| |
| NOTHING could make me sooner to confess 1 | |
| That this world had an everlastingness, | |
| Than to consider, that a year is run, | |
| Since both this lower world’s, and the sun’s sun, | |
| The lustre and the vigour of this all | 5 |
| Did set; ’twere blasphemy to say, did fall. | |
| But as a ship, which hath struck sail, doth run | |
| By force of that force which before it won; | |
| Or as sometimes in a beheaded man, | |
| Though at those two Red Seas, which freely ran, | 10 |
| One from the trunk, another from the head, | |
| His soul be sail’d to her eternal bed, | |
| His eyes will twinkle, and his tongue will roll, | |
| As though he beckon’d and call’d back his soul: | |
| He grasps his hands, and he pulls up his feet, | 15 |
| And seems to reach, and to step forth to meet | |
| His soul; when all these motions which we saw, | |
| Are but as ice, which crackles at a thaw, | |
| Or as a lute, which in moist weather rings | |
| Her knell alone, by cracking of her strings. | 20 |
| So struggles this dead world, now she is gone; | |
| For there is motion in corruption. | |
| As some days are, at the creation, named | |
| Before the sun, the which framed days, was framed, | |
| So after this sun’s set, some show appears, | 25 |
| And orderly vicissitude of years. | |
| Yet a new deluge, and of Lethe flood, | |
| Hath drown’d us all; all have forgot all good, | |
| Forgetting her, the main reserve of all. | |
| Yet in this deluge, gross and general, | 30 |
| Thou seest me strive for life; my life shall be | |
| To be hereafter praised, for praising thee. | |
| Immortal maid, who though thou wouldst refuse | |
| The name of mother, be unto my Muse | |
| A father, since her chaste ambition is | 35 |
| Yearly to bring forth such a child as this. | |
| These hymns may work on future wits, and so | |
| May great-grandchildren of thy praises grow; | |
| And so, though not revive, embalm and spice | |
| The world, which else would putrify with vice. | 40 |
| For thus man may extend thy progeny, | |
| Until man do but vanish, and not die. | |
| These hymns thy issue may increase so long, | |
| As till God’s great Venite change the song. | |
| Thirst for that time, O my insatiate soul, 2 | 45 |
| And serve thy thirst with God’s safe-sealing bowl; | |
| Be thirsty still, and drink still till thou go | |
| To th’ only health; to be hydroptic so, | |
| Forget this rotten world; and unto thee | |
| Let thine own times as an old story be. | 50 |
| Be not concern’d; study not why nor when; | |
| Do not so much as not believe a man. | |
| For though to err, be worst, to try truths forth | |
| Is far more business than this world is worth. | |
| The world is but a carcass; thou art fed | 55 |
| By it, but as a worm that carcass bred; | |
| And why shouldst thou, poor worm, consider more | |
| When this world will grow better than before, | |
| Than those thy fellow-worms do think upon | |
| That carcass’s last resurrection? | 60 |
| Forget this world, and scarce think of it so, | |
| As of old clothes cast off a year ago. | |
| To be thus stupid is alacrity; | |
| Men thus lethargic have best memory. | |
| Look upward; that’s towards her, whose happy state | 65 |
| We now lament not, but congratulate. | |
| She, to whom all this world was but a stage, | |
| Where all sat hearkening how her youthful age | |
| Should be employ’d, because in all she did | |
| Some figure of the golden times was hid. | 70 |
| Who could not lack, whate’er this world could give, | |
| Because she was the form that made it live; | |
| Nor could complain that this world was unfit | |
| To be stay’d in, then when she was in it; | |
| She, that first tried indifferent desires | 75 |
| By virtue, and virtue by religious fires; | |
| She, to whose person paradise adhered, | |
| As courts to princes; she, whose eyes ensphered | |
| Star-light enough to have made the South control | |
| —Had she been there—the star-full Northern Pole; | 80 |
| She, she is gone; she’s gone; when thou know’st this, | |
| What fragmentary rubbish this world is | |
| Thou know’st, and that it is not worth a thought; | |
| He honours it too much that thinks it nought. | |
| Think then, my soul, that death is but a groom, 3 | 85 |
| Which brings a taper to the outward room, | |
| Whence thou spiest first a little glimmering light, | |
| And after brings it nearer to thy sight; | |
| For such approaches doth heaven make in death. | |
| Think thyself labouring now with broken breath, | 90 |
| And think those broken and soft notes to be | |
| Division, and thy happiest harmony. | |
| Think thee laid on thy death-bed, loose and slack, | |
| And think that but unbinding of a pack, | |
| To take one precious thing, thy soul, from thence. | 95 |
| Think thyself parch’d with fever’s violence; | |
| Anger thine ague more, by calling it | |
| Thy physic; chide the slackness of the fit. | |
| Think that thou hear’st thy knell, and think no more, | |
| But that, as bells call’d thee to church before, | 100 |
| So this to the triumphant church calls thee. | |
| Think Satan’s sergeants round about thee be, | |
| And think that but for legacies they thrust; 4 | |
| Give one thy pride, to another give thy lust; | |
| Give them those sins which they gave thee before, | 105 |
| And trust th’ immaculate blood to wash thy score. | |
| Think thy friends weeping round, and think that they | |
| Weep but because they go not yet thy way. | |
| Think that they close thine eyes, and think in this, | |
| That they confess much in the world amiss, | 110 |
| Who dare not trust a dead man’s eye with that | |
| Which they from God and angels cover not. | |
| Think that they shroud thee up, and think from thence | |
| They reinvest thee in white innocence. | |
| Think that thy body rots, and—if so low, | 115 |
| Thy soul exalted so, thy thoughts can go— | |
| Think thee a prince, who of themselves create | |
| Worms, which insensibly devour their state. | |
| Think that they bury thee, and think that rite | |
| Lays thee to sleep but a Saint Lucy’s night. | 120 |
| Think these things cheerfully, and if thou be | |
| Drowsy, or slack, remember then that she, | |
| She, whose complexion was so even made, | |
| That which of her ingredients should invade | |
| The other three, no fear, no art could guess; | 125 |
| So far were all removed from more or less; | |
| —But as in mithridate, or just perfumes, | |
| Where all good things being met, no one presumes | |
| To govern, or to triumph on the rest, | |
| Only because all were, no part was, best; | 130 |
| And as, though all do know, that quantities | |
| Are made of lines, and lines from points arise, | |
| None can these lines or quantities unjoint | |
| And say, this is a line, or this a point; | |
| So though the elements and humours were | 135 |
| In her, one could not say, this governs there, | |
| Whose even constitution might have won | |
| Any disease to venture on the sun | |
| Rather than her; and make a spirit fear | |
| That he to 5 disuniting subject were; | 140 |
| To whose proportions if we would compare | |
| Cubes, they are unstable, circles, angular— | |
| She who was such a chain as fate employs | |
| To bring mankind all fortunes it enjoys; | |
| So fast, so even wrought, as one would think, | 145 |
| No accident could threaten any link; | |
| She, she embraced a sickness, gave it meat, | |
| The purest blood, and breath, that e’er it eat; | |
| And hath taught us, that though a good man hath | |
| Title to heaven, and plead it by his faith, | 150 |
| And though he may pretend a conquest, since | |
| Heaven was content to suffer violence, | |
| Yea though he plead a long possession too | |
| —For they’re in heaven on earth who heaven’s works do— | |
| Though he had right and power and place, before, | 155 |
| Yet death must usher, and unlock the door. | |
| Think further on thyself, 6 my soul, and think | |
| How thou at first wast made but in a sink. | |
| Think that it argued some infirmity, | |
| That those two souls, which then thou found’st in me, | 160 |
| Thou fed’st upon, and drew’st into thee both | |
| My second soul of sense, and first of growth. | |
| Think but how poor thou wast, how obnoxious; | |
| Whom a small lump of flesh could poison thus. | |
| This curded milk, this poor unlitter’d whelp, | 165 |
| My body, could, beyond escape or help, | |
| Infect thee with original sin, and thou | |
| Couldst neither then refuse, nor leave it now. | |
| Think that no stubborn, sullen anchorite, | |
| Which fix’d to a pillar, or a grave, doth sit | 170 |
| Bedded and bathed in all his ordures, dwells | |
| So foully as our souls in their first-built cells. | |
| Think in how poor a prison thou didst lie, | |
| After, enabled but to suck, and cry. | |
| Think, when ’twas grown to most, ’twas a poor inn, | 175 |
| A province pack’d up in two yards of skin; | |
| And that usurp’d, or threaten’d with a rage | |
| Of sicknesses, or their true mother, age. | |
| But think that death hath now enfranchised thee; 7 | |
| Thou hast thy expansion now, and liberty. | 180 |
| Think that a rusty piece, discharged, is flown | |
| In pieces, and the bullet is his own, | |
| And freely flies; this to thy soul allow. | |
| Think thy shell broke, think thy soul hatch’d but now. | |
| And think this slow-paced soul which late did cleave | 185 |
| To a body, and went but by the body’s leave, | |
| Twenty perchance, or thirty mile a day, | |
| Dispatches in a minute all the way | |
| ’Twixt heaven and earth; she stays not in the air, | |
| To look what meteors there themselves prepare; | 190 |
| She carries no desire to know, nor sense, | |
| Whether th’ air’s middle region be intense; | |
| For th’ element of fire, she doth not know, | |
| Whether she pass’d by such a place or no; | |
| She baits not at the moon, nor cares to try | 195 |
| Whether in that new world men live, and die; | |
| Venus retards her not to inquire, how she | |
| Can—being one star—Hesper and Vesper be; | |
| He that charm’d Argus’ eyes, sweet Mercury, | |
| Works not on her, who now is grown all eye; | 200 |
| Who if she meet the body of the sun, | |
| Goes through, not staying till his course be run; | |
| Who finds in Mars his camp no corps of guard, | |
| Nor is by Jove, nor by his father barr’d; | |
| But ere she can consider how she went, | 205 |
| At once is at, and through the firmament; | |
| And as these stars were but so many beads | |
| Strung on one string, speed undistinguish’d leads | |
| Her through those spheres, as through the beads a string, | |
| Whose quick succession makes it still one thing. | 210 |
| As doth the pith, which, lest our bodies slack, | |
| Strings fast the little bones of neck and back, | |
| So by the soul doth death string heaven and earth; | |
| For when our soul enjoys this 8 her third birth | |
| —Creation gave her one, a second, grace— | 215 |
| Heaven is as near and present to her face | |
| As colours are and objects, in a room, | |
| Where darkness was before, when tapers come. | |
| This must, my soul, thy long-short progress be | |
| To advance these thoughts; remember then that she, | 220 |
| She, whose fair body no such prison was, | |
| But that a soul might well be pleased to pass | |
| An age in her; she, whose rich beauty lent | |
| Mintage to other beauties, for they went | |
| But for so much as they were like to her; | 225 |
| She, in whose body—if we dare prefer | |
| This low world to so high a mark as she— | |
| The western treasure, eastern spicery, | |
| Europe, and Afric, and the unknown rest | |
| Were easily found, or what in them was best; | 230 |
| —And when we have made this large discovery | |
| Of all, in her some one part then will be | |
| Twenty such parts, whose plenty and riches is | |
| Enough to make twenty such worlds as this— | |
| She, whom had they known, who did first betroth | 235 |
| The tutelar angels, and assign’d one, both | |
| To nations, cities, and to companies, | |
| To functions, offices, and dignities, | |
| And to each several man, to him, and him, | |
| They would have given her one for every limb; | 240 |
| She, of whose soul, if we may say, ’twas gold, | |
| Her body was th’ electrum, and did hold | |
| Many degrees of that; we understood | |
| Her by her sight; her pure and eloquent blood | |
| Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought | 245 |
| That one might almost say, her body thought; | |
| She, she thus richly and largely housed, is gone; | |
| And chides us slow-paced snails who crawl upon | |
| Our prison’s prison, earth, nor think us well, | |
| Longer than whilst we bear our brittle shell. | 250 |
| But ’twere but little to have changed our room, 9 | |
| If, as we were in this our living tomb | |
| Oppress’d with ignorance, we still were so. | |
| Poor soul, in this thy flesh what dost thou know? | |
| Thou know’st thyself so little, as thou know’st not | 255 |
| How thou didst die, nor how thou wast begot. | |
| Thou neither know’st how thou at first camest in, | |
| Nor how thou took’st the poison of man’s sin; | |
| Nor dost thou—though thou know’st that thou art so— | |
| By what way thou art made immortal, know. | 260 |
| Thou art too narrow, wretch, to comprehend | |
| Even thyself, yea though thou wouldst but bend | |
| To know thy body. Have not all souls thought | |
| For many ages, that our bodies wrought | |
| Of air, and fire, and other elements? | 265 |
| And now they think of new ingredients; | |
| And one soul thinks one, and another way | |
| Another thinks, and ’tis an even lay. | |
| Know’st thou but how the stone doth enter in | |
| The bladder’s cave, and never break the skin? | 270 |
| Know’st thou how blood, which to the heart doth flow, | |
| Doth from one ventricle to th’ other go? | |
| And for the putrid stuff which thou dost spit, | |
| Know’st thou how thy lungs have attracted it? | |
| There are no passages, so that there is | 275 |
| —For aught thou know’st—piercing of substances. | |
| And of those many opinions which men raise | |
| Of nails and hairs, dost thou know which to praise? | |
| What hope have we to know ourselves, when we | |
| Know not the least things which for our use be? | 280 |
| We see in authors, too stiff to recant, | |
| A hundred controversies of an ant; | |
| And yet one watches, starves, freezes, and sweats, | |
| To know but catechisms and alphabets | |
| Of unconcerning things, matters of fact, | 285 |
| How others on our stage their parts did act, | |
| What Cæsar did, yea, and what Cicero said. | |
| Why grass is green, or why our blood is red, | |
| Are mysteries which none have reach’d unto. | |
| In this low form, poor soul, what wilt thou do? | 290 |
| When wilt thou shake off this pedantry, | |
| Of being taught by sense and fantasy? | |
| Thou look’st through spectacles; small things seem great | |
| Below; but up unto the watch-tower get, | |
| And see all things despoil’d of fallacies; | 295 |
| Thou shalt not peep through lattices of eyes, | |
| Nor hear through labyrinths of ears, nor learn | |
| By circuit or collections to discern. | |
| In heaven thou straight know’st all concerning it, | |
| And what concerns it not shalt 10 straight forget. | 300 |
| There thou—but in no other school—may’st be, | |
| Perchance, as learned and as full as she; | |
| She, who all libraries had throughly read | |
| At home in her own thoughts, and practisèd | |
| So much good as would make as many more; | 305 |
| She, whose example they must all implore, | |
| Who would, or do, or think well, and confess | |
| That all the virtuous actions they express | |
| Are but a new and worse edition | |
| Of her some one thought or one action; | 310 |
| She, who in th’ art of knowing heaven, was grown | |
| Here upon earth to such perfection, | |
| That she hath, ever since to heaven she came | |
| —In a far fairer print—but read the same; | |
| She, she not satisfied 11 with all this weight— | 315 |
| For so much knowledge as would over-freight | |
| Another, did but ballast her—is gone, | |
| As well to enjoy, as get perfection; | |
| And calls us after her, in that she took | |
| (Taking herself) our best and worthiest book. | 320 |
| Return not, 12 my soul, from this ecstasy | |
| And meditation of what thou shalt be, | |
| To earthly thoughts, till it to thee appear | |
| With whom thy conversation must be there. | |
| With whom wilt thou converse? what station | 325 |
| Canst thou choose out, free from infection, | |
| That will not give thee theirs, nor drink in thine? | |
| Shalt thou not find a spongy slack divine | |
| Drink and suck in th’ instructions of great men, | |
| And for the word of God vent them again? | 330 |
| Are there not some courts—and then, no things be | |
| So like as courts—which in this let us see | |
| That wits and tongues of libellers are weak, | |
| Because they do more ill than these can speak? | |
| The poison’s gone through all; poisons affect | 335 |
| Chiefly the chiefest parts, but some effect | |
| In nails, and hairs, yea excrements, will show; | |
| So lies the poison of sin in the most low. | |
| Up, up, my drowsy soul, where thy new ear | |
| Shall in the angels’ songs no discord hear; | 340 |
| Where thou shalt see the blessed mother-maid | |
| Joy in not being that which men have said; | |
| Where she’s exalted, more for being good | |
| Than for her interest of motherhood; | |
| Up to those patriarchs, which did longer sit | 345 |
| Expecting Christ, than they’ve enjoy’d Him yet; | |
| Up to those prophets, which now gladly see | |
| Their prophecies grown to be history; | |
| Up to th’ apostles, who did bravely run | |
| All the sun’s course, with more light than the sun; | 350 |
| Up to those martyrs, who did calmly bleed | |
| Oil to th’ apostles’ lamps, dew to their seed; | |
| Up to those virgins, who thought that almost | |
| They made joint-tenants with the Holy Ghost | |
| If they to any should His temple give; | 355 |
| Up, up, for in that squadron there doth live | |
| She, who hath carried thither new degrees, | |
| As to their number, to their dignities; | |
| She, who being to herself a state, enjoy’d | |
| All royalties which any state employ’d; | 360 |
| For she made wars, and triumph’d; reason still | |
| Did not o’erthrow, but rectify her will; | |
| And she made peace, for no peace is like this, | |
| That beauty and chastity together kiss. | |
| She did high justice, for she crucified | 365 |
| Every first motion of rebellious 13 pride. | |
| And she gave pardons, and was liberal, | |
| For, only herself except, she pardon’d all. | |
| She coin’d, in this, that her impression gave | |
| To all our actions all the worth they have. | 370 |
| She gave protections; the thoughts of her breast | |
| Satan’s rude officers could ne’er arrest. | |
| As these prerogatives being met in one | |
| Made her a sovereign state, religion | |
| Made her a church; and these two made her all. | 375 |
| She who was all this All, and could not fall | |
| To worse, by company, for she was still | |
| More antidote than all the world was ill, | |
| She, she doth leave it, and by death survive | |
| All this, in heaven; whither who doth not strive | 380 |
| The more, because she’s there, he doth not know | |
| That accidental joys in heaven do grow. | |
| But pause, my soul, and study, ere thou fall | |
| On accidental joys, th’ essential. 14 | |
| Still, before accessories do abide | 385 |
| A trial, must the principal be tried. | |
| And what essential joy canst thou expect | |
| Here upon earth? what permanent effect | |
| Of transitory causes? Dost thou love | |
| Beauty—and beauty worthiest is to move—? | 390 |
| Poor cozened cozener, that she, and that thou, | |
| Which did begin to love, are neither now; | |
| You are both fluid, changed since yesterday; | |
| Next day repairs—but ill—last day’s decay. | |
| Nor are—although the river keep the name— | 395 |
| Yesterday’s waters and to-day’s the same. | |
| So flows her face, and thine eyes; neither now | |
| That saint nor pilgrim, which your loving vow | |
| Concern’d, remains; but whilst you think you be | |
| Constant, you’re hourly in inconstancy. | 400 |
| Honour may have pretence unto our love, | |
| Because that God did live so long above | |
| Without this honour, and then loved it so, | |
| That He at last made creatures to bestow | |
| Honour on Him, not that He needed it, | 405 |
| But that to His hands man might grow more fit. | |
| But since all honours from inferiors flow, | |
| —For they do give it; princes do but show | |
| Whom they would have so honour’d—and that this | |
| On such opinions and capacities | 410 |
| Is built, as rise and fall to more and less; | |
| Alas! ’tis but a casual happiness. | |
| Hath ever any man to himself assigned | |
| This or that happiness to arrest his mind, | |
| But that another man which takes a worse, | 415 |
| Thinks him a fool for having ta’en that course? | |
| They who did labour Babel’s tower to erect, | |
| Might have considered, that for that effect | |
| All this whole solid earth could not allow | |
| Nor furnish forth materials enow; | 420 |
| And that his centre, to raise such a place, | |
| Was far too little to have been the base. | |
| No more affords this world foundation | |
| To erect true joy, were all the means in one; | |
| But as the heathen made them several gods | 425 |
| Of all God’s benefits, and all His rods | |
| —For as the wine, and corn, and onions are | |
| Gods unto them, so agues be, and war— | |
| And as by changing that whole precious gold | |
| To such small copper coins, they lost the old, | 430 |
| And lost their only God, who ever must | |
| Be sought alone, and not in such a thrust; | |
| So much mankind true happiness mistakes; | |
| No joy enjoys that man, that many makes. | |
| Then, soul, to thy first pitch work up again; | 435 |
| Know that all lines which circles do contain, | |
| For once that they the centre touch, do touch | |
| Twice the circumference; and be thou such, | |
| Double on heaven thy thoughts on earth employ’d. | |
| —All will not serve; only who have enjoy’d | 440 |
| The sight of God in fullness can think it; | |
| For it is both the object and the wit. | |
| This is essential joy, where neither He | |
| Can suffer diminution, nor we; | |
| ’Tis such a full, and such a filling good, | 445 |
| Had th’ angels once look’d on Him, they had stood. | |
| To fill the place of one of them, or more, | |
| She whom we celebrate is gone before; | |
| She, who had here so much essential joy, | |
| As no chance could distract, much less destroy; | 450 |
| Who with God’s presence was acquainted so | |
| —Hearing and speaking to Him—as to know | |
| His face in any natural stone or tree, | |
| Better than when in images they be; | |
| Who kept, by diligent devotion, | 455 |
| God’s image in such reparation | |
| Within her heart, that what decay was grown | |
| Was her first parents’ fault, and not her own; | |
| Who, being solicited to any act, | |
| Still heard God pleading His safe precontract; | 460 |
| Who by a faithful confidence, was here | |
| Betroth’d to God, and now is married there; | |
| Whose twilights were more clear than our mid-day; | |
| Who dreamt devoutlier than most use to pray; | |
| Who, being here fill’d with grace, yet strove to be | 465 |
| Both where more grace and more capacity | |
| At once is given; she to heaven is gone, | |
| Who made this world in some proportion | |
| A heaven, and here became unto us all | |
| Joy—as our joys admit—essential. | 470 |
| But could this low world joys essential touch, 15 | |
| Heaven’s accidental joys would pass them much. | |
| How poor and lame must then our casual be? | |
| If thy prince will his subjects to call thee | |
| My lord, and this do swell thee, thou art then, | 475 |
| By being greater, grown to be less man. | |
| When no physician of redress can speak, | |
| A joyful casual violence may break | |
| A dangerous aposthume in thy breast; | |
| And whilst thou joyest in this, the dangerous rest, | 480 |
| The bag, may rise up, and so strangle thee. | |
| Whate’er was casual, may ever be. | |
| What should the nature change? or make the same | |
| Certain, which was but casual, when it came? | |
| All casual joy doth loud and plainly say, | 485 |
| Only by coming, that it can away. | |
| Only in heaven joy’s strength is never spent, | |
| And accidental things are permanent. | |
| Joy of a soul’s arrival ne’er decays, | |
| For that soul ever joys and ever stays. | 490 |
| Joy that their last great consummation | |
| Approaches in the resurrection, | |
| When earthly bodies more celestial | |
| Shall be, than angels’ were, for they could fall; | |
| This kind of joy doth every day admit | 495 |
| Degrees of growth, but none of losing it. | |
| In this fresh joy, ’tis no small part that she, | |
| She, in whose goodness he that names degree | |
| Doth injure her—’tis loss to be called best | |
| There, where the stuff is not such as the rest— | 500 |
| She, who left such a body, as even she | |
| Only in heaven could learn how it can be | |
| Made better; for she rather was two souls, | |
| Or like to full on both sides written rolls, | |
| Where eyes might read upon the outward skin, | 505 |
| As strong records for God as minds within; | |
| She, who by making full perfection grow, | |
| Pieces a circle, and still keeps it so; | |
| Long’d for, and longing for ’t, to heaven is gone, | |
| Where she receives, and gives addition. | 510 |
| Here, 16 in a place where mis-devotion frames | |
| A thousand prayers to saints, whose very names | |
| The ancient Church knew not, Heaven knows not yet; | |
| And where what laws of poetry admit, | |
| Laws of religion have at least the same; | 515 |
| Immortal maid, I might invoke thy name. | |
| Could any saint provoke that appetite, | |
| Thou here should’st make me a French convertite. | |
| But thou would’st not; nor would’st thou be content, | |
| To take this, for my second year’s true rent, | 520 |
| Did this coin bear any other stamp than His, | |
| That gave thee power to do, me to say this. | |
| Since His will is, that to posterity | |
| Thou should’st for life and death a pattern be, | |
| And that the world should notice have of this, | 525 |
| The purpose and th’ authority is His. | |
| Thou art the proclamation; and I am | |
| The trumpet, at whose voice the people came. | |
