A Funeral Elegy
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TO MASTER JOHN PETER | 0.1
of Bowhay in Devon, Esquire. | 0.2
The love I bore to your brother, and will do to his memory, hath craved from me this last duty of a friend; | 0.3
I am herein but a second to the privilege of truth, who can warrant more in his behalf than I undertook to deliver. | 0.4
Exercise in this kind I will little affect, and am less addicted to, but there must be miracle in that labor which, | 0.5
to witness my remembrance to this departed gentleman, I would not willingly undergo. | 0.6
Yet whatsoever is here done, is done to him and to him only. | 0.7
For whom and whose sake I will not forget to remember any friendly respects to you, or to any of those | 0.8
that have loved him for himself, and himself for his deserts. | 0.9
W. S. | 0.10
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| Since time, and his predestinated end, | 1
Abridged the circuit of his hopeful days, | 2
Whiles both his youth and virtue did intend | 3
The good endeavors of deserving praise, | 4
What memorable monument can last | 5
Whereon to build his never-blemished name | 6
But his own worth, wherein his life was graced. . . | 7
Sith as that ever he maintained the same? | 8
Oblivion in the darkest day to come, | 9
When sin shall tread on merit in the dust, | 10
Cannot rase out the lamentable tomb | 11
Of his short-lived deserts; but still they must, | 12
Even in the hearts and memories of men, | 13
Claim fit respect, that they, in every limb | 14
Remembering what he was, with comfort then | 15
May pattern out one truly good, by him. | 16
For he was truly good, if honest care | 17
Of harmless conversation may commend | 18
A life free from such stains as follies are, | 19
Ill recompensed only in his end. | 20
Nor can the tongue of him who loved him least | 21
(If there can be minority of love | 22
To one superlative above the rest | 23
Of many men in steady faith) reprove | 24
His constant temper, in the equal weight | 25
Of thankfulness and kindness: Truth doth leave | 26
Sufficient proof, he was in every right | 27
As kind to give, as thankful to receive. | 28
The curious eye of a quick-brained survey | 29
Could scantly find a mote amidst the sun | 30
Of his too-shortened days, or make a prey | 31
Of any faulty errors he had done. | 32
Not that he was above the spleenful sense | 33
And spite of malice, but for that he had | 34
Warrant enough in his own innocence | 35
Against the sting of some in nature bad. | 36
Yet who is he so absolutely blest | 37
That lives encompassed in a mortal frame, | 38
Sometime in reputation not oppressed | 39
By some in nothing famous but defame? | 40
Such in the bypath and the ridgeway lurk | 41
That leads to ruin, in a smooth pretense | 42
Of what they do to be a special work | 43
Of singleness, not tending to offense; | 44
Whose very virtues are, not to detract | 45
Whiles hope remains of gain (base fee of slaves), | 46
Despising chiefly men in fortunes wracked. | 47
But death to such gives unremembered graves. | 48
Now therein lived he happy, if to be | 49
Free from detraction happiness it be. | 50
His younger years gave comfortable hope | 51
To hope for comfort in his riper youth, | 52
Which, harvest-like, did yield again the crop | 53
Of education, bettered in his truth. | 54
Those noble twins of heaven-infused races, | 55
Learning and wit, refined in their kind | 56
Did jointly both, in their peculiar graces, | 57
Enrich the curious temple of his mind; | 58
Indeed a temple, in whose precious white | 59
Sat reason by religion overswayed, | 60
Teaching his other senses, with delight, | 61
How piety and zeal should be obeyed. | 62
Not fruitlessly in prodigal expense | 63
Wasting his best of time, but so content | 64
With reason's golden mean to make defense | 65
Against the assault of youth's encouragement; | 66
As not the tide of this surrounding age | 67
(When now his father's death had freed his will) | 68
Could make him subject to the drunken rage | 69
Of such whose only glory is their ill. | 70
He from the happy knowledge of the wise | 71
Draws virtue to reprove secured fools | 72
And shuns the glad sleights of ensnaring vice | 73
To spend his spring of days in sacred schools. | 74
Here gave he diet to the sick desires | 75
That day by day assault the weaker man, | 76
And with fit moderation still retires | 77
From what doth batter virtue now and then. | 78
But that I not intend in full discourse | 79
To progress out his life, I could display | 80
A good man in each part exact and force | 81
The common voice to warrant what I say. | 82
For if his fate and heaven had decreed | 83
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