Henceforth, no learned youths beneath you sing, Till all the tuneful birds to' your boughs they bring; No tuneful birds play with their wonted chear, And call the learned youths to hear; No whistling winds through the glad branches fly: But all, with sad solemnity, Mute and unmoved be, Mute as the grave wherein my friend does lie. To him my Muse made haste with every strain, Whilst it was new and warm yet from the brain: He lov'd my worthless rhymes, and, like a friend, Would find out something to commend. Hence now, my Muse! thou canst not me delight: Be this my latest verse, With which I now adorn his hearse; And this my grief, without thy help, shall write. Had I a wreath of bays about my brow, Instead of bays, crown with sad cypress me; Not Phoebus griev❜d, so much as I, Large was his soul; as large a soul as e'er Submitted to inform a body here; High as the place 't was shortly' in heaven to have, But low and humble as his grave: So high, that all the Virtues there did come, Conspicuous and great ; So low, that for me too it made a room. He scorn'd this busy world below, and all Yet burn not with the same, Had all the light of youth, of the fire none. Knowledge he only sought, and so soon caught, Whene'er the skilful youth discours'd or writ, About his eloquent tongue, Nor could his ink flow faster than his wit. So strong a wit did Nature to him frame, As all things but his judgment overcame; Oh! had he liv'd in Learning's world, what bound Would have been able to control His over-powering soul! We 'ave lost in him arts that not yet are found. His mirth was the pure spirits of various wit, As if wise Nature had made that her book. So many virtues join'd in him, as we Just like the first and highest sphere, With as much zeal, devotion, piety, He always liv'd, as other saints do die. Weeping all debts out ere he slept: Which still in water sets at night, Unsullied with his journey of the day. Wondrous young man! why wert thou made so good, To be snatch'd hence ere better understood? Snatch'd before half of thee enough was seen! Thou ripe, and yet thy life but green! Nor could thy friends take their last sad farewell; But danger and infectious death Maliciously seiz'd on that breath Where life, spirit, pleasure, always us'd to dwell. But happy thou, ta'en from this frantic age, See'st not a soul cloth'd with more light than thine. And, if the glorious saints cease not to know There, whilst immortal hymns thou dost rehearse, Our dull and earthly poesy, Where grief and misery can be join'd with verse. ODE. IN IMITATION OF HORACE'S ODE, "Quis multá gracilis te puer in rosá "Perfusus," &c. Lib. I. Od. 5. To whom now, Pyrrha, art thou kind? Dost thou thy golden locks unbind, And with large bounty open set· All the bright stores of thy rich cabinet ? Ah, simple youth! how oft will he And his own fortunes find to be Of so cameleon-like an hue, That still their colour changes with it too! How oft, alas! will he admire The blackness of the skies! Trembling to hear the wind sound higher, Poor unexperienc'd he, Who ne'er, alas! before had been at sea! |