I fly from pomp, I fly from plate, And choose my lodgings at an Inn. Here, waiter! take my sordid ore, And now once more I shape my way Through rain or shine, through thick or thin, Secure to meet, at close of day, With kind reception at an Inn. Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round, May sigh to think how oft he found William Shenstone. CLVIII. As t'other day o'er the green meadow I pass'd, He told me his fondness like time should endure, He swore with a kiss, that he could not refrain, CLIX. YOUNG Colin protests I'm his joy and delight; His pleasure all day is to sit by my side; He pipes and he sings, though I frown and I chide; He often requests me his flame to relieve; This breast-knot he yesterday brought from the wake, I sure deserve more for his plaguing me so! He hands me each eve from the cot to the plain, CLX. WERE I a king, I could command content; Or were I dead, no cares should me torment, Edward Vere, Earl of Oxford. CLXI. THE REMEDY WORSE THAN THE DISEASE. I SENT for Ratcliffe; was so ill, That other doctors gave me over : But when the wit began to wheeze, I died last night of my physician. Matthew Prior. CLXII. UNDERNEATH this sable hearse Sydney's sister-Pembroke's mother- Time shall throw his dart at thee. Ben Jonson. CLXIII. TO LAURELS. A FUNERAL stone, Or verse, I covet none; But only crave Of you that I may have A sacred laurel springing from my grave, Which being seen Blest with perpetual green, May grow to be Not so much call'd a tree, As the eternal monument of me. Robert Herrick. CLXIV. UPON A LADY THAT DIED IN CHILD-BED, AND LEFT A DAUGHTER BEHIND HER. As gilly-flowers do but stay To blow, and seed, and so away, To lend the world your scent and smile : But when your own fair print was set Sweet as yourself, and newly blown, Robert Herrick. CLXV. UPON THE DEATH OF SIR A. MORTON'S WIFE. HE first deceased; she, for a little, tried CLXVI. Sir Henry Wotton. FOR MY OWN MONUMENT. As doctors give physic by way of prevention, Mat, alive and in health, of his tombstone took care; For delays are unsafe, and his pious intention May haply be never fulfill'd by his heir. Then take Mat's word for it, the sculptor is paid; Yet credit but lightly what more may be said, For we flatter ourselves, and teach marble to lie. Yet counting as far as to fifty his years, His virtues and vices were as other men's are; Nor to business a drudge, nor to faction a slave, Now in equipage stately, now humbly on foot, Both fortunes he tried, but to neither would trust; And whirl'd in the round as the wheel turn'd about, He found riches had wings, and knew man was but dust This verse, little polish'd, tho' mighty sincere, Sets neither his titles nor merit to view; It says that his relics collected lie here, And no mortal yet knows too if this may be true. Fierce robbers there are that infest the highway, If his bones lie in earth, roll in sea, fly in air, Matthew Prior. CLXVII. EPIGRAM. HAD Cain been Scot, God would have changed his doom,— Not forced him wander, but confined him home. John Cleveland. CLXVIII. EPITAPH FOR ONE WHO WOULD NOT BE BURIED IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. HEROES and kings! your distance keep, In peace let one poor poet sleep, Who never flatter'd folks like you : Let Horace blush, and Virgil too. Alexander Pope. |