AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF THE RIGHT Honourable SPENCER, EARLE OF NORTHAMPTON, WHO DIED A CONQUEROUR At the Battaile of Hopton-heath.
BAck, back yee too officious Teares, our Greife
Moves in a Sphere too high to find reliefe
From your moist Tribute: go, and help to mourne
At some dry Nurses Grave, or thirsty Urne
Of a Court Parasite, who there did lye,
While others fought, to beg their dignity;
Or if you like not these, your aid afford
At the scorn'd Fall of some great Edge-hill Lord,
Who mounted on that Tarrace viewd the Field
With such delight as Gardens use to yeeld
Set with Brigads of Bones, or els French Box
Cut into Knots, for whose Familiar Pox
His living Carkasse had for long time been
Steep'd in Populion and Gum Seraphine,
That'mongst the Surgeons a dispute might be
Whether his Morbus were imbalm'd or he.
Bedew what hearse ye please, here is no room
For such light mourners at this Solemne Tombe▪
But (ah) where i'st? Northampton must not have
(Such is their inhumanity) a Grave;
To him who in his death deserved Heaven,
Five foot of Common earth would not be given.
Foolish and Cruell! in denying one
Ye have bestowed on him a Million,
Each noble English breast is now become
Recorder of his vertues, and his Tombe,
Who shall his name in lasting letters keep
When short liv'd Marble shall be laid to sleep,
When Brook, and Gell, and Pym, & Strode & Gray,
(That poor one-syllabled race) shall melt away
And dwindle into nothing, He shall fill
Times Brasen Leaves, that who come after will
Forbeare great Acts, for fear there should not be
For them and him too, room in history.
But on yee Gallant spirits of the Age
Hee'l be content to crowd into a page
Rather then have his sacred Masters cause,
For which he dyed, Religion and the Lawes
To bleed, for as his life was old and plain,
So in his death he did affect no Train
Or idle Pompe, like Kings who when they dy
Oft send a plague out to presse Company
Of followers to wait on them, that so
They may in state salute the Shades below.
He did desire (so free was he from pride)
But two or three t'attend his naked side
Unto his blisse; store of his friends, 'tis true,
Did strongly Court him for the journey too,
Witnesse the blood they lost that fatall day,
Witnesse the noble wounds they bore away.
But all their large endeavours could not move,
His Lordship did the better Courtyer prove:
To leave the Kings Troops full, to him was more,
Then to see old Charon tugg at's Ebon Oare
By the weight of his retinue—
He fell indeed (so nobly did he close
His life,) he fell with multitudes of Foes.
So in faire Beaumont▪ I have seen an Oake
When mercenary hands by many a stroak
Have made him nod, all tottering as he stood,
Threaten a ruine to the underwood.
But (alas) the Rabble that he slew that day
Was neither for his company nor way.
For as they met on bloody Hopton-plaine
They parted there too, ne're to meet againe:
While his blest Soule did up to Heaven fly
To weare an Anadem for his Loyalty,
And his most rightly ordered valour, they
Hunted quite counter downe the other way,
Cursing that Ordinance made them Rebell,
And sent them to the Lower House of Hell,
Where that darke Close Committee shall not need
To make a post-nate Law for their black deed.
It is confess'd he might have been alive,
But that he scorn'd breath as a Donative,
And that from them; he blush'd to have it se'd
They gave him life, who their own had forfeited.
Heroicke Soul! how easie wer't for me,
To make whole Nature weep an Elegy!
I cannot view a shower, nor yet stood still,
To see a Spring come trickling from a Hill
To court a sportive Mead, but I could call
Them Heaven & Earth's teares at thy Funerall,
Night weares a sable Mantle, and for you
The Morne and Euening drop their pearly dew,
Autumne for grief teares off his tawny Locks,
The Trees weep Gummes, their amber-Grease the Rocks.
Lightning as Tapers at thy hearse I place,
And Thunder style but sorrowes deeper Base;
When I the glances of fal'n starres espy,
I fancy tears sent from Astraeas eye
To mourne thy losse: this I could doe, but feare
Apollo then would pluck me by the eare,
And call me foole, tell me such wanton dresses
Would better fit the curl'd and amorous Tresses
Of silken Squires, who safe in a warme Towne
Doe chuse to dye upon ignoble Downe
Summond by surfets, rather then to feele
The shock of Mars lockt up in manly steele,
Who lye at home (like to a boaking Toad)
To blast their Acts who are imployd abroad,
And (like blind veynes through which the waters fall)
Make the pure springs tast of their minerall,
Who scarcely can their buriall day out live,
And have no worth but what their Heraulds give.
I could be angry now, but that I see
With what a gentle scorne he laughs at me
And my distemper'd zeale; pardon blest soule,
I cannot my unruly griefe controle,
Nor think with patience how each family
Almost, but thine, parts stakes with Loyalty
And Treason, so abetting on both hands,
If God or the Divell can doe't, to save their lands.
Thou sett'st but all thou had'st, thy estate, thy life,
Thy goodly offspring, thy heroick Wife,
That vertuous Lady, who like Niobe
Would mourne into a statue, but that shee
Beholds thy picture in her noble Sonne,
Who after thee, being dead, made hast to runne,
But that Bellona in love with him assay'd
To wound his foot, and so his journey stayd.
Greatest of Gamesters, why wouldst thou hazard so?
What all thy Iewells at one desperate throw?
Who shall forbid my vexed Muse to call
Northampton now the Loyall Prodigall,
Who ventur'd his whole Stock? would others bring
Such aides, we quickly then should have a KING,
And Church, & Lawes restor'd, which now do lye
Wounded by a many headed tyranny.
Becalme your rugged foreheads then, ô all
Ye that lament this Lord's too hasty fall;
For though his age be shortne'd, it appeares
He as gain'd in fame, what he has lost in years;
Though th'one halfe of his dayes he hath not told
Who dyes with Honour Vertue makes him Old.
FINIS.