What mean, dull souls! in this high measure To haberdash In earth's base wares, whose greatest treasure The height of whose enchanting pleasure Are these the goods that thou suppliest Can these bring cordial peace? False world, thou liest! DELIGHT IN GOD ONLY. I love (and have some cause to love) the earth: But what's a creature, Lord, compared with thee? I love the air: her dainty sweets refresh flesh, And with their polyphonian notes delight me: But what's the air, or all the sweets that she Can bless my soul withal, compared to thee? I love the sea: she is my fellow-creature, To heaven's high city I direct my journey, But what is heaven, great God, compared to thee? Without thy presence earth gives no refection; The highest honors that the world can boast The loudest flames that earth can kindle be But nightly glow-worms, if compared to thee. Without thy presence wealth is bags of cares; Wisdom but folly; joy disquiet, sadness; Friendship is treason, and delights are suares; Pleasures but pains, and mirth but pleasing mad ness: Without thee, Lord, things be not what they be, Nor have they being, when compared with thee. In having all things, and not thee, what have I? Henry King. King, bishop of Chichester (1591-1669), was the author of poems, elegies, and sonnets. His monody on his wife, who died before her twenty-fifth year, is beautiful and tender, containing the germ of some famous passages by modern poets. FROM THE EXEQUY ON HIS WIFE. And for sweet flowers to crown thy hearse, From thy grieved friend, whom thou might'st see Dear loss! since thy untimely fate, On thee, on thee: thou art the book, Though almost blind. For thee, loved clay, I languish out, not live, the day, But what I practise with mine eyes, Till age, or grief, or sickness must It so much loves, and fill the room And follow thee with all the speed Than when sleep breathed his drowsy gale. Tis true, with shame and grief I yield, Before me, whose more years might crave With hope and comfort. Dear (forgive SIC VITA. Like to the falling of a star, Down, pickaxe! to the depths for gold let's go; We'll undermine Peru. Isn't heaven below? Who gripes too much casts all upon the ground; Too great a greatness greatness doth confound. All things are wonder since the world began: The world's a riddle, and the meaning's man. Father of gifts, who to the dust didst give Life, say to these my meditations, Live! James Shirley. Shirley (1596-1666), born in London, was the last of the Elizabethan dramatists. Indications of the true poet flash out in many passages of his plays. But his narrow circumstances probably prevented him from giving his genius fair scope. He wrote for bread, and lived on into the reign of Charles II. The great fire of 1666 burnt him out of house and home; and a little after, in one of the suburbs of London, his wife and he died on the same day. Shirley took orders in the English Church, but left his living on being converted to the Church of Rome. "Gentle, modest, and full of sensibility," says his biog rapher, "he seems to have conciliated the affection of all his associates." DEATH'S CONQUESTS. This famous little poem appears in Shirley's one-act drama of "The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses," and is supposed to be recited or sung by Calchas before the dead body of Ajax. Oldys refers to it as "the fine song which old Bowman used to sing to King Charles II., and which he has often sung to me." The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things; Death lays his icy hands on kings. Sceptre and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made Some men with swords may reap the field, And plant fresh laurels where they kill; But their strong nerves at last must yield; They tame but one another still. Early or late, They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, When they, pale captives, creep to death. The garlands wither on your brow, Then boast no more your mighty deeds; Upon Death's purple altar now, See where the victor-victim bleeds. Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. George Herbert. Herbert (1593-1633) was the brother of Lord Herbert of Cherbury, the deistic mystic. Disappointed in court advancement by the death of James I., George took holy orders, and earned the appellation of "Holy" by his exemplary discharge of his sacred office. His style, like that of so many of his brother poets, is founded on the manner of his friend Donne. The volume of his poems, still often republished, is entitled "The Temple." He died at the early age of thirty-nine. MAN. My God! I heard this day That none doth build a stately habitation But he that means to dwell therein. What house more stately hath there been, Or can be, than is Man, to whose creation All things are in decay? For Man is everything, And more: he is a tree, yet bears no fruit; Man is all symmetry, Full of proportions, one limb to another, Each part may call the farthest brother; For head with foot hath private amity, And both with moons and tides. Nothing has got so far But Man hath caught and kept it as his prey. His eyes dismount the highest star; He is in little all the sphere; Herbs gladly cure his flesh, because that they Find their acquaintance there. For us the winds do blow, The earth doth rest, heaven move, and fountains flow: |