,
Discover'st things before unfound,
And thy great wisdom understood
The circling Ocean of the bloud,
And by its working looks, (and more
Then has bin known before,)
Tels't when the tempest's neare,
And nature's out of order there;
The vital Bellows couldst repair,
When injur'd by infectious air.
Thou keep'st the soul within, when like a wind
(which struggles when confin'd,)
It strives to scape, and leave the desolate Corps behind.
6.
Thou knew'st the wondrous art,
And order of each part
In the whole lump, how every sense
Contributes to the healths defence;
The several channels, which convey
The vital current every way;
Track'st wise nature every where,
In every region, every sphere,
Fathom'st the mistery,
Of deep Anatomy;
[Page 3] Th' unactive carcasse thou hast preyd upon,
And stript it to a Sceleton,
But now (alas!) the art is gone,
And now on thee,
The crawling worms experience their Anatomy.
7.
What though the rever'end head,
Is laid among the vulgar dead,
And the clear sparkling light,
Ore-cast with death and night,
Thou ly'st to Kings in equal state,
In the sad common bed of fate:
As soaring Comets ne're decline,
But in sublimer regions shine,
After a while the frail, and fainty blaze,
At which the lower, wondering world did gaze,
As well as the low, grosser flame,
That from the baser Dunghill came,
Do's faint, and dy,
For want of fuel the devouring flame to ply.
8.
When thy young, unfledg'd fame did first peep out,
It hovered round its native nest about,
Till by a frequent use at last,
It o're the neighb'ring Regions past;
At length it round the Globe did fly,
With whom like the dear Twins 'twill live and dy;
We thought thy age should nere find date,
But plac'd above the reach of Fate.
The Silence, and disorders of the grave,
The bravest Monarch can enslave,
And Crowns, and Scepters can out brave,
And though the sacred Corps is crusht,
And the loud Organ husht,
Yet the sprightly virtue soares on high,
And lifts its lofty Shoulders to Eternity.
9.
Was nothing seen beneath the Bow?
No Pageantry of Nature now?
Don't she provide, or bring,
A funeral offering?
Yes! look but on the neighb'ring shore,
Where his brisk fame had flown before,
Where she hath laid her brackish store;
As if a common stock could not suffice,
Let through the sluces of their eyes,
But they must float on brinish waves,
And weep ore their own watry graves.
Nothing in Nature too, but doth comply,
And bear a part in this sad, Universal Harmony.
10.
Look how the long-liv'd plant, which now
To fatal Autumn scorn'd to bow,
[Page 4] Hangs down its drooping, dying Head,
Upon its desolate Bed;
The copious Garden too, is little less,
Then a disor'derd Wilderness;
No Vegetable will subsist,
But takes its Autumn with the Herbalist;
And seems too Sensitive,
When no man knowes its Vertue, hates to live.
Hark, how each Dead, Obdurate thing,
Whispers a sigh, and makes a doleful Din,
As if it felt the mortal sting.
See how each Colledge mourns, the Stones
Ev'n Sympathize with us, sweat teares, & Eccho grones.
11.
But since thou'rt gone, Great Soul, and left us here
Wandring in this dusky Sphere,
That without conduct, without guide
Are carri'd with the swift tide
Of the mad age beside;
At every little gust we feare,
To be transported there,
To the so fatal, rocky shore,
Whence we return no more,
After this slumber thou wilt rise,
With active limbs, and open eyes,
As young, and airy, as before.
The mouldred Atoms, that do ly
Hudled up in obscurity,
Shall put on Jmmortality:
And all rude ashes coucht within this Ball,
Shall forthwith muster at th' Almighties thundring Call.
12.
Mean while thou liv'st, and lodgest here,
Although thou'rt quarter'd there,
Thou breath'st, and speak'st ev'n every where,
Art young, and brisk, and flourish'st all the year;
Thy Famous Volumes are the breath,
By which thou dost survive thy death;
Each Sacred, Living Page,
Turns over with the age;
This's the Asylum, this the place,
For him whom great Diseases chase,
Thine is the truly Fortunate book,
In which who ere shall look,
Shall find all true it does divine,
And read long life in every line.
It lies beyond the rage,
Of the ungrateful age,
Beyond the short-liv'd, dull Mortality,
Within the sacred Archives of Eternity.
FINIS.