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No sense have they of ills to come,
No care beyond to-day;

Yet see how all around them wait
The ministers of human fate,

And black misfortune's baleful 10 train.
Ah! show them where in ambush 11 stand,
To seize their prey, the murd'rous band,
Ah! tell them they are men!

These shall the fury passions tear,
The vultures of the mind,
Disdainful anger, pallid fear,

And shame that skulks behind;
Or pining love shall waste their youth,
Or jealousy with rankling tooth,

That inly gnaws the secret heart;
And envy wan, and faded care,
Grim-visaged 12 comfortless despair,
And sorrow's piercing dart.

Ambition this shall tempt to rise,
Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter scorn a sacrifice,
And grinning infamy.

The stings of falsehood those shall try,
And hard unkindness' altered eye,
That mocks the tear it forced to flow;

And keen remorse,13 with blood defiled,
And moody madness laughing wild,
Amidst severest woe.

Lo, in the vale of years beneath
A grisly troop are seen,

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The painful family of death,

More hideous than their queen :

This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That every labouring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage;
Lo, poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand;
And slow-consuming age.

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To each his suffering; all are men,
Condemned alike to groan;

The tender for another's pain,

Th' unfeeling for his own.

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Yet ah! why should they know their fate? 95
Since sorrow never comes too late,

And happiness too swiftly flies;
Thought would destroy their paradise-
No more ;--where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise.

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THE DEATH-BED OF HENRY IV.

SCENE FROM "KING HENRY IV."

Enter PRINCE HENRY.

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I will sit here and watch beside the King.
Why doth the crown lie there upon his pillow,
Being so troublesome a bedfellow ?
Oh polished perturbation! golden care,
That keep'st the ports of slumber1 open wide
To many a watchful night! Sleep with it now,
Yet not so sound, and half so deeply sweet,
As he whose brow with homely biggin bound
Snores out the watch of night. O majesty!
When thou dost pinch thy bearer, thou dost sit 10
Like a rich armour worn in heat of day,
That scalds with safety. By his gates of breath 2
There lies a downy feather which stirs not-
Did he respire, that light and weightless down
Perforce must move. My gracious lord! my
father!

This sleep is sound; this is a sleep
That from this golden circlet hath divorced3
So many English kings. Thy due from me
Is tears, and heavy sorrows of the blood,
Which nature, love, and filial tenderness
Shall, O dear father, pay thee plenteously.
My due from thee is this ungenial crown;
Which, as immediate from thy place and blood,
Derives itself to me. Lo, here it sits,

[Putting it on his head.

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Which heaven shall guard; and put the world's whole strength

Into one giant arm, it shall not force

This lineal honour from me. This from thee
Will I to mine leave, as 'tis left to me.

Exit. K. Henry (awaking). Warwick! Glo'ster! Clarence!

Enter WARWICK.

Warwick. What would your majesty? How fares your grace?

K. Henry. Why did you leave me here alone, my lords?

Clarence. We left the Prince my brother here, my liege,

Who undertook to sit and watch by you.

K. Henry. The Prince of Wales? let me see him.

He is not here.

Warwick. This door is open, he is gone this

way.

K. Henry. Where is the crown? who took it from my pillow?

Warwick. When we withdrew, my liege, we left it here.

K. Henry. The Prince hath ta'en it hence—

go seek him out.

Is he so hasty that he doth suppose

My sleep my death?

Find him, my Lord of Warwick,-chide him

hither.

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